| Date: | 12/15/1981 |
|---|---|
| Organization: | State Ethics Commission |
A Department of Mental Health employee who reduces their position to half-time may not accept part-time employment with a nonprofit corporation under contract with DMH. Because the contract between the nonprofit and DMH is a particular matter pending in the agency in which the employee serves, G.L. c. 268A, § 4 prohibits the employee from receiving compensation from the nonprofit in connection with that contract.
You are presently employed by the Department of Mental Health (DMH) on a full-time basis as a recreational therapist at a state school. You would like to reduce your DMH employment to a half-time position to enable you to accept a part-time employment with ABC a non-profit corporation which receives vocational training funds from DMH. You would participate in a paid apprenticeship program at ABC under which you would work in a daytime vocational training for developmentally disabled clients from the state school community.
You wish to know whether the conflict of interest law, G.L.c. 268A, permits you to accept employment with ABC under this arrangement.
The Commission advises you that it does not.
In rendering this opinion, the Commission has relied upon the facts as you have stated them and has not made any independent investigation of those facts. In your capacity as a recreational therapist with DMH, you are a state employee within the meaning of G.L.c. 268A, s.1(q). If you reduce your DMH employment to a half-time position, you would remain a state employee under s.1(q) but would be subject to the provisions of G.L.c. 268A in a less restrictive way as a special state employee. See G.L.c. 268A, s.1(o). Under G.L.c. 268A, s.4(a) you are prohibited, as a special state employee, from receiving compensation from anyone other than the commonwealth in relation to a particular matter in which the commonwealth or a state agency is a party and where the particular matter is one (a) in which you have participated as a state employee, or (b) which is or within one year has been a subject of your official responsibility, or (c) which is pending in the state agency in which you are serving. G.L.c. 268A, s.4, par.6. The recreational training contract between ABC and DMH is a Particular Matter within the meaning of G.L.c. 268A, s.1(k). Further, DMH, a state agency, is a party to that contract. Accordingly, you may not receive compensation from ABC in connection with its contract with DMH if your situation falls within one of the three contract categories listed above. Inasmuch as the contract between ABC and DMH is pending in the agency in which you serve as a state employee, the Commission advises you that s.4 prohibits your receipt of compensation under this contract.
End Of Decision
