Amid talk of ethics reform on Beacon Hill, the governor and the legislature are proving to be masters of the art of sleight of hand. While one hand shows concern for ethics reform, the other quietly pushes through bills to open gaping ethical loopholes in the awarding of government contracts.
Last week's federal indictment of former House Speaker Salvatore F. DiMasi is but the latest example of this. The indictment accuses DiMasi of using his power and influence to enable software company Cognos to obtain millions of dollars in state contracts.
The indictment prompted Gov. Deval Patrick, Senate President Therese Murray and House Speaker Robert DeLeo to pledge to make ethics reform among their top priorities.
Yet a series of bills proposed by Patrick and making their way through the Legislature would drop an unprecedented veil of secrecy over the awarding of government contracts. These bills would remove key aspects of the process from public purview and make them available only to industry and government insiders.
Present law prohibits state and local governments from awarding a government contract unless they first publish the details in a newspaper that circulates in the location where the project will take place.
This public notice is a crucial check on government corruption — the only real bulwark against secrecy and favoritism in the awarding of government contracts. Notice ensures that the public is informed of the nature of the government contract and of the process by which it is awarded.
Thus there is no rational explanation for the series of bills that would cut public notices from newspapers and cast aside the transparency of the process.
The latest of these is a bill styled to mobilize economic recovery in the state. As filed by the governor, it would eliminate the public-notice requirement for public construction contracts. In place of publishing these notices in newspapers for all to see, the bill would list them only on a government Web site.
The Senate has passed its own version of this bill, which could hide these bid notices even farther from public view. It would allow notices to be posted only on a bulletin board near a government office and in the central register, a government publication available only by subscription for a minimum annual price of $225.
Think about what this means: Today, citizens can learn about government construction projects in their hometowns simply by reading their local newspapers. Under this bill, they could know of these projects only by making regular visits to various state office buildings or by purchasing a subscription to an obscure government publication.
This is but one of a whole series of bills filed by the governor that target public notices of construction projects, transportation projects and other public projects. In place of newspaper notice, the governor proposes to list all procurement projects on the Web, either on a state-run Web site or on local-government Web sites.
As an additional form of providing public notice, the Web makes sense. But it makes no sense to list contract notices solely on the Web, to the exclusion of newspapers. The practical effect would close the procurement process to all but industry insiders with the knowledge and resources to follow these sites.
Even more troubling, these bills would make it harder for minority-owned and smaller businesses to compete for government contracts. In use of and access to technology, there remains a digital divide. Under the governor's bills, larger, more tech-savvy companies would gain a distinct advantage in winning government contracts.
Notices published in newspapers have a key value no government Web site, bulletin board or publication could ever replicate - independence. Newspaper publication of notices is a time-tested assurance of objective, third-party oversight. Newspaper notices are immune from tampering or hacking and stand as permanent and verifiable records
On ethics reform, the leaders on Beacon Hill cannot talk out of both sides of their mouths. They cannot pay lip service to ending corruption while pushing through bills that would draw down the shades on government deals.
Elimination of public notice would benefit only one constituency — the businesses and politicians that prefer to do business in secret.
Robert J. Ambrogi is a Rockport attorney and executive director of the Massachusetts Newspaper Publishers Association.
