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How to Unsettle a Settlement Agreement
Saturday, January 24th, 2009
Robert Wechsler
What happens if an ethics commission enters into a settlement agreement
in which an official admits to certain conduct in violation of the
jurisdiction's ethics code, and then the official goes out into the
world and says he did nothing wrong, but felt it was best for everyone
to pay the fine and move on?
Well, according to an article in yesterday's Philadelphia Inquirer, Philadelphia's ethics board gets at least some officials to agree "not to make any public statements that are inconsistent with the terms of the agreement." A clever move.
But what happens when the official ignores this part of the agreement?
The offense involved campaign finance (an excessively high contribution to a city council member's campaign, by a state senator), but it could have been any ethics violation.
The state senator and his attorney spoke to the press about the conduct, and said things that appear to be inconsistent with the agreement. The ethics board's executive director, Shane Creamer, took the issue to the press and, of course, the senator's attorney denied that they had said anything inconsistent with the agreement.
To which the ethics board director said, "The bottom line is that Sen. Hughes gave an unfair advantage to a city candidate who was in a close election. . . . His mischaracterization of his admitted violations is nothing more than an attempt to mislead the public about the seriousness of his committee's actions."
That goes to the root of the problem. Fines are secondary. The most important thing about ethics enforcement is getting the message across to the public, to other officials and, in cases such as this, to other campaign contributors why ethics rules are important and why enforcing them is important. When a politician acts as if he didn't really do anything so bad, he's questioning the validity of the ethics process and undermining the board's attempt to educate the public.
Not being straight about an ethics violation can be worse than the violation itself. I commend Philadelphia for using such a clause in its settlement agreements, and following up on it when it is ignored.
Robert Wechsler
Director of Research-Retired, City Ethics
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Well, according to an article in yesterday's Philadelphia Inquirer, Philadelphia's ethics board gets at least some officials to agree "not to make any public statements that are inconsistent with the terms of the agreement." A clever move.
But what happens when the official ignores this part of the agreement?
The offense involved campaign finance (an excessively high contribution to a city council member's campaign, by a state senator), but it could have been any ethics violation.
The state senator and his attorney spoke to the press about the conduct, and said things that appear to be inconsistent with the agreement. The ethics board's executive director, Shane Creamer, took the issue to the press and, of course, the senator's attorney denied that they had said anything inconsistent with the agreement.
To which the ethics board director said, "The bottom line is that Sen. Hughes gave an unfair advantage to a city candidate who was in a close election. . . . His mischaracterization of his admitted violations is nothing more than an attempt to mislead the public about the seriousness of his committee's actions."
That goes to the root of the problem. Fines are secondary. The most important thing about ethics enforcement is getting the message across to the public, to other officials and, in cases such as this, to other campaign contributors why ethics rules are important and why enforcing them is important. When a politician acts as if he didn't really do anything so bad, he's questioning the validity of the ethics process and undermining the board's attempt to educate the public.
Not being straight about an ethics violation can be worse than the violation itself. I commend Philadelphia for using such a clause in its settlement agreements, and following up on it when it is ignored.
Robert Wechsler
Director of Research-Retired, City Ethics
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