Louisiana troopers and secondary employment

A current order, published in full

Procedural Order 234, Secondary Employment / Personal Investments, took effect on 25 July 2025 and is published as the current version. It covers the Office of State Police within the Department of Public Safety and Corrections.

Its definition of secondary employment is broad enough to catch things officers rarely think of as jobs: offices and directorships, self-employment, consultant fees, teaching a college course, and honoraria including travel expenses — and it applies whether the work happens inside Louisiana or outside it. Personal investments in property or securities are excluded, as is selling your own car or home.

All secondary employment must be performed during off-duty time, and no employee may hold a secondary job without express written approval.

The alcohol rule, drawn finely

Most agencies here ban work at places whose primary business is alcohol and leave it there. Louisiana splits the license classes.

Work in Class A-General alcohol outlets is prohibited outright. Work in Class A-Restaurant establishments is permitted — but only if the employment is strictly restaurant-related and the employee performs no tasks in the bar section. The order then adds the exception to its own exception: the employee may receive and serve drinks to patrons in conjunction with meals for consumption on the premises.

It is the most precisely drawn alcohol provision in this section, and it maps onto a real distinction in Louisiana licensing rather than onto a general worry about bars.

A separate clause reaches the clientele rather than the license: no commissioned officer may hold secondary employment at a business frequented by racketeers, sexual offenders, suspected felons, people under investigation or indictment, or anyone with a community reputation for present criminal involvement.

Apartment security, and the condition attached

Two of the order's rules carry the same exception, and it is worth putting them together.

Department property, facilities and resources may not be used for secondary employment — except when employed as apartment security. And employees may not use their official position to acquire or further secondary employment — again except as apartment security.

Then the catch: apartment security work shall not be granted unless the officer resides at the complex full-time. The exception is not for anyone who fancies the work; it is for the trooper who lives there, whose presence is the product being bought.

Compare Fairfax County's sheriff, whose "courtesy liaison" deputies live on site but are forbidden the uniform and told the office will not stand behind them. Louisiana takes the opposite view of the same arrangement and lets department resources into it.

The calendar-year permit

Approval does not run for a year from the day it is signed, as it does at Johns Hopkins or Fairfax. It runs to 31 December, whenever in the year it was granted, and lapses then unless the employment ends sooner or the duties change.

The renewal path is deliberately shorter than the first application. An initial request goes up the chain to the employee's Major, then to the Office of Legal Affairs for a compliance review, then to a Deputy Superintendent who is the final authority. Renewals do not go up the chain at all — a Troop or Section Commander can approve them, provided nothing about the work, hours or employer has changed.

A denied application can be reconsidered: through the chain, an employee may ask the Assistant Superintendent or Chief of Staff to review it, and that officer may either reconsider or let the decision stand.

Two smaller rules shape the paperwork. Two types of secondary employment may not be combined on one application. And on promotion or reassignment, personnel must promptly tell their new supervisor about any existing secondary employment, which is then escalated for what the order calls supervisory situational awareness.

What you may not trade on

The badge rules are strict and specific. Using a badge, commission or identification card or other official credentials during secondary employment is expressly prohibited, except where official action is required by policy or law.

Nor may anyone sell or distribute any item carrying the words "Louisiana State Police", the word "Trooper", the letters "LSP" or "DPS Police", or any design resembling the official badge or patch, without the Superintendent's specific authority.

And a provision aimed squarely at the courtroom: employees shall not assist the defense in a prosecution brought by Louisiana or the United States unless the Superintendent authorises it in writing. Complying with a subpoena or court order is exempt, as is an employee's own defense.

Where secondary work needs access to department files, employees get no special right of access beyond what the public has — and pay the same fees for copies.

Money from other public agencies

One provision will surprise anyone used to being paid directly. Where a trooper works for another public agency, the money must be submitted to Financial Services, which forwards it to the employee. Exceptions need the Superintendent.

So the department sits in the middle of the payment rather than beside it — the opposite of Clay County in Florida, where the deputy is paid in the hand and only the fee goes to the office.

Investments, and the absolute one

The order also governs money that is not wages. No employee may hold a direct financial interest in any business over which the Department has administrative or legal jurisdiction without written approval, and the order lists what to weigh: the employee's assignment, the influence the investment carries, the size of the business, how close the Department's regulatory authority sits to the investor's own job, and the effect on public confidence.

One line admits no balancing at all: in no case shall an employee invest in any business licensed to conduct gaming activities in Louisiana. Not a factor to weigh — a bar.

The order is candid about what approval means, too: permission is given in good faith and is not an endorsement of anything improper that follows from the job. Violate that trust and the approval can be revoked on top of any discipline.

What this page cannot tell you

There are no rates here, no minimum hours, no detail coordinator and no hour caps — the order governs permission, conflict and conduct rather than the market for troopers' time.

What it does give an officer is a clear map of the boundaries: which premises, which clientele, which credentials, which investments, and a permit that quietly expires every New Year's Eve.

Common questions

When does approval expire?

31 December each year, with renewals approved locally rather than back at headquarters.

Can a trooper work at a bar?

The alcohol rule here is the most finely drawn in this section — it turns on the premises' license class rather than banning the industry, and there is an apartment security exception.

Can a trooper invest in a casino?

No. Gaming investments are prohibited, not merely gaming employment.