Lawyer gets ethics seat

• By MARSHA SHULER
• Advocate Capitol News Bureau
• Published: Oct 7, 2008 - Page: 5B - UPDATED: 12:05 a.m.

• Print
• Email
• Save
• Share

• Del.icio.us
• Digg
• Facebook
• Reddit
• 

The state House of Representatives on Monday chose a Lafayette lawyer over a Lake Charles priest to fill the last vacancy on the Louisiana Board of Ethics.

Blake Monrose, a worker’s compensation defense lawyer, will round out the 11-member panel. The Ethics Board has not met since mass resignations in June  left no one policing the state’s ethics laws.

The House held a special meeting Monday to conduct the election.  Monrose won a run-off election over the Rev. Henry Mancuso.
“If you ever appear before the Ethics Board, don’t start out ‘Forgive me Father for I have sinned’,” state Rep. John Bel Edwards, D-Amite, quipped after the vote.

Monrose’s appointment Monday allows him to participate in Thursday’s Ethics Board meeting. Ten newly selected board members are expected to be sworn in at the meetings.

The 10 include seven appointees of Gov. Bobby Jindal, one from the Senate and two from the House.

Dr. Cedric Lowrey of Alexandria, a Senate appointee, was the only board member who did not resign.

On Thursday, the board members also will get a required primer in the conflict of interest, nepotism, campaign finance and other laws they are charged with policing. The board cannot conduct business until members have completed the educational requirement.

Acting ethics administrator Kathleen Allen said she anticipates the board will meet sometime toward the end of October to begin tackling a backlog of cases.

There are about 270 items ready for Ethics Board attention, Allen said. Included are about 145 agenda items that will be handled behind closed doors because they involve on-going investigations or complaints that have been filed, she said.

The workload has piled up in the three months since Ethics Board members quit in the wake of a law, pushed by Jindal, which took away some of the board’s powers and changed the burden of proof for finding ethics law violations.

Monrose’s election came during a 30-minute session of the House. The election was conducted by voice vote with each legislator shouting out his or her choice.

The 51-year-old Monrose said he was “humbled” by the House support.

“I do understand the law and the new heightened burden of proof,” Monrose said. “All of us will have to take a look at it.”