Safra Working Papers

The Ethics Resource Center in Washington DC has released an interesting document for anyone active in the Ethics & Compliance Officer field - see the quotes below which give a taste of the subject of the document:

The President of City Ethics, Carla Miller, recently participated in the 2007 NGES Advisory Group in the review of the Ethics Resource Center's first National Government Ethics Study which was released Jan. 30, 2008. You can download a copy by registering at the ERC's website: http://www.ethics.org/

It would be easy to say that politics is a team sport, like football, while ethics is an individual sport, like tennis. But this simply isn't true. Both ethical behavior and unethical behavior can be done as a team.

Four years ago, in one of my first and most important blog posts, on ethical failures in leadership, I wrote that politics is a team sport, continuing as follows:

A chapter in Jonah Lehrer's new book, How We Decide, sheds some interesting light on ethical decision-making. The book shares the latest discoveries neuroscientists have made using hightech views of the brain at work, especially when it is making various sorts of decisions.

This story was published on April 6th, 2005 in the Philadelphia Weekly www.philadelphiaweekly.com/view.php?id=9285 With City Hall in the throes of an FBI probe and Philadelphia's reputation in the dumps, will support for ethics reforms get trashed too? by Gwen Shaffer The first time Richardson Dilworth vied for mayor of Philadelphia in 1947, he rattled the status quo with sensational accusations of Republican ties to illegal gambling and prostitution. The Democratic newcomer was fearless.

The Miami-Dade County ethics commission has been a leader in reaching out to the community. In 2011, it co-sponsored a local government ethics conference, which attracted people from all over Florida.

It's difficult to show clearly that ethical government correlates with ethical conduct. However, last year Raymond Fisman and Edward Miguel came up with a study that does this: They studied parking tickets given to United Nations diplomats in Manhattan. Because, until 2002, there was zero enforcement of parking rules for diplomats, they were given a carte blanche or, if you will, were tempted to act unethically (breaking rules for private gain when enforcement is not a consideration).

There are two morals to the following story. One involves law, the other ethics.

The Supreme Court has been nibbling away at campaign finance laws for years now, but the one thing all but one of the justices agree on is that requiring the disclosure of contributions does not infringe on first amendment speech rights.

Then why, as stated in the Washington Post yesterday, have organizations sponsoring issue ads failed to list the sources of their funding 85% of the time this year, when in 2004 they only failed to do this 29% of the time?

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 is the "shooter" part. Shooting is not what people should do when it comes to ethics advice.

Within Election Law Center blogger Christian Adams' recent ad hominem attack on me is an idea that is worth discussing. He said that, in requiring candidate committees to come to me for permission (what is commonly referred to as "ethics advice") when I was the administrator of a public campaign financing program, I was displaying a "joy" and "love" of power. Does this advisory relationship actually involve power?

According to an article in Town Talk, an allegation against the mayor of Alexandria (LA) of ignoring a conflict of interest has led to some all too typical denial, squabbling, and inappropriate city attorney activity.

One group of individuals with a great deal of power in local government is not covered by local ethics codes or the other aspects of local ethics programs. That group consists of officers of local political parties.

The controversy surrounding the New York State pension fund returned to the front page of the New York Times today. The players are former state comptroller Alan Hevesi, his political adviser Hank Morris, and pension fund investment officer David Loglisci.

Meredith McGehee wrote a thought-provoking Campaign Legal Center blog post yesterday about the upside of election time ethics attacks on opponents.

"Current political thinking generally laments this development, arguing that it cheapens the process and puts all politicians in a bad light." But she sees it as a good development. I don't agree.

Does the Prospect of Attacks Cause Politicians to Better Police Themselves?

Ethics charges are often not the end, but rather the beginning of a process to improve government ethics. Take a recent instance in Los Angeles.

Creating ethics code takes time, expert says

Carla Miller, an ethics officer for Jacksonville, Fla., and a former federal prosecutor, tells city officials, "You are in the upper echelon because you are at least struggling with it."

01:00 AM EDT on Friday, May 19, 2006

An Alaskan state representative needs a new kidney. The new state ethics law does not allow gifts over $250. It has a compassionate gift exemption, but it only allows compassionate gifts with a fair market value less than $250. This is one of many unforeseen consequences that comes from ethics codes (or any legislation, for that matter). So the state legislature is rushing through a bill to change the exemption to a reporting requirement.

It can never be said too often that the quality of a government ethics code is meaningless. What matters is how the ethics program actually works.

Take Bridgeport, CT for example. It is the largest city in Connecticut, with a population of 150,000. It is a poor city in a rich county, and it has had a history of corruption, including the mayor's conviction on federal corruption charges a decade ago.

Here's a tough call. It's a few weeks before a primary election, and you (a local ethics commission member or staff member) learn that a candidate has violated an ethics code provision, and hidden it via a false disclosure. Do you act or do you sit on your hands until after the election?