A Higher Standard for Public Officials : Halted Inquiry Doesn’t Clear 2 CSUN Administrators of Blame in Construction Flap

The state’s Fair Political Practices Commission has dropped a conflict-of-interest investigation of two ranking Cal State University Northridge administrators. The two had accepted free home construction work from the employees of a construction firm that had gained a lucrative contract to help rebuild the earthquake-battered CSUN campus.

“There appears to be insufficient evidence to prove a potential conflict of interest violation,” the commission said, adding that it could not demonstrate that the construction work represented a “gift” under state law.

So, is that it--case closed? Should the two administrators just rest easy with the knowledge that they have essentially been cleared of wrongdoing? Does the commission action prove that CSUN President Blenda J. Wilson overreacted in calling for the investigation and in deciding to seek a new engineering consultant to finish the work of the construction firm?

The answers to all are no.

There is a golden rule for public servants. It does not matter whether wrongdoing was intended. It doesn’t matter whether any wrongdoing occurred. The mere appearance of impropriety, or the chance of it, is all that is needed to interrupt schedules, raise suspicions and complications, and turn a relatively smooth operation into a nightmare.

In this sense, it was not just unwise for CSUN’s Bill and Jane Chatham to have allowed the company’s employees to rebuild their home patio cover for free last summer. It was ludicrous.

Bill Chatham is CSUN’s associate vice president for facilities. Jane Chatham serves as special assistant to Wilson for earthquake recovery. Both positions are very important, and here’s why.

It is not true that the Los Angeles subway is the city’s biggest public works project. The biggest project involves the billions of federal dollars flowing here for Northridge earthquake recovery. The Chathams have a fair piece of responsibility here, given the fact that the CSUN damage price tag is $350 million.

The point is this: Regardless of how innocently it may have been offered, and regardless of how innocently it may have been accepted, you don’t accept free work when the company that employs the folks doing the work is negotiating a $10.5-million increase in contracts with your university.

Because that happened here, Wilson called on the Fair Political Practices Commission to investigate two of her top aides. And the selection of a new engineering consultant will undoubtedly delay the reconstruction work on campus that remains to be done.

Moreover, the two CSUN aides will now have a new boss who will oversee, in part, their work.

And you thought appearances were only deceiving.