City Ethics | Breaking the oxymoron: "City Ethics"

July 26, 2012

The Chick-fil-A Controversy Is Really a Government Ethics Issue

If you read the newspapers and blogs, the big issues in the Chicago Chick-fil-A controversy are free speech and government boycotts. But it's really a government ethics issue. All rational voices acknowledge that a local legislator should not block a store opening just because it has given large su…

Conflicts of Interest July 26, 2012

Unpaid Legal Services to a Candidate Committee

Update: July 27, 2012 (see below) According to an article in yesterday's Philadelphia Inquirer, the Pennsylvania Supreme Court approved the Philadelphia ethics board's decision that a law firm can provide unpaid legal services to a mayoral candidate only to extent of contribution limits. However, t…

July 25, 2012

Council Recall Election Funded by Contractors Past and Present

Talk about independent expenditures usually refers to such expenditures in support, or more often in opposition to, federal candidates. At the local level, the major independent expenditures tend to come from unions, both public service unions and construction unions. There are also cases where ind…

Conflicts of Interest July 25, 2012

When a High-Level Official Seeks Special Treatment

One of the things that really ticks citizens off is when a local official uses his position to try to get out of a traffic ticket. The financial benefit may be minor, but there are two things that are major. One is that this conduct suggests that favoritism is common in the government. That is, the…

July 24, 2012

A Miscellany

Gift Bans In Sunday's Marietta (GA) Daily Journal, former state representative Roger Hines wrote a column with the title "What Does Corruptibility Have to Do with a Dollar Figure?" Hines considered the state's $100 limit on gifts from lobbyists. After talking about the value of lobbyists, he talked…

Ethics Commissions & Administration July 23, 2012

An EC Member Who Sues Her City Government

I've written recently about the propriety of the new chair of D.C.'s ethics commission practicing in matters that involve the city government. In that case, there was an appearance, based on the chair's own website, that he was seeking benefits for his clients from the council and certain city agen…

July 19, 2012

Trenton's Ethics Environment in a Timeline

According to an article in the Times of Trenton yesterday, the FBI raided the homes of Trenton's mayor, as well as the homes of his brother and a major campaign contributor. For those interested in government ethics, the best thing about the raid is the timeline that went up on the Times of Trenton…

July 17, 2012

A Miscellany

It's amazing how much local government ethics activity there is in this July. Here is a miscellany of issues that have arisen in just the last few days. Subpoena Power According to an article yesterday on the WFPL website, the Louisville ethics commission has been trying unsuccessfully to get subpo…

July 17, 2012

Summer Reading: The Righteous Mind IX: Moral Capital, Blind Spots, and Asking

Moral Capital In his book The Righteous Mind: Why Good People Are Divided by Politics and Religion (Pantheon, 2012), Jonathan Haidt discusses what he calls "moral capital," that is, "the resources that sustain a moral community." He also refers to moral capital (as I discuss in the first of my post…

July 16, 2012

An Example of Backsliding

It is common for councils to engage in backsliding shortly after creating or improving a government ethics program. When there has been a scandal, councils often go further than they would like to go in establishing ethics rules and procedures. When attention to ethics matters has lessened, it ofte…

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