Ethics charges dogged current and former state commissioners in F...

ethics panel members were absent. Meanwhile, a Minn. state agency representing the public interest said a former Minn. PUC member committed an “egregious” violation of state ethics laws by soliciting a job from a telecom carrier during the final weeks of his term on the PUC. Fla. PSC Comrs. Braulio Baez, Rudy Bradley and Terry Deason and former comr. Lila Jaber face ethics charges related to their attendance at the 2002 conference of the Southeastern Assn. of Regulatory Utility Commissioners in Miami Beach, partly supported by regulated telecom and energy utilities. The complaint alleges their attendance constituted receiving a gift from regulated utilities because they accepted generally-available free meals and discounted registration fees for regulators. The Fla. legislature this year passed a law to clarify ethics rules by allowing PSC members to attend conference events and meals open to all registrants, and to accept conference discounts available to all regulators. Attorneys for the plaintiffs argued the conduct was legally unethical in 2002 and laws passed afterward can’t apply unless the legislature says so. Attorneys for the 4 PSC members said the legislature clearly meant to clarify an ambiguity in ethics rules regarding conference attendance, so an explicit retroactivity provision wasn’t required. In Minn., meanwhile, the state Dept. of Commerce said former Comr. Greg Scott clearly violated state ethics laws when he solicited a job from telecom carrier Integra Telecom in April, 2 months before his term was to end. Scott joined Integra in June as vp-regulatory affairs. He left Integra Aug. 23, amid widespread publicity about the ethics charges. The Commerce Dept., acting as public advocate, said Scott’s violation was clear cut and some kind of punishment was in order. But Scott’s attorneys and Integra said they followed all applicable laws. Scott’s attorneys said contacts between the PUC member and Integra were lawful because they didn’t relate to pending cases involving Integra. Integra said it did nothing wrong because it didn’t hire Scott until after he left the PUC. Meanwhile, Scott’s ethics troubles expanded last week after Qwest asked a federal court to suspend or set aside a $25.9 million fine assessed in a complaint case involving competitor AT&T because of suspicious communications between Scott and an AT&T attorney during the complaint case. Scott’s attorneys denied wrongdoing.