Request By:
Hon. John A. Hartman
Counsel for Grant County
Board of Education
24 North Main Street
Walton, Kentucky 41094
Opinion
Opinion By: Robert F. Stephens, Attorney General; By: Robert L. Chenoweth, Assistant Attorney General
As counsel for the Grant County Board of Education you have asked for an opinion from the Office of the Attorney General relative to deductions from teachers' salaries for participation in the credit union operated by the Grant County Education Association. Your specific questions in this regard are whether the Grant County Board of Education is required to make deductions for membership in the credit union and also whether, for credit union members who are borrowers from the credit union, the board of education is required to withhold monthly payments on loans and submit the payments to the credit union.
As you noted in your letter, the applicable law appears to be KRS 161.158(2), which reads as follows:
"Each district board of education shall adopt polices or regulations which will provide for deductions from salaries of its employes or groups of employes whenever a request is presented to the board by said employes or groups thereof. Such deductions shall be made from salaries earned in at least eight different pay periods, and shall be remitted to the appropriate organization or association as specified by the employes. The deductions may be made for, but are not limited to, membership dues, tax sheltered annuities and group insurance premiums. With the exception of membership dues, the board shall not be required to make more than one remittance, of amounts deducted during a pay period, for a separate type of deduction. Health insurance, life insurance, and tax-sheltered annuities shall be interpreted as separate types of deductions. When amounts have been correctly deducted and remitted by the board, said board shall bear no further responsibility or liability for subsequent transaction."
In two prior opinions from this office on this subsection, we concluded, first in OAG 72-663, copy attached, that this law makes it mandatory that a board of education do three things:
"(1) adopt policies or regulations which will provide for deductions from salaries whenever a request is made by an employee; (2) make deductions from salaries earned in at least eight different pay periods, and (3) remit the deductions to the appropriate organization as specified by the employees."
Then in OAG 72-707, copy attached, we noted that a school board may, through its policies or regulations, limit the types of deductions to be made based upon practical problems such as the limitations presented by bookkeeping machines.
In view of the language of the statute we believe the board of education is required to make deductions for membership in the credit union. While the board of education may, we believe it is not required to withhold monthly payments on loans taken out by credit union members from the credit union. While the statute specifically provides an exception relative to "membership dues," and would require the board to make remittances for more than one membership dues, payments on loans is a separate type of deduction. Practical problems in the administration of deducting loan payments may be so great as to cause a local board to exclude this type of deduction.