City Related | City Ethics

June 9, 2009

Lawsuits, Legal Fees, and County Attorney Conflicts in El Paso Ethics Complaints Battle

In the midst of a big corruption probe, a pair of back-and-forth ethics complaints filed with a nearly toothless ethics commission in El Paso doesn't seem like much. But it does sheds some light on how much El Paso government is about the players rather than the citizens. And it touches on some iss…

Ethics Commissions & Administration June 7, 2009

The Need for Ethics Commission Independence, and What Is and Isn't a Government Ethics Violation

Updates below Anyone who doubts the need for truly independent ethics commissions need look no further than what has been happening in Philadelphia this week. Or should I say "this year"? I've already reported on the fining of the Ethics Board's executive director, Shane Creamer, for sharing with a…

May 30, 2009

Criminal Charges and a Civil Suit Against Leaders of America's "Dream Machine"

Vernon, the "Dream Machine" I've written about in two previous blog posts (1 and 2), is back in the news. This time, according to an article in yesterday's Los Angeles Times, it appears that there is a crack in the self-serving power structure that allowed a grandfather and grandson to run this pur…

May 29, 2009

Ottawa: A Mayor on Trial Refuses to Deal Responsibly with an Unrelated Conflict

Ottawa is currently in the grips of its mayor's influence-peddling trial. The allegations are that the mayor tried to get another mayoral candidate out of the race by offering him money and a federal position. The Ottawa Citizen has an excellent chronology of what allegedly occurred. There is a lot…

Ethics Commissions & Administration May 27, 2009

Local Government EC Director Shows How It's Done

According to an article on yesterday's Philly.com website, the Philadelphia Board of Ethics fined its executive director $500 for violating the confidentiality rules of the city's ethics code. The story is instructive in how to handle such difficult matters. (Disclosure: I know and have a lot of re…

Ethics Codes & Reform May 24, 2009

The Effects of an Inadequate Ethics Code

There are many perils of an inadequate local government ethics code, as can be seen in Colorado Springs, which passed an ethics code in 2007. Last week, I wrote a blog entry about the new ethics commission's first complaint. Even before the ethics commission has met on the complaint, problems have …

Conflicts of Interest May 21, 2009

Detroit and the Loyalties of Local Government Attorneys

Loyalty is a virtue that is out of place in government, because loyalty is a personal virtue, a virtue that involves one's own personal interest and that of the person one is loyal to. Loyalty is a particularly difficult issue for local government attorneys, because loyalty is essentially the princ…

Transparency & Disclosure May 18, 2009

Applicant Disclosure, and the Difference It Makes

The two best defenses against dealing responsibly with a conflict are that the local government attorney told me it was okay, and I didn't know there was a conflict. The first can be dealt with by getting the local government attorney out of the government ethics picture. But the second requires so…

May 15, 2009

An Ethics Complaint to Bring Some Transparency to a Deal

Updates below (latest on August 11, 2009) There's an interesting situation in Colorado Springs. According to an article in yesterday's Colorado Springs Gazette, an ethics complaint filed against the city's weak mayor alleged that the mayor was an investment adviser to a developer involved in a big …

May 14, 2009

An Ethics Emergency in Corpus Christi?

Update below An ethics emergency was declared in Corpus Christi on Tuesday, according to an article on the KIII TV website. During the final meeting of the council before the council membership changes post-election, the lame-duck council declared an ethics emergency in order to amend the ethics co…

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