NYT/AP: House Approves Page Program Overhaul: When Mark Foley resigned, page board had not yet met

[DeepModem Mom]

House Approves Page Program Overhaul
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: January 19, 2007

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The House voted Friday to overhaul the board that supervises its congressional page program, seeking to close the book on a sordid e-mail and sex scandal that sullied its reputation and became a Campaign 2006 issue.

Specifically, lawmakers voted 416-0 to provide that both parties have equal say in overseeing the program, as old as the institution itself.

The purpose of the resolution the members approved Friday was to ensure that teen-age pages no longer are vulnerable to the kinds of electronic-message come-ons associated with now-resigned Rep. Mark Foley, R-Fla.

The bipartisan resolution resulted from the failure of the House Page Board's past Republican chairman, Illinois Republican John Shimkus, to notify other board members that Foley had sent questionable e-mails to a former page....

The new, eight-member board will include an equal number of lawmakers from each party and include a former page and the parent of a current or former page. The board also would have to meet regularly....

***

Shimkus had learned of Foley's e-mails in November 2005. While he went with the House clerk to confront Foley, Shimkus never convened a page board meeting and Foley failed to stop his messages to male former pages....

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-House-Pages.html?hp&ex=1169269200&en=cf6d55fe64305b70&ei=5094&partner=homepage

[Hekate]

1. About time. It's unbelievable to me that it ever was allowed to get so bad...

...The whole situation was unprofessional on every level. In my entire working life in public institutions (County, University) there have been mechanisms in place to protect the vulnerable from abuse. Bad things can and do still happen, but there are structures in place that mean that when transgressions come to light they are dealt with. Soon.

One of those structures is mandatory management and supervisor training on sexual harassment. It is a crying shame that we would need this very thing and not have it for the members of the US Congress. The sense of entitlement and above-the-law attitude of the formerly Republican-dominated Congress beggar belief.

And the pages are kids! They're teenagers, and they need supervision themselves, not some horny jerk checking them out.

Hekate

edited to KnR
:kick:

[tanyev]

2. 416-0.

Something that should have been done the minute the Mark Foley news broke. (Actually, something that should have been happening all along, but that's another issue.)

[SoCalDem]

3. And?... about Foley (can you hear the crickets chirping?)

He escaped a hearing on his conduct, he "retired" (probably with some pension benefits), and just wandered off to a rehab-sunset..:puke:

[Parche]

4. congress

Isnt it great that they are finally working FOR Americans their BOSS

[rocktivity]

5. For ten years--TEN YEARS!!!--Foley was allowed to prey on those kids

And the Rethugs not only looked the other way, they didn't tell the Dems--and warned only the Repub-sponsored pages. Can you say, "accessory before and after the fact?"

:headbang:
rocknation