State AG Opinions
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Did the Arkansas AG certify Dinwiddie's third attempt at a ballot title for an initiated act lowering the antique-vehicle registration age from 45 to 25 years?
Rejected. Dinwiddie's third version of his initiated act to allow 25-year-old vehicles (down from 45) to register as antique still had unresolved drafting defects: a misused enacting clause followed b…
Under Arkansas FOIA, can a city withhold a letter notifying a police officer of his administrative reassignment pending an internal investigation?
No. The letter notifying a police officer of his administrative reassignment pending an internal investigation is a personnel record, not an employee evaluation, because it documents an administrative…
Can an Arkansas city, county, or private business legally use automatic license plate readers (ALPRs)?
Arkansas law generally prohibits automatic license plate readers (ALPRs). Local governments may use them only for specific purposes (law-enforcement database checks, parking enforcement, controlling a…
Can a county take back a raise it gave an elected clerk of court, and who has authority to set the salary?
An elected clerk of court's salary is set by the county's governing body (the county council) and cannot be reduced during the term for which the clerk was elected. The AG concluded the county supervi…
Can a Delaware town council ban rebuttals during public comment, and is it enough to list executive-session reasons by statute subsection?
The Town Council of Ellendale did not violate FOIA. A public comment period that allows two minutes per speaker and disallows rebuttals still gives the public a meaningful opportunity to engage. FOIA …
Can a water district's lake wardens pull people over for speeding or DUI on or near district property?
No. Public safety officers a special purpose district commissions under § 6-11-340 hold the powers of a state constable and can enforce state law, but only on the district's own property and contiguou…
Does the Oklahoma Commissioners of the Land Office have to follow the State Use Advisory Council's mandatory contracts (which steer state spending to nonprofits employing people with disabilities) and the Central Purchasing Act, when its constitutional duty is to maximize benefits to school trust beneficiaries?
Mostly yes. The CLO is in the executive branch and a state agency, so it must follow both laws. But when a State Use mandatory contract's price is higher than the actual market price, the CLO can use …
Does the Oklahoma Housing Finance Agency (OHFA) have to follow state agency rules for purchasing, finance, and consulting like other state agencies?
Mostly no. OHFA is a public trust, not a state agency. It is not governed by the Central Purchasing Act, State Consultants Act, or most of the State Finance Act. It must comply only with the few SFA p…
Can a Delaware city charge for staff time to identify FOIA-responsive records, including supervisor email searches?
No. The City of Wilmington did not violate FOIA when it charged Jamila Davey a $145 cost estimate (three hours of staff time) to process four outstanding FOIA requests about the Rodney Reservoir. Sect…
Can a South Carolina county use its existing property-tax millage to fund a new county police department?
Yes, if voters approve it. The AG concluded that once a referendum approves a county police department that duplicates or replaces the sheriff's law enforcement functions, the county may use current m…
Can Kathleen Garcia simultaneously sit on a community college district board and a fire protection district board whose territories overlap, or does Government Code § 1099 force her to forfeit one of the seats?
The AG granted the College District leave to sue in quo warranto. There is a substantial legal issue under Government Code § 1099 about whether the two offices are 'incompatible' because the fire dist…
Can Shakir Khan, the former Lodi City Councilmember, sue to challenge his replacement Ramon Yepez and reclaim his seat through a quo warranto action?
Yes. The AG granted leave to sue. Substantial questions of fact and law exist about whether Khan's purported jailhouse resignation was valid and whether the Lodi City Council lawfully declared the sea…
Can a member of the City of San Diego Audit Committee also serve on SANDAG's TransNet ITOC, the SANDAG Audit Policy Advisory Committee, or as the MTS Internal Auditor without violating California's incompatible-offices statute?
Mostly no. The AG concluded that simultaneous service on the City Audit Committee and either SANDAG body would violate § 1099 because of overlapping audit jurisdiction. Service as MTS Internal Auditor…
Did the Arkansas AG certify the Lancaster proposed constitutional amendment that would have rewritten absentee-voting rules and banned wireless voting?
Rejected. The AG declined to certify Clinton Lancaster's proposed Absentee Voting and Anti-Wireless-Voting Amendment because of multiple ambiguities in the amendment text. The biggest problems: an ena…
Did the Arkansas AG certify Lancaster's proposed Hand-Marked Paper Ballots constitutional amendment?
Rejected. The AG declined to certify Clinton Lancaster's Hand-Marked Paper Ballots Amendment because of multiple contradictions and ambiguities: an enacting clause used inappropriately for an amendmen…
Can a Mississippi city donate cash to a local cancer-awareness nonprofit foundation?
Conditionally yes, but only as matching funds. Under Miss. Code Ann. § 21-17-1(8), a Mississippi city may use municipal funds to match state, federal, or private funding for any program run by a 501(c…
Did the Arkansas AG certify the 'Reproductive Healthcare Amendment' for the 2024 ballot?
Rejected. The AG declined to certify Steven Nichols's proposed Arkansas Reproductive Healthcare Amendment because of multiple ambiguities: unclear 'access to abortion' language, undefined 'health,' an…
Can a Mississippi county board of supervisors retroactively raise a county court judge's salary for a previous year if it failed to do so at the time?
No. As long as the salary already met the statutory minimum for that year, the Board cannot retroactively increase it. Section 96 of the Mississippi Constitution prohibits extra compensation after ser…
Can a Mississippi board of supervisors raise its salary based on a higher valuation tier and ALSO take the $2,000 boost in the same fiscal year?
No. If a board of supervisors approves a salary increase under Miss. Code Ann. § 25-3-13(2) effective during a fiscal year, board members 'are not eligible for any additional salary increases for that…
Can a Mississippi city give a certified farmers' market free use of a city-owned parking lot, instead of charging rent?
Yes. Miss. Code Ann. § 21-19-69 allows a Mississippi municipality to donate funds to a certified farmers' market operating in the city, up to the equivalent of a one-fourth (¼) mill ad valorem tax on …
When a Mississippi rural water association tears up a paved county road to fix a water line underneath, who pays to repair the road?
Rural water associations may access their water lines under county roads, but Miss. Code Ann. § 11-27-47 makes them responsible for any damage they cause. The county cannot pay for that damage but may…
Can a Mississippi community college let an elected official use its facilities for free to host a college and career fair?
Yes. Mississippi community college boards of trustees have broad authority over the operation of the college under Miss. Code Ann. § 37-29-67. The board may, in its discretion, allow an elected offici…
If a Mississippi city's only bidder on a road project comes in over budget by more than 10%, can the city negotiate the price down?
No. Miss. Code Ann. § 31-7-13(d)(iv) only allows negotiation with the lowest bidder if the bid is not more than ten percent above the funds allocated for the project. The Mississippi Supreme Court con…
Can a Kentucky agency email a hearing officer's recommended order to the parties instead of mailing it?
Only with the party's consent. The Attorney General read KRS 13B.110(4) to require a hearing officer's recommended order in an administrative case to be served on the parties by U.S. Mail, because in …
Can a city redact a former police officer's records with whiteout, and can it withhold his termination letter and administrative-leave letter under FOIA?
Mostly inconsistent with FOIA. The Bay City Attorney's decisions to disclose some records and redact identifiers (SSN, DOB, DLN) were correct, but two records he withheld are personnel records that mu…
After Dobbs, can Oklahoma prosecute a pregnant woman as a criminal for performing or inducing an abortion on herself?
No. Section 1-733 (which says no woman shall self-induce an abortion except under physician supervision) does not impose any criminal penalty. The only statute that ever permitted misdemeanor prosecut…
Can the Arkansas Department of Education force the Pine Bluff School District (or any state-controlled district) to sell or lease unused buildings to a charter or private school?
ADE's Division of Public School Academic Facilities and Transportation can declare a facility 'unused or underutilized,' subject to district appeal. While a district is in Level 5, Intensive support a…
Under the 2023 amendment to Virginia's judicial-misconduct disclosure statute, when does the Judicial Inquiry and Review Commission have to publicly name a judge it has investigated, and what counts as 'disciplinary action' that triggers naming?
JIRC must publicly name a judge in its annual report only when both (a) it concluded the judge breached the Canons of Judicial Conduct and (b) it took disciplinary action because of that conclusion. '…
Does a North Dakota agency violate the open-records law if a citizen's email request never reached the agency because it was filtered out as spam?
No. Three state entities did not violate the open-records law when they failed to respond to emailed records requests they never received: the emails were quarantined by state IT security filters as s…
Can a citizen use North Dakota's open-records law to demand a public official's personal utility bill from the official's office?
No. The Morton County State's Attorney's personal home water bill is not a record of his office, so denying a request for it under the open-records law was proper. The same record, if held by the City…
How long can a North Dakota agency take to respond to an open-records request before it counts as an unreasonable delay?
Twenty-one days from request to delivery was reasonable here, because the records were exempt (requiring a board vote to release with redactions), the request fell across the Christmas and New Year ho…
Does a North Dakota county have to pre-qualify auction bidders or have a contract-for-deed template ready before a tax lien foreclosure sale?
No. A North Dakota county does not have to pre-qualify bidders before a tax lien foreclosure auction; the qualification check kicks in once a high bidder is identified. The county also does not have t…
When does a long-staying hotel or motel guest become a tenant with eviction protections in South Carolina?
It depends on length of stay and whether a rental contract exists. Under § 27-40-120(4), the Residential Landlord and Tenant Act does not cover transient hotel/motel occupancy that is subject to the a…
Did the AG opine on what local-government powers remain over digital asset mining under Arkansas's Data Centers Act?
Declined. The AG declined to opine on six questions about how the Arkansas Data Centers Act of 2023 affects local zoning authority, sound regulation, and what counts as an electric utility's 'transmis…
Can an Arkansas city or county ban cryptocurrency or digital asset mining operations within its borders?
No. Under the Arkansas Data Centers Act of 2023 (A.C.A. §§ 14-1-601 to 14-1-605), cities and counties cannot pass ordinances banning new digital asset mining operations. They can enforce general opera…
Does the Texas chiropractic board have to revoke a chiropractor's license after certain criminal convictions, or can it choose not to?
It has to, for the offenses listed in Occupations Code section 201.5065. That statute says the Board 'shall suspend' a chiropractor's license on an initial conviction (or initial finding of guilt) for…
Can a West Virginia public school refuse to enroll a student, mark the student truant, or ban the student from a private after-school program just because the family is using dual enrollment to qualify for the Hope Scholarship?
No on every count. A West Virginia public school cannot bar a student who is meeting attendance and academic requirements just because the student is also enrolled in a private program, and cannot ban…
Can the Washington County Quorum Court require the county clerk to publish ordinances, resolutions, and contracts on the county website?
Yes. Under Ark. Const. amend. 55 § 1(a) and A.C.A. § 14-14-902(a)(3)(C), the county clerk is the default secretary of the quorum court and must perform additional duties the quorum court assigns by or…
Is a retired Arkansas mayor's pension calculated using the salary he earned as mayor, or the salary the current mayor earns when he starts collecting?
The retired mayor's salary at the end of his last term as mayor is the basis for calculating his retirement benefit, regardless of when he begins receiving payments. Although the codified statute appe…
Is the Arkansas statute that conditions property tax exemption for school-leased property on a no-profit showing constitutional?
Yes. A.C.A. § 6-21-118, which conditions the property tax exemption for property leased to public school districts and open-enrollment public charter schools on the lessor proving the lease is not gen…
Can a city withhold a former police officer's entire personnel file because his termination was 'unrelated to acts that gave rise to a suspension or termination'?
No. A records custodian cannot withhold an entire former police officer's personnel file based on the conclusion that his termination was 'unrelated' to disciplinary acts. The FOIA requires the custod…
Can an Arkansas state agency moderate or block users on its official social media accounts without violating the First Amendment?
Mostly yes for content moderation. Under the First Amendment, ARDOT may limit, remove, or moderate public comments on the interactive parts of its official social media accounts (which are likely 'lim…
Can the AG certify a ballot title when the proposed initiated act is written as a narrative explanation rather than as legislation?
Rejected. The revised text included an enacting clause but used it before a narrative description and partial statute quotations, leaving the AG unable to determine what was actually being enacted. Sp…
Can a Minnesota education district buy a shopping mall and use most of it for special-education programs while keeping the existing commercial leases on the remaining 10 percent of the space?
Yes, if 90 percent of the building goes to educational programs, the existing commercial leases don't interfere with those programs, and the school board determines the lease terms are in the district…
Can someone who lives outside Delaware use Delaware FOIA to get records from a Delaware state agency?
No. Delaware FOIA only requires Delaware agencies to respond to requests from Delaware citizens. Ian Riden, a non-Delaware resident, sent six FOIA requests to the Delaware Health Information Network a…
Can a California winery owner self-obtain a criminal record check from the California DOJ and forward it to another state's alcohol regulator to satisfy that state's direct shipper licensing requirements?
No. Forwarding a self-obtained California criminal record check (or a 'no record' notification) to another state's alcohol regulator violates Penal Code §§ 11125, 11142, and 11143. The other state's r…
If I bundle several charges on one Virginia expungement petition and the court only grants expungement on some of them, do I get my filing fee back?
Yes. The Virginia AG read § 19.2-392.2(L) literally: as soon as the court grants expungement on any one of the charges in the petition, the clerk must refund the full filing fee. The clerk has no auth…
Can an Arkansas city require homeowners to hook up to private water, sewer, gas, or electric service?
Probably no. Arkansas's heavy state-level regulation of utility service areas (by the Public Service Commission, Department of Health, Natural Resources Division, and others) preempts most local manda…
Can a Delaware journalist FOIA a state employee's attendance, performance, and discipline records, and how generic can the agency's denial affidavit be?
It depends on the type of record. The opinion holds that attendance and leave records with generic descriptors like 'sick' or 'vacation' are not exempt and must be disclosed (with specific medical det…
Can the South Carolina High School League put private and charter schools in their own athletic class or playoff?
Probably risky. FY 2023-24 Budget Proviso 1.50 doesn't mention athletic classifications, but it bars any interscholastic association the public schools fund from restricting a private or charter schoo…
Can a Kansas register of deeds refuse to record a land survey unless the surveyor certifies it meets local zoning rules?
No. The Attorney General concluded that a register of deeds cannot require the land surveyor who submits a survey plat to personally certify that it complies with local zoning ordinances. K.S.A. 58-20…
Can a South Carolina clerk of court use child-support Title IV-D funds to supplement staff or their own salary?
A clerk of court may use Title IV-D child-support funds to supplement the salaries of office staff who perform Title IV-D work, without county council's prior approval, as long as the funds go only to…
Can I get an Arkansas State Police incident report or dashcam video that shows a juvenile who was stopped, arrested, or just a passenger?
If the juvenile was arrested or detained, all records of that arrest or detention (incident reports, dashcam) must be withheld unless an exception applies. If the juvenile was only a passenger or byst…
Can a Mississippi city pay back a homeowners' association that mistakenly paid electric bills for a sewer pump station the city actually owns?
Yes, if the city makes the right factual findings. A Mississippi municipality can pay a settlement under Miss. Code Ann. § 25-1-47 if the claim is bona fide and just and the municipality determines it…
If a Mississippi county finds out it has been underpaying its justice court judges for years, how far back can it go to make them whole?
Three years generally. Mississippi's three-year statute of limitations under Miss. Code Ann. § 15-1-49 applies to unpaid-compensation claims against a county. The clock starts when the plaintiff first…
Can a Mississippi school district hire a contractor whose brother is the district's business manager?
Yes, but watch the conflict-of-interest rules. Mississippi's general nepotism statute (§ 25-1-53) is not violated because the contractor's position (concrete work) is not a 'prohibited position' under…
In Mississippi, does a misdemeanor traffic ticket need a separate general affidavit to start a criminal case, or is the ticket itself enough?
A traffic ticket is enough. Mississippi law treats a sworn traffic ticket as a 'sworn affidavit' satisfying § 21-23-7(1)'s requirement that criminal proceedings be brought by sworn complaint. The Miss…
Can Mississippi voters use electronic signatures on a written protest against a municipal bond, or do they have to sign by hand?
No. Electronic signatures cannot be used on the written protest required by Miss. Code Ann. § 21-33-307 to force a bond election. § 1-3-61 generally requires handwritten signatures unless another stat…
When a Mississippi alderman buys a house outside their district, do they automatically lose their seat, or can they stay until they change their homestead exemption?
An alderman vacates the office when they abandon their municipal residence for another residence outside the district with no intent to return. Just buying a home outside the district doesn't automati…
Can a Mississippi city repave a street with public money and then close the street so a private business gets the property?
No. A Mississippi city cannot expend public funds to improve a street and then vacate it so the property reverts to a private landowner. That sequence converts the public expenditure into a benefit fo…
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