The New York State Joint Commission on Public Ethics (Commission)  today announced that it has reached a settlement agreement with a former employee of Hostos Community College, part of the City University of New York (CUNY), for violating the Public Officers Law by providing private consulting work to assist private businesses with licensing applications and failing to report some of that outside income.

In the agreement,  Seny Taveras, the former Executive Director of Continuing Education for the “CUNY in the Heights Program”, admitted that she assisted private businesses with license applications before the New York State Liquor Authority and other local government entities. She also admitted she failed to report more than $12,000 in outside income on two different annual financial disclosure statements, as well as failed to disclose ownership of investment property and rental income from that property on her financial disclosures over a 6-year period.

Taveras agreed to pay the Commission $8,000 to settle the violations and to submit six years’ worth of amended annual financial disclosure statements to report the proper amount of outside income and rental property income she received during that time.

This case was referred to the Commission by the Office of the New York State Inspector General following its own investigation.