TALKING POLITICS Monitoring seen wanting in Irons's case BY STEVEN STYCOS

Although the Rhode Island Ethics Commission has escaped criticism in connection with the recent resignation of former Senate President William V. Irons (D-East Providence), it is closely linked to the situation. First, the commission gave Irons approval to participate in the General Assembly debate over contentious pharmacy choice legislation, despite the admission that his insurance agency had "a corporate pharmacy client." It apparently then failed to police its own disclosure provision.

Since Irons resigned December 31, it has been revealed that he received about $25,000 a year in brokers’ fees, for at least four years, for selling BlueCHiP health insurance to Woonsocket-based CVS. Irons’s advisory opinion was only one of several Ethics Commission rulings between 1999 and 2002 that weakened conflict of interest standards, according to H. Philip West Jr., executive director of Common Cause of Rhode Island. Best known is the May 2000 repeal of the total gift ban to public officials, which was modified to allow gifts valued up to $150 per occasion, totaling no more than $450 in a calendar year. More recently, West says, commission decisions have become more stringent.

Although he does not agree that standards were weakened, commission chairman James Lynch Sr. says the panel’s regulations may become stricter when they are reviewed later this year.

In April 1999, the commission told Irons he could participate and vote on three specific pharmacy choice bills because they were "broad-based and will not affect his client’s interest to any greater or lesser extent than that of all other pharmacies and health care consumers in Rhode Island." The Ethics Commission had used that standard before. In a 1998 advisory opinion, it told state Representative William Kelso (D-Narragansett), a bar owner, he could vote on legislation lowering the blood alcohol limit for driving from .10 percent to .08 percent. And in 1996, it permitted an independent insurance broker, state Senator David Bates (R-Barrington), to vote on legislation allowing banks to sell insurance.

But in Irons’s case, says West, "The assumption that pharmacy choice legislation would affect all pharmacies alike is wrong." In fact, it would hurt CVS, Brooks, independent pharmacies, and Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Rhode Island, while helping Shaw’s Supermarkets, Walgreens, and Stop & Shop

Currently, Blue Cross requires people with its insurance to use a CVS, Brooks, or an independent pharmacy to be reimbursed for drug costs. Pharmacy choice legislation would outlaw that practice, allowing the more than 60 percent of insured Rhode Islanders who have Blue Cross cards to take their business to Shaw’s, Walgreens, or Stop & Shop. Last year, the House of Representatives passed two pharmacy choice bills, only to see them die in the Senate.

The Ethics Commission’s 1999 advisory opinion had a second less-noticed provision that, if enforced, might have avoided the controversy over Irons’s ties with CVS. Declaring that Irons could participate and vote on pharmacy choice legislation, the advisory opinion added, "However, he must file a section 6 notice with the Commission and the Senate which details his business and financial interests, the nature of the potential conflict, and the reasons why, despite the potential conflict, he is able to vote objectively, fairly and in the public interest." The same was also required of Kelso and Bates.

Irons, however, never filed the notice with the Ethics Commission. "We do not have any recusal forms [also known as a section 6 notice] forms filed by William Irons on any matter," says Steven Cross, the commission’s chief investigator.

Irons’s filing with the Senate also appears to have been less than the commission had in mind. Two weeks after the Ethics Commission issued its advisory opinion, he sent a copy to then-Senate Majority Leader Paul Kelly, noting in a one-sentence cover letter that it was "appropriate" for him to participate in consideration of pharmacy choice legislation. No more details were provided. Irons did not reply to requests for an interview, but Senate spokesman Greg Pare says Irons thought his correspondence fulfilled Ethics Commission requirements.