Request By:
Mr. Terry O. McKinney
Lyon County Judge Executive
P.O. Box 698
Eddyville, Kentucky 42038
Opinion
Opinion By: David L. Armstrong, Attorney General; By: Charles W. Runyan, Assistant Deputy Attorney General
In OAG 82-253, to which you referred, we pointed out that under KRS 67.705(3), the county judge executive's annual salary (except in urban-county governments) as a "minimum" must be the greater of a sum not less than sixty percent (60%) of the maximum compensation certified under KRS 64.527 (the maximum payable to a local constitutional officer for 1984 is $30,605), or not less than the "annual compensation" of the sheriff, or county clerk, or jailer in the county. However there is an exception to the foregoing minimum computation of the county judge executive's salary. It reads, as a part of KRS 67.705(3):
". . . except that no fiscal court shall be required under provisions of this section to approve an amount for the compensation of any one official which would exceed six percent (6%) of the county's total annual general fund receipts including federal revenue sharing moneys. " (Emphasis added).
You ask for our interpretation of the "exception" language above cited.
The statute, KRS 67.705, does not define "total annual general fund receipts." "Revenue sharing moneys" included in the concept "total annual general fund receipts" are under the federal law subject to expenditure by applicable Kentucky law. See 31 U.S.C.A. § 6704(a)(3). KRS 68.240 deals with budget units, as relates to a county budget. However, we are unable to find any statutory definitions of the term "annual general fund receipts" as such. Since there is no county "general fund" treated in the statutes or in the county budget practice, as such, the latter according to Mr. Bob Purdom, the State Local Finance Officer, it is our opinion that the statute, to make sense, can only refer to all revenues coming into the county treasury, each year, including road funds, with the exceptions of revenue sharing moneys (treated as a separate category in KRS 67.705, but still is to be added to the total revenues of the county), special federal grants and Local Government Economic Assistance moneys (involves coal severance tax). See KRS 42.450.
The courts have held that constitutional provisions and statutes must be given a practical interpretation to carry out manifest purpose.
Rouse v. Johnson, 234 Ky. 473, 28 S.W.2d 745 (1930) 750. Since the statutes and budgetary practice contain no such special term as "general fund" in county government, a practical, meaningful interpretation is necessary. The purpose of the six percent limitation was to place a maximum in terms of 6% of the county's total receipts, with exceptions indicated above. See
Reeder v. Commonwealth, Ky., 507 S.W.2d 491 (1974) 491. A practical interpretation in this context to carry out the manifest purpose is compelling.
Reeves v. Fidelity & Columbia Trust Co., 293 Ky. 544, 169 S.W.2d 621 (1943).
It must be noted that the maximum salary for county judge executives in Kentucky for 1984 is $30,605.