BATON ROUGE, La. -- Louisiana's ethics system has been "crippled" as a result of legal changes made during Gov. Bobby Jindal's 2008 special session on ethics, the chairman of the Louisiana Board of Ethics said Monday.
"This is a convoluted and crippled ethics system we have today," Ethics Board chairman Frank Simoneaux said. "It does not make sense. It does not work well."
Simoneaux said the main culprit is a law that moved judicial power from the Ethics Board to administrative law judges, called ALJs.
The ALJs are hired by an appointee of the governor.
The law stemmed from complaints from legislators and some local officials that the Ethics Board was violating due process protections sitting as both prosecutor and judge.
Simoneaux said he agrees that there should be a division of powers between prosecutorial and judicial functions. But the law goes about it in the wrong way, he said.
"Here we are today we can render (ethics) advisory opinions and the ALJs ignore them all together," Simoneaux said. "You cannot have two bodies administering the same body of laws."
Simoneaux also questioned the law's requirement that the Ethics Board follow the rulings handed down by the three-judge panels.
"The Ethics Board is anchored in the constitution. Yet (the law) put the Board of Ethics in a subservient position to the ALJs.
How can that be?" Simoneaux asked.
Now a Baton Rouge lawyer, Simoneaux was one of Baton Rouge's state representatives and served as a cabinet secretary during Gov. Dave Treen's administration.
Simoneaux told the Press Club of Baton Rouge that the issue needs to be publicly debated.
He said he has discussed the problems with Jindal administration officials and House Speaker Jim Tucker who pushed the legislation.
But he said he is getting no traction and suggested "a poisonous atmosphere" exists because of some lawmaker run-ins with the Ethics Board.
Jindal declined to be interviewed on the subject. Jindal deputy chief of staff Stephen Waguespack and Tucker said they don't understand Simoneaux's complaints.
"It is working but there's always an opportunity to make sure it's working as well as it possibly can," Waguespack said in an interview later in the day.
"It's a new system. I think there needs to be some time to let this play out a little bit," Waguespack said.
Tucker said the administrative law judges are issuing "well thought out, well written rulings, far better than the old board. You are also getting dissents."
"In the big picture it is much better than it was before, said Tucker, R-Terrytown, adding that if Simoneaux "is dissatisfied with the process, he needs to resign."
Any change in the law is a legislative prerogative because a policy decision is involved, Tucker said.
(Copyright 2009 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
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