County Related

One Moore County (NC) commissioner has been faced with two conflict of
interest matters in 2010, one of which led him to recently resign
from a board. Although the two have nothing to do with each other, they
have become politically intertwined which, along with the lack of an ethics program, has prevented the
responsible handling of the conflicts.<br>
<br>

The recent arrest of the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prince_George%27s_County,_Maryland&quot; target="”_blank”">Prince
George's
County (MD)</a> executive and his wife, who is a new member of
the county council, shows how wrong it is to give the county executive
and individual council
members power over development projects, a topic I've written about
with

<a href="http://www.pioneerlocal.com/lakeforest/news/forum/2971664,lake-forest-t…; target="”_blank”">An
editorial
in the <i>Lake Forester</i> last week</a> questions whether the
county board of Lake County (IL) should be taking a fresh look at the
county's ethics program.<ul>

At last week's COGEL conference, I learned about a judicial case
involving the Anne Arundel County (MD) Ethics Commission, which has
been going on for six years. <a href="http://mdcourts.gov/opinions/cosa/2009/2714s07.pdf&quot; target="”_blank”">A decision
of the Court of Special Appeals last November</a> is worth a look.

Chinese walls, that is, ways to separate an official from a matter as to which he has a conflict, are a perfect way to appear to be responsibly handling a
series of possible conflicts, but are these walls great or are they
window dressing? And even if the walls truly work, are they enough to
deal responsibly with a series of possible conflicts?<br>
<br>

Investigations of purported ethics violations by the Middlesex County
(MA) sheriff apparently led to his suicide on Saturday. According to <a href="http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2010/11/28/even…; target="”_blank”">a
Boston
<i>Globe</i> chronology</a>, the sheriff filed papers for retirement on

<b>Update:</b> December 1, 2010 (see below)<br>
<br>
Last week, the Texas Attorney General issued <a href="https://www.oag.state.tx.us/opinions/opinions/50abbott/op/2010/pdf/ga08…; target="”_blank”">a
legal opinion</a> on the role of the county attorney in representing
and advising the El Paso County ethics commission, which was
established in 2009.<br>
<br>

<b>Update</b>: December 16, 2012 (see below)<br>
<br>
The news has been full of information about billionaires sponsoring,
secretly and publicly, independent ads supporting and attacking
candidates as well as ballot initiatives. For instance, according to <a href="http://www.followthemoney.org/press/ReportView.phtml?r=437&PHPSESSID=46…; target="”_blank”">a

<a href="http://elections.sun-sentinel.com/2010/results/index.php?id=2&quot; target="”_blank”">Broward
County (FL) voters embraced</a> (3-1) two ethics questions on the
ballot yesterday, which applied the new county code of ethics to all
municipalities in the county as well as to all constitutional offices
(including the sheriff, appraiser, and clerk). They voted 6-1 for the

I learned recently that the Luzerne County (PA) ethics pledge movement,
which I wrote about in <a href="http://www.cityethics.org/content/comparison-two-county-ethics-initiati…; target="”_blank”">May</a>
and <a href="http://www.cityethics.org/content/ethics-pledge-thats-too-much-and-too-…; target="”_blank”">September</a>,