State law requires all counties in Tennessee to adopt an ethics policy for elected county officials and employees, the election commission and the county school board, by June 30, 2007. The County Commission Ad Hoc Committee has suggested a board of ethics made up of a scrabble of politically correct power centers.
“The ethics board needs to be made up of ordinary citizens from the voting rolls,” says Tom Guleff, founder of JoeCitizens.com. “Voters know right from wrong. We don’t need lawyers and accountants from Enron and WorldCom to tell us what is ethical behavior.” To parcel out these positions to various interests and groups is absurd. It appears that a group of technocrats have ignored what is really needed in ethics reform; the regular Joe Citizen voter.
The proposed profile of the 14 person board (one member from each):
100 Black Men, Memphis chapter
NAACP , Memphis chapter
Urban League, Memphis chapter
TN Society of CPAs, Memphis chapter
Memphis Bar Association
Ben Jones Chapter of the National Bar Association
Black Business Association
Leadership Memphis
League of Women Voters of Memphis / Shelby County
Society of Human Resources Management, Memphis Chapter
Memphis Leadership Academy
Memphis Minority Purchasing Council
Memphis Regional Chamber of Commerce
Additionally, one member only shall be nominated, in a manner chosen by those institutions, from the administration or faculty of the University of Memphis, Christian Brothers University, LeMoyne Owen College, and Rhodes College.
