It’s all about accountability

The Leader-Herald, New York: The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency is very conscientious about telling Americans, both businesses and individuals, they have to clean up their air emissions, water discharges, etc. But when it comes to cleaning up its own top management, “not so much” is being charitable.

One might have thought the 2013 conviction of former EPA Deputy Assistant Administrator John C. Beale would have been viewed as a teaching moment. Beale finally was caught after defrauding taxpayers of nearly $900,000 during a decade in which he claimed lengthy absences from work were because he was working undercover for the CIA. No one checked.

But last year, agency officials named Peter Jutro to head the EPA’s Office of Homeland Security — despite the fact 16 women — yes, 16 — had complained he sexually harassed them. Only after someone outside the agency, an intern at the Smithsonian Institution, complained was Jutro terminated from that job.

Members of a congressional committee heard that and other stories about misbehavior by EPA employees last week. “It is well past time for someone to be held accountable,” said U.S. Rep. Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah.

Well, yes. But federal bureaucrats have heard the same threats for years — and little ever changes. Perhaps lawmakers, too, should be held accountable for not cracking down on agency leaders who tolerate misbehavior and outright crime.