State AG Opinions
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Can a person accept the governor's appointment to fill the Desha County District Court (McGehee Department) judgeship and still be eligible to run for the newly-created Twenty-Seventh District judgeship in 2016?
Yes. Amendment 29, § 2 bars a person from succeeding themselves in the position to which they were appointed. The newly created state district court judgeship in the Twenty-Seventh District (effective…
Is the Arkansas Department of Health required to enforce its public water system rules (including fluoridation), and what can a citizen do if the Department refuses?
Yes, ADH is responsible for ensuring public water suppliers follow the rules. ADH cannot selectively enforce regulations: Ark. Code Ann. § 25-15-214 makes it illegal for an agency to 'unlawfully, unre…
Is the Hazlewood Act's requirement that a veteran entered service in Texas constitutional?
The AG took the position that it is, or at least should be upheld, while warning the law was unsettled. The Hazlewood Act (Education Code section 54.341) waives tuition and fees for certain Texas vete…
Can a suspended school board trustee run for and serve on a city council in the same district?
The AG concluded yes. After the Texas Education Commissioner installed a board of managers over the Beaumont Independent School District in 2014, the elected trustees' powers were suspended. The suspe…
When does a Tennessee city or county 'lend its credit' to a private party in a way that triggers the constitutional requirement of a 3/4 voter approval?
Only when the local government takes on a new financial obligation, like a debt, guarantee, or pledge that benefits the private party. Paying in advance with cash, selling on credit, or selling proper…
How does Florida review whether a citizen ballot initiative like the Solar Choice amendment can go on the ballot?
This is the Attorney General's required petition asking the Florida Supreme Court to review a citizen initiative, the 'Limits or Prevents Barriers to Local Solar Electricity Supply' (Solar Choice) ame…
Can the county legislative body force its uniform pay plan on employees of the County Assessor of Property's office?
No, with one exception. The Assessor controls hiring and pay for her own staff within the budget the county appropriates. The county legislative body only sets pay for a secretary in counties too smal…
Can the West Virginia Health Information Network (a public-private health-data-exchange partnership) charge fees to participating organizations and spend the money it collects?
It can charge and collect fees, but it cannot spend the money it collects unless the Legislature appropriates it. W. Va. Code § 16-29G-3(C) gives WVHIN two distinct powers: (a) receive and dispense fu…
Did the Arkansas AG certify the popular name and ballot title for a referendum to approve or reject Act 137 of 2015 (the Intrastate Commerce Improvement Act)?
Yes, with a substituted ballot title. The AG certified the popular name as submitted. The AG rewrote the ballot title to make the FOR/AGAINST framing explicit and to quote Act 137 verbatim: the Act pr…
If a county is forced to buy property at a back-taxes auction and the property catches fire or floods during the one-year redemption window, who pays for the damage?
The county is on the hook. As the tax-sale purchaser, it must hold the property in good condition during the redemption year. If no one redeems, the county absorbs damage costs and the loss in value.
Was Tennessee's 2014 Healthy Workplace Act unconstitutional because it told a state commission to draft an anti-workplace-bullying model policy?
No. The AG concluded the Act survived constitutional review because asking TACIR to draft a voluntary model policy, with the legislature's purpose spelled out in the statute, was not an unlawful deleg…
Can a Tennessee city require taxicabs from outside the county to pass the city county's vehicle emissions test before operating in the city?
No. Tennessee law lets owners register vehicles only in their county of residence or where the vehicle is based, and emissions tests are tied to registration. A city cannot force a vehicle lawfully re…
Could Tennessee constitutionally tax out-of-state companies under the 2015 Revenue Modernization Act's 'economic nexus' rules, even if they had no physical presence in the state?
Yes. The AG concluded the Act's 'substantial nexus' definition, which reached companies with $500,000 in Tennessee sales or comparable economic ties, fit the Commerce Clause framework most state court…
Can a Tennessee court enter a civil contempt order by default when the alleged contemnor was served but didn't show up or respond?
Yes. The 2015 opinion concluded that a Tennessee court can enter a civil contempt default judgment if the alleged contemnor was properly served, given at least 5 days' notice of the hearing under Rule…
Can a Tennessee city pass an ordinance that prevents courts from sending school-zone speeders to driver education in lieu of conviction?
No. The 2015 opinion concluded an Oak Ridge ordinance disallowing diversion-to-driver-education for school-zone speeding directly conflicted with the discretion state law (Tenn. Code Ann. § 55-10-301)…
Can a Washington county let off-road vehicles or wheeled ATVs use roads with speed limits above 35 mph?
The AG concluded that counties may designate any road or highway, regardless of its speed limit, as suitable for off-road vehicle use under RCW 46.09.360. But the same authority does not extend to whe…
Can Washington's Forest Practices Board freeze logging applications on slide-prone slopes after a disaster like Oso?
The AG concluded that the Forest Practices Board cannot impose a flat moratorium on accepting or approving forest practices applications, but it can adopt an emergency rule under the APA that effectiv…
Did the Arkansas AG certify the popular name and ballot title for a revised proposal to add age, veteran or military status, sexual orientation, and gender identity to the Civil Rights Act?
No. The AG rejected both the popular name and the ballot title. The popular name was identical to one already certified for a different measure (2015-029), and the ballot title used the ambiguous phra…
Does Florida's seaport concealed-weapons ban cover firearms, or only knives and other weapons?
Yes. The Attorney General concluded that the phrase 'concealed weapon' in section 311.12(3)(b), Florida Statutes, the seaport security statute, includes firearms. The statute does not define the phras…
Can a Florida county grant an economic-development tax exemption for property improvements made before the ordinance was adopted?
No. The Attorney General advised that to qualify for the economic development ad valorem tax exemption in section 196.1995(5), Florida Statutes, improvements to real property must be made (or tangible…
Are a public agency's security camera surveillance tapes exempt from Florida's public records law?
No. The Attorney General concluded that surveillance video from a public agency's security cameras, here the Pinellas Suncoast Transit Authority, is confidential and exempt from disclosure. While the …
Can a Virginia HOA stop me from installing solar panels if the ban is only in their bylaws or rules, not in the recorded declaration?
No. The opinion concluded that under the July 1, 2014 amendments to Va. Code § 67-701, a Virginia property owners' association (POA) may prohibit solar panels on private property only through a record…
Did the Arkansas AG certify Robert Reed's proposed constitutional amendment to legalize cannabis cultivation, sale, and possession statewide?
No. The AG rejected the popular name and ballot title for the proposed Arkansas Industrial Hemp and Medical Cannabis Amendment because the measure's text was internally ambiguous. The labels 'industri…
Would a Tennessee law making the Holy Bible the official state book violate the U.S. Constitution or the Tennessee Constitution?
Yes. The 2015 opinion concluded designating the Bible as the official state book would violate the Establishment Clause of the First Amendment and Article I, § 3, of the Tennessee Constitution, which …
Can someone with a felony or domestic violence conviction in Tennessee get a hunting license, and can they hunt with a firearm?
Yes to the license: hunting licenses in Tennessee have no felony or domestic-violence bar. No (generally) to hunting with a firearm: violent felons and drug felons can't possess firearms even for hunt…
Can an Arkansas county quorum court require the county judge to get the quorum court's approval before buying specific vehicles, when the funds for those vehicles have already been appropriated?
No. The AG concluded the Cleburne County ordinance was an impermissible legislative encroachment on the county judge's executive authority. Amendment 55, § 3 vests the county judge with the power to a…
Did the Arkansas AG certify the ballot title for a citizen referendum to repeal Act 137 of 2015 (the Intrastate Commerce Improvement Act)?
No. The AG rejected the entire ballot title, popular name, and petition because the proposal was structured backwards. A statewide referendum under Ark. Const. art. 5 puts a legislative act before vot…
When making a left turn on a green arrow in Tennessee, do I have to turn into the lane closest to the center line, or can I turn into any lane to the right of center?
State law doesn't specify which lane to turn into, only that the turn end up on the right side of the center line. Drivers still have a duty to exercise due care. The AG declined to assign fault in an…
Can a Colorado school district give the Healthy Kids Colorado Survey to students without first getting written parental consent, if the district uses an opt-out (passive consent) form?
Yes. Both the federal student-survey statute and Colorado's parallel statute require written parental consent only when participation is 'required.' If schools follow the opt-out procedures the AG des…
How did the Arkansas FOIA require redactions in a city police officer's personnel file released to the public, and what could a custodian properly withhold?
The AG concluded the Lowell Police Department was handling parts of the request correctly but parts wrong. Most attached records were 'personnel records' that had to be released, with mandatory redact…
If a property owner pays property taxes but skips the volunteer fire department dues that are listed on the same tax bill, can the county treat the property as tax-delinquent and put it through forfeiture and sale?
No. The AG concluded the legislature has not authorized counties to treat unpaid volunteer fire department dues as delinquent property taxes for forfeiture purposes. The dues are listed on the propert…
Can a Tennessee county sheriff's office and a school board pool their food orders into one larger bid to get better prices?
Yes. The 2015 opinion read Tenn. Code Ann. § 12-3-1203 to let any local governmental unit purchase supplies and services on behalf of another, or piggyback on another's existing contracts. Equipment p…
Can Tennessee retroactively cut state-shared revenue to a city to claw back money tied to annexations made during a recent moratorium window?
Yes. The 2015 opinion concluded the General Assembly has the constitutional authority to change state-shared revenue distributions, retroactively or prospectively. Cities are creatures of the state an…
Does a former Illinois state representative lose his General Assembly pension if he used his state office, state computers, and state-paid time to commit a federal child pornography felony?
Yes. Attorney General Lisa Madigan concluded that former Rep. Keith Farnham forfeited his General Assembly Retirement System pension under section 2-156 of the Illinois Pension Code, because his feder…
Can a Tennessee county commission change the county wheel tax rate with a simple majority vote, or does it need the same two-thirds supermajority that's required to enact the tax in the first place?
Two-thirds. The 2015 opinion concluded a county commission must follow the same procedure it used to enact the wheel tax: a two-thirds vote at two consecutive regularly-scheduled meetings, subject to …
Did the Arkansas AG certify a proposed initiated act to add sexual orientation and gender identity to the Arkansas Civil Rights Act's protected classes?
Yes, but with a substituted ballot title. The AG accepted the popular name 'An Act Amending the Arkansas Civil Rights Act of 1993' as submitted, but substituted a cleaner ballot title that fixed spell…
When does a sheriff elected to fill an unexpired term take office?
The AG concluded the newly elected sheriff could take office right away. The San Jacinto County sheriff died less than a week into a four-year term that ran from January 2013 through December 2016. Th…
Is a county sheriff's salary increase valid if the required public notice wasn't given first?
The AG concluded the increase was invalid. Before a Texas commissioners court can raise an elected county officer's salary, it has to publish notice of the proposed increase in a newspaper at least 10…
Can a school district spend its funds to audit a mineral lease on county school land?
The AG's answer leaned no on both questions. County school lands are held by the county in a constitutional trust, with the commissioners court as sole trustee for the public schools. Texas courts hav…
Did the Arkansas AG certify an initiated act to lower the signature threshold for calling a local wet-dry alcohol election from 38% to 20% of qualified electors?
Yes. The AG approved the popular name 'An Act Concerning Local Option (Wet-Dry) Elections' as submitted, but substituted a tighter ballot title. The substitute reframed the change as reducing the sign…
If the Tennessee legislature doesn't pass enabling rules under Amendment 2, can the governor still appoint state appellate judges?
Yes. The 2015 opinion read Amendment 2 to make the governor's appointment power self-executing. Legislative inaction does not strip the governor of authority; if the legislature fails to act on a nomi…
Can a Tennessee county use proceeds from its adequate facilities tax to pay debt service on bonds issued to build a new justice center?
Yes, if the justice center is reasonably related to new development. The 2015 opinion read the Maury County Adequate Facilities Tax act to permit using the funds either to pay project costs directly o…
Can a Connecticut state marshal charge extra fees by private agreement, become a designated e-filer for an attorney, or bill clients for recording a lis pendens?
No on all three. The AG concluded that statutory fee caps under § 52-261 are exclusive and cannot be overridden by private agreement, that a marshal cannot serve as a designated e-filer for an attorne…
Was the Arkansas Lottery Commission exempt from the statewide mileage reimbursement cap before it was abolished in 2015, and could it claw back over-cap amounts it had already paid employees?
The AG concluded the Lottery Commission was subject to the State Travel Regulations, including the $0.42-per-mile reimbursement cap, before Act 218 of 2015 dissolved it. The Commission had been reimbu…
Does Tennessee's 2014 textbook quality law apply to textbooks already in use, and is the textbook commission liable for approving books that turn out to have errors?
The 2015 opinion concluded the law applies only going forward, so it does not reach textbooks already in use before January 1, 2015. The Textbook Commission can technically violate the law by recommen…
Can an Illinois county, municipality, or school district opt out of the Prevailing Wage Act by ordinance, resolution, or local referendum?
No. Attorney General Lisa Madigan concluded that the Illinois Supreme Court's decision in *Bernardi v. City of Highland Park* (1988) settled the question for home rule units: prevailing-wage complianc…
Can an Illinois county, city, or village pass a 'right-to-work' ordinance, or create a local right-to-work zone by referendum, in the absence of a statewide right-to-work statute?
No. Attorney General Lisa Madigan concluded that section 8(a)(3) of the National Labor Relations Act federally preempts the regulation of union security agreements wherever interstate commerce is affe…
Who gets to fill a vacant seat on a Tennessee county school board: the county commission or the school board itself?
The county legislative body (the county commission). Article VII, section 2, of the Tennessee Constitution requires it. The 2015 opinion said amending state law to let the school board fill its own va…
Can the Tennessee legislature hand off to another body the job of setting maximum interest rates on short-term loans?
No. The 2015 opinion concluded article XI, section 7, of the Tennessee Constitution gives the General Assembly the exclusive, non-delegable power to define and cap interest rates. Delegating that auth…
Does Tennessee's grandfather clause that exempts one specific distillery from the Lincoln County Process violate the Constitution?
Yes. The 2015 opinion concluded the subsection that exempted a single distillery (Prichard's) from the maple-charcoal filtering requirement was impermissible class legislation under article XI, sectio…
Are deleted emails that exist only on a disaster recovery server subject to release under the Arkansas FOIA?
Probably not. The AG concluded that emails stored only on a disaster recovery system (DRS) are likely not 'public records' under the FOIA because they are not 'kept' in the way the statute uses that t…
How much interest does a Tennessee taxpayer owe when filing a motion to redeem property that was sold at a delinquent tax sale?
1% imposed on the date of the tax sale, plus another 1% on the first day of each month following the sale, including any month-start within the 30-day window after the motion to redeem is filed. Usual…
In 2015, the SD State Board of Education was proposing new Science Standards that drew heavily from the multi-state Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS). SD law had just been amended (SDCL 13-3-48.1) to ban adoption of multistate-consortium standards before July 1, 2016. Would adopting these NGSS-influenced standards violate that ban?
Not as a matter of law on the facts presented. The proposed standards were drafted by SD's own Department of Education workgroup, not by an outside multistate consortium, even though the workgroup hea…
Can Tennessee impose a new fuel surcharge and per-mile fee on trucks but give a tax credit only to in-state motor carriers?
No. The 2015 opinion concluded SB 354 would have violated the dormant Commerce Clause and federal Equal Protection Clause by giving the credit only to motor carriers domiciled in Tennessee, effectivel…
Does an Idaho state employee who gives gifts or meals to a legislator have to register as a lobbyist?
Yes, with narrow exceptions. The Sunshine Law's exemption for state employees covers official-capacity *communications* about legislation, but does not exempt gift-giving meant to develop goodwill or …
Can an Arkansas city use city general funds to pay for water and sewer upgrades to a system that serves both residents and nonresidents?
Probably yes, but the answer depends on the facts. The AG concluded that A.C.A. §§ 14-234-214 and 14-235-223 generally contemplate water and sewer systems being funded through user rates set high enou…
Can a Tennessee arrest warrant list more than one criminal charge on the same piece of paper?
No. The 2015 opinion concluded Tennessee's warrant statutes and Rule 4 are written entirely in the singular, so an arrest warrant should contain only one criminal charge. Multiple charges should be on…
Can the Tennessee Board of Regents require its employees to clear all legislative funding requests through a central office before going to the General Assembly?
The 2015 opinion said the proposed TBR policy would not violate the Tennessee statute protecting public employees' communications with elected officials, but might run into First Amendment trouble bec…
Did the Arkansas AG certify a revised initiated act that would lower the wet-dry election petition threshold from 38% of registered voters to 25% of votes cast in the last governor's race?
No. The AG rejected the ballot title because it failed to highlight the change in the basis for computing signature requirements. A voter quickly scanning the title would see '38% to 25%' and assume t…
Can a Tennessee city or county reduce future pension accruals for already-vested public employees if the plan reserves the right to amend?
Yes, but only if the retirement plan's reservation-of-right-to-amend language is specific enough to tell vested members their future accruals are subject to change. A generic 'we can amend this plan' …
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