City ethics committee reviews complaint

The ethics committee created by the Rhinelander Common Council back in 2020 met Nov. 13 to discuss a complaint filed against a city employee.

After spending just over a half hour in closed session, the panel returned to open session to announce that it would reconvene in two weeks, at 4:30 p.m. Nov. 27, to continue the discussion.

Before the vote to go into closed session, city attorney Steve Sorenson advised the group as to the proper operation of the committee.

As a preliminary note, Sorenson stated that the group met recently for organizational purposes only and there is now a single complaint for the group to review. Two other complaints had been filed since the committee was reorganized in 2020 but both have become “moot” due to individuals leaving their employment with the city, Sorenson explained.

Other than noting that the pending complaint involves a city employee, the group was careful to adhere to confidentiality rules and disclosed no other information about the matter while in open session.

Sorenson also reminded the members — Michael Miller, Winston King, Bob Gauthier, Doug Nelson, Ashley McLaughlin, Nate Sheppard and Stephen Jopek — that they must disclose any conflict that they might have with respect to any individual involved in a particular complaint.

“The thing that’s nice about Rhinelander is we all know each other so we kind of know what the conflicts are,” Sorenson noted. “It’s pretty hard to hide them but it’s good that you disclose them.”

The attorney also noted that not every complaint the committee receives is likely to be valid.

“You’ll find that you’ll get complaints by people because the world isn’t going their way,” he said. “Enough of you have been in business to know that it’s (common) to blame someone else for the world not going your way.”

In situations where it appears someone is “complaining to complain” Sorenson said city administration would attempt to handle it internally but “if they insist they have a right” to be heard by the ethics committee. 

Sorenson went on to explain the criteria for code/ethics violations. Number one, he said, is breach of duty as all city employees have a duty to be independent, meaning their decision-making cannot be predicated upon relationships.

Every employee also has a duty of responsibility, he continued. 

Examples of dereliction of duty would include failure to attend meetings or failure to pay attention during meetings.

The attorney also discussed the duty to use proper channels.

“It’s a violation of the ethics code to try to go around your proper channels,” he said. An example of this would be an attempt to go over the head of one’s direct supervisor to someone higher in the chain of command, he explained.

In addition, city employees and elected officials may not participate in anything that will result in “personal gain.”

Finally, he noted that employees and elected officials must maintain public confidence by not violating rules regarding privileged communication.

An example would be sharing confidential information with others.

Beyond code violations, there is also the possibility of criminal activity including bribery, misconduct in office and the use of public items for private use. 

As an example, Sorenson mentioned a situation that happened in another community where someone took public property, a pair of snowshoes, for their personal use.

He then segued into the concept of the appearance of impropriety. 

“An employee must not act in a way that a reasonable person could think that the employee would show favoritism towards someone that they are interacting with or the person cannot show they are likely to be influenced improperly,” he explained.

“This is the toughest one because the appearance of impropriety can oftentimes create more problems than actual impropriety, because people will start rumors and stories and those are hard to fight,” he said. “I’ve always said the hardest thing in the world is to prove a negative.”

An example of an attempt to prove a negative would be if someone were forced to prove they are not having an extramarital affair with a particular individual.

The attorney also advised against jumping to conclusions and noted “there has to be proof” of a particular allegation and anyone who brings a particular allegation forward must have evidence that proves the veracity of their concerns.

Finally, Sorenson explain the options available to the committee.

 The panel has the authority to issue a private or public reprimand or recommend the common council remove an individual from their employment, he said.

Following the attorney’s remarks, the group voted to enter closed session to discuss the complaint before them. 

Approximately 33 minutes later, the group returned to open session and announced that discussion of the topic discussed in closed session will resume starting at 4:30 p.m. Nov. 27.

Following the announcement, McLaughlin volunteered to move from alternate to full-time status on the ethics committee. 

The mayor must approve the change. If he does so, it was noted there would be an “alternate” vacancy to be filled. Anyone interested in serving as an alternate is asked to contact City Clerk Austyn Zarda.

Heather Schaefer may be reached at [email protected].