EDITORIAL PROOF POSITIVE CITY AND COUNTY OFFICIALS SHARE BLAME FOR EIDC SCANDAL.

WHEN the Entertainment Industry Development Corp. scandal first emerged last year, city and county officials hopped around trying to manufacture outrage that such a thing could happen.

How, they asked, could EIDC President Cody Cluff have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars of public money on such things as yoga classes and strip joints?

Now it's clear that it was all just a big act to deflect the truth: The officials who sat on the board of this quasi-public agency ignored Cluff's shenanigans even while they enjoyed the political donations he made to their campaigns.

The transcripts of the grand jury investigation released this week show officials testifying that they had no clue about some of Cluff's alleged expenditures, such as the $36,000 he dropped on the high school where his sons played football, a family country club membership of more than $15,000 and $8,000 in strip club visits - half of it in a one-night party.

As president of the county-city agency that was created to make it easier to make movies in Los Angeles, and therefore stop the runaway production problems, Cluff made arguments of the ``When in Rome'' variety. If you want to make Hollywood deals, you have to appear as a player, his lawyer said.

That may be true, but things obviously got way out of hand, and that's where the EIDC board should have stepped in and given Cluff and other EIDC officials a reality check.

Supervisors and council members testified to the grand jury that they would never have approved those types of expenditures had they known about them.

So they had no clue, huh? No idea that Cluff was giving himself raises and bonuses and exotic trips at the expense of taxpayers?

That's not very reassuring.

The EIDC scandal raises concerns about whether city and county leaders are doing their job of overseeing how taxpayer money is used, and making sure basic services are covered. What other arms of City Hall or the County Hall of Administration are running rampant with no one paying attention?

Cluff faces possible jail time if convicted of the 11 counts for misuse of public funds, embezzlement and forgery.

But the county supervisors, City Council members, mayor and other city officials who were on the board share much blame for not putting a stop to the out-of-control spending. Perhaps they, too, might benefit from a little time out, so they can reflect deeply on their duty to their constituents.

Their only response to being exposed as irresponsible leaders so far has been to try to find a way to insulate themselves from oversight of the EIDC. Maybe they should think about just doing their jobs.