Lawmakers Talk Ethics on Capitol Hill
08.19.2009 by Jeff Robinson
(KCPW News) A top Republican state lawmaker criticized the idea of an independent ethics commission today in a committee meeting on Capitol Hill. Senate Majority Leader Sheldon Killpack said while voters get to choose their representatives in the legislature, they wouldn’t get to choose who would sit on such a commission.
“You’re putting a lot of control into one person’s hands who does the appointing, rather than a broader group of individuals who have to go back and be accountable to the voters. It seems that we underestimate the voters and their ability to know the individuals who they are putting into office,” he said.
Killpack’s remarks came during a discussion with Republican Congressman Rob Bishop.
Bishop, who once served as Speaker of the Utah House of Representatives, urged legislators not to look to Congress as a model for ethics reform. And he criticized federal campaign finance regulations, saying they make it much easier for incumbents to win elections, and are also confusing to voters.
“What we have ended up on the federal level, which I hope you will never replicate on the state level, is a system in which a common citizen really has little ability to ferret through what is good and what is not good, and will always find a way of messing up in the process,” said Bishop.
Currently, federal campaign contributions are capped at $2,400, while Utah campaign contributions aren’t capped at all. A voter initiative that may get on the ballot in 2010 would create an independent ethics commission, place a cap on campaign contributions and ban corporate donations.
Senator Killpack is wrong in saying that control rests in “one person’s hands who does the appointing.” The five Independent Ethics Commissioners would be randomly selected from a pool of 20 qualified citizens who are agreed to unanimously by the majority and minority leaders of the House and Senate. In this way, the Commission would be shielded from the ever-present politics that currently affect deliberations of the House and Senate Ethics Committee. The Commission is to be established as an arm of the legislature, however, something that respects the authority of the legislature under the Utah Constitution. The selection process is better than many other appointment processes that the Legislature oversees.
[...] surprisingly, some legislators don’t like the idea. Senator Sheldon Killpack, in a “Did you read the initiative?” moment said that an [...]