Advisory Opinions | City Ethics

Conflicts of Interest June 6, 2012

Indirect Benefits, Expertise, and the Responsibility for Poor Ethics Advice

Update: June 20, 2012 (see below) The saying goes that there are two sides to every story. But more commonly there is a story and ways to spin the story. The problem is telling them apart. This week, a Daily Oklahoman editorial took to task the state ethics commission, which has jurisdiction over l…

Ethics Commissions & Administration May 24, 2012

The Gap Between Advice and Enforcement, and The Isolation of Independence

I was on a panel this week as part of the annual Citywide Seminar on Ethics in New York City Government, co-sponsored by the New York City Conflicts of Interest Board (COIB) and the Center for New York City Law at the New York Law School. The panel was called "Challenges & Solutions in Government E…

Ethics Codes & Reform February 6, 2012

Institutional Corruption Conference I: Duplicitous Exclusion

On Saturday, I attended a one-day conference on Institutional Corruption sponsored by the Safra Center for Ethics at Harvard University (videos of it will eventually appear here). Although local government was scarcely mentioned (there was one image of a painting that portrayed the 1930s machine in…

August 12, 2011

Ethics in Congress IV - The Damaging Individual Corruption Paradigm (Summer Reading)

In his book Ethics in Congress: From Individual to Institutional Corruption, Dennis Thompson discusses two tendencies that lead to the overlooking or obscuring of institutional corruption’s significance. Those who bring or judge charges tend to individualize misconduct. This limits the wrongdoing t…

Ethics Commissions & Administration August 11, 2011

Ethics in Congress III - Independent Advice and Enforcement (Summer Reading)

Looking at government ethics through the appearance standard, as Dennis Thompson did in his book Ethics in Congress: From Individual to Institutional Corruption, reveals the great importance of independence to ethics advice and enforcement. No one is in a worse position to see appearances of improp…

Conflicts of Interest July 15, 2011

How Candidates Should Deal Responsibly with Conflicts

A post yesterday in Coates' Canons: NC Local Government Law Blog raises an interesting issue about the situation of a local government candidate who has an interest in a contract with the local government which, by NC law, is prohibited not for candidates, but for a winning candidate the day he or …

Conflicts of Interest June 22, 2011

Ethics Advice and the Importance of Being a Daddy's Boy

Update: June 30, 2011 (see below) One thing you can say for James Bopp, Jr. (an attorney who has taken many campaign finance cases to the Supreme Court for organizations that oppose certain campaign finance regulations) is that he doesn't beat around the bush. He's a straight shooter. The problem i…

Campaign Finance & Pay-to-Play May 29, 2011

In NJ, Large Campaign Contributors Have a Conflicted Relationship

Good news: Westminster is not alone. No, I am not referring to the British Parliament or the New York dog show. I am referring to the Westminster, CO law that says that a campaign contributor has a relationship with the recipient of a sizeable campaign contribution that gives rise to a conflict of…

Conflicts of Interest April 26, 2011

Ethical Obligations Do Not End at the Line Drawn By Jurisdictional Language

There are two morals to the following story. One involves law, the other ethics. Last August, the Nevada Policy Research Institute ran a long commentary on the fact that Nevada's 17 school superintendents were not filing financial disclosure statements with the state ethics commission, something re…

Resources & Learning April 7, 2011

Blind Spots IV — Egocentrism

Max H. Bazerman and Ann E. Tenbrunsel, the authors of the new book Blind Spots: Why We Fail to Do What's Right and What to Do about It (Princeton University Press), point out that egocentrism is in our nature. We naturally see the world from our point of view. We squeeze what we see and experience …

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