The Costs of No Ethics Reform in San Bernardino County (CA)
It's been four months since <a href="http://www.cityethics.org/node/694" target="”_blank”">my latest update</a> on San
Bernardino County's failure to follow <a href="http://www.co.san-bernardino.ca.us/grandjury/pdf/Report0809/20090701_gj…; target="”_blank”">grand
jury ethics reform recommendations</a> with any action. <a href="http://www.sbsun.com/pointofview/ci_14526587" target="”_blank”">An op-ed piece</a>
by Bob Stern, president of the <a href="http://www.cgs.org/" target="”_blank”">Center for
Governmental Studies</a>, in this week's San Bernardino <i>Sun</i> calls for
campaign contribution limits (there are currently none at all), a
prohibition on off-year fundraising, disclosure requirements, and an
ethics commission to enforce the law.<br>
<br>
Proposals such as these have been bouncing around for years now in San
Bernardino County, but some of the county supervisors have been very
creative in their arguments for doing nothing. Stern deals with
expected arguments against these rules, including that they will hurt
challengers (as if incumbents care), and that the rules won't be
enforced (because they don't want an ethics commission).<br>
<br>
These supervisors are more creative than Stern gives them credit for.
One put out a press </span>release that, according to <a href="http://findarticles.com/p/news-articles/sun-the-san-bernardino-calif/mi…; target="”_blank”">a
post</a> on the San Bernardino <i>Sun</i> website, "compared the [ethics
commission] proposal to President Obama's health care reform plan ...
[the] point was that the commission would amount to more bureaucracy
that taxpayers would foot the bill for."<br>
<br>
Another supervisor topped that one: an ethics commission would
create "more government to exert more power over the people." Of
course, the people it would exert power over would all be in, or
running to be in, government. Hardly "the people."<br>
<br>
The biggest argument against an EC is that the county can't afford it
in this economic climate (needless to say, the idea got nowhere before
the recession, as well). An <a href="http://findarticles.com/p/news-articles/inland-valley-daily-bulletin/mi…; target="”_blank”">editorial
in the Inland Valley <i>Daily Bulletin</i></a> responded to this argument as
follows:<br>
<ul>
We say the county can't afford not to establish an ethics
commission. Consider that Jack Brown, CEO of Stater Bros. and one of
our most esteemed businessmen, has complained that the county's
reputation for corruption dogs even him when he meets with business
people and officials outside the county. "Who got indicted in your
county today?" is a smirking question he gets asked. It can't do much
for the county's attractiveness to legitimate businesses to be known as
a den of corruption. It's not good to be the butt of jokes.<br>
</ul>
But it isn't just the cost of a bad reputation. There are real costs
in waste, overpriced contracts, secret deals, harmful development
approvals, grand juries and trials, etc. There are also the costs of driving people away from
participating in what they perceive to be a corrupt government, a psychological cost to citizens
and a democratic cost to government.<br>
<br>
The cost of an EC is so much lower than the cost of bad government
that only a stupid or crooked politician could raise the issue,
recession or not. There's no doubt that it's not a good time to sell
the idea, but if the county supervisors were to be as creative (and
more honest) selling the idea of ethics reform as they have been
stifling it, I doubt they'd have a problem.<br>
<br>
Even the supervisor who most supports an EC is opposed to
contribution limits, according to <a href="http://www.pe.com/localnews/sbcounty/stories/PE_News_Local_W_nramos25.4…
recent <i>Press-Enterprise</i> article</a> about new ethics and structural
reform proposals from the district attorney. No one appears to be in
favor of even a basic range of ethics reforms. It's likely that any
ethics reform in San Bernardino County will have to come via public
initiative, not from its legislative body.<br>
<br>
Robert Wechsler<br>
Director of Research-Retired, City Ethics<br>
<br>
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