Qualified immunity protects elected officials, employees, and officers from liability for civil actions arising from discretionary conduct taken under color of law as long as their conduct does not violate clearly established rights of which a reasonable person in their position would have known. Qualified immunity is an affirmative defense, and rests upon two mutually dependent rationales: (1) the injustice, particularly in the absence of bad faith, of subjecting to liability an elected official, employee, or officer who is required, by the legal obligations of their position, employment, or office to exercise discretion; and (2) the danger that the threat of such liability would deter his/her willingness to execute his/her position, employment, or office, with the decisiveness and the judgment required by the public good. [Ord. 05-31-2018-C § 2(02.05.04.040), 2018.]