Thank you.

Sure, I don't know if Councilmember Cook's language, but I do know she flagged under section one to we are on the resolution to adopt an ethics code.

Yeah, we're starting with the ethics code, because that was the one that had come through on that March 20th work session.

Under section one, paragraph A, subparagraph three.

This is ethical responsibilities.

Councilmember Cook expressed some concern with the second sentence of that paragraph, which reads to declare that a council member is behaving unethically because one disagrees on a question of policy and not because the council member's behavior is unfair, dishonesty responsible in itself and ethical, and had flagged that language and wanted to discuss that more fully.

Yeah, so I'm going to apologize because my computer is only working with a keyboard and my mouse isn't working, so I can't pull up any of my other windows.

But my some of my notes are up here, so we're going to go with what we have.

Yeah, so this that sentence and also it's gonna I'm gonna talk about both of these at the same time as the other one that you've highlighted is the eight.

Um so yeah, I'm not comfortable signing anything with language that includes this.

I think these are kind of the counterpoints to each other.

Um what we're seeing in a national trend is that people are calling all sorts of things policy.

Um we have called people's like health care policy, we have called like their existence policy, um, and I don't think that's gonna happen with this council, but I do think that it's important um that we are not limiting ourselves to not being able to call out ethical issues and or being called unethical because we are um uh presented with oh sorry, no, actually I'm just gonna stay with A with Bree.

I realize that's disregard the B.

I'm just gonna stay with the A for right now.

Um yeah, so to declare that a council member is behaving unethically because one disagrees on a question of policy, um, I just feel like that gives us like so much um there's so much that can be included in the word policy.

I do not feel comfortable with this language at all.

So to give an example, it's like we're talking about trans folks in policy all the time.

Um, and I would say that it is unethical uh to talk about folks that they don't exist, right?

Like this is the thing that I would say is unethical.

Um but if we were gonna have that conversation with the rules as they're written now, then my saying that is unethical would itself be unethical, and I would be potentially open to um to whatever the results are that are later listed under this.

So I'm not comfortable with this.

I don't really know why it's here.

Um I think we cover a lot of this moving forward with how we act with integrity and independence and how we treat our colleagues with respect.

Um but I think given particularly like the conversation that's happening on a federal level, like if we're gonna if we're gonna protect folks for talking about whatever we consider policy is, then we are gonna allow for any conversations to be protected that maybe don't need to be protected.

So that is my colleague for raising um this concern.

I think I think also for I think properly and accurately capturing uh what's going on at the national level.

This document, however, is germane to this particular body.

I mean it's not meant to be tall power what's going on nationally or at the federal level.

And there's really kind of straightforward examples for us as a body.

Um first off this document comports with industry stations or a whole lot of other cities and councils that have kind of similar exact kind of language.

And it's also a deviant.

For example, if I vote differently from you on a zoning issue, my ethics issue, um, and you say you're unethical for calling to approve it or not approve it.

Um that's germane to this particular um body, and that's where the language comes from if you vote um uh uh for or against shot spotter.

Uh and and you know, as I closed under it, or you say that uh a personal attack as opposed to the policy vote.

That's where this community from.

That's where this community from this was not meant to address the universal um a public square in which we deal with this documentary tailored commands as particular body.

Um I I resonate with what you're saying at the national well.

Um, certainly in in but I think this line to kind of the uh attorneys work very hard on what we spend a lot of time was documenting how so this this is not the from you know industry stand industry standard uh documents also uh problem.

Thank you.

Um, because you all did so many so much research, uh studying other ethics policies.

Um can you share with Councilmember Cook some of the other places that we looked to for guidance because I think that helps right.

I mean, it was a long process, and if you can't maybe remember, maybe send the list, because I think that part of the ethics policy that we have in front of us was actually standardizing it to other cities.

Uh we were pretty out of standard uh by the te by the time.

Maybe not out of standard, but there had been a lot of changes in other people's policies over the years, and ours hadn't been really dealt with in a minute, um, if I'm remembering correctly.

Uh, and then you all spent a decent amount of time looking um both at other cities' tr uh ethics policies and then um with school government.

Sure.

I I will say that um, Madam Chair, that this particular provision I don't recall um which specific city or model document I was pulling it from.

It is not a common provision.

So I will say m many North Carolina municipalities work from a model ethics code that was done many years ago by Professor Fleming Bell at the School of Government, and you know, things have changed over time, but that's a very straightforward document as well.

And you may recall that a couple years ago when my office was being asked to look at the ethics code and to address very specific scenarios, um, we were trying to develop more specificity for things that had come up on the council.

Um this provision is intended to make the point that weaponizing the use of the ethics code is itself an ethics violation.

I don't think it would do great harm to the provision to simply delete the second sentence.

I think it's still you know, I think the principle is still the same, right?

Like council members certainly have the ability and freedom to assert policy positions um without fear of reprisal from one another.

And you could just delete the second sentence if they're that a council member.

Yeah, you could delete that sentence, and that third pair that third sentence just says, you know, notwithstanding the foregoing things about comporting yourself pursuant to state and federal law and in compliance with city ordinances and charter that you still should feel free to assert your policy positions and not think that sorry, policy position is any sort of violation of the law.

If that makes sense.

Um maybe that would be the way to clarify it, the second part.

I guess it may be a way to because I think it's for me, and this was in um this this was after a lot of uh quite frankly, damaging yes uh public behavior by many council members.