Request By:
Honorable Babe C. Noplis
Perry County Judge
P.O. Box 450
Hazard, Kentucky 41701
Opinion
Opinion By: Robert F. Stephens, Attorney General; By: Charles W. Runyan, Assistant Deputy Attorney General
You ask whether the fiscal court can buy term life insurance on officials and employees and pay for it out of the county budget. Yes, under an appropriate ordinance of fiscal court pursuant to KRS 67.083 [Home Rule]. This would be a fringe benefit in consideration of public service. The county could also pay the full premium on hospitalization insurance for county employees, if the fiscal court desired.
As to salary increases for county deputies and employees, they are not subject to constitutional limitations, since they are not constitutional officers. However, such raises should be given pursuant to KRS 64.530(5). The C.P.I. formula does not apply to deputies and county employees. There is no maximum for such officers and employees generally.
You ask about salaries for magistrates on and after January 2, 1978. They will have no judicial duties. The fiscal courts, for their [magistrates'] work on the fiscal court, should be guided by the old $260 per month provision of KRS 64.530, although magistrates were placed under KRS 64. 527 [annual adjustment of salaries of constitutional officers]. If you get too far above around $3600 per year for the magistrates you could invite a lawsuit. However, under S.B. 18 [Special Session, 1976], Section 2, justice of the peace serving on fiscal courts as of January 2, 1978, shall receive no less than the total annual compensation received by that offical during the calendar year 1976.
As to the county attorney's salary, for his prosecutorial duties in the district and circuit courts, beginning January 2, 1978, he shall be paid an annual salary out of the State Treasury which shall be the total compensation he received as county attorney during the calendar year of 1976, but which shall in no event be less than $7200. He also gets a $250 per month expense allowance out of the State Treasury. The fiscal court would have to pay the county attorney for his civil services rendered the county. The county attorney's maximum [from all sources] will be determined under the rubber dollar formula by annual adjustment in connection with the current Consumer Price Index, based on an original $12,000 monetary level as stated in § 246, Kentucky Constitution. The county attorney has been given state wide functions under H.B. 17 [1976 Extraordinary Session], Section 14, effective in 1978. He can also engage in the private practice of law.
You ask about the salary of the county judge/executive, under S.B. 18 in Perry County, who will enter that office on January 2, 1978. Under S.B. 18 the minimum compensation for that office will be a sum not less than sixty (60%) percent of the maximum compensation certified under KRS 64.527, except that no fiscal court shall be required to approve compensation of any one official which would exceed six percent (6%) of the county's total annual general fund receipts including federal revenue sharing monies. Suppose the maximum certified compensation of constitutional officers under KRS 64.527 is, in February, 1978, $18,000 per year, then the minimum compensation paid to the county judge/executive out of the county treasury would be $10,800 per year. Under Section 7 of S.B. 18, the county judge/executive shall receive an annual expense allowance of $3600 in connection with the performance of his duties in connection with the county road program, payments to be made on a quarterly basis.