Contractors and Vendors

The paths of justice have some odd twists to them. Consider these twists. As I wrote in a blog post almost exactly a year ago, both parties to a case involving a Baltimore council member's alleged acceptance of a bribe argued that a statutory provision entitled "Action for defamation against local government official" was not relevant to the case. Here is the text of that provision (§5-...

A trash board member attends a homeowners association meeting to talk about potential changes to the city’s residential trash service. Also in attendance is a representative from the company that has the city's landfill contract. After the trash board member makes a short speech, she leaves the meeting and asks the company representative to answer questions from the audience. This was apparently not planned.

The city's trash collector, under a contract up for renewal and for which...

It's fascinating how different issues are important to local government officials in difference places at different times. I couldn't say that officials will always dig in their heels and fight this ethics provision, or that another ethics provision never raises an eyebrow.

Take Broward County, FL, for example. After numerous arrests and convictions of local officials, the county commission passed a new ethics ordinace, and the county's citizens voted to have this ordinance apply...

Just because it happens in New York City doesn't mean it will happen in the average city or, especially, town. Right? No, it can happen, only the numbers will probably be smaller. Two situations described in today's New York Times, both of them effectively centered on the hiring and failure to oversee consultants, are worth knowing about.

An ethics controversy involving the Atlanta Public Schools (APS) has led to the resignation of four of the seven members of the APS ethics commission, a failure to replace them, and a threat to the schools' accreditation status.

On Friday, the Louisville ethics commission found that a council member intentionally violated several ethics provisions. This was its first major action under the city's new ethics code, which I wrote about last year. The EC gave the council member the most serious...