Request By:
Martha Belwood
Department of Finance
State Agency for Social Security
P.O. Box 557
Frankfort, Kentucky 40602
Opinion
Opinion By: Steven L. Beshear, Attorney General; Martin Glazer, Assistant Attorney General
You seek an opinion of this Office as to whether the Russell County Hospital District is a political subdivision to be covered for social security purposes under U.S.C. 42, Section 418.
You have enclosed the Articles of Incorporation and Bylaws, Resolution and Order relating to the establishment of the hospital district.
42 U.S.C., Section 418, in its definition of "political subdivision" and "employee" is mirrored in state law. KRS 61.420(5) defines "political subdivision" as:
"'Political subdivision,' in addition to counties, municipal corporations and school district, includes instrumentalities of the Commonwealth, of one or more of its political subdivisions, or of the Commonwealth and one or more of its political subdivisions, and any other governmental unit thereof."
And subsection 3 defines "employe" as:
"'Employe' means any person in the service of the Commonwealth, a political subdivision or an interstate instrumentality of which the Commonwealth is a principal and shall include all persons designated officers including those which are elected and those which are appointed."
The Russell County Hospital District was established pursuant to KRS 216.310 -- 216.360. KRS 216.320 provides in part:
". . . The district shall then be a taxing district within the meaning of section 157 of the Kentucky Constitution for the carrying out of the purposes for which the district was created, and for executing the powers with which it is vested."
So, based upon the language previously cited in KRS 61.420(3) and (5) and KRS 216.320, there is no doubt that the Russell County Hospital District is a political subdivision of the Commonwealth of Kentucky.
The corporation created as Russell County Kentucky Hospital District Health Facilities Corporation provides in its Articles of Incorporation that the Corporation is created at the request of the District for purposes "of acting as an agency and instrumentality of said District."
The Corporation's Board of Directors "shall be the same persons who are at the time the Board of Trustees of the Russell County, Kentucky Hospital District in accordance with KRS 216.323 through KRS 216.335. . . ."
The Articles of Incorporation of the Russell County Health District Improvement Corporation was formed to act as "agents of the Russell County Public Health Taxing District" and to act as "an agency and instrumentality thereof." "The Corporation shall carry out its public and governmental purposes at the direction of the District [Russell County Public Health Taxing District]."
So, all these entities are either governmental subdivisions of the Commonwealth or instrumentality of such subdivision and therefore come under the definition of KRS 61.420(5) and their employees meet the definition of "employe" previously set out in KRS 61.420(3) and subject to your agency's jurisdiction.