Former state Auditor Les Merritt said the N.C. State Ethics Commission has failed to keep government clean.
In an opinion piece published in the Fayetteville Observer, Merritt writes that the commission has been silent as multiple investigations focus on former Gov. Mike Easley.
However, in nearly three years of existence, the commission has done little to tackle real ethics issues in our state. Not a single resolution of note has come as a result of any Ethics Commission investigation, even though several dozen complaints have been submitted or referred. For example, the media have reported that former Gov. Mike Easley allegedly failed to disclose a seemingly inappropriate relationship on his Statement of Economic Interest, but this went undetected (or perhaps unchallenged) by the Ethics Commission.
Meanwhile, a Board of Elections investigation continues into alleged campaign finance violations by Easley, as well as a federal grand jury investigation of how his wife obtained her position (and subsequent 80 percent raise) at North Carolina State University.
None of these issues appears to have been surfaced or investigated by the Ethics Commission.
—————
Merritt wrote that the commission should be in the business of filing complaints and handling big cases.
Do we really need to have 10 salaried employees to file financial paperwork and offer advisory opinions? Unfortunately, the eight commissioners who are expected to serve the public as an effective regulatory and watchdog entity have been silent in the face of the state's continuing ethics crisis.
The commission has entirely too much discretion to ignore or dismiss complaints. There is little to prevent the commission from failing to aggressively investigate complaints against those who show political favor or exercise financial and administrative control over the commission's operations and budget.
In his last months in office, Merritt was waging a public feud with the commission.
Blog RSS feed
