Bad Rowland Bad!

This has been bubbling for a while, but I hope to pick up some local insight on this when I get back East. The Republican Governor of Connecticut is in trouble. The "i" word has been tossed around.

It may turn out that Mr. Rowland's efforts to upgrade the seasonal cottage into a handsomely furnished, year-round retreat will present the biggest political and legal crises of what had once seemed a charmed career. Indeed, critics have seized on the cottage as an example of what they say is the governor's tendency to accept gratuities, only to be forced later to make restitution or pay fines when they become public.

On Friday, he released a statement listing a number of contractors, state officials and employees, as well as "personal friends," who he says performed thousands of dollars of renovations free of charge. Of particular interest to federal prosecutors are services provided by two of Mr. Rowland's former top aides and a state contractor who are at the center of a corruption investigation into the awarding of government contracts.

The NY Times has picked up on the story in the last week but the Hartford Courant (the nations oldest newspaper in continuous publication, est 1764) have been all over it for a while now.

[ed. oops, bad links, fixed now]