It looks like Attorney General Cuomo is going to face a choice in respect of fiscal reform. Is he going to be part of the problem or part of the solution? A year ago, he announced new regulations on how Albany doles out some $200 million in pork barrel spending to community groups around the state. For years, though lawmakers lined out the payments in the budget, the lucre was distributed largely without any oversight. Then Mr. Cuomo ordered his lawyers to review the grant contracts and make sure the money was going to serve a public interest. He also required recipients to disclose conflicts of interest with the lawmakers sponsoring the grants and to sign sworn statements that could be used to prosecute them if they violated the terms of the contract.
In announcing the new regulations, the attorney general said the oversight and transparency would give New Yorkers confidence that lawmakers and their beneficiaries weren't abusing the system. But a year later, we've heard nothing back from Mr. Cuomo. Instead, we find out that his internal review of the "member items" turned up possibly dozens of suspicious grants whose public purpose was never stated and remains unknown. Instead of alerting the public, Mr. Cuomo's office has kept the findings of the review a secret, claiming they can't release the list of the questionable grants because they haven't finished reviewing them.
Well, that standard hasn't stopped Mr. Cuomo from going on the offensive against, say, student loans or home health care. So people are starting to mutter that he's silent on the member item controversy because he fears upsetting lawmakers, whose support he will need should he mount a bid for governor in 2010. But we're seeing here in the city, where the aspirations to the mayoralty of Speaker Quinn and Comptroller Thompson are being jeopardized in the slush fund scandal, that hesitating or defaulting or failing to follow through on a matter like this can backfire on a politician. This is an issue on which Mr. Cuomo would serve his own cause best by moving quickly, aggressively, soon, and publicly.
