Enforcement & Complaints

Too many of my blog entries look at instances where things did not go right. One reason is that when things do go right, no one talks about them. Another reason is that so often ethics problems are not handled very well. So it's nice to read about the proper handling of a conflict situation in Supe…

Should an agreement between an ethics commission and a respondent, which ends an ethics proceeding, include an acknowledgment by the respondent that he violated the ethics law? According to an article in yesterday's Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee thinks not. The A…

My state, Connecticut, has just added itself to the at least 14 states that provide for public official pension forfeiture. Like some of the other states, its new law covers municipal officials. Pension forfeiture is the capital punishment of government ethics.  It makes legislators look like they …

The standard of proof for determining whether an ethical violation occurred has become an issue in Louisiana's ethics reform. After looking at several local government ethics codes, as well as the ethics codes of the states that have jurisdiction over local government officials, I don't think stand…

The decision of the Louisiana First Circuit Court of Appeal in In re Arnold (May 23, 2008) causes serious problems with respect to ethics enforcement against local government legislators, at least in Louisiana. It opens up a can of worms that I haven't seen discussed (I'd appreciate being alerted t…

When should governments provide counsel for officials who have had an ethics complaint brought against them? This has become a big issue recently in my state, Connecticut. Click here to read the rest of this blog entry. In March, a lawyer for the Office of State Ethics proposed a legal opinion that…

Ethics complaints are often brought for purely political reasons, and election time is the favorite time for bringing them. According to an article in yesterday's Flint Journal, a Thetford Township Supervisor brought an ethics complaint before his own board against a township Trustee who is plannin…

I also write a blog relating to my town's government. One purpose for starting the blog, and its sister information website (the town's website is so limited, it doesn't even include town ordinances, the town's code of ethics, or the town charter), was to create a model that could be used by people…

Today's New York Times Week in Review section features an article on local prosecutors and how their ethical misconduct is dealt with by the lawyer discipline system, the profession's disciplinary system. The case of the Duke lacrosse prosecutor, Michael B. Nifong, is, of course, the occasion for t…

You don't hear too much about recidivism in the municipal ethics world. One reason may be that it happens, but often at different levels, as a politician moves up the ladder. Take Congressional Representative Gary Miller, for instance. According to a recent article in The Hill, he got his start whe…