Texas Attorney General Opinion: JM-1165 Page: 4 of 5
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Honorable Carlos Valdez - Page 4
The accounting officers of this State
shall neither draw nor pay a warrant upon the
Treasury in favor of any person for salary or
compensation as agent, officer of appointee,
who holds at the same time any other office
or position of honor, trust, or profit under
this State. ...
H.J.R. 27, Acts 1967, 60th Leg., at 2989.
The opinion stated that a person holding an "office or
position of honor, trust or profit" in a school district,
would be holding it "under this State." An independent
contractor, however, was not an agent or employee of the
school district. See also Attorney General Opinion MW-129
(1980) (an independent contractor is not an employee for
purposes of the Open Meetings Act). Thus, a predecessor of
the relevant provision in article XVI, section 40, did not
reach someone who was an independent contractor of a school
district. The mayor of Corpus Christi was an independent
contractor of a private corporation that contracts with the
State of Texas -- a much more remote relationship with a
public entity than that discussed in Attorney General
Opinion V-303.
Finally, Attorney General Opinion JM-782 (1987) also
lends support to our construction of this provision. It
construed the language of article III, section 18, of the
Texas Constitution that bars members of the legislature from
being "interested, either directly or indirectly, in any
contract with the State, or any county thereof, authorized
by any law passed during the term for which he was elected."
The legislator wished to be employed by a transit system
that received state-administered federal grant funds. The
transit system was operated by a nonprofit corporation
established by political subdivisions to receive and
administer federal grant funds under various federal
programs. We stated that the legislator as employee of the
transit system would have no direct or indirect interest in
any contract with the state. His interest in any contract
with the state was too remote to be an indirect interest
under section 18 of article III.
Accordingly, article XVI, section 40, does not prohibit
the mayor of Corpus Christi from contracting as an indepen-
dent contractor with a private corporation that receives
state funds under contract with the state. In view of ourp. 6157
(JM-1165)
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Texas. Attorney-General's Office. Texas Attorney General Opinion: JM-1165, text, April 24, 1990; (https://texashistory.unt.edu/ark:/67531/metapth273603/m1/4/?q=%22Mattox%2C+Jim%22: accessed June 3, 2024), University of North Texas Libraries, The Portal to Texas History, https://texashistory.unt.edu; crediting UNT Libraries Government Documents Department.