The Political Radar blog had an interesting item on a letter from legislative leaders asking the attorney general to weigh in on the Ethics Commission’s ruling that members of task forces and working groups formed by the Legislature must follow the same ethics rules on lobbying as members of other state boards and commissions. I’ll [...]
Posted tagged ‘ethics’
Legislators continue ethics fight
September 14, 2011New twists in teachers contract dispute
August 18, 2011The state Ethics Commission is likely to take more flak from high places for its advisory ruling that led Sesnita Moepono, one of three members of the Hawaii Labor Relations Board, to withdraw from the prohibited practices case involving the Hawaii State Teachers Association contract. The ethics determination was pretty much a no-brainer; Moepono’s husband [...]
Les Kondo strikes again
August 11, 2011Ethics Commission executive director Les Kondo will likely have an even bigger target on his back with state legislators after he shot down a posh dinner well-heeled special interests planned for Hawai‘i lawmakers attending the National Conference of State Legislators in San Antonio. According to the Hawaii Reporter, the event was cancelled after Kondo advised [...]
Ethics chief in Legislature’s crosshairs again
August 4, 2011Nobody knows how to paint a target on his back better than Les Kondo, executive director of the state Ethics Commission. He got lawmakers’ noses seriously out of joint during this year’s legislative session when he told them that they couldn’t accept free tickets to a dinner hosted by a prominent Democratic power broker. How [...]
Legislators give up their fight for freebies — for now
April 1, 2011Every year, the Legislature seems to have an issue that drains its energy with negative vibes — all to no avail in the end. In 2011, it was SB 671, a gutted ethics bill that attempted to expand the freebies legislators could receive from special interests. It finally met an inglorious death yesterday with a [...]
Time for legislators to back off on ethics loopholes
March 25, 2011One of the most specious arguments in the debate over SB 671 is the one offered by House Majority Leader Blake Oshiro that rules governing the gifts public officials can receive from special interests need to be loosened because Hawai‘i’s ethics law hasn’t been updated in 39 years. For one thing, Hawai‘i’s law is viewed [...]
Legislators fight for the right to freeload (cont’d)
March 23, 2011The one thing you can count on with our Legislature is that bad ideas never die, especially when it comes to legislators taking care of themselves. So it is with SB 671, a shameless attempt by lawmakers to render themselves ethically free to accept gifts, travel and free meals from those seeking to buy their [...]
Senators fight for the right to freeload
March 8, 2011Update: Final reading on SB 671 was delayed 48 hours after the Senate amended it again today to limit the free tickets public officials can accept to fundraisers of IRS 501(c)(3) organizations (public charities and private foundations). Language was deleted that would have also allowed free admission to events sponsored by non-charitable tax-exempt groups such [...]
Hawai‘i lawmakers hunger for free meals
March 1, 2011Ethics laws governing Hawai‘i public officials are so lax that I didn’t think further loosening was possible. But cutting themselves ethical slack is one of our legislators’ special areas of creativity, and they’ve done it again with a bill up for hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee at 9 a.m. today that would allow lawmakers [...]
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