Attorney General Bill Lockyer says he will not send state monitors to San Diego for the election of the city’s largest labor union, which began Friday. The city attorney requested observers to mediate disputes of corruption within the Municipal Employees Association. KPBS Radio’s Andrew Phelps reports.
Spokesman Tom Dresslar says it did not take long for the attorney general to decide he’d stay out of local, union politics. But City Attorney Mike Aguirre told the attorney general he has information that has “raised a number of concerns” about the integrity of the election, although Aguirre won’t say what that information is. Outgoing president Judie Italiano disputes any claims of corruption and says state monitors are not necessary.
Italiano: We will have people monitoring the election. The whole process is being looked at by our attorney and monitored by our attorney. And there is no reason for anyone to think for one moment there is anything wrong with the procedures of this election.
The Municipal Employees Association is the city’s largest union, representing 6,000 white collar workers. For KPBS, I’m Andrew Phelps.
