Recent editorials of statewide and national interest from New York’s newspapers:

Trump-Ukraine scandal tests the nation’s principles

Newsday

Sept. 26.

Perhaps the greatest service Joseph Maguire performed Thursday was in the framing he gave to the controversy surrounding President Donald Trump’s phone call with Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelensky:

Unprecedented.

Maguire, the acting director of national intelligence, said the word over and over in response to House Intelligence Committee questions about his handling of the whistleblower’s complaint that led to exposure of the call. It was not hyperbole.

It is unprecedented that a whistleblower law set up to protect someone from exposing, say, a rogue intelligence officer now must safeguard someone implicating the president in an abuse of his power.

It is unprecedented that a president would approve the release of a summary of his conversation with a foreign leader, trying to exonerate himself of allegations that he asked that leader to dig up dirt on a political opponent.

It is unprecedented that Congress, in conducting normal constitutional oversight of a co-equal branch, discovers it lacks a tool kit to deal with a president who flouts laws, rules, norms and conventions.

It is particularly unprecedented that a U.S. president would equate whistleblowing with treason, disregard essential laws designed to protect those who risk their careers in coming forward by demanding to know the identity of the whistleblower and his sources and threaten retribution with a chilling reference to execution. “You know what we used to do in the old days when we were smart with spies and treason, right? We used to handle it a little differently than we do now,” Trump told staff of the U.S. mission to the UN.

It was strongman talk, and possibly a case of witness intimidation.

This is the territory we’re in. It’s uncharted. But it’s all the more reason that Congress must continue its investigation, even as it must examine the rules governing that process.

That process has been strained by a series of percussive bombshells. The whistleblower’s complaint released Thursday included the allegation that White House lawyers directed White House officials to “lock down” the transcript of the Trump-Zelensky phone call by moving it from the usual computer system where such documents are stored to a protected system reserved for classified information. Now the investigation by Congress includes the possibility of a cover-up.

Maguire, a career military man playing by the rules, brought the complaint to the White House and Justice Department, where Trump and Attorney General William Barr acted to stymie it. Congress, too, has been hampered by refusals to obey subpoenas or answer questions, and questionable assertions of executive privilege for people who never worked in Trump’s administration. So we have a dichotomy - an investigation that must be pursued within a legal structure not designed for these times.

The Ukraine controversy shows laws must be strengthened, especially those protecting whistleblowers who perform an invaluable service in seeking to expose wrongdoing that otherwise might remain secret.

At the root of this struggle is the nation’s fundamental principle that nobody is above the law. Congress must do all it can to deliver on that promise.

Online: https://nwsdy.li/2oBBACY

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Brave Voting in Afghanistan

The Wall Street Journal

Sept. 30

The voting totals won’t be known for weeks, yet the two leading candidates for Afghan president are both declaring victory. The current occupant, President Ashraf Ghani, last week ruled out a renewed power-sharing deal, such as the one brokered after the disputed 2014 election. His rival, Chief Executive Abdullah Abdullah, warned Thursday about electoral fraud.

As messy as this young democracy can be, Saturday’s election is also a hard reminder of the stakes. Hundreds of polling places could not be opened amid threats of violence by the Taliban. Despite security measures, there were reports of scattered violence and casualties, including a bomb blast in Kandahar, according to the Associated Press.

In the face of such peril, it’s worth dwelling on the bravery of Afghanistan’s security personnel, poll workers and voters. A photo circulating online this weekend showed a man holding up his two index fingers. The first is missing its tip; the second is dipped in the purple ink used to prevent double-voting.

“The Taliban cut off Safiullah Safi’s right forefinger for voting in 2014,” Reuters explained. “That did not stop the businessman from doing it again.” Mr. Safi told the reporter via phone: “When it comes to the future of my children and country I will not sit back even if they cut off my whole hand.”

A second telling news item: Last week the Taliban reversed its ban on vaccination by the World Health Organization. For months the Taliban blocked the WHO and Red Cross from the territory it controls, citing “suspicious activities.” The result is that in 2019, says the Global Polio Eradication Initiative, there have been 16 cases of polio in Afghanistan, which is one of three countries where the virus is endemic. Immunization can now proceed, although only in health clinics, the Taliban warns, not door to door.

This barbarity is what will follow a Taliban takeover in Kabul. It’s a precarious moment. Peace talks with the Taliban have fallen apart, and President Trump would like to exit Afghanistan. Meantime, Mr. Ghani and Mr. Abdullah are weighing the prospect of another contested vote. A unity government isn’t ideal but consider the grim alternative.

Online: https://on.wsj.com/2od4jxB

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Another sad chapter at Upstate Medical: When will SUNY show leadership?

Syracuse Post-Standard

Sept. 29

A new audit of SUNY Upstate Medical University by the New York state Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli follows the trail of hush payments and questionable leadership decisions laid out by Syracuse.com’s James T. Mulder in a series of investigative news stories.

Will DiNapoli’s official accounting wake up Upstate’s distant, ineffective minders in Albany? We sure hope so.

The audit does what audits do: In precise, bloodless prose, it points out where Upstate’s employment policies and procedures have led to egregious overspending and bad hiring decisions. Using his audit powers, DiNapoli’s staff is able to go further than Mulder’s reporting, and attach some astonishing dollar figures documenting the cost to taxpayers of these practices. Such as:

Upstate paid $1.4 million to 38 employees exiled from campus for disciplinary reasons, often giving them bogus work assignments, and failing to even notice if their “homework” was turned in.

It paid $4.7 million in supplemental salary to 12 people, without documenting or justifying what they did to earn the extra paychecks.

It paid full SUNY salary to former president Dr. Danielle Laraque-Arena at the same time it was paying her interim replacement, Dr. Mantosh Dewan, to keep her as an “available resource” during the leadership transition.

The comptroller also slams Upstate’s lax hiring and firing procedures that could put SUNY property and patient information at risk for theft.

Dewan, in his polite response to the comptroller’s recommendations, promises to tighten up policies and procedures and to keep better records. And that utterly misses the point.

SUNY Upstate may have a paper-shuffling problem, but it’s not what ails the institution. The real problems are a chronic lack of transparency, lack of accountability, lack of steady leadership at the local level and lack of institutional controls in Albany.

It does not speak highly of an institution that has to pay people to stay away, pay them for work they’re not doing or fire them for transgressions that should have been identified before they were hired. This not only costs taxpayers millions of dollars; the lurches in leadership and priorities hobble one of Central New York’s most vital institutions in carrying out its many missions.

Upstate’s medical school trains the doctors of the future. Its academic medical center, operating at two hospital campuses, provides Level 1 trauma care, a children’s hospital and cancer treatment center, among many other health services, to the entire region. Upstate employs more than 10,000 people, making it Central New York’s largest employer.

SUNY is at a loss to properly manage this complex institution. The SUNY chancellor and 18-member Board of Trustees oversee all 64 SUNY campuses. They are simply not able to provide adequate oversight to every one of them. Under such remote supervision, Upstate’s president wields enormous power to shape the institution. Recent presidents have not always used it wisely, leading to corruption scandals, mismanagement and staff upheaval.

It’s important to choose the right leader, but that’s not enough. SUNY also needs to create better system of governance to watch Upstate more closely – a local board of trustees, for example, that would act in more than an advisory role. Two former Upstate executives, in an op-ed last year, said SUNY was ill-equipped to oversee hospitals, which face unique regulatory and financial challenges. They suggested separating governance of the university and the hospital, as other academic medical centers have done – an idea worth exploring.

Comptroller DiNapoli’s recommendations offer a starting point for SUNY and Upstate to better protect state taxpayer money. We congratulate the comptroller for following up on Mulder’s reporting. We thank our subscribers for underwriting accountability journalism that makes a difference.

Online: https://bit.ly/2oDxkCX

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New York state still too weak on workplace harassment

The Auburn Citizen

Oct. 1

A harassment case against a New York state employee reminds us that the state still has a long way to go in protecting its workforce, after a man accused of outrageous illegal behavior at a state agency was given the green light to return to work.

Chad Dominie was suspended more than a year ago after women in his office reported that he exposed himself, groped them, and threatened them with sexual assault. He admitted calling female co-workers “whores” and engaging in what he labeled horseplay - and he was also arrested and pleaded guilty to harassment.

But Dominie also took advantage of the opportunity to take his case to an arbitrator, who found him guilty of four of the 10 charges against him and decided that he would not get back pay for his 17-month suspension. The arbitrator also ruled that Dominie should be able to keep his job.

The state is now appealing the arbitrator’s decision, but the case is a clear example of weaknesses in state employment policy designed to protect workers from harassment, because we can’t imagine a workplace anywhere else that would take an employee back after that person pleaded guilty to a criminal charge related to the treatment of a co-worker.

We understand that people accused of wrongdoing have the right to defend themselves, and safeguards need to be in place so that people don’t lose their jobs over false accusations. But in the monstrosity that is New York state government, civil service rules that protected illegal behavior in the bad old days are still with us today, making it very difficult to fire people, no matter how outrageous their conduct.

The governor and the leaders of the Assembly and Senate say that they care about protecting workers from sexual harassment. And we believe them. But they need to do more than talk about it and work to address the state’s longstanding problems in dealing with it effectively.

Online: https://bit.ly/2n2InoM

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Making streets safer for pedestrians

Rome Sentinel

Oct. 2

The latest numbers show that being a pedestrian is dangerous.

Pedestrian fatalities in the United States are at their highest level since 1990, with an estimated 6,227 killed in 2018, according to the Governors Highway Safety Association. Pedestrian fatalities now account for 16% of all traffic fatalities. Another 129,000 or so pedestrians are treated for injuries each year.

Statistically, New Hampshire has the lowest pedestrian fatality rate in the nation, according to the Governors Highway Safety Association. The run-for-your-life states with the highest rates are Florida, Arizona, California, Georgia, Texas and New Mexico. Still, there is more that states and localities c an do.

The Concord (N.H.) Monitor reports that Main Street in the Granite State’s capital recently had a major redesign to make it much safer for pedestrians. Even so, the Monitor reports it usually takes just a few minutes of observation to see a motorist fail to yield to one or more pedestrians in a crosswalk.

Vehicle-pedestrian encounters have increased and become more deadly for several reasons; highway safety experts say. One factor is an old one. One-third of all pedestrian fatalities involved a walker whose blood-alcohol level was above the legal limit for driving. In many other cases, the driver is impaired.

Distraction on the part of both drivers and pedestrians, typically because of cellphone use, is to blame for many accidents. When they occur, thanks to the renewed popularity of SUVs and pickup trucks, pedestrian injuries are far more likely to be fatal. The bigger, higher vehicles also make it more difficult, when starting from a stop, for drivers to see children, people of small stature or wheelchair users. A disproportionate share of pedestrian fatalities involves victims in their seventies or older.

Technology, such as signals that flash when pedestrians approach a mid-block crosswalk and camera systems in newer vehicles, can help. So can public information campaigns and increased enforcement.

A study done in Miami Beach found that saturation enforcement of vehicle crosswalk laws increased the percentage of drivers who yielded to pedestrians by up to one-third, and the improvement lasted a year with minimal additional enforcement.

Concord’s police department carried out a similar campaign a decade ago, and in one week issued 106 warnings and 11 citations for motorists who ignored pedestrians in crosswalks.

Other communities could consider similar crackdowns. Yet no matter how many safety measures are taken, the old rule still applies. Don’t cross unless you can look the driver in the eyes first.

Online: https://bit.ly/2pu6Wfb

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