Last week, federal agents and investigators from the state attorney general's office raided Senate Majority Leader Pedro Espada's nonprofit, Soundview Health Clinic. The previous day, Attorney General Andrew Cuomo announced that he was filing a civil case against Espada for pilfering $14 million from Soundview. The suit charges that Espada spent hundreds of thousands on sushi, campaign literature and family trips, and even granted himself a multi-million dollar severance package.
Espada's alleged corruption has been Albany lore for years, and he now joins a list of state politicians charged with abusing their office. The attorney general's office is currently investigating Gov. David Paterson. Meanwhile, former Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno waits for sentencing following his conviction on federal corruption charges. To top it off, former Assemblymember Anthony Seminario was recently sentenced to six years on federal corruption charges, and a number of legislators are under federal investigation for their relationships with nonprofits.
Susan Lerner of Common Cause said that Albany faces a "crisis of corruption." So why -- Espada’s case aside -- has the attorney general not brought more corruption cases? Why have federal authorities taken the lead? And what more can, or should, the attorney general do to police Albany?
New Yorkers will almost assuredly elect a new attorney general this year, and already at least five Democrats have lined up to seek the job. So the question of how he or she would confront official corruption has acquired new urgency.
The attorney general has enormous authority. He or she serves as the legal counsel for the state and for state employees facing lawsuits. The office protects the public good and can investigate and file lawsuits in the areas of consumer fraud, civil rights, real estate, environmental protection and internet transactions. It also collects money owed to the state.
The attorney general's office, though, does not have a license to police Albany. The attorney general cannot start a public corruption probe unless it is referred by a head of a state executive agency, the governor or the state legislative ethics board. The attorney general also has little oversight over election law violations unless the governor compels the office to investigate them. The office once had sweeping power to prosecute election law violations, but that ability was ceded to the Board of Elections in the 1970s.
As elected officials –- and politicians -- attorney generals almost inevitably will make political calculations about cases. This can cut both ways. Espada has charged Cuomo’s prosecution of him is politically motivated. Critics of former Attorney General Eliot Spitzer say he did not pursue Albany’s misdeeds as fervently as those of Wall Street because he wanted support of elected officials when he ran for governor.
During a 2004 interview with Gotham Gazette, former attorney general and current City Councilmember Oliver Koppell asked, "How can the lawyer for state officials investigate wrongdoing by those officials?"
Others, including those vying for the office, say they can.
"I don't think it matters who is prosecuting the charges as long as they are brought," said Assemblyman Richard Brodsky, a candidate for attorney general this year. Brodsky added that he thinks a number of the larger corruption cases were prosecuted by the federal authorities simply because they fell under federal jurisdiction.
According to Eric Phillips, spokesman for Nassau County District Attorney Kathleen Rice, another Democratic candidate for attorney general, federal investigations have exposed more corruption in Albany than the attorney general simply because the state official does not have the power to do so. "Despite [the attorney generals'] unique insight and statewide grasp of the landscape and the laws, the legislature has limited their scope and put them in a rather narrow place between local district attorneys and U.S. attorneys,” Phillips said.
That is not to say Cuomo has kept his hands off Albany completely. He ran as the "Sheriff of State Street," promising to deliver Albany from itself. To start out, he created a system where his office screens member items. He created Project Sunlight -- a virtual digest of member items, legislation and campaign contributions -- and has repeatedly called for the power to issue subpoenas in corruption cases.
Only recently, though, with both the Paterson and Espada investigations, has Cuomo truly bared his teeth.
A number of politicians who hope to replace Cuomo have their own ideas of how the office should lead the charge against corruption in Albany. Some Democrats say they believe Cuomo has not been as aggressive as he could have been in hunting down corruption in Albany because he wanted to maintain his political alliances. Those vying to replace Cuomo (assuming, as everyone does, that he will run for governor) have been trying to explain their vision to voters as the race begins to heat up. The first major test will be Democratic Rural Conference straw poll in Niagara Falls on Saturday.
At the turn of this century, Spitzer rode into town vowing to clean up Wall Street. While Washington turned a blind eye to questionable conduct in the financial industry, Spitzer, with the help of the Martin Act (a piece of New York's General Business Law written in 1921 that allows the attorney general extraordinary powers in fighting financial fraud), was able to build his Sheriff-of-Wall Street reputation.
Sean Coffey, a lawyer best known for recovering millions for the victims of the WorldCom debacle and a Democratic hopeful for attorney general, said he thinks the legislature must grant the attorney general powers equivalent to the Martin Act to police corruption in Albany. "Given the state of the state, the number one mission for the next [attorney general] has to be to fight corruption. For Wall Street we had the Martin Act, and we need that to fight corruption in Albany,” he said
Coffey said he expects that the top priority following the November election will indeed be reform. Coffey said he will work side by side with Cuomo -- if he is elected governor -- to enact reform, but says the attorney general's office will need additional power no matter who is governor. The attorney general "needs the permission of the governor or department heads to initiate an investigation," he said. "I think that has cramped Andrew Cuomo. Let’s give the [attorney general] the tools he needs.”
Phillips said that Rice, "absolutely believes that the attorney general should be unshackled when it comes to these cases, but she also thinks the next [attorney general] should find innovative ways to ensure justice and use the office's existing reach and resources. The next [attorney general] won't necessarily be able to rely on Albany for an increase in jurisdiction, so [Rice] believes the solution should include both expansion and innovation."
Another candidate, the former superintendent of the New York State Insurance Department Eric Dinallo, who is also credited with dusting off the Martin Act for Spitzer, has a six-point plan for getting the job of reform done. Most of it relies on using existing law to better regulate Albany. His major proposal calls for the governor to sign an executive order giving the attorney general jurisdiction over corruption cases involving state departments, agencies and the legislature.
“Mr. Dinallo continues to support Attorney General Andrew Cuomo's call for legislation granting the attorney general primary jurisdiction over public corruption cases, but with the stroke of a pen the governor can, and should, immediately provide the attorney general greater authority," a statement from him says.
Brodsky said he thinks focusing on prosecution will not "change the culture of Albany or affect the rate at which these crimes occur." Instead he thinks the attorney general has to lead efforts to change the culture of Albany and make fighting corruption his or her top priority.
"We need to reform the office again," said Brodsky. "Under Spitzer it went from consumer advocate to Sheriff of Wall Street; we need to reform it again to make the office the base for Albany reform efforts."
Sen. Eric Schneiderman, a Democratic attorney general candidate who has proposed numerous ethics reforms during his time in the Senate, said that he would expand the public integrity unit that looks into political corruption and put one member from it in every local attorney general's office across the state. "There are already plenty of statutes that give the office lots of authority. There are restraints on jurisdiction in certain areas, but the [attorney general] has broad authority over misuse of public funds," said Schneiderman.
Schneiderman said that he has already been leading a change in the culture of Albany, including chairing the Senate committeethat recommended the ouster of Sen. Hiram Monserrate after he was convicted of misdemeanor assault.
Representatives of good government groups say they would like to see the attorney general have more oversight. "Anything that would increase oversight is warranted until the legislature can pass ethics legislation with independent oversight," said Lerner.
Blair Horner of the New York Public Interest Research Group agrees.
"The problem is that laws of jurisdiction prevent the attorney general from looking at things unless they are invited," Horner said. The Legislative Ethics Commission, which has the job of investigating corruption, is relatively useless, he said. Any cases they investigate would be referred to the attorney general, but Horner says the office does not initiate its own investigations and rarely -- if ever -- looks into possible ethics violations. "The attorney general can't do much about it. It makes a lot of sense to me that someone besides the commission should have oversight," he said.
At the same time, some note that it's not just the powers granted to the attorney general that determine whether corruption gets prosecuted. The attitude and priorities of the office's occupant makes a difference too.
"If there is a will there is a way," said Baruch College Professor Doug Muzzio. "They've got substantial powers to investigate political corruption; we've seen that with Espada and Troopergate."
"There has been reluctance in the past for elected officials to take on the system that got them there," said Horner, adding, "I think Andrew has run as the 'Sheriff of State Street,' and he delivered."
Espada, on the other hand, has alleged that Cuomo's investigation is politically motivated -- a punishment for Espada's role in orchestrating last year's Senate “coup.”
Others have alleged that Cuomo has been eager to go after Espada because federal investigations into the abuse of nonprofits by senators are heating up, and he does not want to look as though he has been sitting on his hands. They say the Espada investigation is a perfect lead in to Cuomo's announcement that he will run for governor.
Still others worry that giving the attorney general more power could lead to political abuse. "Would the consolidation of powers or enhancement lead to an overzealous (attorney general) looking to make a name for himself?" asked Muzzio. "I don't know. It's just a question. It could provide the condition for abuse."
With New York facing the biggest changes in voting in decades, the city Board of Elections, the agency entrusted with making sure everything goes smoothly, has no executive director.
The post has remained vacant since Marcus Cederqvist, the previous occupant, abruptly announced his departure in January and left shortly thereafter. Not only does the board not have a director but it has not revealed a timeframe for or method by which the next person will be selected.
All this comes as the city prepares to abandon its old lever machines and replace them with a new computer-based voting system by next fall's elections for governor, two senators, members of Congress and other political leaders. In the meantime, new technology must be tested and implemented, pollworkers have to be trained, and voters need to be educated.
The situation at the board has alarmed watchdog groups and some public officials. "It's an injustice to the voters of New York, and the taxpayers of New York, to not conduct a meaningful, open public search, and to set out expectations, to have a contract, and to have performance criteria," said Neal Rosenstein, coordinator for the New York Public Interest Research Group.
The executive director oversees the voting operations for New York City. In theory, the appointee is responsible for overseeing poll worker training, voter registration and implementation of new technology and new policies.
It is "a position of great potential impact, and New Yorkers have a right to see that the best possible person is selected to run their election," said Lawrence Norden, senior counsel at the Brennan Center for Justice.
The board almost never elaborates on how it staffs positions. At present, its web site has no job posting or any indication that it even needs an executive director. City Councilmember Gale Brewer, who chairs the Committee on Governmental Operations, said, "I hope the Board of Elections will do an extensive search to identify the best person."
At previous Board of Elections commissioners' meetings, the board revealed it has two possible candidates, former Queens Councilmember Anthony Como and the board's current deputy executive director, George Gonzalez. But there is no public information on how the commissioners are conducting their search.
Although "both candidates have a lot of experience with the board itself," Rosenstein said, he expressed disappointment that the board is not conducing an open and wide-ranging search for the most qualified person.
Gotham Gazette asked board spokesperson Valerie Vazquez-Rivera about the executive director's responsibilities, how tasks were being handled during the vacancy and the search for a replacement. After two weeks, Vazquez did not reply to our inquiries. Individual commissioners also did not reply to requests for comment.
According its critics, transparency has never been the board's forte. It does hold public meetings and communicate with public interest groups, but observers note that the board still does not truly reveal how it works.
"It's extraordinarily secretive, and that's a problem," said Paul Newell, a Democrat who was recently elected as district leader for Part C of the 64th Assembly District. Newell said that the lack of transparency preserves status quo, and the status quo maintains existing problems.
Twelve public interest groups, including NYPIRG and Citizens Union (whose sister organization publishes Gotham Gazette) have called for "an open and public search" for the executive director position. The groups have been pressing the board to select someone who has strong experience with election administration, voting rights, and information technology.
The city's Board of Elections is a bipartisan organization. Its 10 commissioners are split evenly between Republicans and Democrats, one of each party from each borough. The commissioners, who are selected by their respective parties, vote to appoint the executive director and other staff positions, which also must be evenly divided between Republicans and Democrats.
New York State adopted this bipartisan structure in 1894 as a way of having the two strongest political parties -- the Republicans and Democrats -- serve as a check on each another. But numerous critics have charged that this system has allowed political patronage to take hold since it places no checks and balances on how the parties bring their own candidates to the board.
"Virtually every single employee of the board, as well as the executive director, are hired through the patronage process," said Rosenstein, who explained that local party bosses hold influence over board's commissioners, who in turn select the executive director and other staff. It is a selection process, he said, based on a loyalty rather than merit with no nonpartisan oversight.
The last executive director, Marcus Cederqvist, had a long relationship with the Republican Party. According to a 2002 biography on the New York Republican County Committee's website, Cederqvist was chief of staff for former City Councilmember Andrew Eristoff for six years and Republican district leader for the 64th Assembly District between 1995 and 2002. Cederqvist told City Hall News in March 2008 that Republican John Ravitz, the board's previous executive director, had approached him about the position.
Nothing in Cederqvist's background suggests that he had any particular management or voting expertise. In fact a November 2008 editorial in the Daily News accused Cederqvist of having "less management experience than a street-corner hot dog vendor."
The board, which unanimously approved Cedarqvist's selection, would not comment on why he was chosen.
When problems occurred at the polls during the 2008 presidential election, some blamed Cederqvist, but other watchdog groups considered that unfair, given his short tenure at the board and its long history of problems. Margaret Fung, executive director of Asian American Legal Defense and Education Fund said Cederqvist was attentive to suggestions and was simply not in the post long enough to be adequately judged on his leadership.
Yet with the election process in New York facing such huge changes, critics and public interest groups say the city cannot afford to take a complacent or wait-and-see approach to Cederqvist's successor, whoever it is. "We need the most qualified executive director, we don’t need one who tows the party line or the party boss' line," said Rosenstein.
Fung said that any incoming executive director needs to understand the issues faced by the city’s many groups.
An understanding of new technology is especially important because the new voting system will use optical scanners to count ballots. In addition, the new machines will be able to display ballots in different languages, raising an increased possibility of translation mistakes.
In January, the board awarded the multimillion contract to Election Systems & Software, Inc. One day after the contract was awarded, a lobbyist for Election Systems was arrested on accusations of bribing a Yonkers City Council member. Shortly thereafter, a rival vendor sued the board, alleging that it awarded Election Systems points during the bidding process for technology features that cannot legally be used in New York.
Even though a court has not decided on the rival vendor’s allegations, Howard Stanislevic, founder of the E-Voter Education Project, believes that the controversy underscores the kinds of problems that can arise if the board hires an executive director who is not proficient in voting technology, and the laws governing it.
"Election administration has become more of a [technology] job," said Stanislevic. "You need people with experience otherwise the vendors will control everything."
A flood of cash raced into some State Senate districts in the city last year as Democrats took control of the Senate for the first time in decades. Sen. Malcolm Smith brought home $5.7 million worth of member items in 2009, up from just $657,000 only one year before. Other members of the Democratic leadership, like Sen. Jeff Klein, also delivered several millions of dollars in pork to their districts, but most legislators brought home much less, with some senators falling far short of the million dollar mark.
A study by New York Public Interest Research Group and three other good government groups found that the average Assembly member received $300,000 in member item distributions and the average senator took home around $1.2 million in member items. Most districts in the city and the state, though, received much less than their fair share. Analysis by the Citizens Union reveals that residents who live in 49 of the 64 city based Assembly districts that received member items and in 11 of the 26 Senate districts received less than the average amount typically spent on member items.
Now a group of legislators is proposing legislation that would make sure every district gets the same amount of member item cash. It also would create new measures to make sure member items are awarded responsibly.
For years the majority of Senate member item spending was concentrated in the districts of the Senate Republican leadership. Meanwhile, in the Democrat-controlled Assembly, most of the member items went to city districts of the Democratic leadership -- especially the Manhattan district of Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver.
Since the shift in control of the Senate, spending on member items has skewed even more sharply to the legislative leadership’s districts, while the districts of rank and file legislators get less than their fare share. Assembly district are supposed to have roughly the same amount of constituents as are all Senate districts.
So while Smith pulls in more than $5 million in pork, Sen. Bill Perkins and Sen. Shirley Huntley each brought home $1 million in member items -- about $300,000 less than the average allocation of member items -- even though they are in the majority party. Republican senators who represent New York City received even less. Republican Sens. Martin Golden and Andrew Lanza were each able to deliver just $250,000 to their districts, over $1million less than the average.
Statewide data shows that 69 percent of New Yorkers live in a Senate district that received less than the average allocation, and 81 percent of New Yorkers live in an Assembly district that similarly came up short.
Check out the 2009-2010 Assembly member item allocations here. The Senate allocations can be found here.
It isn't just the disparity in spending that concerns good government groups and reform minded legislators. Member items have been a repeated source of scandal over the years as legislators have used them to reward groups run by the family members or political allies.
Currently, party leadership is supposed to review where member items are going. Then the attorney general's office also conducts a review.
Under the proposed legislation, the attorney general's office would pre-certify groups before they received any cash, and state agencies would audit the groups to make sure the money was being spent for the approved purpose. "It is important to make sure that an elected official is checking to make sure these are legitimate groups that are receiving money, just like the mayor does in New York," said Dick Dadey, executive director of Citizens Union of the City of New York. (Gotham Gazette is published by Citizens Union Foundation, the sister organization of the Citizens Union. )
The names of the groups receiving the grants and the legislators awarding them would have to be made public 24 hours in advance of the budget to allow for public comment. Legislators and recipients would also have to provide documents proving they do not have any conflicts of interest.
The New York City Council uses a similar method to screen organizations. Although it has not been foolproof, advocates say it is a step in the right direction. "If New York City can do it, the state can do it," said Dadey, "and the state is in worse financial shape."
Blair Horner of the New York Public Interest Research Group said he hopes that New Yorkers will see the disparity in the distribution of member items and push their legislators to support the legislation. Right now, besides the bill's sponsors, the proposed legislation has decent backing among rank-and-file members in the Assembly and sparse support in the Senate.
"It will take a while to change the culture," said Jose Serrano, the bill's sponsor in the Senate. "There is a group who think that member items are the life blood of politics," he said, referring to the leadership's ability to reward loyalty and bolster flagging candidates by sending them more member items. Sens. Liz Krueger, ,Eric Schneiderman and <ahref="http://www.gothamgazette.com/campaigns/whosrunning.php?t=indiv&id=258">Daniel Squadron are co-sponsors of the legislation.
Serrano said he think the idea that member items translate into backing and votes "is a myth." He said the Democrats' ability to win a majority in the Senate in 2008 shows that member items are not the be-all and end-all. "They [Republicans] had millions to hand out for decades, but we took control. People voted for policy," Serrano said.
Some Democratic members balk at making changes that would limit their new-found wealth and power. "At the very time that we have finally got black and Latino leaders, all of a sudden we're looking to limit. We've never had that before. We had old white guys running the chamber for 250 years," Sen. Kevin Parker said, speaking about rules changes approved last year that mandate among other things that the majority party will get two thirds of all pork an the minority party one third.
"When I was in the minority I railed against how unfair it was for the majority to be getting 85 percent of the member items," said Serrano. "It would be the height of hypocrisy if now that I was in the majority I didn't speak out." But Serrano is doing more than speaking out and pressing for his legislation. He and the bill's sponsor in the Assembly, Sandy Galef have decided not to partake of member items during this year's budget process.
Barbara Bartoletti of the League of Women Voters said that member items do have a purpose. She noted that funding for health clinics in schools began as a member item. An increasing number of legislators allocated member item funding for the clinics over the years until eventually the funding became a standard part of the budget process, and the money was no longer distributed through member items. As the economy has grown worse, a lot of member item spending keeps essential services such as homeless shelters, food pantries, health clinics and teen outreach groups afloat. Bartoletti notes that some legislators really use their funds exclusively for that purpose.
Regardless, Blair Horner of NYPIRG said that the system is in critical need of repair. "If they can't reform the system they should just eliminate it," he said.