On just about every important issue this year Nelson has been on the wrong side. Now he wants to end 2020 with his largely symbolic measure that will be considered tonight by the Franklin Common Council that would create a city Ethics Committee. A similar committee was disbanded by Franklin in 2005.

Nelson is pursuing this added layer of government even though despite the absence of a local ethics code, dozens of current public officials in Franklin remain subject to the Codes of ethics for local government officials set forth under $19.59 of the Wisconsin Statutes, and there’s page after page after page in the statutes about the “General Duties of Public Officials.”

This issue surfaced during the recent Strauss development debate. Connect the dots. Strauss opponents like the idea of a new ethics committee. Nelson is anti-Strauss. He’s caved, again.

So Nelson and others believe the formation of a committee of unelected bureaucrats with little authority will suddenly transform Franklin public officials into exemplary pristine above reproach statesmen/women. Our city will become a model of efficiency, the jewel of the Midwest.  It’s nonsense.

Franklin doesn’t need an ethics committee. What Franklin needs is public servants who will utilize the brainpower the good Lord gifted them with to exercise common sense and move Franklin forward with a pro-growth agenda.

Will Nelson’s measure be approved? My guess is yes. Franklin’s Common Council can be weak more often than not. Their rational could likely be, “Do I want to be on the record opposed to ethics?”