Bredesen assembling citizen ethics panel

By Skip Cauthorn
Nashville City Paper
June 29, 2005

In response to last month’s Tennessee Waltz arrests of four lawmakers, Gov. Phil Bredesen is assembling a special task force made up of experts outside of the legislature to recommend needed ethics changes.

The “citizen panel” will consist of members of the religious, business and academic communities as well as other citizens and will be called together through an executive order soon to address ethics in state government.

The group would meet over the summer and deliver recommendations by this fall, said Bredesen Press Secretary Lydia Lenker Tuesday.

In addition, a legislative committee will begin meeting in two weeks to discuss campaign finance reform, lawmaker conflict of interest and lobbyist regulation issues, leaders decided Tuesday afternoon.

The committee will work toward the possibility of a special session this fall or could possibly take up ethics reform upon return in January, said House Speaker Jimmy Naifeh (D- Covington).

“The mission is to try to come up with meaningful legislation we can pass through the House and the Senate,” Naifeh said.

Senate Democratic Leader Jim Kyle (D-Memphis) also suggested the committee may travel to different areas of the state for public input.

Other issues could arise but the main thrust of the committee would be to work on tightening up campaign finance laws, conflict of interest questions and lobbyist rules, Kyle said.

“We need to try to work toward legislation we believe could pass overwhelmingly,” Kyle said. “How long it will take us to do that? I don’t know.”

The 12-member joint committee was named by Naifeh and Lt. Gov. John Wilder (D-Mason) and is made of six members from each party.

On May 26 the FBI arrested senators John Ford (D-Memphis), Ward Crutchfield (D-Chattanooga), Kathryn Bowers (D-Memphis) and Rep. Chris Newton (R-Benton) on alleged extortion and bribery charges.

Ford, whose questionable ties to several state contractors had already embroiled the five-month session in an ongoing ethics debate, resigned from the Senate two days following the arrests.

Several lawmakers in recent days have written Gov. Phil Bredesen asking for a special session, which the governor earlier said is a possibility this fall.

Though the legislature — with a two-thirds majority — may convene a special session of its own, the call would likely be up to the governor, Kyle said.

State representatives Mike Turner and Gary Moore, both Nashville-area Democrats, have written Bredesen and asked that he call lawmakers back prior to their scheduled return early next year.

Sen. Mark Norris (R-Collierville) and Randy McNally (R-Oak Ridge) also asked that a special session be called.

At issue should also be the fact that, if convicted, Ford, Bowers and Crutchfield would continue to receive their state pensions for life, McNally said in his letter to the governor.

House Republican leaders Tuesday morning laid out a laundry list of ethics improvements to address last month’s indictments including some tighter lobbyist regulation — an area that went unchanged throughout last session’s ethics debate.