Robert J. Fontaine -- on leave since Sept. 1 from his $91,000-a-year job -- quits as the state police investigate possible misappropriation of funds.

01:00 AM EST on Saturday, November 13, 2004

BY KATHERINE GREGG
Journal State House Bureau

PROVIDENCE -- With the state police still investigating his spending of public money and the $8,300 he had the state pay his family members for unspecified work, Robert J. Fontaine, executive director of the state Board of Elections, quit yesterday.

Fontaine, who has been on paid leave since Sept. 1, quit his $91,503-a-year job before he could be fired.

By midweek, it had become clear that a majority on the seven-member board -- including the chairman, Roger N. Begin -- was poised to vote on Tuesday to fire Fontaine, a former Woonsocket City Council president, from a job he had held since April 2, 1995.

"I don't want to prejudge what is going to occur, but it appears likely that the board will terminate Bob Fontaine's employment," said Begin, the former state lawmaker, state treasurer and lieutenant governor who recruited Fontaine from his own hometown world of Woonsocket politics.

Begin would not detail the reasons.

But in an interview earlier this week, he said the information the board has "to work with . . . appears to be enough to justify the termination of Bob Fontaine and I would support that."

The board's vice chairman, Thomas Iannitti, was more blunt: "We want this guy off the payroll. Enough is enough."

Not every member of the seven-member board agreed.

On Wednesday, member John DaLuz, said: "I believe there is a state police investigation going on and it hasn't been completed. I think that should be completed before a decision is made."

But Iannitti said his own "conversations with employees and discussions about how that place has been managed . . . or in my humble opinion, mismanaged" are sufficient grounds to fire Fontaine, without waiting for the outcome of the criminal investigation.

"At the least, I am going to ask that the board just strip him of that salary of almost $1,800 a week. I find that highly offensive," Iannitti said.

Elections board member Frank Rego agreed: "I am not saying Bob Fontaine is guilty of anything from a criminal aspect. I think from a management standpoint, it's time that we move on."

Fontaine's one-sentence letter of resignation was conveyed to Begin yesterday by his attorney, Peter DiBiase, who declined to answer any questions about the timing and impetus of the move.

"He has resigned effective today," DiBiase said. "As to the whys and the wherefores, I really can't get into it."

Asked specifically whether Fontaine's resignation resulted from any plea negotiations, DiBiase said: "I have no comment on the substance of this."

But state police Inspector Elwood Johnson said Fontaine's resignation "will not affect our efforts or our investigation." He did not elaborate.

Deputy Attorney General Gerald Coyne confirmed that "members of our criminal division have been working closely with the state police for quite a while now," and "I believe we are nearing an end . . . The investigative phase will [soon] be ending."

FONTAINE'S TROUBLES have been building since late last year when an anonymous letter prompted Begin to request a "special audit" by Auditor General Ernest A. Almonte.

The audit cited a series of questionable purchases by the state elections agency, Fontaine's home-use of a state-owned snow blower, and the prohibited use of a state computer to visit "inappropriate sites."

Almonte later confirmed that this included "more than one" visit to a "pornography site."

The questionable purchases included two Bose stereo systems costing an estimated $1,300 each, and six leather bags valued at between $195 and $534. One of the bags was still in its packing; another could not be located.

Asked why the state Board of Elections needed two stereo systems, the report quoted Fontaine as saying the second "was purchased after the first one was misplaced." As to why the agency needed even one high-end stereo system, the auditors said: "we were informed that the use of the stereo system is as a public-address system during vote recounts or absentee-ballot counts."

The auditors said Fontaine's routine requests for $75 or more, each month, for in-state travel did not match "actual odometer readings."

They also noted that all the documentation for the purchases "included the authorized signature of the Board of Elections except one, which was purchased through the use of a state provided charge card."

In response to these findings, the elections board decided during a Jan. 13 closed-door meeting to give Fontaine "an oral reprimand."

Months later, Begin said the board weighed "the circumstances, the evidence and frankly . . . the years of service, very good service, that Mr. Fontaine has given to the state and to the Board of Elections." Neither the audit -- nor the board's response to it -- were made public, however, until a new round of allegations from a "current employee" precipitated the board's Sept. 1 move to put Fontaine on leave.

Neither Begin nor the election board's lawyer, Raymond Marcaccio, disclosed the allegations.

But the state police ackowledged they were investigating "possible misappropriation of funds."

A Providence Journal inquiry subsequently uncovered more than $8,300 in Board of Election payments to Fontaine's daughter, Jillian, and his brother, Maurice.

Fontaine's executive secretary, Tina Benros, said he would give her "yellow sticky note[s]" telling her how many days she was to place them on the payroll.

The newspaper also exposed other expenses, including Fontaine's purchase, just before Christmas, of three A.T. Cross pens at a cost to the state of $227; a $251 "presidential lamp" from a gift catalog; and three hand-held personal organizers, ranging in price from $399.99 to $499.99.

When asked their whereabouts last month, Marcaccio, the board's lawyer, said: "We can't point to them."

Yesterday, Begin said: "What has occurred here is a terrible tragedy for him personally, terrible for the board and it will always be a mystery to me, to understand the motivation of what appears to be this behavior."

But Iannitti said some items that were missing "have mysteriously reappeared," including framed prints, flag sets, and a Bose sound system that "happened to show up in a black garbage bag."

"How did that get back in the building? Who assisted in getting that stuff back into the building?" asked Iannitti, a onetime chairman of the West Warwick Republican Committee and GOP candidate for Congress and secretary of state.

At Iannitti's request, the agenda for Tuesday's Board of Elections meeting includes "possible vote of no-confidence in the chairman of the Board of Elections; possible discussion of duties and responsibilities of the chairman of the Board of Elections and commissioners."

BEGIN HIMSELF publicly anticipated the move earlier this week, and he labled it a "disingenuous attempt" by political opportunists to use Fontaine's "tragic" situation to "take control of the board".

Begin said he is not under investigation; in fact, there is a "continuing investigation of whose signatures actually appear" on the documents authorizing the questionable purchases and payrolls.

As for why Iannitti would now claim the board was habitually kept in the dark, Begin said: "That's ridiculous . . . He's not shy . . . You mean he never asked about any of this?"

But Iannitti had this response yesterday: "This is not a political issue. This is a moral issue," Iannitti said. "There has been gross mismanagement at the Board of Elections. We've now got to make sure that people in Rhode Island understand that we're going to change that. That will change. Period."

And, "let me tell you what was really disingenuous and deceitful," he continued, "to make the comment that people 'covet becoming the chairman' when he knows, beyond any reasonable doubt, that would be the decision of Governor Don Carcieri.

"I do not become the chairman if, for some reason, Roger Begin, should step down, and that is totally disingenuous and dishonest to say that," Iannitti said. "It is that typical glib answer that I find personally offensive for the business that we are in."

Echoed Rego, his fellow elections commissioner: "As Harry Truman said, the buck stops here . . . He's the only guy signing that stuff."