Request By:
Mr. Jere Pigue
Vice President-Sales
WKYT-TV
P.O. Box 5037
Winchester Road
Lexington, Kentucky 40555
Opinion
Opinion By: Steven L. Beshear, Attorney General; Carl Miller, Assistant Attorney General
You have requested an opinion of the Attorney General as to whether the Fayette County School Board's Affirmative Action Advisory Committee comes under the strictures of the Kentucky Open Meeting's Law, KRS 61.805-61.850.
From the title of the Committee we assume that it was created by formal action of the Fayette County Board of Education. If this assumption is correct, the Affirmative Action Advisory Committee is a public agency within the definition stated in KRS 61.805(2) which reads as follows:
"'Public Agency' means any state legislative, executive, administrative advisory board, commission, committee, policy making board of an institution of education or other state agency which is created by or pursuant to statute or executive order, (other than judicial or quasi-judicial bodies); any county, city, school district, special purpose district boards, public commissions, counsels, offices or other municipal corporations or political subdivisions of the state; any committee, ad hoc committee, subcommittee, subagency or advisory body of a public agency which is created by or pursuant to statute, executive order, local ordinance or resolution or other legislative act, including but not limited to planning commissions, library or park boards and other boards, commissions and agencies."
A school district is created by statute and is, therefore, a public agency under the Open Meetings Law. In OAG 78-496 and OAG 78-571 we stated our opinion that any committee or subcommittee created by a formal action of a school board is a public agency under the Open Meetings Law. We reached that conclusion by equating any formal action taken by the Board of Education with "executive order, local ordinance or resolution or other legislative act. " We are still of the same opinion.
[We note that in the case of
Courier Journal and Louisville Times Co. v. University of Louisville Board of Trustees, Ky.App. 596 S.W.2d 374 (1980), there is dictum in the opinion that the word "resolution" refers only to a "resolution" or "ordinance" enacted by a municipal legislative body authorized by statute to adopt resolutions and ordinances. However, the decision of the Court was not in any way based upon that expression in the opinion by the judge who wrote it. Since mere dictum does not have precedential force, we do not depart from our position that any formal action by an agency creating a committee or subcommittee brings the committee or subcommittee under the Open Meetings Law. ]
It is our opinion that the Fayette County School Board's Affirmative Action Advisory Committee is a public agency which is required to conduct its meetings according to the Open Meetings Law.