Speakers defend campaign contributions and urge ethics-code review after complaint

During the June 26 public-comment period, speakers urged the council to treat an ethics complaint as a partisan attack and to consider revising the city’s ethics code.

Fergus Scully read a statement on behalf of Sergio Perez, who asked the council to dismiss a complaint about campaign contributions. The statement said the contribution in question was intended to retire campaign debt from the general election and runoff and cited “section 253.15 b of the Texas election code,” saying the acceptance of contributions to retire debt is permitted if properly documented. The statement concluded by urging the council to “focus on what matters most to the people of Irving.”

Susan Motley, speaking later in the public-comment period, said ethics should transcend political ideology and urged the council to craft an ethics policy that protects citizens and the integrity of government. Motley read the preamble to Irving’s ethics code and said the city’s citizens have been “shaken” by recent events; she said she would submit proposals by email to councilmembers working on the issue.

Neither the statement read on Perez’s behalf nor Motley’s remarks led to a formal council action during the meeting; members of the public and council discussed the subject in the work session earlier that day, and several councilmembers said they intend to review the code further.

Ending: Speakers asked the council to treat the complaint procedurally and to seek nonpartisan reforms to the ethics ordinance; the council did not take a formal vote on changes at the June 26 meeting.