Request By:
Mr. Wendell H. Bowman
Box 187
Campton, Kentucky 41301
Opinion
Opinion By: Robert F. Stephens, Attorney General; By: Robert L. Chenoweth, Assistant Attorney General
You have asked the Office of the Attorney General for an opinion as to whether public common schools teachers must remit to the employing local board of education the jury pay received for jury duty. It is the opinion of this office the answer to your question is in the affirmative.
The applicable statute to your inquiry is KRS 161.153. This statute, as amended by the 1978 General Assembly, reads in full as follows:
"(1) Any teacher or state employe, except employes subject to the provisions of KRS Chapter 18, who serves on a jury in any duly constituted local, state or federal court shall be granted leave with full compensation, less any compensation received as jury pay, for the period of his actual jury service, which leave shall be in addition to all other leave to which the teacher or state employe may be entitled.
(2) Any state employe who is subject to the provisions of KRS Chapter 18 and who serves on a jury in any duly constituted local, state or federal court shall be granted leave with full compensation for the period of his actual jury service, which shall be in addition to all other leave to which the employe may be entitled."
In this statute a teacher is to have deducted from his or her regular compensation any "jury pay." KRS 29A.170, copy attached, mandates that all jurors for either the circuit or district court are to be paid $5.00 per day for jury service and $7.50 per day as reimbursement of expenses incurred. We believe a teacher is to receive his or her school teacher's compensation less $5.00 per day received as jury pay. We do not believe the $7.50 per diem received must be deducted from the teacher's regular compensation.