The creation of a new fraud unit at the state Attorney General’s office has stalled again. Thursday, the Legislative Fiscal Committee voted to table a request to approve funding for it.
The governor and Executive Council have approved the unit, which would be funded by the state’s mortgage settlement with big banks. But the Republican-dominated committee has resisted allocating money to it, saying it would ultimately add staff to the government payroll. But the AG’s Consumer Protection Bureau Chief James Boffetti says a fraud unit is needed.
“We get complaints about consumer fraud and concerns of unfair and deceptive business practices that we need to investigate, but we don’t have adequate staff to do that," Boffetti says.
New Hampshire got $43 million in the national settlement. Boffetti says the proposed unit would be funded for four years with $2.5 million of that cash. After that, he says it would be self-funded through civil penalties from prosecutions.
