Request By:
Honorable Donald E. Skeeters
Attorney at Law
705 North Dixie Blvd.
Radcliff, Kentucky 40160
Opinion
Opinion By: Robert F. Stephens, Attorney General; By: Walter C. Herdman, Assistant Deputy Attorney General
This is in answer to your letter of April 12 in which you, on behalf of the mayor of Vine Grove (a city of the fourth class), request an opinion concerning the following:
"In the City of Vine Grove, there is one automobile body repair shop whose owner is a city council member. In light of KRS 61.270, and in light of the fact that the councilman operates the only automobile body repair shop in the city, may the councilman make repairs to automobiles and or trucks owned by the city?"
Our response to your question would be in the negative as KRS 61.270 and KRS 86.050 prohibit, in effect, any member of the city council from being interested, directly or indirectly, in any contract with the city, and any such contract executed in violation of the statutes is void.
The fact that the automobile repair shop owned by the city councilman is the only one located in the city would not abrogate the contractual prohibition referred to in the cited statutes as the city can obviously contract for the necessary repairs with a repair shop located outside of the city or within another city close by.
It is only when the law requires that the city contract within the city, as for example, where it must publish the legal advertisements through a newspaper published within the city pursuant to Ch. 424 KRS, that such a contract would not be held in violation of the referred to terms of the statute. Reference OAG 73-88 and OAG 74-516.