| Request for an advisory opinion as to whether the Code of Governmental Ethics ("Code") prohibits Allie DeLeo-Allen's company DKB Solutions, LLC from providing services to Louisiana Tech University's Innovation Enterprise division following her retirement from Louisiana Tech University. |
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Allie DeLeo-Allen was employed by Louisiana Tech University from June 2012 to May 2023. During her entire tenure at Louisiana Tech University, she was employed within the College of Engineering and Science. Since September 2021, she served as a lecturer in the Instrumentation and Control Systems Engineering Technology ("ICET") Program within the College of Engineering and Science. In this role, her primary duty was to teach a variety of courses ranging from first-year to upper-level engineering courses. She reported to the Director of ICET and Industrial Engineering.
As of December 2023, she is the sole owner of DKB Solutions, LLC, which provides grant writing and management services. She has been approached by Louisiana Tech University's Innovation Enterprise division to establish a grant writing program that guides student employees through the grant writing process and serves faculty, external partners, and the Innovation Enterprise team. The Innovation Enterprise division is led by the Chief Innovation Officer and is separate from the College of Engineering and Science.
DKB Solutions, LLC would like provide contract services to Louisiana Tech University's Innovation Enterprise division to coordinate and manage funding proposal projects that will service Innovation Enterprise business partners. Allie DeLeo-Allen did not coordinate and manage funding proposal projects at any time while employed by Louisiana Tech University.
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La. R.S. 42:1102 provides the following definitions:
(2)(a) "Agency" means a department, office, division, agency, commission, board, committee, or other organizational unit of a governmental entity.
(12) "Governmental entity" means the state or any political subdivision which employs the public employee or employed the former public employee or to which the elected official is elected, as the case may be.
(18)(a) "Public employee" means anyone, whether compensated or not, who is:
(i) An administrative officer or official of a governmental entity who is not filling an elective office.
(ii) Appointed by any elected official when acting in an official capacity, and the appointment is to a post or position wherein the appointee is to serve the governmental entity or an agency thereof, either as a member of an agency, or as an employee thereof.
(iii) Engaged in the performance of a governmental function.
(iv) Under the supervision or authority of an elected official or another employee of the governmental entity.
(19) "Public servant" means a public employee or an elected official.
La. R.S. 42:1121B(1) provides that 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 draft advisory opinion.
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| Assigned Attorney: |
Suzanne Mooney |
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