THUMBS DOWN The Grand Jury’s Wild Goose Chase

Thumbs down to Frank Finn, foreman of a Dallas grand jury, for instigating an investigation of the Dallas County commissioners. Their “crime”? Trying to keep the budgets of county judges in line with other county spending. Of course it is inconceivable that considering budget matters in open public hearings, as the commissioners have done, can be construed as illegal. And it is even more absurd that a grand jury would waste county money investigating the matter. Commissioner Chris Semos correctly states that it is the commissioners’ constitutional duty to set the budget, and any attempt by a grand jury to punish them for doing that is nothing less than a crime against a fair and public process.