Mission possible (continued)

THE RECENT FLURRY of legislative Democrats’ ethics issues came into view in December, when Katherine Gregg of the Providence Journal reported that Senator John A. Celona (D-North Providence), the chairman of the Senate committee that oversees health-care, was a paid consultant to the CVS drug-store chain from February 2000 until August 2003. The Journal also revealed that Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Rhode Island funded a statewide television program featuring Celona. The growing controversy over undisclosed relationships between legislators and businesses — which sparked an ongoing state police investigation — then led to the unexpected New Year’s eve resignation of Senate President William V. Irons (D-East Providence), who left rather than answering questions about whether clients in his insurance business included CVS. Documents obtained by the Journal and Phoenix subsequently indicated that Irons received about $25,000 a year in broker’s fees, for at least four years, for selling BlueCHIP health insurance to CVS.

Meanwhile, House Majority Leader Gordon D. Fox (D-Providence) recently agreed to pay a $10,000 conflict-of-interest fine for voting on an uncompetitive deal for lottery systems maker GTECH that yielded work for his law firm. Fox denies being aware at the time of his vote that his firm had been hired to work for GTECH.

The recent scandals — combined with indictments last September of Lincoln Park officials and the 2002 racketeering conspiracy conviction of former Providence Mayor Vincent A. "Buddy" Cianci Jr. — lent a ready platform for Carcieri to use in calling for a select commission to probe Rhode Island’s culture of corruption. As Carcieri put it while unveiling his legislative proposal during a January 21 news conference, "When I took this job, I stated that improving our state’s ethical climate, and engendering a higher standard of ethics would be one of the four primary goals of my administration, and I believe that this commission is necessary to get at this. We cannot grow this state, we can not make this state prosper the way I believe it can be, if we can not get at the root of what is causing this kind of behavior — and it’s way overdue."

Although Senate President Joseph Montalbano and House Speaker William Murphy have reacted coolly to Carcieri’s proposed commission, the concept offers something of a potential twofer for the governor, regardless of what happens. If the commission concept goes forward and results in meaningful findings, Carcieri will deserve a measure of the credit. For now, General Assembly Democrats are talking of offering more resources to the strengthening state Ethics Commission, and hastening to offer their own reform measures, such as a bill to restore a stringent gift ban, done away with in 2000, for public officials. Ultimately, though, if the legislature doesn’t back Carcieri’s select commission, the governor could make the case that legislators blocked efforts to clear the ethics cloud lingering over the state.

Carcieri has take pains to try to avoid being seen as a partisan player, recently refusing, for example, to back GOP chairwoman Morgan’s call for Gordon Fox to resign his House majority leader post. Asked during the January 21 news conference about legislative leaders’ less than enthusiastic response to his proposed select commission, the governor said, "I’m not talking about politics. This, as far as I’m concerned, is a bipartisan issue . . . I am not making a political statement. I am trying to get at what is happening, and how do we make the climate here better, and how do we instill a sense of confidence. Right now, the public, in my view, has got deep cynicism about what is happening, and we can pretend, and we can bury our heads in the sand like an ostrich, but I think we have to get at it."

The governor’s disclaimers notwithstanding, the Democrats, of course, already fault Carcieri for inflaming partisan warfare — just as they did last June when he took to the airwaves of talk radio to rap the General Assembly’s budget. The partisan feuding will likely become only more intense in the months to come.

Referring to the chief executive’s ability to use the bully pulpit, Common Cause’s Phil West says, "It’s a tremendous opportunity for Governor Carcieri. I remember when we talked back in ’92 about passing the four-year term [for state general officers]. There was resistance in the General Assembly. They said very specifically, a strong governor in a year he wasn’t running could really go out," and target a handful of legislative races. "That in itself is a very powerful stick. It may not be a club yet, but it’s a stick, and I think it’s going to happen. If he went out and picked seven to eight members of the House where there are some common themes — or the Senate — it could really have an impact."

BECAUSE OF A variety of factors, however, the Republicans still face a stiff uphill battle as they try to increase their numbers in the legislature, including the two-thirds percentage needed to sustain a gubernatorial veto.

Darrell West, a political science professor at Brown University, sums up the chance and challenge: "Historically, when there have been major ethics charges against Democrats, Republicans have done well. Republicans have their best opportunity [now] in a couple of decades." West notes, though, that of the particular Democrats who have been under a cloud, one (Irons) has resigned and the other two (Celona and Fox) are in heavily Democratic districts. "I’d say there’s about a 30 percent chance of [Republicans] picking up enough seats to get a veto-proof chamber. It’s not overwhelming, but it’s not impossible, either."

Maureen Moakley, chairwoman of the political science department at the University of Rhode Island, notes that the involvement in ethics controversies of corporate entities more generally associated with the Republican Party has muddled the situation. "I do not think this whole issue is going to cut neatly, either in partisan lines or institutional lines," she says. "My take originally was that the governor was planning on running against the unions and state workers, and that was the platform he was going to use to try to encourage more party competition, but now, with the problems with CVS, Blue Cross & Blue Shield, and GTECH — everyone was for that deal," she says, referring to the lottery maker’s plan to relocate to new headquarters in downtown Providence. "It’s not as clear cut, and six months from now the situation will probably look very differently."

Moakley describes the House and Senate leadership teams — Murphy and Fox in the House, and Montalbano and Teresa Paiva Weed, the recently elevated Senate majority leader, the first woman to hold such a high post in Rhode Island — as "fairly impressive." She also predicts that Fox will succeed in putting his ethics issue in the past since he has admitted a transgression, paid a fine, and quit his former law firm. "If they get about the business of worrying about the budget, passing certain initiatives, it steals some of the governor’s thunder," Moakley says. "Moreover, I don’t really see them buying into the idea of a commission. I don’t think the legislature will go for it. I don’t how long the governor can continue to promote the idea without it beginning to smack of partisan politics."

Another complicating factor is the presence of what Moakley calls "stealth Republicans" — legislators who lean GOP in their outlook, but run as Democrats because of the latter party’s dominance and institutional advantages in Rhode Island. While it’s no snap to recruit legislative candidates under any circumstances, getting people to run as Republicans is "very hard," she notes. "When you look at traditional Republican constituencies, they either run as Democrats or go about the business of private life. Being in the minority is terrible — they won’t even give you parking spaces."

The Democrats, of course, are better organized, better financed, and better able to exploit opportunities than their Republican counterparts.

The state GOP has been making an effort to recruit minorities, with party activists attending such events as the Urban League Ball and the annual Martin Luther King Jr. Breakfast. When it comes to members of the state’s burgeoning Latino community, which emerged as an increasingly powerful and recognized bloc in the 2002 election, "I’m letting them know that we are interested," says Republican Party chairwoman Morgan. "Honestly, I don’t think the Democrats have served them all that well," opportunistically using Latino constituents for their votes. Melba Depeña, then the president of the Rhode Island Latino Civic Fund, made a similar, if more muted, criticism last year while speaking with the Phoenix (see "Ready to rumble," News, June 27, 2003). After reading her comments, however, Democratic chairman Lynch seized the initiative, making a bravura move, by entering into talks that resulted in the hiring in December of Depeña, considered a gifted organizer, as the first female executive director of the state Democratic Party.

Similarly, although Morgan expects get-out-the-vote assistance from the Bush-Cheney campaign, the Dems scored another coup when US Representative Carolyn McCarthy of New York was the special guest for the formation on Monday, January 26 of the Rhode Island Women’s Democratic Caucus.

If the Rhode Island Republicans succeed just in getting a few dozens candidates to run competitive legislative races this fall, it will mark a victory of sorts. Winning a number of those campaigns, obviously, would be even better. If local GOP activists really want to strive for parity at the General Assembly, though, such efforts will constitute just the first step of a much longer journey.

Ian Donnis can be reached at idonnis[a]phx.com.