The Miami Herald reported: A group of law enforcement and political figures are pushing to toughen the county's ethics code. But will Miami-Dade County commissioners act?
Well, of course they won’t. We will have to shove these down their throats with a petition drive. How do I know they won’t adopt these recommendations? Because I like them.
Among them:
• Lobbyists would be required to disclose how much they're paid to influence county decision-makers.
• Developers and other vendors would not be permitted to donate to political campaigns.
• Gifts to public officials would be banned from vendors and capped at $100 for others.
''This really represents almost a fundamental shift in the way the system runs,'' Miami-Dade State Attorney's Office public corruptions chief Joe Centorino said of the proposed campaign finance reform. Centorino, who serves on the task force, said, ``I think it would alter the landscape.''
Joe Centorino is right. These might be a better tonic for what ails the County Commission than the Charter Review Recommendations (which they already shot down). We might get 2 or 3 votes, tops, in favor of these out of the 13.
5 comments:
Nah, the commission will never adopt any of these recommendations because they help the residents and hurt the money purveyors who prop up the commissioners.
The recommendations are polyanish; they are our fondest wish but too good to be true.
I bet you the 13 will vote against the proposals. Change will happen at the BCC until we get rid of all the incumbents.
Maybe we can offer them some wine during a commission meeting, get them a nice friendly buzz, and then ask them to vote on the ethics issue.
Or perhaps, we can substitute the phrase "ethics" for something else? Maybe call it "the county code of average behavior"? Maybe they would not realize that they were voting on ethics for them and not for the general public to follow.
The Ethics review panel has a "fox in the hen house".
Lawyer/lobbist Javier Alberto Soto, past Chief of Staff for Penelas, was seen lobbying for Miami Children's Hospital at County hearings within the two year period he was supposed to be restricted from lobbying at the County.
Oops. Maybe Joe Centorino from the Office of Public Corruption needs to investigate his new friend and panel member a little closer.
This was brought to the attention of our "Strong Mayor", but nothing happened to the lobbyist.
Question/Suggestion on this issue. I've been mulling over all kinds of things and went back to read the Herald article on this. Something caught my eye at the bottom of the article:
Commission Chairman Bruno Barreiro -- who could hold considerable sway in sponsoring items -- couldn't be reached Monday.
[Robert] Meyers is hoping to present the proposals to commissioners in October. He'll need one of the 13 members to sponsor the reform.
''If we find a sponsor, what will happen at the public hearing -- I have no idea,'' said Meyers.
Can we do a call to action on this? Can we ask your readers to write to their Commissioners to sponsor these? Mine is Moss. I am definitely going to write him a letter about this. Is there an update? Do we know if Meyers was able to get a sponsor? I think this is worth focusing on. Like you and Centrino point out, I agree these are very good suggstions at fixing our problems ESPECIALLY the campaign finance reforms.
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