County Related

Transparency, although not generally part of a local ethics code, is
central to a local government's ethics environment. A lack of transparency is both a
tell-tale sign that things are wrong, and an impediment to discussing
ethics issues and enforcing ethics violations. Unfortunately, ethics codes do have confidential information provisions, making it appear to those who do not understand government ethics that it is more important to hide confidential information than to let the sunshine in.<br>
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There are people who get great satisfaction going after the ethics of
government ethics professionals. Rarely are their accusations relevant
to government ethics; it's just about showing that we're not good
people, either, as if government ethics was just about good and bad.
Maybe we should wear t-shirts that say, on the front, "We're Not
Perfect," and on the back, "So?"<br>
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Usually, in government
ethics situations, local officials can get away with doing nothing,
especially when the conflict isn't theirs. Few ethics codes have
provisions prohibiting complicity in and requiring the reporting of
others' ethics violations (see <a href="http://www.cityethics.org/content/full-text-model-ethics-code#0.1_TOC49…; target="”_blank”">the
City

According to <a href="http://www.naplesnews.com/news/2011/jan/31/guest-commentary-earmarked-v…; target="”_blank”">an
op-ed
piece by a county commissioner</a> from <a href="http://www.colliergov.net/&quot; target="”_blank”">Collier County, Florida</a> (in the
Naples <i>Daily News</i>), two interesting twists on the gift to an

This third of three posts on ethics reform in Gwinnett County, Georgia
looks at the county officials' response to the recommendations in <a href="http://www.cviog.uga.edu/services/assistance/gwinnett/report.pdf&quot; target="”_blank”">the
2007
report</a> drafted by the <a href="http://www.cviog.uga.edu/&quot; target="”_blank”">Carl

In this second of three blog posts on ethics reform in Gwinnett County,

The boom years of the Oughts were very good to <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gwinnett_County&quot; target="”_blank”">Gwinnett County</a>,
a
suburban Atlanta county of 800,000 that grew by a third in the last
decade. But boom times are rarely good for local government ethics, and
Gwinnett County appears to be no exception. A grand jury report
unsealed in
October (a searchable copy is attached; see below) found a series of

The most underrated aspect of accountability is the need for government
officials to honestly and publicly explain why they do what they do.
This need is strongest for two groups of officials:  elected representatives
and their watchdogs.<br>
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It is, therefore, painful to see the chair of a major county board of
ethics refusing to even speak to the press about his own possible

On today's Palm Beach County (FL) Board of Commissioners <a href="http://www.pbcgov.com/PubInf/Agenda/agenda.pdf&quot; target="”_blank”">agenda</a> is
approval of an Interlocal Agreement with the city of Lake Worth. The
agreement is one of many that will be entered into between cities and
towns in the county to give the county ethics commission jurisdiction
over the municipalities' ethics training, advice, disclosure, and

Cuyahoga County, OH, which includes Cleveland, has been the site of a
large number of arrests of government officials, contractors, and