Request By:
Mr. Bernard W. Gratzer
Executive Secretary
Commonwealth of Kentucky
Board of Accountancy
310 West Liberty Street
Louisville, Kentucky 40202
Opinion
Opinion By: Robert F. Stephens, Attorney General; By: Martin Glazer, Assistant Attorney General
You seek an opinion of this office as to whether the experience requirements for prospective certified public accountants may be satisfied by two years of experience in the employment of any agency of state government, even though that experience may have been earned prior to the enactment of the 1978 amendments to KRS 325.261.
Prior to those amendments, an accountant, in order to obtain experience, was required to have either:
two years of public accounting experience in the employ of a public accountant or certified public accountant (with a baccalaureate degree with a major concentration in accounting or,
Ony year of such experience and a master's degree or,
four years experience as a field agent with the internal revenue service of which two years are at grade GS-11 (or future equivalent) and a baccalaureate degree.
KRS 325.261 (3) was amended to add sections (h) and (i) and to allow two years of experience in the employment of any agency of state government as an auditor or accountant, provided that such experience is gained under the supervision of a CPA and includes application of the attest function using standards adopted by the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants.
And, under subsection (i), if the employee has a master's degree and experience set out in (h), he may be eligible with one year of experience.
So, before the 1978 amendments, two years or one year of experience with state government was not sufficient experience time. In construing that statute, may the board consider experience prior to the effective date of the 1978 amendments?
KRS 446.080 (1) and (3) provide:
"(1) All statutes of this state shall be liberally construed with a view to promote their objects and carry out the intent of the legislature, and the rule that statutes in derogation of the common law are to be strictly construed shall not apply to the statutes of this state.
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(3) No statute shall be construed to be retroactive, unless expressly so declared."
Considering these two sections in para materia it seems that the Kentucky General Assembly intended to allow accountants with two ears (or one year as the case may be) of experience (under strict guidelines) in state government to be eligible to be certified as CPA's regardless of when the experience was obtained. Otherwise, it would have been simple for the legislature to require that the experience be earned after the effective date of the amendments. Such an interpretation would meet the intent of the legislature and still not be construed retroactive.
The board, in administering the statute as amended, would consider on and after June 17, 1978 the present experience of the applicant. If the applicant had the proper two years of experience on June 17, 1978, the Board of Accountancy would not be applying the statute retroactively but presently as of the date he applied, on and after June 17, 1978.
Therefore, the Board should consider all the proper experience of an applicant, even though such experience was earned prior to June 17, 1978.