Public Regulation Commissioner Ben Hall criticized the media last week for reporting on the conduct of another commissioner, Jerome Block Jr.
Block is not only again facing criminal embezzlement and conspiracy charges for alleged misuse of public campaign funds, he’s now under investigation because his PRC charge card was used to rack up thousands of dollars in suspicious gasoline charges. He’s innocent until proven guilty, Hall said Thursday, and the press should back off. He wondered why the media never report any good news about the PRC? Block is innocent until proven guilty, sure enough. Unfortunately, he’s just the latest in a long list of commissioners whose behavior has ranged from merely dubious to astonishingly criminal. One commissioner hired a convicted embezzler as his executive assistant. Another stuck taxpayers with an $840,000 settlement in a sexual harassment lawsuit. Still another got caught at a local airport carrying marijuana. And yet another bashed her husband’s alleged mistress over the head with a rock. Hall would do well to remember that many of these commissioners apparently saw nothing wrong with their behavior. The one with the embezzler on staff defended his hiring choice. The one carrying pot refused to resign. Even the one convicted of aggravated assault didn’t see any reason why she should step down from a job that pays $90,000 a year plus free gas and a car. It took the Supreme Court to toss her off the commission. If Commissioner Hall isn’t happy with the news, maybe he should take a careful look at what’s going on around him and get out in front of a campaign to clean up his shop. For the public, at least, that would be good news. This editorial first appeared in the Albuquerque Journal. It was written by members of the editorial board and is unsigned as it represents the opinion of the newspaper rather than the writers.
