Article: Penalties vary in ethics cases
After watching a judge convict the governor of ethical violations and a legislative panel tell a state senator to apologize for a serious ethical breach this year, the Ohio Republican chairman and others are calling for changes in how such cases are handled.
Robert T. Bennett, the veteran state GOP chairman, is telling his legislative leaders that punishments handed down for ethics violations in 2005 weren’t fair.
Republican Gov. Bob Taft — the first sitting Ohio governor ever found guilty of a crime — was convicted of four misdemeanors for failing to disclose 52 golf outings and other gifts.
Meanwhile, state Sen. Ray Miller, D-Columbus, allowed an aide to work for his private company while she was on state time. The Joint Legislative Ethics Committee forced him to write a letter of apology and pay back $936 for the time she worked.
"The governor had to stand up before a judge and take his punishment, and Ray Miller, with a much more egregious wrongdoing, basically gets a slap on the wrist and pays back money that he stole," Bennett said. "Justice has to be evenly enforced."
Though she doesn’t think Taft was treated unfairly, Catherine Turcer, legislative director of the government watchdog group Ohio Citizen Action, agrees that Miller got off easy.
On Dec. 13, the same ethics panel gave minor punishment to three Republican lawmakers for ethics violations.
Reps. Jim Raussen of Springdale, Diana M. Fessler of New Carlisle and Michelle G. Schneider of Cincinnati were given something resembling a reprimand — a "notice of remedy" — for failing to disclose that they accepted dinner and $300 Cincinnati Bengals luxury box tickets from a lobbyist in October 2004.
Taft went to court; the lawmakers were judged by a 12-member bipartisan panel of legislators.
Until two weeks ago, that panel had not made an ethicsviolation finding since 1997.
An oversight panel composed of legislators is more likely to be lenient, Turcer said.
"When they’re your friends and peers, you’re more likely to see the gray area in the ethics violation than someone on the outside who can get in there and hold people accountable," she said.
A separate panel, the Ohio Ethics Commission, oversees the governor and others in the executive branch. Turcer said it doesn’t make sense to have separate bodies policing executive and legislative officials. Others agree.
Bob Stern, president of the nonprofit and nonpartisan Center for Governmental Studies in California, said legislatures at both the state and federal level rarely police themselves.
"Legislatures do not want anyone else looking at them. It’s really that simple," Stern said. "Unless (legislative committees) can show they are actively investigating and bringing cases against legislators . . . they need to be supplemented if not scrapped."
Stern and other experts on government ethics say one independent agency should oversee both the executive and legislative branches. The judiciary polices itself in Ohio and most states.
One agency can enforce the law consistently and fairly, said Paula Franzese, a law professor at Seton Hall University in New Jersey, who completed a detailed ethics review as part of that state’s reform efforts.
"This sort of approach is a good one," she said. She noted that model is used in at least 16 of the 38 states that have a statewide ethics commission.
In Pennsylvania, where the state ethics commission has jurisdiction over the legislature, six-term state Rep. Jeff Habay, of Allegheny County, was convicted recently of conflict of interest for making his legislative staff do political work for his campaign on state time.
In June 2004, the ethics commission ordered Habay to repay the state about $13,000 and then referred the case to the state attorney general, who filed the felony charge.
Ohio Republican legislative leaders — Senate President Bill M. Harris of Ashland and Speaker Jon A. Husted of Kettering — defend the system here.
"I think that is an appropriate way for members in both parties to police each other in a bipartisan way," Husted said.
Husted said the House will introduce legislation next year dealing with ethics issues. Although he would not offer specifics, he said the bill would clarify some compliance measures and standards.
House Democrats this year proposed increasing the penalty for knowingly filing multiple false disclosure statements, but the Republican majority blocked the measure.
Turcer said lawmakers should set up a grace period — maybe a month — in which they are allowed to amend their disclosure forms without penalty. After that, they should get hit with tougher punishments, she said.
Bennett suggested a zero-tolerance system in which fines escalate after each reporting mistake, and eventually the case goes to the prosecutor.
Bennett also said it’s not fair that the Joint Legislative Ethics Committee allows lawmakers to amend their disclosure statements, but the Ohio Ethics Commission does not.
Tony Bledsoe, the legislative inspector general, denied that’s the case. Each panel decides whether failing to disclose gifts or assets was deliberate, he said.
"We simply use the term amendment for it. They do not," Bledsoe said. "We both abide by the same standards."
Husted said he listened to Bennett’s frustration about Taft and Miller, but he declined to talk to him about the level of punishment in Miller’s case.
"That was a matter for the prosecutor to deal with," not the legislative ethics committee, he said.
Neither the Ethics Commission nor the legislative committee can file criminal charges, but both can refer cases to prosecutors, who decide whether to file charges.
Prosecutors were willing to file charges against Taft. Bledsoe turned the Miller case over to Franklin County Prosecutor Ron O’Brien, but he didn’t pursue any charges.
O’Brien would not say why, nor would he talk about a punishment comparison between Miller and Taft.
O’Brien signed off on Miller’s letter of apology and $936 repayment before the Joint Legislative Ethics Committee approved it.
"When you measured everything out, it seemed like a fair resolution," he said.
Miller has said that allowing the aide to work for his nonprofit voter-registration company was an inadvertent mistake.
jsiegel@dispatch.com
mniquette@dispatch.com
posted by Kathie Bracy at 10:03 PM
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