ALBANY, N.Y. — New York ethics panel is preparing subpoenas as it probes ex-governor Andrew Cuomo over his administration’s use of “volunteers” to manage the state’s pandemic response.
The Joint Commission on Public Ethics approved a motion on Tuesday calling for a subpoena asking Gov. Hochul’s office to turn over records related to unpaid officials enlisted by Cuomo to help run New York during the COVID crisis as the group investigates potential conflicts of interest.
“We don’t know who the volunteers were. We don’t know whether they were true volunteers or not,” JCOPE Commissioner Gary Lavine told the Albany Times Union. “It’s a pretty big development.”
Cuomo called on longtime allies to assist his administration during the early days of the pandemic. The volunteer panel included Larry Schwartz, a longtime confidante who ran the state’s COVID contact tracing program and vaccination efforts.
Schwartz stepped down from his post last April, a day after lawmakers rolled back a rule exempting Schwartz and others who assisted the administration during the coronavirus crisis from the state’s public officers laws.
The chief strategy officer at OTG, an airport concessions company, Schwartz previously served as a senior adviser to Cuomo before being appointed secretary to the governor in 2011.
He left the administration in 2015 but served on the Metropolitan Transportation Authority Board before formally stepping down this week. Schwartz was one of several former Cuomo officials who became part of the former governor’s COVID task force during the early days of the pandemic.
During his tenure with the administration amid the COVID crisis Schwartz faced scrutiny for allegedly calling county officials to talk about vaccine distribution and also seeking support for Cuomo as multiple women came forward with accusations of sexual misconduct against the governor.
Cuomo resigned in disgrace last August following a bombshell report detailing harassment allegations made by nearly a dozen women.
Lavine told the Times Union that the subpoena would seek a list of people who were deemed “volunteers” and were exempted from the state Public Officers law as well as all volunteers for whom a conflict of interest had been expressly indicated, including with the individuals’ normal, private sector work duties.
It also seeks information on any arrangements made for dealing with those conflicts.
Cuomo has maintained a contentious relationship with the ethics panel he created in 2011 since leaving office.
Earlier this month, the ex-governor’s legal team issued a request calling on JCOPE to preserve any documents related to its December decision ordering Cuomo to relinquish profits from his $5.1 million pandemic memoir deal.
The commission voted to claw back Cuomo’s profits following reports that staffers assisted in writing and promoting the tome. Cuomo insists all the assistance was done on a voluntary basis.
However, aides told investigators working on a since-scuttled Assembly impeachment probe that they felt the tasks they were assigned when it came to the book, “American Crisis: Leadership Lessons from the COVID-19 Pandemic,” were not optional.
Rich Azzopardi, a spokesman for the former governor, dismissed the latest move by the ethics panel.
“J-joke is going to J-joke,” he said.
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