Crowdfunding a Local Government Ethics Program

Crowdfunding is a 21st-century way of funding projects that are not
being funded by the government, the stock market, venture
capitalists, or even angel investors. But it's really not as
21st-century as people think. For example, the Statue of Liberty's
pedestal was crowdfunded back in 1885 (without the Internet, the
crowdfunding was led by Joseph Pulitzer, the publisher of New York
<i>World</i> newspaper).<br>
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Very few local government ethics programs are funded at all, and
those that have funding are usually underfunded. Is there any
prospect for crowdfunding these programs? One big advantage is that
crowdfunding would make ethics programs be and appear truly independent (as long
as there were rules prohibiting large contributions from those seeking
benefits from the government).<br>
<br>

Several ethics programs have been created or approved by citizen
referendum, the voting version of crowdfunding (e.g., the ethics
programs in San Diego, in Miami-Dade, Palm
Beach, and Broward counties in Florida, and in Rhode Island). Voters supported these referendums, often by high percentages,
knowing that they would pay for them.<br>
<br>
Crowdfunding would be less useful in creating an ethics program than in improving an ethics program by turning it
from a passive ethics commission dependent on the city or county
attorney to an active independent ethics commission that can hire at
least one staff member of its own, providing independent training
and advice, and initiate investigations and hold public hearings
about problematic ethics issues.<br>
<br>
But would enough citizens see an ethics program as valuable in order to
ensure that sufficient funds were raised? And could the ethics program
deliver sufficient results to ensure that citizens kept funding it
year after year? Or would the successful crowdfunding of an ethics
program shame the local legislative body into providing the program
with a sufficient budget to allow it act effectively?<br>
<br>
Crowdfunding a government ethics program would require the support
of the news media, the local blogosphere, and local good
government groups. It would also be helpful if members of more than
one party or faction on the local legislative body supported the
solution, after failing to get the legislative body to provide the
ethics program with sufficient funding. A combination of anger at this failure and partial bipartisan support would make a big difference. The involvement of respected
independents in the community would also be helpful, because independents are the ones most
likely to see the legislative body's failure as the selfish act of both
political parties to allow an oversight body to function
effectively.<br>
<br>
Crowdfunding a government ethics program would make a great
experiment. It would allow citizens to better understand the value
of such a program and to commit to it in an active way that would
ensure continuing support for it. It would emphasize the nature of
an ethics program as citizen oversight of those who manage their
community, and ensure its true independence and, through that
independence, the community's trust in it.<br>
<br>
The precedent this experiment would create would be seen, in the
community and in neighboring communities, perhaps nationwide, as a
limit on elected officials' participation in their own oversight to
extent they attempt to create obstacles to the effectiveness of the oversight.<br>
<br>
Robert Wechsler<br>
Director of Research-Retired, City Ethics<br>
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