State ethics officials are continuing to press the former Methuen police chief who resigned in 2021 after a scathing report from the inspector general questioned his handling of contracts that would have sent ranking officers’ pay soaring.
The state Ethics Commission on Thursday issued an order to show cause alleging Joseph Solomon violated the conflict of interest law by changing a draft collective bargaining agreement to increase his salary and providing unwarranted benefits to five intermittent officers.
The commission’s Enforcement Division says Solomon had an opportunity to resolve the matter through a disposition agreement before it filed the order as it found “reasonable cause” regarding a conflict of interest.
A hearing on the allegations against Solomon will be scheduled within 90 days.
A bulk of the complaint accuses Solomon of never informing the mayor or any other Methuen official that he consulted with the leader of the superior officers’ union to add a contract provision that would have increased salaries between 35% and 183%.
That caught the attention of former Inspector General Glenn Cunha who published a report in late 2020 that his office “found a failure of leadership at all levels” regarding the contracts approved in 2017 for Solomon and the superior officers; sergeants, lieutenants and captains.
The inspector general report led to Solomon and a captain being placed on paid administrative leave.
The language would have set already well-paid Solomon up to be one of the highest-paid police chiefs in the country, boosting his salary by around $90,000 to over $375,000 in Fiscal Year 2019.
“Solomon, with a bachelor’s degree in accounting, understood the financial impact of the changes, but did not inform other members of the negotiating team of the changes,” the order alleges.
Solomon is alleged to have hired three employees of his private security firm and a Methuen city councilor as non-civil service intermittent police officers, another conflict-of-interest violation, the order states.
The former chief also recommended hiring five intermittent officers for full-time work, at least four of which didn’t have proof of completing required training, the order alleges.
These actions came to light in a report released in March and commissioned by the city of Methuen. In that report, Solomon was described as a “‘Don’ of an organized crime family” and a co-conspirator to get former city council president Sean Fountain a police detective job that defrauded the city out of $400,000.
Thursday’s order emphasizes those points, including how Solomon provided the city’s human resources director a fabricated training certificate to get Fountain the job which provided him benefits exceeding $1,000 in a 12-month period.
Fountain is alleged to have forged a certificate that claimed he graduated from Northeast Regional Police Institute in 1995. But the certificate was actually an altered copy of a retired police lieutenant’s actual certificate, reports allege.
“Solomon repeatedly violated the conflict of interest law’s prohibition against public employees using their official positions to obtain valuable, unwarranted privileges or benefits for themselves or others,” the order alleges.
The Ethics Commission is authorized to impose a civil penalty of up to $10,000 for each violation of the conflict of interest law.
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July 07, 2023 at 07:38AM
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Massachusetts Ethics Commission: Former Methuen police chief violated conflict of interest - Boston Herald
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