Request By:
Mr. R. B. Ligon
Election Commissioner
603 S. 7th Street
Mayfield, Kentucky 42066
Opinion
Opinion By: David L. Armstrong, Attorney General; Walter C. Herdman, Asst. Deputy Attorney General
This is in response to your letter of May 31 in which you relate that the Republican Party is having difficulty finding sufficient registered Republicans living in several precincts who will serve as party election officers. The question is raised as to whether or not registered party members living outside these precincts could be legally designated to serve as election officers in the referred to precincts.
Our response to your question would be in the affirmative and we refer you to KRS 117.045(2) which reads in part as follows:
"An election officer shall be a qualified voter of the precinct, except that where no qualified voter of the required political party is available within the precinct, the election officer shall be a qualified voter of the county. . . ."
The above statute clearly provides that where there is no qualified voter of a particular political party available to serve within a particular precinct, a registered party voter residing outside the precinct and anywhere within the county, can be legally appointed to serve as representative of a political party.