Secretive security team for PA. Senate questioned
HARRISBURG PA Jan 8 2018 — They stand guard outside Senate meetings. They keep the peace inside the Senate’s ornate chambers on voting days. They check offices of senators after hours and are supposed to report suspicious activity.
That aside, little is known about the 14-member Senate security force that came under scrutiny last week when its director resigned amid an investigation into sexual harassment allegations.
In many ways, it is a force that is ultimately accountable only to one person: Senate President Pro Tempore Joe Scarnati, R-Jefferson, who appoints its supervisor. Senate officials have blocked the public release of the force’s reports and have answered questions only about its most basic functions and responsibilities.
“There are certain basic [security] metrics the public is entitled to know because the public is paying for it,” said Eric Epstein, a Harrisburg-based good government advocate and coordinator of the voter education group Rock the Capital. “We are not living in a state where you can say ‘just trust me.’ ”
The Senate’s security force is part of a multi-layered security network inside the state Capitol. Though the Capitol Police guard and patrol the state Capitol complex, in Pennsylvania — as in several other states — each chamber in the Legislature has its own security force that ensures that legislative meetings run smoothly and legislative spaces remain safe.
Unlike the Capitol Police, however, the legislative security guards do not carry guns and do not have arrest powers. According to an official job description, security officer duties include protecting “persons and property from … fire, theft, trespass, harassment and other potential hazards.”
Senate security guards are also required to check on Senate offices after hours and fill out detailed log sheets about any “discrepancies.” Depending on what they find, they also could fill out a formal security report.
But unlike the Capitol Police, they do not make even basic information on those reports — such as time, place and a brief description of the incident — public.
Security guards have no written guidelines on when they should write detailed reports because of the wide array of incidents they might encounter on the job.
“Our security officers always have to weigh the privacy of members and staff in their offices with the public nature of the offices,” Megan Martin, the Senate’s secretary and parliamentarian, who oversees the Senate security unit, said in an emailed response to questions.
She added: “There is a degree of privacy the senators and staff are expected to be granted and our officers try to recognize this degree of privacy. It is a balance between the public aspect of the offices and the private aspect of holding meetings or conferences, taking calls, conducting legislative business and creating work product in these offices.”
Late last year, the Senate denied requests under the state’s Right-to-Know law by the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette and The Philadelphia Inquirer to divulge reports filed by Senate security officers during several months in 2017, saying they do not meet the definition of a “legislative record” and therefore are not public.
The Senate’s chief clerk, Donetta M. D’Innocenzo, an appointee of Mr. Scarnati, first rejected the records request.
An appeal by the newspapers was then denied by a legislative lawyer after Ms. Martin, also a Scarnati appointee, recused herself because her office oversees the chamber’s security force, which costs about $700,000 a year in salaries.
Last week, Ms. Martin became the acting director of Senate Security after Justin Ferrante, who held that position, resigned under pressure amid an investigation into allegations that he sexually harassed two female subordinates. The Senate hired an outside law firm to investigate the complaints against Mr. Ferrante, who has declined to discuss the matter. State records show his salary was $78,542.
The harassment complaints are not public, and a top Senate official has said only that the inquiry is ongoing.
The Legislature, which wrote the state’s Right-to-Know law nearly a decade ago, shielded much of its work from public access. Only very specific records, such as financial documents, legislation, meeting minutes and policy manuals, are defined as open records.
Ms. Martin, in her emailed response, said security officers — and the subjects of the reports — are the only people who are allowed to view and obtain copies of them. In some instances, including those that involve someone getting injured on the job, the reports could be forwarded to Ms. D’Innocenzo’s office.
Mr. Epstein, the Harrisburg-based activist, called that policy “horse hockey.”
“It doesn’t build confidence,” he said.
Pittsburgh Post Gazette
