ethics

Recent stories

Maine one of 16 states to push ethics reform, one year after getting an “F”

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A lot has happened since the State Integrity Investigation, a first-ever analysis of transparency and accountability in all 50 states, was published a year ago. (The Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting provided the research that went into Maine’s grade.) Here’s a report from the Center for Public Integrity, which spearheaded the investigation:

“The project — a collaboration of the Center for Public Integrity, Global Integrity and Public Radio International, with cooperation from the Investigative News Network — has been quoted, praised, assailed or otherwise cited by hundreds of news outlets, good-government groups and legislators. The project was also a finalist for the prestigious Goldsmith Prize for Investigative Reporting awarded by Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government. Clearly, the idea of measuring accountability and transparency in state government has touched a reformist nerve — and our package is continuing to resonate across the country.” To read the rest of the story, ‘State Integrity Investigation’ has blockbuster first year,” click here. Continue Reading →

Filed under: Cool Stuff We Like, Ethics, conflict of interest, ethics, transparency

Editorial based on Center’s ethics coverage

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This legislative session, many of the bills to reform ethics were prompted by the Center’s report last year that gave Maine an “F” for anti-corruption measures. Here’s the Press Herald’s editorial from today on “revolving door” legislation making its way through the statehouse:

Maine should pass tougher ethics laws – Allowing regulators to move from public jobs to jobs in industries they once regulated is dangerous. Sometimes it’s bad to be too good. After decades of honest government peopled with principled members of both parties, Maine finds itself ranked near the bottom when it comes to tough ethics rules. States that have a culture of political corruption often have the strongest protections in their laws because they needed them. Continue Reading →

Filed under: Reporter's Notebook, ethics, revolving door

Governor and Democratic leader announce plans to fix state ethics

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Gov. Paul LePage — Photo Robert F. Bukaty, BDN

AUGUSTA — Two of the state’s top political leaders are vowing a bipartisan effort to make government ethics, accountability and transparency key issues in the upcoming legislative session. Republican Gov. Paul LePage and House Democratic leader Emily Cain are responding to a national report that gave Maine government an “F” for its potential for corruption. Maine ranked 46th in the “State Integrity Investigation” by three nonpartisan good government groups that was released in mid-March. Cain, the Democratic House leader who is running for a Senate seat from Orono, has proposed two linked initiatives that she hopes will lead to government ethics reform. Cain said Tuesday she will ask her fellow lawmakers to form a bipartisan, joint select committee to consider ethics reform and report out a bill in the legislative session that begins in January, 2013. Continue Reading →

Filed under: Ethics, Stories, Emily Cain, ethics, LePage, Maine legislature

Lawmakers told transparency bill will ensure “ethical government”

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Gov. Paul LePage — Photo Robert F. Bukaty, BDN

AUGUSTA — Legislators were urged Wednesday to approve a bill submitted by Gov. Paul LePage to close an ethics law loophole that has allowed high-level state officials not to report millions in state payments to organizations run by themselves or their spouses. The governor proposed the bill, L.D. 1806, shortly after publication of a Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting story that revealed that between 2003 and 2010 the state paid almost $235 million to such organizations. “This legislation will help ensure that the citizens of Maine have a transparent and ethical government and I urge this committee to grant it a unanimous ‘ought to pass,’” said Sen. Nichi Farnham, R-Penobscot, who delivered the public hearing testimony before the Veterans and Legal Affairs Committee on behalf of the bill’s sponsor, Senate President Kevin Raye, R-Washington. “This legislation,” said Farnham, “attempts to close loopholes in the laws governing financial disclosure by legislators and certain executive employees that quite frankly most of us did not realize were there.”

Current law requires only that legislators or high-level state employees report state purchases of goods or services worth more than $1,000 directly from the individual legislator or family member, not from a corporation or entity for which the legislator or family member works. The proposed bill requires legislators, executive branch officials and constitutional officers, like the attorney general and secretary of state, to disclose if organizations they or family members were affiliated with – as owners or management-level employees – were paid more than $1,000 annually by the state. Continue Reading →

Filed under: Ethics, Stories, ethics, Paul LePage, transparency

Legislature may use subpoena powers on turnpike spending

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AUGUSTA — The Senate chairman of the Legislature’s Oversight Committee may take the unheard of step of using the committee’s subpoena powers to get to the bottom of spending at the Maine Turnpike Authority. State Sen. Roger Katz, R-Augusta, said the Government Oversight Committee is “unsatisfied” with some the MTA’s answers to questions raised by the recent 88-page report from the Legislature’s Office of Program Evaluation & Government Accountability. He especially cited the authority’s lack of complete records on how it spent $157,000 in gift certificates between 2005-07. He said the committee also has more questions about $900,000-plus spent on travel, including bills at three hotel chains during the same period. Katz said the committee, which will meet Friday with MTA officials, will first ask for the records in writing. Continue Reading →

Filed under: Ethics, Money, ethics, Maine legislature, Maine Turnpike Authority, OPEGA

Documents show how incoming Speaker Nutting inflated Medicaid charges more than $1 million

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AUGUSTA — In 2001, True’s Pharmacy in Oakland, owned by incoming Speaker of the House Robert Nutting, bought medical gloves for $4.39 per package. By the time True’s sold them to a Medicaid provider, the price had gone up to $11.11. That markup — 153 percent — was much more than was allowed by Maine’s Medicaid program, known as MaineCare, which requires only a 40 per cent mark up. Nutting contended in state hearings that his use of a different formula to calculate the markup — a formula which put more money in his pocket — was the accepted method. Although the state ruled its Medicaid formula — not Nutting’s — should have been followed, the state said that even if it allowed Nutting’s formula, True’s still “overcharged MaineCare 100% of the time …” Continue Reading →

Filed under: Ethics, Money, Stories, bankruptcy, Department of Health and Human Services, ethics, Maine legislature, MaineCare

GOP backers from 2003 still with Nutting

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His fellow Republicans backed him when he was in trouble in 2003 — and they still back him now. When Rep. Robert Nutting was battling Maine regulators in 2003 over a payment plan for the $1 million-plus his pharmacy owed the state in Medicaid overbilling, his fellow Kennebec County Republican lawmakers demanded that Gov. John Baldacci intervene in the conflict and force a resolution of the long-running conflict. Baldacci declined to get involved. A response sent by his then-counsel, Kurt Adams, stated that “the Governor cannot intervene in the manner you have requested because he would be infringing upon the powers and duties lawfully assigned to the Attorney General.” Nutting declared the pharmacy business bankrupt, leaving the state and feds with no way to collect $1.2 million in overpayments. Continue Reading →

Filed under: Ethics, Money, Baldacci, ethics, Maine legislature, Robert Nutting

Adams Investigation Finds No Conflict

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An investigation by Maine Attorney General Janet Mills has concluded that the state’s former chief utilities regulator, Kurt Adams, broke no laws when he accepted a job offer and securities from a prominent wind power developer while still head of his agency. A citizens’ group had asked the attorney general to investigate Adams, the former Public Utilities Commission Chairman, after the Maine Center for Public Interest Reporting reported that he had been granted 1.2 million units of equity in wind power company First Wind while he was still on the state’s payroll in April, 2008. First Wind constructs, operates and owns wind turbines across the country, including farms at Mars Hill and at Stetson Mountain. Two other projects are planned for Maine in Oakfield and Rollins Mountain in Lincoln. Adams left the commission in May 2008 to work as senior vice president for First Wind and said the stock options — which First Wind called “equity units” in filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission — “had no value at all,” and thus should not trigger state conflict of interest or improper gift laws. Continue Reading →

Filed under: Energy, Ethics, conflict of interest, ethics, First wind, Kurt Adams, Maine Public Utilities Commission, PUC

For Whom Does the Secretary of State Work?

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By NAOMI SCHALIT
Senior Reporter

Secretary of State Matthew Dunlap’s job is to run elections, oversee the state archives, ensure compliance with corporate incorporation filings and administer the Bureau of Motor Vehicles. But Dunlap, who is paid $83,844 by Maine taxpayers to represent their interests, also represents the interests of one of the most powerful special interest groups in the state: He serves on the Sportsman’s Alliance of Maine board of directors and acts as a representative in state proceedings on behalf of SAM. Dunlap has been most visible representing SAM on the “Keeping Maine’s Forests” committee that is crafting a plan for the future of Maine’s North Woods. He has also represented SAM in statehouse discussions about a controversy regarding logging in deer yards near Katahdin Lake. Those discussions included Republican Senator David Trahan and Democratic Rep. John Piotti. Continue Reading →

Filed under: Stories, conflict of interest, ethics, Matt Dunlap, SAM, secretary of state, Sportsman's Alliance of Maine