Personal use of public property discussed

Bobbie Bicknell Coray, Reporter

Rich Civic Times

RANDOLPH, Utah.  June 5, 2019.  When can a government employee use government property?  That was the question asked and answered by the Utah State Legislature with HB 163.  Unfortunately according to many County Attorneys including Ben Willoughby, Rich County Attorney, the answer was not clear.  Is making a phone call home to check on the children on a county phone eligible to be a third degree felony?  Or is stopping on the way home from a work related meeting in Logan for a gallon of milk when you are driving the county truck a felony?  Willoughby said that as the law is written it is.  Actually, he said, those incidences had more felony consequences than smoking meth.

He said the new law will go into effect on July 1, 1919 across the state.  Every governmental agency is scrambling.  Harmless use of public property incidental use is excluded from this statute. The problem is that no one has defined "incidental" use.  Calling home to see if kids got home safely may be but is it incidental if you make a five minute call every day?  When does it cross over?

Each county and agency must have a written policy now defining incidental use.

There may be a legislative fix in 2020 for the unintended consequences of the new law. Commissioner Bill Cox said that there are a couple of policies in other counties that specifies what can be used and not used.

Willoughby said that he surveyed other counties and found that they are falling into two camps.  The first is to list all the incidental uses that a public employee can do.  That has risks, because  a policy could leave out a situation that might happen.  The second camp uses whereas clauses to get a feeling for what underlies the option.   Most public employees use county property in a responsible manner and in good faith and should not unwontedly become felons.

Under the second option all use is authorized for property that is in the employee job description, the county clerk can’t use the county backhoe for example because that is not in her job description, but use of the phone is.  The county will not carve out anything that is unauthorized, said Willoughby.  The benefit of this approach is that you cannot overlook anything.  If a supervisor was concerned with an employee overusing county property there needs to be a section on procedure for the supervisor.

He presented the draft policies for Rich County which will be put in the personnel handbook as a section on personal use. Department heads will have to send written notification that the employee was inappropriately using county property.  This policy must be in place by July 1