Request By:
Mr. Paul P. Borden
Executive Director
Higher Education Assistance Authority
691 Teton Trail
Frankfort, Kentucky 40601
Opinion
Opinion By: Robert F. Stephens, Attorney General; By: Robert L. Chenoweth, Assistant Attorney General
As the Executive Director of the Higher Education Assistance Authority you have presented the Office of the Attorney General a draft of proposed legislation which would relate to Title IV, Part B, of the Higher Education Act of 1965, as amended, and to Regulations issued by the U.S. Commissioner of Education under 45 CFR 177. This proposed legislation would create a public corporation for the purpose of promoting higher education opportunities through a program of financing, making and purchasing of insured student loans to students accepted for enrollment at or attending an eligible, as defined, institution of higher education within the Commonwealth of Kentucky. You have requested this Office to advise whether the corporation to be established by this proposed legislation would be considered an agency of the Commonwealth.
It is the opinion of this Office that the proposed Kentucky Higher Education Student Loan Corporation would be an agency of the Commonwealth of Kentucky. This corporation would be a special agency to handle a function of state government. See Martin v. Chandler, 318 S.W.2d 40 (1958), and compare Kentucky Region VIII v. Commonwealth, 507 S.W.2d 489, 491 (1974). The board of directors of the corporation would be state public officers. See Howard v. Saylor, 305 Ky. 504, 204 S.W.2d 815 (1947).
The proposed corporation under consideration herein would be in many respects similar to the Kentucky Housing Corporation created by KRS Chapter 198A, which was created as a public agency and instrumentality of the Commonwealth.