A quick little notice out of California - former City of Los Angeles building and safety commission chief Efren Abratique is coming under fire for voting three times to grant permits to a firm that directly benefitted his own company financially.

And now a friendly little reminder for all the local officials out there: if a vote comes before you where you have a financial stake in the outcome, the proper thing to do is to recuse yourself.  I have a feeling Abratique is going to learn that lesson the hard way.

On Wednesday, the Los Angeles city council took a step closer to adopting full-public financing for municipal campaigns. Although five of the council members expressed the usual concerns about tax-dollars for campaigns, the full 15-member council voted unanimously to draft a measure that could be placed on the March ballot. Check out the LA Times story.

Reflecting the unimpeachable tidiness of the current members, the city council also voted to change the name from Clean Money to "full-public financing". I still think "voter-owned elections" best captures the intent and philosophy of public-finance.

A successful drive for public-finance in the second most populous city in the nation would obviously be a huge boon for the movement.