Multnomah County calls for outside investigation into conflicts of interest, ethics

Multnomah County has hired an outside law firm to scrutinize its conflicts of interest and ethics policies.

Chief Operating Officer Christopher Neal announced the investigation Thursday, two weeks after the county’s Preschool for All Director Leslee Barnes resigned under a cloud of controversy. Barnes was tied to a preschool provider accused of wasting state funds. That preschool, Village Childcare, was only receiving money from a state program, not the county’s Preschool for All program, officials have said.

“We’re going to take a hard look at how we’ve been doing things, and take action everywhere we can to improve,” Neal said in a statement.

While the law firm will consider the county’s conflicts of interest policy broadly, it won’t examine Barnes’ case specifically, officials s