City Related | City Ethics

Conflicts of Interest January 26, 2010

Government Employees and the Class Exception to Conflicts of Interest

Yesterday, the California Supreme Court published its decision relating to the conflict of interest charges against five members of San Diego's pension board, which I discussed a couple months ago in a blog post. Needless to say, the court completely disagreed with me. It felt that being part of a …

Ethics Codes & Reform January 25, 2010

Officials' Personal Opinions and the Separation of Aspirational and Enforceable Ethics Provisions

Many local government ethics codes have a provision that, when officials publicly give personal opinions rather than the government's position, requires them to clearly state that they are not representing the local government. Here's the one from the ethics code in Santa Clarita (CA) where, accord…

Conflicts of Interest January 24, 2010

Officials Requesting Police Investigations of Political Opponents: A Serious Misuse of Office

Which is the more troubling misuse of office? A local government official having a citizen arrested for criticizing him, or a local government official using tax dollars to pay off a citizen so that it doesn't come out that the politician has influence over whom the police arrest? This choice of ev…

January 20, 2010

Exempting Special Developer Board Members from City Ethics Code in Dallas

According to a January 15 memorandum, a week from today the Dallas city council will be considering an amendment to the city's ethics code, which would exclude municipal management district (MMD) board members from the ethics code (it has already been approved by the council's economic development …

Local Government Practice January 18, 2010

Lessons from Mistakes Made in a Connecticut City

Assuming you can learn a lot from the mistakes made in local government ethics matters in cities and towns other than your own, there is a great deal to learn from a simple ethics matter that, through a number of mistakes, oversights and, apparently, partisanship has been turned into a big issue in…

January 15, 2010

Pension Forfeiture in Baltimore

"My e-mail boxes are full of angry letters about [former Baltimore mayor] Dixon's retirement package being left intact. The deal to resolve this case and get Ms. Dixon out of office seems to have sparked more public emotion than the mayor's transgressions." (Dan Rodricks' column in the Baltimore Su…

Conflicts of Interest January 14, 2010

A Mayor's Nightmarish Misuse of Office

Every bad situation has a nightmare equivalent. The nightmare equivalent of mayoral misuse of public office and public property for personal benefit seems to have occurred in the Philippines. According to an article in today's New York Times, a town mayor has been accused of leading, and participat…

January 11, 2010

Yorba Linda's Proposed Ethics Ordinance Falls Short

It's not an unfamiliar story. Council candidates promise ethics reform. They are elected, and actually fulfill their promises with a proposed ethics ordinance. But there's not really much to the proposed ethics ordinance, and there's no enforcement mechanism. This is what is happening in Yorba Lind…

Conflicts of Interest January 10, 2010

Local Government Political Activity and Misuse of Office

Political activity by local government employees can be a sign of misuse of office. And when election problems arise, they generally involve local government employees, as has happened in Essex County (NJ; home of Newark), according to an article in Friday's Star-Ledger. The principal problem with …

Conflicts of Interest January 9, 2010

A Court Decision That Focuses on the Reasons Behind Conflict of Interest Rules

Two months ago, I pointed out Patricia Salkin's new summary of 2009 reported cases dealing with ethical aspects of local government land use matters. I'm finally getting around to analyzing one of them that provides a fascinating perspective on why conflicts of interest are important. The decision …

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