Ethics. It’s been a founding principle of our profession since the creation of the ICMA over 100 years ago. And it has never been more important than in these times of “fake news,” hyper-partisanship and widespread distrust in government at all levels. Ethical choices confront us every day and our staff, elected officials and the public rely on us to be the voice of reason and responsibility when times get tough; we are the professionals.
We train throughout our careers to hone our ethics skills because the choices we face are increasingly difficult and complex. As FCCMA members, we agree to live by the ICMA Code of Ethics and the FCCMA requirement to receive and document our four hours of ethics training yearly.
The Ethics requirement is on the honor system. You don’t have to take any one particular course, but you must log your hours by October 1st of each year. We have made changes to the FCCMA website to make it easier and staff is available to help if you have any questions.
FCCMA is in the process of creating an Ethics Training Resource Page. There are a number of ethics training opportunities as well as on the ICMA site. We are working on more training choices for next year too.
If you haven’t logged your hours, do it now!
