Request By:
Mr. James Crowell
Kenton County Sheriff
103 City Building
Covington, Kentucky 41011
Opinion
Opinion By: Steven L. Beshear, Attorney General; By: Charles W. Runyan, Assistant Deputy Attorney General
You raise the question concerning turning over taxes collected by you to the taxing authority or special district at certain intervals.
You are required to report in writing under oath to the county judge/executive, by the 10th day of the month, or more often if required by the county judge as relates to county or special district taxes, after each calendar month of tax collecting the amount of "state and county taxes" you have collected during the month preceding your report. See KRS 134.300. You must show in such report the amount collected for each fund for which such tax money is intended and the disposition of such tax money collected. The reports must be filed and recorded in separate books furnished by the county judge/executive for that purpose, and shall be open for inspection in the office of the county clerk.
The purpose of the provision, that the county judge may require more than the monthly reporting, is to prevent the sheriff from having funds in his possession in excess of the amount of his general revenue bond. See KRS 134.230. The general revenue bond required by KRS 134.230 covers liability to account for all charges of taxes made against the sheriff, and for all money received by him as revenue collector. Thus the officer fixing this bond should set it for no less than the aggregate amount of state, county, and special district tax receipts for each year the bond is in force. Leslie County v. Maggard, 212 Ky. 354, 279 S.W. 335 (1926) 338. See also KRS 134.240.
Thus under KRS 134.300 and 134.230, where the county judge/executive requires the sheriff to make his tax collections report more often than on the monthly basis, the statutes clearly require you to turn over taxes collected, after any previous report, to the appropriate taxing authority or special taxing district. In connection with the usual monthly report, you are required at that time to turn over taxes collected to the appropriate taxing authorities or special taxing districts.
The payment of taxes collected by the sheriff to the appropriate taxing authority and special districts to coincide with the reporting-of-taxes-collected scheme is mandatory. Fulton County v. Thompson, 265 Ky. 510, 97 S.W.2d 40 (1936) 41. Although KRS 134.300(2) specifically mentions the payments of county taxes collected to the county treasurer, the entire reading of the statute suggests that the payment scheme was intended to apply to the state, as a taxing authority, and special taxing districts. See KRS 134.320 requiring the same time scheme for "reporting" and "payment" of taxes, as relates to state taxes, as mentioned in KRS 134.300, except that the department of revenue, instead of the county judge/executive, may require more than the monthly reporting and payment as relates to state taxes collected by the sheriff.