The Alabama House Ethics Committee will begin Wednesday discussing possible changes to the state’s multiple ethics laws that apply to elected officials, government employees — and in some cases their families — and lobbyists.
The committee will first review a 2019 report from the Code of Ethics Clarification and Reform Commission, a group created by the Legislature in 2018 to propose changes to existing ethics laws.
The report noted the state’s Code of Ethics was, at the time, more than 40 years old and had been amended at least 25 times and “that the piecemeal amendments combined with evolving interpretations of portions of the code have created confusion regarding the scope and application of numerous sections of the code.”
That’s why legislative work is needed, committee chairman Rep. Matt Simpson, R-Daphne, said recently.
“There’s so much gray area in our ethics laws right now as to who they apply to,” he said. “They directly apply to 300,000 people, but by the time we count their families and their extended families … we’re talking about over a million people who are covered by the ethics laws. And that’s just not right.”
Topics covered in the report included the state’s ban on gifts and “things of value,” the revolving door law that prohibits lawmakers from leaving their posts and immediately becoming lobbyists, statements of economic interest, the definition of principals, and conflicts of interest.
Before he was a lawmaker, Simpson was a prosecutor for nearly 12 years in the Mobile County and Baldwin County DA’s offices. Various ethics laws applied to him and his family.
“If someone bought my father-in-law dinner, it was technically a violation of the ethics law,” Simpson said of the ban on gifts or things of value as a way to influence an official’s actions.
The last major ethics reform was in 2010, when the GOP supermajority was brand new. While well-intended, Simpson said there was a broad brush approach taken.
Last year, Alabama Daily News reported that outgoing legislative leaders Del Marsh and Mac McCutcheon said Republicans rushed too soon to pass the ethics changes.
“If there’s one thing I look back on and had the chance to do it over again, it would be ethics reform,” Marsh said. “Listen, I’m all for ethics, but that has caused unintended consequences for a lot of people and it made it hard for people to build relationships with members of the Legislature.”
“We’ve had discussions about how to fix it, but it’s hard because as soon as you’ve taken a vote to change the ethics code, you’re accused of weakening ethics. But we need to take a look at it.”
Sen. Arthur Orr, R-Decatur, was on that 2018-2019 commission that produced the report. He has specific recommendations for tightening up rules related to the annual statements of economic interest public officials and state employees must file. Especially when it comes to elected officials, the reports need to capture more information on sources of income and potential conflicts of interest, Orr said this week.
Former House Majority Leader Micky Hammon once had a small ownership in a health care clinic that was lobbying the Legislature in 2016 to require insurers to cover its procedures. But that ownership was too small to trigger required reporting on his statements, The Decatur Daily previously reported. Federal investigations into that business and Hammon led to him pleading guilty to felony mail fraud.
Orr is considering legislation changing the statements of economic interest, but knows it would be a legislative fight.
Simpson said there also needs to be clarification on whether the Alabama Ethics Commission, DAs, or State Attorney General prosecute alleged violations. He also said it’s possible the committee will consider changes to campaign finance reporting laws.
Simpson said he knows some will be leery of cracking open ethics laws because they’ll be accused of wanting to weaken them for their own profit. He’s trying to counter that with public, live streamed meetings beginning nearly six months prior to the 2024 session.
“Let’s get to the root of some of these problems and actually fix them,” he said.