Request By:
Mrs. Fred W. Burch, Jr.
City Member
Capital Plaza Authority
Capital Plaza
Frankfort, Kentucky 40601
Opinion
Opinion By: Robert F. Stephens, Attorney General; By: Walter C. Herdman, Assistant Deputy Attorney General
This is in answer to your letter of March 12 in which you seek an opinion as to whether or not a conflict of interest would exist where the Assistant Director of the Capital Plaza Authority is selling insurance for the Kentucky Central Life Insurance Company, located in the commercial area of the Fountain Place at Capital Plaza and, as a consequence, rents from the state.
Our response to your question would be in the negative unless the Assistant Director, Mr. Matthew Johnson, owns an interest in the insurance company amounting to more than ten per cent (10%), and even then, we seriously doubt the applicability of the State Conflict of Interest Act, particulary KRS 61.096(5), which is the only statutory provision that could possibly be applicable to your question. This subsection reads as follows:
"(5) No officer or employe of an agency or appointee shall knowingly himself or by his partners or through any corporation which he controls or in which he owns or controls more than ten per cent (10%) of the stock, or by any other person for his use or benefit or on his account, undertake, execute, hold or enjoy, in whole or in part, any contract or agreement for sale or purchase, as provided in KRS chapter 45, made, entered into, awarded or granted by any agency, unless the provisions of KRS chapter 45 are complied with."
Aside from the above, the only conflict of interest statute pertaining to the Capital Plaza Authority is found under KRS 58.310, which simply provides that officers and employees of the Authority cannot have an interest in the sale or purchase of bonds issued pursuant to Ch. 58 KRS.
Nor do we find where there would be any common law conflict of interest since such an interest would only involve contracts where the individual receives a pecuniary interest. See Commonwealth v. Withers, 266 Ky. 29, 98 S.W. 24 (1937).