The Hall County Board of Commissioners will hear a report on ethics at its last board meeting in February.

The issue has been discussed for more than a year, and the commission voted Jan. 28 to adopt a new ethics policy by the Association County Commissioners of Georgia. A citizen ethics committee composed of Douglas Aiken, Scott Gibbs and Tommy Sandoval met last week to revise the document and tailor it to Hall County’s needs.

"I think they should have certain rules of conduct to abide by," Aiken said. "I don’t think that’s asking too much."

Jim Grubiak, general counsel for the ACCG, said for years, counties across the state had asked for help in framing an ethics code.

"What we have had over the years are samples from various counties," Grubiak said. "Given that we’ve continued to get requests for it we felt it would be better to have something that was a little more structured."

Grubiak said there has been a bigger focus on transparency in local government over the last decade.

"I suspect that’s led to the interest in recent times," he said.

The ACCG code allows counties to select either a permanent committee or a temporary panel to deal with any ethics violations.

The review committee will recommend the commission establish a permanent ethics panel. Aiken said he would like to see each commissioner select four people who would agree to serve on the committee in the event of an ethical complaint to provide a large pool of potential members.

The final committee would be selected by a "special master," an attorney not affiliated with the county.

The special master is a position required by the ACCG code that the commission will need to appoint within the next month.

The committee also discussed who could be a potential member of the ethics committee. They agreed that no elected officials, board members or employees of groups that have any special interest with or receive funding from the board of commissioners would be eligible.

Aiken said the ACCG document is "very well-written" and offers guidance on issues that have come up in county business before.

"It defines ‘interest’ and ‘family’ very well," Aiken said.