Jurisdiction

A city creates the position of inspector general in order to root out, and hopefully prevent, corruption. The inspector general decides to investigate a situation. A city attorney is involved. The attorney-client privilege is invoked. The investigation is blocked. And the word goes out:  if you want to hide your corrupt conduct, involve a city attorney. It's that simple.

Here's another blog post about a Georgian who wants out of EC jurisdiction.

Some ethics commissions, especially state ethics commissions, have no jurisdiction over officials once they leave office. Especially when ECs require confidentiality regarding complaints until probable cause is found, this lack of jurisdiction allows officials to resign before their unethical conduct becomes public. And it allows officials to evade enforcement.

Government lawyers enjoy exceptions to transparency laws. Should they also be excepted from government ethics laws? Atlanta senior assistant city attorney Robert N. Godfrey thinks so, according to an article in yesterday's Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

Update: June 7, 2010 (see below)

There is some very good news out of Rhode Island, even if it is over a month old. The house majority leader, now the speaker of the house, Gordon Fox, has introduced a bill seeking a referendum in November on a constitutional...

Here are two interesting situations where it is not clear what an ethics commission's role and authority are. One in Baltimore, the other in Philadelphia.

EC Jurisdiction Over Independent Agencies: The Charter's the Answer
In Jacksonville, where City Ethics' president, Carla Miller, is the ethics officer, the charter revision commission unanimously voted to give the city's ethics commission jurisdiction over all the city's independent agencies, according to an article in yesterday's Daily Record.