County Related | City Ethics

February 20, 2014

Montgomery County, MD Public Campaign Financing Bill Introduced

According to an article in the Washington Post, two weeks ago, a public campaign financing bill (attached; see below) was introduced, cosponsored by all council members of Montgomery County, MD, a suburb of Washington, DC with about one million inhabitants, home to Silver Spring, Bethesda, Rockvill…

Ethics Commissions & Administration February 18, 2014

When a Department Engages In Ethics Advice and Enforcement

What should an ethics program do when an agency or department takes ethics advice and enforcement into its own hands? This issue has arisen in Hawaii County, according to two articles in West Hawaii Today, one from two years ago, the other from last week. The county's finance department oversees pr…

February 3, 2014

Broward County IG Report on Countywide Ethics Program

This week, the Broward County (FL) inspector general filed a Review of the Existing Ethics Structure (attached; see below) of the countywide ethics program that he oversees, and which came into being via charter amendments overwhelmingly approved by the county's voters in late 2010. The 21-page rep…

Ethics Commissions & Administration January 31, 2014

A Government Attorney Ethics Advice Case Study from Florida

Here is a concrete example of the problem of allowing local government attorneys to provide ethics advice that protects local officials, a problem that Florida state senator Jeff Clemens and the Florida League of Cities want to harden into state law in SB 606 (see my recent blog post for a discussi…

Conflicts of Interest December 31, 2013

Ethics Waivers by a Legislative Body

I am a proponent of ethics waivers. But only if they are provided by an independent ethics commission. When they are provided by high-level officials or their appointees, they appear to be self-serving. Why self-serving? Because they create precedents that will enable those who make the precedents …

Ethics Codes & Reform December 18, 2013

Best Practices, The Criminalization of Ethics, and Illness As a Conflict Situation

According to an article in the Capital Gazette, a former Anne Arundel County (MD) county executive, who was convicted early this year of a misdemeanor for misconduct in office, wants to run for office again, despite the judge ordering, as part of the criminal penalty, that he not be permitted to ru…

December 14, 2013

A Restricted Source Involved in a Preferential Arrest and a Questionable Third-Party Candidacy

Sometimes, conflict of interest matters come disguised as election law matters. Most of the time, due to secrecy, laziness, or an inability to draw lines between the dots, no one recognizes the conflict of interest matter. But sometimes, someone gives the game away, and it becomes clear how inextri…

Conflicts of Interest November 19, 2013

The Conflicts That Arise When Coroners Are Part of a Sheriff Office

A Bakersfield Californian editorial on Saturday points out the kinds of conflict situation that arise when, to save money, a coroner office is brought into a sheriff or police department office. A conflict situation arises when a coroner is asked to determine the cause of death of a jail inmate, of…

November 6, 2013

An Audit Report on the Palm Beach County EC

In an April 2013 blog post, I wrote about the problems surrounding a Florida state senator's request for a state audit of Palm Beach County's EC. That report, drafted by the state legislature's Office of Program Policy Analysis and Government Accountability, has recently been published, and it incl…

October 25, 2013

Caught Between a Rock and a Hard Place

What can a local official do when he is required to withdraw from a matter that involves a close personal friend who's in hot water due to that official's feud with another official? What do you do when you're caught between a rock and a hard place? The district attorney of Putnam County, NY is fac…

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