**Ethics Training**

**Department of the Interior**

A Telecast Originating from the National Conservation Training Center

\[U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service - Shepherdstown, WV\]

September 30, 1999

This transcript is from the closed-captioning file produced during the
telecast.

It may contain errors and omissions in transcription.

Announcer: a Presentation of The United States Fish & Wildlife Service
National Conservation Training Center, Providing Leadership in Learning
To Conserve Fish, Wildlife and Natural Resources.

Welcome. Today We Have the Unique Opportunity to Provide Satellite
Ethics Training to Approximately 50,000 Federal Employees and
Contractors Across the Country. I Understand That We Have Federal
Employees from Alaska to Puerto Rico with Us Today. I Want You to Know
We\'re Delighted That You Could Join Us. This Opportunity Began with a
Partnership Between the Department of the Interior and The U.s.
Department of Agriculture. It Has since Grown to Include at Least Nine
Other Federal Agencies. Ethics Is the Framework That We All Use to Guide
Our Decisions, Both Personally and Professionally. And Making Ethics an
Integral Part of the Government Workplace Is Critical Because Those
Decisions We Make on a Day‑to‑day Basis Profoundly Impact the Nation
That We Serve. The Very Foundation of the Government Is Dependent on the
Public\'s Confidence in the Integrity of Their Government And of Their
Federal Employees. Today\'s Broadcast Is Unique in Several Ways. It
Clearly Demonstrates That Agencies, Partnering Together, Can Provide
this Training in an Efficient, Cost‑effective Manner Rather than
Duplicating Their Efforts Many Times Over. But More Importantly, it
Provides an Environment Where Employees May Be Active Participants in
the Process Through Interaction with the Presenters. We Have with Us
Today Miss T.j. Sullivan, Who Is the Director of The Department of
Interior\'s Ethics Office and Mr. John Surina, the Designated Agency
Ethics Official at the Department of Agriculture. They Will Be Giving Us
an Overview of the Changes That Have Occurred in the Federal Ethics
Program over the Last Year. And a Refresher on Some of the Hot Topics
Such as the Hatch Act. They Will Answer Some of Your Questions Such as
\"Can Federal Employees Do to Help the Victims Of the Recent Hurricane
and Subsequent Flooding?\" I Know You Will Find this to Be A Helpful and
Informative Hour. And Now I Will Turn the Program Over to T.j.

Thank You, Secretary Babbitt. I\'m T.j. Sullivan, Director of The
Departmental Ethics Office Of the Department of Interior.

I\'m John Surina, Director of The Office of Ethics in the Usda.

We Are Absolutely Delighted To Have Employees from 45 States, the
District of Columbia And Puerto Rico at 217 Downlink Sites, at Last
Count, Joining Us Today. Having So Many People Participating this
Afternoon Poses Some Additional Challenges To Us. As You Know, the
Ethics Program Has Some Umbrella Statutes and Regulations That Apply to
All Federal Employees. But Each of Our Agencies Have Their Own
Agency‑specific Regulations, Policies and Procedures. Because We Don\'t
Have the Time To Go into All of That and Because There Are So Many
Different Agencies Represented, We Are Only Going to Be Speaking To
Those Umbrella Statutes and Regulations. If You Have Questions
Pertaining To Your Own Agency\'s Policies, Procedures or Regs, Please
Call Your Own Designated Agency Ethics Official. That Name Is Either in
Your Handout or Your Site Coordinator, Where You Are Seeing this
Broadcast, Can Help You with That. Or If That Is Not Available to You,
If You Will Call Me or John, We Will Be Happy to Help You Get to the
Correct Person in Your Agency. Our Numbers Will Be Shown at the End of
the Program. The Other Thing, Little Piece of Administrative Matter I
Want to Make Sure We Cover Before We Get Going, Is All Employees Who
File Financial Disclosure Forms, Either the Public Forms in the Spring
or the Confidential Forms, You Know Who You Are, You Are Going to Be
Receiving Your Forms Tomorrow, You\'re Going to Fill Them out Promptly
and I Hope Get Them Back to Us by the End of October. For All of Those
Folks, They Must Have Annual Ethics Training, and to Get Credit for It
We Hope That You Will Sign in Where You Are So That We Get the ‑‑ We
Find out Who You Are, We\'ll Get That Information Back To Your Agencies,
and You Won\'t Have an Ethics Counselor Calling You and Telling You You
Have to Take Ethics Training Again. During the Course of this Broadcast,
Bee Would Be ‑‑ We Would Be Happy to Entertain Any Questions You Might
Have and at The End of the Broadcast, We\'re Going to Take a Quick Break
and Then We\'ll Come Back and We Will Answer Any Additional Questions
That You Might Have. And in Just a Few Minutes, John Is Going to Tell
You How You Can Reach Us. But for Right Now, I\'m Going to Turn the
Program over to John, And He\'s Going to Tell Us a Little Bit about What
We\'re Going to Be Doing Today. John?

Thank You, T.j. We Are Going to Try to Approach This with the Objective
of Giving You a Broad Understanding Of the Underlying Laws and Statutes
That Govern the Ethics Program Governmentwide and Then Go on and Move to
Some of the Specific Topics That Are Particularly Important Right Now.
We Are Going to Address Fund Raising, Which Is Important Because We\'re
Entering the Combined Federal Campaign Right Now. We\'re Going to
Address the Hatch Act. Political Activity. The 2000 Election Is Already
Under Way and You Need to Know About the Reforms That Came About with
the 1993 Act but What Restrictions Still Apply to You. And Then the
Perennial Questions That We Get All the Time Regarding Gifts, Travel and
Use Of Government Equipment. It\'s Going to Be Very Important, Though,
to Give Meaning to this Training That You Participate as T.j. Mentioned
and There\'s Several Ways in Which You Can Reach Us. Up on Your Screen
Right Now Can You See Our Fax Number, the Telephone Number, and for
Those Of You That Are in Fish & Wildlife Services with the One‑touch
Keypad, All You Need Do Is Hit the \"Call\" Button. With Those
Preliminaries over With, Let\'s Get into Some of the Basic Overview of
What the System Is Really About. The Basic System Is as a Governmentwide
Systematic System Of Ethics Regulations. It\'s Fairly New on the Scene.
Many of the Statutes Existed for Years, but We Didn\'t Have an Executive
Branchwide Standard Until Recently. The Ethics in Government Act Itself
Was One of the Several Post‑watergate Reforms and it Came into Effect in
1978 and Was Later Modified in 1989 and it Provides a Foundation of What
We\'re Talking about Now. These Whole System of Rules Are Predicated on
Building a Wall Between the Corrosive Impact of Private Interests and
Private Money on Public Policy. This Is a System Which Is Not a General
Morality System, Which We Believe That Most Federal Employees Bring to
the Job That They Pick up at Home, but Rather It Is a System of Real
Specific Prescriptions or Rules That You Cannot Breach Without Real
Consequences. Not Withstanding the Fact That There Are Consequences of
Breaking the Rules, Our Goal Here and the Goal of the Whole Program Is
to Keep You out of Trouble in the First Place with An Emphasis on
Training, like We\'re Doing Today, and for Disclosure Reporting Whereby
We Can Help Identify Those Conflicts Before You Encounter Them. And
Using Enforcement Only as a Backup. \[ Theme from \"Dragnet\" \] With
That Little Sound Segue, When We\'re Talking about Enforcement, We Have
a System as I Mentioned That\'s Based on Voluntary Compliance, but
Voluntary Compliance Has Little Effect Unless There Is Consequence for
Willful Disregard of the Rules. The Primary Vehicles That Can Be Used to
Enforce These Rules Are The Criminal Statutes. All of These Are Found in
18 U.s. Code. The First, and the Most Obvious, I Think to Most People,
Is Section 201. 201 Is the Section That Governs Bribes and Illegal
Gratuities. It\'s Interesting to Use this Particular Section Right Now
Because There Was a Recent Court Decision Which Somewhat Qualifies How
It\'s Used in the Courts but Also Provides a Counter Point to Explain
the Difference Between the Administrative Regulations and The Criminal
Statutes. This Recent Case Was Sun Diamond Growers in Which the Supreme
Court Overturned an Appeals\' Court Conviction Because the Conviction
Was Not Based on a Clear Connection Between an Illegal Gratuity from a
Prohibited Source and an Official Act That Was Either in Response to or
as Expression of Favor from the Party. All Right? This Meant That the
Burden of Proof, or Further Demonstrates, That the Burden of Proof in a
Criminal Prosecution Is a Rather High Bar. It\'s Important for All
Employees To Know, However, That That Does Not Apply to the
Administrative Regulations. There Is a Bar That T.j. Is Going to Talk
about a Great Deal More on Gift Acceptance from Prohibited Sources. It
Is Not Qualified with Having To Have a Specific Connection to An
Official Act. And That Administrative Regulation on Gifts Remains
Intact, in Fact Was Cited by the Supreme Court When They Overturned the
Criminal Conviction. So the Administrative Rules Have A Lower Standard
of Proof and They Can Be Administered Without The Same Rigor of the
Criminal Statutes. The Second Two Criminal Statutes That I Want to Treat
Together Are Sections 203 and 205 That Speak to Representation of Third
Parties Back to the Government. 203 Speaks to Representation Where
You\'re Being Compensated. 205 Does Not Require Being Compensated. And
What it Says Basically Is That While You\'re a Federal Employee, You May
Not Represent Anyone Other than Yourself Back To Another Element of the
Government. Not Just Your Own Department. And We Had a Faxed Question
That Came in Prior to Our Broadcast From an Individual in Chicago Who
Wanted to Know If He Was a Member of a Board of a Public Interest Group
Could He Sign a Letter Going Back to His Agency Or Any Other Agency, for
That Matter, Protesting a Position of The Agency. And the Answer, Quite
Frankly, Is No. In His Own Behalf, He Can Voice His Opinion to His
Agency or Other Agencies or to the Congress, but He Cannot Represent a
Third Party, in this Case the Public Interest Group, On That Matter. And
this Is an Area That You Really Need to Keep Track of Because the Law Is
Evolving. There Is Right Now Working its Way up Through the Courts a
Decision at the District Court Level Which Was Then E.versus The
Environmental Protection Agency That That Was Affirmed That an
Individual Representing A Public Interest Group Cannot Make
Representations to Any Government Agency on Behalf of The Public
Interest Group. So Keep Your Eye on That One. The next Issue That I
Wanted to Address Is the Post‑employment Restrictions. These Can Be
Found in Section 207 of the Criminal Code. It\'s Important for You to Be
Cognizant That There Are Restrictions. We\'re Not Going to Try and Go
Through All These Detailed Restrictions Today, but If You Have Any
Intentions of Coming Back and Working for the Government after You
Retire or Leave Government Employment, or Representing Other Parties
Back To the Government, You Need to First Consult with Your Ethics
Advisor at the Agency Level. There Are Very, Very Complex Rules about
Switching Sides and Cooling off Periods, but They Break down According
to What You Intend to Do, What Your Grade Level Is, and You Just Need to
Remember to Check with Your Ethics Advisor Before You Leave Your
Government Service. The Granddaddy of All of Our Work Is Section 208,
Which Is The Statute Barring Conflicting Personal Interests. This Is
Another Example Where I Can Juxtapose or Compare the Criminal Code
Versus the Administrative Regulations on The Other Hand. The Conflict of
Interest Statute Uses Very Specific Language. You May Not Personally and
Substantially Participate in a Matter, a Particular Matter, That Has a
Direct and Predictable Impact on Your Own Financial Interest. And by
\"Your Own,\" That Means Yours, Your Spouse and That Means Your
Dependent Children. Most People Think of 208 Kicking In in a Contract
Setting Where You May Have Stock in a Company That\'s Bidding on a
Contract and You\'re Evaluating the Proposals. It Can Be Far less Clear
than That. For Example, You Could Have Someone Working for the Inspector
General and They\'re Investigating the Manner in Which a Grantee at a
College or Institution Is Administering the Money That Was Granted. The
Spouse of the Investigator May Work for the Grantee Organization. The
Spouse Itself Creates That Same Imputed Self‑interest, Which Makes this
a Violation of The Criminal Statute at 208. Now, as Opposed to That,
Let\'s Look for an Analogous Situation That Would Be Governed by the
Regulations. Let\'s Assume That Instead of the Spouse Working for the
Grant Organization it Is a Non‑dependent, I.e., a Child of The
Investigator, Who Now Could Be 30 Years Old. And While That Would Not Be
a Breach of the Criminal Code, it Would Bring into Question the
Impartiality of the Investigator, and the Administrative Regulation That
Guards Against Loss of Impartiality Kicks In. So We\'re Talking Same
Type of Situation with a less Rigorous Standard for the Administrative
Side of It. The Final Point I Want to Raise Under the Criminal Statutes
Is Supplementation of Salary. The Government Pays Us to Do Our Job, and
People on the Outside Do Not Have to Augment Our Personal Salaries to Do
What We\'re Already Paid For. This Doesn\'t Mean It\'s Necessarily
Something Malign or ‑‑ Really it Underpins in Part The Gift Restrictions
That Are Also Precluded by Section 201 And, like I Said, T.j. Is Going
To Be Speaking to Those. The Criminal Statutes Are Enforced by the
Department of Justice and the U.s. Attorneys Around the Country. Up till
June 30th, the Independent Counsel Act Was in Place, Which Would Enforce
These Laws Against Very High‑ranking Officials of Government, but as You
Know, That Law Lapsed on June 30 P‑. As I Mentioned, There Is a Very
Rigorous Burp Before a Criminal Conviction Can Be ‑‑ Burden of Proof
Before a Criminal Convic Shun Can Be Secured. The One Thing That\'s Made
Convictions Easier Is No Longer The Only Sanction Jail Time or In Car
Ration but the Justice Department Can Now Seek and Secure a Civil
Forfeiture for Violations That Really Don\'t Warrant Someone Securing
Jail Time. Let\'s Move on to the Standards Of Conduct Itself. The
Standards of Conduct Are the Federal Regulations That Correspond to the
Criminal Standards. They Really Were Directed on an Executivewide Basis,
Executive Branch Much‑wise Basis by Executive Bush When He Issued
Executive Order 1264. It Set up 14 Principles of Conduct. It Further
Directed the Office Of Government Ethics to Promulgate Regulations That
Would Be Applicable Only on an Executive‑wide Basis. Prior to That Time,
Different Agencies Had Their Own Schemes Of Standards of Conduct, and
Not That Any One of Them Was Bad, But They Were Not Necessarily
Consistent Across the Government. So the Objective of the Standards of
Conduct That You Have Now Was to Have a Uniform System Throughout the
Executive Branch. There Is a Provision for Agencies to Supplement These
Regulations with Regulations That Are Tailored to Their Specific
Regulations, but to Promulgate Those, You Need the Concurrence of the
Office of Government Ethics to Make Sure That Your Regulations Are
Consistent with and Defensible In the Light of the Executive Branch
Rules. Unlike the Criminal Standards That Has High Bars of Proof, There
Is an Apparent Standard That Applies with the Regulations. The Apparent
Standard Essentially Says \"If a Reasonable Person in Possession Of All
the Facts Sees a Problem, You Can Assume There Is a Problem and You Need
to Find a Remedy.\" Those Remedies Are Administratively Enforced. This
Is Not a Criminal Process At this Point. It Is Through the Adverse
Action Of the Personnel Rules That Keep The Process Going. Your
Administrative Remedies Can Range from a Reprimand Letter up To and
Including Dismissal from The Job, Which Is a Pretty Heavy Sanction for
Violating the Rules. So All of Our Talk about Voluntary Compliance,
You\'ve Got To Remember, We Want You to Voluntary Comply, We Want You to
Know the Rules, but You\'ve Got To Know There Are Real Teeth That
Enforce These If You Have a Willful and Knowing Violation. The Office of
Government Ethics Has General Oversight over How Agencies Administer
Their Ethics Programs. They Provide Us with a Great Deal of the Training
Materials Which We Then Turn Around and Pass on to You and They Also
Have the ‑‑ Around and Pass on To You and They Also Have the Authority
to Audit Departmental And Agency Ethics Programs and They Do it with
Vigor, and They Make Sure That Our Training Programs and Our Disclosure
Programs Are Being Operated with The Force and with the Timeliness That
Are Called for By Regulations. Those Are Our Obligatories and Having
Gone Through Those, Let\'s Move on to the Specific Topics We Want to
Talk about Today, and I\'m Going to Speak to Fund Raising.

\"Show Me the Money!\"

We Really Did It. The Fund Raising Rules Are Really Timely Now, for the
Most Part Because We\'re Going into The Combined Federal Campaign. There
Are Some Rules That Regard How One Administers Combined Federal Campaign
and I Think There\'s a Little Background That People Know on Why We Do
Have This Consolidated Process. Opm Has a near Monopoly on Fund Raising
for Cash. There\'s a Good Reason for That Near Monopoly. First of All,
Opm Recognizes That it Is Difficult to Solicit Federal Employees and Do
So in a Fashion That Ensures That They Don\'t Feel a Compulsion to Give.
Prior to the Combined Federal Campaign and its Monopoly Status, You
Would Have Agencies That Would Have Repeated Charity Drives Within the
Agency, Some Of Which May Have Been Associated with Whomever the Boss
Would Be, and You Recognize That an Employee Would Feel a Subtle
Coercion, If You Will, to Give to the Campaign That Happened to Be near
and Dear to His or Her Boss. Having a Single One‑time All‑purpose
Fund‑raiser Is a Way Of Getting Around That Sort of Untoward Compulsion.
Secondly, Having a Single Combined Campaign Establishes a Set of
Regulations and Rules Whereby this Money Is Going to Be Handled by the
Key Workers. Absent That Sort of Structure of Separate Controls and Cash
Accounting, You\'re Putting Your People in Harm\'s Way If You\'re Asking
Them to Hold the Checks And the Cash Given by Other People in the
Department. Opm Does Have Three Exceptions And I Will Touch on Them Now,
Because Quite Frankly They Are Important in View of What Secretary
Babbitt Said about How Can We Help People That Have Been Hurt by
Hurricane Floyd. First Is an Exception with Omp Approval for Helping
People That Are the Victims of Natural Disasters, Such as Hurricanes. If
the Department Wants to Engage in Cash Fund Raising to Help Disaster
Victims, it May Do So, but it May Only Do So in a Period That Excludes
the Csc Period. It must Not Pertain or Not Kick In Between September 1
and December 15. Outside of That Period, You May Raise Money with the
Approval of Opm for Disaster Victims. Even During That Period, Though,
There Are Two Other Exceptions That Apply. One, Agencies Are Permitted,
Not Withstanding the Combined Federal Campaign, to Donate Goods Other
than Cash, in the Case of Hurricane Victims, You Could Be Talking
Foodstuffs, You Can Be Talking Paper Supplies, Clothing, In‑kind
Contributions Are Permissible at Any Time of Year. In Most Cases, We See
this for Programs like Toys for Tots and Food Drives. But it Was
Applicable for Helping People in a Disaster Mode. Secondly, If You Have
Your Own Employees That Are Affected by Disaster, O Pm Allows Agencies
To Raise Cash Donations to Benefit the Welfare of its Own Employees If
That Program Is Being Administered by an Employee Association Such as a
Recreation Association. And I Just Want to Make One Last Point Regarding
the Combined Federal Campaign, Because it Seems to Come up Every Year ‑‑
Key Workers, Coordinators Need To Know That the People That Are To Be
Solicited Are Your Own Employees. You Don\'t Hit on Contractors and You
Don\'t Hit on Contractor Personnel, and You Don\'t Hit on Regulators and
the People That Work for Them. This Is a Program That\'s Designed to
Solicit Money from Our Own Federal Employees. So That\'s Another Caution
You Need to Be Mindful Of. When We\'re Talking about Fund Raising, Apart
from the Combined Federal Campaign, You Need ‑‑ There Are Other Cautions
You Need to Be Mindful Of. There Are Many Private Organizations,
Nonprofit Organizations and Interest Groups, That Share the Goals and
The Mission of Your Department Or Agency. And Oftentimes, Agency\'
Officials ‑‑ Agency Officials Are Asked to Speak at an Event Where That
Organization Is Concurrently Trying to Raise Funds. There Is No Rule
That Bars the Agency Employee from Speaking at A Fund Raising Event by a
Private Party, However, the Government Official Cannot Him Or Herself
Participate in That Fund Raising. For Example, the Fund Raising
Organization May Not Use the Appearance of the Federal Official as a
Draw to Get People To Come to the Event. Furthermore, the Federal
Official When Speaking Cannot Him or Herself Participate in The Fund
Raising by Appealing For Money or Being in a Situation That Makes it
Even Appear as If He or She Are Participating in the Fund Raising Aspect
of the Event. Their Involvement in the Event Should Strictly Be to Speak
to What the Agency Is Doing on a Related Subject, to Talk about Agency
Programs That Happen to Harmonize with What the Organization Is Doing.
Not Help the Organization Raise Funds. The next Issue of Fund Raising Is
in One\'s Personal Capacity. Many Federal Employees Are Very Active in
Civic Society, and They Involve Themselves in Any Number of Groups That
May Be Raising Money. In Your Personal Capacity, You May Do So. However,
You May Not Use Government Time, Space or Equipment. Nor Can You Use
Your Subordinates to Help You Organize a Private Fund Raising. You must
Avoid the Use of Your Own Title in Any Literature That Goes out
Regarding a Fund‑raiser. And, Finally, a Common Sense One ‑‑ You must
Not Solicit Your Subordinates Either at Work or At Home on a Private
Charity. The Only Other Fund Raising Aspect I Was Going to Touch on
Dealt with Political Fund Raising, but That\'s More in the Bailiwick of
the Hatch Act Restrictions, and T.j.\'s Going To Speak to Them. The
Basic Rule on Political Fund Raising Is Do Not Do So, Either On the Job
or at Home. T.j., If Can You Pick it up There?

Thank You, John. I Appreciate It. Before I Get Going, Let Me Just Say
Again, If You Have Any Questions, Please Feel Free to Give Us a Call.
Next Hot Topic, the Hatch Act. Back in 1993, Congress Passed Amendments
to the Hatch Act. They Went into Effect February 4th, 1994. And at about
That Time the Newspapers Were Writing Lots of Articles about Employees
Being Hatched or Unhatched. Fact of the Matter Is, Everybody Is Still
Covered by the Hatch Act. It Is Simply That They Carved Out Certain
Groups of Employees Who Would Be Subject to the Amendments. When We\'re
Talking about the Hatch Act, Remember That We Are Only Talking about
Partisan Campaign Activities. What Is Partisan? It Is a Partisan
Election If Any Of the Candidates Who Are Running Are Representatives of
a Marty ‑‑ Party That Got an Electoral Vote in the Last Presidential
Election. So We Know If It\'s a Republican Or Democrat That this Is a
Partisan Campaign. But If There Are People Who Are Running Who Are from
Other Parties, You Still Need to Go Back and Check to See Whether or Not
Their Party Got Any Electoral Votes, and If They Did, It\'s a Partisan
Political Campaign and It\'s Covered by the Hatch Act. Now, Let\'s Talk
a Little Bit About These Groups of Employees. First Off, There Is a
Group That Is Still under the Old Hatch Act Rules. These Include Members
of the Career Ses, Administrative Law Judges, Contract Appeal Board
Members, Federally Election Commission People, Those Who Were in the
Enforcement and Intelligence Communities. Those People Are Not Covered
by The Amendments. The Other Groups Are Technically Referred to as
Everybody Else. They Include Full‑time, Part‑time, Gs, Wage‑grade,
Special Government Employees. They Are Non‑career Ses and They Are
Schedule C Employees. They Are Also Senate Confirmed Presidential
Appointees, but Because a Senate Confirmed Presidential Appointee Is
Considered to Be on Duty 24 Hours a Day, the Rules Are Just A Little Bit
Different for Them, And We\'ll Talk about That as We Go Along. What I
Would like to Do Is Start Out with Those Rules, Those Prohibitions, That
Apply Only to The First Group, the Group That Is Not Covered by the
Amendments. Those Individuals May Not Actively Participate in Any
Political Activities. That Is, Management or Campaign Activities. They
May Not Serve as an Officer Of a Partisan Political Party or A Pac. They
May Not Solicit, Accept or Otherwise Handle Any Funds That Are Part of
this Campaign. And, Finally, They May Not Solicit Votes by Phone, by
Mail Or Personally. They Can\'t Call You Up. They Can\'t Go Door to
Door. They May Not Solicit Votes. Now, There Are Some Additional Rules,
Things That May Not Be Done, and They Apply to All Federal Employees.
Those Include Officially Endorsing a Candidate. Oh, I\'m Sorry, These
Are Still The Career Ses and That Group. They May Not Officially Endorse
A Candidate, Serve as a Delegate, Alternate or Proxy. They May Not Drive
Voters to the Polls on Behalf of a Partisan Political Candidate or
Partisan Political Party. Now We\'re Getting into Those That Apply to
All of Us, and Those Include Running for Partisan Office, Using
Government Time, Funds or Equipment for Political Activities. There\'s a
Little Caveat on this One, and That Has to Do with Your Pasers. As I
Said, Because the Pas Employees Are Not Considered to Be ‑‑ They Are ‑‑
They Are Considered to Be on Duty 24 Hours a Day, So They Have No
Personal Time. So They May Conduct a Limited Amount of Political
Activity on Government Premises. They May Use the Telephone and The
Computer. But the Rest of Us May Not Use Any Government Time, May Not
Use Any Government Funds or Equipment for Political Activity. We May
Not, Any of Us, Solicit Campaign Contributions at All. You May Not Go
Door to Door. You May Not Call People up at Dinner Time and Ask Them for
Money. You May Not Write a Letter Soliciting Funds. May Not Solicit
Funny at Any Time. May Not Solicit Volunteer Activities, Either. The
next Is Using Government Office to Further a Partisan Campaign. You May
Not Use Your Official Position to Coerce Employees or Contractors into
Participating Or Donating Funds for a Partisan Political Activity. And
Finally, You May Not Display What We Might Call Political Stuff at the
Office. Those Are the Buttons, the Badges, the Bumper Stickers, the
Posters. The Only Difference Is If You Have a Bumper Sticker on Your
Car, You May Park it in a Government Lot, Unless You Are Using That
Personal Vehicle for Official Government Travel or Official Government
Business. If You Are Using Your Personal Vehicle in an Official Manner,
Then Either Do Not Put a Bumper Sticker on Your Car or You Need To Cover
it Up. Now Let\'s Move on to What All Federal Employees May Do. You May
Run in a Nonpartisan Election. You May Register and Vote. And You Are
Encouraged to Do So. You May Express Your Personal Opinion. But You Need
to Make Absolutely Sure That it Is Your Personal Opinion. So If You
Write a Letter to the Editor, Be Sure That Your Official Title Is Not
Included Or Your Affiliation with Your Federal Agency. You May Sign a
Political Petition. That\'s for a Referendum, a Constitutional
Amendment, a Municipal Ordinance, or If You Just Want to Put Your Name
on a List Saying That You Think Somebody Ought to Be Able to Run For
Office. That\'s Fine. No Problem. You May Attend a Political Gathering.
Everybody May Attend a Political Gathering. Either a Convention or a
Fund‑raiser. But for Our Group That Are Not Covered by the Amendments,
You May Not Actively Participate in These Events, but You May Attend.
And, Finally, Everyone May Make A Financial Contribution. To a Political
Party or to a Political Candidate. Now, John Surina Is Our Local Expert
on Campaign Contributions, So I Am Going to Ask John If He Would Talk to
Us Just a Little Bit about Campaign Contributions. John?

Be Happy To. Unfortunately, Most of Us Feds Don\'t Have the Resources to
Breach the Contribution Limits, But Each of You Need to Know These
Limits Just in Case You\'re Independently Wealthy or You Hit The
Lottery. The Rules Are Rather Straightforward, and You Can Look These up
at the Website of The Federally Election Commission Which Is Listed at
The End of Our Program. But Basically You May Contribute Up to a
Thousand Dollars per Candidate per Election in Both The Primary and the
General Election Are Considered Two Different Elections. So for Any One
Candidate over The Course of an Election Cycle You May Make Two \$1,000
Donations. You May Donate up to \$5,000 to a Political Action Committee.
And, Finally, You May Donate up To \$20,000, If You Have It, or Are So
Inclined, to a National Party Committee. There Is Another Rule to Keep
in Mind. That\'s \$1,000 per Candidate per Election, \$5,000 to a
Political Action Committee, \$20,000 to a Senate Party Committee. But
Amongst All Committees over The Course of a Calendar Year, You May Not
Donate More than \$25,000. So That\'s the Sum Total of What You Could Do
If You Have the Wherewithal. T.j., Back to You.

Thank You, John. All Right. Let\'s Talk a Little Bit about What Federal
Employees Who Are Covered by the Hatch Act Amendments May Do. These
Folks May Volunteer or Be Employed by a Political Campaign. The Only
Caveat Here, Again, Is For Our Pas Employees, Because They\'re on Duty
24 Hours a Day, May Not Have Two Employers. They May Not Have
Outside‑earned Income from Another Source. So They May Not Be Employed,
but They May Volunteer. For the Rest of Us, We May Volunteer. We May Be
Employed by a Partisan Political Campaign or by a Candidate. We May
Endorse Candidates and Make Speeches for or Against a Particular Matter
or a Candidate Or a Party. We\'re Free to Do So on Our Own Time. We May
Engage in Partisan Grass Roots Activities on Our Own Time, and That\'s
Going Door to Door. Calling People. That Is Making Appearances. I Had
One Gentleman That Called Me One Time Who Asked If He Could Stuff Ballot
Boxes and I Told Him That That Was Generally Not a Good Idea. But He
Realized His Mistake and Said, No, No, What I Really Meant Was, Can I
Stuff Envelopes? The Answer Is, Yes, You May Stuff the Envelopes. And
That Would Be Just Fine. Now, That Pretty Much Is Going To Cover What We
Have for ‑‑ We Have a Student Number 10 at Nctc With a Question. Or a
Comment? Speak to Me.

it Looks like We\'ve Lost Student Number 10. Get Back to Us. We\'ll Take
Your Question When You Get Through. All Right. Let\'s Move on and Talk
about Gifts. The Gift Arena Is Fairly Broad. It Covers Gifts from
Outside Sources. It Covers Gifts Between Employees and Gifts from
Foreign Governments. Now, First Thing You Need to Know Is That the
Prohibition Says That You May Not Accept a Gift from a Prohibited
Source. When We Are Talking about a Gift From an Outside Source. So, a
Prohibited Outside Source May Not Give You a Gift. Who Is a Prohibited
Source? A Prohibited Source Is Any Outside Entity That Has or Is Seeking
to Do Business with Your Agency. Conducts Operations Regulated by Your
Agency. Or Has Interests That May Be Affected by the Performance or
Nonperformance of Ohio Official Responsibilities. It May Be Any Outside
Organization, the Majority of Whose Members Represent Prohibited
Sources. And Finally, it May Be Any Outside Organization, Even the
Nonprofits, Who Are Seeking to Influence Your Agency\'s Policies Or
Regulations. Now, Let\'s Talk about What Is a Gift. A Gift Is Any
Tangible or Intangible Item. It Can Be Food, Gratuities, Services,
Invitations, Such as An Invitation to a Holiday Party At the
Contractor\'s Office, it May Be Tickets to a Sporting or Entertainment
Event, Any ‑‑ Any Tangible or Intangible Item That Is Something of
Value. But There Are Some Exclusions to This Definition. The First One
Is Snacks. We\'re Talking Coffee, Doughnuts, We\'re Talking about Small
Food Items That Are Not in Connection With a Meal. What Constitutes a
Snack? That\'s up to You to Decide Whether or Not You\'ve Received a
Snack or Not. I Know at Home I\'ve Got Three Sons Who Look at a Side of
Beef And See an After‑school Snack. It\'s in the Eyes ‑‑ or in the
Stomachs of the Beholder Here. You Make the Decision. The Second
Exclusion Has to Do With Those Items That Have Minimal Intrinsic Value.
They\'re Greeting Cards. They Are Certificates for Display Purposes
Only. Or for Presentation Purposes Only. These Are the Sorts of Things
That You Couldn\'t Sell at a Garage Sale If You Tried. No Intrinsic
Value. They\'re Not Considered a Gift. Also Not Considered a Gift Is a
Prize in Any Contest That Is Open to the Public. You Win the Lotto, You
Win the Publisher\'s Clearing House, You Win the Reader\'s Digest
Contest, If You Are Still Working for the Government after You Receive
the Prize and You Are Worried about It, Let Me Assure You, That Is Not
Considered to Be a Gift. Next, We Have Discounts and Loans That Are on
the Same Terms And Conditions That Are Given to Members of the Public.
Or to All Federal Employees. If They Limit to Any Class of Employees or
Any Agency, Then it Doesn\'t Count. But If It\'s on Terms and Conditions
That Are Open to Everybody, Either the General Public or All Feds, Then
You May Accept It. For Example, You\'re on ‑‑ Your Family Family
Vacation, You Go To a Hotel, You Go in and You Say, Do You Give a
Government Discount? They Say Yes. You Don\'t Have to Ask Them Whether
or Not They Give it to Everybody, All Feds. You Don\'t Have to Say,
Well, You Know, Do You Limit it in Any Way. No, You Don\'t Have to
Wrestle Them Two Folds out of Three. Just Accept It. It\'s Good. You
Might Want to Check to See If They Give Any Other Discounts. I Know I
like the Aarp Myself. But If They Give it to the Feds, Then That\'s the
Best Can You, Do Go for It. Next, Anything That Is Purchased By the
Government or You Purchase it at a Price That Is Available to the
Public, There Is No Problem. This Is Not Considered to Be a Gift. We\'ve
Gone over the Definition. We\'ve Gone over the Exclusions. There Are
Some Exceptions. We Had a Question That Came in Over the Registration
Process About Whether or Not Somebody Could Accept a Gift Valued at \$5
Or Less. And the Answer Is, the Limit Is \$20 per Occasion from Any
Prohibited Source. With an Aggregate of \$50 from Any One Source in Any
Calendar Year. So the Answer to Our Questioner In Chicago, Was, Yes, If
You Are Offered a Gift Valued at \$5, You May Accept It,, Even Though
the Donor Was a Prohibited Source. The Only Caveat I Would Put on This
One Is That If They Say, I Will Give You this Gift If You Will Do a
Specific Action in Your Official Capacity, Then That\'s Probably Not a
Good Idea. Usually the Gifts We\'re Talking About Are Those Gifts That
Are Given for General Goode Will. Ok. The next Exception to the Rule
Giving ‑‑ or Gift‑giving Rule Is That of Based on a Personal
Relationship. We\'re Talking about Your Personal Friends. We Were\'
Talking about Your Relatives Here. And I Understand That a Lot of People
Who Work with Contractors, Who Work with Outside Organizations, If
You\'re Working with Them for a Long Time, Lots of Times You End up
Being Personal Friends. So Let Us Say That on a Saturday Afternoon
Someone Who Is One of The On‑site Contractors Invites You to Go Biking
with Them. You Can Go. No Problem. At the End of this Good, Healthy
Activity, They Offer to Take You Out for Pizza. No Problem. They Offer
to Pay for the Pizza. The Money for this Pizza Comes Out of Their
Pocket, No Problem. This Is a Gift from a Personal Friend. On the Other
Hand, If Your Mother Works for a Prohibited Source and Gives You a Gift,
but It Was Her Employer That Paid For It, and It\'s Worth More than ‑‑
and It\'s Worth More than \$20, You Can\'t Accept It, Because Since it
Is from the Prohibited Source, You Go Back to the \$20 Rule. Keep Your
Eye on the Ball. Who Is Actually Giving You the Gift? Ok? If It\'s
Personal, It\'s Fine. Ahh, I Understand We Have Student Number 10 at
Nctc Who Is Making Another Valiant Attempt. Talk to Me. Valiant but Not
Successful! Come On, Come On.

Caller: My Colleague Is a Little Shy.

All Righty.

Caller: T.j., Going Back to Something You Said Earlier, it Had to Do
with Campaigns. You Mentioned about Campaigning During Supper Time,
Which Sort Of Implied to Me That That Was Off‑duty. And ‑‑

Oh, Very Good Point.

Caller: Can You Clarify?

Absolutely. That Is an Excellent Point. If You Are on Duty over Supper
Time, Then You Should Not Be Doing That. You Should Not Be Doing it at
Any Time That You Are on Duty And I Apologize for That. I Won\'t Try and
Be Funny Again. I Promise. Ok? But No Soliciting. You May Not Solicit
Funds on Duty or off Duty. Ok? Thank You for That Call. I Appreciate
That. Now, Let\'s Get Back to Gifts and The next Exception Has to Do
With Gifts for ‑‑ as a Result of Your Outside Business or Personal
Relationships. If You Belong to an Organization On the Outside, Outside
of Your Federal Employment, and a Prohibited Source Is Giving a Gift to
Members of That Outside Organization, it Is Permissible For You to
Accept That Gift. Also, If You Are Given a Gift Because Your Spouse or a
Family Member Is Affiliated with a Prohibited Source or Has Some
Dealings with a Prohibited Source, Then You May, Indeed, Accept the
Gift. The Reason for That Is That the Gift Is Being Offered Not Because
of Your Federal Employment, but Because of Your Personal Relationship
with this Family Member or with this Outside Organization. Let\'s Talk
for a Moment about Awards and Honorary Degrees. If You Are Offered an
Award Because of Meritorious Public Service, Because You\'ve Done Your
Job So Well, and the Donor Of this Award Is an Outside Source, and the
Value of the Award ‑‑ Well, If the Award Is a Tangible Item Valued at
\$200 or Less, There\'s No Problem. Can You Just Go Ahead and Accept It.
But If It\'s Cash or If It\'s Valued at More than \$200, Then You Have
to Have a Prior Approval from Your Ethics Counselor. Normally That\'s
Going to Be the Designated Agency Ethics Official, or in Some Instances,
That Will Have Been Been Redelegated down Perhaps to the Alternate
Ethics Counselor. But You Need to Come into the Ethics Counselor, Tell
Them That This Offer Is Going to Be Given To You, Give Them the
Circumstances, Who Is Giving the Award, What ‑‑ Were There Criteria That
Were Established, Were There Looking at Other People. As Long as Your
Ethics Counselors May Determine That This Is Not an Award That Is Being
Given to You Because the Outside Source Knows They Can\'t Give You a
Supplementation of Salary, That this Is Really a Bona Fide Award
Program, Then There Won\'t Be Any Problem at All. So, Be Sure That You
Do. Honorary Degrees, Same Way. Go in and Double Check it with Your
Ethics Office. Now I Would like to Talk a Little Bit about
Widely‑attended Events and I Would like to Talk About Those Because the
Rules Have Changed in the Last Few Years, and Some of You May Be Unaware
of It. If You\'re Invited to a Widely Attended Event for Which There Is
No Dollar Cost Attendant to Going and it Is an Event Where There Are
Going to Be People Representing a Wide Range of Views, If Your Agency
Makes the Prior Determination That it Is In the Government\'s Best
Interest and There\'s No Conflict Of Interest, Then Certainly You May
Attend. If, on the Other Hand, There Is A Dollar Value Attendant to this
Event and the Sponsor of the Event Is Not the Entity That Is Inviting
You to Attend, but Rather a Prohibited Source Has Purchased a Table at
this Event, There Is a Different Set of Rules. If it Is a Nonsponsor Who
Has Invited You and the Value of the Tickets to the Event Are less Than
\$250 Total, That\'s for You And a Guest If That\'s What It\'s Going to
Be, and There Are Going To Be over 100 People, Then You Can Go to Your
Agency, and If Your Agency Determines That It\'s In the Government\'s
Best Interest and That There Is Missouri Conflict of Interest, Then You
May Attend. But If the Value Is over \$250, If There Are Going to Be
Fewer Than 100 People, Then You May Not. We Have Julie in Portland Who
Is Calling In. Julie, What Can We Do for You? Questions, Comments.

Caller: Ok, T.j. I Have a Question for You. I Understood That Earlier in
the Discussion You Indicated That as A Government Employee You Could Ask
for Discounts, like If You Went to a Hotel or Whatever, and I Understood
That You Said That You Could. If That\'s True, Is it Also Possible That
You Could Ask for Discounts at Other Places? I Had Thought That Was
Prohibited.

You Can Ask ‑‑ You Can Ask Anybody Whether or Not They Give A Government
Discount. Most Places Do Not, but Certainly it Is Not Prohibited For You
to Ask, and If You Do Ask If They Give a Government Discount and They
Don\'t Put Any Qualifiers on It, Then You May Accept It. Does That Help?

Caller: it Helps. It\'s Very Clear. It\'s Just Not the Way I Understood
It.

I Don\'t Know of Any Situation Where You Are Prohibited from Asking If
‑‑ If Somebody Gives a Government Discount. John, Did You Have Something
You Wanted to Add?

I Just Want to Reiterate What I Believe T.j. Said Earlier, That this Has
to Be a Discount That\'s Available to All Government Employees, Not a
Particular Department or Not a Particular Type of Government Employee,
but I Know Also it Extends to Things like a Car Rental. There Is
Oftentimes a Discount For Government ‑‑ a Government Rate for Renting
Cars and Provided It\'s Not an Exchange For Some Official Act, and It\'s
Available to All Government Employees, It\'s Perfectly Acceptable.

Ok. We Now Have the Department of Interior and the Department of
Agriculture. If There Is Another Agency out There That Has Perhaps an
Internal Policy That Would like To Call In, We\'d Be Happy to Take Your
Call. Ok. We Have Betsy from Epa. Betsy?

Caller: Hi. I Think That My Question Was Essentially the Same as the
Previous Caller\'s.

Ok.

Caller: but Let Me Make Sure That I\'m Understanding You, Because ‑‑ Are
You Saying That We Can Take Advantage ‑‑ If a Company or a Hotel or a
Car Rental Place Offers a Rate That\'s Available for Government
Employees, That We Can Take Advantage of That for Private Purposes?

That Is Correct. If it Is Available to All Government Employees, You May
Take Advantage of It. It\'s Only When It\'s Limited That There\'s a
Problem.

Caller: but We Are ‑‑ We\'re Sitting Here Questioning This, Because None
of Us Have Ever Exercised This, Especially for Government Rates at
Hotels When You\'re Not on Business.

It\'s Available to You. 5 Cfr 2635 Is Your Citation, If You Want to Go
and Look it Up. If Don Nankis Is Listening and He Is Your Alternate Deo
at Epa, If He Would like to Weigh In, We Would like to Hear from Him.

Caller: We Understood Those Rates Were Negotiated for the Federal
Government and So That We Would Not Be Taking Advantage ‑‑ We Would Be
Using Our Position as a Government Employee to Access Something That Had
Been Negotiated Specifically for the Federal Government.

That\'s Only If it Is for Your Agency ‑‑ If You Are Getting Something
That Is Not Available To Anyone. A Commercial Enterprise Can Set Their
Rates Any Way They Want To, and If They Want to Take the Negotiated Rate
and They Want to Open it up to Everyone, That\'s Fine. That Is Their
Right.

Caller: Ok.

Ok?

Caller: Thank You.

All Righty. Let\'s See. We\'ve Got Another Question Coming In. We\'ve
Got Karen from Epa. Karen? Karen, Got a Question? We\'ve Lost Karen. Ok.
We Have Dan in Arizona. Dan?

Caller: from the Short Bit That I Caught, I Guess You May Have Already
Answered This, but I Still Doubt Whether the Answer Is 100% Correct,
That Employees Not on Official Business Can Ask For a Government
Discount. Is That What You Are Saying?

That Is What I Am Saying.

Caller: Thank You.

All Righty. Ok. Let\'s Move on Here So That We Can Talk about Some Other
Things. The Last Exception under Gift Acceptance Has to Do with Speaking
Engagements. If You Are Speaking in Your Official Capacity at a Seminar,
A Conference, Anything like That, and Let\'s Say You\'re the Luncheon
Speaker, That Lunch Is Not Considered to Be a Gift. That Lunch Is Part
of What You Are Doing to Do Your Official Government Business, and You
Don\'t Have to Worry about the \$20 Rule or Anything Else. You Can Sit
up on the Dais and Eat the Rubber Chicken along With the Rest of the
Speakers, And That\'s Fine. Also, If You Are at a Seminar or A
Conference, They May Waive the Conference Fee or the Seminar Fee for
That Day. Not for the Entire Conference, But for the Day on Which You
Are Speaking. All Right. Let\'s Speak Just Briefly about Agency‑specific
Gift Acceptance Exceptions, and That Is If Your Agency Has its Own
Exceptions as A Result of Their Legislation, Their Statutes, Then You
May Accept it as Long as You Have The Approval of the Authorizing
Official. It must Be a Benefit to the Government. It must Not Create the
Appearance of an Impropriety. When You Accept this Gift on Behalf of
Your Agency, You Bring It Back to the Office, and You Turn it into Your
Property Officer. Your Property Officer Will Bar Code It, and Then If
It\'s Appropriate, the Property Officer May Give it Back to You And You
May Display it in Your Office. You Can Keep it There for as Long as You
Work for the Agency. But When You Leave, You Do Not Take it with You.
Give You a Quick Example. I Was Giving a Presentation One Time,
Explained the Agency Gift Acceptance Authority, and I Had A Gentleman
Who Raised His Hand And He Said, Oh, Dear, I May Have Done Something
Wrong. Just Last Week the Community Gave Me a Horse. What Do I Do? And,
of Course, Then We Had a Discussion about Whether or Not The Horse Was
Worth \$20 or Not. And Once We Determined That it Was Worth More than
\$20, the Answer Was, You Take it Back to The Office, You Give to it
Your Property Officer and Let Him Worry about the Bar Coding. He Also
Has to Worry about the Feeding and the Stabling of this Animal. But You
May Not Take the Horse With You When You Go. All Righty. Let\'s Talk
Real Quick ‑‑ Oh, We Have Karen Back. Karen, Epa.

Caller: Hi, T.j. We Need to Go Back Briefly to The Question about the
Government Rate and a Specific Question Has Come up about Taking the
Government Rate for Airline Tickets, If That Is a Rate That Employees
May Accept When They Are Not on Official Business. And, If So, Can They
Accept it For the Family Members as Well As Themselves?

All Right. You May Ask an Airline If They Give a Government Rate. Most
Airlines Do Not. Occasionally There May Be an Airline Who Is Willing to
Have a Promotion. They May Do It. And in That Case, If They Are Willing
to Give That Rate to Any Government Employee, Then They May Accept It.
And It\'s ‑‑ It\'s Whatever the Airline Will Give. Ok? All Right. Let Me
Say This. We\'re Going ‑‑ We\'re Going to Finish up the Presentation,
and Then after the Break, Let\'s Go Back to this Issue If There Are
Still Concerns. But We\'ve Got a Lot of Information That We Need to
Cover, and I\'d like to Get Through, Because We\'re Hitting The 3:00
Mark, and There Are People That Have Other Meetings And Other Things
That They Have To Go To. Ok? All Right. Let\'s Talk Just Briefly about
Gifts Between Employees. This Is Going to Be Real Brief. Generally
Speaking, You Are Not Supposed to Be Giving Gifts to Your Official
Superiors. That\'s Supervisors or Anybody up Your Chain of Command That
Can Affect Your Finances, Your Awards, Your Training, Your Career
Opportunities. You Are Not Supposed to Be Soliciting Gifts from
Subordinates for ‑‑ or Soliciting from Subordinates for Gifts to Your
Official Superiors. Unless There Is an Exception That Applies. Now, the
Exceptions Would Include, on an Infrequent Basis, Items of \$10 or Less,
Food and Drink That Are in the Office, Shared in the Office, You Want To
Have a Potluck Lunch, That\'s Fine. Personal Hospitality, the Boss
Invites to You Their House. You May Go. You May Take a Host Test Gift.
In New York That May Be a Bottle Of Booze. In California it it Be a
Bottle Of Wine. In the Rest of the Country, it Could Be a Six‑pack.
Whatever Is Considered Reasonable in Your Neighborhood, Feel Free to Do
That. No Dollar Limit. Also, Leave Transferred under an Approved Agency
Leave‑sharing Program, Though in Most Cases Though Programs Do Not Allow
You To Give Leave to Your Immediate Supervisor. Also, There Is One Other
Exception and That Is for Those Infrequent Occasions When There Is an
Event of Personal Significance, Such as a Marriage, Such as a Birth of a
Child, an Illness, or Any Occasion Where the Official Relationship Is
Severed, Such as A Retirement or a Transfer to Another Job That Takes
Either Party out of the Chain of Command. So Whenever We Have That Sort
of A Situation, You May Give a Gift To an Official Superior, and There
Is No Dollar Limit on It. Quickly, Gifts from Foreign Governments.
You\'re Not Supposed to Take a Gift from a Foreign Government. However,
We All Know That We ‑‑ When We Travel Overseas, Very Frequently We Are
Dealing with Cultures Where They Want to Give Gifts. It\'s Part of Their
Culture. So If the Gift Is of Minimal Value, That\'s \$260 or Less, Then
You May Personally Accept That Gift. And That\'s Fine. Also, You Can
Accept a Gift That\'s an Educational Scholarship, Medical Treatment, Or
When Refusal Would Cause an Embarrassment to Either the Foreign
Government or to Our Government. And, Finally, Transportation Taking
Place Entirely Outside of The United States. You\'ve Gone to Meeting, to
a Conference Outside of the United States, and They Want to Take The
Attendees to an off Site and They Want to Provide Transportation. You
May Accept It. If it Is Entirely Outside of the United States. Now, If
That Transportation Is Originating in the United States Or Comes Back to
the United States, a Different Set of Rules Apply. Congress Realized
That as the Travel Budgets Got Smaller and Smaller for Agencies, That it
Was More and More Difficult for Agencies to Actually Meet the Needs of
the Agency with Respect To Their Travel, and as a Result, They Passed 31
Usc 1353. This Is an Augmentation of Appropriation for Agencies, for
Agencies, Only Agencies Can Accept. And What it Says Is That with Prior
Approval If an Employee Has Received an Unsolicited Invitation for
Travel and Related Expenses to Any Event Such as a Conference, a
Seminar, Training, Where There Is an Exchange of Information, Then The
Agency May Accept Reimbursement from the Outside Source. What the
Employee Does Is They Take this Unsolicited Offer to Pay, They Take it
to Whoever Approves Their Travel, along With a Travel Authorization.
That Individual Will See to it That the Appropriate Folks Sign Off
Saying That it Is All Right For the Agency to Accept the Reimbursement.
The Employee Travels, Comes Back, Puts in the Travel Voucher. Now, If
the Travel Arrangements, Such as the Airline Ticket, the Food, the
Hotel, Has Been Provided In‑kind, That Is, They Sent You the Airline
Ticket, They Presented You with the Meal, They Presented You with The
Hotel Key, Then You Just Put Down on Your Voucher That Travel And
Related Expenses, Whatever They Are, Were Provided In‑kind By this
Outside Source. Let\'s Talk Just a Moment about ‑‑ Oh, We\'ve Got a
Call, Tom From Nasa. What Should We Do with Frequent Flyer Miles
Accumulated as a Result of Government Travel. Tom, I Am So Glad You
Asked. If We Will Get the next Bullet. Thank You. Frequent Flyer Miles.
If You Are Flying at Government Expense and You Accrue Frequent Flyer
Miles, Those Frequent Flyer Miles Belong to the Government and May Only
Be Used For a Free Ticket for Government Travel or If Your Agency
Approves for an Upgrade to Business Class. It Used to Be That You Could
Not Combine Your Mileage, Your Personal Frequent Flyer Mileage, With
Outside Mileage. That Is No Longer the Case. You May Co‑mingle Them as
Long As You Keep Very, Very Good Records. And as Long as You\'re Not
Using The Official Miles for Personal Travel or Personal Upgrades,
You\'re Doing Just Fine. Now, the Other Question That We Frequently Get
Has to Do with The Bump Rules, That Is, If an Airline Has Overbooked and
They Bump You off a Flight and They Give You Any Kind of a Benefit, Be
it a Ticket, Be it Dollars Off Coupon or a Meal Ticket, Those Belong to
the Government. Those Belong to the Government. They Are Not Yours
Personally. But If the Airline Says We Have Overbooked and There Is ‑‑
We\'ll Give a Free Ticket to Anybody Who Wants to Turn in Their Ticket,
and It\'s Not Going to Cost the Government Any Additional Money and it
Is Not Going to Interfere with the Business of the Government, Then You
May Avail Yourself of That And You May Take Whatever Benefit it Is That
They Have Offered. John Did, They Hand Us Another Question Here?

it Came Back and While We\'re On Travel, It\'s Useful to Bring It up
Again. The Question That We Received From Epa, and We\'ve Had a Couple
Other Callers about Discounts Generally, Asking If They Can Have
Discounted Airfare. You Brought up the Fact That Discounted Airfare
Would Be Permissible. This Is Not Speaking to Contract Air Rates,
However. Contract Air Is for Your Gtr, For Your Actual Government Travel
on Official Duty. But If You Look at it from the Point of View You Have
Contract Air for Official Duty, If an Airline for a Promotional Purpose
Wants to Offer All Federal Employees a Discount, That Would Be
Permissible. I Haven\'t Seen It.

Neither Have I.

but as Far as Using the General Discounts to All People, That\'s Fine.
Epa, You Have to Take Yes for an Answer Here!

Ok. Let\'s Wrap up Real Quick with The Use of Government Equipment,
Government Credit Cards, since It Kind of Is a Nice Segue from Travel.
You Use the Government Travel Credit Card Only in Conjunction With
Official Government Travel. You May Only Use it for Those Types of
Things Such as Transportation, Lodging, Meals, Tips That Are in
Conjunction With Your Official Government Travel. Even Though You\'re on
Government Travel, You May Not Use the Government Card to Buy Souvenirs
For Your Kids. You May Not Use it for Anything That the Government Is
Not Going To Reimburse You For, and That Includes Going to the Local
Public and Buying a Round for The Bar and We\'ve Had Employees Who Have
Done That Sort of Thing. We Had One Employee Who Went out And Bought
Himself a Car. His Reason Being, Well, There Was No Interest Rate on It.
Well ‑‑ You\'re Not Supposed to Use the Government Card for Anything
That\'s Not in Conjunction with Official Travel. When You Are Using an
Official Government Vehicle, You Need to Be Very Careful, Again, to Only
Use That in Conjunction with the Official Travel. Now, I Know There Are
an Awful Lot of People Who Will Use the Government Vehicle on Extended
Tdy, and When You Have the Extended Tdy, Generally Speaking, Your Agency
Will Either Have a Policy in Place or They Will Have Something Written
On Whatever the Authorizing Document Is That Allows You to Take That ‑‑
to Check That Vehicle out That Will Say That You May Use That Vehicle
for Any Reasonable and Necessary Personal Use. And Reasonable and
Necessary Would Include Things like Going To the Grocery Store, the Post
Office, the Laundromat, Anything Like That. Reasonable and Necessary.
It\'s Not Taking a Vacation. It\'s Not Going to the Casinos. That Is Not
Considered to Be a Reasonable Use of a Government Vehicle. When We\'re
Talking about a Rental Car, These Are the Cars That Do Not Have the
Agency Logo On the Side, We\'re Not Quite So Sticky about That Sort of
Thing. You\'re in a Contract with the Rental Company. But, Still, You
Need to Use this Car in an Appropriate Manner. You Don\'t Want to Bring
Concern On Behalf of the Public down Upon Us Because You Were Using That
Inappropriately. Finally, Let\'s ‑‑ or next Let\'s Talk a Little Bit
about Penalty Mail. Penalty Mail Is Anything with The Official Stamp on
it That Says \"Official Business Penalty For Private Use, \$300.\" You
Don\'t Use the Penalty Mail To Send out Your Christmas Cards Or Holiday
Cards. You Do Not Use it for Your Personal Correspondence. You Do Not
Use the Penalty Mail To Lobby a Member of Congress. This Is Where a Lot
of People Get into Trouble. Remember, this Is Only for Official
Business. If You Are Going to Be Lobbying A Member of Congress, You May
Not Use Appropriated Funds in Any Way, Shape or Form. But You May Lobby
Congress on Your Own Time Using Your Own Stamps and Envelope and Your
Right to Lobby Congress, Your Elected Representatives, Shall Not Be You
a Bridged Nor Denied. And Finally, I Know That People Are Very
Interested in the New Acceptable Use Policy. A Few Years Back the
Justice Department Came out with an Opinion Saying That They Believed
That it Was Acceptable That Federal Employees Use Government Equipment
for Limited Personal Use as Long as There Was No Additional Cost to the
Government. Now, Shortly Thereafter, the Counsel for Chief Information
Officers Put out an Advisory Opinion about Internet Use. A Lot of
Agencies Have Accepted Both the Justice Department and The C.i.o.
Counsel Recommendations, and They Are Writing Their Own Acceptable Use
Policies. I Know at the Department of the Interior, Our Acceptable Use
Policy Is on the D.o.i. Homepage, Kind of down in the Bottom Right‑hand
Corn for People Would like to Look at It. It Speaks a Lot ‑‑ or
Primarily To the Use of the Internet. And Across the Board, the C.i.o.
Recommendations Again Spoke to The Use of the Internet, and Let Me Tell
You about That as an Example of the Acceptable Use Policy. If One Is
Going to Be Using the Internet, and We Encourage People to Become
Familiar, to Research and to Use the Internet To Get Information for
Their Official Jobs, and Part of That In the Familiarization Process Is
Allowing Employees to Use Their Own Time Before Work, After Work and on
Their Lunch Hour to Surf the Net, to Become Familiar with It. But You
May Not Use Official Government Time to Get Your Sports Scores, to Go to
Ebay, to Go to Any of the Other Sites That You Would Want to Look at For
Personal Uses. Before Work, after Work and on Your Lunch Hour it Would
Be Acceptable. As Long as There Is No Additional Cost to the Government,
as Long as You Are Not Using it for Commercial Purposes or for Illegal
or Immoral Purposes. And by That I Mean, That You\'re Not Going to Be
Buying and Selling Online. You\'re Not Going to Be Conducting Your
Outside Work Orphaned Raising. You\'re Not Going to Be Lobbying As I
Said Earlier. You Can\'t Use Government Supplies and Equipment for
Lobbying. You May Not Engage in Political Activity. And You Cannot Use
the Government Internet as a Platform for Hacking into Other Computers.
Now, What We\'re Going to Do Now Is to Take about a Three‑minute Break
for Those of You Who Have Additional Questions or Would Like to Revisit
the Discount Issue. Come Back to Us in Three Minutes And We\'d Be Happy
to Talk to You For as Long as it Takes. Thank You. I Understand We\'ve
Got a Number Of Questions in the Queue. Also You May Want to Talk to
Your Onsite Coordinator. If You Do Not Have the Capability of Calling
into Us Today. Thank You.

We\'re Back. We Do Have a Special Request for You. There\'s a Website
That We Asked For the Side Coordinators to Record Attendance at Your
Various Sites. It\'s on Your Screen Right Now. So with That out of the
Way, Let\'s Get on to Some of the Questions. We Have Judy at Cdc. Are
You There, Judy? We\'ve Lost Judy.

Caller: No, You Haven\'t Lost Judy. My Question Relates to Travel
Reimbursement.

Judy, We Had a Little Technical Difficulty. Could You Repeat Your
Question, Please? Moo Quest My Question Relates to Travel Reimbursement.
If a Cooperative Agreement Partner Invites a Government Employee Who Is
a Technical Expert to Present a Lecture or Something in a Training
Course, Can the Cooperative Agreement Partner Reimburse the Agency for
The Travel Expenses for the Employee, or must the Agency Pay Those
Expenses Directly?

the First Question I Would Ask Back to You Is Whether or Not There Are
Any Provisions in The Cooperative Agreement That Provides for That Other
Party to Pay for Travel. If There Are, Then the Answer Is Yes. If There
Are Not, Then under 31 Usc 1353, If it Meets the Criteria, Then They
May. So it Has to Be to an Exchange Of Information, Either a Training,
Conference, Seminar. If It\'s a Site Visit, That Would Be Acceptable
Also, as Long as The Site Visit Was for the Exchange of Information and
Not To Conduct the Official Responsibilities. The Statutorily Mandated
Responsibilities of the Agent, Such as an Inspection. So, Yes, the
Answer Is They Could.

Caller: Thank You.

Max in Fort Snelling.

Caller: Can You Hear Me?

Yes, We Can, Barely.

Caller: Now Can You Hear Me?

Yes, We Can.

Caller: this Goes to Travel, What Can You Do While You\'re on Travel. I
Travel at Least 80% of My Time. I\'m a Construction Representative. We
Get into Situations Where We Get Bumped, Especially in Detroit,
Michigan, at the Airport There.

I\'ve Been Bumped There Myself.

Caller: \[ Inaudible \] We Can\'t Call Overtime or Anything on ‑‑ after
Our Working Hours, Which Mine Happens to Be 3:30. I\'ve Got Bumped
Several Times And Gotten ‑‑ Not Known Whether I Could Take the Cash
Money, Which Is up to \$200 Now, Towards The next Flight. I Have Been
Refusing That Lately, but Under, I Think, from Now I\'m Going to Accept
That Gratuity, If You Want to Call it That. I Don\'t See Nothing Wrong
with Taking That Gratuity When I\'m on My Own Time, Because I Get
Bumped. Both from St. Louis and from Detroit.

Thank You.

Caller: Is There a Problem With That as Far as Your Point Of View?

Let\'s Make Sure That I Understand Your Question. That Is, When You Are
Traveling, You Are Bumped by the Airline ‑‑ If You Are Bumped by the
Airline, Then the Government Continues to Pay Your per Diem And and the
Government Gets Any Benefits. But If the Airline as Overbooked And the
Airline Asks You If You Would Voluntarily like to Take a Later Flight,
Then You Take Yourself out of a Travel Status, In Essence, Because
You\'re Not Going to Be Charging the Government Any Additional per Diem,
and as Long as It\'s Not Going to Be Costing the Government More Money,
as Long As It\'s Not Going to Be Interfering with the Government\'s
Business, Then You May. Now, it May Be If It\'s in the Middle of a Day,
Say a Friday Afternoon, and You Get ‑‑ You Voluntarily Take Yourself out
of Travel Status at Noon and Don\'t Go Back into Travel Status until
After 6:00 in the Afternoon, Then for That Part of the Day When You
Would Have Been in Travel Status, You\'re Going to Have to Take Leave.
But Other than That, If It\'s Voluntary, No Cost to the Government,
Doesn\'t Interfere With the Government\'s Business, Can You Take That.
And I Think That It\'s Admirable That Somebody Who Travels 80% of Their
Time Wants to Take a Free Ticket and Travel More. I Think That\'s Great.
Does That Answer Your Question?

Caller: I Know It\'s Travel Annual Because It\'s Only 33 Cents for a
Stamp, but When You Send in Your Application for Reemployment Someplace
Else Within the Government and Use a Government Envelope ‑‑ I Think
That\'s Ridiculous. I Think from Now on They Should Change That Room a
Little Bit And Be Able to Use a Government Envelope, Because You\'re
Employing for Another Government Entity, and It\'s Within the
Government.

I Would Not Argue with You.

Caller: I Think That Should Be Changed Shortly or ‑‑

I Would Not Argue with You, However, That Is the Rule. When You Are
Sending in a Job Application, That Is Considered To Be Your Personal
Business and When it Is Your Personal Business, Then You Are Expected To
Pay Your Own Postage. But Thanks for the Question. We Have a Question
from Jay at Nasa.

Caller: Hello. Can You Hear Me?

Yes.

Caller: I Have a Question Regarding the Use of Government Vehicles on
Official Travel. I Want to Make Sure That I ‑‑ \[ Feedback \] Can You
Still Here Me? I Want to Make Sure I Understand The Rule. When You\'re
‑‑ When You Live in The Direction of the Travel That You\'re Going to Be
Going and You\'re Taking a Government Vehicle, I\'d like to Understand
Why Is it Not a Reasonable Use Of That Government Vehicle to Take the
Vehicle Home with You On the Night Before and Then Leave from Your House
to Go Where You\'re Going? It Seems like ‑‑

That Is a Management Decision. It Is Made by the Agencies, Individual
Agencies, but it Is a Pretty General Rule. Most Agencies Don\'t Do That.
They Do Not Consider That It\'s a Good Idea to Have Their Vehicles
Parked out in Front of Somebody\'s Personal Residence. But That Is
Something That You Will Have to Take up with Your Own Individual Agency,
with Your Deo, or with Your Own Local Ethics Counselor. I\'m Sorry. That
Is One That I Cannot Answer For You.

Caller: No, You Answered a Lot. I Think What I Heard You Telling Me Was
That Nasa Has Made That Decision and in Accepting the Cost Implications
of That?

That Is Correct.

Caller: Thank You.

I Should ‑‑ If I May at this Time, We\'ve Got a Couple Faxes That Have
Come in on Fund Raising That I Think I Can Answer Rather Quickly. We Had
a Question from Frank in BLM Wanting to Know If an Employee Association
Can Engage In Fund Raising on Behalf of a Local Charity. As a Matter of
Fact, They Can. The Employee Association Is a Separate Entity. It\'s a
Not Governmental Entity. It Is Not Considered the Agency Of the
Employees Who Work There. So That\'s a Yes. The next Question, Though,
Another BLM Question, Came in And Said That They Are Partnering with a
Nonprofit Organization, and They Want to Know If as Part of Their Role,
If I\'m Reading this Correctly, Can They Engage in Fund Raising With
That Other Organization, That Nongovernmental Entity? And the Answer
There Is No, That Their Restrictions on Fund Raising as a Federal
Employee Still Attach to Them Even Though They\'re Working with Another
Organization in an Official Capacity. They Can Do the Fund Raising, But
You Ought Not to Do So.

I\'m Sorry. We Are Running out of Satellite Time. But We Will Get Back
to Everyone That Has Faxed in a Question, And If You Want to E‑mail to
Us, We Will Get the Answers Back to All of You. I Thank You So Much for
Your Participation. You Have Been Wonderful! We Look Forward to Doing
this Again in the Future. Take Care. \[ Short Break \]

Caller: this Is Lynn from the Usda in Stoneville. Two Questions ‑‑
First, as Far as Utilizing Government Postage for Payments For the
Government Travel Cards, Can the Government Mail Our Payments, or Can We
Use Government Postage to Mail Our Payments In?

That\'s a Good One. That\'s a New One on Me. It\'s Interesting, Because
the Charges Go to You Personally, as You Know.

Caller: Right.

I Think Quite Frankly I Would Err on the Side of Caution since It Comes
to You and You\'re Obliged to Pay for It, You Should Probably Put Your
Own Stamp on There.

Caller: Ok. The Other Question I Have Is ‑‑ Are Gsa, Companies Which
Offer Gsa Discounts for Tangible Items, Such as Desks or Computers, If I
Ask Them When I Call Whether or Not They Offer Gsa Discounts and They
Say Yes, Can I on My Personal Time as a Federal Employee Purchase an
Item at a Gsa Discount?

Yeah, as a Matter of Fact ‑‑ This Is T.j. As a Matter of Fact, a Lot of
Companies Will Do That, and They Will Put That in Their Advertisements,
That They Will Offer the Gsa Rate to Government Employees with
Identification. So If a Company Will Do That to Any Government Employee,
Then That\'s Fine. Now, When We Were Talking about Discounts Earlier,
the One Thing That I Didn\'t Say That We Really Do Need to Make Sure
That People Understand Is That We Do Not Expect the Employees to Be
Giving the Vendors the Impression That They Are on Official Government
Business in Order to Get the Government Rate For Their Personal Hotel
Discount or Purchase of Tangible Items. What They Need to Do Is to Just
Go in and Say, You Know, \"I\'ve Got Triple‑a, I\'ve Got Aarp, I\'m A
Government Employee, Do You Give a Government Rate?\" And If the Hotel
Is Willing to Do It, or If the Vendor Is Willing to Give You a Rate,
Then It\'s Going to Be Ok.

Let Me Add One Other Caution. What You Styled a Gsa Discount, Which Is
Available to All Government Employees Is Permissible, but I Have Seen
Some Deals, If You Wish to Call Them That, Where a Specific Vendor Said
If Your Agency Buys Our Hardware or Software, Then Everybody Within That
Agency Can Have That Discount. In Those Cases, it Does Not Apply,
Because It\'s Not a Broad Governmentwide Discount.

Caller: Ok. I Understand That. Thank You Very Much.

Yes, Indeed.

Thank You.

Caller: Bye‑bye.