Request By:
Mr. Joe W. Johnson
Fulton County Attorney
P.O. Box 300
122 Clinton Street
Hickman, Kentucky 42050
Opinion
Opinion By: Robert F. Stephens, Attorney General; By: Charles W. Runyan, Assistant Deputy Attorney General
Your questions relate to the Fulton County Fiscal Court holding its meetings at an office building in the corporate limits of Hickman, Kentucky, the county seat of Fulton County.
Question No. 1:
"Is it lawful for the fiscal court to hold its regularly scheduled meeting at a building other than the county courthouse? The other building is located in the city limits of the county seat."
Under KRS 67.090, as amended by H.B. 659 [Ch. 390, 1978 Acts, § 1] the fiscal court of each county in Kentucky must hold its sessions at the county seat or at other county government centers within the county as authorized by the fiscal court. This means that the fiscal court must hold its meetings either in the county seat or at some other government center within the county but outside of the county seat as authorized by the fiscal court. Thus the fiscal court can hold its meetings in the courthouse in the county seat or it may hold its meetings in some other building located in the county seat, or it may hold its meetings outside of the county seat, as mentioned above, upon notice as prescribed by the statute.
Question No. 2:
"Must the county court clerk, at the direction of the fiscal court, carry the fiscal court order book from the county courthouse to the meeting of the fiscal court?"
If the county clerk is the clerk of the fiscal court, the fiscal court, if it wishes, can require the clerk to physically bring the current fiscal court order book over to the meeting. After all, the fiscal court is a court of record, and the fiscal court order book reflects the various resolutions, orders, and ordinances of the fiscal court. If the presence of the fiscal court order book would facilitate the work of the fiscal court in any reasonable way, then it seems that such legislative body has the authority to require its clerk to bring its record over to the meeting. See KRS 67.100, as amended by H.B. 152 [Ch. 118, 1978 Acts, § 8].