Training spells out ethics for Illinois workers

SPRINGFIELD, Ill. -- In a state that helped write the book on political corruption, every employee is getting a crash course in ethics.

Illinois has launched a training program in which state workers are given a computerized test that highlights a variety of ethical dilemmas, such as accepting payoffs from contractors and making fund-raising calls during lunch breaks.

The program is part of an effort to combat a long history of political corruption in Illinois -- a state where mysterious shoeboxes filled with cash have been known to surface after a politician's death.

It also comes amid a scandal that has produced dozens of federal corruption convictions and led to the indictment of former Gov. George Ryan, who is accused of taking cash, gifts, vacations and other favors to steer state business to friends and associates.

The test poses workers with several predicaments. For example: You're a state worker whose boss wants to approve a professional license for a housing company. The company doesn't meet state regulations but is promising your boss a good deal on a new roof for his house.

What should you do?

Another possible question: A co-worker skips lunch with colleagues to go home and make fund-raising calls for his boss, who is running for re-election.

Is that acceptable?

The political phone calls from home are OK, but employees are warned to avoid such gray areas just in case.

"Sometimes, just because something is legal doesn't mean it's the right thing to do -- always think of how it will appear to others," the training tutorial says.

The tutorial tells employees that the boss getting a new roof should be reported to the governor's inspector general by calling the state's new ethics hot line.

Gov. Rod Blagojevich's staff says the training is meant to use mistakes of the past to avoid them in the future.

"We're not trying to indict the former House Minority Leader in this scenario," spokeswoman Rebecca Rausch said. "But it is a scenario that the state of Illinois is familiar with and we want them to know why this isn't OK, why this shouldn't be going on in state government."

Gail Kruger, an administrative assistant at the Human Rights Commission, spent about an hour taking the training this week. She praised it for clarifying "things every state employee should be aware of but maybe aren't."

The training also uses Ryan's troubles to make the point that state employees can say no when their bosses urge them to do political work. It points out that criminal prosecution could be the result of doing political work on state time.

Ryan has pleaded innocent in the case, which initially focused on the selling of driver's licenses for bribes at the secretary of state's office. Ryan was secretary of state before becoming governor.

The training was developed by a California-based company at a cost of $240,000. Employees must answer eight of 10 questions correctly on a post-training test or they have to take the training and test again until they pass. Blagojevich is one of 9,900 employees who have already passed the test, Rausch said, and the rest have until May to do so, although there is no specific punishment for not taking it.

"This is an educational process, not a punitive process," Rausch said. "We can't foresee a valid reason to not comply with this."