Agency Code of Conduct and Platform Participation Agreement

This Agency Code of Conduct and Platform Participation Agreement (the "Agreement") is entered into by and between Public Service Lateral Network ("PSLN") and the agency identified below (the "Agency"). By signing electronically or otherwise accepting this Agreement, the Agency confirms that it has reviewed, understands, and agrees to comply with this Agreement and to ensure that all authorized Agency Users comply with it.

1. Purpose and Scope

PSLN is a confidential pre-application career mobility platform designed to connect public service professionals with verified agencies before the formal application process begins. This Agreement governs the Agency's access to and use of PSLN, including agency profile management, candidate discovery, interest requests, communications, media uploads, analytics, and any related services.

This Agreement applies to the Agency, all Agency Users, contractors, representatives, employees, administrators, recruiters, hiring personnel, and any other person accessing PSLN under the Agency's account or authority.

2. Definitions

"Agency" means the public service, public safety, governmental, quasi-governmental, or otherwise approved organization that registers for access to PSLN.

"Agency User" means any person invited, authorized, or permitted to access PSLN under the Agency's account.

"Authorized Representative" means the individual who signs or electronically accepts this Agreement on behalf of the Agency and certifies authority to bind the Agency.

"Candidate" means a public service professional using PSLN to explore career opportunities, including law enforcement, fire service, EMS, dispatch/public safety communications, corrections/detentions, or other approved paths.

"Candidate Information" means any information associated with a Candidate, including anonymous profile data, messages, interest-list activity, private identity data, resume, contact information, certification data, career goals, and any platform activity.

"Private Identity Data" means Candidate name, photo, email, phone, resume, current agency/department/communications center, certification numbers, POST numbers, exact identifying details, or any information intentionally restricted until Candidate release.

"Identity Release" means the Candidate's affirmative approval to release selected identifying information to a specific Agency.

"Platform" means PSLN, psln.org, the PSLN portal, web app, app/PWA, dashboards, directories, media library, messaging, analytics, and related services.

"Verified Agency" means an Agency that PSLN has reviewed and approved for access to agency functions. Verification does not constitute endorsement, hiring approval, or background clearance.

3. Authority to Bind Agency

The person accepting this Agreement represents and warrants that they are authorized to bind the Agency to this Agreement. The Agency is responsible for confirming that the signer has appropriate authority under Agency policy, law, procurement rules, and internal approval processes.

If the signer lacks authority, PSLN may suspend or terminate the Agency account and may take any other action available under this Agreement or applicable law.

4. PSLN Role and Platform Limitations

The Agency acknowledges that PSLN is a confidential pre-application connection platform. PSLN does not make hiring decisions, conduct background investigations, verify employment eligibility, determine suitability, provide consumer reports, rank candidates, score candidates, contact current employers, or replace the Agency's formal hiring process.

The Agency remains solely responsible for its own recruiting, application, background, suitability, selection, employment, compliance, and hiring decisions.

5. Agency Verification and Eligibility

Agency access to candidate-facing tools is conditioned on PSLN verification. PSLN may require official agency email verification, public directory confirmation, authorization letters, callback verification, domain validation, billing verification, re-verification, or other reasonable measures.

The Agency shall not misrepresent its identity, authority, service path, size, jurisdiction, contact information, employment offerings, or recruiting status. Creating a fake agency account, impersonating an agency, or using unauthorized agency branding is strictly prohibited.

6. Authorized Users and Account Security

The Agency shall ensure that only authorized personnel access PSLN. The Agency shall assign appropriate user roles, maintain accurate user records, promptly deactivate users who no longer require access, and prohibit shared logins.

Agency Users shall maintain account security, use multi-factor authentication where required, safeguard passwords and devices, and immediately report suspected unauthorized access to security@psln.org.

7. Candidate Confidentiality and Identity Protection

Candidate confidentiality is a material condition of Agency participation. The Agency shall treat all Candidate Information as confidential and shall use it only for legitimate pre-application recruiting and PSLN-authorized communication.

The Agency shall not attempt to identify an anonymous Candidate, correlate anonymous profile data with outside sources, infer a Candidate's current employer, or otherwise circumvent candidate-controlled identity release.

The Agency shall not access, use, disclose, download, screenshot, export, copy, store, redistribute, or share Candidate Information except as expressly permitted by PSLN and this Agreement.

8. Candidate-Controlled Identity Release

The Agency acknowledges that Candidate identity is protected by default. Candidate name, resume, contact information, current agency/department/communications center, certification numbers, POST numbers, photo, or exact identifying details may be released only when the Candidate affirmatively approves release to that specific Agency.

A Candidate's release of information to one Agency does not authorize disclosure to any other agency, person, database, public record, internal system, or third party.

9. Permitted Agency Uses

Creating and maintaining an accurate agency recruiting profile.

Reviewing anonymous Candidate profiles made available under PSLN rules.

Sending professional interest requests to Candidates in accordance with PSLN workflows.

Communicating with Candidates who approve communication.

Reviewing Candidate information that has been expressly released by the Candidate to the Agency.

Using aggregated agency analytics for legitimate recruiting improvement.

10. Prohibited Conduct

The Agency and Agency Users shall not:

Attempt to identify, expose, investigate, track, monitor, or unmask anonymous Candidates.

Contact or attempt to contact a Candidate's current employer, agency, department, supervisor, co-worker, union representative, or chain of command without the Candidate's separate written authorization outside PSLN.

Retaliate against, blacklist, threaten, discipline, expose, or harm any person for using or being suspected of using PSLN.

Use PSLN to monitor current employees, identify employees seeking outside employment, or interfere with lawful career mobility.

Discriminate or make recruiting decisions based on protected characteristics or unlawful criteria.

Use Candidate Information for background investigations, internal affairs investigations, disciplinary investigations, public records research, intelligence gathering, litigation, or any purpose outside PSLN-authorized recruiting.

Mass message, spam, pressure, harass, mislead, or make negative recruiting statements about other agencies.

Circumvent PSLN workflows, access controls, verification gates, identity-release controls, or communication limits.

Upload media containing confidential records, patient/victim information, juvenile information, criminal justice records, medical information, private personnel records, copyrighted material without authorization, or sensitive operational content.

Sell, license, scrape, export, publish, or redistribute Candidate Information or platform data.

11. Non-Retaliation and Fair Recruiting

The Agency shall not retaliate against any Candidate, employee, or public service professional for creating a PSLN profile, browsing agencies, expressing interest, declining an agency request, requesting privacy, or choosing not to proceed with an Agency.

The Agency shall comply with applicable equal employment opportunity, anti-discrimination, privacy, public-sector employment, and recruiting laws.

11a. Current Agency Experience Rating Protections

PSLN maintains a Current Agency Experience system that allows verified current employees to anonymously rate their current employer using structured categories only. The Agency acknowledges and agrees that the following prohibitions are material conditions of Agency participation:

The Agency and Agency Users shall not: (i) attempt to identify, discover, or infer which employees have submitted Current Agency Experience ratings; (ii) ask, survey, question, or pressure any employee regarding whether they have rated the Agency or what rating they provided; (iii) require, mandate, coerce, or direct any employee to submit a Current Agency Experience rating or to rate in any particular way; (iv) reward, offer, promise, or provide any money, benefits, assignments, promotions, incentives, preferential treatment, or consideration of any kind in exchange for favorable ratings or for submitting a rating; (v) discipline, threaten, retaliate against, demote, transfer, ostracize, or harm any employee for actual or suspected rating activity; (vi) create, attempt to create, or facilitate the creation of fake employee accounts or fraudulent employment verifications for the purpose of influencing the Agency's Current Agency Experience score; (vii) attempt to suppress, remove, challenge, or interfere with legitimate ratings through any means other than the PSLN admin reporting process for documented fraud or abuse; (viii) use Agency payment, subscription tier, add-ons, partnership status, or advertising to increase the score, suppress valid ratings, hide category scores, remove legitimate ratings, or change the publication threshold in the Agency's favor.

The Agency acknowledges that Current Agency Experience ratings are structured (1–5 stars across ten categories) with no written reviews, comments, narratives, or free-text fields. Ratings are submitted anonymously and agencies cannot access individual ratings, employee identity, submission timestamps, verification documents, or any data that could identify a rater. Rating participation is completely separate from recruiting identity — even if an employee later releases their identity to the Agency through PSLN recruiting workflows, the Agency cannot determine whether that person rated the Agency or what rating they provided.

Violations of this Section 11a are subject to all remedies under Section 17 (Liquidated Damages and Remedies), including suspension, termination, and liquidated damages up to $10,000 per violation.

12. Agency Profile Content and Media

The Agency is responsible for all content, images, videos, pay scale documents, benefit summaries, recruitment materials, logos, colors, and other media uploaded or published through its profile. The Agency represents that such content is accurate, authorized for recruiting use, and does not contain confidential, protected, sensitive, or unauthorized information.

PSLN may review, approve, reject, hide, archive, or request revision of Agency content or media. PSLN's review does not transfer responsibility from the Agency and does not constitute legal, HR, or compliance approval.

13. Data Security and Incident Reporting

The Agency shall use reasonable administrative, technical, and physical safeguards to protect Candidate Information and platform access. The Agency shall promptly notify PSLN at security@psln.org of any suspected unauthorized access, disclosure, loss, compromise, misuse, or security incident involving PSLN, Candidate Information, Agency credentials, or platform data.

The Agency shall cooperate with PSLN in investigating and remediating suspected misuse, unauthorized disclosure, or platform security incidents.

14. Monitoring, Audit Logs, and Platform Records

The Agency acknowledges that PSLN may maintain audit logs, consent logs, access records, export logs, upload history, signature records, user activity logs, and other platform records for security, privacy, troubleshooting, legal, compliance, and operational purposes.

Agency use of PSLN may be monitored to enforce this Agreement, detect misuse, protect Candidate privacy, and preserve platform integrity.

15. Misuse Reporting and Investigation

PSLN may receive reports from Candidates, Agency Users, PSLN personnel, or third parties regarding suspected violations. PSLN may investigate, request information, restrict access, suspend accounts, preserve records, contact Agency leadership, or take other reasonable actions during an investigation.

The Agency shall not retaliate against any person who reports suspected misuse in good faith.

16. Suspension, Termination, and Access Restrictions

PSLN may suspend, restrict, or terminate the Agency's access, remove content, revoke user privileges, disable candidate-facing tools, or permanently prohibit use of the Platform if PSLN determines that the Agency or any Agency User violated this Agreement, failed verification, allowed unauthorized access, failed to pay or renew where applicable, or created risk to Candidate privacy, PSLN, or platform integrity.

Unverified, pending, suspended, terminated, expired-verification, or expired-subscription agencies shall not access candidate search, Candidate profiles, interest requests, Candidate messages, released Candidate data, candidate analytics, or export tools unless PSLN expressly authorizes limited access for account administration only.

17. Liquidated Damages and Remedies

The Agency acknowledges that violations of this Agreement may cause harm that is difficult to measure, including loss of Candidate trust, privacy harm, reputational damage, operational disruption, investigation costs, legal expense, loss of goodwill, and harm to PSLN's marketplace integrity. The parties agree that the following liquidated damages are intended as a reasonable pre-estimate of anticipated harm and not as a penalty, subject to applicable law and any public-entity limitations.

PSLN's remedies are cumulative and may include suspension, termination, injunctive relief, actual damages, costs, attorney fees where available, preservation of evidence, and any other legal or equitable remedies. PSLN may also reduce, waive, or modify liquidated damages in its discretion based on facts, severity, intent, remediation, and applicable public-entity constraints.

18. Indemnification and Public-Entity Limitations

To the fullest extent permitted by applicable law, the Agency shall be responsible for claims, losses, damages, costs, expenses, fines, penalties, and liabilities arising from the Agency's or Agency Users' breach of this Agreement, misuse of Candidate Information, unauthorized disclosure, unlawful recruiting conduct, uploaded content, or violation of law.

If the Agency is a public entity, nothing in this Agreement is intended to require an unlawful indemnity, waive governmental immunity, waive statutory defenses, violate fiscal/appropriation limitations, or create obligations beyond those permitted by applicable law. Public-entity terms may require agency-specific addenda or counsel review.

19. Public Records and Legal Process

If the Agency receives a public records request, subpoena, court order, or other demand seeking PSLN records, Candidate Information, platform data, or Candidate communications, the Agency shall notify PSLN promptly to the extent legally permitted and shall cooperate to protect confidential Candidate Information and PSLN proprietary information.

The Agency shall not voluntarily disclose Candidate Information unless required by law or authorized by the Candidate and PSLN rules.

20. Electronic Signature, Records, and Acceptance

The Agency agrees that this Agreement may be executed electronically. The Agency and Authorized Representative consent to the use of electronic records, electronic signatures, typed names, checkbox acknowledgments, clickwrap acceptance, and platform-generated signature records.

An electronic signature, typed name, checked acknowledgment box, or other electronic acceptance process associated with this Agreement is intended to be the legal equivalent of a handwritten signature. PSLN may maintain the signed record, version ID, timestamp, IP address, user ID, email address, role, audit trail, and copy of the Agreement accepted by the Agency.

The Authorized Representative shall be required to affirmatively acknowledge: (i) authority to bind the Agency; (ii) receipt and review of the Agreement; (iii) consent to electronic signature and electronic records; and (iv) agreement that the Agency and its Agency Users will comply with all aspects of this Agreement.

21. Updates to Code of Conduct

PSLN may update this Agreement, the Agency Code of Conduct, platform rules, privacy controls, security requirements, media rules, or verification requirements from time to time. Material updates may require renewed acknowledgment or e-signature before continued access to candidate-facing tools.

Agency Users may be required to re-acknowledge the Agency Code of Conduct annually or when material changes are made.

22. Governing Law, Venue, and Severability

This Agreement shall be governed by the laws of the State of Colorado, without regard to conflict-of-law rules, except where federal law or mandatory public-entity law applies. Venue shall be in a Colorado court of competent jurisdiction, unless otherwise required by applicable law or agreed in a separate written agreement.

If any provision of this Agreement is held unenforceable, the remaining provisions shall remain in effect, and the unenforceable provision shall be modified to the maximum enforceable extent permitted by law.

23. Entire Agreement and Relationship to Other Terms

This Agreement supplements any PSLN subscription agreement, order form, pilot agreement, terms of use, privacy policy, or agency-specific addendum. In the event of conflict involving Candidate confidentiality, identity release, access control, or Agency misuse, the more protective provision shall control unless otherwise required by law.

No Agency User may modify this Agreement unless the modification is in a written agreement executed by PSLN and an authorized Agency representative.

Agency acknowledgment and e-signature

By signing below, the Authorized Representative certifies that they have authority to bind the Agency, that the Agency has reviewed this Agreement, and that the Agency agrees to comply with this Agreement and ensure that all Agency Users comply with it.