Request By:
Mr. James E. Greer
Executive Director
Lincoln Trail Area
Development District
305 First Federal Building
Elizabethtown, Kentucky 42701
Opinion
Opinion By: Robert F. Stephens, Attorney General; By: Charles W. Runyan, Assistant Deputy Attorney General
Your problem was stated as follows:
"The Chairman of the Lincoln Trail Area Development District was defeated in the general election and will relinquish his position on the Board of Directors effective January 1, 1978. Since the annual meeting of the Lincoln Trail ADD Board of Directors is held in April of each year, it will be necessary to name an acting Chairman to serve in the interim.
"As stated in the 1976 Kentucky Administrative Regulations, Volume I, Chapter 10, Section 8, relating to KRS Chapter 147A: '. . . no officer shall be eligible to serve more than two (2) full terms consecutively in the same office.'
"In the event a current officer of the Board in line for the Chairmanship is appointed as acting chairman, would this make him ineligible to serve for two full terms consisting of one year each consecutively as Chairman? "
Under KRS 147A.060 the composition of the Area Development District Board and the terms and appointments of its members in each district shall be specified by administrative regulation issued by the Executive Department for Finance and Administration pursuant to KRS Chapter 13. 200 KAR 10:010, Section 8 provides in part that the Board of Directors of each area development district shall elect a chairman, a vice-chairman, a secretary, a treasurer, and such other officers as the board may deem necessary. Each officer shall be elected for a term of one (1) year. " No officer shall be eligible to serve more than two (2) full terms consecutively in the same office. (Emphasis added).
It is our opinion that considering the regulation prohibits a person from serving more than two (2) full terms consecutively in the same office, an acting chairman selected to serve from now until April, 1978, would not be ineligible to serve for two full terms consisting of one year each consecutively as chairman. We assume under the procedure of assuming office that the usual term as chairman would begin in April, 1978, at the end of this interim period.
Section 99 of the Kentucky Constitution provides that a sheriff is not eligible to reelection or to act as deputy for the succeeding term. The Court, in McGinnis v. Cossar, 230 Ky. 213, 18 S.W.2d 988 (1929), held that provisions in the constitution and statutes imposing restrictions on the right of persons to hold office should receive a liberal construction in favor of the right of people to exercise freedom of choice in selection of officers. Specifically the court held that the word "term" means a full term and the particular officer's own term. Thus a sheriff appointed to fill out some other person's term does not count as a "term" for the officer so appointed. Here the appointment for the interim as chairman of the board is not counted in connection with "two full terms." His serving in the interim period would not be charged against his two full terms period as mentioned in the regulation, since the regular term would not begin until April, 1978, the end of the interim period.