Pretend you’re bar-manager-turned- state Rep. Paul Weissmann, and the House is considering a bill to boost the price of restaurant licenses. Do you vote?
Just to make sure nobody thinks he’s voting in his own interest, the real Weissmann says he abstains.
Colorado’s 100 state legislators — most of whom have day jobs — face dozens of these personal decisions about conflicts every session with little outside guidance or oversight.
A rare look into the conduct of Sen. Abel Tapia, who both funded and benefited financially from the State Fair, underscores how complicated and incomplete state ethics laws can be.
“It’s a tough one. It’s a tough one for every single one of us,” Tapia told a legislative ethics board last week.
The four-lawmaker board could formally decide today that the Pueblo Democrat did nothing wrong when he helped direct $3.2 million a year to his hometown fair while his engineering firm benefited from $440,000 in fair contracts.
Like two-thirds of the nation’s statehouses, Colorado’s so-called “citizen legislature” is composed of engineers, ranchers, teachers and other professionals, said Peggy Kerns, head of the National Conference of State Legislatures’ ethics division.
Conflicts of interest are unavoidable.
“Idealists want someone to come into office washed clean and totally objective, but that’s not realistic,” said Kerns, herself a former Colorado lawmaker. “It’s how a lawmaker handles it that becomes of interest.”
Different approaches
Long involved in the Pueblo business community, Tapia never considered that the fair contracts he started receiving a few years after taking office might pose conflicts, he said.
But his Senate colleague Ron Tupa never stops thinking about conflicts. His wife lobbies for bills on Capitol Hill, and the Boulder Democrat regularly refuses to vote on them, he said.
“If it had been me, it would have been an easy call to recuse myself,” Tupa said. “I avoid even the appearance of impropriety. I may be on one extreme end, but there has never been a question.”
Most other lawmakers fall somewhere between the two.
Lawyers may tweak trial rules. Some landlords refuse to vote on real-estate laws.
Farmer and Sen. Greg Brophy, R-Wray, doesn’t shy away from agriculture bills, but he doesn’t try to sell his wheat, corn and watermelons to the state, either.
“Everyone has to have a job,” Brophy said. “And everyone has to ask themselves, ‘Is this something I shouldn’t be a part of?’ ”
While more than a third of lawmakers and their spouses operate businesses, a rough survey of business filings and state-contract records showed none other than Tapia did business with the state in the last three years.
Some reconsider ties
Prompted by media attention, Tapia became the second state lawmaker ever to seek advice from a legislative ethics committee on a potential conflict.
The Tapia probe has left lawmakers examining their own business ties and worrying that there is little guidance for navigating gray areas, said Rep. Claire Levy, a Boulder Democrat and ethics board member.
“The upshot will be we take a harder look at relationships we thought were OK but we should review and revisit,” Levy said.
Citizen legislatures across the country face similar dearths of direction, especially as lobbying and ethics scandals make the public more sensitive to the issue.
Though a newly established Independent Ethics Commission is months away from hearing complaints, Elena Nuñez of Colorado Common Cause said it should be the venue for issues like Tapia’s.
“They shouldn’t hesitate to ask questions beforehand,” Nuñez said.
Ethics rules fall short
The rules that elected officials must play by aren’t always clear, and they don’t necessarily prohibit behavior that some consider unethical.
“We have found out there are gaps in our rules,” said panelist Rep. Rob Witwer, R-Genesee. “When people want to do the right thing, they need more guidance than we provide.”
Reading the same rules, the board disagreed on exactly when a lawmaker crosses the line and starts acting in his or her own interest.
Some said Tapia’s firm Abel Engineering Professionals, which received more fair contracts than all other firms combined, could expect future work with the agency, and therefore the senator had a personal stake in the indebted fair’s survival.
Others took a broader take on the term “personal interest.”
“Whether it’s a vote for charter schools or a vote for workman’s comp, tell me a vote that doesn’t affect our lives. I’ll tell you a vote that doesn’t matter,” said Sen. Bill Cadman, R-Colorado Springs.
In the end, Tapia’s actions passed muster because the money in question flowed into one fair account, while construction projects were funded from another account.
Members of the public, however, have their own much- less-forgiving litmus tests, Common Cause’s Nuñez said.
“If voting on a particular issue will cause doubt, it’s better to just stay away from it,” Nuñez said.
Jessica Fender: 303-954-1244 or jfender@denverpost.com
