Council members would have to report private talks with developers under an ethics rule due for a December vote

Denton City Council members, planning commissioners and people running for council would have to report private conversations with real estate developers under a disclosure requirement the city expects to bring to a vote in December.

Mayor Pro Tem Nick Stevens, who made the disclosure rule part of his campaign, told Spectrum News this week that the goal is public trust. "Disclose it. Say what you're talking about, who you were talking with, why you were talking with them. Just put it out there in the public," he said in the interview, published Wednesday.

How it would work

City staff have outlined the basics after a council work session last month, according to the Denton Record-Chronicle:

• An official who talks privately with a developer would have 10 business days to file a report with the city auditor.
• The city would maintain a log of those disclosures open to the public, and disclosures tied to a pending matter would be included with the council agenda.
• Failing to disclose could be treated as a violation of the city's ethics ordinance. An official who misses the deadline would get another 10 business days after being notified to file the paperwork.

At the work session, council members agreed that a "private" conversation should cover exchanges with a developer that are not generally open to the public, whether spoken or written. They also directed staff to place the requirement in the ethics ordinance rather than in a separate policy.

Questions the city had to answer

City Auditor Madison Rorschach told the council that Denton's existing code did not settle basic questions such as what counts as a developer or a pending matter. She said she looked at the codes in Fort Worth, Dallas and Austin and found no comparable requirement.

A July 31 audit report found that none of the three ethics rules now covering council members requires them to report a private meeting with a developer whose project is pending before the council.

Mayor Chris Watts raised the idea of a cure period, giving an official time to correct a missed disclosure should someone file an ethics complaint, so the rule is not turned into a weapon, the Record-Chronicle reported. Council members also chose not to send the proposal to the Board of Ethics first; Stevens said the council would make the final decision either way.

Stevens told Spectrum News he believes no other city has a rule like it, and that most of the members who helped shape it support it. The city's chief communications officer, Kayla Herrod, has said staff expect to return with the ethics amendment for a possible council vote in December.

Sources

spectrumlocalnews.com

Denton Record-Chronicle