Let me see if I get this right! Raymond E. Gallison, Jr. was a Democratic representative for primarily the town of Bristol (and part of Portsmouth) since 2000. In 2014 house speaker Nick Mattiello appointed him chair of the powerful House Finance Committee. This committee is the gatekeeper for this year’s $9 billion state budget, but which every year includes General Assembly-approved grants. One group, the Alternative Educational Programming (AEP), received grants through his committee somewhere in the neighborhood of $70,875 annually through the years Gallison was on the finance committee. He took his salary yearly from this non-profit association.
In 2007 Mr. Gallison paid a fine of $6000 to the state’s Ethics Commission (which today no longer has jurisdiction over legislators) for failure to disclose his salary. Initially, Representative Patricia Morgan, who was then head of the state GOP, had accused Gallison of violating state ethics laws by voting on budgets and other financial matters that affected AEP programming, and his failure to report the funds for 2000, 2001, and 2002. Inexplicably, her complaint—while true—was dismissed. But the Ethics Commission said its investigator filed his own complaint, accusing Mr. Gallison of repeatedly failing to disclose the source of more than $100,000 of his income over a three year period for another entity, The College Readiness Program. His response was that he made an error (although it was actually 6 errors, i.e. three years each of failure to disclose income from 2 entities). From 2011-2014 he was socked again with another fine for misreporting $18,850, which Gallison blamed on a “lack of close and timely bookkeeping of his campaign account.”

Notwithstanding his repeated “mathematical errors and memory lapses,” it is very curious indeed as to why the speaker promoted him to the chairmanship where he still voted for money for himself under the guise of a nonprofit entity. One would think that with all the money at stake, lobbyists vying for state monies for their clients, and his repeated self-dealing that he’d be the last candidate for the job. As disappointing as his promotion was the real kicker here actually comes from the fine citizens of Bristol.

Bristol has been rightly hailed by Family Circle as a great place to raise a family. There are probably more dedicated people in the hometown of the venerable Fourth of July parade than any other location per square foot. The Fourth of July Committee tirelessly works year round to stage the fabulous parade. How discouraging it is, therefore, that all these fine people chose Mr. Gallison to be the chief marshal of the Fourth of July parade in 2015. The committee had notice of the misdeeds from 2000 onward and the 2 penalties, yet they saw nothing wrong in choosing him for the greatest honor a Bristolian can have.

When the recent scandal was announced which led to the Gallison legislative resignation many politicians talked about the “people deserving better”. Query: Do we? Is there something in the culture of Rhode Island that allows its people to overlook corruption? If the great people of Bristol on the parade committee can rationalize their choice of a known serial ethics violator to lead the prestigious parade is there any hope for the state? I wonder.

Arlene Violet is an attorney and former Rhode Island Attorney General.