Request By:
Mr. Gary L. Martin
Box 47
Estill, Kentucky 41627
Opinion
Opinion By: Robert F. Stephens, Attorney General; By: Walter C. Herdman, Assistant Deputy Attorney General
This is in answer to your letter of November 16 in which you relate that at the November, 1976 general election you replaced a regularly appointed election officer. Your question is, does the initially appointed officer have the right to serve in the following primary election, or the person replacing him.
In response to your question, we quote the following excerpt from KRS 117.045 (2) and (3):
"(2) . . . Vacancies shall be filled in the same manner as provided for original appointments and the person appointed to fill the vacancy shall be of the same political party as his predecessor.
"(3) If the county board of elections fails to appoint election officers, or if any such officer fails to attend for thirty (30) minutes after the time for commencing the election, or refuses to act, the officer in attendance representing the political party of the absentee shall appoint a suitable person to act in his place for that election. . . ."
If you were appointed to fill a vacancy which can only occur when the original appointee resigns or refuses to serve prior to the election by notifying the board, you serve for the remainder of the one (1) year term, which would of course include the following May primary in accordance with subsection (2) referred to above. On the other hand, if you were appointed on election day at the polls as indicated in the quoted excerpt from subsection (3), then your appointment would continue only through that election and immediately thereafter the regularly appointed precinct officer would resume his position and serve out the remainder of his term which would have, in this instance, included the May, 1977 primary.
You also indicate that you are a member of the Beaver-Elkhorn Water District Commission and raise the question as to whether or not commission meetings are required to be open to the public.
The answer to your question would be in the affirmative. Water districts are political subdivisions of the state as held in the case of Louisville Extension Water District v. Diehl Pump and Supply Co., 246 S.W.2d 585 (1952). KRS 61.810 provides that all meetings of a quorum of the members of any public agency at which any public business is discussed or at which any action is taken by such agency are declared to be public meetings open to the public at all times, with certain exceptions listed therein. The term "public agency" is defined to include political subdivisions of the state under the definition section of the Open Meetings Act, namely KRS 61.805. Under the circumstances, at all meetings of the Beaver-Elkhorn Water District Commission are required to be open to the public. There are, of course, exceptions relating to the matters to be discussed at meetings of public agencies listed as we previously indicated in KRS 61.810. For your information, we are enclosing a copy of the Open Meetings Act.