Critics blame the precedent set for public officials by the Pawlenty administration’s own ethical lapses, as well as the outdated disclosure requirements that are rife with loopholes.

Minnesota was one of the first states to create an agency to oversee the ethics of public officials in the wake of the Watergate scandal. A major component of ethics reform was a requirement that elected and appointed officials who faced potential conflicts of interest file a written statement with the ethics agency, now called the Campaign Finance and Public Disclosure Board. These disclosure filings were designed to keep the public aware of situations where officials might benefit from decisions they made as part of their routine duties.

Dozens of disclosures were filed in Minnesota between 1975 and 2002, according to the board’s annual reports. Prior to 2003, there were only a handful of years that no disclosures were filed. But since Pawlenty took office — and appointed many of the state’s officials, including the six governing members of the disclosure board — not one form disclosing a potential conflict of interest has been filed.

Pawlenty and some of his high-profile appointees have faced criticism over repeated ethical stumbles, including a hefty 2002 fine against Pawlenty for illegally coordinating his campaign ads with the Republican party.

Last year, Lt. Gov. Carol Molnau, who formerly served as a legislator, also faced allegations of conflict of interest when a Star Tribune investigation revealed she’d sold her farm in 2000 for many times its assessed value only eight days after pushing through legislation funding a nearby highway.

Pawlenty also riled critics with his 2002 appointment of former 3M employee Sheryl Corrigan as commissioner of the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency at a time when the state was dealing with contamination of water supplies by Corrigan’s company. Corrigan only recused herself from 3M-related business in a letter to the governor a year and a half after her appointment.

Neither alleged conflict of interest was investigated by the Campaign Finance and Public Disclosure Board, which relies mainly on citizen complaints to spur investigations. But in interviews with the Minnesota Independent, multiple lawmakers expressed concern about the lack of prompt disclosure or enforcement in Corrigan’s alleged conflict and the precedent set by the then-young administration.

Hamline University professor David Schultz, a specialist in professional ethics and the legislative process, said Pawlenty institutionalized a “lower standard of ethics” as a result of these incidents and his overall approach to governmental ethics.

“Part of the issue here is that this is an administration that doesn’t take seriously the administrations before it in terms of ethical practices and conflicts of interest,” Schultz said. “That translates down into the unwillingness of people across the board in government to file these kind of forms.”

Pawlenty spokesman Brian McClung said the statute clearly places responsibility for the disclosure filings with individual officials, not the governing administration.

“It is up to each public official to either abstain from voting or taking action that presents a conflict or file the form as required by statute,” McClung said. “To claim that the governor or any other person is responsible for someone else’s failure to file the form, if necessary, is ludicrous.”

But Sen. John Marty, DFL-Roseville, who spearheaded earlier ethics reforms and is running for governor, said it’s expected that some conflicts might arise for public officials, but that the precedent needs to be set at the top of the administration.

“If the commissioners don’t disclose, then their employees aren’t going to feel the need to disclose,” Marty told MnIndy. “[Pawlenty] and his departments have a responsibility to disclose, and if they don’t think the laws are tight enough, to tighten them up.”

McClung said the Pawlenty administration is open to ethics reforms.

Ethics requirements loopholes

The decline in conflict-of-interest disclosures is partly due to the broad wording of the 1974 statute that requires such a disclosure only when an official “would be required to take an action or make a decision that would substantially affect the official’s financial interests or those of an associated business.”

The broad language allows public officials to slip through informal loopholes well before they’re required to file a public disclosure with the state board, Schultz said.

“The laws so loosely define conflict of interest for public officials and require them to disclose so little,” he said, “that you can probably engage in a lot of practices without ever violating the law.”

In the legislature, for instance, both the House and Senate excuse members from voting if they declare a conflict of interest, although the reason for the legislator’s abstention isn’t recorded. The statute also allows that there won’t always be time to write out the disclosure forms, and in that case permits the official to notify their superiors, who are required to reassign or excuse the official.

Citing the details of the statute, Campaign Finance and Public Disclosure Executive Director Gary Goldsmith said the board “only gets the notice [of disclosure] if the person has a conflict and is unable to resolve it under the other provisions of the statute.”

“I’m not sure there would be a situation where a public official or a local official with a metropolitan government unit would not be able to either abstain from voting or [pursue] some of the other possibilities, [like] the superior finding somebody else to participate in that action,” Goldsmith said.

David Schultz

These statutes for declaring a potential conflict are so weak, Schultz said, that they are currently only “symbolic.”

The situation is further complicated by the limited statements of economic interest required of public officials. Although officials are required to submit the forms listing their jobs, investments and some property, it’s up to the individual officials to fill the forms out completely, said Goldsmith.

“Because the board has no idea what the holdings are of any public official, we don’t look at them to see if there’s something because we have no way of knowing if something is missing.” Goldsmith said.  “The only things we would see are cases of over-disclosure, not under-disclosure.”

The outdated language of the economic disclosure has failed to keep pace with modern business practices, said Marty.

“The biggest loophole is, if I do independent contracting, it doesn’t show up anywhere,” Marty said. “Any group that wants to buy influence with me, they can’t give me a gift, but they can hire me as a consultant, pay me thousands of bucks a year and frankly ask me to do nothing.”

In addition to the loopholes provided by the broad language of the statutes, the ethics agency, the Campaign Finance and Public Disclosure Board, is “exceedingly weak” in investigatory and enforcement powers, Schultz said.

“Disclosure actually requires somebody that’s in the position of enforcing the law and monitoring the conflicts of interests,” Schultz said. “Our public officials practically break their arms patting themselves on the back, saying that we’ve got all these fine laws, but in fact the laws really are quite weak compared to contemporary standards.”

The potential for reform

Despite the fact that Minnesota has fallen to 40th in the nation in terms of rigorous disclosure laws, according to a recent ranking by the Center for Public Integrity, there’s been little appetite from state lawmakers to engage in ethics reform.

As early as 1975 and 1979, the disclosure board asked in its annual reports that the legislature clarify and strengthen the conflict of interest statute and outline the potential sanctions of failing to file a disclosure, although the conflict of interest portion of the statute has only been broadened.

Ethics reform often evokes anger from legislators who think any reforms allude to their corruption, Marty said.

“Conflicts of interest corrupt the process,” Marty said. “It doesn’t require corrupt people; it’s a corrupt process.”

Efforts to reform disclosure laws also face the wrath of powerful private interests that are the laws’ targets, as well as some lawmakers.

“[Reforms are opposed] by people who get things like that and don’t want to stop getting them; and people who give things, because they get influence, don’t want to lose their influence,” Marty said. “Our laws could be a lot stronger and unfortunately people who either don’t get it it or are taking advantage of the weak laws don’t want to change them.”

The danger of weak conflicts-of-interest laws, especially in a citizen legislature where legislators are often dependent on outside employment, is that the public’s interest won’t be represented, Marty said.

“The whole point of these laws is not that people have to go through a bunch of paperwork,” Marty said. ”If I’m taking money from somebody, I think the public has the right to know whether I’m serving the public or serving some other interest.”

Photo: The UpTake

Gov. Tim Pawlenty was at odds with his own communications office on a couple points at his press conference yesterday — including the topic of his talk.

Here’s how Pawlenty’s communications director, Brian McClung, billed the event:

Governor Pawlenty will hold a press conference today regarding his future plans.

Never mind that the phrase “future plans” is a notorious redundancy deserving of its own line-item veto. Pawlenty played off all questions on the topic like a rock star who refuses to perform the hit that the promoter promised:

I don’t know what my plans are. I don’t have any plan …

I do not know what my future plans are. I really don’t. …

I’ll just reiterate: I. Don’t. Know. What. My. Future. Plans. Are.

Then there was the answer that the governor’s office had to scramble to take back. Two hours after Pawlenty’s press conference ended, McClung issued this statement:

At today’s press conference, Governor Pawlenty misspoke when he said that our administration considers unallotments as permanent cuts to programs.  The Governor thought he was addressing a question regarding the impacts of line-item vetoes rather than unallotments.  While line-item vetoes are counted as permanent funding reductions, an unallotment only impacts funding for that specific biennium.  The reduction does not carry forward into future years.

Politics in Minnesota’s Steve Perry, who asked the question, wonders whether Pawlenty really thought he was talking about line-item vetoes. Here’s Perry’s transcription:

PIM: Regarding the question of unallotments, I know your administration has studied closely the House Research paper on unallotments, and it points to ambiguities in the law–one of which is that it’s not clear whether unalloting a sector of the budget reduces the base budget going forward. In your view, does it reduce the base budget, or is it a temporary reduction?

Pawlenty: You’re talking about in terms of the forecast beyond the current biennium? Well, I think it’s our position and the Department of Finance’s position that that’s a permanent reduction. But I’ll defer that to the Department of Finance.

Maybe Pawlenty did mix up line-item vetoes with unallotment, lost in the emotion of a moment that some media labeled his retirement from politics (though that seems a mislabeling, and the event was, as Pawlenty reminded reporters, “not a wake”).

But this is a man who ordinarily watches his words. He rarely, for example, flings “Democrat” as a partisan pejorative in place of the more proper adjective “Democratic.” So it was surprising to hear him at the press conference deliver this line in his fed-up, scolding tone:

We need leaders and visionaries and change-agents, not whiners and defenders of the status quo.

You’d think Pawlenty would have excised the word “whiner” from his vocab list last summer, after the man he nearly joined on the national Republican ticket, Sen. John McCain, dispatched former Sen. Phil Gramm from a campaign post for making comments about a “nation of whiners.”

Franken can’t expect to chip away at the debt through Senate back-pay, WCCO’s Pat Kessler reports. Yesterday, the Secretary of the Senate’s office told him that back pay is no longer possible and Minnesota’s next senator will get paid — at a rate of about $464 a day — starting on the day he’s sworn in. Kessler estimates that whoever wins will miss out on around $37,000. And counting.

Mary Ann Akers at The Washington Post says Democrats are ready to blame Gov. Tim Pawlenty, if Franken isn’t seated in the event that the three-judge panel hearing Norm Coleman’s election contest deems him the winner. T-Paw spokesman Brian McClung told Akers the governor wouldn’t issue an election certificate until Coleman’s expected appeal is completed. It’s not welcome news for Democrats:

“Republicans have made it clear they will hold this Senate seat hostage in order to pursue their political agenda — at the hefty expense of Minnesota having full representation in Congress,” says DSCC spokesman Eric Schultz. “Governor Pawlenty has said that Minnesota is suffering from not having two senators. Governor Pawlenty ought to make clear that if former Senator Coleman chooses to appeal the outcome of the contest in the state Supreme Court that this is the end of the road — and that, consistent with the law, he will certify Al Franken the winner following that state court appeal.”

Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell predicted Minnesota won’t have a second seated senator for months, stating that Republicans will use a Bush v. Gore-style defense in state and possibly federal court to appeal on Coleman’s behalf. A key actor in prolonging the contested seat, McConnell said “it’s a shame” Minnesota only has one senator, Democrat Amy Klobuchar, on the job.

Sharing the “shame,” is Pawlenty, who told the Pioneer Press’ Rachel Stassen-Berger today that having only one senator is “frustrating.” He said, “Any time a state is lacking a member of Congress, it puts you at a disadvantage … If I could appoint a temporary senator, I would, but Minnesota law, unfortunately, doesn’t allow for that… The delay is frustrating, but it’s important the process run its course and we have a comprehensive, fair, just result, and it’s going to take a little more time to get that.” He confirmed McClung’s words: He won’t sign an election certificate until “the law requires me to do so.”

At a press conference Tuesday afternoon, Pawlenty said, “Unlike my friends in the DFL, who are proposing to cut education, we are increasing education.”

In a followup press release, Pawlenty’s spokesman Brian McClung said, “While DFLers have not issued a priority-based budget, they did make choices. Their plan doesn’t recognize that some parts of the budget are strategically more important. DFLers are choosing social services, welfare and publicly subsidized health care over Minnesota’s K-12 schools and students.”

But Sen. Tarryl Clark said the governor’s message is “don’t get sick, don’t get old, don’t lose your job or you’ll lose health care.”

Pawlenty told reporters that the DFL budget would raise taxes on those making $65,000 a year, but DFLers said that’s not true.

DFL chair Brian Melendez shot back, “Gov. Pawlenty is again spouting his false rhetoric about taxes, misleading Minnesotans for his own political gain. On St. Patrick’s Day, Minnesotans were hoping for a pot of gold from our governor. Instead, we got a crock — of something else. Gov. Pawlenty’s do-over budget again fails to address the economic crisis in a fair, honest, or realistic way.”

As the 86th two-year session of the Minnesota legislature gets underway, Gov. Tim Pawlenty says there’s at least one option off the table to fix a state budget that faces a $4.8 billion shortfall: raising taxes.

“This challenge is going to be very difficult,” Pawlenty told leaders gathered at his Government Reform Summit on Monday. “[I]nterest groups, the stakeholders, legislators, I think, all understand that we can’t take a ‘business as usual’ approach.”

But despite his call to avoid a “‘business as usual’ approach,” Pawlenty said increasing taxes would be off the table. Minnesota hasn’t increased revenues in a decade. The period from 1997 to 2001 saw massive tax cuts and refunds in the form of “Jesse checks” (named after then-Gov. Jesse Ventura) and with the exception of Pawlenty’s 21 percent increase in fees, his “no new taxes” pledge has held from 2002 to 2008.

The co-chair for the campaign of John McCain invoked President-elect Barack Obama’s policy of holding off on tax increases until a stimulus package is passed. “It’s not wise [to increase taxes],” Pawlenty said. “It is not what President-elect (Barack) Obama is doing.”

However, Minnesota cannot legally run a budget deficit and the federal government can.

“We should live within what we’ve got,” Pawlenty said.

And we don’t have much. As Britt Robson reported for the Minnesota Independent in July, Pawlenty presided over $2.7 billion in tax cuts as House Majority leader and has resisted any tax increase in his seven years as governor. Minnesota government took a $4.3 billion cut in 2003 because of those tax cuts and the refusal to increase the amount of money the state takes in. Education, one of Minnesota’s strongest economic drivers, took a big hit.

The structure of the tax cuts has created a regressive tax system, a fact the governor’s own tax study demonstrates. Those with fewer means are paying a larger portion of their income on taxes than those who are wealthy.

Pawlenty plans to combine government services and make cuts to state-sponsored health insurance and other health and human services programs.

“Ideas that were offered include paying for performance, redesigning local government aid, getting better value in health care, reforming chemical-dependency programs, making early childhood programs stronger and more targeted, and connecting higher education to workforce needs,” Pawlenty spokesman Brian McClung said.

“We’ll be exploring these and other ideas as the governor puts together his budget recommendations.”

A letter to the editor of the Star Tribune offered a novel idea of where some money might be saved. “I’d say Tim Pawlenty’s salary of $120,000 is more than he deserved for the results of his efforts: a $5.2 billion deficit,” said Marcia Aubineau of St. Paul.

“We don’t want you to sound like some of the political candidates where you say the economy is strong and it is not, Brian, it is not.”

How do we read this? Is it merely sour grapes from the guy John McCain passed over? Or might he be anticipating a McCain loss and doing a little preemptive distancing?

Listen to it.

Do you have any evidence related to this charge? These are pretty bold accusations.”

Lahammer took exception and posted the note on her blog, with the following comment:

Frankly, it’s rather creepy to me to have people putting accusatory notes in my office when I’m not there. I have had people stalk me, who leave anonymous notes, follow me and have threatened to kill me. This is true for almost anyone who works in television, so we’re a bit sensitive to such actions. So if anyone knows who is responsible, please let me know because it’s at the very least highly unprofessional and downright creepy.

So who was the highly unprofessional and downright creepy letter writer? None other than Pawlenty press secretary Brian McClung. In an e-mail sent to Lahammer after she published the note, McClung explained himself:

I left you that note around 6:00 p.m. yesterday. I came downstairs to talk with you, but when you weren’t there, I just wrote a note and left it. Unfortunately, I forgot to write my name on it, but after I slid it under the door I figured I’d just call you first thing Tuesday to discuss it. I didn’t intend it as an “anonymous” note, as I always planned to follow up with a call.

After making the long walk between the governor’s office and Lahammer’s desk, McClung was lucky to have a printed copy of the objectionable blog post in hand. Though it is surprising a press secretary would make such a mistake as forgetting to sign his name, it is not a mistake McClung is likely to repeat anytime soon.