Request By:
Mr. Carl Brown
Jefferson County Commissioner
Jefferson County Court House
Louisville, Kentucky 40202
Opinion
Opinion By: Steven L. Beshear, Attorney General; By: Walter C. Herdman, Assistant Deputy Attorney General
This is in response to your letter of May 16 in which you raise the following question:
"Assuming no factual circumstances that would give rise to their common-law conflict of interest, may a Jefferson County Commissioner, a member of Jefferson County Fiscal Court, while serving in office also be employed, full-time or part-time as an instructor at the University of Louisville, or any other state institution of higher learning?"
Our response to the above question would be in the affirmative, assuming no common law conflict of interest exists. The position of county commissioner is of course a county office under § 144 of the Constitution. At the same time employment as instructor at the University of Louisville or any other state institution would be considered a form of state employment since such institutions are state agencies as held in a number of cases, among them being
Board of Trustees of Fairview Graded Common School District v. Renfroe, 259 Ky. 644, 83 S.W.2d 27 (1935). See also OAG 73-8 in which we held that a position on the faculty of a state community college, a part of the Kentucky community a form of state employment.
Section 165 of the Constitution and KRS 61.080 prohibits a person from holding a state office and a county office at the same time, however, neither prohibits a person from holding state employment and a county office at the same time. As a consequence, the office of county commissioner and that of instructor at the University of Louisville or other state educational institutions, are not incompatible under the constitution and statute.