Morgan and Grebner spar over updated county ethics policy

A dispute over a rewrite of the Ingham County ethics policy has spilled over into bad blood between at least two county commissioners, who each accuse the other of wanting to cut corners on ethics.

Commissioner Thomas Morgan has been pushing for a rewrite of the ethics policy — first drafted by Commissioner Mark Grebner in the 1990s — in order to reduce a lot of flowery, difficult language and include an email policy.

“You have to have a post-doctorate education to read a lot of the language in there. It’s so dense and incomprehensible,” Morgan said. He argued the policy was weak because it was hard to read.

Grebner has largely fought him the whole way, accusing Morgan and Commissioner Ryan Sebolt of trying to gut the ethics policy — something Morgan and Sebolt deny.

“He’s a well-known pain in the ass, and I love him for it,” Morgan said of Grebner.

The current county ethics policy dates to the 1990s, which Grebner said is the toughest policy in the state, going much further than the state requires. The Board of Commissioners was set to approve a new, clearer version that included an email policy from Morgan on Tuesday night. Morgan and Grebner both expected it to pass easily and likely unanimously.

The existing policy has barred commissioners from soliciting campaign donations from their staff or hiring them to work on their campaigns. There are strict rules against hiring family members and close relatives. It also bars them from receiving campaign donations from companies, unions and individuals who have business with the county — an unheard-of prohibition in America’s pay-to-play political culture.

Grebner said his older policy had fostered a climate in Ingham County that was self-policing because the conflicts of interest are clear. “The emphasis is on reciprocity and repeated violations. You look for substance. You don’t look for technical violations of the rules.”

An early draft from Morgan and Sebolt would have whittled at these prohibitions but it was quickly withdrawn and Grebner’s basic policy remained in plainer language, while an email policy was added.

“Our existing policy is all about breaking down and preventing the establishment of reciprocal back-scratching," Grebner said, adding that Morgan’s initial proposal “was more or less a road map for using elected office to create profitable deals.”

“But it’s gone, and didn’t last 30 seconds at the subcommittee. So it’s more of a study in alternative universes than a genuine threat. When I saw it, I was afraid they were lining up the votes needed to push it through. But it died so fast there was never even a rough nose count; nobody but Sebolt and Thomas are recorded as supporting it.”

Sebolt said Grebner is misleading the intention of that rough draft, which was never meant to be the final version. “It was just meant to be a starting point.”

Morgan also said that draft was just incomplete. “I’m not sure I’ve ever heard Grebner bring it up. Considering he’s opposed updating the ethics policy long before June, I’m sure this is a red herring,” Morgan said. “He wants to look like he’s for stronger ethics while fighting an attempt for stronger ethics.”

At minimum, Morgan said the policy needed to be updated to reflect a reality of 21st century communication — the use of email, something Grebner has dismissed as trivial.

“If people are conducting business on the taxpayer dime, it needs to be as open as possible. You can’t do a FOIA request on a gmail account,” Morgan said.

Morgan’s predecessor, Dennis Louney, had used his public account to solicit campaign donations. He resigned after that was publicized. It was later uncovered that Louney had also violated ethics policies against soliciting campaign endorsements from entities that have business with the county, including local labor unions, Sparrow Health System and Lansing Community College.

Morgan says Ingham County has trailed other governments in restricting the commissioners’ public business to their public email accounts — Grebner conspicuously uses a gmail account — while restricting their private business and campaigns to a private account.

“There’s this unforgiving ‘gotcha’ atmosphere. We’ll have a policy we can’t follow because it’s impossible to understand,” said Grebner, who argued it’s seldom easy to define what is and what is not county business. “They say every single thing a person says is either county business or not county business.”

Morgan said some situations can indeed be clear — such as when commissioners are communicating with county staff. “The argument that if we’re too transparent, we’ll never get anything done is complete and utter bullshit,” said Morgan.

Grebner argued what he says in an email is his First Amendment right, and he was afraid any little thing could be counted as unethical by vindictive political opponents. “They’ve created a system where they’ll yell, ‘Gotcha!’ all the time because the rules are impossible to follow. They are distracting people from real ethical problems.”