EDITORIAL REAL-TIME REPORTING QUARTERLY DISCLOSURE OF WHO'S SHILLING FOR WHOM ISN'T STRONG ENOUGH.THE loose reporting laws for lobbyists to reveal who they work for and what they are paid for their services were tightened up Tuesday. Instead of filing this information every six months, lobbyists must now do it quarterly. The new requirement means it will only take three months for citizens to find out what highly paid lobbyist has been hired to shill shill Slang n. One who poses as a satisfied customer or an enthusiastic gambler to dupe bystanders into participating in a swindle. v. shilled, shill·ing, shills v.intr. for which well-heeled interest. But that's still three months too late. What the city needs, and should have, is real-time 1. real-time - Describes an application which requires a program to respond to stimuli within some small upper limit of response time (typically milli- or microseconds). Process control at a chemical plant is the classic example. reporting requirements for lobbyists. There ought to be instant accountability the minute a contract is signed. City officials, led by Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa Antonio Ramon Villaraigosa (born Antonio (Tony) Ramon Villar, Jr. on January 23, 1953) is the mayor of Los Angeles, California. He is the first Latino mayor of Los Angeles since Cristobal Aguilar in 1872. , have made some strides toward cleaning up politics at City Hall. One of the biggest pieces was realizing that it is a clear conflict for lobbyists to sit on city commissions. Requiring immediate disclosure of lobbyists and clients would be a huge step down the road of true ethics ethics, in philosophy, the study and evaluation of human conduct in the light of moral principles. Moral principles may be viewed either as the standard of conduct that individuals have constructed for themselves or as the body of obligations and duties that a reform for a city government that very recently found itself mired mire n. 1. An area of wet, soggy, muddy ground; a bog. 2. Deep slimy soil or mud. 3. A disadvantageous or difficult condition or situation: the mire of poverty. v. in corruption probes. As it works now, the damage done through the influence network has already been done by the time lobbyists are required to file their forms. As citizens, we have a right to know who is getting paid to push what to politicians. For that matter, we have a right to know which lobbyists are meeting with politicians. With the ease of e-mail and electronic reporting over the Internet, it's reasonable to require that this type of information be posted weekly, or even daily. If the goal is to make City Hall a place that works fairly for all interests, then elected officials must do more than make feeble fee·ble adj. fee·bler, fee·blest 1. a. Lacking strength; weak. b. Indicating weakness. 2. Lacking vigor, force, or effectiveness; inadequate. See Synonyms at weak. attempts to tighten accountability rules. |
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