Principal and teacher pay fines in nepotism cases

A public school principal and teacher have paid administrative fines to the state Ethics Commission to resolve charges against them involving the hiring of relatives.

The decisions, known as "resolutions of charges," were posted Thursday on the Ethics Commission website. The commission did not disclose the names of the people involved or their schools.

In one case a teacher agreed to pay a $2,000 fine for recommending that her husband be hired as a part-time teacher for a "supplemental learning program" that she supervised. He worked for 22 months, and she allowed him to bank his billable hours from one week to the next, skirting a weekly limit on his hours.

The commission concluded that the hiring appeared to violate the conflict-of-interest law, which prohibits state employees from taking any official action that directly affects their own financial interests or those of their spouses.

The teacher did not dispute the facts of the case. Her husband was qualified for the job and had volunteered at the program for some time, and it was a hard position to fill, according to the teacher and her principal.

In the other case a principal was fined $500 for recommending that subordinates hire his son for a summer school program as well as his nephew and niece. The son worked for less than three weeks, and his nephew and niece worked for "short periods of time," according to the commission.

The ethics code prohibits state employees from taking actions that affect the financial interests of their dependent children, and from using their state position to give anyone unwarranted advantages.

In issuing the resolution, the commission noted that there was no indication that the relatives were not qualified, and the principal took no further action on the hiring other than his original suggestion and did not benefit financially from the arrangement.

The commission sometimes discloses names in issuing resolutions of charges. Asked why the names were withheld this time, Executive Director Les Kondo said the commissioners decided to do so based on the individual circumstances of the case.

"The commission, in weighing all of the factors and discussing the resolution with the employees, felt it was fair and in the public interest to resolve it in this manner, with payment of a fine and resolution of charge without disclosing the employees’ names," Kondo said.

The commission issued the charges in both cases Nov. 20. The resulting resolutions, 2014-1 and 2014-2, were issued Feb. 19 and posted on the website Thursday after a period allowing for comments by the respondents, Kondo said.