Published: May 23, 2008 02:29 pm            

CHRISTY: It’s all fun and games until someone gets hurt

Isn’t anyone willing to stand up and say enough is enough?

The news of the ongoing investigation into the secret “dirty tricks” department within the New York State Police has been news for the past few weeks. The story intensified recently as State Attorney General Andrew Cuomo conducts a thorough investigation into the secret and covert operation begun under the apparent direction of former Governor Pataki.

By way of review, the state police apparently operated a secret internal operation designed to build files on state legislators and other public officials across the state in order to embarrass or otherwise cause career-harm to any elected official they deemed not toeing the line. And that would mean the line the state police wished toed of course, since the operation was created by Pataki but quickly adopted and utilized by Governor Spitzer. Had the word “Spitzer” not become synonymous with “hypocrite” this operation would still be a secret and there is no doubt the upcoming battle for control of the state legislature would be an ugly, dirty, accusation-filled event.

There are several problems here that should make us in WNY sit up and take notice.

For one, this is basically business-as-usual for our state government. While the media seems semi-outraged, it’s not front-page news in WNY that’s for sure, and no local state legislator has thrown down the gauntlet on this issue and called it one of the most serious symptoms of a dysfunctional government — and demanded change.

Why should we mention WNY legislators?

Lewiston is home to the greatest hydro-electric power plant in the United States. It’s an amazing structure and its “green” electricity, generated not by burning fuel, but by running water over turbines. It’s operated by the New York State Power Authority which is responsible for a total of 27 power plants throughout NYS, but local citizens feel a connection to the operation and consider it theirs.

However, we pay some of the highest electric rates in the entire country, and nobody ever has a very good answer as to why. Some people even deny we pay high rates! Anyway, the point is, the State Police dirty-tricks scandal was headed by someone on the payroll of that same Power Authority. A retired state police employee drawing a pension, he was placed in a six-figure salary/benefit at the Power Authority and apparently continued to run the dirty tricks operation. What in the world was such a blatantly political operative doing on the payroll of the Power Authority?

The story gets worse, much worse. While Cuomo was digging around and figuring out what the heck was going on, he considered calling in witnesses. His office visited the secretary to the now-suspended Power Authority employee and found that the entire computer had been stripped bare, and the hard drive “scrubbed,” which is a techie term for having everything completely, irrevocably, and untraceably deleted. It’s apparently such a thorough deletion process that it could not have been an accident. Since this was a Power Authority employee who was now a prime participant in what may be a felony, the Power Authority has retained one of the most expensive defense law firms in New York to represent this “secretary” who may have deleted the files. One and one makes two, and now this is starting to get expensive. But the Power Authority can pass these costs on to the rate payer.

Here’s where the story gets not only worse, but extremely sad. Because an assistant to the dirty-trick’s architect, who was a retired 26-year State Police employee, was going to be called in by Cuomo and interviewed as to what he knew or didn’t know he instead chose suicide last Thursday. He was only 48, and leaves a young wife and three grown children.

The Power Authority, involved in this and perhaps other political operations, is diverting money into things that clearly have nothing to do with the electricity business, and you’re paying for it. The fact political shenanigan’s cost us money, drive up electric rates and keep us mired in an economic depression is horrible. The fact that it has now cost a family their father in such a tragic situation should be a wake-up call to everyone involved in politics in this state.

Political dirty-tricks have cost us taxpayer money for decades. It’s no stretch to say that with the suicide of a dedicated state trooper, political dirty tricks are now costing us lives as well.

Tom Christy is the founder of FAIR Government, a non-political and non-editorial educational foundation dealing with local government issues. www.fair-government.org. He encourages communication and can be reach via e-mail at aim1986@mac.com.

        

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