Request By:
Mr. Jennings H. Kearby
Attorney at Law
P.O. Box 177
Louisville, Kentucky 40201
Opinion
Opinion By: Robert F. Stephens, Attorney General; By: William S. Riley, Assistant Attorney General
In your recent letter to the Attorney General, several questions are raised concerning KRS 132.460 and KRS 132.990(2) as they relate to hearings before the Kentucky Board of Tax Appeals. KRS 132.460 provides in part as follows:
"The Property Valuation Administrator shall attend all hearings before the County Board of Supervisors and before the Kentucky Board of Tax Appeals relative to his assessment and submit to examination and fully disclose such information as he may have in any other matters pertinent to the inquiry being made."
KRS 132.990(2) reads as follows:
"Any Property Valuation Administrator who willfully fails or neglects to perform any duty legally imposed upon him shall be fined not more than five hundred dollars ($500) for each offense and a judgment of conviction may declare his office vacant."
We have been advised by the Department of Revenue that in the case in which you represented your father and mother before the Kentucky Board of Tax Appeals, the Property Valuation Administrator appeared in person before the Local Board of Assessment Appeals and was represented before the Kentucky Board of Tax Appeals by the local county attorney. The burden would be upon the aggrieved party to show that the Property Valuation Administrator had willfully failed and neglected to perform his duties. Under the circumstances, it would probably be very difficult to establish a showing of willful neglect on the part of the Property Valuation Administrator.
Your first question asks, assuming that a PVA has willfully failed to attend a hearing of the Board of Tax Appeals in Frankfort, whether an offense has been committed in Franklin County or the county where the assessment of real estate had first been made. KRS 452.540 permits prosecution of such an offense to be brought in either Franklin County or the home county of the Property Valuation Administrator.
The second question in your letter asks who would prosecute such an offense. The appropriate Commonwealth Attorney for the county in which the prosecution is being brought would prosecute such an offense.
The third question put forth is what other statutes besides KRS 132.990(2) served to implement section 227 of the Constitution of Kentucky with respect to Property Valuation Administrators. KRS 132.990(2) is the only statute directly implementing section 227 of the Constitution of Kentucky which deals exclusively with Property Valuation Administrators.
Your question concerning recommendations to the Consumer Protection Commission may best be handled by making such wishes known to your elected representatives.