State legislators were urged to be careful in making changes to the state ethics code applying to members of state task forces to constrain their dealings. Instead, the lawmakers approved a key change that broadens their own exemptions from ethics restrictions. Sen. Josh Green, for one, already appears to have benefited by the exemption, which should be repealed quickly in the upcoming session.
It’s unclear how the legislators’ provision was inserted in the bill intended to apply to members of Legislature-created task forces, a measure to prohibit state employees from using their positions to gain unfair advantages for themselves or others. Allowing anybody such exemption to the restriction "would not only set a bad tone, it could well start things down a slippery slope," JoAnn Maruoka of the League of Women Voters warned legislators in February. We agree. Imagine, then, Maruoka’s and our collective surprise to learn later that the bill also exempted legislators from the ethical prohibition.
The consequences came clear after Green, a Hawaii island physician and chairman of the Senate Health Committee, disputed to the city numerous claims from Florida-based Automated HealthCare, citing inflated billing of prescription drugs and other issues. Writing under his legislative letterhead, Green called the city’s settlement unreasonable and urged the city to accept the lesser amount "graciously agreed" by Automated HealthCare by Aug. 24.
Eight days later, Green received his second $2,000 donation from the company, reaching the $4,000 maximum donation allowed by a company for an election cycle for a state senatorial candidate. Unfortunately, the new exemption for legislators made Green’s action not only lucrative but legally and ethically acceptable.
Les Kondo, the state Ethics Commission’s executive director, told the Star-Advertiser’s Rob Perez that his staff would have made inquiries about Green’s conduct if the ethics code had not been amended. The law’s new amendment broadened legislators’ exemption from the ethics code, which had prohibited legislators from using their official positions to secure unwarranted treatment "for oneself or others."
In 2005, the Ethics Commission was considering a complaint and action against then-Sen. Brian Kanno for his strong-arm tactics to try influencing Norwegian Cruise Line to rehire a cabin steward who had been fired because of allegations of sexual harassment. The commission dropped the complaint against Kanno after he chose not to run for re-election.
The amended law enacted by the Legislature this year resulted from concern about whether members of a mortgage foreclosures task force were subject to the ethics code. Even on that score, lawmakers’ dubious action would now allow task force members to use confidential information obtained through their duties to benefit themselves or their private employers.
Changes to the ethics code obviously received too little public scrutiny in the rushed last weeks of this year’s Legislature and appear to have included handing legislators the authority to engage in unethical behavior. The previous, upright aspect of that law should be restored.
