Ethics and redistricting are targeted

GOP legislative leaders may have thought they dealt with the broad issue of ethics reform in the 2009 Legislature.

But two citizen groups strongly disagree. And Wednesday, in separate press conferences, they talked about the citizen initiative processes they are now beginning.

If either group can get the necessary 94,552 signatures of Utah registered voters by next April, their initiatives, which would create independent ethics and redistricting commissions to make recommendations to the House and Senate, would be placed before voters in November 2010.

It won't be an easy task for either group.

The Legislature itself set the signature-gathering bar pretty high. But leaders of both groups, Utahns for Ethical Government and the Fair Boundaries coalition, believe they can do it.

While members of each group may support what the other is doing, they will operate separately, leaders said in press conferences on the Capitol steps.

Kim Burningham, State School Board member and former GOP House member, is one of the leaders of Utahns for Ethical Government. He listed, point by point, areas where Utah's ethical standards are sub-par — ethical investigations of lawmakers, campaign finance, gift-taking by lawmakers and influence of special interests and lobbyists.

Legislators did pass some ethics laws last session, he said, but they were weak and didn't address the core issues, like proper conduct by lawmakers and reducing the influence of big money and special interests in shaping the Legislature's agenda.

Most legislators are honorable, Burningham said. But lawmakers, especially the leaders, are good people trapped in a bad system. Utahns, through polling and other measures, clearly want these reforms, he added.

One of the state's most popular current Democrats along with a one-time Republican political powerhouse shared a podium at the first gathering at the Capitol on Wednesday, and they affixed the first two signatures to the petition in support of the Fair Boundaries initiative. The group's goal is to allow voters to decide whether an independent commission should redraw legislative and congressional voting districts. It recently lost a legal challenge to the $1 million price tag levied on the plan by the Governor's Office of Planning and Budget. The Utah Supreme Court ruled late last month that the amount, which pays for both the independent commission and a parallel effort on behalf of the state Legislature, was appropriate.