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Flushing out the facts

It’s not quite clear what the folks at the State House were thinking when they plunked down 72 grand to renovate a bathroom in the venerable building, ostensibly to make it American with Disabilities Act-compliant.

But, as has been pointed out in other places, $72,000 for a bathroom? And at a time when budget writers are not just scouring underneath the cushions in search of nickels and dimes, but pennies and lint as well, to fill the gaping revenue shortfalls.

Nevertheless, it was amusing to see state Republicans send around a Foster’s Daily Democrat editorial justifiably excoriating Democratic leaders for defending the expenditure, since one of the points the newspaper made was that $72,000 seems more in line with the kind of money the noted lavatory designer Dennis Kozlowski – he of the $6,000 shower curtain – would cough up for such a job.

After all, before Kozlowski moved his official residence from Rye, N.H., to Attica, N.Y., at the behest of his long-term adopted home, he certainly didn’t just dedicate his largesse to bathrooms and toga parties. He also spent a significant amount in helping out his friends in the Republican Party, donating some $19,000 between from 1999 to 2001 to such causes as Elizabeth Dole’s presidential campaign, Rudy Giuliani’s Senate campaign, the National Republican Congressional Committee and Judd Gregg and John Sununu’s Senate campaigns.

Email - Jeff Feingold
Editor, New Hampshire Business Review