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Firewalls <br />Often, officials offer to set up a firewall between themselves and their professional partners <br />or other business associates, so that they cannot, in theory, have any personal involvement <br />with or benefit from a matter theY are dealinb with as an officiaL However, since there is no <br />way for the public to lrnow whether the firewall is truly there, a firewall cannot ensure that <br />there will be no misuse of office. In any event, the official's decision may still benefit her <br />business partners or client. A firewall is not an effective way to handle a conflict situation. <br />4. An Offiicial's Sacrifices and Senefits <br />Local government officials need to make certain sacri$ces to show their community that <br />they are actinb for the community rather than for themsel��es and for those with whom they <br />have special relationships. There are jobs and clients they cannot take, contracts and grants <br />they cannot get, properties and businesses they cannot invest in, gifts they cannot accept. <br />And thev have to disclose to the world the jobs, properties, and businesses they do have. To <br />officials, this seems unfair. <br />After all, many officials have already sacrificed potentially higher pay in the private <br />sector, or they are serving as volunteers or low-paid local lebislators, giving up their <br />precious time for the coinmunity. Why should they have to sacrifice more? <br />The reason is that with power and authority come responsibility and oblibations. And <br />every obligation entails sacrifice. For example, parenthood and childhood (as an adult) both <br />require sacrifices. Government service is no different. <br />What is important for officials to recobnize is that bovernment ethics is not only <br />beneficial to a community's residents. It is also beneficial to them. It helps officials do their <br />jobs more professionally, and it helps them keep out of scandals involving themselves and <br />their colleagues. It is hard to manage a community under a cloud of scandal. <br />While protecting the community from officials' inishandling of conflict situations, a <br />government ethics program also protects officials by providing rules and advice, which allow <br />them to deal with their oblibations to others in situations that inay be very uncomfortable for <br />them. Take, for example, an official who has little respect for a nephew who wants a no-bid <br />contract, or who disagrees with her own employer's position on riverside development, or <br />who wishes her law firm had never agreed to represent that bastard who is seeking a permit <br />from his board. A bovernment ethics probram protects such officials by requirinb them not <br />to <br />