Gov. Paterson, distracted by the Caro line Kennedy debacle and other pressures, may not fully realize that his Labor Department is deputizing vigilantes to treat honest businessmen like horse thieves in the Old West.
That is, to hang ’em high.
A new pilot program announced last week will effectively sign up activist unions and “community organizations” (think ACORN) to sniff out alleged violations of labor law by employers.
One needn’t have lived in New York very long to understand where that presently will lead: kangaroo-court proceedings against companies that refuse to buckle under to activist pressure.
And, probably, worse.
Under the program, dubbed New York Wage Watch, six groups in New York City and Long Island – including several union locals and an activist outfit called Make the Road New York – will get official sanction from the state to “educate” workers and employers about state labor law.
They’ll also have an expedited line to the Labor Department’s enforcement arm to report any violations they encounter.
The department touts the program as a creative way to respond to violations that otherwise would have fallen into the cracks.
It’s creative, all right.
No reasonable person objects to state efforts to fairly, fully enforce the law. But empowering interest groups between the state and the citizen can quickly distort the law’s purpose.
After all, the organizations the Labor Department has teamed up with are hardly disinterested parties.
Indeed, the arrangement is an open invitation for the unions to use their semi-official stature to extra-legally extend their reach into targeted businesses.
Assurances from the Labor Department that it will be responsive to complaints from businesses are hardly reassuring.
After all, Make the Road New York is closely allied with community-organizing behemoth ACORN – which is notorious for shaking down banks, developers and other businesses that even gently resist its brand of “activism.”
Imagine the pressure such groups could bring to bear on law-abiding businesses with simply a hint of calling down a full-fledged state investigation.
Imagine the potential for old-fashioned cash-on-the-barrelhead corruption.
The program is slated to last six months – after which, presumably, the department would look to bring even more groups on board.
But there’s no reason to wait.
Gov. Paterson needs to put a stop to this foolishness now.