Utah Legislature: Major ethics reform bill passes House committee

SALT LAKE CITY — In just over an hour Monday a Utah House committee made perhaps the greatest strides in government ethics reform in the state's history.

At the same time, a proposed gift ban bill includes a large exemption that could cut in half the amount of dollars spent on legislators that lobbyists would be required to declare.

The bipartisan House Ethics Committee passed Monday a package of five bills, including a constitutional amendment that would create an independent ethics commission. Some leaders called it "landmark legislation," but it also led to some new questions.

Specifically, the proposed bills could create a situation where Utahns would vote in November on two forms of legislative ethics reform — a constitutional amendment backed by the Legislature and an initiative placed on the ballot based on a petition signed by tens of thousands of Utah residents.

If voters adopted both the constitutional amendment and a citizens' ethics initiative, it would take court action to sort out the ensuing confusion, said the Legislature's general counsel, John Fellows.

The possibility exists that the provisions of the tough initiative backed by Utahns for Ethical Government would never become law even if approved at the ballot box because the constitutional amendment and an accompanying legislative rules change take legal precedence, though years of litigation might be necessary.

Meanwhile, House Majority Leader Kevin Garn, R-Layton, explained to the Deseret News that a proposed gift ban bill includes an exclusion that would end reporting of some events by lobbyists that make up a large portion of the cash currently reported.

Specifically, Garn said, when groups of legislators are invited to an event, all costs associated with that event would not be reported at all.

Currently, even though 80 percent of gifts/entertainment provided to legislators by lobbyists does not come with the accepting lawmaker's name attached, the overall expenses are reported.

That would no longer be the case in a number of instances under HB267, Garn explained.

Even though HB267 would "change the way we do business up here," as Garn put it, the annual spending on legislators now compiled by the Lieutenant Governor's Office, and published by the media, could be cut in half from its current dollar amount — since many of the big-ticket items legislators attend every year are events where groups of legislators are invited.