Ethics Commission will investigate McKee's 'free lunch' with lobbyist. What to know.

Gov. Dan McKee's fundraising Capital Grille power lunch with a State House lobbyist and the since-fired firm that was trying to redevelop the Cranston Street Armory is going to be the subject of a State Ethics Commission investigation.

The Ethics Commission, responding to a state Republican Party complaint, voted unanimously Tuesday to investigate whether McKee's share of the $228 lunch, paid for by lobbyist and political fixer Jeff Britt, violated the $25 gift limit in the code of ethics for public officials.

"The Ethics Commission needs to expose Rhode Island’s pay-to-play political culture," Rhode Island GOP Chairman Joe Powers said after the Ethics Commission vote to investigate.

Background on the lunch

Those involved differ on how the January lunch came together, but McKee and his campaign's lead fundraiser, Jerry Sahagian, attended it with Britt and his clients, the two principals of then Armory developer Scout Ltd. The Scout team, Managing Partner Lindsey Scannapieco and Development Director Everett Abitbol, contributed $500 to the McKee campaign that day.

McKee campaign spokesman Mike Trainor said in an email that "this complaint is politically … not ethically…motivated by the GOP. The campaign will look forward to the conduct and completion of the Ethics Commission investigation."

More: McKee, Britt give conflicting accounts of Capital Grille lunch. What actually happened?

The lunch was revealed by The Journal after Scout, which was seeking state funding to rehab the Armory, reported details of a March visit by two high-ranking McKee administration officials to a project they had done in Philadelphia, and the behavior they described turned into a national scandal.

Scout reported that one of the Rhode Island officials, David Patten, had made racist and sexist remarks while using his position to extract favors and gifts from Scout and businesses at a former vocational school building they turned into a commercial and community space.

The McKee administration hired consultant JLL to scrutinize Scout's Armory proposal on March 15, shortly after the Philadelphia trip, although Department of Administration spokeswoman Laura Hart said plans to commission a third-party analysis began in February.

After that consultant's report was released earlier this month, Scout was fired.

McKee says he didn't know lunch was with Scout

Regarding the January lunch, McKee told reporters he hadn't known ahead of time that he would be lunching with people from Scout.

But Britt said he had told the campaign ahead of time that Scout would be at the lunch and the "governor was clearly familiar with the project."

The ethics case is likely to hinge on the money paid for the lunch and, as Common Cause Rhode Island executive director John Marion described it, whether the governor "ordered the $24 Cobb salad or the $39 steak for lunch."

The McKee campaign said the governor left the lunch early and since Sahagian had forgotten the campaign credit card asked Britt to pick up the $228 tab and send them an invoice for reimbursement.

This article originally appeared on The Providence Journal: McKee's lunch at Capital Grille with lobbyist subject of ethics investigation