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 Okay. Hello, everyone. We are here for the special called meeting of the Board of Ethics.

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 And we have one item for consideration today, BOE 20-023, ethics complaint number 20-001

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 filed on October 15th, 2020 concerning alleged violations of ethics ordinance section 2-273.

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 And I'll go ahead and share my screen. So this is the agenda information sheet. So the

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 background is that the complaint was made by a citizen named Scott Campbell, and it

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 was concerning Deb Armitour, and he claimed that she was in violation of 2-273. And he

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 talked about a video that she had, well, the video of a city council meeting. And our Board

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 of Ethics met on October 22nd, or a panel of our Board of Ethics met, and they found

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 that the complaint was baseless. And on the 27th, they sent the letter that it was baseless.

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 And on the 29th, Mr. Campbell appealed that, which now brings us to why we're here today.

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 And Madison had previously talked to Alan, who's in the meeting, too. And the nature

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 of this hearing is limited to the question of whether the panel's determination on the

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 26th in dismissing the case was erroneous. And so the standard is whether the allegations

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 and evidence contained in the complaint, if true, would constitute a violation of the

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 Code of Ethics. And so the complaint's on the screen now. And like I said at the beginning,

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 he claimed that Deb Armitour actively campaigned for reelection during a meeting, and he claimed

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 it was unethical for several reasons, conflict of interest, using official post-it meeting

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 of Denton Council to campaign for reelection during an active campaign. And hopefully we've

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 all read that and are familiar with that. So my initial thoughts are he claims conflict

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 of interest, and it reminds me of some of our first complaints, where he might be thinking

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 conflict of interest, but not using the ordinance's definition of conflict of interest. I would

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 agree with the panel at the initial hearing that the complaint is baseless and doesn't

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 fall under 2-273A. And they also talked about whether it fell under 2-273G, which I also

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 agree with them that it did not. They discussed a lot about whether the video is included

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 in this complaint. And I think what we're supposed to do is follow the four corners

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 of this complaint and not look at evidence outside of that. But that would be something

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 that Mia Madison has talked about in January, maybe talking about and clarifying our rules

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 and the ordinance as far as whether we can look at that when there's a complaint. But

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 I think it doesn't even matter in this case, because I don't even think we get there. I

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 think it's baseless. So is there any discussion on this? Anybody have any thoughts? Let's

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 see. Is anybody? Oh, Alan? Hey, Madam Chair. If you don't mind, if no one's fighting for

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 the microphone since I haven't gotten to speak with you all, Ian helped early on in the faces

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 of this. But by way of orientation, I wanted to just remind the board that when the City

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 Council adopted this ordinance, one of the features they wanted to include was basically

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 pre-screening or pre-filtering complaints before they get to the full board. And so

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 the standard is very straightforward and simple, and our chairperson has spelled it out precisely.

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 And so we have these panels that have these predeterminations. If perhaps either party

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 thinks the panel got it wrong, there's a procedure to have a hearing just on that point, not

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 on the merits of the complaint, but on the point of whether or not it was rightfully

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 dismissed as being baseless, as that term is defined under Denton's code. And we talked

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 about this a lot when we do the training and that sort of thing. There may be conduct that

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 a member of the public finds offensive or inappropriate or outrageous or something.

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 And that may be legitimately how they feel. That doesn't mean there's always a remedy

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 under the City of Denton's code of ethics. So you have this process for pre-filtering

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 and then appeal before this board, and you get to decide not to the person do what they're

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 alleged to have done, but if you take everything in the complaint as true, you assume, does

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 it add up to anything? Does it add up to something actionable that warrants a full-blown hearing?

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 And that's where you are today. The only question is, did the three-person panel get it wrong?

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 Yes or no? And if you think they got it wrong, well, then you can, by majority vote, go forward

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 with the full-blown hearing. I will work with your city auditor, Madison, to schedule the

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 hearing and get you prepared for it. Or you can uphold what the panel did. That really

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 is the extent of what we're doing here this afternoon.

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 And I see Ronnie has joined us as well. And Ronnie, we had just gone over, we don't see

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 you, but if you can hear us, we just went over the complaint and what happened in the

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 initial hearing. And I had shared my opinion that I agree with the panel, and I think that

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 we should uphold what the panel found on the 26th. Does anybody have, is everybody in agreement

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 or does anybody disagree with that, Patricia? I don't disagree. I just had a question. Were

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 you saying that we should have watched the video or not watched the video? I did watch

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 the video, but is there a problem with watching the video of the meeting?

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 So well, I watched the video of the meeting and we are deciding whether the panel, well,

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 I watched both videos. There's the panel meeting video and there's the video from the city

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 council meeting. I'm not sure if the city council meeting should be included or not.

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 That slips unclear. And you probably heard them talk about that in the panel meeting

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 is he specifically mentioned it and puts on a timestamp. So what Ian was saying at that

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 panel meeting is that that's just going to be up to us to decide whether we would include

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 that or not. But I'm not sure because to me, it seems like it would just be the four corners

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 of this complaint and we wouldn't go out by that at all. But I think that's something

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 me and Madison have already talked about a few things to talk about in the January meeting,

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 but I think that's something we should clear up. So in the future, we don't have the panel

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 asking about it the night of the hearing or the afternoon of the hearing. Oh, I see. So

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 I don't even think we got to see the video, but you know, I'm not, but you know, it seems

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 like it would be harder to decide without seeing the video. But yeah, I get what you're

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 saying. And that's just what we're going to have to decide is if we can go outside of

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 the complaint at all. Or in this case, when he is specifically telling us what to do,

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 can we look at that before the panel meeting? And I don't know if you have a thought about

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 that, Alan. I do. I don't think that it was wrong or a problem that that someone viewed

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 the video link. No need for it to be stricken from the record or, you know, forget what

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 you saw or that sort of thing. But I do think the way the ordinance is worded, it's just

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 the written materials that are submitted. Or so I wanted to submit a flash drive or

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 something else with evidence on it. I think they could have done that. But I agree with

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 our chairperson that the purposes of this meeting today, it doesn't really matter. You

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 have an allegation that someone spoke at a city council meeting, that they talked, they

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 were basically campaigning at a council meeting, and that the complainant thinks that is wrong.

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 And so if you assume that it's true, this person did talk, they did say these sorts

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 of things at this meeting, and they're covered by this ordinance. Does that mean that if

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 it's all true, there's a violation, we need to go in to have some evidence and decide

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 whether there's an infraction or so. What's the consequence of that? So the video to me,

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 the link is really extraneous. It's extra. Just assume the complaint is true. Does it

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 add up to something? Your panel said no. Does the rest of the group think that perhaps the

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 panel missed something, didn't understand what they were doing, or made a mistake?

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 I've got a question to follow up on that. If there's no other new information beyond

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 what was written in the complaint and the information from the panel, there's nothing

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 additional that we can make a decision different from, is there?

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 I would agree with you that there's no new information, there's no basis other than,

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 and this happens, it happens in ethics world, it happens in municipal government. One group

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 looks at the same data, comes to one conclusion, a different group looks at the same data later,

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 and concludes that the first group got it wrong. They made a mistake, they didn't understand,

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 they missed something. That does in fact happen. But the way Denton's code of ethics is written,

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 it really does put the burden on the complainant to get the complaint correct, to provide the

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 evidence up front, and to actually identify something that's covered by the code. Otherwise,

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 what you end up becoming is sort of an all purpose complaint desk for people that don't

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 like what someone did. And they may have a grievance. It doesn't mean that there is a

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 remedy for that before the Board of Ethics. Okay, thank you.

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 Yeah, and my opinion is that, you know, he might have a grievance with what happened,

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 whether he believes it happened or not, whether it actually happened or not, but I don't think

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 it falls under our ethics code. Does anybody think differently about that, or should we

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 just, you know, have a motion and take a vote? I'm ready for a motion and a vote.

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 All right, well, I guess, could I get, and I guess somebody can correct me if I'm saying

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 this wrong, but if we could get a motion to, I guess, affirm the finding of the three person

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 panel, I don't think I can make the motion as chair, but if somebody else will make that

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 motion and second it, I still move. And do we have a second? Second by Bob. Well, the

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 motion by Ron and the second by Bob and all in favor. I forget, Madison, do we, do I need

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 to go through everybody? Is that how we want to do this on Zoom? Yeah, I think it's best

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 for you to roll call. All right. And I'll just go on the screen from left to right.

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 Bob, what's your vote? Affirm. Rob? Yes. Patricia? Oh, I think you're muted, if you don't mind

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 unmuted. I think he said yes. Yes. Thank you. And Ron? Is Ron, Ron? Oh, Ron Johnson. Sorry.

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 Right there, think. He's got an icon. Okay, I see it. And Ronnie, if you're on with us.

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 I'm not sure if Ronnie's is working, but with or without Ronnie's vote, we don't hear him

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 or see him. We'll go ahead and just not count them either way, but the majority does vote

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 in favor of that motion. So we, yeah, so we have found that the panel, we don't disagree

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 with the panel and that the complaint is baseless. And I think that's, that's all we need to

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 do. Right, Madison or Alan, if anybody has any thoughts, I can just adjourn if we're

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 done. I think you've completed the agenda for today. You can adjourn and then prepare

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 the written letter at the conclusion. All right, thank you. Okay, so we will adjourn

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 and I will get a letter to Madison and we'll go from there. Thank you everybody for taking

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 some time out today for this. Thank you. Bye. Thank you everyone. Thank you. Bye bye.