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Friday, January 15, 2010
Boomer with Attitude / News Helms: Great career, terrible ending
Posted By John Grooms on Fri, Jan 15, 2010 at 11:22 AM
Parks Helms resigned yesterday as head of the county ABC board after taking a beating for weeks over his attendance at a lavish November dinner paid for by Diaego, a liquor company. No one has suggested that the dinner involved a quid pro quo exchange of favors by the ABC board for Diaego. Nonetheless, Helms & Co.'s acceptance of the liquor company's gift emits the obvious smell of corruption and good ol' boy back-scratching. The general public was unaware that such rail-greasing has been the norm for ABC boards statewide for decades, so once the dinner became news, the outpouring of outrage was so strong, Helms' resignation was just a matter of time.
State ABC Commission Chair Jon Williams said Helms was an example of a "culture of entitlement" in the alcoholic beverage system — and Williams should know, since he heads up that system. Helms says Williams made him a scapegoat, which rings true, considering that the November dinner was really just a particularly expensive version of a common form of industry/government, er, massaging. Williams and Gov. Perdue are to be commended for their determination to clean up the system — it's long overdue, in fact — but it’s lamentable that Parks Helms became the designated fall guy.
It's a lousy end to a fine career of public service; Helms led the county commission through turbulent times with an even hand, while promoting progressive values. Over the years, he became a sort of benevolent godfather for Charlotte-Mecklenburg Democrats, and even though he no doubt lingered too long in the deal-making swamp that is government at any level, his career, overall, was a positive, constructive one.
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