For the past several years, as scandals involving state officials multiplied, the Legislature considered — but never passed — various proposals to create a state Ethics Commission. But a new proposal for a panel to investigate charges of official misconduct, approved this week by a legislative committee, has a better chance of passing than ever before, said state Sen. Peter Wirth, D-Santa Fe.

There's one problem, Wirth acknowledged: Convincing fellow lawmakers to create a new agency, which Wirth said could cost $500,000 a year, at a time of severe budget shortfalls.

The Legislature's interim committee on Courts, Corrections & Justice on Tuesday unanimously endorsed a bill that would create an 11-member Ethics Commission appointed by the Legislature and the governor.

Wirth said in an interview that the commission would be set up similar to the state Judicial Standards Commission. The body would have the power to subpoena witnesses regarding ethics complaints against state officials or employees and determine whether complaints are valid.

If the commission deemed a complaint to be valid, the information would be turned over to the state attorney general — or if there's a violation of criminal law, a district attorney. Other complaints deemed valid would be forwarded to the Legislature if the complaint pertains to a lawmaker or other elected state official. Complaints regarding state employees would go to the appropriate state agency.

The bill proposes that commission members can't be elected officials, candidates for office, officers of political parties, state employees, government contractors or lobbyists.

Like the Judicial Standards Commission, all meetings pertaining to specific investigations would be held behind closed doors. The bill contains criminal penalties for those who leak documents.

In the past, Ethics Commission bills have had the hardest time in the Senate. Earlier this year, the House unanimously passed such a bill, but it stalled without ever being heard in the Senate Rules Committee. So why would this bill have a better chance than all the other Ethics Commission bills that have stalled in the Legislature?

Wirth — who is co-chairman of the interim committee with Rep. Al Park, D-Albuquerque — said the committee looked at the "sticking points" of previous bills and tried to address those concerns.

One of those areas is the scope of the commission, Wirth said. The committee decided the commission should have jurisdiction over the legislative and executive branches but not the judicial branch. The Judicial Standards Commission already handles accusations against judges. "The judiciary should be independent," Wirth said. "They should police their own employees."

Another large area of concern, Wirth said, has been the makeup of the commission and who gets to appoint the members. Under the new proposed bill, the House and the Senate each would get to appoint four members, while the governor would appoint three.

The members would be politically balanced. In each chamber of the Legislature, each of the two party caucuses would get to appoint two members. The governor's appointments would have to include one Democrat, one Republican and one person who is not registered with either party.

"The big fear is that if one party is in control that investigations could be perceived as partisan," Wirth said.

For the proposed commission to take any action, a quorum of eight of the 11 members would have to be present, Wirth said. "That's a protection so any action has to be a bipartisan action," he said.

The proposed commission's standard of proof to find that an ethical complaint is valid, Wirth said, would be "clear and convincing" evidence. That's the standard of proof for civil cases, he said, as opposed to criminal cases in which the standard of proof is evidence "beyond a reasonable doubt."

But even if legislators decide the latest Ethics Commission bill answers their concerns, they've still got to find clear and convincing evidence that the state can afford to fund the commission.

The proposed bill gives the commission the power to hire an executive director, who must be a lawyer. And that director would have the power to hire a general counsel.

But there's no appropriation in the bill. Wirth said the cost of the bill that passed the House earlier this year was estimated to be about $500,000 a year.

"Rep. Park and I will be taking this to the Legislative Finance Committee hopefully in December," Wirth said.

Contact Steve Terrell at 986-3037 or sterrell@sfnewmexican.com. Read his political blog at roundhouseroundup.com.