Free Republic

A panel of the Metropolitan Transit Authority board wants to know why the agency employs so few Hispanics, but its search for answers has been slowed by the difficulty of wading through reams of employment records. Board member Janie Reyes, who chairs the committee looking into hiring practices, said Monday the agency did not computerize these records until October. Despite incomplete records, the committee will hold its first meeting today to begin its review of Metro's hiring practices. "I'm asking for the last year of applicants," she said. "The problem is the time it takes manually to pull them out."...

Metro employee reportedly remained on bus, made calls Witnesses to an accident in which a Metro bus struck and killed a man in downtown Houston last month told police the bus driver never checked on the victim after the incident, but remained on the bus making telephone calls and filling out paperwork. One witness, Mary Acker of Houston, told police that the bus driver -- Alroyce Sheppard -- stepped out of the bus after the accident, looked at the injured man, then got back on the bus and began making telephone calls. Lisa Egan of Houston, one of the witnesses...

<p>The New Jersey Legislature has become a personal money machine for many lawmakers who parlay their public service into private gain, a Gannett New Jersey newspapers investigation found.</p> <p>Gov. McGreevey delivers his annual budget message early this year to a joint session of the Legislature in the General Assembly chamber in Trenton.</p>

Brady warns Democrats: The issue is party jobs By Thomas Fitzgerald Inquirer Staff Writer Forget the wage tax, the downward spiral of the city economy, and improving schools. Republicans want your job. Philadelphia Democratic chairman Bob Brady included that warning in a pointed memo addressed recently to about 2,500 members of the party's city committee, urging them to work harder to reelect Mayor Street. Giving up control of City Hall to the GOP, which in recent months took over the city Parking Authority and the Convention Center, would "jeopardize" patronage jobs that Democratic loyalists hold across the city, Brady wrote....

Wanted: Someone to work flexible hours, relaxed dress code, excellent pay, state job. Governor's stepdaughter preferred. On April 16, 2002, Bambi Todd, the stepdaughter of Gov. Paul Patton, was appointed, despite a hiring freeze, to be "responsible for public information, strategic planning, training, and assisting the executive with the day-to-day operations" at the Kentucky Racing Commission. The commission said the post was "essential or of a critical nature to the ongoing operation of the program," when it established it three weeks earlier. But Todd didn't work the weekend after the Kentucky Derby, when the eyes of the world focused on...