Request By:
Honorable Roger Wm Perry
Attorney at Law
908 Poplar Street
P.O. Box 352
Benton, Kentucky 42025
Opinion
Opinion By: Steven L. Beshear, Attorney General; John H. Gray, Assistant Attorney General
Thank you for your letter in which you ask if the Department for Human Resources, Bureau of Health or any District Board of Health may promulgate regulations that govern how the assets of a County Board of Health may be used? Your letter also asks if such regulations could be enacted in the future.
It is the opinion of this office that neither DHR, nor the Bureau of Health, nor any District Board of Health may promulgate regulations that govern how the assets of a County Board of Health may be used.
Although DHR has general supervisory powers over County Health Departments in formulating plans and establishing services, under KRS 212.120(1) DHR's involvement with local assets is limited to making an investigation upon the creation of a County Health Department into the adequacy of the appropriation provided by the county. The statutes make no provisions that would allow DHR to promulgate regulations governing how local assets are to be used.
Although such regulations could conceivably be adopted in the future, they could only be adopted by amending the statutes.