May 29, 2007 By Paul Sunyak 3 min read

Although the rules are plainly printed Fon the editorial page nearly every day, some people still submit letters to the editor with no name, or requesting that their name be omitted. Here’s yet another reminder: We don’t print anonymous letters to the editor, nor do we leave your name out because you request it. We need your name, hometown and telephone number for verification. (Some people forget to add their phone number.) While I’m at it, here’s another reminder to letter writers: We’re still liable for what’s printed, so you can’t make personal attacks or unsubstantiated allegations against someone that aren’t already known in the public domain or aren’t verifiable. You can’t call someone a crook or a thief, for example, if they haven’t been convicted of those crimes. During election season, we got several letters from people that crossed this line.

Remember Bonusgate, the surprise news of earlier this year that employees of the state Legislature (and House Democrats, in particular) were granted secret bonuses totaling in the millions? That was followed by reports that state Attorney General Tom Corbett had launched a grand jury investigation into whether those employees got the extra pay for doing campaign-related work, which is a legal no-no. It’s a pretty serious matter.

But if doing campaign-related work on public time (and using public equipment) is something Corbett finds worth probing, why did the State Ethics Commission, in its ruling on former state Rep. Larry Roberts (D-South Union), state, “The Investigative Division will recommend that the State Ethics Commission take no further action in this matter, and make no specific recommendations to any law enforcement or other authority to take action in this matter”? Roberts got assessed a $600 fine.

Here’s another passage from the Ethics Commission document: “A state legislator is prohibited from using legislative office staff or equipment/facilities for private purposes, including campaign purposes. Roberts’ use of the staff, equipment and facilities of his Uniontown District Office for arranging for and accepting deliveries of campaign related materials resulted in a private pecuniary benefit to Roberts, consisting of savings of expenses that would otherwise have been incurred by Roberts or his campaign for separate campaign facilities or staffing, or (making) other arrangements for ordering and accepting delivery of campaign related materials.”

This is the same Larry Roberts who professed to be for open records while serving in the Legislature, but refused to give me copies of his taxpayer-paid telephone bills back in 2000. We took the case all the way to the Pennsylvania Supreme Court, and lost basically because the Legislature is exempt from the open records law, something we knew going in.

In the wake of that decision, we got a letter to the editor that read, in part: “What is sad is the fact that you chose a bad case to take forward. Now, because of the precedent-setting Supreme Court decisions on this matter, all legislative phone bills will forever be considered as non-public documents. You may have zinged Larry Roberts but you did a great disservice to all of us.” It was signed by Tony Perno of Uniontown.

The same Tony Perno whose name and office phone number appeared on an order for campaign envelopes for Roberts, his legislative boss, according to the Ethics Commission.

Paul Sunyak is editorial page editor of the Herald-Standard. Reach him at 724-439-7577 or psunyak@heraldstandard.com