My column over at Civil Beat this week tackled an uncomfortable issue, at least uncomfortable for me (“Ian Lind: Lawmakers Got Ethics Awards For Not Breaking The Law“).

I don’t like criticizing the State Ethics Commission, since I know how difficult their job is, but their decision to create a new Ethics Award and present it for the first time to the state House and Senate started me thinking. Why create an award that sets the bar so low that simply complying with the law by meeting a statuary deadline is enough to qualify?

I stewed about this for a while, then sat down this week and wrote the column.

I welcome your thoughts. I also apologize to the commission for this public criticism, but I hope they’ll agree that sparking public discussion on the issue will be a positive.