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Updates re Rhode Island and Oregon - Legislative Immunity and Annual Disclosure
Wednesday, January 21st, 2009
Robert Wechsler
Rhode Island - Legislative Immunity
According to yesterday's Providence Journal, the Rhode Island Supreme Court has agreed to hear an appeal from the court decision supporting the former state senate president's claim of legislative immunity against the Rhode Island Ethics Commission, which equally has jurisdiction over local government legislators and other officials. It has thus recognized the importance of this issue to enforcement by the state's EC.
However, the Supreme Court refused to stay the lower court decision, so that, for the time being, legislators involved in legislative activity are outside the EC's jurisdiction. It is not clear whether this would apply to local government legislators, as well.
Oregon - Annual Disclosure
According to an Associated Press article yesterday, the Oregon legislature is considering changes to the state's annual disclosure requirements due to the many complaints and resignations of local officials, as discussed in a couple of blog entries here, both accessible from the one link. According to the article, the biggest problem local officials have with the disclosure requirements is listing their adult relatives.
"It doesn't make any sense; there's no public benefit to it," the Senate Majority Leader is quoted as saying. Is there really no sense in knowing the names of relatives who might come before a commission member or get a contract from the local government? If there's no sense to this, there's also no sense in knowing whom an official works for or what property he or she owns in town, because knowing this would not in any way help people know if there's a conflict. And it would also be of no benefit to the public if an official who discloses this information were (sensibly) more careful about letting family members or employers benefit from his or her position.
I think we should all thank Senator Devlin for knocking some sense into government ethics.
Robert Wechsler
Director of Research-Retired, City Ethics
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According to yesterday's Providence Journal, the Rhode Island Supreme Court has agreed to hear an appeal from the court decision supporting the former state senate president's claim of legislative immunity against the Rhode Island Ethics Commission, which equally has jurisdiction over local government legislators and other officials. It has thus recognized the importance of this issue to enforcement by the state's EC.
However, the Supreme Court refused to stay the lower court decision, so that, for the time being, legislators involved in legislative activity are outside the EC's jurisdiction. It is not clear whether this would apply to local government legislators, as well.
Oregon - Annual Disclosure
According to an Associated Press article yesterday, the Oregon legislature is considering changes to the state's annual disclosure requirements due to the many complaints and resignations of local officials, as discussed in a couple of blog entries here, both accessible from the one link. According to the article, the biggest problem local officials have with the disclosure requirements is listing their adult relatives.
"It doesn't make any sense; there's no public benefit to it," the Senate Majority Leader is quoted as saying. Is there really no sense in knowing the names of relatives who might come before a commission member or get a contract from the local government? If there's no sense to this, there's also no sense in knowing whom an official works for or what property he or she owns in town, because knowing this would not in any way help people know if there's a conflict. And it would also be of no benefit to the public if an official who discloses this information were (sensibly) more careful about letting family members or employers benefit from his or her position.
I think we should all thank Senator Devlin for knocking some sense into government ethics.
Robert Wechsler
Director of Research-Retired, City Ethics
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- Robert Wechsler's blog
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