Proposed "Conflict of Interest" Law for Gloucester County Freeholders

The following is the body of a letter I wrote to the Courier Post, outlining a "Conflict of Interest" ordinance which I intend to propose to the Gloucester County Freeholders.....



The preponderance of campaign contributions from corporations, developers and other special interests undermines democracy itself by making our elected officials more indebted to the contributors than to the voters. Our current “safeguard” against contributors buying favors, a limit on contributions, is legally and routinely circumvented by the practice of routing large contributions through political committees.

As a candidate for Gloucester County Freeholder I will be pushing a strong “Pay-to-Play” law for the county, which does not currently outlaw pay-to-play. I will also be going a step further by proposing a “Conflict of Interest” law.

This law would require Freeholders to abstain from either debating or voting on any motion which would directly benefit one of their “major” contributors. A “major” contributor would be defined as someone who gave more than an allowable amount of money (perhaps $400 in the past 4 years) either to any campaign in which the Freeholder has run (for any office) or to any political committee which in turn channeled money to the Freeholder.

Since “following the money” can get complicated, a stiff penalty for knowingly violating the law would be needed to ensure compliance.

A number of cities out west have added campaign contributions to their traditional “conflict of interest” ordinances, typically citing the fact that developers were exercising too much influence over their city councils. Most of these laws have resulted in dramatic decreases in political contributions by developers, and thus in their influence.


Charles Woodrow
Green Party Candidate for Freeholder