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What We Do
The Baltimore City Board of Ethics is a group of five people. We make sure that everyone working for the City follows the rules of the Ethics Law. This law stops people who work for the City from doing things that aren't fair or right. It also makes sure that people who try to influence City decisions follow the rules.
The Board and its team are here to check complaints about ethics, teach people about the Ethics Law, and answer questions about ethics from both City workers and regular residents. In 2020, the City Council decided that Baltimore's Inspector General (IG) would also be in charge of the Ethics Board. The IG gave the Board full-time staff, helping us serve our City around the clock.
The next Ethics Board meeting is scheduled for Wednesday, September 11, 2024.
It’s an Election Year: How about those “suspicious” campaign contributions?
One thing crops up periodically in Citizen complaints to the Ethics Board: Campaign donations. More specifically, campaign donations made by certain citizens to candidates or incumbent elected officials that seem to suggest shady business dealings or influence peddling.
A clear case for the Ethics Board, you’d think?
Not so fast….[Click here to read more]
Ethics Board issues guidance to the Fair Election Fund Commission: Can individual FEF Commissioners donate money or volunteer time to campaigns that receive FEF funding?
The Board determined that the Ethics Law does not override a Commissioner’s First-Amendment rights to make “political contributions” of time and money to campaigns/candidates who receive public funds through the Fair Election Fund. However, accepting paid employment by such a campaign would create a prohibited economic “interest” within the scope of the Law.
[Click here to read the full opinion]
Court Confirms Ethics Board’s Position regarding the “Donor List”
“The Baltimore Brew and The Baltimore Sun are wrong when they argue that ‘Sections 4-304 to -342 set forth a number of exemptions upon which a custodian may rely to deny inspection of public records.’ Respondent’s Mem. at 6 (emphasis added). All of these sections, including § 4-336, are mandatory and require a custodian to deny inspection of either a record or information that is included within the provision. The custodian has no discretion to disclose information covered by a mandatory denial if the custodian believes there is special public interest in the information or that a person in interest would not be affected adversely by Disclosure.”
– The Hon. Lawrence P. Fletcher-Hill, associate judge for the Baltimore City Circuit Court.
On March 15, 2023, in Petition of the Mayor and City Council of Baltimore, for Judicial Review of the Decision of the Maryland Public Information Act Compliance Board in the Matter of Fern Shen, Complainant v. Baltimore City Board of Ethics, Custodian (Case No. PIACB 23-31), the Baltimore City Circuit Court, (the Hon. Judge Fletcher-Hill presiding) confirmed the Board’s position that, under the MPIA, this list of “specific contributions made by private individuals to a private trust through a private web site is information concerning the contributors’ ‘financial . . . activities’ and therefore is ‘information about the finances of an individual’ that the City Board of Ethics was required to withhold from public disclosure.”
In plain language: The Court agreed that State Law clearly prohibits the publication of the information sought by the local media outlets. The Board, as the custodian of that information, has no discretion to decide otherwise.
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Baltimore, MD 21202