Orange County, NY Grand Jury Ethics Reform Recommendations

Another day, another grand jury report recommending government
ethics reform. This report (attached; see below) comes from Orange
County, NY, a county northwest of New York City,
whose biggest town is Newburgh and whose most famous towns include
the very different Tuxedo and Kiryas Joel.<br>
<br>
The report criminally exonerates the county legislator who is its
subject, because he did a couple things right:  he sought ethics
advice from the ethics board, and he disclosed his employment with a
county contractor to the county legislature's attorney (who
responsibly told the legislator to seek an ethics opinion from the
ethics board) and other county officials, and in his annual
disclosure statement. But the report does recognize that there are still
problems which should be considered by the ethics board, including
(1) the legislator's vote on a project when he was in talks about
employment with a contractor working on the project, and (2) the
legislator's signing in to a meeting, which was chaired by a county
official, as a county legislator, and then soliciting business for
the contractor he had been employed by.<br>
<br>
Despite its exoneration of the legislator, the grand jury — like
many grand juries and unlike most local legislatures — took a look
at the county's ethics program as a whole, making recommendations that
went beyond those that would prevent the particular misconduct it was considering. However, it still made piecemeal recommendations,
without any research into best practices (there is mention only of some state and
nearby practices, and government ethics programs in New York state are not, on the whole, very good). Here is a list of its most important
recommendations:<br>
<br>

1. Make contractors subject to the same disclosure requirements as
county officials. It's noteworthy that witnesses repeatedly
recommended this. The grand jury rightly notes that, "in the instant
matter, if Vendor X had filed a disclosure form, then legislators
would have been made aware of the conflict even in the absence of
Legislator A’s disclosure." The grand jury also notes that, in
certain areas, such as the county nursing home and airport, a
contractor acts with all the powers of a department head, and
yet need not file any disclosures.<br>
<br>
2. Clarify the role of counsel to the county legislature, so that
everyone knows (1) whether the counsel represents solely the
interests of the legislature or also the interests of individual
members, and (2) whether counsel to individual legislators is
confidential. It is valuable to recognize and deal with government
attorneys' conflicts of interest.<br>
<br>
3. Significantly increase the ethics board budget, which is only
$10,000 a year, which goes for counsel, a secretary, and office
supplies.<br>
<br>
4. Mandate ethics training, and provide an online course.<br>
<br>
5. Pass post-employment provisions that would create a
cooling-off period before high-level officials could take a job with
a contractor, as occurred in the case the grand jury was
considering.<br>
<br>
6. Prohibit officials from soliciting employment with contractors if
they were involved in any way with the awarding of their contract.<br>
<br>
7. Require the reporting of conflicts of interest to the ethics
board.<br>
<br>
8. Switch to an aggregate gift limit rather than the current per-instance limit of $75.<br>
<br>
9. Upgrade the annual disclosure form to include more information
and to have clearer language (giving, as examples, the state form
and a neighboring county's form).<br>
<br>
10. Post annual disclosure forms and advisory opinions on the county
website.<br>
<br>
11. Change the ethics board selection process, but only to even out
the selections of the executive and legislative branch and to prevent
one political party from dominating, not to make the board
independent of those under its oversight and jurisdiction.<br>
<br>
12. Prohibit officials from sitting on committees that have
oversight over departments where their spouses or children are
employed (what about siblings and parents?).<br>
<br>
13. Clarify whether the county legislature has the authority to
censure its members. I would add that it should also clarify what
to do when both ethics board and county legislature are considering
related allegations of misconduct (it is best that such matters be
dealt with by an independent body rather than self-enforced).<br>
<br>
These are good recommendations, as far as they go. But they would
have been much better if made in the light of best practices and
within a vision of what a local government ethics program should be.
The grand jury started out on the right foot, recognizing that the
"current ethics program is inadequate, outdated, underfunded and
largely disregarded." It quoted one official as saying, “I don’t
believe anybody really knows what they’re supposed to be doing.” But
it didn't take the next step of saying what the ethics program is
supposed to be doing, and what it is supposed to be (e.g., that it
is supposed to be independent and have a monopoly on ethics advice
and enforcement).<br>
<br>
However, it did a much better job than the Orange County legislature
or the legislative bodies of the great majority of local governments
in New York state or in other states. It is sad that most of the
best recommendations for government ethics reform come from outside
governments, from grand juries, good government groups, bar
associations, and task forces (but not from academia). Because of
this, it is unlikely that these recommendations will be accepted
or, even if most of them are turned into law, that they will become the basis for an effective ethics
program.<br>
<br>
Let's hope that Orange County goes against the odds and
creates a program that other New York counties can use as a
template.<br>
<br>
Robert Wechsler<br>
Director of Research-Retired, City Ethics<br>
<br>
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