In the News
Sun-Times News Group, September 13, 2006
Governor Blagojevich and the Legislature made some sweeping and significant changes in the state's ethics laws in 2003. They cracked down on lobbying, tightened the rules on job switches between government and the private sector, banned political work by state workers, ended public service announcements that helped incumbents get free re-election publicity and made a variety of other worthwhile changes. In one critical area, however, the law needs some tweaking to give it more teeth.
The law created inspectors general for five statewide offices and an ethics commission to oversee them. The inspectors were given power to investigate wrongdoing by state employees. But the law didn't give those inspectors much leeway to talk publicly about what they're investigating, or what they've found, or how the situation was resolved — even with a whistleblower who brought the matter to their attention. In fact, it gave them almost none, which is probably why you didn't know they existed.
The reports of the inspectors are shared only with the elected official they work for. If the inspector and the official agree about how to discipline the person investigated, the ethics commission doesn't get involved, and neither it nor the public are even informed.
The need for change became apparent earlier this year. Published reports revealed that two years ago, Blagojevich's first inspector general accused the governor's intergovernmental affairs chief of doling out jobs to clout-heavy candidates. Blagojevich said he followed the inspector general's recommendations, but the chairman of the ethics commission, James Brennan, said he never knew about the report until he read about it in the papers.
Cindy Canary, executive director of the Illinois Coalition for Political Reform, compared the sequence of events to police officers catching and punishing criminals without informing the public — or even the police chief.
As Brennan points out, the secrecy denies the public the opportunity to judge whether the situation was handled properly. It also erodes trust in government, which is low already. And it prevents punishments from serving as a deterrent to other state workers who might be thinking about engaging in similar improper activity.
The governor says he is open to changes. And legislation has been introduced by state Senators Susan Garrett (D-Lake Forest) and Kirk Dillard (R-Hinsdale) that would lift some of the secrecy, setting up a process for revealing to the ethics commission and the public an inspector general's report that leads to an employee being disciplined. It's a sensible step, and the Legislature should move quickly to take it.