Relationships, Relationships, Relationships
“It’s much to-do about not much. I’m trying to run a city, and
you’re worried about people’s relationships?” These are the words of
Mount Vernon, NY mayor Ernest Davis, who is the subject of IRS and
FBI investigations, and now an investigation by the city's ethics
board, according to <a href="http://www.lohud.com/article/20130227/NEWS02/302270055/Mount-Vernon-Eth…; target="”_blank”">an
article in Wednesday's <i>Journal News</i></a>.<br>
<br>
Dealing responsibly with relationships is what government ethics all
about. You can't deal responsibly with them unless you acknowledge
them, and worry about them a little.<br>
<br>
With this attitude toward relationships, one wonders what sort of
ethics training program there is in Mount Vernon, a relatively poor
city of 68,000 in Westchester County, just north of New York City. <a href="http://cmvny.com/?s=ethics&search=Search" target="”_blank”">The city's
website</a> has no page for the ethics board. But it does appear
to meet regularly, including three times this month after a hiatus
of two months.<br>
<br>
One of the fascinating things about the relationships that are
popping up in Mount Vernon is the fact that high-level officials say
they don't even know about some of them. For example, the mayor has
a condo in Florida, whose property listing uses a council member's
home address. The council member says she doesn't know anything
about it.<br>
<br>
The council member's business partner rents a townhouse from the
mayor, but the council member knows nothing about it.<br>
<br>
According to <a href="http://www.lohud.com/article/20130215/NEWS/302150101" target="”_blank”">another
<i>Journal News</i> article</a> this month, there are seven nonprofits
listed at the mayor's home address. "During a brief
conversation Friday, Davis appeared to have vague recollections of
the hip-hop fund but said he was unaware of the other funds and why
they were registered at his home. 'I didn’t know it had my address on it,' he said
of the funds’ paperwork." The nonprofits were not listed on the
mayor's disclosure statements.<br>
<br>
The relationship Davis referred to in the quotation that begins this
post is that between the corporation counsel, who is also his chief
of staff, and a newspaper publisher/strip club owner, who is a
member of the civilian complaint board and has sued the city twice,
in cases defended by the corporation counsel. The relationship issue
arose because the publisher has loaned the corporation counsel his
BMW. They have, at least, a gifting relationship.<br>
<br>
Most interesting, the publisher told the newspaper that he has an
“attorney-client privilege relationship” with the corporation
counsel, who he said has done legal work in the past for him and his
companies.<br>
<br>
A small city like this is going to have a lot of relationships. Many
of these relationships require disclosure and withdrawal. Some
simply should not exist. Mayors should not have their own
nonprofits. A corporation counsel should represent the city, not act
as the mayor's chief of staff. Nor should a corporation counsel take
a gift from (or represent) someone who has been on the other side of
a case from her and the city (or, in most cases, from someone on her
own side of a case).<br>
<br>
The rental/ownership relationships are more murky. It's a problem
when a high-level official has rental properties, because it can
appear that he is using them (and maintenance on them) to reward
people who have done him favors (they can also be used for pay to
play, where businesses that want something from the government
feel obligated to rent from the official at an above-market rate).
If the official is already involved in the rental business, it is
best for such properties to be handed over to a realty management
company, so that the official is not involved in renting and
maintenance decisions. If the official was not already involved in
the rental business, it's a good business to stay out of while in
office.<br>
<br>
Robert Wechsler<br>
Director of Research-Retired, City Ethics<br>
<br>
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