It should not have taken months for the McKee administration to investigate the details of the now-infamous March business trip to Philadelphia by two state officials that made the state the butt of national jokes.
That’s what Gov. Daniel J. McKee suggested was the holdup in publicly denouncing – and then acting on – the complaints by developer Scout Ltd. against David Patten, the former state property director, and James Thorsen, the former director of the R.I. Department of Administration.
Gov. McKee finally announced on June 15, three months after the trip, that Patten, accused of the worst of the “blatantly sexist, racist and unprofessional” behavior outlined in an email the developer sent state officials, will resign.
That announcement followed news that the staff of the R.I. Ethics Commission had prepared ethics complaints against the two officials just a week after first learning of the sordid details in the email.
Yes, there were privacy issues to consider. But it should have been immediately clear to the governor and his advisers that a swift public response and resolution from the administration deserved priority in this case.
Instead, the administration fought for months to keep the details private and let the matter linger as a human resources issue.
In the interim, Mr. Thorsen announced within weeks of the trip that he was leaving his post for a federal job, with the governor issuing a statement thanking him for his service.
It’s hard not to wonder now what else is going on in the McKee administration that we should know about.
I’ve been wondering that every since McKee took office.