Legislative Bodies Should Not Be Providing Ethics Waivers
Erosion of an ethics program can occur in many ways (see <a href="http://www.cityethics.org/files/lgep1-0%20-%20Robert%20Wechsler.htm#Bac…; target="”_blank”">the
section of my book on backsliding</a>). In Louisiana (where the
state ethics program has jurisdiction over local officials), there
has been a great deal of erosion, regarding the ethics board's role
in the ethics process, the <a href="http://www.cityethics.org/node/452">standard of proof</a>,
and the exemption of state legislators to the extent they are
involved in legislative activity.<br>
<br>
Now, according to <a href="http://www.dailycomet.com/article/20120613/WIRE/120619891?p=1&tc=pg" target="”_blank”">an
article in the Lafourche Parish <i>Daily Comet</i></a> this week, the
state legislature has essentially taken the role of providing
waivers. It provided an exemption to doctors in two parishes, to
allow public hospital board members' relatives to be hired for
health care jobs. In a series of bills just approved by the governor, it provided an exemption for doctors on a public
hospital service district board from a two-year ban on having a
contract or a job with that board or the facilities it oversees. It
provided an exemption for members of a port commission and their
family members to sell grain to a grain elevator overseen or owned
by the commission.<br>
<br>
These exemptions reflected very specific requests. For example, one
exemption was made to allow the wife of a parish council member to
work at one of the public service district hospitals.<br>
<br>
This means that the waiver process, instead of being an adjunct to
the ethics advice provided by an independent ethics commission, has
now become part of individual legislators' constituent services. If you feel
the ethics board will say No to your request, all you have to do is
ask your state representative to get the legislature to say Yes. No
one else in the legislature will care one way or the other. But
precedents will be set, and they will be hard to change. Slowly,
conflicts of interest, as well as the ethics board, will become
something that people will rightfully ignore.<br>
<br>
If you think I'm exaggerating the effect of these minor exemptions, here's what a
state senator said during the debate of the exemption bills: "If you want to destroy ethics
in this state, you do it one local bill at a time."<br>
<br>
It's not that waivers are wrong, it's that elected officials should
play no role in the waiver process. This should be left to the
ethics board, and the creation of precedents should be carefully
considered and limited, not left up to individual legislators and individual bills.<br>
<br>
Fortunately, according to <a href="http://theadvocate.com/news/opinion/2900804-123/inside-report-ethics-is…; target="”_blank”">a
recent article in the Baton Rouge <i>Advocate</i></a>, the biggest
exemption bill, passed by the House, was rejected by the
Senate. This bill would have exempted from the definition of “public
employee” architects, engineers, landscape architects, certified
public accountants, title abstractors, and land surveyors contracted to do
work for state or local government. There was an attempt to include
lawyers among the exemptees, but it failed.<br>
<br>
The state ethics board takes the position, “We
don’t look at what they are. We look at what they do.” This is the
right approach. Anyone acting in the stead of the government, no
matter their profession, should be fully subject to government
ethics laws.<br>
<br>
Robert Wechsler<br>
Director of Research-Retired, City Ethics<br>
<br>
203-859-1959