All: I’ve looked at a number of the previous messages about nepotism and reviewed some of the AG’s opinions, but wanted to get thoughts from others, if possible. One of my towns tragically and unexpectedly lost their long time clerk. She had been there for years and ran most of the day to day operations for the Town. They are scrambling just to find someone to help the Treasurer out while they try to figure out their best path forward. The mayor’s wife offered to volunteer to help out while the Town works to find a permanent replacement. Obviously, that is clearly within the three degrees of separations, but as a volunteer it is not a position of profit (probably). As a volunteer, I’m not even sure the Board would need to vote on it, so there wouldn’t really even be an appointment made, although I’m sure they’d want to be careful to make sure all official decisions or actions usually taken by town hall staff are done by one of the employees to make sure the actions are covered by insurance in case some type of issue arose. Does anyone have thoughts as to whether allowing someone to volunteer in an instance such as this would end up causing issues that would invoke the nepotism statutes? Thanks, Jared Harrison Harrison & Mecklenburg, Inc. 202 N. 6th Street P.O. Box 658 Kingfisher, OK 73750 (Phone) 405-375-6484 (Fax) 405-375-6413 Email: jared.harrison@hmlawoffice.com<mailto:jared.harrison@hmlawoffice.com> Website: www.hmlawoffice.com<http://www.hmlawoffice.com/> HM [AY8OaK+2H4ydAAAAAElFTkSuQmCC] CONFIDENTIALITY NOTICE: This e-mail transmission, and any documents, files or previous e-mail messages attached to it, may contain information which is legally privileged and/or confidential, and is solely for the use of the intended recipient(s). If you are not the intended recipient, any review, disclosure, copying, distribution or use of the information contained in or attached to this transmission is strictly prohibited. If you have received this e-mail transmission in error, please destroy it and notify us immediately at (405) 375-6484.

The prohibition in 8-106 reaches uncompensated positions if they are public offices ("office *or *position of profit"). Position of profit reaches all compensated positions in the municipality (whether they qualify as a public office or not). One fun legal nuance that I don't think the AG has really ever picked up on - did the addition of a statutory definition for "officer or official" in 1-102 limit the reach of the nepotism prohibition in 8-106 when it comes to uncompensated public offices? For example, an uncompensated reserve police officer is clearly a public office under the common law test, but it would not be an "officer or official" under the statutory definition in 1-102 - so can we appoint a 3rd degree relative as a reserve officer? The AG's always interpreted 8-106 based on the common law test, which makes sense given that the prohibition in 8-106 long predates the "officer or official" definition in 1-102 (which I think was added in 1978 or 1979). For your purposes, that legal nuance won't matter (since the vacant position is in the Office of the Clerk). Clearly you can't appoint the spouse to serve as Clerk - be that on an interim or permanent basis. But that doesn't necessarily mean that a spouse of a Board member can't offer to help out around the office. For example, would anyone say there would be a legal prohibition that would prevent the spouse of a trustee from helping the Clerk get caught up on filing on a volunteer basis? Probably not. But in that case, there would be a Clerk, and the Clerk would be overseeing everything as part of ensuring performance of his/her statutory duties. Here, there is no Clerk to oversee the work of the volunteer. It would make me a little nervous to have a spouse volunteering to help ensure that the work of a statutory office was completed when that office is vacant - since the reality would be, the person would *de facto* be serving as the public official. In the end, if it's for a short period of time and it's purely as a volunteer, then I'm not sure there'd be anyone that would throw a fit. Does the Board have a role to play? Sure. For example, in the example of the Clerk accepting volunteer help, their ability to do so would still be subject to any policies adopted by the Board (e.g. the Board could adopt a policy that would prohibit volunteers from accessing areas in Town Hall that weren't accessible to the general public; accessing files, file cabinets, etc. that aren't accessible to the genera public, etc.). Same would be true here - the Board *could* adopt a policy which effectively allowed or prohibited this kind of activity. My suggestion would be to have *someone*, *anyone* take on the title of Clerk. Or at a minimum consider adopting a policy or ordinance which tasked the Mayor with ensuring performance of the office of the clerk when there's a vacancy in that office. *See* 11 O.S. 12-105 (Mayor's powers and duties can include "such other powers, duties and functions as may be prescribed by law or ordinance"). That way, whether you appointed a temporary Clerk or assigned the Clerk's duties to the Mayor when the Clerk's office is vacant, then there's *a person* who is tasked with ensuring performance of the statutory duties (who isn't the spouse of a Trustee). Those are my thoughts Matt matt@mattlove.law On Tue, Jan 21, 2025 at 2:12 PM Jared Harrison via Oama <oama@lists.imla.org> wrote: > All: > > > > I’ve looked at a number of the previous messages about nepotism and > reviewed some of the AG’s opinions, but wanted to get thoughts from others, > if possible. > > > > One of my towns tragically and unexpectedly lost their long time clerk. > She had been there for years and ran most of the day to day operations for > the Town. They are scrambling just to find someone to help the Treasurer > out while they try to figure out their best path forward. The mayor’s wife > offered to volunteer to help out while the Town works to find a permanent > replacement. Obviously, that is clearly within the three degrees of > separations, but as a volunteer it is not a position of profit (probably). > As a volunteer, I’m not even sure the Board would need to vote on it, so > there wouldn’t really even be an appointment made, although I’m sure they’d > want to be careful to make sure all official decisions or actions usually > taken by town hall staff are done by one of the employees to make sure the > actions are covered by insurance in case some type of issue arose. > > > > Does anyone have thoughts as to whether allowing someone to volunteer in > an instance such as this would end up causing issues that would invoke the > nepotism statutes? > > > > Thanks, > > Jared Harrison > Harrison & Mecklenburg, Inc. > 202 N. 6th Street > P.O. Box 658 > Kingfisher, OK 73750 > (Phone) 405-375-6484 > (Fax) 405-375-6413 > Email: jared.harrison@hmlawoffice.com > Website: www.hmlawoffice.com > HM > > [image: AY8OaK+2H4ydAAAAAElFTkSuQmCC] > > CONFIDENTIALITY NOTICE: This e-mail transmission, and any documents, > files or previous e-mail messages attached to it, may contain information > which is legally privileged and/or confidential, and is solely for the use > of the intended recipient(s). If you are not the intended recipient, any > review, disclosure, copying, distribution or use of the information > contained in or attached to this transmission is strictly prohibited. If > you have received this e-mail transmission in error, please destroy it and > notify us immediately at (405) 375-6484. > -- > Oama mailing list -- oama@lists.imla.org > To unsubscribe send an email to oama-leave@lists.imla.org >