Senate DFL leader not ready to okay sex scandal legal bill

The Minnesota Senate minority leader says the Senate shouldn't yet pay its $46,000 it owes to lawyers dealing with a possible lawsuit from ex-employee Michael Brodkorb.

Sen. Tom Bakk, DFL-Cook, said Thursday the Senate should have a public hearing on the expense before it approves the payment.

The Senate last week got the $46,150 bill to cover the first three months of the year of outside counsel's work in defending the Senate against a possible Brodkorb lawsuit. Brodkorb was fired late last year the day after former Senate Majority Leader Amy Koch stepped down. Koch resigned as leader after fellow senators confronted her about the affair she and Brodkorb were having.

Although the private attorney, Dayle Nolan, originally told the Senate that she would bill it every month, her first bill came only after five months of work and included charges for only the first quarter of the year.

Bakk noted the bill amounts to just under the $50,000 trigger for a public hearing. But Secretary of Senate Cal Ludeman has also said that he needs both Bakk and Senate Majority Leader Dave Senjem, R-Rochester, to sign off before he can pay it.

Bakk, who was traveling last week when the bill arrived, said he is reluctant to give his sign off without a hearing.

"I understand why Republicans want to put their scandal behind them, but that's no reason to subvert the public process," Bakk said.

He also noted that the legal charges will only grow saying the bill, "is just the early down payment on what I expect to be a long, contentious, and expensive ordeal for the State Senate," he said.

Update:Senate Republican spokesman Steve Sviggum said Thursday that "ultimately" the Senate will hold the public hearing that Bakk desires so that the bill can be paid. But he also noted that Bakk and other senators approved a resolution during the session to allow bills under $50,000 to be paid without such a hearing. "Now Bakk wants to change the rules," Sviggum said. He said it was in "poor taste" that Bakk was, "trying to politicize the situation and politicize the institution."