Advisory Opinions

Thinking in terms of risk is a great way not to take responsibility
for your actions, including your inactions. As soon as you start
thinking about the chances that, overall, you might win or lose from
a transaction, you have begun thinking in terms of your personal
interest. This makes it very difficult to think in terms of the
public interest.<br>
<br>
You have also begun thinking in terms of consequences rather than in
terms of rules. And it is rules, not consequences, that underlie the

One of the great things about discussions of the conflicts of
interest of people in the securities world is that
"fiduciary duty" is considered the basis for the rules that govern their relationship with government officials and others. In discussions
of the conflicts of interest of those whom they deal with in municipal governments and those who provide other sorts of advice or products to municipal governments, "fiduciary duty" often goes unmentioned.<br>
<br>
I say this as an introduction to a discussion of the Municipal

Many government ethics professionals don't like waivers. I think
they're valuable. Basically, they are requests for an advisory
opinion in which the official recognizes that certain conduct would
constitute an ethics violation, but wants a determination that he
can engage in the conduct due to special circumstances. The
result of such a determination is the creation of a new, narrow
exception to a rule. This is a good way of preventing bad unforeseen

A conflict situation in my state of Connecticut is instructive
regarding a basic concept of government ethics, as well as a basic
concept of legislative immunity.<br>
<br>
Legislators insist that they require immunity because their motives
in making decisions cannot be questioned outside their body. Government ethics, on the
other hand, does not consider motive, only conduct and relationships. This is one of
the principal reasons why I argue that legislative immunity does not

I thought that I had covered all the blind spots that wreak such
havoc on local government ethics (see <a href="http://www.cityethics.org/files/lgep1-0%20-%20Robert%20Wechsler.htm#Bli…; target="”_blank”">the
section in my book <i>Local Government Ethics Programs</i></a>).

Here's a good-news story from Delray Beach, FL. But first the bad
news. According to <a href="http://articles.sun-sentinel.com/2014-04-07/news/fl-rscol-oped0407-2014…; target="”_blank”">an
op-ed by Rhonda Swan this week in the <i>Sun-Sentinel</i></a>, in
2012 the Palm Beach County inspector general "warned Delray that

"<a href="http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1418585&quot; target="”_blank”">'Public
Service Must Begin at Home': The Lawyer as Civics Teacher in
Everyday Practice</a>" by Bruce A. Green and Russell G. Pearce
(<i>William & Mary Law Review</i>, Vol. 50, p. 1207, 2009) provides an
excellent basis for something that I consider extremely important to

<b>Sometimes Withdrawal and Formal Processes Are Not Enough</b><br>
It never looks good when a high-level elected official gets a job
with the government while in office or soon after leaving office. It
looks like he got the job because of his influence and relationships
with those who made the decision.<br>
<br>

This is the second of four blog posts on <a href="http://static.lobbytools.com/bills/2014/pdf/0606.pdf&quot; target="”_blank”">Florida
Senate Bill 606</a> (attached; see below), one of the worst ethics

Some jurisdictions have an ethics provision entitled Prestige of
Office that, among other things, limits work that officials can do outside of government.
Here is the language that the Baltimore school district uses (this is
essentially the same as the city government's Prestige of Office provision, but with the addition of the phrase "public position," which turns it into a basic misuse of office provision):<blockquote>