Indiana ethics body approves DCS chief of staff’s move to major contractor

The Indiana Ethics Commission on Thursday unanimously voted 3-0 to allow a high-ranking Department of Child Services staffer to take a job with a major contractor.

Chief of Staff Aaron Atwell—who has also worked as DCS’ chief financial officer—has been offered a job as the chief financial officer of The Villages, an Indianapolis-based not-for-profit child and family service provider.

The Villages has had more than 100 state contracts, amendments or renewals worth a combined $231 million since 2006, per a Capital Chronicle review of the Indiana Transparency Portal’s public contract database.

Atwell first sought an informal opinion from Indiana’s Office of Inspector General, or OIG.

When asked by OIG attorney Hope Blankenburger whether he could confirm that his compensation at The Villages wouldn’t come from a state agency, Atwell wrote that DCS contracts are a “primary resource” for The Villages, per the commission’s meeting packet.

DCS Ethics Officer Rachel Russell then requested a formal opinion from the commission, housed within the OIG, on Blankenburger’s recommendation.

Atwell told the commission that The Villages didn’t approach him about the job. Instead, he saw the posting and applied.

Ethics questions

Conflict of interest provisions in Indiana Code ban employees from participating in any decisions or votes on a subject if they’ve got a financial interest in the topic, or have begun negotiations over a prospective job.

DCS executed a conflict of interest screen on June 6 barring Atwell from participating in any decisions, votes, contracts “or other matters” involving The Villages, along with other restrictions, according to the commission’s meeting packet.

The agency filed the screen with the OIG. DCS filed a conflict of interest disclosure, which discusses the screen, with the commission on June 11.

Commission members said they had no concerns with the screen.

Russell assured the commission that Atwell’s new role would include no lobbying.

Atwell told commissioners that the contracts are awarded in a competitive bidding process. Employee teams throughout DCS put together the requests for proposals and the scoring systems.

Atwell said that means he was not involved in scoring proposals or the outcomes of such competitive bidding processes, and that he wasn’t in a position to make such discretionary decisions.

The law also prevents former state employers from working on 12 “particular matters” in which they were involved while working for the state. That ban applies for the life of the application, contract, lawsuit, license, or other matter.

Atwell confirmed to the commission that he has worked on no qualifying particular matters while at DCS.