Park the Carr

Where would the Commonwealth be without Howie Carr exposing the machinations of Gov. Patrick?

This column is for everyone standing in those long lines at the Registry of Motor Vehicles branch offices this morning.

Now that Gov. Deval Patrick has shuttered so many branches, the lines at the remaining offices are out the door again, as in the bad old pre-Grabauskas days.

But look on the bright side. The Friends of Deval are doing just fine, thank you very much.

Come on down, Eddie Jenkins, just hired July 6 as the RMV’s new director of enforcement services for $80,000 a year. He’s the first RMV employee to have this job title, although there used to be a “deputy registrar for enforcement services,” and she was making $120,000 a year.

Her job went unfilled for more than a year, but then came Eddie. The job needed a man, and the man needed a job.

You may remember Jenkins, a lawyer from Roxbury, for his unsuccessful runs for political office in Boston. Before he got picked up on waivers by the RMV last month he was the chairman of the state Alcoholic Beverages Control Commission. His name was dropped by ex-Sen. Dianne Wilkerson when she was soliciting bribes from a wired-up businessman for a city liquor license.

On one memorable day last fall, feds arrived at Jenkins’ ABCC office with a subpoena, only to discover that State Treasurer Tim Cahill already had placed him on paid administrative leave over another problem – what the papers called a “possible diversion of state reimbursement money.”

Jenkins was cleared of any wrongdoing in the first case – the Treasury had placed the money into his account directly, rather than paying a law firm he’d been using in a State Ethics Commission probe in which he was, yes, cleared. And Jenkins is clean on the Wilkerson case, although he was one of her campaign donors.

He resigned from his $110,703.28-a-year ABCC job May 8. In other words, he’s taking a big pay cut at the RMV, but any port in a storm, as they say. According to a dime-dropper, the RMV “was told it was a ‘must-hire’ from the governor.”

Asked about that charge, an RMV spokeswoman said, “I’m not aware of that.”

UPDATE: More from the Boston Business Journal.

SECOND UPDATE: More from the Globe and Herald.

THIRD UPDATE: More from Holly Robichaud and the AP.

Book ‘Em

No wonder Gov. Patrick can’t stand conservative talk radio hosts. Here’s Howie Carr:

Shhhhh – keep it under your hat, because nobody’s supposed to know. But Deval Patrick grabbed an extra $382,500 last year on top of his governor’s salary of $140,535.

And Deval didn’t even report the mega-score on his annual sworn statement of financial interests to the State Ethics Commission. Surely the governor plans to close such unconscionable loopholes in his “landmark” ethics reform package.

Deval pocketed a $450,000 book advance (minus a 15 percent cut to his literary agent). But nothing was reported because a book advance apparently isn’t covered under “employment and other associations with businesses.”

Actually, Deval’s advance is $1.35 million, pretty damn good for a first-time author who’s never been on “American Idol” or tested positive for steroids. Deval will get another third of the money – $450,000 – when his (or some ghostwriter’s) manuscript is accepted, and a final $450,000 when it’s published.

So the governor continues his moonlighting – or should I say moonbatlighting. Working title: “Up From Texaco.”

No doubt he’ll be working hard on the tome this weekend out at his mansion in Richmond, after he delivers his not-at-all-anticipated speech to the Democratic state convention in Springfield.

Attending today’s dreary convention is proof that Deval is running for re-election. More evidence: the fact that his operatives, when they’re not testifying before the Sal DiMasi grand jury, continue trying to put a rocket in the pocket of Tim Cahill.

UPDATE: More from Holly Robichaud, WBZ, Wendy Murphy, CNN, the Herald and the Globe.

SECOND UPDATE: More from the Herald and Globe.

THIRD UPDATE: More from Holly Robichaud, the Lawrence Eagle-Tribune, the Herald and Globe.

Who Watches The Watchmen?

When the State Ethics Commission dismisses allegations that are clearly unethical, you can’t help but wonder, who is keeping an eye on them?

The State Ethics Commission has dismissed illegal gratuity allegations against a Big Dig contractor accused of giving Red Sox tickets to a state inspector involved with four of the firm’s projects.

The commission ruled that Boston’s P.J. Riley & Co. did not violate a state conflict of interest law when executive vice president Thomas Riley allegedly gave pairs of tickets to three Sox games to Taylor Roth, a senior inspector at the state Board of Examiners of Plumbers and Gasfitters. Roth allegedly got the tickets in 2004-06, the same time that he was permitting and inspecting gas and plumbing work by the firm.

Sorry, this just doesn’t pass the stink test.

Mass GOP Files Ethics Complaint Against Speaker DiMasi

The Massachusetts GOP filed a complaint with the State Ethics commission today¬†in response to yesterday’s Boston Globe story which detailed how Speaker Sal DiMasi “may have helped fast-track legislation on behalf of a friend who extended him a $250,000 line of credit at a low rate.”

Rob Willington, Executive Director of the Mass GOP, released the following statement:

“Once again Speaker DiMasi has shown that when it comes to the Democrat party, ethics are optional. I won’t hold my breath waiting for the Democrats to do anything about it, because they have shown a complete unwillingness to do the right thing, even when blatant violations are staring them in the face. The voters will remember their arrogance this November, and Republicans will be there to remind them.”

A copy of the letter to the ethics commission is posted in the extended entry.

(more…)

Ethics Head Resigns

The Boston Herald reports on the resignation of the head of the state Ethics Commission.

The executive director of the state Ethics Commission, an agency that has been criticized for being too slow and too soft on some politicians, has announced he will step down at the end of the month.

Peter Sturges, 59, submitted his resignation letter to the five-member panel of commissioners on Friday.

A consultant hired three years ago to review the commission’s operations issued a report in October 2005 that said the agency moved too slowly and called for changes in the way complaints are reviewed and investigated.

The agency has also faced criticism for being soft on politicians, particularly legislators, who set the commission’s budget. The state Republican Party also reproached the commission earlier this year for not pursuing an investigation of Democratic Gov. Deval Patrick for a telephone call to a Citigroup official on behalf of subprime mortgage lender on whose board of directors he once served.

The 2005 report found no instances of favoritism.

Perhaps the new Executive Director will look into a little quid pro quo action courtesy of our Governor.