Request By:
Thomas O. Harris
Executive Director
Kentucky Council
on Agriculture
35-36 Fountain Place
Frankfort, Kentucky 40601
Opinion
Opinion By: Steven L. Beshear, Attorney General; John H. Gray, Assistant Attorney General
Your letter of June 25, 1982 asks for an opinion concerning the legal position of the Kentucky Tobacco and Health Research Institute Board as to appointments and election of officers from the present time until such time as the amended version of KRS 248.510 takes effect (July 15, 1982).
As I understand the situation, your Board was to have appointed new at large members and elected new officers at your June 1982 Board meeting. Realizing that an amended version of KRS 248.510, which would add an additional permanent member to the Board and which would allow the Governor to appoint the three at large members, was to become effective July 15, 1982, your Board chose not to appoint new at large members or to elect new officers at your June meeting, even though the terms of both the at large members and the elected officers were to expire on June 30, 1982. Instead, your Board, by proper motion and second, adopted a resolution extending the terms of the at large members until such time as the Governor appoints new at large members and postponing the election of new officers until your next Board meeting.
This office feels that the Board's action was proper.
Under KRS 248.520 the Kentucky Tobacco Research Board is charged with formulating policies and procedures as necessary to carry out the provisions of the State's Tobacco Research Program. It is the opinion of this office that the Board's action in extending the terms of its officers and at large members was a prudent way of ensuring the stability and continuity of the Tobacco Research Program and was thus consistent with the Board's legislative charge.