Ethics process is on trial

This morning, a group of Utah House members will start a formal ethics investigation of two of their own — and the current ethics process will be on trial along with Reps. Greg Hughes and Phil Riesen.

One of the main complaints by some House Democrats and Republicans is that having the Legislature investigate its own members is inherently flawed, riddled with conflicts of interests, and complicated by friendships (both broken and held) and partisan politics.

That is certainly part of the case with both Hughes, R-Draper, and Riesen, D-Salt Lake.

It is a point that former Rep. Susan Lawrence finds most disturbing — that the Hughes/Riesen matter may derail some true ethics reform in the 2009 Legislature. "My concerns are just one small part of all this," Lawrence told the newspaper Tuesday, 24 hours before she answers a subpoena to appear before the House Ethics Committee as a witness.

Lawrence said she wrote a "to whom it may concern" letter containing her concerns about Hughes' actions in the 2006 elections mainly because she believed it would be used to convince House GOP leaders to take ethics reform seriously.

Meanwhile, complaints by House members about retaliation and meddling over internal ethics complaints seem to have been reflected in the current situation. House chief of staff Chris Bleak called Lawrence last week offering to help her "draft" a media response to her original Hughes letter. Bleak's suggestions "were not a clarification" of her original statement, Lawrence said Tuesday. She felt uncomfortable with those suggestions, and she decided not to agree to the changes. Bleak said he was just responding to leadership's request that Lawrence may desire help in dealing with the "early" release of her information. "I never tried to get her to retract what she had said," said Bleak.

That call came after a private meeting between GOP House leaders and those bringing concerns about Hughes — a meeting that contained some harsh language "and was tense," one of those attending told the Deseret News.

But on Tuesday, Lawrence said Riesen releasing her letter to the media and including it as part of a formal ethics complaint against Hughes, was not what she intended.

"I think that (making her allegations public) was a betrayal of trust, a breaking of a confidence, and (Riesen) stabbed everyone in the back that (Riesen) was working with" to get real ethics reform, said Lawrence.

Whether Riesen's actions are a violation of legislative ethics will be up to the committee. Whether it "derails" ethics reform, as Lawrence puts it, remains to be seen.