Today's Confirmation Albany is Just Being Albany

Only in Albany can you be nominated to head the Public Service Commission, which oversees utilities, and start doing work for the government - while still working for a private sector energy company! The state inspector general released a report explaining how this actually happened with former PSC nominee Angela Sparks-Beddoe last year.

Sparks-Beddoe was President for Energy East, a utility in Saratoga Springs, when Spitzer nominated her early last year. She was still working for Energy East when she, per the Daily News, "threatened the jobs of Public Service Commission staffers who...disagreed with [her] and offered raises to other officials who fed her information about PSC business." Pretty classy! The Inspector General said since Sparks-Beddoe withdrew her nomination after these dealings came to light and was never a state employee, she does not break the Public Officers Law.

The report blamed Governor Spitzer's top energy aide, Steven Mitnick, for giving Sparks-Beddoe the free rein to get involved before being confirmed. State Inspector General Kristine Hamann was also investigating Mitnick, who was accused of threatening to fire an employee who wanted to probe Con Ed's involvement in the 2006 Queens blackout. The report found Mitnick, who resigned last summer, to be basically a jerk, but he did not break the law.

And the Times Union has a report on how one in five state legislators break the law.