EDITORIAL UNETHICAL SILENCE GIL GARCETTI'S DIVIDED LOYALTY TAINTS L.A. ETHICS COMMISSION.

WHILE Los Angeles City Council members have worked at breakneck speed to water down city ethics laws and give themselves four more years in office, one person has been conspicuously silent: Ethics Commission President Gil Garcetti.

Strange, isn't it?

Here's a plan cooked up by special interests, misleadingly packaged so as to confuse voters, and designed to enshrine bogus ethics reforms into the City Charter, so we'll be stuck with them forever. The City Council rammed this plan through at the last minute, without any scrutiny from the Ethics Commission, let alone the public at large.

And the city's ethics guru, the former district attorney, has nothing to say about the matter?

Gee, could it possibly be because the man behind this plan happens to be Eric Garcetti, the City Council president and Gil's son?

Gil Garcetti should know well the danger of conflicts of interest, even apparent ones. And here the conflict couldn't be more apparent: If this term-limits deception becomes law, Gil's son will get four more years in office, which means $1 million more in accrued salary and benefits, not to mention the enormous power of his high office.

It's fair to ask if paternal interests are what led the senior Garcetti to cancel a special commission meeting to discuss the measure and to hold his tongue about this scheme -- even as other ethics commissioners were lambasting it as the cynical deceit it is.

Gil Garcetti offered no explanation for canceling the meeting, just a scheduling conflict. By saying and doing nothing, he cleared the path for his son's professional and political aspirations.

The elder Garcetti owes the public an explanation for his conduct. It's understandable that he might have a greater loyalty to his family than to his city. Understandable, but unacceptable.

His son's abuse of his position to benefit himself and his colleagues, without any showing of a public interest, is unethical. By his silence and inaction, Gil Garcetti has undermined the credibility of the Ethics Commission. He should step down immediately.