July 14, 2009 05:25 PM UTC

Conservative GJ Sentinel Defends Ritter's Stimulus Legal Contract

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• by: Colorado Pols

If Governor Bill Ritter’s decision to award a contract to his former law firm concerning distribution of federal stimulus funds was really the public-image disaster some Republicans insist it is, we submit to you the Grand Junction Sentinel’s stalwartly conservative editorial board would say so.

Instead, they said today almost exactly what we said this weekend:

Gov. Bill Ritter would have been better off to ask for bids on legal work related to the $3 billion in federal stimulus funding Colorado is to receive, instead of approving a no-bid contract with his former law firm.

But that doesn’t mean Hogan and Hartson is a poor choice to do the work. In fact, it is one of Colorado’s pre-eminent law firms, with lawyers from both sides of the political aisle. One of Ritter’s Republican opponents in his re-election bid next year, Scott McInnis, is a partner at the law firm.

Furthermore, the firm is very well qualified to deal with the intricacies of federal legislation and public finance. Congress made the stimulus funding a complicated patchwork of conditions and mandates on how the money may be spent, so such expertise is certainly warranted.

Even so, some of Ritter’s opponents will no doubt make much of the fact that he awarded the contract to his old legal buddies. The governor could have deflected that criticism if he had put the contract out to bid. He chose not to, as is his legal right…

And like the Sentinel concludes, he’s going to have to explain that decision on the campaign trail, probably more than once. But just as we said originally and the Sentinel agrees, the underlying reason to bring in this particular law firm for the job is unassailably sound. Kudos to the Sentinel for keeping their criticism focused on the less-controversial facts of the matter, when they could just as easily have chucked all that and eagerly subsidized the latest Ritter-hater sound bite.

Of course, it also doesn’t hurt that Scott McInnis has worked for Hogan and Hartson for the last several years, and the Sentinel doesn’t want to do anything that might boomerang back on their local boy.