- (a) No party of record, or representative thereof, to a pending adjudicatory proceeding shall attempt by any means to communicate ex parte with any member of the Arkansas Pollution Control and Ecology Commission or the administrative hearing officer regarding that proceeding.
- (b) Any flagrant violation of this section may constitute grounds for denying the relief sought by the offending party.
(c)
- (1) Any member of the commission or the administrative hearing officer who received an ex parte communication in violation of this section may be disqualified from the proceeding if necessary to eliminate the effect of the communication.
- (2) Alternatively, other appropriate action may be taken, such as writing a memorandum disclosing the ex parte communication, which shall be filed in the record of the proceeding.