About the Philadelphia Board of Ethics

The five-member, independent Philadelphia Board of Ethics was established by ordinance, approved by voters in May 2006, and installed on November 27, 2006. It is charged with providing ethics training for all city employees and enforcing city campaign finance, financial disclosure, and conflict of interest laws, and has authority to render advice, investigate complaints and issue fines. More…

About the Public Integrity Laws

The Board of Ethics administers and enforces the City's Public Integrity Laws. These laws include standards of conduct for City officials and employees, financial disclosure requirements, campaign finance matters, restrictions on political activities, lobbying registration and reporting, and non-competitively bid contracts. These laws are generally designed to ensure that City officials and employees act with the best interests of the public in mind as they exercise their authority and to provide for transparency and integrity in government.

There are several sources of public integrity laws that apply to City officials and employees, including the State Ethics Act, the Philadelphia Code of Ethics, certain provisions in the Philadelphia Home Rule Charter and several executive orders issued over the past few decades.

Philadelphia recently passed a campaign finance law that applies to candidates for City elective offices. The City’s campaign finance law sets limits on political contributions to candidates, requires candidates and political committees to disclose campaign finance information to the Ethics Board and gives authority to the Board to enforce and provide guidance on the law.

The intent of the campaign finance law is to reduce the influence of large political contributors and to promote public confidence in our elected officials. As such, the City’s campaign finance law is an integral part of the City’s recent set of ethics reform measures.