City Related | City Ethics

February 16, 2010

Don't Take Anything For Granted

The Grants of a Conflicted Board of Insiders Sometimes conflicts can cause a city or county serious problems with such things as state and federal grants. This is what has happened in Brockton, MA (pop. 94,000), according to an article in the Enterprise-News. The board of the city's redevelopment o…

Local Government Practice February 16, 2010

Defending Officials: Misuse of Office and Who the Client Is

Misuse of government resources, nepotism, transparency, and the obligations of government attorneys are all issues in litigation over a village's secret use of a contaminated well for 20% of the village's water supply, according to an article in Sunday's Chicago Tribune. Here a few questions that a…

Conflicts of Interest February 12, 2010

How to Deal Responsibly With a Conflict That Falls Between City and State Ethics Codes

Some situations clearly involve a conflict of interest, but are not dealt with in a local government ethics code. Two issues arise. One is the quality of the local government ethics code. The other is whether the code matters at all, if the conflict is clear. Such a situation exists with respect to…

Ethics Codes & Reform February 11, 2010

Time and the Drafting of Conflict of Interest Provisions

Time is a very important element of conflicts of interest. Some conflicts simply exist, but others either occur suddenly or suddenly become relevant. For example, an official can have a piece of property for twenty years and then suddenly the owner of a neighboring piece of property asks the local …

February 10, 2010

New York City Council Member Indicted for Misuse of Slush Fund, But He Was Enabled by Many Other Officials

It's been almost two years since the New York Times broke the story on the abuses of New York City council earmarks slush fund, which totaled about $50 million a year. This week, the council member featured in the Times article was expelled from the state senate for a violent act committed against …

February 6, 2010

A Columnist Gets Government Ethics, A Former Mayor Doesn't

(Update: March 1, 2010: Also see this excellent Times-Union editorial on the importance of an independent ethics commission that has authority over independent authorities. A particularly valuable observation: "The city Ethics Commission needs the ability to obtain independent legal advice. The cit…

February 3, 2010

One Chicago Alderman Goes to Prison, The Rest Claim Legislative Immunity

Never a dull moment in Chicago. According to an article in the Chicago Tribune, a now-former alderman has pleaded guilty to bribery and tax fraud charges relating to $40,000 in work done on his home by a developer whose development he backed. This makes him the 29th Chicago alderman to be convicted…

February 3, 2010

An IG-Compliance Battle in Chicago

Update: February 19, 2010 (see below) This blog post is about Chicago, and things are more complicated in Chicago than in other American municipalities. So please read slowly and carefully. According to an article in yesterday's Chicago Tribune, the first deputy in the mayor's Office of Compliance …

Ethics Commissions & Administration February 1, 2010

An EC's Immune System

Update: December 10, 2010 (see below) After all I've written about the immunity courts have given legislators from enforcement actions by ethics commissions, I now can write about a court decision that gives ethics commissions and their staff immunity from suits by respondents in ethics enforcement…

Conflicts of Interest February 1, 2010

Conflicting City-County Positions Where One Is Not Technically a Government Position

Update: February 5, 2010 (see below) Here's an interesting dual position question, that is, a question involving one individual holding two government positions. The most important conflict involved in dual positions is that you cannot consistently fulfill your fiduciary obligations to one constitu…

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