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.
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Questions raised about Bev's ethics
Friday's N&O article lists some key players but leaves an important one out: our current Lt. Gov Bev Perdue. I am as concerned about her role in this series of events as I am the Ethics Commission for the following reasons:
- Cole & Perdue were in fact acting on their own best interests as for two years she misrepresented her financial statements and as a result, criminal charges could (or maybe should) be filed. How about IRS concerns? What conflicting votes did she oversee during that time that now would be called into question?
- As an "attorney", Cole should have known better than to review documents behind a closed door in an ethics office (unless he really needed to do it for Bev - should we take his word for it that he has told us everything that he did that day?)
- Did anyone apply political pressure on Edwards months after the fact to delete the notations. Could it have been Cole or Perdue that were trying to cover their footsteps during an election year?
Where there's smoke, there is often fire. This is just another example of corrupt and unethical practices by the democrats in Raleigh and a specific case where Bev Perdue is in the middle of it. The N&O should not stop now but get to the bottom of not just the Ethics Commission problem, but the Perdue angle as well. Do we want her to be our next Governor as it looks like we would get more of the same corrupt government in Raleigh? She's one of them!