Personnel
Board Policy No. 4112.8
Policy Adopted: August 19, 2010
EMPLOYMENT OF RELATIVES OR PERSONS WITH ROMANTIC OR PERSONAL RELATIONSHIPS
The Governing Board desires to maximize staff and community confidence in district hiring, promotion, and other employment decisions by promoting practices that are free of conflicts of interest or the appearance of impropriety.
(cf. 4030 - Nondiscrimination in Employment)
(cf. 9270 - Conflict of Interest)
The Board prohibits the appointment or continuing assignment of any person to a position for which his/her relative (or a person with whom he/she has an intimate or romantic relationship) maintains management, supervisory, evaluation, or promotion responsibilities. The Board further prohibits an employee from participating in any decision that singularly applies to any of his/her relatives or to any person with whom he/she has an intimate or romantic relationship.
In the event that an employee marries or enters into an intimate or romantic relationship with a person in a position for which he/she maintains management, supervisory, evaluation, or promotion responsibilities, the Superintendent or designee shall first attempt to reach a collaborative resolution with the parties involved. If a collaborative resolution cannot be reasonably reached, the Superintendent shall have discretion to re-assign one or both of the employees to eliminate any potential conflict of interest. (Re-assignment may result in placement in a lower classification and/or a lower position on the salary schedule.)
In the event that one of the employees is the Superintendent, the specific remedies with respect to the Superintendent shall be defined in the Superintendent’s contract. The Superintendent’s contract is a public document and a copy of the current agreement shall be available upon request at the District Office.
(cf. 4111/4211/4311 - Recruitment and Selection)
(cf. 4115 - Evaluation/Supervision)
For purposes of this policy, “relatives” includes the individual’s spouse, domestic partner, parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, children, grandchildren, great-grandchildren, brothers, sisters, aunts, uncles, nieces, nephews, cousins, and the similar family of the individual’s spouse or domestic partner.
For the purposes of this policy, an “intimate or romantic relationship” includes dating, sexual contact of any type, or any other similar private activity that might compromise an employee’s ability to evaluate his/her partner effectively or impartially.
In addition, the Superintendent or designee may, on a case-by-case basis, refrain from appointing a person to a position in the same department or facility as an employee with whom he/she maintains a personal relationship when that relationship has the potential to create (1) an adverse impact on supervision, safety, security, or morale of other district employees or (2) a conflict of interest for the individuals involved which is greater because of the their relationship than it would be for another person.
An employee shall notify his/her supervisor within 30 days of any change in his/her circumstances that may constitute a violation of this policy.
Legal Reference:
EDUCATION CODE
35107 School district employees
FAMILY CODE
297-297.5 Rights, protections, benefits under the law; registered domestic partners
GOVERNMENT CODE
1090-1098 Prohibitions applicable to specified officers
12940 Unlawful employment practices
CODE OF REGULATIONS, TITLE 2
7292.0-7292.6 Marital status discrimination, especially:
7292.5 Employee selection