“Reverse Engineering” occurs when the end result of a product (or objective) is defined  first then designed “backward” into its several individual components.  The concept is simple.  Decide what you want as a final product AND THEN, step-by-step, work to that end IN THE REVERSE.

Two Legislative Interim committees have been creating (and endorsing) several pieces of significant legislation specifically addressing an Independent Ethics Commission, Campaign Finance Revisions, Elections Law , and Lobbying Practices.  Most of these proposals have unanimous, bi-partisan support.  The Legislative Ethics Interim Committee and the Government Operations & Political Subdivisions Interim Committee recently approved a number of key pieces of draft legislation to address many of the meritorious components of the highly publicized ethics initiative.  These committees’ recommendations, combined with a recent battery of bills requested by Legislators  who were members of the Governor’s Commission on Strengthening Utah’s Democracy, represent the benchmark of legislative proposals to publicly address deficiencies in the current processes.

What Bob Bernick columnized this morning and what my Commission colleague La Varr Webb has suggested in the recent past, has already been taking place…just in a “reverse engineered” approach.   The public document filed with the Lieutenant Governor’s Office of the Citizens’ Ethics Initiative has been available to the public for sometime, now.  I’ve read it.  It’s tedious and Frankly…goes way too far.  Our current system is antiquated and needs some tuning-up.  Nobody questions that.  And, although I am intrigued by Mr. Bernick and Mr. Webb’s proposal to place the Citizens’ Initiative into a bill and strike (or amend out) the parts “we don’t like,” would take more staffing resources than we currently have and bottleneck other deserving pieces of legislation during the general session.  There are so many “different” and unrelated issues haphazardly rolled into the content of the ethics initiative “as a bill” that certainly someone would legally challenge the very “Omnibus” nature of a “one-stop-shop” bill  following the 2010 Legislative process, and we’d be right back to Square One.  Constitutionally, the Legislature is required to address similar topics within a single bill.

The legislative process is designed to bring the People’s representatives to the table.  With numerous legitimate proposals on their way to the Legislature in January of 2010, we have a benchmark.  We have bi-partisan support for most of the current proposals for changes to our antiquated system.  If after the Legislative Session the People aren’t satisfied by the changes and direction of the Legislature, then there’s always next November.