Okay, this sounds good at first blush. The House Ethics Task Force is recommending the creation of an "independent ethics office" according to The Hill. As always, the devil is in the details and some of the details basically undermine the whole concept:

Outside individuals and groups will not be allowed to file complaints against members either to the office or the ethics committee, and the panel lacks subpoena power — two provisions ethics watchdog groups have pushed for, according to an outline of the ethics proposal and knowledgeable sources.

Just because they say they're doing an independent ethics office doesn't mean it's a real independent ethics office. Without subpoena power and without the ability for outside groups to file ethics complaints, the new office lacks the teeth to police congress.

The House of Representatives is studying how to move forward on serious ethics reform.  CREW maintains that successful reform must include an independent office of public inquiry.  That model exists in almost half the states according to an analysis by US PIRG.  We believe outside oversight is needed because elected officials can't or won't police themselves:

Known as "Operation Boptrot," an FBI probe into bribes and horse-racing legislation in Kentucky rocked state politics in the early 1990s, leading to the conviction of 15 state legislators.

Another victim of the federal sting turned out to be the in-house panel in charge of legislative ethics at the time.

"There was a feeling that the relationship between lobbyists and legislators had gotten pretty unprofessional and too cozy," said Anthony Wilhoit, executive director of the independent Kentucky Legislative Ethics Commission, created in 1993 following several of the indictments.

Unlike New Jersey, where lawmakers account for half the legislative ethics panel and dominated its membership until 2006, nearly half of the states have created independent panels to oversee legislative ethics that don't include legislators. Proponents say those bodies eliminate conflicts inherent when lawmakers police each other and boost public trust in how complaints are handled.

Kentucky's commission was among 23 state panels held up by the U.S. Public Interest Research Group in a public report issued by the organization this year as examples for Congress. The effectiveness of in-house ethics panels in the House and Senate has come under fire following the Jack Abramoff scandal and the handling of lewd communications sent by former U.S. Rep. Mark Foley to congressional pages.

US PIRG, a nonprofit, good-government group based in Washington, selected commissions in those states -- not including New Jersey -- because they don't include current legislators, and service is limited to those who aren't covered by ethics rules. Members oversee a director and investigators, and the commission can launch investigations without outside approval and enforce sanctions.

According to the DC Examiner, a House Task Force studying ethics reform is actually considering an outside overseer of ethics. The devil is, of course, in the details.

A group of House lawmakers headed by Rep. Michael E. Capuano, D-Mass., is now weighing the idea of an independent ethics commission that would follow the tradition of accepting complaints only from members of the House. The commission could initiate investigations based on complaints made by watchdog groups but would not be compelled to do so.

“Rep. Capuano continues to work on a set of recommendations relative to the establishment of an independent ethics enforcement entity,” said his spokeswoman, Alison Mills.

According to sources familiar with the preliminary discussions, the commission would not have subpoena power but could request it from the House ethics committee, a bipartisan panel comprising 10 lawmakers who now monitor the conduct of House members and mete out punishment to offenders. The commission would have to finish an investigation within a set period of time, rather than leaving it open indefinitely, as the House ethics committee is allowed to do.

The new plan will likely attract more support in the House, but not from the outside groups that have long demanded the ability to file formal ethics complaints.

“Any independent ethics committee has to allow for outside ethics groups to file in order for it to be worthwhile,” said Naomi Seligman-Steiner, spokeswoman for Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington, one of several watchdog groups clamoring for an independent commission. “They might be between a rock and a hard place, but they did promise the American public in the last election they would fix this.”

Indeed they did. We're waiting.

David Lightman at the Hartford Courant takes a look at the new ethics bill, which President Bush has yet to sign.  He notes the concerns with enforcement expressed by Melanie Sloan as "a huge problem."  Lightman takes a deeper look to figure out why Congress needs outside enforcement: 

The problem?

It's up to the House and Senate ethics committees to look into potential violations, but three Connecticut congressmen want an independent mechanism to initiate and investigate possible violations.

Self-policing is a bad idea, Rep. Chris Murphy, D-5th District, warned. "It isn't natural to turn against your colleagues, your co-workers and your confidants to file complaints against each other under our current ethics process," he said.

Rep. Christopher Shays, R-4th District, was more succinct. "You can't investigate yourself."

Currently, ethics committee investigations are highly secret, and enforcement action is rare.

Sen. Joseph Lieberman met strong resistance recently when he tried to set up an independent office to go after possible violations. A House task force is studying ways to beef up enforcement and is expected to have recommendations later this year.

But when Lieberman, an independent, and Sen. Susan M. Collins, R-Maine, proposed an Office of Public Integrity in 2006, it was defeated soundly. That was despite their stature as the top Democrat and top Republican on the committee that writes ethics legislation and the timing of their proposal, which was soon after the high-profile lobbyist Jack Abramoff pleaded guilty to fraud, tax evasion and bribery charges.

Congress doesn't police itself.  But, most members of Congress don't want anyone else to police them either. 

The San Antonio News-Express takes a look at the very low approval ratings for Congress -- and thinks the failure to deliver on ethics reform is a key factor. We agree. Congress needs to get real about reform. That means an office of public integrity:

The new Congress has taken some positive steps on ethics with regard to transparency and disclosure. But on the fundamental promise to change ethics on Capitol Hill, it has failed.

A bipartisan task force created to advance the reform process has hit a dead end. The primary obstacle is the refusal of congressional members to cede any ethics oversight authority to an independent body — the cornerstone of meaningful ethics reform.

Lawmakers have amply demonstrated their inability to police themselves on ethics. Doubts about political conduct drive public cynicism — and poll numbers.

As low as those numbers are, they can go lower still unless Congress reasserts its integrity by allowing an external office to monitor and enforce ethics rules.

Having the ability for groups, like CREW, to file ethics complaints against members of Congress is a key goal for us in ethics reform.  In the U.S. House of Representatives, only members can file ethics complaints against other members.  You can see where that's gotten us -- not very far.  So, if this announcement from Speaker Pelosi pans out, it will be a marked improvement:

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) is planning an announcement soon on an independent ethics commission that will help police members’ conduct.

“How complaints can be brought to [the ethics committee] by having some outside group be part of that process is what we’re working on now,” Pelosi said Friday. “And we’ll have an announcement about that soon.”

We anxiously awaiting that announcement. 

Noting the whining among members of Congress in the new lobby reform bill, today's New York Times editorial shares the view of CREW.  It's a good start, but it's not enough.  Congress still needs an independent office of public integrity: 

In the lead-up to the vote, some lawmakers whined as if lobbyists would be barred from seeking privileged access with bundled donations. Not hardly, but at least they must now let the public in on who is giving how much to whom. A companion bill requires lobbyists to file more details of their business expenditures and puts restrictions on members’ spouses who lobby the Hill. And it bars lawmakers from pressuring lobby firms to hire favored partisans, a signature trait of the last G.O.P. majority.

Voters should still keep in mind the House Democrats’ refusal to slow the revolving door by requiring former lawmakers to wait two years — rather than the current one — before they can cut out the middleman and become lobbyists themselves. That self-interested failure is one more reminder of why the House still needs to create an independent agency to help enforce the promised ethics reforms.

Let's face it.  The House Ethics Committee, and the House in general, does not have a great track record for policing Members of Congress.  That's why they need an Office of Public Integrity -- and that's what they are being encouraged, strongly encouraged, to consider that approach: 

Government watchdog groups, meeting privately in recent weeks with a House task force studying ethics reform proposals, are urging the appointment of an outside panel to screen complaints against lawmakers before they are considered by the ethics committee.

Rep. Michael E. Capuano (D-Mass.) chairs the bipartisan task force scheduled to report back to House leaders by May 1 with recommendations. It's unlikely to meet the deadline because of the two-week Easter recess.

Capuano confirmed the watchdog meetings but declined to elaborate.

The issue of an outside panel first reviewing ethics complaints is a controversial proposal that has been rejected in the past. Many lawmakers feel that such a system would be an abdication by the House of its constitutional authority to police legislators and staff on noncriminal matters.

But the watchdog groups believe such a system would restore credibility to the House Committee on Standards of Official Conduct, which has come under heavy criticism in recent years for failing to act decisively, particularly in the Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal and in the case of former representative Mark Foley (R-Fla.), who was accused of improper conduct with congressional pages.

CREW agrees with the New York Times :

As the Houses special task force considers whether Congress needs an outside monitoring panel to help enforce stronger integrity standards, we suggest that it start with an in-depth briefing on the Abramoff-Ney downfall complete with cash-flow charts and poll data on how the scandal has tainted the publics view of lawmakers.

It shouldnt take more than that to persuade the task force of what is needed.

The House ethics committee sat mute and petrified for a year while the news media and prosecutors peeled back the Abramoff scandal. An independent integrity office to investigate allegations of ethics violations is exactly the restorative needed by the ethics committee. Unfortunately, no one knows what is on the task forces agenda because the bipartisan group has decided to start its work with private meetings. Public hearings may or may not come later as the lawmakers face a May 1 deadline for making recommendations. There may be some virtue in eliciting candor in private, but sooner or later the House very much needs to hear from a galvanized public that sent a clear demand for ethical reform when it voted the Republicans out of power last year.

The Democratic Senate has already run away from a proposed integrity office. The House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, deserves credit for ordering consideration of the sensitive subject of an outside watchdog. But the study group must not be shrouded in secrecy nor its work be allowed to drag on beyond May 1. For all the tenderness of the task, lawmakers should focus on where and how Mr. Ney went wrong and try to ensure that it does not happen again.

As noted below, the Democratic Chair of the House Ethics Reform task force, Rep. Michael Capuano (D-MA), already told his hometown paper that it's unlikely there will be an independent ethics oversight board.  Now, he tells The Hill that the task force will be meeting in private:

Rep. Michael Capuano (D-Mass.), who heads a task force examining whether an outside panel should investigate ethics allegations against members, said the group will begin by holding private weekly meetings rather than public hearings.

“I have found that if you really want to solve problems, it’s better to have discussions than have the typical hearings where you ask witnesses three ‘gotcha’ questions and it’s a public exercise rather than a open discussion aimed at finding solutions,” he said, noting that the task force may hold public hearings at a later date.

The ethics process on Capitol Hill has been private for too long.  That's one of the problems.   If you're wondering if anyone thinks the current ethics process is working the answer is "yes."  According to The Hill, that would be Rep. Todd Tiarht (R-KS):

Citing the corruption cases against former Reps. Randy “Duke” Cunningham (R-Calif.) and James Traficant (D-Ohio), both of whom are serving prison sentences, Tiahrt said members involved in wrongdoing are being caught.

“The system is working,” Tiahrt declared.

Okay.