By Bryan Schott
An eight-student panel says the Utah Legislature has a poor image when it comes to ethics and needs to adopt comprehensive ethics reform.
The Weber State University Student Ethics Committee interviewed members of the Legislature's Ethics Committee as well as examining ethics practices in other states over a three-month period. They concluded that the Utah Legislature needs to make four changes to strengthen ethics:
The Legislature saw more than 30 bills introduced in the 2009 session dealing with ethics reform, but only five passed. Nancy Haanstad, chair of Weber State's Political Science department and faculty mentor to the group, said "It's interesting to note two of the students' recommendations - an independent ethics commission and an independent redistricting commission - were under consideration by the Governor's Commission on Strengthening Utah's Democracy, but were later dropped."
Adam Gardner, the Republican co-chair of the Committee says an independent commission to deal with ethics is a very sticky subject. "For the legislature to give up their executive powers in policing themselves and giving it to a separate entity, is really difficult for them to grasp."
The students cite examples from other states that would work well in Utah, if implemented.