A County Ethics Commission Resigns En Masse

Anonymous

Mon, 01/12/2009 - 05:19

City Related

When the entire ethics commission of a major county resigns,
something is seriously wrong. This is what recently happened in Jackson
County, MO, home of Kansas City and Independence.

According to <a href="http://www.kansascity.com/105/story/968423.html" target="”_blank”">an
article in Tuesday's Kansas City </a><a href="http://www.kansascity.com/105/story/968423.html" target="”_blank”">Star</a>, most
of the resignations occurred because the county legislature exempted
itself (and other elected officials) from a new ethics code just before
passing it. According to <a href="http://www.examiner.net/news/x1017430620/Ethics-commission-resigns-en-m…; target="”_blank”">an
article in Thursday's Independence </a><a href="http://www.examiner.net/news/x1017430620/Ethics-commission-resigns-en-m…; target="”_blank”">Examiner</a>,
three members resigned in protest, one member resigned for other
reasons, and the fifth resigned because she didn't want to be the only
member left. 
 
Some members of the county EC said that they would be useless, because
complaints
have only been filed in the past against elected officials. This does
not, however, mean that future complaints (or requests for an advisory
opinion) would not involve appointees and employees. 
 
Was this a case of legislators insisting on legislative immunity? No.
In fact, supporters of the exemption argued that it would be best if
the Missouri Ethics Commission dealt with them (the Missouri EC already
did have
jurisdiction over county legislators, but they can enforce only the
state ethics code, not the
new county ethics code). 
 
Possible Conflicts and Other Problems 
One legislator argued that there is a conflict of interest because the
county legislature determines the budget of the ethics commission, and
that's why it was better to have the state in charge. This is certainly
a good argument in favor of state jurisdiction over local government
ethics, but clearly the county was not satisfied with <a href="http://www.moethics.mo.gov/Ethics/GeneralInfo/GenInfoPDF/LawBook2009.pd…; target="”_blank”">state
laws</a> or the state's enforcement of these laws, or it would not have
felt it necessary to pass a new ethics code of its own. 
 
It's interesting how rarely budget control over an ethics commission is
considered a conflict of
interest. One reason is that legislators love to control budgets of
bodies that have some control over them. Another reason is that if you
call it a conflict, you would be required to deal with the conflict
responsibly. As it turns out, it is
easy to remedy such a conflict: the ordinance can be written so
that legislators
cannot tinker with the budget. 
 
Another possible but common conflict of interest involves selection of
ethics commission members by the legislative body. But there is no such
conflict in
Jackson County. The <a href="http://www.jacksongov.org/filestorage/4450/1167/1183/1269/JCMoChrtr.pdf…; target="”_blank”">county
charter</a> (Article XII, Section 5.1) requires that EC members be
selected by a commission consisting of the executive director of the
Mid-America Regional Council, the dean of the Henry W. Bloc School of
Business and Public Administration at the University of Missouri -
Kansas City, and the president of the Southern Christian Leadership
Conference of Greater Kansas City. This is just the sort of selection
process recommended by the <a href="http://www.cityethics.org/mc/full#TOC71" target="”_blank”">City Ethics Model Code</a>
to prevent such a conflict from occurring. 
 
One Jackson County legislator argues that if the county EC were to have
jurisdiction over legislators, legislators could face double jeopardy.
That is, they could be brought before both the state and county ECs. It appears
that there are no formal impediments to simultaneous or successive
ethics proceedings in these two bodies, at least at the state level (I
haven't been able to get a hold of the county ethics code yet). This is
definitely a topic for a future blog entry. 
 
One conflict the county legislature ignored was that its decision
conflicts with a charter
provision that explicitly gives the county EC jurisdiction over elected
officials. 
 
Which Ethics Program Is More Strict? 
The chair of the task force that drafted the county ethics code insists
that
the state laws are weaker. This University of Missouri-Kansas City law
professor also told the Kansas City Star
that the county legislature's exemption of
elected officials "has an appearance of impropriety that absolutely
stinks." The task force was appointed not by the legislature, but by
the county executive. 
 
At least one county legislator thinks that state laws are much more
strict, that he and his colleagues are being hard on themselves. I
can't see why, since they have always been subject to the state ethics
laws, and would be subject to them no matter what they did. 
 
The state EC is treated more roughly in <a href="http://voices.kansascity.com/node/3220" target="”_blank”">an editorial from
Thursday's Kansas City Star</a>:
"Is this the same state commission that’s considered to be a mostly
toothless watchdog? The one many elected officials throughout Missouri
consider incompetent? The public entity that conducts its most
important sessions in private? Yes, this sounds exactly like the kind
of panel that the County Legislature would like watching over its
shoulders. But taxpayers would be better off with the services of
local, knowledgeable citizens who usually hold their meetings in
public." 
 
Already, the county is moving on. The selection committee hopes to come
up with new EC members in the next few weeks. The county has a new
ethics code, even if, once it gets a new ethics commision, those most
likely to indulge in unethical conduct will not appear before it, and
citizens will start out believing that local government ethics is
unfair. 
 
Robert Wechsler 
Director of Research-Retired, City Ethics 
 
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A County Ethics Commission Resigns En Masse

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