Fiscal watchdog has no teeth

Since Democrat Joe Hoeffel worked out a power-sharing agreement with GOP-turncoat Jim Matthews, Montgomery County government has been the scene of one scandal after another.

Cronyism, patronage, mismanagement and wasteful spending are the bywords at the Montgomery County Courthouse under the Hoeffel-Matthews regime.

Reporter Margaret Gibbons has been covering county government for decades and she doesn't like what she sees, especially in the "look-the-other-way" attitude of Montgomery County Controller Diane B. Morgan, a newly-elected Democrat.

The county controller is supposed to be looking out for the taxpayers, making sure county resources aren't being wasted. Gibbons thinks Morgan has been too deferential to Commissioner Hoeffel.

From Gibbon's latest column:

When is an early retirement not an early retirement? Apparently if you work in the Montgomery County solicitor's office.

The county commissioners earlier this year said goodbye to assistant solicitor Bruce Eckel and then brought him back as a part-time solicitor for $50,000. Then, two weeks ago, they said goodbye to assistant solicitor Larry Folmar and brought him back as a part-time solicitor who will receive $20,000 for the rest of the year.

The commissioners claim that both have certain areas of expertise and, after all, they are no longer paying them benefits and the much bigger salaries they were drawing when they worked full-time.

I guess I'm just a little confused.

Wasn't the fact that the pair was retiring and their replacements needed time to be brought up to snuff the reason that new full-time assistant solicitors were brought on board at the beginning of the year. Maybe these new solicitors are just slow learners or, maybe, they were just patronage hirings.

Where is new county Controller Diane Morgan when citizens need her?

Morgan, a Democrat, was quick to jump on prior Republican row officers for emptying their technology funds before their Democratic replacements took office. She also was quick to criticize Republican county Commissioner Bruce L. Castor Jr., the county's district attorney, for his machinations to secure additional vacation time payment for this year.

However, she has been strangely silent about bringing back these retired-but-not-retired solicitors and, as a member of the salary board, she even voted for them.

Could it be that she worships at the feet of Democratic Commissioner Joseph M. Hoeffel III, who secured one of those new solicitor positions for his bud?

Partisanship, ain't it grand?

Read Gibbons' full column in today's edition of The Mercury.