Readers may recall a post from July about the excessive municipal compensation of officials in Bell, California, an impoverished town where officials helped themselves to huge salaries. See, Excessive Public Compensation in Bell, California (Lessons for the Rest of America).
Those officials now face more than public condemnation and forced resignations, as the AP reports that the Ex-city manager [is] among 8 arrested in Calif. scandal:
The mayor and ex-city manager of the scandal-plagued Los Angeles suburb of Bell were among eight current and former city officials arrested Tuesday in a corruption investigation.
The district attorney’s office said several City Council members were taken into custody along with ex-city manager Robert Rizzo and Mayor Oscar Hernandez.
“This, needless to say, is corruption on steroids,” District Attorney Steve Cooley said at a news conference in Los Angeles.
The district attorney, state attorney general and others have been conducting investigations of officials in the small working-class city since it was disclosed they were paying themselves huge salaries. Rizzo was making nearly $800,000 a year.
The investigations involve allegations of corruption, misuse of public funds and voter fraud in the city where one in six of the 40,000 residents live in poverty.
Pretending public officials are saints, and their every action selfless and noble, is worse than false; it’s delusional and destructive.