Request By:
Clint R. Collins
Monticello
Kentucky 42633
Opinion
Opinion By: Steven L. Beshear, Assistant Deputy Attorney General; By: Walter C. Herdman, Assistant Deputy Attorney General
This is in answer to your letter of March 28 in which you raise the following questions:
"May a chairman of a legal subdivision of city government make a motion in a business meeting. Example: May the Chairman of the Library Board make a motion in the meeting or must it come from a member of the board."
In response to the above we assume you are referring to a City Library Board established pursuant to KRS 173.350 which details the organization of the board and its powers and duties. This statute does not indicate the procedure for conducting business before the board and as a consequence it is left up to the board to adopt its own rules of procedure which it is authorized to do under McQuillin, Municipal Corporations, Vol.4 § 1432 and 58 AmJur 2d, Municipal Corporations, § 158.
Of course under ordinary parliamentary procedures, (Roberts Rules of Order), following the selection of a chairman such chairman does not make motions or second motions but on the other hand entertains motions from the legislative body, in this instance the board, and asks whether or not such motions are seconded. However, the board of trustees of the library is not necessarily governed by strict parliamentary procedures.
It is thus possible that the board could adopt a rule of procedure to permit the chairman to make a motion since he is a member with the same voting powers as the other members.