| Advisory opinion request regarding whether the Forest Oak Windsor Place Crime Prevention, Improvement, and Beautification District is permitted to employ the daughter of a member of the Board of Commissioners to work as an off-duty police officer. |
|
Forest Oak Windsor Place Crime Prevention, Improvement, and Beautification District (the "District") is a political subdivision of the State, created within East Baton Rouge Parish and managed by a board of commissioners pursuant to La. R.S. 33:9097.32. The District's Board of Commissioners is comprised of the members of the governing board of the Forest Oaks Windsor Place Civic Association. The Commissioners serve without compensation but are reimbursed for their reasonable out-of-pocket expenses directly related to the District's governance.
The District works with the Baton Rouge Police Department ("BRPD") to employ off-duty police officers approved by the BRPD Extra Duty Division to work extra-duty patrol shifts within the District. According to the contract between the District and the BRPD, the off-duty police officers are paid by the District as independent contractors and issued 1099-NEC tax statements. Also, the off-duty police officers hired by the District are under the supervision of a Baton Rouge Police Officer Administrator, not the Board of Commissioners.
The daughter of Commissioner Pauline Watson is a commissioned police officer with the BRPD and is authorized by the BRPD Extra Duty Division to work extra-duty shifts. The Board of Commissioners would like to employ Commissioner Watson's daughter to work extra-duty patrol shifts for the District.
|
|
La. R.S. 42:1113B provides that no appointed member of any board or commission, member of his immediate family, or legal entity in which the appointed member has a substantial economic interest shall bid on, enter into, or have a substantial economic interest in any contract, subcontract, or other transaction which is under the supervision or jurisdiction of the agency of such appointed member.
La. R.S. 42:1119B states that no member of the immediate family of a member of a governing authority or the chief executive of a governmental entity shall be employed by the governmental entity.
La. R.S. 42:1102(2)(a) defines "agency" to mean a department, office, division, agency, commission, board, committee, or other organizational unit of a governmental entity. "Agency of the public servant" and "his agency" when used in reference to the agency of a public servant shall mean: (vi) For public servants of political subdivisions, it shall mean the agency in which the public servant serves, except that for members of any governing authority and for the elected or appointed chief executive of a governmental entity, it shall mean the governmental entity.
La. R.S. 42:1102(10) defines "governing authority" to mean the body which exercises the legislative functions of a political subdivision.
La. R.S. 42:1102(11) defines "governmental entity" to mean 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.
La. R.S. 42:1102(12) defines "immediate family" as the term relates to a public servant to mean his children, the spouses of his children, his brothers and their spouses, his sisters and their spouses, his parents, his spouse, and the parents of his spouse.
La. R.S. 42:1102(16) defines "political subdivision" to mean any unit of local government, including a special district, authorized by law to perform governmental functions.
|
|
|
Adopt the proposed advisory opinion.
|
|
| Assigned Attorney: |
Jessica Meiners |
|
|