Morelle is out of contention for comptroller - update: or is he?
Morelle is out.
Saturday should be interesting in terms of who will be the next MCDC leader.
Update: btp here, and dammit, stlo7! You scooped me! More detail from the Daily Politics (h/t The Albany Project):
The panel screening candidates for state controller has just released its list of three finalists — not five — and none of the four Assembly members vying for the job made the cut.The picks are investment banker Bill Mulrow, New York City Finance Commissioner Martha Stark and Nassau County Controller Howard Weitzman.
This sets up a confrontation with Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, who has expressed a preference for electing one of his members and threatened to ignore the panel’s findings if it sent less than five names.
Spitzer set up the panel to select the short list, but as Assemblywoman Susan John said tonight on WXXI, “He’s done participating.” Now it’s up to Silver’s Assembly to make the selection, and he doesn’t seem to feel constrained to the list.
Some feel that the Comptroller position is mainly to audit the Governor, but man, there’s a lotta corruption in the state leg. I can’t see a way to select a comptroller (other than in a general election) that won’t be an inherent conflict of interest.
Related posts:
This is far from over. Sheldon made it known earlier this week that he doesn’t have to abide by the recommendations of the panel (http://tinyurl.com/ytyp5j). If Spitzer presses the issue, Sheldon may remind him that the Governor shouldn’t be impeding on the process to choose his own auditor.
From Spitzer and Morelle’s understanding (http://tinyurl.com/2aa8jv), the agreement was that 5 out of the 18 candidates would be elevated to the legislature for a vote (despite the official up to five wording). I think we’re headed for a showdown. Unless Spitzer can impose some major public pressure on Sheldon to abide by the panel’s recommendations, his hands are relatively tied, according to the law.
By the way, word on the street is that it appears likely Jim Vogel (Vice Chair of the MCDC and Town Board member in Brighton) will be voted in as interim Chair on Saturday, to allow more time for the candidates and committees to become acquainted with each other (at least that is the official reasoning).
Given what I said above, and the politics of the situation, I don’t foresee Saturday’s scenario changing.
http://blogs.timesunion.com/capitol/
Morelle: I’m Still In (Maybe)
January 26, 2007 at 2:23 pm by Elizabeth Benjamin
Assembly Joe Morelle, D-Rochester, one of five Assembly members who interviewed for the state comptroller job earlier this week, just released the following statement:
“The Legislature volunteered to be guided by outside advisors with the goal of creating a fair and open process to elect the next State Comptroller.
If it turns out that those advisors made a decision to exclude candidates solely on the basis of their status as State Legislators - without consideration of the quality of their service, grasp of the issues, or vision for the office - then it taints the entire process and the transparency and even-handedness that was meant to define it.
As long as that question remains unanswered, I remain a candidate for state Comptroller, and hope that my fellow Legislators and the voters of New York will judge me on the basis of my blueprint for the office and record as a reform-minded public servant and upstate business owner.â€ÂÂ
An interesting approach, sort of along the same lines as Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver’s statement last night that the panel didn’t fulfill its duty when it sent out three, not five, candidates.
I spoke with panel member and former state Comptroller H. Carl McCall a little while ago. He didn’t want to say anything much beyond the statement the three panelists put out last night.
“I just stand by that statement,†McCall said. “That explains what we did, and now it’s up to other people to do what they do. We sat through the testimony; we listened to all that. We deliberated, we concluded.â€ÂÂ
I asked McCall whether, as my sources tell me, the governor and/or people close to him urged the panel not to recommend any members of the Assembly. His response:
“Absolutely not.â€ÂÂ