For months now, the previously testy relations between the offices of Denver Mayor John Hickenlooper and City Auditor Dennis Gallagher have been quiet.

Too quiet, apparently. At least that's one conclusion you could draw from the auditor's refusal to sign a $3 million contract between the city and Seedco Financial Services, which was hired to fund community development.

In a letter to the city's director of housing and neighborhood development, Gallagher listed two main concerns. First, he argued that Seedco would duplicate work now done by the city. Then, he said that the decision of Peter Chapman, the city's former economic development director, to seek the job of heading Seedco's Denver office created "the appearance of a conflict."

Those worries were worth raising, and the city's ethics code deserves a few revisions. But the objections do not justify delaying the contract, and we urge the auditor to approve it right away.

The partnership between Seedco and Denver was announced in February - so Gallagher should have been aware of it. And Seedco would not replicate existing city programs. Instead, it would create an entirely new enterprise, which the Rocky has reported on in detail. Its activities would be financed with federal grants and not from the city's general fund, as other similar projects often are.

The complaint about Chapman doesn't seem to hold up, either. Gallagher's conclusion that Chapman "violate\[d] the City Ethics code" when he decided to pursue employment with Seedco appears overwrought.

Instead, it looks like Chapman followed procedures when on Feb. 6 he asked the Board of Ethics for a waiver from the city's six-month "cooling off" period so that he could apply for the Seedco job.

The cooling-off provision bars any city employee from "obtain\[ing] employment in which he or she will take direct advantage, unavailable to others, of matters with which he or she took direct official action during his or her service with the city."

Chapman was, in Gallagher's words, Seedco's "most significant advocate before City Council." But the the board can grant an employee a waiver if it thinks it would serve "the best interests of the city."

That's what the board concluded, and Chapman won the waiver on Feb. 28. His hiring was announced May 2, in a press release published on the company's Web site. Again, this is no reason to delay the contract.

Gallagher may have overreacted. But he has highlighted a few gaps in the ethics code that the City Council should repair.

First, the six-month cooling-off period seems too brief to prevent a public official or employee from "cashing in" on his service, if that's what someone really wants to do.

Federal executive branch officials have to wait one year after they leave government before they can lobby federal agencies. A year, with the possibility of waivers, seems like sufficient time to slow any potential revolving door between private employment and city service.

Finally, the Board of Ethics should be required to publish all its rulings on its Web site. It isn't now.

Such disclosure of ethics complaints and waivers should be mandatory, even if some allegations are baseless. And doing so in a timely manner could minimize future dust-ups between the mayor and the auditor - or anyone else.