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October · Volume 90 · Number 9
Strengthening Ethical Governance in Local GovernmentsThis article has three objectives. The first is to identify significant obstacles and challenges that confront efforts to strengthen ethics in American local government. The second is to describe and assess two approaches, compliance and integrity, that are used to build and sustain a strong ethics culture. The third objective is to illustrate with a case study how a city mired in an (un)ethical swamp found a way forward by adopting an approach that melds the best qualities of both the compliance and integrity approaches. BackgroundStrengthening ethics in American government has been under way for more than 100 years since good-government reform efforts took hold at the turn of the 20th century. Patronage politics gave way to civil service systems that stressed merit in hiring, promoting, protecting, and retaining public servants. Federal and state laws and local ordinances were adopted to combat partisanship and promote openness and transparency.
The age of “I seen my opportunities and took ‘em,” as Senator George Washington Plunkitt of New York City’s Tammany Hall put it, slowly but surely began to ebb as cities and counties replaced partisan offices with nonpartisan offices and district elections with at-large elections. Republicans, Democrats, and other political personages were not needed to fix potholes, build and maintain water and sewer systems, guard against hazardous fires, fight crime, or deal with a myriad of everyday problems. Rather, what was needed was expertise in the conduct of the people’s business. Thus, modern public administration with a decided emphasis on professionalism was given birth in the crucible of political and civic distress. While 21st-century governance of local governments is radically different than governance of the 19th century, the task of strengthening ethics in local governance remains a work in progress. The strides made in recent decades are noteworthy and include curbs on nepotism, conflicts of interest, post-employment relationships, secrecy, use and abuse of equipment and property; financial disclosure; and other measures. These “don’t do” admonishments along with the establishment of state and local ethics laws and regulatory commissions have done much to improve local governance. Yet, lapses are not uncommon, and some would argue that they are occurring with increasing frequency. The 2007 survey of ethics in government by the Ethics Resource Center (ERC) supports this view. The ERC report finds that six of every 10 local government employees say they witnessed misconduct at work during the past 12 months, with abusive behavior and placing one’s own interests ahead of the organization leading the way. The survey also found that one of every four local government employees say they work in environments conducive to misconduct. The ERC further contends, as Figure 1 shows, that the lack of awareness by top management of misconduct and a nonconducive work environment in combination with ineffective intervention results in a high rate of misconduct that places the public trust at risk. Frequent news media accounts of misconduct in local government lend additional support to the ERC findings. One recent example is the highly publicized case of Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick of Detroit. He apparently perjured himself by lying during a trial involving a suit filed by three Detroit police officers; the lie was about an affair he had had with his former chief of staff. He is accused of striking a secret deal with the officers to settle an $8.4 million whistle-blower suit in exchange for the officers’ attorney turning over text messages that showed that the mayor and his former chief of staff had lied under oath. Kilpatrick also stands charged with obstruction of justice and conspiracy. Another recent case a thousand miles from Detroit involved three Hillsborough County, Florida, employees who repaired county-owned fire trucks. Like George Washington Plunkitt, they saw their opportunity and took it by removing parts from the trucks and selling them for a tidy sum. Lying and stealing are clearly beyond the ethical call to duty. Laws, rules, admonishments, and more have their place in deterring unethical behavior and encouraging ethical behavior, but they are not sufficient. Staying out of trouble or following the law, however meritorious, is the moral minimum. Obstacles and ChallengesOne significant obstacle to strengthening the ethics in local government is leadership myopia—failing to recognize the importance of ethics in getting the work of government done. Government does not exist to produce a product called “ethics.”1 Rather, government is expected to provide and produce valued public goods and services such as justice, safety, security, transportation, clean air and water, parks and recreation, safe food and drugs, emergency services, and more. Thus, it is not surprising that many government leaders do not place a high priority on ethics and typically recognize its importance only after the fact—that is, after there has been a serious ethical breach. When put this way, it might be argued that ethics is the cornerstone of effective and democratic governance. “Ethics may be only instrumental, it may be only a means to an end, but it is a necessary means to an end,” asserts Dennis Thompson.2 The challenge is to ensure that public officials, elected and appointed, understand the importance of ethics in carrying out the work of government and then act on that understanding. Another leadership obstacle (mentioned at the outset of this article) is lack of top management awareness of misconduct. As unimaginable as this may be, many leaders do not know what is happening in their organizations. No government, of course, wants to encourage its workers to become ethics vigilantes who take it upon themselves to police misconduct. Nonetheless, organizational leaders must find the ways and means to be informed of misconduct before the culture breeds an organizational crisis. A third obstacle is the one-two punch of history and culture. Organizational scholars are quick to point out the enormous influence of the past on the present. Local governments with a checkered history in ethical governance are unlikely to be transformed overnight. Indeed, historical tentacles and norms can be deeply rooted in a culture that resists change and fosters benign neglect or, worse, permits outright unethical behavior. The phrase, “this is how we do things around here,” means just that—keep doing things the same way. The challenge is to find leaders who are willing to break with the culture of the past. A fourth obstacle is ethical illiteracy. Leaders and followers who are unable “to grasp fully the intricacies of complex ethical issues and to see all of the consequences of one’s actions” suffer from ethical illiteracy. Ethical illiteracy commonly surfaces when issues are seen from a fatally narrow and limited legal perspective. A large ethical blind spot can produce tunnel vision that severely damages a community’s reputation as a fair and equitable provider of public goods and services. The challenge in overcoming this obstacle is to think and act outside the box of what the law requires. Sound ethical judgment calls for more than meeting the moral minimum of the law. We turn now to several approaches that local governments have adopted to encourage ethical behavior and to prevent misconduct.
Approaches to Strengthening Ethics CulturesTwo approaches—a compliance approach and an integrity approach—are widely drawn on to strengthen the ethics culture of local governments, with the former the far more dominant approach (Figure 2). A compliance approach depends heavily on rules and practices that, if followed, are designed to keep members of the organization out of trouble. Stated differently, behavior deemed acceptable and unacceptable is defined for the employee. Rules are typically expressed and often placed in obscure personnel manuals, codes of conduct, and new-employee orientation sessions. Many local governments require their employees to sign a statement that they have read and will abide by the rules of acceptable behavior for the organization. Those who break the rules are presumed to do so out of either ignorance or willful intention. The latter, of course, is viewed as more serious and can result in severe penalties, ranging from a letter of reprimand, to suspension with or without pay, to getting fired. Those who commit misconduct out of ignorance are treated less harshly but are expected to reform themselves. Ignorance is not an excuse for misconduct, but it is correctable. Detection is the key to a successful compliance approach and can, if not implemented in a sensitive and wise manner, foster an unhealthy “gotcha” culture. Figure 3 illustrates the key components of a compliance approach and also hypothesizes that unethical behavior varies inversely with the probability of detection and the severity of the penalty. Stated differently, misconduct decreases as punishment and detection increase.
The compliance approach is popular and widely adopted for several reasons. First, it is straightforward. Rules and penalties are easy to draft and put into place, although putting an effective detection system together that does not turn into a tattletale exercise is challenging. Second, it is possible to develop training and education that focus on, yes, rules, detection, and penalties. Third, this approach often appears to be low cost once the rules and guidelines are drafted. Monitoring compliance, however, is not necessarily cheap. Fourth, it presumes that with enough dos and don’ts in place that most errant behavior can be deterred. In other words, the accent is on preventing unacceptable behavior. An integrity approach, in contrast with a compliance approach, empowers the individual to make value judgments about right and wrong. It is value driven rather than rule driven. It presumes that there are not always, maybe even seldom, bright lines to help one choose the right thing to do. One must learn how to deal with ethical challenges.
But what are the values that drive an integrity approach? One way to answer this question is to look empirically at what several communities actually do. Figure 4 lists the values of three communities in three different states—Indiana, Kansas, and Florida. The values listed in Figure 4 do not exhaust the universe of values but they are reasonably inclusive. Figure 5 provides a more detailed specification of the integrity model. As is evident from the four cornerstones—leadership, awareness, culture, and aspirations—the integrity model responds to the organization’s mission and is bolstered with appropriate education and training to ensure that decisions are reached in an ethical manner and achieve ethical results. This model is comprehensive and reflects interdependence among the key elements. In this sense, it offers a systemic approach to building and sustaining a strong ethics culture. The principal weakness, critics might contend, is a reliance on the reasoning ability and goodness of members of the organization. By contrast, the compliance approach emphasizes the dark side of human nature—that is, given the opportunity, people will opt for behavior that is questionable and perhaps even crosses over to the unethical. These approaches do not necessarily have to be viewed as polar opposites. Instead, it is possible to blend the best of both in a fusion model. Authors Carol W. Lewis and Stuart C. Gilman describe the fusion model as “a two-pronged, systematic approach” that “incorporates both compliance with formal standards and the promotion of individual ethical responsibility.”4 Although it is difficult to schematically display, the fusion model can be vividly illustrated by the case of Venice, Florida, a city that found itself mired in an unethical swamp but managed to put together a fusion approach to find a way forward. The Case of Venice, FloridaVenice, Florida (see Figure 6), was incorporated in 1927 with a mayor-commission form of government. In 1977, the citizens voted to change the structure to a council-manager government. The seven-member council is elected for staggered three-year terms on a nonpartisan ballot. The mayor is elected at-large.
The city’s population in 2007 was 21,584 with another estimated 4,000 snowbirds (people from cold northern states) taking up winter residency. The city employs 296 full-time persons, has an operating budget of $24.2 million, and has an all-funds budget of $68 million. The city workforce has been downsized over the past five years. Into the Ethics Swamp with Eyes Wide ClosedThe disposal of treated water from the city’s sewage treatment facility has been a long-standing problem. Consequently, the city has been forced to dispose of this treated water (also known as reclaimed water) from the city’s facility into a variety of locations as permitted by state and federal regulatory agencies. Thus, the city manager and the director of utilities decided to save the city money by disposing of the wastewater in violation of these regulatory operating permits. This practice continued for several years until an employee blew the whistle and reported the city’s dumping to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Florida Department of Environmental Protection (FDEP). EPA and FDEP launched a joint investigation. The city manager was not pleased with the whistle-blower. Indeed, it can be imagined that he called him into his office and read him the proverbial riot act. “Why would you do such a thing? Where is your loyalty?” As the EPA and FDEP investigation continued, the city manager decided to discipline the whistle-blower. Convinced that he had been wronged, the employee charged the city manager with retribution and sought relief under the state’s whistle-blower protection law. Before trial, the city settled the whistle-blower’s lawsuit for the amount of $40,000. EPA brought formal charges against the city for illegal spills and the falsification of documents in violation of the Clean Water Act. The evidence was so overwhelming that the city did not fight the EPA; instead, it entered a guilty plea in federal court and paid a $110,000 fine. The settlement reflected a significant reduction in potential multimillion dollar penalties, partly because new city management and philosophies were embraced that included a goal of 100 percent compliance and 100 percent reporting of noncompliance. This new approach included reporting to the public, media, and regulatory agencies of even the smallest of spills. Wastewater dumping was not the only unethical and illegal act experienced by the city during this period. The city’s director of information systems, who owned a software company, decided to do business with the city. He bought software from his company with city funds. An ethics complaint was soon filed with the Florida State Ethics Commission, which, after an investigation, found that he was in violation of state ethics laws for doing business with the city. He received a $12,400 fine and was publicly censured and reprimanded. The city ultimately terminated his employment. Rebuilding the Ethics InfrastructureThe city faced a values crisis that had nearly resulted in a complete organizational meltdown. It was evident that whatever passed for mission was lost on the city workforce. As the ethical night darkened, the city council hired a new city manager who immediately led an effort to restore fundamental values to the organization. Six months later, the city adopted a mission statement to provide exceptional municipal services through a financially sustainable city with engaged citizens. The core values underpinning the mission statement are productive, responsible, innovative, dedicated, and ethical. The new city manager also put forward a code of ethics, which was adopted by the mayor and city council as law. It incorporated the core values and struck a balance between a compliance approach and an integrity approach. The code called for employees to know what behavior is acceptable and what is not. At the same time, it promoted integrity in the workplace by endorsing values such as trustworthiness, honesty, impartiality, fairness, and respect for others. The introduction to the code reads: “Unlike some other codes of conduct or ethics, the city policy emphasizes those activities and approaches that will be valued and encouraged, while also identifying those behaviors that are not acceptable.”5 Every employee—whether staff or volunteer—receives an orientation to the code annually to ensure consistency of understanding and application across all city services. The federal courts and the EPA thought so highly of this approach and of the efforts by the city’s new management team that the fine imposed on Venice, which could have been much higher than $110,000, was reduced. The EPA also agreed to the unusual provision that the city manager serve as the EPA’s on-site compliance officer.
The code of conduct and ethics in Venice has five central features:
The new city manager believed that one more task was necessary before the city could become confident that its workforce was on a path that would lead them out of the swamp. The city manager asked: “How will I know if we are making progress? I know that an organization of integrity cannot be built overnight, so there must be a way to benchmark the change.” He decided to turn to a university-based institute to survey the ethics culture of the organization. The survey results, he believed, would provide a benchmark that could be revisited as time passed to determine whether the ethics culture needed more management attention. The purpose of the survey was threefold: (1) to establish a benchmark to track the culture over time, (2) to assess the strength or weakness of the existing culture, and (3) to identify the steps needed to further strengthen the culture. Survey Methodology and FindingsA 56-item paper questionnaire was developed on the basis of previous research of the university consultant, with some items drawn from a survey instrument constructed by the Institute of Local Government, California League of Cities. All 296 full-time employees of the city were provided a copy of the survey instrument; 210 surveys were completed for a return rate of 70.9 percent. The surveys were returned in postage-paid envelopes sent directly to the university. Participation was voluntary, and respondents were accorded anonymity. The findings were surprising. The city manager had anticipated that the ethics culture was weak, but the findings indicated quite the opposite. Among the questions asked was: Have you observed unethical behavior in your department over the past 12 months? This question is commonly asked in local government surveys, and the typical response is that one of every four respondents says yes. In the Venice case, however, one of every seven respondents reported observing unethical behavior. In other words, Venice employees said that they had observed a lower number of ethical lapses than is typical. In addition to these descriptive findings, regression analysis was performed to explore the factors that contribute to a strong or weak ethics culture. Several indices were constructed with the questionnaire items, including a 10-item scale that measures the dependent variable (ETHICS), in other words, the strength of the ethics culture:
Indices were also constructed for the independent variables: merit, rule orientation, workload pressure, routine nature of work, and leadership encouragement of ethical behavior:
The working hypotheses were that the ethics culture would be strengthened when merit is recognized for pay and promotions, rules are not rigidly followed, workload pressure is not heavy, employees trust and respect one another, and organizational leaders exemplify and encourage ethical behavior. Two additional variables that could have an influence on the ethics culture, although in an unspecified way, are also in the model: the extent to which an employee has discretion in carrying out work (JOBSAY) and the nature of the work (ROUTINE). The regression model and results are presented in Figure 9. This is a powerful model that predicts 93 percent of the variance in the organization’s ethics culture. Three variables are influential—one variable, LEADERSENCOURAGE, was by far the most influential—leadership encouragement of ethical behavior (with a standardized coefficient = .701); job autonomy (with a standardized coefficient = .149); and trust and respect among members of the organization (with a standardized coefficient = .128).
Escape from the Ethics SwampGiven these striking findings, how did the manager lead Venice’s workforce out of the swamp? At the top of the list was the development of a mission statement that the workforce could understand and own. Second, a values-driven approach was adopted that embraced the acronym PRIDE for productivity, responsibility, innovative, dedicated, and ethical. Third, a code of ethics was adopted. Fourth, and related, a compliance process was put into place. Fifth, top managers and supervisors began to advocate and model exemplary behavior. Sixth, ethics training was initiated that was conducted by the city manager. Research shows that when top management visibly supports training and even conducts training sessions, employees pay attention. Seventh, benchmarking was launched with the workforce survey described above. The survey findings indicate rather strongly that one variable—organizational leadership—was the centerpiece. Respondents reported that top management and their supervisors encouraged them “to speak up about any practices and policies that are ethically questionable”; that “my superiors set a good example of ethical behavior”; that “managers in my department have high ethical standards”; that “top management has created an environment in which staff are comfortable raising ethical concerns”; that “top management expects staff to use ethical practices in getting results—not whatever it takes.” The case of Venice, Florida, exemplifies how a fusion approach can have a powerful influence on the ethics culture of a troubled organization. ConclusionSeveral action components are necessary to strengthen the ethics culture of a local government—leadership awareness and commitment, openness and transparency, and a balanced approach that draws on both compliance and integrity driven by ethical values and individual responsibility (Figure 10).
Building a strong ethics culture that facilitates the day-to-day work of a city or county government is not a one-shot effort. Rather, constant vigilance, attention, and energy are needed to ensure that public trust and confidence are properly placed in a government whose members are committed ethical good governance. ReferencesThe author thanks Marty Black, city manager, Venice, Florida (Martin.Black.AICP.ICMA-CM@msn.com), for his constructive critique of this article.
1Dennis F. Thompson, "The Possibility of Administrative Ethics," Public Administration Review 45 (1985): 555–561. |
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