City Ethics | Breaking the oxymoron: "City Ethics"

Conflicts of Interest September 29, 2010

Staff Members and the Revolving Door

Update: October 15, 2010 (see below) Decision-makers are given too much credit. Most individuals who vote on government matters are non-professionals who are paid little or nothing, and who rarely focus on the matters before their body. They are, therefore, very dependent on staff members who are p…

Ethics Commissions & Administration September 29, 2010

Do Ethics Commissions Have Jurisdiction Over Officials' Practice of Law?

Lawyer-legislators are extremely creative people. The latest use of their creativity is to argue that ethics boards cannot require disclosure of a conflict of interest that arises from legal representation because they have no jurisdiction over the practice of law. Only the state Supreme Court has …

September 27, 2010

A Stamford Ethics Controversy Involving Time Limits, Enforcement of Policy Declarations, and More

Update: October 8, 2010 (see below) There's a fascinating ethics controversy going on in Stamford, CT which raises a number of issues involving time limits, the enforcement of declarations of policy, intimidation, and the roles of ethics commissions and inspectors general. Time Limits Stamford's Co…

Resources & Learning September 25, 2010

Lewis Hyde's New Observations on Civic Virtue, Mixing Values, and the Freedom to Listen

Two years ago, I wrote a blog post about a book by Lewis Hyde entitled The Gift, which had a lot to say, philosophically, about gift-giving and -receiving, an issue of relevance to government ethics. I just finished Hyde's book Common As Air: Revolution, Art, and Ownership, which just came out last…

September 24, 2010

A Miscellany

An Active EC Is a Good Thing Local officials often say that because there are no complaints to or advisory opinions by their ethics commissions, their town or city government does not have ethics problems. Actually, it's the other way around. Local governments with active ethics commissions, especi…

September 24, 2010

The Republican Party Stands Against and Ignores Government Ethics, All in One Day

I make a great effort to be nonpartisan in choosing what and whom I write about. I am an unaffiliated voter who believes in nonpartisan local government. But yesterday, the Republican Party took a strong stand against government ethics and, in its most important statement in years, totally ignored …

September 23, 2010

Local Legislators Investigate an Ethics Commission in Suffolk County

When I wrote about the disclosure controversy in Suffolk County back in July, I didn't realize that another interesting ethics issue was going on there. In late June, the county legislature had instituted an investigation of the county ethics commission. One reason for this investigation appears to…

Transparency & Disclosure September 21, 2010

Confidential Information Provisions, Ethics, and Transparency

In Milwaukee County, according to an article in Sunday's Journal-Sentinel, a county supervisor is seeking to add to the county ethics code a confidential information provision that would not limit the prohibition to what is common in ethics codes: information divulged for someone's benefit. As I've…

September 21, 2010

Update on Vernon, The Ultimate Company Town

Those who, like me, are fascinated by Vernon, California, the ultimate company town, with an ethical environment that breaks nearly all the rules, will be happy to know that it was given a long treatment in a front-page article in Sunday's Los Angeles Times. There are no new revelations, but a few …

September 20, 2010

Ethics Reform: League of Women Voters Versus Town of Greenwich

I'm always fascinated by the myriad ways in which local governments approach ethics reform. An article in the Greenwich Time last week sheds some light on the state of ethics reform in Greenwich, CT. (Disclosure: my brother lives in Greenwich, but is not politically involved, at least that I know o…

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