Skip to main content
CityEthics Breaking the oxymoron: "City Ethics"

Main navigation

  • Topics
  • Articles
  • Resources
  • About

Breadcrumb

  1. Home

County Related

April 7, 2011

New Cuyahoga County Ethics Code

This week, according to an article in the Cleveland Plain Dealer, Cuyahoga County (which includes Cleveland) passed a new ethics code, largely based on the recommended code drafted in October by the Code of Ethics Workgroup, set up by the Cuyahoga County Transition Advisory Group Executive Committe…
Read more →
March 18, 2011

Prince George's County (MD) Ethics Reforms Good, But Incomplete

Update: March 19, 2011 (see below) Last December I wrote a long blog post about the pay-to-play culture of Prince George's County, Maryland. The new county executive and the county's state representatives appear to have been working hard to make changes to end this pay-to-play culture, although you…
Read more →
March 2, 2011

Big Questions Arise from Cook County Assessor's Refusal to Abide by Campaign Finance Ordinance

Cook County assessor Joseph Berrios is becoming a regular character in this blog (see below for prior posts on him). This time he is declaring unconstitutional a law passed by the county to limit his fundraising from lawyers who appeal property tax assessments. And he has the support of a questiona…
Read more →
Conflicts of Interest March 1, 2011

Local Officials Sitting on Community Boards

I don't usually turn over an entire blog post to someone else, although I would like very much to do it. This letter to the editor by Kevin Haggerty, the Lackawanna County (PA) deputy director of government and community affairs (and candidate for state representative), which appeared in the Times …
Read more →
February 25, 2011

Term Limits and the Poor Handling of a Conflict in Pierce County, WA

Term limits, the recession, a new kind of governmental district, and a drive to save and manage local parks have all contributed to a fascinating ethics situation in Pierce County, Washington, home of Tacoma. Just last year I stayed in Pierce County and visited some of these parks, so this story is…
Read more →
Conflicts of Interest February 24, 2011

Three Conflict Case Studies

Here are three interesting conflict of interest case studies from Tuesday's news. Conflicts That Make You Act Differently, and Imaginative Resolutions According to an article in the Los Angeles Daily Breeze, a former Los Angeles airport attorney, who reviewed the paperwork submitted by four compani…
Read more →
Local Government Practice February 21, 2011

Should an Ethics Provision Limit an Official's Discretion to Withdraw?

An article in the Bismarck (ND) Tribune this weekend raised the issue of when a board or commission member may withdraw from a matter in which he feels he has a conflict, but where there is not a direct, pecuniary interest. It turns out that, back in 2007, the Burleigh County state's attorney had a…
Read more →
February 20, 2011

Grand Jury Lays Into Broward County (FL) School Board

You know you're doing a pretty poor job with government ethics when a grand jury recommends that you be all but abolished. This is the case with the Broward County School Board, according to a report published on Frday. It concludes, on p. 48: Unfortunately based on the history of this Board as an …
Read more →
Conflicts of Interest February 19, 2011

The Responsible Handling of an Ongoing Conflict Situation in New Castle County, Delaware

It's nice to be able to write about a difficult conflict situation that is handled responsibly. It's unusual to be able to write about a resolution where the local newspaper ends its editorial saying that the right thing has been done. According to an article posted last night on delawareonline.com…
Read more →
February 18, 2011

Transparency and Confidential Information Issues in Clackamas County, OR

Transparency, although not generally part of a local ethics code, is central to a local government's ethics environment. A lack of transparency is both a tell-tale sign that things are wrong, and an impediment to discussing ethics issues and enforcing ethics violations. Unfortunately, ethics codes …
Read more →

Pagination

  • Previous page ‹‹
  • Page 7
  • Next page ››
Subscribe to County Related

Search

User account menu

  • Log in
CityEthics
Local government ethics, explored
© 2026 CityEthics.org