LAUSD'S SECRET CODE DISTRICT'S EMPLOYEES YET TO GET ETHICS RULES.

Byline: Helen Gao Staff Writer

Three years after the Los Angeles Unified School District committed to creating an ethics program, only nine lobbyists have registered and district employees have yet to receive their copy of the code of ethics.

What's more, codes of conduct for district employees and contractors have been weakened from their original drafts and contain loopholes that allow the superintendent to waive ethical violations.

And the district has backed down from requiring employees to sign the code because of concerns raised by the school administrators union.

``If you don't have the leadership being committed, the ones who work below you - the mid-management and the people below - they are going to look up and say, why are you trying to get us to be ethical when the upper management level is not committed,'' said Terry Harrison, curriculum development coordinator for the Josephson Institute of Ethics, which advised the district on creating a program.

As of Friday, six lobbyists from the law firm of Pillsbury-Winthrop, two from Avaya Communications and one from United Telecommunications have filed papers since the program was launched Jan. 1.

By contrast, the more established Los Angeles City Ethics Commission, after which the LAUSD modeled its program, shows 150 lobbyists having registered with the agency to do business in the city.

``I would expect a great deal more (lobbyist) registrations. I am really shocked and appalled,'' said school board member Julie Korenstein, who represents the east San Fernando Valley.

District officials described their ethics program as a work in progress and said they are in the beginning stages of implementing the program.

``I feel that we have been working at it. It's a high concern of mine,'' Superintendent Roy Romer said.

As the nation's second largest school district, LAUSD's current-year budget stands at $9.9 billion - nearly twice that of the city of Los Angeles. In any given year, the district contracts with 10,000 vendors for goods and services totaling more than $436 million.

In addition, LAUSD is undertaking a $5.05 billion new school construction program, the largest building program of its kind in the nation.

School board member Jose Huizar, who led the charge to create a lobbyist registration system, said the tepid response also surprised him because he hears about and sees lobbyists throughout the district.

More enforcement

``I strongly believe we have to do more on the enforcement part. We have so many regulations now, they are ineffective if we don't enforce them,'' said Huizar, chairman of the school board's Business, Finance, Audit and Technology Committee.

``I am getting to a point where I think we need to either see more results or positive outcomes or we really need to re-examine the whole (ethics) office and reshape it if we wanted to.''

Ethics Officer Peter Bowen, who was hired by the district in February 2001 to implement the ethics program, said he is still trying to figure out how to reach potential lobbyists to get them to register and how to distribute the employee ethics code.

The Ethics Office had initially targeted lobbyists who registered with the city, only to find out they are not the same individuals who lobby the district. Now Bowen is turning his attention to vendors.

``Originally, when we thought we would have the same audience as the city, we had anticipated a fair number of them to register with us. Because that didn't happen, we don't have a whole bunch registered,'' he said.

Fleishman Hillard, a prominent lobbying and communications firm in town, is among those that have not yet registered. The company recently lobbied the LAUSD on behalf of Laidlaw Transit Inc, which was seeking to win a bus transportation contract.

Read it in the paper

Doug Dowie, general manager for the Los Angeles office of Fleishman Hillard, said he had not been officially notified of the program by the district, but added his company is preparing to file paperwork later. Dowie said his knowledge of the district's lobbyist registration system came from a newspaper article.

``If it wasn't for the media, I don't recall ever receiving anything from the district saying, 'dear friend, if you want to stay out of trouble, we have just passed this law; you may want to know about it.'''

Similar to the city's registration system, the district's program requires lobbyists to register only after they have been compensated $4,000 or more in a calendar quarter for work influencing decision-making in the district.

Those who fail to file on time face fines of up to $500, and violators of the code could be suspended or permanently prohibited from lobbying the district.

Bowen insisted his office has made great strides despite a lack of resources and personnel. During the first 10 months on the job, Bowen worked by himself. Later, the district added a paralegal to his staff. Just recently, he was able to hire two more people, with another two expected to come on board next week.

``It's difficult to convey how much work it is to get the program to start from scratch with two people, as well as hire people, provide (ethics) advice and do projects,'' Bowen said.

The school board first authorized the creation of an ethics program in October 1999. A year later, it approved an employee code of ethics, a contractor and consultant code of conduct and a lobbyist registration code. All three codes underwent revisions throughout the next year.

The board did not finalize the lobbyist and contractor/consultant code until November. The final version of the employee code of ethics was not ratified until February.

The revised versions weakened the original drafts, allowing loopholes. Both the employee code of ethics and the contractor/consultant code of conduct contain a waiver allowing the superintendent or his designees to waive ethical prohibitions upon ``showing good cause'' and written notification to the school board.

Loopholes defended

The waiver in the contractor/consultant code allows the superintendent to hire former district employees within 12 months of their departure.

Romer defended the loopholes.

``Every once in while in a circumstance, you will get an employee between a rock and a hard place and ... trying to do the right thing,'' he said. ``There are times in which you have a circumstance where fairness cannot be attained by the rigidity of the law.''

Another major change to the ethics program that has been quietly made behind the scenes is that staffers will not be asked to sign the code of ethics to signify their commitment. Signing the code is now voluntary. According to an audit by Inspector General Don Mullinax's office conducted late last year, Associated Administrators of Los Angeles had urged its members to boycott the code, describing it as a document that would be used to ``hang people.'' Subsequently, district officials backed down from the signature requirement and rewrote the code.

Eli Brent of AALA said his organization initially opposed it because it didn't have assurances from the district that it would apply to teachers and others as well.

Bowen said he has not yet asked the superintendent, the board or any of the 11 local district superintendents to sign the employee code of ethics.