Is it possible we'll get real ethics reform in Utah?  The lieutenant governor recently approved the language of the ethics initiative sponsored by Utahns for Ethical Government.  It is noteworthy that Greg Bell, our new lieutenant governor, sponsored ethics reform legislation himself when he was in the state legislature.  But now that he is working with Gary Herbert he needs to be careful what he says and does on ethics reform.  Republican party leaders in the state aren't too keen on ethics reform.  They know it could place limits on the size of their campaign war chests, the gifts they receive, and their overall relationships with lobbyists. "Business as usual" may now become illegal.

However, the problem is the ethics initiative is not enough, even if it passes.   Since the initiative is a statute, it can be overturned by the legislature at any time. The Republicans likely will attempt to do that.

We need not only ethics reform for legislators, but also brand new legislators!

The candidates we ran last year all supported extensive ethics reform. They were not going to conduct "business as usual."   The candidates we will run next year will be much the same.  Unlike their Republican counterparts, they won't bad-mouth the ethics initiative, claim they've already done yeoman work on ethics reform, or whine that they can't understand why people are questioning their ethics!

We need to vote in ethics reform next November.  But in order to make it stick we need to vote out the Utah County Republican legislators who have dragged their feet on ethics reform for years.  Only with a change of personnel in the legislature will we get permanent ethics reform.