Questioning the AGs Means, Not Motive

This morning’s Globe has a story on the Attorney General’s office handing out a grant to provide summer jobs in Boston. Now, that’s a fine thing to support in principle but why is the AG’s office in the business of grant-making to worthy causes? My read of the office’s enabling act — Chap. 12 of the MGLs — provides little insight.

It turns out that the AG has been giving out grants to a variety of groups under the rubric of “Project Yes” which is spending out funds from a settlement with pharmaceutical companies on projects that “promote health”.

Again, each of these group appears worthy of support. But why is the AG’s office making grants in the name of health (particularly when we have a state department charged with similar duties and one hopes greater expertise at grantmaking)?

And what are the incentives involved when the AG’s office has the power to settle legal cases that then fund their own grantmaking activities?