| Request for an advisory opinion regarding whether the
Code of Governmental Ethics ("Code") permits Benjamin Walker to write active shooter response
plans and conduct training for Louisiana parishes while still employed with the
Terrebonne Parish Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness. |
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Benjmain Walker is the Assistant
Director at Terrebonne Parish Office of Homeland Security and Emergency
Preparedness and has been for the last 13 years. He was trained by the
Louisiana Governor's Office of Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness in
2015 to assist local schools in developing active shooter response plans.
Over the course of 5 years, Mr. Walker has developed
a training program flyer, an active shooter vulnerability analysis checklist, an
active shooter response plan template, a PowerPoint presentation, attendee
review forms, emergency response maps, and lockdown drills.
The products were
developed with the encouragement of his supervisor, Earl Jues Jr., the Director
of Terrebonne Homeland Security and Emergency Preparedness. Mr. Walker also conducted
over 40 trainings with schools and businesses. His supervisor allowed him to
conduct the trainings because no other organization offered active shooter training
to schools and businesses. However, the provision of these trainings was not in his job description.
Tracy Hilburn started a consulting
business named Bayou State Grant Management LLC that does various parish,
state, and federal granted-related work. Mr. Hilburn has asked Mr. Walker to assist
him in seeking to write active shooter response plans and conduct active shooter
training for Louisiana parishes. Mr. Walker asks whether this would result in a
violation of the Code.
Mr. Walker also may open a business with Mr.
Hilburn to provide active shooter prevention equipment to parishes. He asks whether the Code would prohibit him from doing so. He also asks how the Code's
post-employment restrictions would apply in that scenario.
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La. R.S. 42:1111C(1)(a): No public servant shall
receive any thing of economic value for any service, the subject matter of
which:
(a) Is devoted
substantially to the responsibilities, programs, or operations of the agency of
the public servant and in which the public servant has participated.
La. R.S. 42:1111(C)(2): No public servant and no legal entity in which the public
servant exercises control or owns an interest in excess of twenty-five percent,
shall receive any thing of economic value for or in consideration of services
rendered, or to be rendered, to or for any person during his public service
unless such services are:
(d)
Neither performed for nor compensated by any person from whom such public
servant would be prohibited by R.S. 42:1115(A)(1) or (B) from receiving a gift.
La. R.S. 42:1115A: No public
servant shall solicit or accept, directly or indirectly, any thing of economic
value as a gift or gratuity from any person or from any officer, director,
agent, or employee of such person, if such public servant knows or reasonably
should know that such person:
(1) Has or is seeking to obtain contractual or
other business or financial relationships with the public servant's agency.
La. R.S. 42:1115B: No public
employee shall solicit or accept, directly or indirectly, anything of economic
value as a gift or gratuity from any person or from any officer, director,
agent, or employee of such person, if such public employee knows or reasonably
should know that such person:
(1) Conducts operations or activities which are
regulated by the public employee's agency.
(2) Has substantial economic interests which may
be substantially affected by the performance or nonperformance of the public
employee's official duty.
La. R.S. 42:1113A.(1)(a): No public servant,
excluding any legislator and any appointed member of any board or commission
and any member of a governing authority of a parish with a population of ten
thousand or less, or member of such a public servant's immediate family, or
legal entity in which he has a controlling interest shall bid on or enter into
any contract, subcontract, or other transaction that is under the supervision
or jurisdiction of the agency of such public servant.
La. R.S. 42:1121B(1): No former public
employee shall, for a period of two years following the termination of his
public employment, assist another person, for compensation, in a transaction,
or in an appearance in connection with a transaction in which such former
public employee participated at any time during his public employment and
involving the governmental entity by which he was formerly employed, or for a
period of two years following termination of his public employment, render, any
service which such former public employee had rendered to the agency during the
term of his public employment on a contractual basis, regardless of the parties
to the contract, to, for, or on behalf of the agency with which he was formerly
employed.
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Adopt the proposed advisory opinion.
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| Assigned Attorney: |
Mallory Guillot |
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