The State Ethics Commission met for about three hours behind closed doors today to discuss personnel matters, but took no action and offered no comment afterward.

The regularly-scheduled meeting took place amid controversy within the commission. A report in June by a consultant to the Office of State Personnel found a work environment that was dysfunctional and distrustful, Dan Kane reports.

Last month the commission's executive director, Perry Newson, fired an office assistant who had raised questions about preferential treatment to an aide to Lt. Gov. Beverly Perdue. The aide had visited the commission to review Perdue's statements of financial interest.

The office assistant, Amanda Thaxton, had made a notation about the visit that was later erased from the log.

Thaxton was present at the opening of the meeting, but left after the commission went into a closed session. She has filed a grievance over her firing and said she wanted to be present in case the matter came up for public discussion.

Tim Hoegemeyer, general counsel for the State Auditor's Office, also attended the open session. The auditor is investigating how the aide's visit was handled, and its aftermath.

An office assistant at the State Ethics Commission has raised questions about its own ethics.

Ten months ago, Amanda Thaxton made a notation in a public records log when an aide to Lt. Gov. Beverly Perdue was allowed to review her financial disclosure forms alone.

The Perdue aide "reviewed files in ... office alone with door closed," she typed into an electronic log.

Six months later, Kathleen Edwards, the assistant director who let the Perdue aide review the records, found the notation and removed it. Last month, after an N&O reporter asked about the log, executive director Perry Newson fired Thaxton, giving no reason.

"I think it was probably more than coincidence," she said.

The state auditor's office is investigating the incident. (N&O) 

A UNC-Greensboro vice chancellor inappropriately hired a technology contractor who was paid $431,925 in state money over two years, including $65,000 in expenses for commuting to Greensboro from Los Angeles and Las Vegas, according to a state audit released today.

The payments included $212,000 in student fee revenue to the contractor, whose billing rate was raised from $150 to $200 an hour during the period, Jane Stancill reports. The contract was executed by the vice chancellor for information technology services without following university procedures, the audit said.

The job, which was to ensure that a new administrative computing system was implemented on time, was not posted nor competitively bid. The university's top legal and business officials did not review the contract in violation of university procedure.

The vice chancellor who approved the contract was not named in the audit, nor was the independent contractor.

More after the jump.

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State Auditor Les Merritt released a report Tuesday on state Sen. Martin Nesbitt.

The report, at the center of a dispute over whether the auditor should investigate violations of the state ethics law, became public after Nesbitt waived his right to confidentiality for the State Ethics Commission to give its side, Ben Niolet and Mark Johnson report.

In the report, Merritt says he believes the Asheville Democrat should have disclosed on ethics filings that he worked with his son's racing team. Nesbitt was an unpaid crew chief.

Merritt's report details how Nesbitt and his son own a business that owns a warehouse that Nesbitt's son used as collateral for a loan for the racing team.

"It's hard to get around the fact that Nesbitt Ventures' business plan is to 'own and lease real estate' but their sole property is being used to provide financial backing to Nesbitt Racing," Merritt said. "Therefore, if Nesbitt Racing fails, which could happen if a major financial sponsor backed out, Nesbitt Ventures and its owners are left holding the debt."

But the ethics commission does not see a conflict because Nesbitt's son doesn't live with his father, which means his financial dealings are irrelevant to Nesbitt's.

"When (Merritt) doesn't like (the ethics commission's) opinion, he says, 'I'm going to apply my own law,'" Nesbitt said.

A bill to prohibit the auditor from looking into ethics cases is moving forward in the legislature.

Questions about state Sen. Martin Nesbitt's son's stock-car racing team are at the heart of an ethics feud.

The Asheville Democrat volunteers as a crew chief for his son Mart's Nesbitt Racing Enterprises and co-owns a Swannanoa garage used as collateral for the company's line of credit. Until recently, the racing team was sponsored by Blue Cross Blue Shield, the Asheville Citizen-Times reports.

The State Ethics Commission advised Nesbitt in 2007 that he did not need to disclose the relationship as a potential conflict of interest on the statement of economic interest filed by legislators. After getting a tip on the matter, Republican state Auditor Les Merritt's office looked into the case.

A spokesman for Merritt would not confirm the legislator in question is Nesbitt but said the auditor is "proceeding with caution" and "not wanting to send something out that could be illegal."

The investigation led to a dispute between the Ethics Commission and the auditor's office over which agency has the responsibility to enforce the state's ethics law.

A bill to prohibit the auditor from looking into ethics cases is moving forward in the legislature. 

The Senate honored a National Guardsman in its session.

During a 20-minute session today, Lt. Gov. Beverly Perdue recognized Brig. Gen. James H. Trogdon III, the second-highest official in the North Carolina National Guard.

In May of 2006, the Senate gave Trogdon a North Carolina flag that he flew over his headquarters while serving in Iraq. He returned to honor those who died overseas by returning the flag.

"History will certainly remember the names of Casey and Petraeus and Odierno, but in this historic struggle of our time, the unnamed heroes of Mosul, Baquba and Samarra ... are the true stars," he said.

The Senate also considered a resolution honoring veterans, noted the presence of the Junior N.C. Rhododendron Queen, recognized the birthday of Senate leader Marc Basnight and noted two new paintings of former legislators.

It also signaled it will seek to reduce the state auditor's responsibilities.

The state Senate is wading into a battle between the State Ethics Commission and the auditor's office.

In recent weeks, state Auditor Les Merritt has said that the commission is prohibited by law form investigating anonymous complaints, saying that is his job.

The commission has said that it has sole responsibility to enforce the state's ethics law.

In today's brief session, Sen. Dan Clodfelter said the Joint Legislative Ethics Committee will meet at 7:30 a.m. in Room 424 tomorrow to discuss the conflict.

He made it clear how the Democrat-controlled Senate feels about the Republican auditor's take on the issue.

"The meeting will be to consider authorizing the introduction of a bill to clarify the authority of the State Ethics Commission and the lack of authority of the state auditor's office," he told his fellow senators.

Two state agencies charged with cleaning up state government are fighting over who gets to hold the broom.

The N.C. State Ethics Commission, created in response to corruption scandals that sent powerful officials to prison, says it has the sole responsibility to enforce the state's ethics law.

State Auditor Les Merritt says the commission is prohibited by law from investigating anonymous complaints and that he has the right and duty to follow up on credible tips about problems in state government.

The debate has been quietly simmering since at least January. It boiled over Friday when the commission voted to ask the legislature to settle the dispute.

"We think the legislature gave it [the commission] the sole authority for implementing, interpreting, investigating and enforcing the ethics act," Perry Newson, executive director of the commission, said in an interview. "It's not the job of other agencies."

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A state audit released today says that the state Department of Environment and Natural Resources could speed up the process of approving air quality permits by as much as 52 percent and eliminate a backlog of applications by the end of next year.

DENR officials say they are encouraged by the findings, which were developed in part, during a workshop conducted by N.C. State University's Industrial Extension Service, Dan Kane reports. B. Keith Overcash, the director of DENR's Division of Air Quality, said staff have already begun using some of the techniques developed from the audit.

The workshop helped identify one of the major snags in the permitting process — a lack of information provided by applicants in their permit applications. The back and forth required to complete the applications often drags on for months. The audit also found that DENR's Division of Air Quality needs to adopt standardized review methods to speed up the process.

The audit said that DENR could save $572,439 and avoid hiring an additional seven staff if it followed the recommendations.

The federal Clean Air Act requires all major sources of air pollution — such as electric utilities, manufacturing facilities and governmental installations — to obtain an operating permit. Just under 340 facilities have permits, and as of Dec. 31 there was a backlog of 229 applications, most of them for renewals.

When you flub your checkbook, the mistake is probably worth a few bucks.

When the state treasurer botches the books, it can mean $141 million.

State Auditor Les Merritt released a report Tuesday that was part of a larger look at state finances. It showed that financial statements prepared by Treasurer Richard Moore's office contained a few bookkeeping errors. Moore is a Democratic candidate for governor.

The errors found in a routine audit included an understatement of $141 million, an overstatement of $80 million and misclassification of millions more.

No money is missing and the errors appear to be just that — bookkeeping mistakes. In a response to the auditor's findings, Moore's office wrote that the mistakes were minor and the milliions were a tiny fraction of the total funds Moore's office handles. Moore's office has already improved its processes, according to the report.

"We strive for total accuracy in all aspects of our agency's functions," according to the response from Moore's office.