City Related

Here are three cases from New York City that
involve relations between superiors and subordinates, one of the most
important aspects of local government ethics. What is especially interesting is that two of these cases involve co-opting, in one case of subordinates, in the other of vendors. These cases were included
in COGEL's ethics update last week.<br>
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Yet another court decision discussed at the COGEL conference placed
First Amendment free speech rights far above the obligations of a
government official, employing a strict scrutiny approach where a simple due process (for statutory vagueness) approach would have been sufficient. This time the official is a member of the Sparks
(NV) city council, in fact, the same council member who successfully
sued to overturn an advisory opinion of the state ethics commission in

<h4>I have abstained because some unnamed person tried to question my
integrity and silence my voice on this issue. So I was forced to ask
the Ethics Officer for an opinion, and she gave me one. She told me I
could participate in the debate and that I could actually vote on this
issue. But because we're dealing with politics, and, as Jim Maddox
always said, you can never take the p out of politics, I've got to
think and calculate down the road to see if someone would try to use my

"You say that [we are] corrupt and I'll jump over this table and punch
you out." Those are the words of Philadelphia city commissioner
Margaret Tartaglione, according to <a href="http://www.philly.com/philly/news/local/20101209_Tartaglione_defends_in…; target="”_blank”">an
article in yesterday's Philadelphia <i>Inquirer</i></a>. She was upset by a

<b>A Municipal Bid Rigging Scheme Comes to Light</b><br>
According to <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/08/business/08muni.html&quot; target="”_blank”">an
article in the New York <i>Times</i></a> this week, Banc of America Securities
(which recently merged with Merrill Lynch) agreed to pay the SEC and others $137 million to settle charges related to
a municipal bond bid-rigging scheme. For those who think competitive

According to <a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/AP5e51ce7f65184273a8b61f3e3ad7732e.html&q…; target="”_blank”">an
Associated
Press article yesterday</a>, a New York City school principal
"didn't think there was a conflict of interest because there was no
exchange of money."<br>
<br>

Sensational local government ethics news, such as scandals, is online in minutes. Ordinary local government ethics
news, such as the appointment of a new executive director or general counsel, is covered
more slowly, if at all.<br>
<br>
For example, the Los Angeles Ethics Commission announced via <a href="http://ethics.lacity.org/pdf/pressrelease/press_111010_Ethics_Commissio…; target="”_blank”">press

In <a href="http://www.cityethics.org/content/waivers-and-ironies&quot; target="”_blank”">a
recent blog post</a>, I wrote about how the mayor's selection for New
York City schools chancellor needed to get a waiver from the state
department of education because she lacked an educational background,
and that she resigned corporate board positions to make it clear she
was serious about taking the job, even though there were, in some

Indefinite conflicts can cause a lot of problems for officials. They see them as not yet ripe, not something they should have to deal with yet. But others see them as looming in the future, and want to know how the official plans to deal with them. One such indefinite conflict is the subject of controversy in Tampa,
where a council candidate is the executive director of a nonprofit
organization that has a large contract with the city to build
affordable apartments. This sort of indefinite conflict comes up a lot.<br>
<br>

More from Madison. According to <a href="http://www.channel3000.com/entertainment/25375284/detail.html&quot; target="”_blank”">an
article
last month on the Channel3000.com website</a>, a stagehands
union sent 28 copies of a book on creating and maintaining healthy arts
organizations to members of the Madison council and members of an ad hoc
committee on the future of the city's arts center. The union insists