At the last Sacramento City Council meeting, Council member Rob Fong followed through on a recent comment he made about the need for a refresher course on ethics for the entire City Council.
Fong's interest in the subject stems from recent articles in The Sacramento Bee that disclosed the names and business affiliations of the volunteers Mayor Kevin Johnson has recruited to help him understand and address city issues. Many of those volunteers have business before the city and regularly lobby elected leaders and city officials. Johnson has invited his volunteers to attend private briefings with top city officials, which has made some city officials uncomfortable.
"Given the new administration," Fong said at last week's council meeting, "it would be particularly helpful to have (the city attorney) come back to us and kind of give us a briefing on conflict of interest."
Fong's request was a polite nudge to the new mayor. City Manager Ray Kerridge or City Attorney Eileen Teichert, who have the authority to make sure such a briefing takes place, should pay attention.
Johnson would be smart to encourage the briefing. The new mayor has reached out in an unprecedented way for input from a wide variety of interest groups. That can be a good thing, but there is always a danger that it will cross the line into inappropriate activities.
A briefing on conflict-of-interest rules would be time well spent for the mayor or anyone else on the City Council.
What You Should Know About Comments on Sacbee.com
Sacbee.com is happy to provide a forum for reader interaction, discussion, feedback and reaction to our stories. However, we reserve the right to delete inappropriate comments or ban users who can't play nice. (See our full terms of service here.)
Here are some rules of the road:
• Keep your comments civil. Don't insult one another or the subjects of our articles. If you think a comment violates our guidelines click the "report abuse" button to notify the moderators. Responding to the comment will only encourage bad behavior.
• Don't use profanities, vulgarities or hate speech. This is a general interest news site. Sometimes, there are children present. Don't say anything in a way you wouldn't want your own child to hear.
• Do not attack other users; focus your comments on issues, not individuals.
• Stay on topic. Only post comments relevant to the article at hand. If you want to discuss an issue with a specific user, click on his profile name and send him a direct message.
• Do not copy and paste outside material into the comment box.
• Don't repeat the same comment over and over. We heard you the first time.
• Do not use the commenting system for advertising. That's spam and it isn't allowed.
• Don't use all capital letters. That's akin to yelling and not appreciated by the audience.
You should also know that The Sacramento Bee does not screen comments before they are posted. You are more likely to see inappropriate comments before our staff does, so we ask that you click the "report abuse" button to submit those comments for moderator review. You also may notify us via email at feedback@sacbee.com. Note the headline on which the comment is made and tell us the profile name of the user who made the comment. Remember, comment moderation is subjective. You may find some material objectionable that we won't and vice versa.
If you submit a comment, the user name of your account will appear along with it. Users cannot remove their own comments once they have submitted them, but you may ask our staff to retract one of your comments by sending an email to feedback@sacbee.com. Again, make sure you note the headline on which the comment is made and tell us your profile name.
About Comments
Reader comments on Sacbee.com are the opinions of the writer, not The Sacramento Bee. If you see an objectionable comment, click the "report abuse" button below it. We will delete comments containing inappropriate links, obscenities, hate speech, and personal attacks. Flagrant or repeat violators will be banned. See more about comments here.