Updated at 8:36 p.m.
The Vermont House is expected to appoint its first-ever ethics committee this week, according to House Speaker Shap Smith (D-Morristown).
The panel will be charged with investigating complaints of ethical violations committed by House members and will be empowered to recommend disciplinary actions to the body as a whole. The five-member committee will also oversee the creation of a new, online database disclosing members’ employment and board service.
“This is a pretty big departure from the past,” Smith says. “It’s not everything that people wanted, but I think it’s a good first step.”
The panel, which is to be appointed by the House Rules Committee, will include Reps. Donna Sweaney (D-Windsor), David Deen (D-Westminster), Linda Martin (D-Wolcott), Larry Cupoli (R-Rutland) and Sandy Haas (P-Rochester), according to Smith. The tri-partisan committee could be formally named as soon as Wednesday afternoon.
Ethical issues loomed large last year after retired Wall Street banker Bruce Lisman and the advocacy group he founded, Campaign for Vermont, proposed a far-reaching set of recommendations for increased disclosure within state government. In response, Smith appointed Sweaney, who chairs the House Committee on Government Operations, to lead a group studying the House’s policies.
In April, the House passed a resolution proposed by Sweaney’s group authorizing the creation of an ethics committee.
The resolution called on the panel “to advise individual members and provide training to all members on ethical conduct” and to “receive and investigate complaints of alleged ethical violations made against members of the House… and to recommend to the House any disciplinary action against a member for an ethical violation, if the Panel deems it necessary.”
The resolution also required House members to submit a form to the House clerk disclosing the names of their employers and “any boards, commissions or other entities on which the member serves,” a description of the member’s position on such boards and whether he or she is paid.
According to Smith, the clerk’s office is currently drafting the form lawmakers will be required to complete. He says he hopes the information will be available online by the end of January.
Smith says his decision to change the House rules was not prompted by any particular incident.
“There have been persistent calls for more financial disclosure and more clarity around conflict of interest,” he says. “And the appointment of [Sweaney’s study group] was really in response to the concerns that have been articulated and an effort to figure out what steps we should take to give Vermonters confidence that we operate in an ethical manner.”
Smith says one of the first actions the committee will take is to determine what disciplinary actions it can recommend. He says censure by the House would likely be among them.
The Vermont Senate has taken no action to create an equivalent panel governing its members.
“It’s great to see it coming together,” says Campaign for Vermont executive director Cyrus Patten, calling the creation of the panel “a good, incremental step” toward the group’s broader recommendations.
He says he hopes the Senate will follow the House’s lead.
“If it’s good enough for the House, so to speak, it’s good enough for the Senate,” Patten says. “What it means to me is that a majority of our legislature agrees that this is a necessary step to take.”
Got something to say?
Send a letter to the editor and we'll publish your feedback in print!
It seems to me that this group should not be limited to just keeping track of House Members and their ethics or lack there of, but also include looking into the ethics of the governor and his staff and any who might be hired by him and are working under contract for the State such as the individual who proclaimed that it was necessary to keep things secret because the voters were stupid.
Merely a Witch Hunt without Judicial Oversight!
Speaker Smith’s recent behavior has indicated that he has the same ethical values as his good buddy “Putney Pete”! One needs to be ethical in order to judge the ethics (and morality) of others. I would like to see a code of ethics AND an enforcement panel (committee) for the House, Senate and Executive Office under the guidance of the State Supreme Court.
Smith’s proposal is little more than requiring the disclosure of financial and business interests. We are left to assume that would lead to individuals with conflicts-of-interest recusing themselves from legislation that touches on their interests – something that we hope is already happening today. Without judicial oversight, any ethics panel will devolve into a partisan witch hunt, a boiling political cauldron more apt to scald difficult and uncooperative legislators than the unethical rascals.
H. Brooke Paige
Washington, Vermont
If we are talking about ethics, why not start with Vermont’s crooked lottery and the deceptive practices they use to rob a segment of our society of their hard earned money ,all in the name of education. When in fact ,proceeds from the lottery account for only 1% of Vermont’s education budget!!. The Crooked lottery preys on the poor ,the working poor, and the elderly. It is merely a back door tax on this segment of Vermonter’s . The ones who can least afford it. The harm caused by the lottery ,far out weighs any perceived good the politicians would have You believe it does. . It hurts our economy, robs the poor, the working poor and the elderly. The lottery sells to our minor children ,in hopes of creating the next generation of addicted gamblers. The lottery lies about the odds on the backs of scratch tickets therefore committing fraud each time a ticket is sold. Where is Willie sorrel on this one?? He would be all over any other business that did this!!. The lottery is responsible for a higher crime rate in Vermont. The lottery causes stress related illnesses. The list goes on.I say follow Texas lead!! They are exploring getting rid of the lottery. We should be first and shut down Vermonts crooked lottery. Lets set the example for the rest of the country. The late Senator John Finn said at the lotteries inception that it was a regressive tax, and a bad idea. Get rid of the lottery!!!
Mr. Ward makes a great point, however we had better not hold our breath waiting for Lapdog Willie (Sorrell) to investigate his Democratic buddies on anything. Grandmother told me that “Gambling is the Devil’s Playground” – of course she was right and just look who is running the playground!
Hopefully it is not lipservice
The panel should consist of ordinary taxpayers, not members of our corrupt congress.