Request By:
Mr. Robert Kirtley
Daviess County Attorney
Courthouse
Owensboro, Kentucky 42301
Opinion
Opinion By: Robert F. Stephens, Attorney General; By: Charles W. Runyan, Assistant Deputy Attorney General
The question you raise was stated in your letter as follows:
"May the Fiscal Court, pursuant to KRS 64.346, provide the Sheriff and his deputies with a $150.00 per month automobile maintenance allowance plus furnish gas for their vehicles?"
First, the lump sum allowance of $150 for automobile maintenance would not be legal, since lump sum allowances are prohibited by KRS 64.710. Pursuant to Section 106 of the Kentucky Constitution and KRS 64.346, the fiscal court in your county is authorized to pay out of the general fund for any expenditures which may be deemed necessary for the efficient operation of the sheriff.
In answer to your question specifically, it is our opinion that the fiscal court may authorize the payment out of the county treasury for the monthly maintenance of automobiles used by the county sheriff in connection with his statutory duties. In addition, it can authorize the payment out of the county treasury for gasoline used by the sheriff's vehicles in the carrying out of his statutory functions. See
Funk v. Milliken, Ky., 317 S.W.2d 499 (1958); and
Barkley v. Gatewood, 285 Ky. 179, 147 S.W.2d 373 (1941). Of course these payments for automobile maintenance and gasoline should not be in duplication of reimbursements involved in KRS 70.170 and 64.095 [mileage allowances] .
In connection with the proposed $150 per month allowance, it is legal to budget a sum which is an estimate of what may be expended for that category. However, the actual expenditure of such money must be based upon actual maintenance cost accrued as documented and presented by the sheriff to the fiscal court for payment on an item by item basis.