Ex-ethics official sees no conflict in lease deal
2006-09-20
Source: North Jersey Media Group
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rss feedA former Democratic lawyer for the House ethics committee said Tuesday she would have advised Bob Menendez, then a member of the House, in 1994 that leasing property he owned in Union City to a federally funded Head Start office was not a conflict of interest.
Ellen L. Weintraub, who is now a commissioner on the Federal Election Commission, also said it would not be a conflict under House rules for a member of Congress to advocate for and vote for federal funding for an organization to which he rented office space, unless there was a specific provision that benefited only that member of Congress.
Menendez was appointed to the Senate in January and is in a tight election campaign against Republican Tom Kean Jr.
Kean has said the lease, which earned Menendez more than $300,000 over nine years, is a sign that Menendez is corrupt. The U.S. Attorney's Office has subpoenaed information about the lease to the North Hudson Community Action Corp., which operates a Head Start program that leased space for administrative offices in a house Menendez owned.
Menendez also successfully lobbied the government to make the North Hudson Community Action Corp. a federally qualified health care center, which allowed it to apply for some forms of federal funding.
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