On Measure H, the Meter is Running : Ethics: Cabbies are ticketed for improper dress. Why then should public officials be rewarded to clean up their act?

Seems that the Los Angeles City Council and the city’s Transportation Commission believe that the cabbies have an image problem.

They don’t like the way they dress. So new rules have been established to bring some conformity to the appearance of these drivers. Hair must be groomed, shirts buttoned, hats must match the color of other clothing and toes must be covered. Skirts may be worn only by women. And objectionable body odors are out. Already a team of investigators is citing cabbies for breaking the rules. Companies may be assessed up to $100,000 in fines.

The city will provide no financial reward to encourage conformity with these new guidelines. No money for hair styling or designer jeans (permissible if the overall look is “professional”).

Contrast this approach with the code of ethics that the council has drawn up for itself and placed on the June ballot as Measure H. This proposed charter amendment was touted as the stiffest government ethics package in the country. Its proponents say that it will clear up any appearance of chicanery at City Hall.

The code would ban gifts and honorariums, ban outside employment, limit spending by candidates for city offices and restrict lobbying by former officials.

In other words, Measure H would remove the bad odors from city government.

While the cabbies will be slapped with tickets by inspectors for ignoring the rules of proper behavior, elected officials must have incentives to clean up their act. The charter amendment that the council put on the ballot would establish the ethics code and, at the same time, raise council salaries from $61,522 to $86,156 a year, and lift other elected officials’ salaries as well.

This 40% increase will serve as a great incentive for improving City Hall’s image.

Why is it that government officials need the carrot of more money to improve their bad habits, while the stick of heavy fines is applied to the cabbies? I guess its easy to tell who runs things in the city.

The cabbies will have to dip into their own pockets to get a better wardrobe. If Measure H passes, the elected officials get to dip into our pockets to run their campaigns. A fund not to exceed $8 million is set up for limited public financing of campaigns.

Perhaps there is an answer to this problem. Tell the elected city officials that we expect them to live up to the high standards they propose in Measure H--just to keep their current salaries. Then we can take the $450,000 set aside for the City Hall raises and buy a store-full of designer jeans and matching hats for the cabbies.