Request By:
Mr. William Harrison
City Councilman
Vanceburg, Kentucky 41179
Opinion
Opinion By: Steven L. Beshear, Attorney General; By: Walter C. Herdman, Assistant Deputy Attorney General
This is in response to your letter of June 10, in which you relate that you are presently serving in your second term as city councilman of the City of Vanceburg and was recently appointed as the city's ABC representative. You further relate that there are certain records in the Clerk's office that you need; however, some of the members of the city council have objected to you having a key, presumably to the Clerk's office, and have in fact drafted an ordinance authorizing only the Mayor and the Clerk to have such a key. The question is raised as to whether or not the council has this authority.
Under the open records act, particularly KRS 61.872, all public records must be open for inspection to any person with certain exceptions not applicable here. Such persons have the right to inspect such public records during regular office hours of the public agency having custody. Of course the records of the city located in the Clerk's office are public records under the definition section found in KRS 61.870.
The 1982 General Assembly enacted a new section to the municipal code, namely KRS 83A.085, which creates the office of City Clerk and provides among the duties and responsibilities attached to this office, the maintenance and safekeeping of the permanent records of the city. The officer holding the position of Clerk is also designated as the official custodian of the records within the meaning of the open records act, namely, KRS 61.870 to 61.882. Thus, the Clerk is responsible for the safekeeping of the city records and is certainly entitled, not only to a key to wherever the records are stored, but it is her responsibility that they remain in her safekeeping as the open records act provides, subject to inspection as the act provides. At the same time the Mayor, as the chief administrative officer of the city pursuant to the terms of KRS 83A.010(6) and 83A.130(3), has the responsibility, rather than the council, to see that the affairs of the city are properly administered and, as a consequence, we see no legal objection to he along with the Clerk being authorized to receive a key to the official city records to the exclusion of anyone else, including members of the city council.
Certainly as a member of the city council you are entitled to inspect and make copies of any public records of the city located in the Clerk's office during normal office hours and at other times in emergencies.