Conflicts of Interest
Conflicts of Interest
(OP)
Under pressure in local government situation. In SC, I believe it is a conflict of interest to be employed by local government as the jurisdiction engineer that oversees enforcement of State Stormwater Regulations and to be directed to perform the stormwater design services for the local government projects to avoid hiring a private engineer to provide the design. I have been informed those in authority that I believe it is not legal to both provide the design service and then be the enforcer of the law on that design at the same time. I have been challenged to provide where it says in the law or the regulations that I can't be the designer and the enforcer at the same time. I have tried to find that information in a written form from the State Law or the Licensing Board and can't find anything. Can anyone please help?





RE: Conflicts of Interest
You should call and ask the State Board.
If you're working for someone who asks to see written evidence that your ethical issue is valid, you should be looking for another job.
RE: Conflicts of Interest
Mike McCann, PE, SE (WA)
RE: Conflicts of Interest
Without that insurance you really should lock your stamp up in a bank safe deposit box in another town and then mail the key to a distant relative (preferably one who travels a lot and is regularly inaccessible). That way if you ever feel a strong urge to put your home, retirement, family's future, and any capital assets that you've accumulated over your life at risk you will have a couple of weeks to reconsider before you actually have access to your stamp.
David Simpson, PE
MuleShoe Engineering
Law is the common force organized to act as an obstacle of injustice Frédéric Bastiat
RE: Conflicts of Interest
I didn't dig too deep.
RE: Conflicts of Interest
RE: Conflicts of Interest
David Simpson, PE
MuleShoe Engineering
Law is the common force organized to act as an obstacle of injustice Frédéric Bastiat
RE: Conflicts of Interest
however, i would resist doing it specifically because of both the liability and also because it is difficult to be objective about enforcing the regulations when your own staff is doing the work. And really the cost for an experienced consultant to do it is probably less than your own cost.
RE: Conflicts of Interest
See how your bosses like that?
:)
That's just a first impression. I don't really have the answer to this question, but I do think that having an engineer-reviewer relationship between separate entities with different perspectives is a positive influence on the end product.
Hydrology, Drainage Analysis, Flood Studies, and Complex Stormwater Litigation for Atlanta and the South East - http://www.campbellcivil.com
RE: Conflicts of Interest
RE: Conflicts of Interest
I know of plan checkers who do their own design for the City, but are not stamping the plans. I need to ask a friend how that gets handled.
B+W Engineering and Design
Los Angeles Civil Engineer and Structural Engineer
http://bwengr.com
RE: Conflicts of Interest
Now, suppose you do the design on behalf of the county. The county will then waive the approval process as the design is being produced in house and is certainly expected to be consistent with county requirements that would have been a part of the aforementioned "approval". You are not tasked with approving your own design....the county has already done that by its waiver of approval and its codification of the requirements. There is no ethical dilemma here. This is commonly done throughout the country.
RE: Conflicts of Interest
http://www.nceng.com.au/
"Programming today is a race between software engineers striving to build bigger and better idiot-proof programs, and the Universe trying to produce bigger and better idiots. So far, the Universe is winning."
RE: Conflicts of Interest
RE: Conflicts of Interest
RE: Conflicts of Interest
Thank you so much for the variety and depth of your responses. In short, I think I can conclude that there is no direct, clear, black and white answer. Once again, life is grey and murky at best. In response to the last post from urgross, I have done numerous Federal projects on military bases and you are correct. The Federal Government does not bow to any State or Local requirements but can abide by them voluntarily if they so choose. Likewise, they may or may not follow their own standards (which they do have).
In my specific case, my main concern was being the designer of record and the enforcer of all the Federal, State and local stormwater regulations that exist at the same time. The conflict, in my mind, exists that if I, as the designer, design to meet all of these requirements in private practice, then the regulator who enforces the laws that I must abide by as a designer can enforce that which I missed or misinterpreted without threat of impunity (note the sovereign immunity doctrine cited in an earlier post above). However, if I am under threat of losing my job at worst or potentially stunting my advancement or pay raises because I adhere to both the design and enforcement of laws created by others that are not necessarily engineers, that could create a perceived conflict of interest. The appearance of such a conflict of interest could lead to the accusation that I purposely did not design it correctly (as opposed to an omission error or misinterpretation) or I pressured my enforcement staff to not enforce things correctly in order to protect my reputation. Again, with ethics, it is not just "not doing the wrong thing" but also not "appearing to do the wrong thing". By virtue of my position as both designer and enforcer, my concern is that a simple mistake or omission would "appear" to be, in reality, purposeful. Hence the question of a conflict of interest...
This has been a great discussion and I think has flushed out many issues for us all to consider. In the end, I have discovered that it is not clearly legislated in my exact circumstance (although I think it would be wise to enact such clear legislation for exact examples such as I have proposed). Therefore, in the end, it is a personal decision that I must make without any real clear answer. I think all of you have helped me to frame my reasoning as what any other reasonable engineer would do in the same situation should I ever be challenged. Thank you!