This Advisory Opinion concerns the following issue as formulated from facts and/or circumstances furnished by a requestor. The Commission approved this opinion on June 14, 2002, basing its approval solely on the facts and circumstances stated herein.

May the city pay the mayor, board of aldermen and police officers from the water and sewer fund to meet payroll?

State law restricts the Mississippi Ethics Commission to interpreting and issuing opinions on Sections 25-4-101 through 25-4-119, 1972 Mississippi Code Annotated and Article IV, Section 109, Mississippi Constitution of 1890.  Therefore, this opinion does not address the Mississippi laws outside the Commission’s jurisdiction nor the governmental entity’s internal rules and regulations.

The pertinent conflict of interest laws to be considered here are:

Code Section 25-4-103(e), (g)(ii), (h) and (p)(i)(ii)(iii) state:
 

“(e) ‘Compensation’ mean money or thing of value received, or to be received, from any person for services rendered.

(g) ‘Governmental’ means the state and all political entities thereof, both collectively and separately, including but not limited to:
 

(ii) Municipalities.

(h) ‘Governmental entity’ means the state, a county, a municipality or any other separate political subdivision authorized by law to exercise a part of the sovereign power of the state.

 
(p) ‘Public servant’ means:
 

(i) Any elected or appointed official of the government;

(ii) Any officer, director, commissioner, supervisor, chief,  head, agent or employee of the government or any agency thereof, or of any public entity created by or under the laws of the State of Mississippi or created by an agency or governmental entity thereof, any of which is funded by public funds or which expends, authorizes or recommends the use of public funds; or

(iii) Any individual who receives a salary, per diem or expenses paid in whole or in part out of funds authorized to be expended by the government.”

Code Section 25-4-105(1) states:
 

“(1) No public servant shall use his official position to obtain pecuniary benefit for himself other than that compensation provided for by law, or to obtain pecuniary benefit for any relative or any business with which he is associated.”

Pertinent facts and circumstances provided by the requestor, absent identifying data, are set forth as follows and considered a part of this opinion.
 

The purpose of this letter is, The Town has concerns about the payroll for the Mayor, Board of Alderman and Policeman.  My question is, if there are no funds available for the month to meet payroll and funds are in the water and sewer account can a transfer be done to meet that payroll?  Also can they receive two checks in one month because of no funds were available doing the previous month?

Based solely on the facts and circumstances presented by the requestor, the Commission’s opinion is as follows.

The conflict of interest laws, specifically the above cited Code Section 25-4-105(1), allow the mayor, board of aldermen and police officers to be compensated as provided by law.  However, the specific payment method and procedures, as defined by law, should be directed to the Office of the Attorney General and the Office of the State Auditor as the specific manner of payment for these public servants are not dictated by the conflict of interest laws.
 
 

Scott Rankin
Executive Director