Request By:
Honorable Harold R. Childress
Webster County Judge
Courthouse
Dixon, Kentucky 42409
Opinion
Opinion By: Robert F. Stephens, Attorney General; By: Charles W. Runyan, Assistant Deputy Attorney General
On December 26, 1973, the City of Providence and Webster County Fiscal Court procured a loan from Providence State Bank to finish construction on on the Providence-Webster County Airport. The Coal Producing County Development Fund legislation [KRS 42.300 et seq. ] was enacted in 1974. The Coal Severance Economic Aid Fund legislation [KRS 42.330 et seq. ] was passed in 1976. Both programs, though separate and distinct pieces of legislation, are funded by the state's coal severance tax. We concluded in OAG 76-184, copy enclosed, that the "Coal Producing County Development Fund" must be continued until all allocated monies are disbursed.
Your question:
"Is it legally permissable for coal severance tax money to be paid on a preexisting debt for capital improvements as a capital project? "
KRS 42.300(2) provides in part that money in the fund [Coal Producing County Development Fund] shall be used for "public improvement projects," which includes but is not limited to construction, reconstruction and maintenance of roads and bridges, sewer and water projects, public facilities, parks and industrial development projects. [Emphasis added].
Assuming that Webster County still has some allocations in the Coal Producing County Development Fund, it is our opinion that Webster's allocation may be expended legally for the purpose of retiring the $17,000 obligation. The point is that the expenditure of the $17,000 on this joint city-county airport capital project is expressly authorized under KRS 42.300(2), as it mentions "public improvement projects" and "public facilities. " The airport capital construction is indeed a public improvement project or public facility as mentioned in KRS 42.300(2). See KRS 183.132 and 183.133. The airport project has been constructed. The question is: Can available state coal severance tax money [allocation in favor of Webster County under KRS 42.300] be used to pay off a part of this capital project cost. We think the answer is "yes". This coal severance tax money would merely reimburse the county for its previous contribution to the airport capital project.
Now, let us apply the question to the Coal Severance Economic Aid Fund of 1976. Here again we are of the opinion that KRS 42.330(2) expressly authorizes the expenditure of state coal severance tax money, allocable to Webster County, for this "capital project" , i.e., for this city-county airport capital construction project. KRS 42.330(2) states that the money in the fund shall be used only for "capital projects" in coal producing counties. This airport project was indeed a capital project as mentioned in that statute.
Our construction is based on the literal wording of these statutes. The court has said it has a duty to construe statutes literally if it is reasonably possible to do so. Here it is reasonably possible to engage in a literal construction. Barrett v. Stephany, Ky., 510 S.W.2d 524 (1974). In fact Judge Cullen wrote in Department of Revenue v. Greyhound Corporation, Ky., 321 S.W.2d 60 (1959), that "we conceive it to be our duty to accord the words of a statute their literal meaning unless to do so would lead to an absurd or wholly unreasonable conclusion." Here our construction is wholly reasonable.
We disagree with the Department for Local Government which took the position that the statutes neither prohibit nor specifically authorize this expenditure. We have just pointed out that both statutes expressly and explicitly authorize expenditures for such capital projects.