3 minute read
Ethically Speaking
YOU CAN BE EMPLOYED BY A COMPANY THAT DOES BUSINESS WITH YOUR SCHOOL DISTRICT
Mark Boardman, Attorney, Boardman, Carr, Petelos, Watkins & Ogle & Howard, P.C. and Christy Boardman Kuklinski Attorney Balch & Bingham LLP
Education retirees sometimes work in their retirement for companies that do business with boards of education. However, is retirement a requirement before taking such a job?
The Ethics Commission ruled in 2024 that a public employee may provide consulting services to a private business that contracts with the public employee’s employer. However, the public employee is prohibited from using his or her position, confidential information learned through his or her employment, and equipment, facilities, time, materials, human labor, or other public property under that employee’s discretion or control when providing or seeking to provide consulting work. Additionally, the public employee cannot interact with his or her public employer on behalf of his or her private employer.
For example, in Opinion 2024-04, a jail administrator with the Limestone County Sheriff’s Office asked if she could work for the company that handles inmate medical billing for the Limestone County Jail. The jail administrator made it clear she had not had any prior interaction with this private company, but the company wanted to hire her to work with jails, using the experience she received as a Limestone County jail administrator and promoting the vendor’s business. So long as the jail administrator did not consult with the Limestone County Jail on behalf of her new company, the Ethics Commission authorized the jail administrator to accept the second job.
You might wonder if your experience, which is something you have in a large part acquired through your employment along with any specialized training your school district provided to you, prevents you from serving as a consultant. The Alabama Ethics Commission has addressed that too. In Opinion 2004-27, a police officer, whose training had been partially paid for by the police department that employed him, could offer accident reconstruction services for others as long as he did not use any city property or perform those services on matters that involve the city or the city’s police department. Thus, the fact that you have been trained, even at public expense, does not prohibit you from providing consulting services or representing a vendor before other school districts, just not your own district or public employer.
The Legislature, in passing the Ethics Act, stated that those who serve in government “should not be denied the opportunity, available to all other citizens, to acquire or retain private economic and other interests, except where conflicts with the responsibility of….public employees to the public cannot be avoided.” Likewise, the Ethics Commission recognizes that you should be able to be paid for using your expertise acquired over your years of public service.
