A disputed contract with the Salt Lake County Recorder's Office remains unpaid, and the county recorder is pointing to election-year politics.

The Salt Lake County Council on Tuesday tabled a discussion to pay off a $45,000 contract with SIRE Technology for off-site Web hosting. The contract was the subject of a highly publicized audit, after accusations that County Recorder Gary Ott sidestepped county contract policies to fund the project.

But four months after the audit cleared his name, Ott says the County Council is unfairly playing election-year politics to punish SIRE by not paying the bills.

"I hope it's not politically motivated, but it sure feels like it," said Ott, a Republican who is up for re-election in November. "I would hope they were above that. This is too good of a contract and too good of a company."

A vote to approve the contract failed 4-4 across party lines, with Republicans supporting the contract. Another vote to postpone the vote until next week again failed on party lines. Republican councilman David Wilde was not at the meeting and could have rendered the deciding vote.

After both votes, Democratic councilman Joe Hatch asked to table the discussion until a later time, as he said he would like to thoroughly examine the contract as well as read the full audit report, not just the summary.

"I'd hate to make a decision based on a full audit I haven't seen," Hatch said.

County Auditor Sean Thomas said the full audit report should be ready within the next couple of weeks.

The disputed contract goes back to November 2004, when the County Council approved $425,000 in budget requests for the recorder's office — equivalent to the amount Ott had saved through personnel cuts that year. Ott asked the council to direct $100,000 toward SIRE's off-site data management service.

That's where things got tricky. No contract was ever signed with the company. The only documentation about the off-site Web server was a quote proposal with an unsigned letter attached, stating the county would end up paying an additional $230,000 over the course of four years for the data-management project.

"It was a loose contract," Ott said. "No two ways about it. It was loose."

Ott said he has worked with the district attorney's office, the mayor's office and even the auditor's office, and formal written contract was ready for approval Tuesday.

The contract, which the county decided not to vote on, would have authorized the recorder to pay out $45,000 to now purchase SIRE's equipment, instead of continuing a lease.

"This payment was due in March," Ott said. "We have worked very hard to make this thing work. Thank goodness (SIRE) had a good year. This could have been a crippling blow."

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E-mail: ldethman@desnews.com