| Date: | 02/21/1979 |
|---|---|
| Organization: | State Ethics Commission |
A state employee responsible for monitoring federal and state grants to local councils is not precluded from accepting a position with a private, non- profit corporation which oversees a regional agency's use of such federal grants. Sections 5(a) and 5(b), respectively, impose limitations regarding those "particular matters" in which the state employee was actually involved, or which were within his official responsibility.
You are a full-time state employee. You are responsible for monitoring federal and state grants to local councils. You have been offered the position of Executive Director of the Area Agency. You would be employed by the private, non-profit corporation which oversees the federal grants made by that agency.
You ask whether your accepting this offer would involve a conflict of interest under General Laws Chapter 268A.
The Commission advises you that you are not precluded from accepting the Executive Director position by virtue of your prior position with the state. However, because you would be a former state employee, § 5 of chapter 268A may well impose certain limitations on your actions as Executive Director in specific cases. In the absence of a more detailed statement of precisely how your present responsibilities may overlap with your responsibilities as Executive Director or of specific questions relating to particular activities of the area Agency, we decline to offer you specific advice on issues that may arise in the future. However, you may always ask us to address such issues if and when they arise. However, we can offer you the following general advice and guidance on the applicability of § 5 to you. Section 5(a) would preclude you from working on any "particular matter" (as defined in § 1(k)) in which you were involved or "participated" (as defined in § 1(j)) as a state employee. Therefore, to the extent you were actually involved as a state employee in decisions relating to grants made by the Area Agency, you would be prohibited from further involvement in matters relating to those grants as Executive Director unless and until they are terminated or renewed.
Section 5(b) also prohibits you from personally appearing before your state agency after the termination of your state employment in connection with any particular matters pending in that agency, whether or not you participated in them, if they were within your "official responsibility" (as defined in § 1(i)) during the last two years of your state employment. This prohibition, however, applies to you only for one year. Section 5 does not prohibit you from appearing before the agency on any cases or matters which arise after the termination of your state employment.
End Of Decision
