Fund scandals erode coffers, Utahns' trust

"If people are allowed to read or have some kind of ethics training, they won't be inclined to embezzle?" Wood asked. "Give me a break. If somebody has that inclination, they are going to do it no matter what."

That tendency to push ethical boundaries to misuse or even pocket public funds is often augmented by a sense of power felt by government officials, said David Keller, director of the Center for the Study of Ethics at Utah Valley State College.

Many state or city employees feel a sense of entitlement to public funds or that "they're underpaid and the public owes them," he said.

"I would assume that this stuff goes on all the time, and sometimes it bubbles to the top and becomes visible," Keller added. "It's a part of human nature to exploit a position of power."

The only way to combat that disposition, Keller added, is to make government transparent so employees don't feel comfortable pushing the limits.

"When the operations of the government are not transparent to the public, (employees) either may take the opportunity to exploit their position or they may innocently not question their actions because they know it won't come under scrutiny," he said.

Random checks of the petty cash drawer by internal auditors in Davis County help keep county employees honest, Davis County Clerk/Auditor Steve Rawlings said.

Davis County has a system in place in which no employee has the power to both receive and cash checks. And every year, both an external and internal auditor examines county procedures to make sure that doesn't happen.

"We check to see if they have a combination of functions that would allow them to do something they shouldn't do," Rawlings said. "If that happens, we try to split those functions so we don't have a problem."

The Utah unit of Common Cause, a national government watchdog group, is also working to tighten government by promoting oversight by a Utah State Ethics Board of non-partisan community members.

The group, headed locally by Anthony Musci, is advocating for a system to provide an avenue for whistle-blowers to report ethical violations and a method to investigate such claims.

"The idea is to have a board that is independent of the governmental body," Musci said. "There's a 'protect your own' mentality that makes ethical violation hearings not very serious."

Musci added that government codes and regulations are not stringent enough in Utah, leaving most government employees to rely on personal integrity when deciding whether an act is ethical.

"It's not always that they're bad people, but the system is so lax that it allows people to get into trouble," he said. "Officials are kind of left to their own devices."

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