ETH 14-008
No. 14-008
Pennsylvania Ethics Opinion
Opinion of the Commission
December 3, 2018
DATE
MAILED: 12/4/14
Before: John J. Bolger, Chair, Nicholas A. Colafella, Vice
Chair, Mark R. Corrigan, Roger Nick, Kathryn Streeter Lewis
This
Opinion is issued in response to your letter of September 4,
2014, by which you requested a confidential advisory from
this Commission.
I.
ISSUE:
Whether
the Public Official and Employee Ethics Act ("Ethics
Act"), 65 Pa.C.S. § 1101 et seq., would impose
prohibitions or restrictions upon a State Legislator serving
in the [Chamber of the General Assembly], who is an A of the
B of [name of private educational institution] (the
"Institution"), with regard to receiving payment
for teaching a course on Subject C at the Institution as a D.
II.
FACTUAL BASIS FOR DETERMINATION:
You
have been authorized by State Legislator E to request a
confidential advisory from this Commission on his behalf. You
have submitted facts that may be fairly summarized as
follows.
State
Legislator E was first elected to the [Chamber of the General
Assembly] in [year]. For [number] years prior to his
legislative service, State Legislator E served as Public
Official F for Political Subdivision G. State Legislator E
also worked for Public Official H from [year] until [year].
State
Legislator E received a [type of academic degree] in Subject
I from the Institution in [year], and he is currently an A of
the Institution's B. The Institution has asked State
Legislator E to serve as a D in the J in the [certain
semester]. State Legislator E would teach a course on Subject
C.
The
class would meet for [certain amount of time]. State
Legislator E would develop lectures, materials, and exams for
the class, grade course work, and meet with students before
or after class as necessary. The total preparation time per
week for the course would be approximately two hours, not
including class time. You state that State Legislator E would
not include in course materials or his remarks to students
during class any confidential information received through
his legislative role and that he would not use legislative
resources such as personnel, equipment, supplies, facilities,
and the like to prepare his course materials. State
Legislator E has not published any materials that would be
used during his class instructions.
The
Institution treats Ds as employees for tax purposes. Ds
complete a W-4 when starting at the Institution in order to
withhold federal and state income taxes from wages earned,
and they receive a W-2 at the end of the year. You state that
State Legislator E would receive [amount] for teaching the
course, which he believes is below the compensation paid to
other faculty at the Institution.
You
note that Section 1103(d) of the Ethics Act, 65 Pa.C.S.
§ 1103(d), provides that "No public official or
public employee shall accept an honorarium." Citing the
Ethics Act's definition of the term
"honorarium" (see, Section 1102 of the
Ethics Act, 65 Pa.C.S. § 1102), you assert that any
compensation that State Legislator E would receive for
teaching the course on Subject C at the Institution should be
viewed as consideration for the value of the nonpublic
professional services which he would be providing to the
Institution.
You
argue that any compensation State Legislator E would receive
for teaching the course would not be a prohibited honorarium
based upon the following assertions:
(1) Teaching a multi-class
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