Maricopa Community Colleges

Maricopa Steward

The following scenario may seem familiar to many of you since it was excerpted from the mandatory MCCCD Public Stewardship training required of all full-time employees.

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What Would You Do?

No Such Thing as a Free Ticket

Because hockey was her favorite sport, College President Alexandra Evers was thrilled to take her colleague Don Phillips, a telecommunications adjunct faculty member at a sister college, up on his offer to attend the All-Star game which was being played in their city. Phillips indicated he had a free, extra ticket, and would meet her at the sports arena the night of the game.

When she arrived, she saw Phillips with Marc Eyre, president of the local cable franchise. She assumed they had bumped into each other in the lobby and was surprised when she realized she was joining Eyre in the cable company’s box along with Phillips, his family, and other friends. Because the college had an active Request For Proposal in place to negotiate a new cable contract she felt especially uncomfortable when the executive sat next to her. In an attempt to be clear that this was a social event, not an opportunity to talk business, the college president announced to both her colleague and to Eyre that she had absolutely no plans to talk about the cable contract or any other issues associated with the college or district. Even with that said, she found herself in the middle of a wide-ranging discussion of the future of the telecommunications industry that skirted on the district’s expansion into new areas of occupational teaching programs.

At the end of the game she hurried home and wrote a letter to Eyre, asking for the cost of the ticket so that she could reimburse the company, and copied her colleague. Both responded that there was no cost—it was a free ticket that was part of the season privileges purchased by the cable company. She felt betrayed by her colleague and frustrated that her attempts to pay for the ticket were thwarted.

Should President Evers have left the game as soon as she found out where she was sitting?

How should she now proceed?

Suggested Response

Leaving would have been the best approach, particularly because she knew that the College had initiated a competition for a new cable contract. It doesn’t matter that those at the sports event didn’t specifically discuss the College’s needs and the company’s potential to meet them, or that the company didn’t give her the ticket directly. It is avoiding the appearance of a conflict of interest that is important in maintaining the public trust. To the naked eye, it seems as though the President is getting something of value so that the company may gain more favorable treatment during the competitive process for a contract. Note that Mr. Phillips needs to retake ethics training. He seems oblivious to the problem.

She needs to complete the College’s conflict of interest form, submit it to the appropriate College staff, and refrain from having anything to do with the competition for the new cable contract. While she may not have a specific conflict of interest as defined under Arizona law, she has run afoul of purchasing standards for employees.