The North Carolina Democratic Party would like to extend best wishes to State Auditor Les Merritt on the retirement of his side business.

Mr. Merritt announced in May that on June 30th he would end on the practice of providing investment advice to private clients.

This followed scorching public scrutiny after Mr. Merritt approved a press release advertising his public job to lure clients at an investment firm through which he and his son provide services. The state’s largest newspapers joined NCDP Chair Jerry Meek in 2005 in calling for Merritt to stop compromising his public job with ads featuring a coupon to receive a free hour of consultation services.

Merritt earns $115,000 a year, three times the annual income of the average North Carolina family. Now that Merritt has decided to stop moonlighting, maybe he could give the people of the state his undivided attention.

Please join NCDP as we send retirement wishes to Merritt by commenting here.
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