Request By:
Mr. Homer Weaver
Clay County Jailer
115 Court Street
Manchester, Kentucky 40962
Opinion
Opinion By: Steven L. Beshear, Attorney General; By: Charles W. Runyan, Assistant Deputy Attorney General
The Secretary for Corrections has imposed certain costs of training conducted by that Cabinet upon participating jailers of Kentucky. In fact, KRS 441.017 mandates that the Corrections Cabinet maintain a local corrections training program to provide training for jailers and jail personnel.
You raise the following questions:
"(1) Can the Department of Corrections legally charge the jailers for the required training or is it to be provided without charge?
"(2) In the event any jailer refuses to pay for the standard required training and then takes the training can the jailers $3,600.00 travel allowance be stopped?
"(3) After successfully completing the required training can Corrections refuse to issue a certificate because you refuse to pay?"
KRS 441.017 reads:
"(1) For the purpose of raising the level of competence of jailers and jail personnel, the cabinet shall maintain a local corrections training program to provide training for jailers and jail personnel consistent with the standards promulgated pursuant to KRS 441.011 and shall keep records of jailers and jail personnel who satisfactorily complete basic and annual continuing education. A curriculum advisory committee composed of jailers, their representatives and recognized professionals in the field of jail administration shall advise the cabinet concerning the training needs of jailers and jail personnel.
"(2) Beginning in August, 1982 each jailer shall receive an expense allowance to help defray the costs of his and his staff's participation in the local corrections training program. The expense allowance shall be in the amount of three hundred dollars ($300) per month payable out of the state treasury, provided, however, that such payments shall be discontinued if the jailer fails to complete basic training within one (1) year of taking office. Thereafter, expense allowance payments shall be discontinued if the jailer fails to satisfactorily complete annual continuing training. Expense allowance payments shall be resumed following a discontinuance for failure to satisfactorily complete basic or annual training only upon the jailer's satisfactory completion of such training.
"(3) The allowance authorized in subsection (2) of this section shall be considered as operating expenses of the jailer's office and shall not be considered as part of his compensation. Jailers shall not be required to keep records verifying the expenditures from the allowance provided by the state."
The expense allowance provided county jailers under KRS 441.017(2) is for the express purpose of helping to defray the costs of the jailers' participation in the local corrections training program. It logically follows that Corrections can require the jailers who are receiving the training to bear a portion of the cost (estimated by Corrections to be about 50%) by using their training allowance. In this way the express purpose of the allowance is being subserved. See kentucky
Region Eight v. Commonwealth, Ky., 507 S.W.2d 489 (1974), holding that the policy and purpose of a statute will be considered in determining the meaning of the words used.
In answer to question no. 2, in the event the jailer takes the training but refuses or fails to pay the cost charged against him, Corrections can ask the Department of Finance to take steps to stop the monthly training allowance, to the extent of training charges owed to Corrections, until the training charge is paid by the particular jailer. Keep in mind that KRS 441.017(2) provides in part that "such payments shall be discontinued if the jailer fails to complete basic training within one (1) year of taking office. " The jailers' allowance is not compensation. It is to be used solely for the expense of the training program. In addition, KRS 44.030 provides that no money shall be paid to any person on a claim against the state in his own right when he is indebted to the state. Judge Gant, in Reliance Ins. Co. v. Com., Dept. of Transportation, Ky.App., 576 S.W.2d (1979) wrote this for the court: "The statutory law so lucidly set out in KRS 44.030 is but an extension to the government of the equitable right of set-off given to all persons. As the Supreme Court of the United States said in the case of
United States v. Munsey Trust Co., 332 U.S. 234, 67 S. Ct. 1599, 91 L. Ed. 2022 (1947): The government has the same right which belongs to every creditor, to apply the unappropriated monies of his debtors, in his hands, in extinguishment of the debts due to him."
In response to question no. 3, even though the jailer has taken the required training course, Corrections may legally refuse to issue the certificate of training in the event the jailer has not paid the training charge assessed against him. The condition of paying training charges, as relates to issuing a training accomplishment certificate, is a reasonable one in terms of the whole program as outlined in KRS 441.017. It would be a condition to enforce the statutory purpose of the training program. The training program has to be paid for. See 501 KAR 3:040, Section 4.