The curious case of Elizabeth Smith

June 22, 2:18 PMBaltimore Politics ExaminerAdam Meister

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One of the many current city hall sagas involves two city employees accusing each other of second degree assault. The female in this relationship gone terribly wrong is named Elizabeth Smith. Since I first wrote about this story I have received numerous emails and page comments that have implored me to write more about Smith. I gave it some thought and Ms. Smith is quite a newsworthy individual for many reasons.

According to this City Paper article, Elizabeth Smith had a job with union organizer Glen Middleton. She had a position with the American Federation of State, County, and Municipal Employees Council 67. AFSCME is one of the unions that many of our corrupt politicians are indebted to. Glen Middleton is so powerful that he basically got the city council to make his wife Sharon Green Middleton the councilperson for the 6th district after Stephanie became City Council President and gave up her 6th district seat. The City Paper article implies that Glen Middleton had thoughts about giving Smith this position but he decided to give it his wife. Smith eventually left her union job and ran for against Sharon Green Middleton in the 2007 election. In 2007 she was the deputy director of CommunityBuilding in Partnership, a West Baltimore economic and community development nonprofit.

Smith was defeated in 2007 but in April of that same year she was placed on the Baltimore Commission for Women by Mayor Dixon.  She was also placed on the liquor board in April of 2007 by Governor O'Malley. Her liquor board job is a paid position. The Baltimore Sun now says that Smith now works for the city's housing department.  

Smith is clearly associated with some "powerful people" who have tremendous influence over most of the Baltimore bureaucracy. It is clear that some patronage has been tossed her way.  She has played the machine well.  I am not a big fan of the machine or high salaried patronage jobs though.  She has been able to get "jobs" with a union, city government, state government, and a non-profit.    I am curious about the ethics behind a city employee having a paid state appointment.   Something does not seem right about that one.

PS- I am on Twitter now. You can follow me at Twitter.com/techbalt