City Ethics | Breaking the oxymoron: "City Ethics"

Conflicts of Interest November 8, 2012

Gifts to Agencies Should Be Cleared with an Ethics Adviser

With the frequent confusion of person and office, sometimes it's not that easy to tell the difference between a gift to a local government agency and a gift to its director. This confusion can open an agency director to accusations of ethical misconduct.

Local Government Practice November 7, 2012

A High-Level Official's Obligation to Seek Out the Truth

Several years ago, one of my town's department heads was arrested for embezzlement of funds. When someone had reported to the first selectman (effectively the mayor) that this was going on, the first selectman went to the department head and asked him if the report was true. The department head denied it. And the matter was dropped.

Did the first selectman have an obligation to the public not to accept his department head's word, but instead dig deeper to find out the truth, or have this done by the appropriate authorities?

Ethics Codes & Reform November 6, 2012

Vague, Character-Based Ethics Rules Give More Power Than Guidance

A presidential election day is a good time to consider how vague, character-based ethics rules can be misused.

According to an article in the October 27 Economist, the Iranian constitution, for example, requires a presidential candidate to have the attributes of "trustworthiness and piety." Iraq's requires that a presidential candidate have "a good reputation." And Singapore's president must be a "person of integrity."

Ethics Codes & Reform November 5, 2012

The Collateral Damage of No Ethics Program

Independent agencies, especially those with lots of money to spend and contracts to enter into, require not just ethics policies, but a comprehensive, independent ethics program. This rarely acknowledged fact has been made clear once again by an external audit of an agency that proved completely unable to self-regulate its officials' and employees' conflicts of interest.

Conflicts of Interest October 20, 2012

Unpaid Advisers and the Misuse of Inside Information

A front-page article in today's New York Times looks on a conflict situation that is usually ignored: the unpaid adviser who effectively sells her inside, often confidential information to her clients. She is not technically a lobbyist, because her communications with officials are not intended to push for her clients' goals (although it is impossible to know whether her clients' goals affect her advice).

Campaign Finance & Pay-to-Play October 19, 2012

Employers Seeking to Affect Employees' Political Participation

Intimidation is, I believe, the worst kind of ethical misconduct in government, because (1) it limits or changes participation of people in the democratic process, (2) it is emotionally damaging, and (3) it enables all sorts of ethical misconduct. Intimidation is a fundamental form of misuse of power and position. (For more about intimidation, see the section of my book on this topic.)

Enforcement & Complaints October 18, 2012

Enforcing Ethics Laws Against Contractors: Quickest Is Not Always Best

It is important to bring contractors into an ethics program, requiring them to disclose gifts their employees make to officials, and to deal responsibly with possible conflicts they are aware of. Businesses tend to deal with such things internally. Bringing them into an ethics program requires them to recognize that dealing with conflict situations internally is not enough.

Conflicts of Interest October 17, 2012

Church Affiliation as a Conflict

I recently wrote a blog post about a situation where a citizen asked an ethics commission for ethics advice when council members failed to do so and, despite the corporation counsel's suggestion that it provide the advice, the ethics commission refused to provide it.

Conflicts of Interest October 16, 2012

Misuse of a Local Office on a Regional Board

One conflict that is difficult to deal with in an ethics code, but which comes up again and again, is the conflict situation that arises when a local government official sits on a regional board or holds another office that has a different constituency than the one he was elected or appointed to represent.

Ethics Commissions & Administration October 11, 2012

Advice on Ethics Advice Falls on Deaf Ears

Last week, a resident from one of the towns next to mine (Wallingford, CT) called me for advice regarding his request for an advisory opinion. The request involved the appropriateness of council members affiliated with a church participating in a matter that involved funding for renovation of a wall along the church's parking lot. This is a difficult conflict situation, but some town officials made it much more complicated than it had to be.

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