Conflict of Interest by 3 Wilmington City Council Members

Or at least the appearance of a conflict of interest by 3 Councilmembers who work for or have recently worked for Connections CSP in Wilmington. Sunday’s NJ has a great article by Andrew Staub and Beth Miller detailing the concerns that quite a few people have had over what appeared to be conflicts of interests between the roles of City Council members and Connections employees or consultants for Hanifa Shabazz, Mike Brown and Darius Brown.

Shabazz is one of three current council members to work for Connections while holding office, and a review of council actions shows she joined Michael A. Brown Sr. and Darius Brown in consistently acting in ways favorable to Connections despite their conflicts of interest.

Each has voted to send public grant funding to Connections. Michael Brown suggested legislation that would shield the nonprofit from nuisance violations. All three drew the ire of another council member who suggested ethics complaints be filed against them.

And none of them have declared their employment relationship as a potential issue:

All of them filed notarized documents – called the “affidavit of absence of conflict of interest” – with the city this year indicating they had “no conflict of interest, or appearance of a conflict of interest” that could affect their service.

Under the city’s Code of Conduct, council members and other officials can file either the affidavits or a financial disclosure report, which lists sources of income exceeding $1,000 in a calendar year. The affidavits included no employment information, simply a declaration that no conflict existed.

Of course, the City’s Ethics Commission is mostly non-functional, so there is no one watching the henhouse here. The article details some of the issues — Councilman Brown sending what appeared to be intimidating letters to property owners who complained about Connections, Councilwoman Shabazz actively defending them on the City Council floor, both Shabazz and D. Brown voting for bills that would provide grants (very small ones, admittedly) to Connections. And I have some personal experience with this too — in a meeting with a number of WCC stakeholders discussing issues around Connections with the Mayor, Councilwoman Shabazz (who was not invited, BTW, specifically because of her CoI issues) did nothing but defend her employer. Mayor Williams pointedly asked her who she was representing that day — her WCC and downtown constituents or Connections. She said she was representing her constituents, but at no time did she ever speak for anyone but her employer. This wasn’t the only time this happened, either. Mike Brown sending letters to complainers is beyond the pale too — there are plenty of folks who could use stern letters from City Council Members (slum landlords, anyone?), but expecting Council letterhead to get people to back off is especially tone deaf. If you are squandering your credibility with unresolved CoI issues, why would anyone think you are serious?

As I hear it from a few of the City’s non-profits, being approached by City Council people who need employment is somewhat routine. It is a tough request for most of the City’s non-profits who have nowhere near the budget that Connections has. Which isn’t to say that these three haven’t done real work for Connections, because I have no way to know that. But cash-strapped non-profits seem to be viewed as easy employment, with Council people probably not bringing anywhere near the juice that they are selling.

Does it matter? I’m glad that this got some sunshine, because that is certainly not usual. What will happen from here? Who knows. I do hope that the Administration revives the Ethics Commission and lets them get to work. It would help the perception of City governance immeasurably if we took CoI and Ethics issues seriously.