Request By:
Mr. Brent Yonts
Attorney at Law
114 Mill Street
Greenville, Kentucky 42345
Opinion
Opinion By: Steven L. Beshear, Attorney General; By: Walter C. Herdman, Assistant Deputy Attorney General
This is in response to your letter of May 24 in which you, as representative of the City of Rosewood, a city of the sixth class, relate that there are vacancies in the entire legislative body that must be filled. However, there is disagreement as to whether the governor or county judge fills these vacancies.
Since Rosewood is a city of the sixth class it must operate under the commission form of government composed of four commissioners and a mayor pursuant to the terms of KRS 83A.020 and 83A.030.
KRS 83A.040(4) provides with respect to the legislative body the following:
"If vacancies occur in a way that all seats become vacant, the governor shall appoint qualified persons to fill the vacancies sufficient to constitue a quorum. The remaining vacancies shall be filled as provided in this section."
With respect to vacancies in the office of mayor, subsection (2) provides that in such an event the legislative body of the city shall fill the vacancies within thirty days thereof. Prior to the enactment of the new municipal code it is true that vacancies in the city legislative body of cities of the sixth class were to be filled by the county judge/executive pursuant to KRS 88.230. However, this section was repealed by the new code and as a consequence the City of Rosewood must operate in accordance with the above referred to provisions of the new code.
Under the circumstances, the governor must fill the vacancies on the commission by selecting a sufficient number to constitute a quorum, remembering of course that the mayor is a voting member of the commission. At the same time he must appoint a mayor since, from the facts, more than thirty days have elapsed since the vacancies occurred. As a consequence, the appointed members of the commission could not fill the office of mayor under any circumstances. We might also add that the thirty-day deadline applies to vacancies occurring in the commission.