On the Cheng Patrol: Lamont asks Scanlon to audit Chancellor’s spending on meals, driver and housing.

Governor Ned Lamont said Friday that he has asked State Comptroller Sean Scanlon to audit Connecticut State Colleges and Universities (CSCU) Chancellor Terrence Cheng’s lavish spending on meals and travel. The audit is also expected to examine Cheng’s use of his housing and automobile allowance, including the use of a car service to ferry the New York resident around Hartford and the state. The black SUV was spotted several months ago and is pictured above.

The issue of Cheng’s spending was raised in a CT Insider investigation by Jacqueline Rabe Thomas in a Thursday article. Lamont’s referral to Scanlon comes on the heels of top state legislators calling for Cheng to turnover his personal spending records in the next 10 days. Cheng slow-walked complying with Thomas’s request for documents under the Freedom of Information Act for eight months. He has thus far disclosed about a third of the documents, according to Thomas.

The remaining 70% of the records are likely to add to public alarm at Cheng’s priorities. It is lost on no one but him that dinners with Lamont administration officials at Hartford’s Capital Grille came as Cheng ceaselessly complained that the 85,000 student system was underfunded.

Lamont earlier this year asked Scanlon to audit the records of the state’s Social Equity Council.

The audit of Cheng’s spending by Scanlon comes at an inopportune moment. Tuition at CSCU schools has been rising and the system’s Board of Regents has required a restoration of some student services, such as library hours. On Thursday, the board required Cheng to develop an extensive five-year sustainability plan, though that will likely be completed and initiated by Cheng’s successor.

The Cheng spending revelations are likely to grow more alarming as legislators and Scanlon obtain records that Cheng long denied Thomas. The insertion of Scanlon by Lamont into the issue has other implications as another reminder that the governor never turns to Lieutenant Governor Susan Bysiewicz to handle controversial or complicated matters.