Josh Moves on Up

Our favorite Phi Psi lawyer checks in with this which was reported in the Buffalo News.

An Albany lawyer with a reputation as a troubleshooter has been named chief executive officer of the State Liquor Authority, an agency under investigation by the state attorney general's office for failing to enforce its own laws on alcohol sales.

Joshua B. Toas was named to the newly created post Monday, according to an e-mail message sent to SLA employees by Edward F. Kelly, chairman of the state agency.

Gov. George E. Pataki's office confirmed Toas' appointment Tuesday evening.

"Josh Toas is a trusted and valued member of the administration, and the governor is confident that his leadership and impressive record of accomplishments will serve the State Liquor Authority well," said Pataki spokesman Saleem M. Cheeks.

Sources in the Pataki administration say Toas was named to beef up enforcement efforts in the troubled agency.

Toas was most recently deputy executive director of the state agency overseeing science, technology and academic research, and before that was executive deputy commissioner of the state's Office of Alcoholism and Substance Abuse Services.

A state official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the changes are coming to the SLA to "help move the agency in another direction, in particular with respect to improving their enforcement efforts."

His appointment comes after The Buffalo News last summer reported that SLA officials had ignored the widespread practice of alcohol wholesalers' and suppliers' paying off favored retailers with illegal deep discounts, cash and trips to wineries.

Witnesses testified about the lack of enforcement at a later Assembly hearing, and in October, Attorney General Eliot L. Spitzer confirmed that his office had undertaken a major investigation of the SLA and the liquor industry.

Prosecutors from Spitzer's office have issued a number of subpoenas to wholesalers and distributors, and retailers say the illegal pricing, as practiced in the past, already has stopped.

Left uncertain about Toas' appointment is the future role of Kelly, who is paid $120,000 to run the agency, along with two commissioners - Lawrence J. Gedda and Joseph E. Zarriello - who are paid $80,000 each.

Albany sources said they expected that Kelly, 71, and other senior agency officials will soon be retiring or moving on.

Assembly Majority Leader Paul A. Tokasz, D-Cheektowaga, said the newly created position came as a surprise to him.

"Obviously, the State Liquor Authority in the Buffalo area doesn't appear to be doing its job," Tokasz said. "Employees have complained to me about a lack of enforcement, a lack of staff. I think the agency in general is going downhill."

Toas, a captain in the Army Reserve's Judge Advocate General's Corps, recently served a tour of duty in Iraq.

He is a former assistant secretary of state, assistant counsel to the governor and associate counsel of the State Senate.

Active in Republican national politics, Toas served as a floor manager for Republicans during the 2000 presidential election recount in Dade County, Fla.

Paul W. Zuber, a lobbyist who works with the liquor industry through the firm Powers Crane & Co., said that he knows Toas well and that he brings a reputation for solving problems in government. "I feel he'll do an outstanding job," Zuber said. "I'll enjoy working with him."