Request By:
Mr. Kenneth S. Baker
Perry County Attorney
P.O. Box 1096
Hazard, Kentucky 41701
Opinion
Opinion By: Robert F. Stephens, Attorney General; By: Charles W. Runyan, Assistant Deputy Attorney General
You ask whether or not the county attorney can serve as a member of the county airport board. Of course the members of a county established airport board are appointed by the county judge/executive under KRS 183.132. Subsection (10) of that statute provides in part that "No board member shall hold any official office with the appointing authority." While the language used here is somewhat awkward, it is our view that the legislature intended that no one should serve as a board member if he holds any official position under the county judge/executive. When you consider that the county attorney, as a constitutional officer, is an elected official who works with the fiscal court and the county judge/executive, it can be seen that he does not work under the county judge/executive. He does not take orders from the county judge/executive as such. We conclude that the county judge/executive may legally appoint the county attorney as a member of the county airport board. Here we are only giving the statute its ordinary meaning. Old Lewis Hunter Distillery Co. v. Kentucky Tax Commission, 302 Ky. 68, 193 S.W.2d 464 (1946).