BENTON – Judge/Executive Kevin Neal addressed in Tuesday’s Fiscal Court meeting, correspondence between Benton City Attorney Zach Brien to Marshall County Attorney Jeff Edwards concerning the Interlocal Cooperative Agreement between the county and City of Benton. Benton Mayor Rita Dodson, council members and city workers were in attendance during Tuesday’s proceedings.
Brien’s letter to Edwards addressed concerns the City of Benton has stating, “it has been brought to my attention that the county is no longer willing to supply assistance to the City of Benton as the city and county agreed to do so and has been a common practice for many years.”
The letter, dated November 22, 2016, went on to say the citizens of Benton pay millions of dollars in taxes to the county government and the county and city have a contract to provide assistance to maintain certain governmental properties and roads.
A copy of the Interlocal Agreement was provided, which requires a 10-day notice before the county can remove itself from this agreement, which according to Brien, they have not done.
Neal said Edwards did respond to Brien’s letter in November but following his meeting with Mayor Rita Dodson, as far as the use of the Road Department, especially the budget accountability on tax dollars, he felt needed to be maintained, Neal stated he did not respond to the letter.
“A mayor calling the road department to do business outside the fiscal court or my office is not good business”, Neal said. “I wouldn’t do that and I wouldn’t expect it from any other elected official or private citizen. So my response was nothing which generated a January 18th response from this year from the city attorney to the county attorney.”
The January letter from Brien said the city would like for the county to make clear its position as to whether it recognizes the Interlocal Agreement as valid and effective. The city believes the agreement is valid with over two decades of evidence that both sides have honored the agreement.
Neal then read the Interlocal Agreement in question, pursuant to KRS 65.210. Two signatures appeared on the document out of four and they were Judge Mike Miller and Benton Mayor Coy Creason. The two other signatures required were from then Hardin mayor Danny Baker and Calvert City mayor Kean McKinney.
Neal asked Brien, “do you think this agreement is specific or non-specific”, to which Brien said “non-specific, poorly written agreement”. KRS 65.242, which Brien cited in his letter to the county attorney states “an agreement approved under KRS 65.210 and 65.300”, which Brien feels the agreement falls within those statutes.
“The city is stating that we intend on standing behind this agreement”, Brien said.
Neal said the agreement does not fall within KRS 65.210 and KRS 65.300, saying “that’s not my opinion, it’s just a simple fact”.
Neal said he began looking into these Interlocal Agreements two weeks ago and addressed KRS 65.250 which states agreements like these must specify the duration of the agreement to which Neal asked Brien is there anything in the Interlocal Agreement that specifies duration to which Brien replied “no”.
Neal continued by saying that all sub-sections in KRS 65.250 do not fall within the agreement and said his concern is in budgeting.
“There’s a right way of doing business and a wrong way of doing business in my opinion”, Neal said. “This agreement was read in Fiscal Court on May 8, 1989. This agreement was sent to the Attorney General’s office. I contacted the DLG (Department for Local Government) and the Attorney General’s office. There’s four Interlocal Agreements that are on file, this is not one of them.”
Neal read a letter from former County Attorney Missy Moss to the Attorney General’s office that pertained to the Interlocal Agreement in question. In the letter it states that in order to enter into the Interlocal Agreement, particular attention needs to be paid to KRS 65.250 which sets forth the requirements of such an agreement. Those items were addressed in the letter that said “None of these items are covered in your proposed agreement. The proposed agreement is too general and non-specific.”
“The reason why I’m a little bit upset about this is because I’m the one that’s… I have people calling me saying, Judge you’re not providing assistance to the cities, and that’s not accurate”, Neal said.
Neal said after receiving the letter from the County Attorney in 1990, they (county and cities) sat back down and created another agreement that stated, “the agreement would be in effect for four years provided that either party may terminate the agreement by providing a written note 30 days in advance of the termination date, and the agreement allowed the county to assist Benton from time to time in the maintenance of its streets, parks, right of ways and other public improvements”.
Neal continued to read the agreement, dated April 11, 1990, that included prior approval of the Fiscal Court for undertakings pursuant to the agreement. The agreement stated that the Marshall County Judge Executive and the Mayor of Benton shall jointly administer the cooperative undertaking and equipment used in the undertaking including equipment and labor shall be paid by Benton.
Neal said it’s clear in the past an agreement was attempted to do business the right way, but the required documentation was not submitted by the City of Benton. A response from the Attorney General on May 18, 1990 to Mayor Harvey, stated the proposed agreements were reviewed under the Interlocal Cooperation Act of KRS 65.210 and KRS 65.300 which said “proposed agreements cannot be approved at this time and are therefore being returned to you.”
The letter went on to say that copies of the Ordinance or Order of participating cities has not been furnished as required and laid out the items that needed to be addressed.
Agreements drawn in 1992 and 1994, according to Neal, still did not meet the requirement as stated by the Attorney General and are the last agreements that could be found recorded by the County Clerk.
“There may have been two decades of evidence to show that the county and cities have worked together, which I don’t think that’s ever been a question out of my office, but I do question the legalities of how we do business going forward and under 65.210 and 65.300, it outlines how we do business and that’s what I fully intend to do.” Neal said.
Brien said a lot of this information was new to him to which Neal asked Brien, “if this was new to you, then was this discussed in an open meeting with the Benton City Council”, to which Brien replied “no”.
“This is the conversation that I’ve been attempting to have so that we can get information, so we can identify the way that we need to work together in the future”, Brien said.
Neal said “it’s clear the statues outline how we do business moving forward and you have to understand that there are citizens being told that I do not support the cities, to me that’s a problem, that’s politics.”
Neal said if there’s support that the city needs, the county will support it but will do it in the right way, presented in open court so that people can see what’s going on with their tax dollars with the elected officials present.
Brien questioned the appropriate way to work together and Neal suggested to Brien that he needs to sit down with the Benton city officials in open meetings and discuss this before moving forward.
Commissioner Rick Cocke said that cooperation is imperative for the cities and county to work together with the resources they have and would like to see a joint meeting between the Judge, Fiscal Court and City of Benton to communicate and not go through attorney’s saying, “we need to help each other”.
“Cooperation and communication are not in question”, Neal said “What’s in question is the validity of that agreement. That’s as simple as it is.”
Assistant County Attorney Jason Darnell said, “moving forward, whether we like it or not, we’ve got to put it in writing like the statute says and send it to DLG to get their approval.”
Commissioner Bob Gold said “I support working together with cities without a doubt and whatever needs to be done to fix it needs to be done and done the right way.”
Documents:
1980InterlocalAgreementAndAGResponse
1990InterlocalAgreementAndAGResponse
1992InterlocalAgreement