ALBANY — Meeting for the first time in eight years, the state Senate Ethics Committee punted over the issue of controversial stipends that were paid to noncommittee chairmen.
Senate Democrats tried to push a motion that going forward would bar the stipends meant for committee chairmen — known as lulus — from being paid to anyone else.
The effort was blocked. Senate Ethics Committee Chairwoman Elaine Phillips (R-Nassau County) noted the issue is the subject of litigation, but then corrected herself to use the word “inquiries.”
But a source in the room said GOP Counsel David Lewis quietly told her there was litigation and that the Senate hired a lawyer. A Senate GOP spokesman had no comment.
The Daily News previously reported that the Brooklyn U.S. attorney’s and state attorney general’s offices have been reviewing the payment of committee chairmen lulus to five Senate Republicans and three members of the breakaway Independent Democratic Conference aligned with the GOP. They got the stipends even though they did not lead the panels that records submitted to the state controller’s office said they did.
The Senate GOP maintains everything was legal.
The stipend issue was put off until the next Ethics Committee meeting, which Sen. Michael Gianaris (D-Queens) quipped would be in another eight years.