Request By:
Mr. John R. Cox
County Attorney
P.O. Box 9
Morehead, Kentucky 40351
Opinion
Opinion By: Robert F. Stephens, Attorney General; Elizabeth E. Blackford, Assistant Attorney General
You have written to ask whether the Fiscal Court is responsible for paying unemployment tax on office employees of elected officials such as the county clerk. You stated that KACO has informed you that it is optional. The answer is essentially correct.
I am enclosing a copy of OAG 79-433 which addressed the same question to a great extent. As you will note, we have opined that it is the county which is ultimately liable for the unemployment tax so that the county must pay the unemployment tax if the various offices do not generate sufficient fees to cover the contribution. However, where the offices do generate sufficient fees to cover the contributions, the county has the option of having the various offices pay the contributions on those people employed in the office.
The fees earned by the elected officers, such as the sheriff, the clerk and the jailer, are to be used to pay the salaries of the assistants or deputies of the officers and the necessary expenses of the office. See, for example, KRS 64.345. The unemployment tax is in essence a necessary office expense as liability for the tax accrued as a direct corollary to each salary paid to each person employed in the various offices. Therefore, the contribution may, optionally, be assessed against the individual offices so long as the offices generate sufficient fees to cover that cost.