RI Ethics Commission's New "Interpretation" May Spark Hundreds of New Violations
GoLocalProv News Team
RI Ethics Commission's New "Interpretation" May Spark Hundreds of New Violations
Specifically, Ethics Commission Chairman Ross Cheit told McKee in closed session earlier this month that any error on a state-required Financial Disclosure statement is an “uncorrectable error.”
Each year approximately 4,400 state and local officials are required to submit a multipage report. “Officials are required to disclose sources of income and assets, including those of a spouse and any dependent children and must also disclose whether they, a spouse or dependent child hold an interest in any business regulated by Rhode Island government or in any enterprise which engages in business transactions with the government,” writes the Commission
GET THE LATEST BREAKING NEWS HERE -- SIGN UP FOR GOLOCAL FREE DAILY EBLAST“[Cheit] said that even if you correct an error [on the Financial Disclosure], it is still a violation [of the ethics code],” said McKee in a phone interview on Sunday.
“Under this interpretation, there is no incentive to correct an unintentional error,” said McKee.
“Additionally, the statute for violations goes back five years, hundreds of amended statements are now potentiality violations,” said McKee, who is now in his second term as Lt. Governor.
Cheit did not respond to request for comment.
“It seems like a bad idea to punish people correcting the record — most important is that the disclosure forms are correct,” added McKee.
Cheit, who has served on the Commission since 2004, has been chair since 2011.
For McKee, he admits he did not properly report a 2017 trip to Asia on which the Taipei Economic and Cultural Office in Boston, spent $3,500 paying for his travel, hotel and food. In addition, McKee later said he did not report two other, smaller trips that were also paid for by outside entities. McKee was fined $250.
“I made a mistake — admittedly, but this new interpretation will lead to many politically motivated complaints being filed," said McKee. McKee said that this ruling will lead to people seeing that an amendment has been filed can file a complaint and be assured of violation and fine being issued.
A GoLocal investigation that began in February in 2018 found serious flaws in the Ethics Commission’s financial disclosure tracking and that the Commission was opposed to improving the reporting or the transparency of the reports. Ultimately, the Ethics Commission reversed its position after significant criticism.
GoLocal's reporting sparked outrage from a range of officials, including Governor Gina Raimondo to Speaker of the House Nick Mattiello and a host of other state leaders who called on the Ethics Commission to post the disclosure forms.
Mattiello introduced legislation to require the Commission to post the annual disclosure forms. Presently, members of the public can only request the documents via email or phone calls to staff during the offices 35 hour work week. The majority of states post disclosure forms online.
Michael Raia, Director of Communications for Raimondo told GoLocal in March, “[The Governor] would agree that it makes sense that those disclosures should be easily accessible and available to the public online.”
And, Cranston Mayor Allan Fung told GoLocal that the existing process is burdensome and the public deserves greater accessibility to the records. “Of course they should be online, “ said Fung.
Initially, Cheit when asked why the annual disclosure forms are not available online, said that the agency did not have the funding available to be able to post the documents.
“We have looked into online system that could be searchable and it would actually cost money that isn't in our budget," said Cheit. "It also poses questions about staff time and redaction to make sure confidential information isn't posted. Once that is added, it's not sealer that any money is saved.”
In March, the long-time serving Cheit wrote follow-up emails, “My guess is that very few Rhode Islanders would think we should spend lots of money to create a system just so you can access forms at night, when in fact you can almost always get them in one business day. The RIEC responds so much faster than the law requires and much faster than any agency I have ever heard about.”