A reasonable person must wonder why members of the Anchorage Assembly majority are not in a lather to discover whether former Mayor Mark Begich played a shell game with city finances right before they voted in 2008 on $150 million in labor contracts.
A reasonable person also must ask: If there is something amiss in how we do things with the city's finances, would it not be prudent to find out what it is and find a way to fix the problem so that it does not happen again?
None of that, apparently, carries any weight with our six-member Assembly majority. Each time Mayor Dan Sullivan -- he's the guy who was left holding the $33 million tab for Begich's six-year spending spree and the Assembly's labor largesse -- tries to broach the subject, he is rebuffed by the unabashed Begich apologists.
Instead of demanding answers, the majority and other Begich hat-holders angrily drag out the Bill Clinton defenses: "Let's just move on," or "It's just politics," or, my favorite because it is a bald lie and so snarky on so many levels: "Mayor Begich never complained when he inherited a $30 million deficit from George Wuerch; he never called for an investigation."
That ignores facts and history. Did Begich take the reins with a $30 million deficit? Some, including at least one former mayor, say no, that it was a manufactured reason to hike fees and taxes, and that the $30 million figure represents proposed spending increases that would have outstripped revenues -- a wish list by bureaucrats, if you will, and funding for unfilled positions -- not real red ink.
If Begich inherited a deficit it would have sprung from mandatory multimillion-dollar police and firefighter retirement fund payments and the Legislature's jettisoning of revenue-sharing, not from Wuerch's spending like a governor seeking another term.
There is no doubt, however, that Sullivan inherited a budget mess -- a real one -- because of the ill-considered labor contracts and riotous spending by Begich.
When Begich squeaked into office by a handful of votes in 2003, the approved budget was $289.2 million. The next year, $309.3 million and the next, $332.8 million. In 2006, it was $367.2 million; in 2007, $399.4 million; and, in 2008 the revised budget topped $431 million.
The question -- the most important of several -- is whether Begich intentionally misled his Assembly pals on the city's finances so they would, or could, approve the contracts? Why, after all, would any Assembly member not be screaming for an answer, if for no other reason, to establish their conduct was not misfeasance, malfeasance or nonfeasance -- the lifeblood of recall movements? Or were some of them part of the scam?
For its part, the Assembly commissioned a report late last year by Municipal Attorney Dennis Wheeler on the question, which concluded Begich did not disclose important financial information to the Assembly before the votes. That conclusion has drawn fire, but has not been refuted. A work session to discuss the finding was set for Jan. 8, but canceled.
The battle is far from over. Sullivan says Wheeler will have a supplementary report to the Assembly by Jan. 19. Assembly Chairman Patrick Flynn, apparently uninterested in pursuing the matter, says the Assembly's hands are tied, although it does have subpoena powers. If there are no subpoenas and no audit, Sullivan says his administration will take on the job.
"Every citizen has a right to know what happened. If the Assembly takes no action on the 19th, we will pursue it," Sullivan told Kirsten Adams of the Anchorage Daily Planet.
The mayor says Wheeler is recommending a forensic audit and subpoenas for the city's former top finance officials to get to the bottom of the mess.
"If it turns out it was just human error, who wouldn't want to know that?" Sullivan asked. "And, if it turns out there was some malfeasance, who wouldn't want to know that too? The search for the truth has no wrong answers."
Flynn suggests if Sullivan has a beef he should take it to the attorney general's office. A great idea. I suggested a grand jury early on as the only way to get at the truth, and, as Sullivan puts it, the truth has no wrong answers.
It makes you wonder why the Assembly majority does not even want to ask the question.
Paul Jenkins is an editor of the Anchorage Daily Planet.
PAUL JENKINS
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