Code of Ethics

PURPOSE: The board is charged with assisting and advising the state in ensuring the availability, implementation, and enhancement of a statewide emergency telephone number common to all jurisdictions. The board and its staff are held to the highest ethical and professional standards and must conduct all business in a manner which maintains the public trust. Therefore, the following Code of Ethics prescribes measures to prohibit practices that possess a potential of wrongdoing or the appearance of impropriety. (1) Standard of Compliance for Board and its Staff. Each member of the board and all board staff are directed to read and comply with this Code of Ethics and with Executive Order 92-04 dated January 31, 1992. For the purposes of this Code of Ethics, the term staff shall include the board’s executive director, staff, and state employees who provide day-to-day services to the board. The board shall be responsible for the enforcement of applicable statutes, the provisions of the Executive Order, and this rule by the suspension or discharge, other disciplinary action, or other action as the board deems appropriate. (2) Compensation. No member or staff of the board shall solicit anything of value, nor shall any member or staff of the board accept anything of value, in addition to that compensation received from the board or state of Missouri in their official capacity, intended to influence the member or staff’s official duties or in exchange for having exercised the member’s or staff’s official powers or performed the member’s or staff’s official duties in a particular manner. For the purposes of this rule, grant or payment of a thing of value to another person on behalf of the member or staff shall be considered grant or payment to the member or staff. Nothing in this rule shall preclude the acceptance of any award, presentation, honor, or memorabilia presented to the member or staff of the board in recognition of his/her performance in his/her official capacity and not designed to influence any particular action taken by the member or staff of the board. (3) Confidentiality. No information furnished to the board by a corporation, organization, or person that the board deems to be a closed record under Chapter 610, RSMo, shall be open to public inspection or made public except on order of the board. (4) Use of Confidential Information. No member or staff of the board shall use or disclose confidential information gained in the member’s or staff’s official position or activities to further the member’s or staff’s own financial or political interests or the financial or political interests of anyone else. (5) Duty to Maintain Confidentiality. A former member or staff of the board having information that s/he knows is confidential governmental information or knew was confidential governmental information at the time the member or staff acquired the information about a person or matter subject to the jurisdiction of the board while the member or staff was associated with the board, may not disclose such information without the consent of the board granted before such disclosure and after complete disclosure to the board of the information sought to be disclosed, all persons to whom the information is to be disclosed, and the reasons for such disclosure. Confidential information means information that has been obtained under governmental authority and which, at the time this rule is applied, the government or the board is prohibited by law from disclosing to the public or has a legal privilege not to disclose, and which is not otherwise available to the public. AUTHORITY: section 650.325, RSMo Supp. 2020.* Emergency rule filed May 6, 2020, effective May 21, 2020, expired Feb. 25, 2021. Original rule filed May 7, 2020, effective Dec. 30, 2020. *Original authority: 650.325, RSMo 1997, amended 2017.