Per
reimbursements for expenses incurred during volunteer activities.
Ethics
Advisory Opinion No. 22
May
24, 1999
Issued
By: City Attorney’s Office
Whether a City employee may accept honorariums or reimbursements of expenses incurred during volunteer activities.
A City employee in the Building Inspections
Department has asked whether he may accept honorariums or reimbursements for
expenses incurred during volunteer activities. The following facts are
presented:
An employee in the Building Inspections
Department is responsible for, among other things, developing and enforcing a
program for the implementation of the City’s tree preservation ordinance. On
occasion, the employee makes presentations to organizations regarding various
landscaping issues. For said services, the employee may be presented
honorariums in amounts less than $25.00 and/or may be directly reimbursed for
expenses incurred during these volunteer activities.
The issue is whether the employee may accept
such honorariums and/or expense reimbursements given his position with the
City. Under the Ethics Code of the City of
Gifts. Part B. Section 3[1]
states that an employee may not accept any gift that may influence or reward
official conduct or give the appearance of such. A gift is defined as "a
voluntary transfer of property (including the payment of money) or the
conferral of a benefit having pecuniary value, unless consideration of equal or
greater value is received by the donor." The employee makes
presentations to various organizations, services that amount to a greater
consideration for the donors. Given that neither the honorariums nor the direct
reimbursements are gifts as defined herein, the employee may accept such monies
subject to the remaining standards of conduct of the Code.
Conflicting Outside Employment. Generally, a City employee may not engage in
outside employment, which may influence the performance of the employee’s
official duties. More specifically, "a City ... employee shall not
provide services to an outside employer related to the . . . employee’s City
duties." If the services the employee provides are related to his
duties with the Building Inspections Department, he may not provide such
services to an outside employer. However, according to the employee, the
presentations made are done on a volunteer basis, which may at times be
compensated in the form of an honorarium or a reimbursement of expenses.
Because the employee is neither employed by these organizations nor providing
services related to his position with the City, there is no violation of this
section of the Code.
SUMMARY
City employees are governed by the standards
of conduct as set forth in the Ethics Code of the City of
FRANK J. GARZA
City Attorney