Assemblywoman Alison Littell McHose

McHOSE: LATEST 'MISSTATEMENTS' FROM BPU SHOW AGENCY IS AWASH IN COVER-UP

AGAIN DEMANDS BUDGET COMMITTEE HEARING AND CALLS FOR SUBPOENA POWERAugust 2, 2006
Assemblywoman Alison Littell McHose/973-726-0954
Assembly Republican Office/609-292-5339

McHOSE: LATEST 'MISSTATEMENTS' FROM BPU SHOW AGENCY IS AWASH IN COVER-UP

AGAIN DEMANDS BUDGET COMMITTEE HEARING AND CALLS FOR SUBPOENA POWER

In the wake of an admission from Board of Public Utilities (BPU) President Jeanne M. Fox that she made a "misstatement" when claiming the Treasury Department signed off on an $80 million bank account for the troubled clean energy program, Assemblywoman Alison Littell McHose again today called for the Assembly Budget Committee to schedule a special hearing with subpoena power and for the newly called testimony to be delivered under oath.

"We need an opportunity to publicly question Jeanne Fox and BPU officials so that we can extract the truth out of the many conflicting statements and retractions that are floating about," said McHose, R-Sussex, Morris and Hunterdon. "The agency worked to hide this audit from the public for months and has hired four private attorneys to fight a whistleblower who exposed this scandal. Now it appears that BPU officials are trying to mislead the public about the accuracy of the audit findings."

At a Treasury Department budget hearing in June, Republican members of the Assembly Budget Committee had requested a separate hearing for the BPU. At that time, Assembly Budget Committee Chairman Lou Greenwald had indicated he would be willing to have BPU come back at a later date to discuss these issues.

Treasury’s audit of the BPU's clean energy program, which was hidden from the public for more than a year before it was finally released on July 25, found the clean energy program to be rife with waste and abuse. The audit was only released after the whistleblower’s attorney sought a court order to obtain the audit.

Among the problems alleged in the audit were the depositing of program funds in a bank account outside the state’s financial systems with no controls; contracts being awarded with no competitive bidding or review process; and people being grossly overpaid for their work.

Fox last week dismissed the Treasury Department's claims in the audit that it was not informed about the existence of the separate bank account, and she state that she could prove through correspondence that Treasury officials had helped set up the account.

The audit did not discuss other funds kept off the state accounting system or efforts by the BPU to prevent auditors from looking further into the BPU. There are now questions surrounding additional BPU funds that may have been kept in private bank accounts.

"Given the damning findings in this audit, the budget committee should have an opportunity to ask questions of President Fox and other BPU officials," McHose said. "Only by forcing these BPU officials to testify publicly before a legislative committee and asking pointed questions about these findings will we be able to get an accurate assessment of the program."

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