Two people are running for local office, one for mayor, the other for council. Its elected positions, not appointed. Are there any ethics violations in them having a relationship? Thanks.
I don’t see anything objectionable there. Is there any reason you suspect there might be an ethics issue? There are all kinds of relationships. You can’t require the mayor and council members to be strangers.
Ethics issues arise when there is abuse of power, like a mayor awards contracts to his fraternity brother without competing them.
One of the parties thinks there cannot be a romantic relationship between the two. Do you have any links?
Thanks.
What is the relationship between the mayor’s office and the city council? Does one have any direct power over the other?
Ethics issues arise when one person in a relationship is in a supervisory position over the other, or is able to show them unfair favoritism or other preference. If the positions are independent, then ethics issues should not be a factor.
Christina Fernandez de Kirchner, current president of Argentina, served as a Senator in the Argentine Congress while her husband was president.
It will be difficult to find a link that says this specific situation *is *ethical, much easier to find examples of what is *not *ethical.
I did a search and found, for example, that Detroit requires all city employees to disclose relationships to the mayor or city council members. But those are employees who are accountable to those people. Much different than two elected officials.
A mayor, AFAIK, doesn’t have the means to show favoritism to a council member. How could an ethical issue arise? The burden of proof is on the person who claims this would be unethical. Does “one of the parties” have any links?
There were a couple of days in 2001 when the sitting President was married to a sitting Senator. And for all that people were grasping at straws to accuse both or either of them of anything unethical, I never heard an objection on that point.
It would depend on local election laws, but I’m unaware of any jurisdiction in which it would be a problem.
Has the relationship been disclosed? I would disclose it personally but if you are asking is this is an actionable ethics law violation, I don’t see how. I’ve dealt with councils that have had siblings as well as parents and children on the same board. Those relationships are as significant as two people in a sexual relationship.
I think violations occur more often when hiring family members to appointed positions. That’s been an issue in a couple of smaller towns I have lived in.
My thought is that you need a pretty specific statute that bars related persons from being elected or serving together. If such a statute exists, I would think its specific to your state or community. I am not even sure how a law would be policed. Would you ban one of the individuals from even appearing on the ballot? If so, which one stays and which one goes? If they are elected, how would a court decide which person to remove from office?
There is generally no ethical violation in this.
President or Mayor is in the Executive branch of government; Senator or City Councilor is in the Legislative branch. So neither is an ‘employee’ of the other.
A few years ago, my State Legislator had his wife running for the City Council. Even that had no ethical violations, because even though they were both in the Legislative branch of government, one was state level while the other was local level.
Both are running, no one has been elected yet!
A councilperson can introduce resolutions the mayor would want, but they’d need approval from the majority of council.
I don’t see how there could be any ethics violation unless and until both were elected; but based on the information provided so far there shouldn’t be one even then.
Now, if the two people belonged to different parties, and one was elected on the basis of supposedly providing opposition to the other, then the electorate could potentially think it was shady in retrospect. But it wouldn’t be a legal ethics violation.
So, pretty much the same as any other member of the mayor’s party or other political ally.
The man and woman are also both in a political action committe. Something about lowering taxes.
“Something about lowering taxes” should be your campaign slogan.
I asked the clerk of courts today and she knows of no ordinance or anything in the charter. She said a father and son were once both on council.
I wouldn’t be surprised at all to learn that things like that are very common in local government, where you have a (relatively) small number of people who wield power, and they often hold power for a long time. You see family “dynasties” in government all the time here in the Chicago area. In most cases, the child undoubtedly is assisted in getting into office by his family’s ties (and name recognition).
Well this could be a hypothetical romantic couple.
A few years ago, we had 2 people who met when both were serving in the Minnesota Legislature, fell in love, and got married.
But they couldn’t sell one of their houses and move in together – they each had to keep legal residence in their respective districts. So they did a lot of traveling & sleepovers – ‘which house do we stay at tonight?’
Personally, I don’t see any difference as far as “influence” between a romantically-involved couple and a parent and child (or, for that matter, two very close friends). Politics are full of fellow public servants who go out of their way to help each other and side with each other’s causes…you don’t need to be sleeping with each other to do that.
If the couple in question were attempting to keep their relationship a secret (or were engaging in such a relationship while one or both were married to others), it’d be a different story.
It sounds like their opposition is attempting to make this an issue. As long as the local regulations don’t prohibit it, I don’t see an issue.