Raising the state ethics bar

Since we are in the midst of another legislative session where ethics and lobbying reform legislation seem again to be dead on arrival, some comments about how governmental ethics is handled here in Hawaii are in order to help the public better understand the nature and magnitude of the problems we face — and perhaps what can be done to better the situation.

Hawaii does, of course, have a State Ethics Commission, created by our state Constitution. The commission regulates ethics for state officials and employees, and lobbying at the state level.

It therefore might seem that all is in order so long as the commission does its job. Unfortunately, however, it’s not that simple.

First, there is a widely held but erroneous belief that the commission can stop any and all apparently ethically inappropriate conduct, and any and all apparently inappropriate lobbying at the Legislature.

However, this is not how things work in Hawaii — nor anywhere else, for that matter.

It must be understood that the powers of the commission are limited to enforcing only the ethics laws and lobbying laws passed by the state Legislature. Because of this, the "name" of the State Ethics Commission perhaps implies more authority than actually exists for the commission. In short, the commission can only enforce the laws that are currently on the books.

The real problem regarding ethics and lobbying regulation thus rests almost entirely with the Legislature passing reasonable laws so that the commission can do its job. But the Legislature, for the most part, has been missing in action.

For years on end, the Legislature has failed to pass even the most basic laws for ethics and lobbying reform.

For ethics, for example, this includes a law on nepotism, more rational restrictions for conflicts of interests, lower thresholds for the reporting of gifts, and "public" (not confidential) financial disclosures for high-level boards such as the University of Hawaii Board of Regents, and boards that head state authorities.

In the area of lobbying, for example, the Legislature simply will not pass a bill requiring a fourth lobbying expenditures report to be filed around September of each year, leaving us with a mere three reports for each year, with one oddly covering the last seven months of the year.

When the Legislature sets the bar this low, it is near- futile for the commission to consider submitting real reform legislation to the Legislature.

On top of this is the commission’s paltry budget, despite increases every now and then. The commission is, in essence, two commissions in one: one for ethics, and one for lobbying regulation. These are two very distinct areas of law. New York, for example, has a separate board created solely to regulate lobbying in the state.

If Hawaii is not enforcing ethical conduct and lobbying regulation to the degree we expect, the fault lies almost entirely with the Legislature in not passing laws or providing a realistic budget for the commission, in order for the agency to have the tools to do its job.

For the kind of democracy we want, the laws have to be reformed, whether by statute, or even by amendments to our state Constitution.

It’s time for Hawaii state government to work for 100 percent of the people, and not the 1 percent who are currently laughing all the way to the bank.