A recent State Ethics Commission opinion will require Mayor Alvin Brown and other City officials to report third-party private donations used for travel expenses when carrying out duties in public office, with those donations collected in a new City fund.
Nearly a year after Office of Ethics, Compliance and Oversight Director Carla Miller received a request for an investigation of Brown's travel records through the ethics hotline, the City is developing training to clarify what does and does not have to be reported as a gift under the latest opinion from the commission.
The state commission ruled March 13 that: "The mayor's travel was a gift or honorarium event-related given to him personally and subject to the acceptance and disclosure provisions in (Florida Statutes on reporting and prohibitive receipt of gifts, and solicitation and disclosure of honoraria)."
It further said that "since the gift law was first enacted in 1990, we (the State Ethics Commission) have never concluded that a public officer had not received a gift when he traveled at the expense of someone other than his agency."
General Counsel Cindy Laquidara asked the state commission if it was appropriate to establish a fund within City government that third parties could contribute to and could be used to pay for travel by the mayor and other City officials.
Under the proposal, the City would establish a public account where those funds can be deposited. The donation registry would be transparent and include donors, dates and amounts, according to Laquidara.
"In other words, rather than a back-end reimbursement to the City by outside third parties as previously suggested by the Commission, this would be a front-end public gift depository from which certain public agency-approved business-related travel expenses would be paid," Laquidara stated in her request for an advisory opinion.
The commission approved the fund's creation.
The advisory opinion request stemmed from an ethics hotline complaint received by Miller.
She notified Chris Hand, Brown's chief of staff, and Laquidara that an anonymous complaint was filed regarding the mayor's reporting of private funds used for travel for City business, according to a March 11 memo from Miller to the Ethics Commission explaining the investigation.
The Ethics Commission at its Sept. 4 meeting asked Miller to investigate the matter and it was conducted with the assistance of the mayor's staff.
The complaint questioned whether or not the mayor violated state and/or local ethics laws on receipt and/or disclosure of gifts in accepting private funds for travel to conduct the business of his office.
The complaint addresses trips, including those to Brazil in October 2011 with Gov. Rick Scott and Enterprise Florida, in August 2011 to the National Basketball Hall of Fame, and a February 2012 trip to a mayors' conference in Seattle.
"In an effort to save taxpayers money, Mayor Brown decided to utilize public-private partnerships to fund mayoral travel (in fiscal 2012-13). As we said at the time, our goal was and is to set up a public-private travel partnership process that is appropriate, transparent, and consistent with city and state law," Hand said Monday in an email.
The mayor's office has reported to Miller that the money donated for the three trips has been paid back.
Laquidara and Miller had different interpretations of ethics laws regarding receipt and/or disclosure of gifts at the beginning of the investigation.
Miller's March 11 memo to the Ethics Commission stated: "Having failed to achieve a mutual understanding on the law with the General Counsel, the ECO director filed an official complaint with the City Ethics Commission Oct. 1, 2012 against the Mayor for potential violations of state and local gift laws and failure to file reports on receipt of honorarium related expenses from lobbyists."
Miller made a recommendation to the Ethics Commission that the general counsel's office request an advisory opinion from the State Ethics Commission for clarity on the issue.
She said pursuing the opinion would faster clear up the matter than the possible legal proceedings and penalties that could occur if a complaint was filed with the State Ethics Commission regarding the matter.
Laquidara filed the request for advisory opinion Nov. 5 and the Ethics Commission withdrew its complaint to allow the City to pursue the advisory opinion.
"When the order came back from FEC, we were pleased with the result," said James Young, ethics commission chair.
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