Bruno & son have distorted family values

Column by Bill Hammond

ALBANY - So one of the three most powerful men in state government can accept a $50,000 payment from a lobbyist, and it's legal. He can co-sign a $50,000 bank loan for that same lobbyist, and it's legal. He can omit these transactions from his financial disclosures, and it's legal - all because the lobbyist in question happens to be his son.

That was the upshot of last week's much-anticipated Albany Times Union investigation into the tangled affairs of Senate Majority Leader Joe Bruno and his son, lobbyist Kenneth Bruno. The paper found a $50,000 loan, a messy divorce and a money-losing real estate development, but no smoking gun.

At times like these, it pays to remember Michael Kinsley's Law of Political Scandal: The real scandal is what's legal.

The Times Union found that the younger Bruno, then a district attorney, borrowed $50,000 from his father to help build a house. Last year, when Ken Bruno was in the midst of divorcing his wife, he took out a bank loan to pay his father back, and his father co-signed the loan.

Top officials are obliged to disclose business dealings like these, but not if they involve a family member.

The real scandal here is that Ken Bruno makes $50,000 a month - a month - lobbying his father's aides and colleagues (he claims not to deal directly with his old man), and his father sees nothing wrong with that.

Sen. Bruno also feels free to use his considerable clout in ways that directly benefit his son's clients. Joe Bruno helped to block the West Side stadium, which is exactly what Ken Bruno's client, Madison Square Garden, wanted. Joe Bruno also refused to authorize an Indian casino in the Catskills - which was convenient for his son, who was representing a competing tribe.

Joe Bruno, though generally respected and well-liked around the Capitol, has a tin ear for ethics. "I love my family," the senator replied to his critics. "I'm not going to disadvantage them from whatever it is they feel they are capable of doing."

Maybe it wouldn't be fair - or constitutional - to "disadvantage" relatives of elected officials by prohibiting them from lobbying. But if Bruno wanted to send the right message, he would disclose his financial relationships with all lobbyists, whether or not they're blood relatives. Better yet, he would put the public's interest ahead of his family's - and persuade his son to find another line of work.