County Related

See below for two updates

I've written a lot about politicians' charities, and how they allow lobbyists and others to get around limits on campaign contributions. But an article in today's New York Times presents a new form of abuse of a politician's charities (although it's not as different as it first seems).

To what extent should financial disclosure rules be applied to nonprofits that do government work?

According to an article in Sunday's New York Times, two years ago New York State extended disclosure requirements to the board members of nonprofits "affiliated with, sponsored by or created by a county, city, town or village government." The goal was more transparency in quasi-...

We don't know why the Summit County developer is running for a council seat (see the most recent blog entry), but we do know why a sheriff's sergeant in Rancho Murieta, California, is running for the Sacramento County Community Services District Board: to get off-duty sheriff's deputies to provide security in his area. And according to an article on ranchomurieta.com, he is very frustrated that, if elected, this is the one issue...

Expertise is one of the most difficult issues in local government ethics. In most cases, more expertise also means more potential conflicts of interest, and yet it can also mean more effective government. According to an article in yesterday's Park Record (Park City, UT), a Summit County Council candidate running against the head of a development company is focusing on this issue.

According to an editorial in the New Jersey Star-Ledger, Gov. Corzine has set forth a number of ethics reforms, which focus on cities and counties, where the corruption has been the worst in recent years (see my blog entries here, here,...

According to an article in today's New York Times and in yesterday's Huffington Post, the investigator charged by Alaska's Legislative Committee, before Sarah Palin was even being considered as a vice presidential candidate, found in...