Jacksonville Ethics Commission: Florida House amendments would 'handcuff local watchdogs'

Changes to a Florida ethics bill would “dismantle” government oversight efforts, the Jacksonville Ethics Commission said in a letter Monday.

The commission joined with offices of four other municipalities to oppose changes to upcoming legislation (HB 1597) in the Florida House of Representatives after the Senate passed a companion bill (SB 7104) with an amendment that would limit the types of complaints local commissions can investigate.

The Jacksonville commission met Monday afternoon to discuss the legislation and agreed to send a second press release in opposition to House representatives.

“I think our statement must be the strongest it possibly can and our actions must be very deliberate, to make clear that this would be an incredibly step backward,” Linda McCallum, a commission member, said at the meeting.

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In the letter to the Florida House, the Jacksonville, Naples, Tallahassee, Miami-Dade County and Palm Beach County commissions urged members to pass the legislation without the Senate amendment.

The amendment would eliminate the ability of state and local ethics commissions to research the informal complaints or tips they receive for their independent investigations into government offices and employees.

If passed, commissions would only be able to investigate complaints if the person filing it had "personal knowledge" of wrongdoing and was willing to file it under their name and oath. The commissions could not self-initiate the investigations.

“Voters have expressed, over and over, their frustrations with unethical behavior and public corruption at every level of government,” the commissions said in the letter. “Limiting ethics complaints to those based only on personal knowledge and removing the ability to self-initiate investigations handcuff local watchdog agencies and renders anti-corruption laws virtually useless.”

The sponsor of the Senate bill and amendment, Sen. Danny Burgess, R-Zephyrhills, said it prioritized “fairness” for the person alleging wrongdoing and the alleged violator.

“What we’re looking to do here…is add greater protection for more malicious or meritless attempts that are politically motivated, and we know that those do happen,” Zephyrhills said at the Feb. 1 Senate session.

In the past eight years, the Jacksonville commission has investigated two complaints out of 55 informal reports. Commissioners at Monday’s meeting said they used due process in deciding how to investigate and limiting complaints would result in a chilling effect.

Commissioners compared the legislation to hypothetical restraints on police officers. If applying the proposed law, police could not investigate matters unless someone with direct knowledge of a crime reported it, Scott Simpson, commission member, said.

“If you do that, some of these articles and some of the comments have meant it will raise the bar unrealistically high and prevent ethics commissions around the state from being able to do their jobs and help support ethical governance,” Simpson said.

Jacksonville City Council member Matt Carlucci opposed the amendment last week, calling the amendment’s passage without going through committee or public comment a “direct assault on the pillars of accountability and transparency essential to our democracy.”

He attended the ethics committee meeting Monday and called the amendment unethical and preemptive.

“Y'all [Jacksonville Ethics Commission] are not doing anything that preempts what the state does,” Carlucci said Monday. “...They're interfering with home rule, and there's nothing that irritates me more than when the state, in the negative sort of way, sticks their noses into our home rule and tries to tell us what's best for us.”

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The current legislative session ends in less than 30 days, giving the House until then to pass some version of the legislation. The bill is in the House State Affairs Committee but not currently on the agenda as the commission originally expected.

This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: Jacksonville ethics commission pens opposition to Florida legislation