Request By:
Mr. Ralph E. Coppage
Harrison County Clerk
Courthouse
Cynthiana, Kentucky 41031
Opinion
Opinion By: Robert F. Stephens, Attorney General; By: Charles W. Runyan, Assistant Deputy Attorney General
Your question reads as follows:
"May the Harrison County Clerk refuse to accept a plat solely on the grounds that the Harrison County Health Department Supervisor and Sanitarian has not approved and signed the plat as having met with all health department regulations? "
A part of the powers of a local health board is described in KRS 212.230(1)(c):
"(1) County, city-county, and district boards of health shall:
* * *
"(c) Adopt, except as otherwise provided by law, such rules and regulations not in conflict with the rules and regulations of the department for human resources, as may be necessary to protect the health of the people or to effectuate the purposes of this chapter or any other law relating to public health;"
The statute relating to filing of land plats or surveys, KRS 322.400, provides:
"It shall be unlawful for the county clerk of any county, or any other public authority with whom the same may be required by law to be filed, to accept for filing, file or record any map, plat, survey or other document related to the practice of land surveying, unless there is affixed thereto the personal seal and signature of a licensed land surveyor by whom, or under whose personal supervision and direction, such map, plat, survey or other document was prepared."
The plats or surveys envisioned by KRS 322.400 relate strictly to plats or surveys of land. This means a survey of the land by a licensed land surveyor to determine corners, boundaries, divisions, with distances and compass directions. Black's Law Dictionary (4th ed.) p. 1614. In other words, a survey or plat depicts lines run by the licensed surveyor, which lines indicate the precise location of the land surveyed. Kentucky Union Co. v. Hevner, 210 Ky. 121, 275 S.W. 513 (1925) 515.
The local county board of health published certain subdivision regulations. It provides that no subdivision development shall be approved unless certain enumerated standards, involving health and sanitation criteria, are met. The local health department supervisor and sanitarian has requested that you not record any new surveys or plats of subdivisions until he has examined them and determined that the plats or surveys meet all applicable local and state health department regulations concerning sewage systems, etc.
The answer to your question is that because of the narrow range of KRS 322.400, a new plat or survey or other document relating to the practice of land surveying which complies with the requirement of that section in terms of the personal seal and signature of a licensed land surveyor, etc., must be accepted by you for filing and recording. There is no other condition precedent that can be placed on such filing and recording. Thus you can't refuse to file and record such document, where it meets the requirements of KRS 322.400, for the reason that the county health department has not given approval.
The plat or survey relates only to the land location, and has nothing to do with health and sanitation measures to be observed in connection with such land. The subject health regulations do not involve planning and zoning. The restrictions of KRS 100.277 are not applicable here.