2007-06-13 Board of Ethics Minutes Regular Session mc

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yourself for this— eventually to get to an informal advisory opinion. Your rules provide the only way that can be done is through a quote, formal resolution. That's the reason I prepared that written document for you, so there's no question that we're following the proper procedure to get to where we need to go. So I hope that was responsive to your question, Mr. Chairman, but that's the reason whyI don't know why Ms. Hale didn't do it. I know that Ms. Nae` ole probably didn't do it only because I told her attorney that I would be pursuing this route, to which I understand that she readily —again to her credit, readily agreed to this process. And that's why we're here today. And Mr. Pranke, obviously, when he sits in this chair, is going to disagree with me. CHAIR: Mr. Pranke? PRANKE: Well, I agree that it is the Board's option to do that, but what we don't know is where did—Mr. Ashida has said this started somewhere. But he's the one that brought this forward, and he is not the Board of Ethics. Now there's nothing in the minutes of the last Board of Ethics meeting that says that anyone asked him to do this. And so, because he hasn't been asked by the Board to do this, if he wishes to bring this, he should bring it as a person, as an individual, not as the Corporation Counsel. There's an important part of that which I talked about before —it's not having witch hunts on other officials by County officials, someone in a less reputable setting who might go after other County officials by filing, having things filed against the —with the Ethics Board—against another person that they might not like. And I think that's an important thing that should be recognized. This is a bad precedent to set in that direction. AndI'm sorry, there was one other thing here that needed—it talked about and I can't think of, come to it, so I'll let that go, but ASHIDA: Is it (inaudible)? PRANKE: Well, that's all right. The point is that this should have been filed by an individual. That's what your Code of Ethics —what the Code of Ethics says for the Board. And it's very important that this be done, because in 284, 286, I'm sorry, of the Code of Ethics, it says thatI'm sorry, missing it anyway, it calls this the method for investigating violations, possible violations, of the Code of Ethics. The method. And it's not, it doesn't give other options. By keeping this as tight as possible, it makes sure we don't have the possibility of somebody going on a witch hunt. This becomes a secondary way of investigating. ASHIDA: I'm sorry—Mr. Chairman, my response, briefly. Thank you. Very well, good points by Mr. Pranke. The first issue he raises about me bringing this petition, I'm not bringing this petition. If you read my letter I'm recommending that the Board on its own initiate it. So you three could vote it down today. Just say no, we disagree with Ashida, we don't want to do this, everybody goes home. So I'm not bringing the petition. It's your decision. But that's a very good point Mr. Pranke brings up, so I'm glad we had a chance to clear that up.