Last week, <a href="http://www.cityethics.org/node/800&quot; target="”_blank”">I wrote</a>
about municipal corruption scandals in Montreal. This week, I'm happy
to be able to write about a report requested by the province of Quebec,
which determined that the province's municipalities should all have a
code of ethics (only about 10% do now), that the largest cities and the
counties should have ethics commissioners, and that financial

<b>See update below:</b><br>
An issue that arises in many local governments involves campaign
contributions from local government employees, which often appear to be
coerced or required, that is, they appear to result from a misuse of
office by elected officials. Often, it appears that the giving occurs
because employees are concerned about keeping their jobs. This
concern includes concern about retaliation as well as concern about
what will happen if the candidate loses.<br>
<br>

In <a href="http://www.cityethics.org/node/803&quot; target="”_blank”">yesterday's miscellany</a>,
I talked about an ethics commission member conflicted due to having
played a role in the campaign of an official brought before the
commission. There are two ways to deal with such a conflict. One is to
deal with it like any conflict, when it arises. The other is to prevent
the conflict from occurring.<br>
<br>

<b>Ethics Reform and Ethics
Environments</b><br>
This weekend, the <span>Press-Enterprise</span>
ran <a href="http://www.pe.com/localnews/opinion/editorials/stories/PE_OpEd_Opinion_…; target="”_blank”">an
excellent editorial </a>about ethics reform in San Bernardino County.
Not only do the editors recognize that watered-down, "symbolic" ethics

<b>Update</b> - July 31, 2009 - see below<br>
In my April <a href="http://www.cityethics.org/node/707&quot; target="”_blank”">blog post</a>
about the legislative immunity defense made by a former Baltimore
council member (now the mayor), I felt that her arguments didn't have a
chance. Well, I was wrong. I was wrong primarily because I thought that
a state prosecutor would be determined to see the case through and,

As I have noted again and again, there is no more difficult, conflicted
role than that of a local government attorney. In small towns, there's
not a lot that can be done. But in cities and counties, there are
several things that can be done to lessen the local government
attorney's conflicts.<br>
<br>

We here in the U.S. like to think of Canadians as like us, but better.
More honest, less greedy, more accepting of diversity, etc. And they
pay for it by being dull.<br>
<br>
In the realm of government ethics, this sadly isn't true. At least in
Montreal. According to <a href="http://www.economist.com/world/americas/displaystory.cfm?story_id=13905…; target="”_blank”">a

<big>"In my view, the suggestion [by Judge Sotomayor] that [campaign]
contributions are tantamount to
bribery should offend anyone who’s ever contributed to a political
campaign — including the millions of Americans who donated money in
small and large amounts to the Presidential campaign of the man who
nominated Judge Sotomayor to the Supreme Court."</big><br>
<br>

I don't like seeing conflicts of interest discussed improperly in the
context of an election. Elections are a good time to educate the public
about issues, but when government ethics is used for partisan purposes,
it undermines both the public's understanding and their trust in
elected officials.<br>
<br>

A <a href="http://www.cityethics.org/node/227&quot; target="”_blank”">judicial opinion</a> is
apparently not enough to put an end to local government officials using the excuse that
the local government attorney told them participation in a matter is legal. Nor is the fact that the official's decision whether to participate is not solely a legal decision, but
rather a judgment based partially on the language of an ethics code and