(A) The city may enact ordinances or bylaws to require from all officers and servants, elected or appointed, bonds and security or evidence of equivalent insurance for the faithful performance of their duties. The city may pay the premium for such bonds or insurance coverage.
(B) (1) All official bonds of officers of the city shall be in form joint and several and made payable to the city in such penalty as the City Council may fix.
(2) In place of the individual bonds required to be furnished by municipal officers, a schedule, position, blanket bond or undertaking, or evidence of equivalent insurance may be given by municipal officers, or a single corporate surety fidelity, schedule, position, or blanket bond or undertaking, or evidence of insurance coverage covering all the officers, including officers required by law to furnish an individual bond or undertaking, may be furnished. The municipality may pay the premium for the bond or insurance coverage. The bond or insurance coverage shall be, at a minimum, an aggregate of the amounts fixed by law or by the City Council, and with such terms and conditions as may be required.
(3) The penalty amount on any bond shall not fall below the legal minimum, when one has been set by the state, for each particular official.
(C) (1) Official bonds, with the oath endorsed thereon, shall be filed in the City Clerk’s office within the following time:
(a) Of all officers elected at any general election, following receipt of their election certificate and not later than ten days before the first Thursday after the first Tuesday in January next succeeding the election;
(b) Of all appointed officers, within 30 days after their appointment; and
(c) Of officers elected at any special election and city officers, within 30 days after the canvass of the votes of the election at which they were chosen.
(2) The filing of the bond with the oath endorsed thereon does not authorize a person to take any official action prior to the beginning of his or her term of office pursuant to Art. XVII, § 5, of the Constitution of the state.
(D) All official bonds of city officers shall be executed by the principal named in such bonds and by at least two sufficient sureties who shall be freeholders of the county in which such bonds are given, or any official bond of a city officer may be executed by the officer as principal and by a guaranty, surety, fidelity, or bonding company as surety, or by two or more such companies. Only such companies as are legally authorized to transact business in this state shall be eligible to suretyship on the bond of a city officer.
(E) The City Clerk shall carefully record and preserve the bonds in his or her office and shall give certified copies thereof, when required, under the seal of his or her office, and shall be entitled to receive for the same the usual fee allowed by law for certified copies of records in other cases.
(F) (1) The approval of each official bond shall be endorsed upon such bond by the officer approving the same, and no bond shall be filed and recorded until so approved.
(2) No bond shall be deemed to be given or complete until the approval of the City Council and all sureties are endorsed in writing on the instrument by the Mayor/Chairperson and City Clerk pursuant to the approval of the City Council.
(G) All official bonds shall obligate the principal and sureties for the faithful discharge of all duties required by law of such principal and shall inure to the benefit of any persons injured by a breach of the conditions of such bonds.
(H) No official bond shall be rendered void by reason of any informality of irregularity in its execution or approval.
(I) No city official shall be taken as security on the bond of any administrator, executor, or other officer from whom by law bond is or may be required.
(J) (1) If any person elected or appointed to any office neglects to have his or her official bond executed and approved as provided by law and filed for record within the time limited by this section, the City Clerk shall immediately issue an order to such person to show cause why he or she has failed to properly file such bond and why his or her office should not be declared vacant.
(2) If such person properly files the official bond within ten days of the issuance of the show cause order for appointed officials or before the date for taking office for elected officials, such filing shall be deemed to be in compliance with this section. If such person does not file the bond within ten days of the issuance of such order for appointed officials or before the date for taking office for elected officials and sufficient cause is not shown within that time, his or her office shall thereupon ipso facto become vacant and such vacancy shall thereupon immediately be filled by election or appointment as the law may direct in other cases of vacancy in the same office.
(K) Any person appointed to fill a vacancy, before entering upon the duties of the office, must give a bond corresponding in substance and form with the bond required of the officer originally elected or appointed, as herein provided.
(L) When the incumbent of an office is reelected or reappointed, he or she shall qualify by taking the oath and giving the bond as above directed, but when such officer has had public funds or property in his or her control, his or her bond shall not be approved until he or she has produced and fully accounted for such funds and property. When it is ascertained that the incumbent of an office holds over by reason of the nonelection or nonappointment of a successor or of the neglect or refusal of the successor to qualify, he or she shall qualify anew within ten days from the time at which his or her successor, if elected, should have qualified.
(M) No person shall be surety for the same officer for more than two successive terms of the same office, but this provision shall not apply to incorporated surety companies.
(N) (1) If the sureties on the official bond of any appointed officer of the city, in the opinion of the City Council, become insufficient, the Council may, by resolution, fix a reasonable time within which the officer may give a new bond or additional sureties as directed.
(2) If the officer fails, refuses, or neglects to give a new bond or additional sureties to the satisfaction and approval of the Council, the office shall, by such failure, refusal, or neglect, become vacant and it shall be the duty of the Council to appoint a competent and qualified person to fill the office.
(Prior Code, § 33.30) (Ord. 618, passed 2-18-2014)
Statutory reference:
Related provisions, see Neb. RS 11-104, 11-105, 11-109, 11-110, 11-111, 11-112, 11-113, 11-114, 11-115, 11-116, 11-117, 11-118, and 17-604