At-large D.C. Councilman Vincent Orange plans on Tuesday to push for emergency legislation establishing an ethics task force, much to the ire of some of his colleagues. Orange said on Monday his first attempt to move emergency ethics legislation was rebuffed when Chairman Kwame Brown left it off the agenda for the council’s first legislative meeting in September. Brown was not available Monday for comment.
Now that Orange is trying again, Ward 4 Councilwoman Muriel Bowser, head of the committee in charge of shepherding an ethics proposal to council, is stepping up to the plate. On Monday afternoon she fired off a memo to the council urging them not to vote for the emergency proposal.
“Recognizing that the formal and public committee process is best for the review of these sensitive and highly publicized measures, I trust that you will oppose emergency legislation that undermines that process,” read a copy of the memo obtained by The Washington Examiner. “Now is the time for a serious, deliberate discussion of the nine bills that sit in my committee, not for knee-jerk solutions or political pandering.”
But Orange, who would need nine votes to get his emergency bill approved, said the council also needs an outside entity to assist its ethics reform effort.
“There’s a feeling the council members, we cannot police ourselves,” he said.
Emergency ethics legislation was also a campaign promise, he said.
Bowser has scheduled a hearing for Oct. 26 for the nine ethics proposals currently referred to her Government Operations Committee.
“This hearing is a critical step in our legislative process and one that should not be skipped over as the Council reshapes the laws that govern all of us,” she said in the memo.
