
PAR_Logo_NEW_Paths from Franklin 04162008
The board that investigates alleged ethics violations against public officials has new restrictions to abide by. That’s due to a new law as a result of the passage of House Bill 674 by New Iberia Republican Beau Beaullieu, who says officials have complained for years about the egregious nature of ethics investigations – especially during campaign season.
“It’s amazing the amount of complaints that come in during campaign season, simply, so that someone can be used against it in a campaign,” Beaullieu said.
Beaullieu stresses, however, that these new rules by no means gives any public official – elected or otherwise – permission to act unethically.
“If you’re doing stuff that’s dishonest, we want you still to be held accountable. We don’t want to give anybody a green light from that standpoint,” Beaullieu said.
The bill sailed through both houses of legislature, with only two Republican senators voting against it. However, the Public Affairs Research Council of Louisiana has expressed criticism. PAR President Steven Procopio says among his concerns is a provision that the board of ethics has to determine that the investigation is not too expensive, either for the board or for the person it’s investigating.
“I’ve never heard of anything like that, where before you did some sort of investigation you have to make sure it wasn’t expensive to the person you were investigating,” Procopio said.
However, Procopio says the legislature did address PAR’s biggest concerns by the time the bill got to Governor Landry’s desk, including a provision that required having evidence before even launching the investigation.
“In the Senate, they removed those things or changed them, they followed both of PAR’s recommendations on that and a couple of other things,” Procopio explained.
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