By Nicholas Brown
Staff Writer

In March, voters will decide whether to adopt an ethics code for all town employees. If the code is adopted, an ethics committee – composed initially of appointed members, with elected members filling spots in later years – will oversee hearings related to alleged code violations.

A five-member volunteer committee has been drafting the code – which is largely based on Dunbarton's – for more than six months, and selectmen approved it for the ballot at a December meeting.

"This has to be accepted by voters," said Selectman Heleen Kurk. "It's not just something that the board can say, 'Let's do it.'"

Shortly before the 2003 election, selectmen – none of whom are on the current board – adopted an ethics code.

Kurk described that code as "the paperwork from Dunbarton, with the name Dunbarton taken out," and replaced with the name Weare.

With with no established protocol in place for code violations, that code has been sitting idle.

"It was just kind of a piece of paper," said Weare resident Bill Alleman, who helped draft the new code.

Current ethics committee members have been researching ethics codes from other towns and have taken advice from a California nonprofit organization, the Institute for Local Government.

Members also met with Dunbarton Ethics Committee Chairman Nick Holmes, who helped draft Dunbarton's ethics code, adopted in 2001.

Since its inception, the Dunbarton code has served as a model for codes drafted or being drafted in several New Hampshire towns including Weare, Merrimack, Raymond and Pittsfield.

"I think it's served the town of Dunbarton quite well," said Holmes.

Holmes said Dunbarton's Ethics Committee typically sees four to five code violation allegations per year, though only two have resulted in a full hearing in nearly five years. Only one town employee has been found in violation of the code.

According to Weare's proposed code, "The ethics committee shall not have the power to impose any monetary or other penalty."

Rather, if a town employee is found in violation of the code, penalties would be determined by whichever town board or department head has jurisdiction.

The committee would have authority, however, to investigate allegations and determine their credibility in relation to the code. Kurk suggested the idea of an enforceable ethics code was resurrected by selectmen as an appeal to Weare residents.

"The idea was, if the voters wanted to do it, then they could have a system in place," she said.

Kurk said she hoped some potential ethics controversies could be resolved prior to the formal complaint stage.

"Good human manners might just be to say, 'Hey, we have a problem here,'" she said. Kurk also noted that state statutes are still firmly in place, guiding the behavior of municipal employees throughout New Hampshire.

"Of course state law trumps anything we do," she said. Alleman said personal opinions about the relevancy or need for an enforceable ethics code occasionally differed between committee members during the draft process.

But, he said, "As a committee, we don't have an opinion on whether the town needs this code. We were not charged with making a recommendation on way or another."