Creating and Denying Conflicts of Interest in Harlingen, Texas

In researching a recent ethics complaint in Harlingen, Texas (pop. 67,000), I came across some disturbing ethics matters. The most disturbing can be seen from the minutes of the city development corporation's September 29, 2009 meeting (pp. 3-4).

Brendan Hall, the former city attorney, wanted to remain counsel to the development corporation, so he was seeking renewal of an amended contract. One of the board members of the development corporation was representing Hall in a defamation suit against a city commissioner who, according to an article in the Valley Morning Star, had sought to have the commission consider Hall's job performance and had questioned the legal department's billing practices.

When the devco board member moved to amend the contract with Hall, another city commissioner in attendance stated that the board member had a conflict of interest due to his representation of Hall in a lawsuit against the city.

Very cleverly, the devco board member insisted that the suit was not brought against the city, even though it was brought against a city commissioner, and the city's insurance company was paying for counsel. The devco board member insisted that it was a personal lawsuit, even though the city commissioner was speaking and acting as city commissioner, and never even mentioned Hall.

Advising About One's Own Conflict
What is so horrible is not that this weak argument won the day, but that another board member asked Hall if the board member/attorney had a conflict of interest due to his representation of Hall. And instead of recusing himself because of his clear involvement in the matter, Hall actually said there was no conflict. And his contract was amended and renewed, unanimously.

It appears that the city does not provide ethics training to its board members, but this is ridiculous. In any event, Hall and his counsel certainly understood what a conflict of interest is.

Creating a Conflict for Self-Protection
The following, from another Valley Morning Star article, shows how well the two of them understood conflicts of interest, so well that they filed a suit in order to accuse a city commissioner of a conflict:

A letter from [the board member representing Hall] was hand-delivered to [the mayor, the city manager, and the commissioner Hall was suing]: “We hereby give you notice of the existence of a ‘conflict of interest,’ as defined by the City Charter and Texas state law, regarding [the commissioner] taking part in any discussion or vote as a commissioner, that pertains to any personnel issue regarding Brendan Hall’s position as city attorney.”

In other words, Hall and his counsel were using the suit to set up a conflict of interest in order to keep the commissioner out of play in the commission's consideration of the then city attorney's job performance.

The misuse of government ethics doesn't get any more nefarious than this.

Needless to say, after Hall had agreed with the commission on a retirement agreement, he dropped the suit against the commissioner, according to two other Valley Morning Star articles (1  2)

Harlingen's Ethics Program Is Greatly in Need of Reform
Oh, by the way, according to Harlingen's ethics code, the city attorney is the city's ethics administrator (the ethics code is attached (see below), because it appears on the city website only page by page in several non-searchable PDFs, without the 2007 amendment, and it can't be found in a search of the city website).

Last year, according to yet another Valley Morning Star article, the city commissioner against whom the defamation suit was filed, along with a second commissioner, sought to have an ethics committee of the city commission formed to deal with ethics complaints as part of a larger reform in the ethics program. No reform appears to have been made. A lot more needs to be done, but the commissioners' attempt was at least on the right track.

The reason is that the city's ethics program is in the hands of the city commissioners' and board members' counsel, who is asked to investigate the very people he regularly represents. This is a big conflict of interest that the current city attorney should be the first to point out to the commission.

How did I manage to come across the goings-on in Harlingen? What caught my eye was an ethics complaint brought in April of this year against the devco member who had asked Hall to give his opinion about his own counsel's conflict of interest. According to an article in the Valley Morning Star, the complaint involves the alleged misuse of office in a purchase of city land at an allegedly low price. The matter is being investigated by the current city attorney.

Robert Wechsler
Director of Research-Retired, City Ethics

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