Request By:
Mr. Buel E. Stalls
407 North Fifth Street
Murray, Kentucky 42071
Opinion
Opinion By: Robert F. Stephens, Attorney General; By: Walter C. Herdman, Assistant Deputy Attorney General
This is in answer to your letter of January 17 in which you raise the following question:
"Do the Kentucky Revised Statutes require the Common Council of a city of the third class to divide the city into wards for the election of Common Council members?"
Our response to your question would be in the negative. Section 160 of the Constitution clearly indicates that cities of the first three classes may be divided into wards, which is obviously permissive under the construction of statutes. KRS 446.010. At the same time KRS 85.050 is the key statute governing the question of establishing wards and it provides that:
"The common council may from time to to time, by ordinance, divide the city into not more than six (6) wards, as nearly equal in population as possible." (Emphasis added.)
Here again the word "may" is obviously used in the permissive sense as previously mentioned. At the same time KRS 85.040, which provides that the common council of twelve members are to e apportioned equally among the wards of the city, is dependent, in our opinion, on whether or not wards have been established by the common council under KRS 85.050.
Under the circumstances, therefore, we believe that it is purely optional on the part of the council of a third class city, such as Murray, as to whether or not the city shall be laid out into wards.