Saratoga Springs Politics

 

 

[JK: I asked Michele Madigan to post me pictures and stories regarding the Women’s March in D.C.]

They left at 11:45 this evening on a bus to D.C.  She is traveling with her mother.

 

The Crown Grill owned by Christel and Colin MacLean on Broadway is under contract for sale.  The perspective buyer has not been named.  It was originally listed for $595,000.00.

The MacLean’s say they want to focus on their growing juice business.

[JK: This is a release from the Charter Commission]

Spa City Charter Commission Unanimous 14-0 for

Council Manager Form of Government

After eight months of research and deliberations, the Saratoga Springs Charter Review Commission voted 14-0 in favor of the council manager form of government. The decision is a non-binding recommendation as the commission continues to develop a new charter that will go before voters in a May 30 referendum. If approved, a new charter would take effect in 2019.

The Charter Commission members discussed the importance of representing the wishes of the citizens, providing city services efficiently, and keeping taxes low.

One of the major themes was the increasing competition to attract and retain businesses and workers in the 21^st century economy.

“I was on the City Center Parking Garage Task Force in 2001 and saw the plan fall apart due to jurisdictional and political turf conflicts between commissioners,” said Gordon Boyd. “It is 16 years later and we still have no garage.  Now, we are competing with at least 30 other cities nationwide to retain Ayco.  I am worried that the five silos of the commission form of government inhibit the ability to act quickly.”

Jeff Altamari, a former VP of Finance at a Fortune 500 company, emphasized that Saratoga faces increasing competition to attract and retain businesses and workers.  “A new charter needs to be focused on the demands of future growth.  While the existing commission form of government may have been adequate for the last 100 years, it cannot accommodate these demands given its parochial structure and short terms of service.”

Several commission members emphasized that interviews and research had highlighted how a city manager could improve city services.

“When we interviewed city managers from Corning and Batavia, I was impressed with their long-term vision for infrastructure improvements, technology and economic growth,” said Beth Wurtmann. “A strategic ten-year plan under a skilled city manager is what Saratoga Springs needs to stay abreast with 21st century demands.”

Mike Los, who has served in senior management for several major medical device companies, said, “In interviews with city managers from around the state, I was impressed by how they use their professional organization, the International City/Council Manager Association, to identity best practices to save taxpayers money. The city manager of Geneva saved millions on city employee health care costs by creating a regional health care consortium.”

Several commission members also felt that a council manager form of government could minimize partisan bickering and infighting.

“I think the council manager structure offers the dual benefits of professional management, which our dynamic City demands for its future growth, guided by the personal involvement, experience and commitment of citizens on the Council, the bedrock of our City’s historical strength,” said Ann Bullock.

“A council manager structure would reduce political pressures and in-fighting by having the City Council represent the will of the people and the city manager administer the daily operations of the city,” said BK Keramati.

Several members highlighted how they felt the council manager structure would reduce taxes for city residents.

“I think the city would save money by hiring one professional city manager instead of five deputy commissioners,” said Rob Kuczynski.

“In Canandaigua, the city council and mayor told the city manager to keep costs down,” said Bob Turner, Commission chair. “The city manager is forced to squeeze out the waste and inefficiency or lose his job.”

 What is the Council Manager Form of Government?

Under the council manager form of government, the city council approves the budget, determines the tax rate and focuses on the community’s goals, major projects, and such long-term considerations as community growth, land use development, capital improvement plans, capital financing, and strategic planning.  The council hires a highly trained non-partisan, professional city manager to carry out these policies with an emphasis on effective, efficient, and equitable service delivery. Managers serve at the pleasure of the governing body and can be fired by a majority of the council.

The council manager form is the most popular structure of local government in the United States.  Among cities with 25,000-49,999 population, 63% of cities have a council manager structure, 31% have mayor council, and 1% has the commission form of government. Currently, Saratoga Springs and Mechanicville are the only cities in New York that have the commission form of government.

Next steps

The Charter Review Commission will continue developing an alternative charter at its next meeting on Tuesday, January 24, 7pm, City Hall, with a public comment period at the beginning of the meeting. Members will discuss the role of the mayor under the council manager form of government, as well as finance provisions, the city attorney role and the recreation commission.

 

[JK:Both courtesy and  protocol required that that those of us working to improve the city’s ethics code ask for input from the city’s Ethics Board before seeking action by the City Council.

Cynical as I can be about our public institutions, even I was not prepared for the unabashed indifference the Ethics Board showed the public who had come out on a cold night to hear their deliberations on the proposed changes.  Emblematic of this was the Ethics Board’s decision to dispense with microphones and audio equipment which would have allowed them to be heard by the citizens in the audience. (The acoustics in the council chambers are notoriously poor).  There were no name plaques to identify the members of the board nor any introductions.  For all intents and purposes the chair never really acknowledged the presence of the public.

There was no public comment period.  Most strikingly the committee never engaged the authors who were present about the proposed amendments.

Still, it was necessary to have gone through this step before approaching the City Council which has the actual authority to act on the proposed changes.]

Below is Joseph Levy’s wonderfully acerbic report on the meeting.

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Meeting of the Bored [JK: Didn’t want anyone to miss this]

By Joseph Levy

I took John’s advice and skipped a rerun of “The Simpsons” to attend the January meeting of the city’s Ethics Board, which convened at 5:30PM, January 12th, in the City Council chambers. The major topic was a continuation of its discussion of the proposed reforms drafted by Your Faithful Blogger, John Kaufmann, attorney Jerry Luhn who is retired from New York State service, former City Planner Geoff Bornemann, and its sponsor, Public Safety Commissioner Chris Mathiesen. In a way, it felt as if the December meeting had briefly adjourned and was just reconvening following a break for beer and sandwiches. This was underscored by Board members arriving seemingly aware of the agenda and, with a few exceptions, unarmed with fresh insights.

Members in attendance were:

Justin Hogan, Chairman – Mr. Hogan is in charge of “Government Relations” with the law firm and lobbying organization Featherstonehaugh, Wiley, and Clyne. Mr. Featherstonehaugh is one of the principals of Saratoga Casino Hotel, formerly the Racino and before that, Saratoga Harness.

Brendan Chudy – Director of the Legal Department at Global Foundries in Malta.

Marilyn Rivers – Director of Risk and Safety in the Saratoga Springs Accounts Department.

John Ellis – who currently works for the Civil Service Employees Association (CSEA), has served on the Saratoga Springs Board of Education and previously worked for the Ballston Spa School System for 21 years.

Also present was Tony Izzo, the Assistant City Attorney.

As before, there were no identifying plaques, no microphones, and no opportunity for audience members to participate in this public meeting. In fact the only acknowledgment of the eight people in the gallery was a comment by one of the members that, apparently, for the first time in its history the board was outnumbered by the public.

While Mr. Hogan opened by saying that the principal business was to discuss the draft reform proposal, he never mentioned the authors or sponsor by name.

Mr. Izzo reported conducting a random online search and looking at codes from across the country, mentioning San Antonio and Miami by name. Those cities, among others, all had ethics codes that applied to every board and department and not restricted to a particular municipal group, such as the land use boards, the specific area of interest here. When queried, he said that he could find no separate ethics code from any comparable city in New York State, but would continue to research this point. In the end, he said that the concept of a code which was limited in its application to certain named boards (land use, in this case), but not as a blanket code for all municipal entities, appeared to be without precedent.

Mr. Izzo also mentioned that while the draft proposal was principally written to cover the city’s three major land boards – the Zoning Board of Appeals, the Planning Board, and the Design Review Board — other panels, such as the Special Assessment Board, occasionally took on issues that also dealt with that general area.

Mr. Hogan asked somewhat rhetorically, “Is there an issue to be fixed?” and wondered aloud what exactly prompted the need for such a proposal in the first place. Though several audience members were likely prepared to answer, without a format that invited their participation, the question was left hanging awkwardly in midair. It bears noting that the same question was raised in a similar manner at the Board’s first meeting on this subject, so for all appearances, it looked like little headway was made in answering the Chair’s own question.

The heart of the discussion which followed involved revisiting the four main concepts within the proposal, as Mr. Izzo saw them, modified by recent revisions submitted by the original authors. He then produced copies of the existing code and, at Mr. Chudy’s request, a line-by-line search ensued to seek out elements of the proposal which were already incorporated into the existing municipal code. To some extent, it was an exercise in “compare and contrast.” A few examples:

• Ms. Rivers pointed out that the existing clause regarding gifts between parties to an application and members of the board reviewing same, was actually stricter in its current wording and expressed support for retaining it in its current form. It seemed like there was at least some interest in maintaining a strong code.

 

• Mr. Izzo introduced a refined definition of the phrase ex parte, which in this context references inappropriate communication between an applicant and a board member outside of the formal meeting setting. He suggested that for a communication to cross the line, it must “substantively relate to the merits of an application” before a board and that currently there is no provision to address this issue. There was also some discussion about how one might prove that such communication actually took place. Parroting Mr. Hogan’s earlier question, Mr. Chudy wondered aloud what issue was out there that needed fixing and said, in effect, that just because there have been a few complaints, it didn’t mean there was a real problem. However, Mr. Hogan responded by saying that there may be some basis for certain allegations along these lines.

 

Mr. Izzo then asked what, in parliamentary terms, does the relevant board do with a public disclosure that is followed by the recusal of a member, saying that the present code has sparse language or guidance on this point.

 

• The concept of defining how far from a proposed project a board member had to have a property interest before a conflict arose (for example, 100 feet), was analogized in the proposal to that of defining the speed limit on a road — it could be 30 mph or 31 mph, but at some point the line had to be drawn. Mr. Hogan said that he was mystified by the analogy and seemed to mock the entire concept of defining a specific distance before recusal on the part of a board member was necessary.

 

• Returning to the current ethics code, Mr. Chudy felt that the existing “private interest” clause regarding ethical conflicts already covered much of the ground which the draft tried to define in greater detail, such as the last point, above.

 

As the meeting continued, diving deeper and deeper into the minutiae of the draft, I couldn’t help but feel that the members, especially Mr. Hogan and Mr. Chudy, regarded the reform proposal as if it were a party crasher, albeit one whom everyone knew and who nobody really had the nerve to escort to the door.

The discussion continued along these lines until about 6:45, at which point people started arriving for the Planning Board’s meeting, which was scheduled to begin at 7PM in the same chambers. With a few apparently unrelated items yet to be covered, the Ethics Board retired to Mr. Izzo’s office at 6:55 to convene in executive session without indicating how they might proceed with the draft and we called it a night, looking forward to some comic relief on “the tele.”

[JK: I received this press release from the Charter Commission.  Unfortunately, the video of the meeting had not been posted as of this morning (Monday, January 16).  Your loyal blogger usually endures viewing these meetings.  Often it is worth while because, as is understandably the case, other matters often come up that provide more insight to the process.  I would observe that there were apparently no actual votes on these things.  I will be posting some comments on this shortly]

Charter Review Commission Proposes New Direction for Saratoga City Council

Seven members, four-year staggered terms, term limits, neighborhood districts and at-large districts Saratoga Springs:

After seven months of interviews, hearings, interviews, and fact-finding, the Charter Review Commission got down to the business of drafting a new city charter, at its meeting on January 12.

Last month, the Commission voted 12-3 to draft a new charter that separates the legislative responsibilities from the administrative ones.

“In drafting a new charter, we wanted to start with the City Council, because a strong Council is at the heart of a responsive and efficient government.” said Bob Turner, Commission chair. The Commission discussed the number of members, the length of terms, term limits, and the merits of neighborhood districts versus at- large districts.

The first issue discussed was whether to keep the current number of city council members at five.  Turner, who teaches political science at Skidmore, pointed out that James Madison, in Federalist #10, said that there is no magic number, however, it must be large enough “in order to guard against the cabals of a few; (but) must be limited to a certain number, in order to guard against the confusion of a multitude.”

The Commission reviewed national and New York data on the tremendous variation in the size of city councils. The consensus of the Commission was that seven members seemed appropriate for the size of this city.

The second issue discussed was whether to keep the current term length at two years. Former city council members and City Hall employees, in interviews, have stated that campaign politics in the second year of a term detracts from a focus on governance.

Council members felt that having a four year term would reduce the frequency of fundraising and campaigning. Approximately 70% of city governments in America have four year terms.  The Charter Review Commission supported staggered elections for the city council.

The most lengthy discussion concerned the merits of neighborhood districts versus at-large elections. Under the current system, Commissioners are elected in city-wide elections.  Under a neighborhood district system, council members are elected from a neighborhood or smaller geographic area. Candidates would have to live in the district they represent.

Neighborhood districts would make a positive contribution to the electoral and governance process of the City. Neighborhood districts make it easier for new candidates to run for office since they would only have to reach out to approximately 4,500 voters instead of 18,000.  The smaller size would keep campaign costs down and enable an enterprising candidate to potentially knock on every door in their district.

The Commission’s studies have revealed that the vast majority of City Council candidates from the past 15 years have come from a small cluster on the central east side of the city. Neighborhood districts would ensure more geographic representation in City Council affairs. Commission members Gordon Boyd and Matt Jones thought the mix of at-large and district representation would reduce NIMBYism in city politics.

The tentative consensus of the Commission was that the Council members should be a combination of four neighborhood district representatives and three at-large district representatives.

The Commission also supported giving the City Council confirmation power over all Mayoral appointments to city boards and judicial appointments pending state law.  The Commission felt that this was an important step in restoring checks and balances to a new system.

The Charter Review Commission’s next meeting is Thursday. January 19^th when they will discuss the merits of city manager versus a strong mayor.  The current commission form of government was adopted by Saratoga Springs in 1915.  There are only two other cities in New York with the Commission form of government, Mechanicville and Sherrill.

The Charter Review Commission is a 15-member citizen board appointed by the Mayor and City Council.  A new charter would be placed before the voters in a special election on May 30^th.

 

The Charter Commission met on Tuesday, January 10^th.

Selecting a Date for the Referendum.

The commission voted to schedule a special election for a referendum on a new city charter for Tuesday, May 30.

Pat Kane had met with John Franck who had acknowledged the authority of the commission to set the date and to secure the required funding from the city for this election. There had been some question as to whether the commission could compel the city to pay for a special election and apparently the answer to that is yes.

Commission chair Bob Turner led a discussion about the costs associated with holding a special election in the city. Usually the cost of running elections is primarily covered by the county. For a special election just for the city, though, Saratoga Springs will pay. Apparently there are two models for elections.  The less expensive model for primary elections involves shorter hours and the ability to have as few as one polling place open. The consensus was to go with the model for general elections with all polling places open from 6AM until 9PM. According to the county board of elections the cost to the city for printed ballots, polling places, and staff will be around $37,000.00.

There was a very long and extensive discussion about whether to go with the May 30^th date.  For a variety of logistical reasons, this was the only viable date if they wanted to have a vote on the charter in the spring. The question they then turned to was whether to have this on the ballot in the spring or have it included on the November ballot at the regular November general election.

Mr. Turner repeated the arguments he made to the City  Council when he appeared before them  and most of the members of the commission offered related, supporting arguments.  They liked the fact that the charter will be the sole source of discussion as the only item on the ballot in a special election.   They will not have to compete with the noise of concurrent campaigns for office.  They apparently have budgeted $20,000.00 for a mailer to the public and there was a strong agreement that this mailer would be lost in the blizzard of advertizing that a November election would bring.   They felt that by the end of May the “snow birds” will have migrated back to participate in the vote.

There was also the issue that the referendum would have appeared on the back page of the ballot in an election that included candidates whereas in May it would be the only item on the ballot.  It was stated that in an earlier referendum held during a general election some 2,000 people cast ballots but did not vote one way or the other on the charter revision item.  Someone observed that they were not sure how much of this could be attributed to the public’s confusion or how much to the public’s indifference.

The committee discussed at some length Commissioner Franck’s contention that a spring election would in effect “suppress” the vote.

Some of the commission’s advocates for a spring vote took exception to the idea of “suppression” asserting that the public would be fully informed of the opportunity to vote and that the decision would rest with the citizens as to whether or not to participate.  No action was being taken, they argued, to hide the referendum.

Someone asked what the turnout had been in the past for special elections and someone else said that this would be the first special election in the city’s history.

Attorney Matt Jones expressed reservations.  He noted that if the ballot included both candidates and the referendum that voters would be quite informed and aware of the charter issue. It would, he argued, be a major issue in the campaign as the candidates would be pressed on their positions on a charter change. His main concern was that an election date be selected when the most voters could be expected to participate and in his opinion that would be in November.

In the end Matt Jones (appointed by Commissioner Scirocco) and Elio DelSette (appointed by Commissioner Madigan) were the only dissenting votes.  I believe that Rob Kuczynski (appointed by Commissioner Franck) was absent. All but one who voted in favor of the May 30 date were Yepsen appointees.

Pulling Back From Submitting Changes to the City Council

For many months, a subcommittee chaired by Matt Jones has labored over amending the existing charter.  Some of the changes expected to come out of his committee could be enacted by the City Council without a referendum while others would require one.   All the changes would assume the continuation of the current “Commission” form of government.

In December, the Charter Commission adopted a resolution put forward by Gordon Boyd (and discussed in an earlier post) that called for a spring referendum on a charter change that would replace the current “Commission” form with something else. It also committed the Charter Commission to submitting the work of Mr. Jones’ subcommittee to the City Council by February 1.

Jeff Altamari asked that the original Boyd resolution be amended to some sort of language that would have Jones’ Committee complete its work by February 1 but not submit it to the City  Council. He was concerned that submitting this to the City Council before a vote on a change of government might produce confusion. I think it was a rather shrewd move because throwing this to the council would have directed energy to reforming the existing form of government.  It would also have changed the forum for charter change from this commission to the council.  Given the overwhelming support for ending the “commission” form of government by the commission members, this was not a route they wanted to travel.

The Boyd resolution was amended accordingly.

An Agenda For Changes But Where Is The Elephant?

Apparently the members of the Commission had received the agenda for their planned meeting for January 12^th prior to this meeting (January 10^th) [JK: No one can accuse this group of being lazy!] .  It is as follows:

7:20 Discussion of Charter Provisions on City Council to include some or all of the

following

1. City Council
2. Council qualifications and compensation
3. Member qualifications
4. Prohibitions

iii. Vacancy and forfeiture of office

1. Council to be the judge of the qualifications of its members
2. Council compensation: to be set in charter or to be set by council in

budget

1. Council representation and composition
2. Number of members
3. Terms of office: number of years; staggered or concurrent

iii. Nomination method

1. Election method: wards, at large, combination (if wards, method of

districting and apportionment)

1. Term Limits
2. Council organization and procedures
3. The presiding officer: election by voters at large or chosen by

council, duties (voting power)

1. The council’s secretary, selection and duties

iii. Time and place of regular meetings

1. Method of calling special meetings
2. Meeting procedures
3. Public meetings
4. Council to establish rules of procedure
5. Voting, quorum, binding action requirements

As the readers can see, these agenda items are limited to a discussion of aspects of a council in a new form of government rather than a consideration of a strong mayor or city manager form of government.  Commission member Minita Sanghvi innocently asked the obvious question.  The group was supposed to take on the big issue of what type of government they planned to adopt as their next task.  She pointed out that this list of items did not include this.

Mr. Turner and several others on the Commission assured her that addressing the questions on the above agenda would lead them into a discussion of what the new form of government would be.

On Thursday, January 12^th the Ethics Board will be meeting to discuss proposed changes to the city’s ethics code.  They will meet in the Council chambers in city hall at 5:30PM.  According to the posted agenda, it will be the first item of business.

This is a link to the proposal: proposed-ethical-standards-for-land-use-board-members

Here is an overview of the issues:

To: Justin Hogan and Members of Ethic Board

From: Chris Mathiesen, Geoff Bornemann, Jerry Luhn, John Kaufmann

Date: January 2, 2017

Subject: Revising Ethics Code
Mr. Hogan, please share this email with the members of your Board in preparation for the meeting now scheduled for January 12, 2017.

There were a number of issues raised at your December 12, 2016 meeting that were thought provoking. We would like to share with you and other members of the Ethics Board some comments and recommendations on those items that might prove helpful with your deliberation leading to  an advisory opinion for Commissioner Mathieson and other members of the Council you serve.

Purpose/Intent. 

We drafted suggested amendments to the City’s existing Ethics Code with a number of issues in mind. As we see it, the regulatory goal should be to provide the most clear and concise ethical standards in order to minimize the risk of compromising the credibility and effectiveness of our land use boards.

First, we acknowledge the impossibility of establishing clear and simple rules applicable to all situations land use board members are expected to face. Given this reality, a reasonable strategy is simply to establish clear codes where possible, assuming that the tenor of articulated standards will help influence conduct in related but unspecified transactions.

There will still remain the need for a broader statement of expectations, and it will be the responsibility of the Ethics Board to exercise its collective wisdom in assessing complaints brought before it that are not as plainly stipulated in the governing Code.

Second, we were mindful of the critical need for land use boards to maintain quorums to carry out their business. In order to carry out their duties, the boards must maintain a sufficient pool of active members at their meetings to remain effective.  Put otherwise, our municipal codes must not be so restrictive as to present a functional impediment to achieving quorums and serving the public mandate.

Would the Proposed Changes Adversely Affect the Ability of the Boards to Function?

For the passage of any motion, a majority is required and, in the case of our land use boards, a majority means the vote of at least four active members and not simply a majority of those present. Fortunately, informed by experience, the City has established the use of alternates on our land use boards. Each board now has a regular membership of seven, with two alternates.

With that architecture in mind, we believe that it is simply unreasonable to assume that proceedings convened to address any given proposal would be likely to suffer from mandated recusals sufficient to leave a given board unable to transact its business. It bears noting that one of our proposal authors is Geoff Bornemann, who served as City Planner for 22 years. Few people are more familiar with the makeup of our boards or more qualified to assess the impact of our codes on participation and effectiveness.

Would the New Standards Make Finding Qualified People To Serve a Problem?

The success of our City is rooted in its extraordinary, civic-minded citizenry. There is simply no shortage of persons interested in serving on these boards who possess the array of skills, work experience, and education that would aid such service. We are also fortunate in that the New York State Department of State and the annual conference of the Saratoga County Planning Board have extensive resources devoted to training land use boards. In addition to online tutorials and reference materials, they provide direct training as well.

Added to the above, our boards are supported by professional staff from the Planning Department who attend all of the meetings and seminars providing technical support and research.  The Planning Board and the Zoning Board of Appeals even have a land use attorney at every meeting held. This near-comprehensive professional and logistical support provides extraordinary assurance that, once in motion, applications and proceedings are guided appropriately and consistent with articulated public goals.

Addressing Issues Raised By Members of the Ethics Board.

Several members of the board questioned what they suggested are the arbitrary nature of some elements of our proposed amendments. In particular, they noted the requirement that a board member with property within one hundred feet of a project under review would need to recuse. They asked “why not one hundred and three, one hundred and fifteen…?”

We acknowledge the challenges that inhere with specifics in measures like these. Such problems are not unique to ethics codes, but are not sound reasons to dispense with standards. One might ask why a speed limit is set at thirty miles per hour within the City limits. Why not set it at thirty-one or thirty-three?  To borrow from legal realms, reasonable minds may disagree about any given foundation for a posted speed limit, but few would argue for not having one.

Our approach was to take the conservative approach. We asked what would be a number that any reasonable person would agree would potentially impact their property. We believe that anyone considering this in good faith would concede that a change in a property within one hundred feet of their home or business could impact their property in a way that they might not like, and that it would therefore impact upon their personal or familial interests.  It is that kind of realization that begs the question addressed by this proposed amendment.

How Would These New Codes Be Enforced?

Several Ethics Board members expressed doubts as to the enforceability of these new codes. This seemed to us a misplaced concern. The Ethics Board is comprised of volunteer appointees; it has no enforcement powers — or mandate — and no disciplinary authority. Paradoxically, its strength is as a public advisory body to the City Commissioners. Its members would handle the additional provisions we are recommending in the same way they handle the current ones.

Addressing the Tougher Issues

A member of the Ethics Board expressed concern that the list of very specific conflicts could imply that no other possible conflict might exist: that specifying certain conduct or practices as prohibited means that any not specified are therefore excluded from the Code’s reach. As noted at the beginning of this paper, where possible it is helpful to be clear and concise on specifics, but we had no wish to recreate something akin to the Internal Revenue Code. Accordingly, we have crafted the following language to establish that many other conflicts may exist prompting recusal:

A Board member shall recuse him/her self if their action creates the appearance of a lack of fairness or impartiality regarding an application.

As a way of understanding the intent of this language, consider the following. The current Code requires recusal if a member of one’s family came before the land use board with an application. What if an applicant had been divorced from a member of the board?

A reasonable person would consider the real possibility that the board member in question would have trouble being objective. Currently, the board member may recuse him/herself were they to advise the chair that they felt they could not be objective. We have put this language in because the Ethics Board would have an affirmative responsibility to issue an advisory opinion responsive to the circumstances presented, a classic guidance function for the City board concerned. The issue is not how a member of a board feels about their relationship with an applicant; rather, the actual issue is whether their ruling on a particular applicants proposal would create the appearance of a conflict, and therefore diminish public trust in that critical agency’s functions.

It is assumed that in thorny issues like this, the collective wisdom of the Ethics Board would lead to a fair determination worthy of the public trust. It is possible that some members might think there was no conflict, or would want to consider how long it has been since the divorce transpired, or whether property disputes were involved. The assumption is that as a body, they would consider all the factors and that as a body they would make a wise and transparently fair decision.

It is also important to note that new land use board members go through rigorous training in preparation to serve. This training includes ethics. It is the responsibility of the City Council to insure that relevant and sufficient resources for training are provided. It is also Important to note that with the authority of serving on a board goes personal responsibility to carry out that responsibility properly. It should be axiomatic that the responsibility of the Ethics Board is to establish an effective code and to examine allegations of violations. It is the responsibility of the people who serve our City to know what is expected of them.