Request By:
Hon. W. E. Quisenberry
McLean County Attorney
P.O. Box 261
Calhoun, Kentucky 42327
Opinion
Opinion By: Robert F. Stephens, Attorney General; By: Charles W. Runyan, Assistant Deputy Attorney General
In your letter of May 2 you requested the opinion of this office as to whether the County Judge/Executive may appoint a library board under KRS 173.340 if the Fiscal Court has not first established a library district pursuant to KRS 173.310.
KRS 173.310 provides various means by which the legislative body of a governmental unit, in this instance the McLean County Fiscal Court, may provide library services for its residents. In that same section the legislative body is authorized to appropriate the funds necessary to support the library. KRS 173.340(2) provides for the appointment of a library board within thirty days after a library has been established pursuant to KRS 173.310.
The plain language of the statute clearly indicates a library board may not be appointed before a library is established by the fiscal court.
In the situation you have described the county, through the library board, would have to provide storage facilities for books though the rest of the library program would be furnished free of charge by the Kentucky Department of Libraries and Archives. The storage facility would necessarily be supported with county funds.
KRS 67.080 authorizes the appropriation and spending of county funds by the Fiscal Court. The County Judge/Executive is given no such authority or power. KRS 67.710. Therefore, the County Judge/Executive would be acting beyond the scope of his powers by appointing a library board which would in turn initiate a library program which would be supported by county funds where the fiscal court had not, by prior action, appropriated funds for such a purpose.
Therefore, it is the opinion of this office that the County Judge/Executive cannot appoint a library board under KRS 173.340 where the Fiscal Court has not first established a library.