Untitled Texas Attorney General Opinion ( 1940 )

Honorable Roland Bogd County Attorney Collin County McKinney, Texas Dear Sir: Attention Mr. flwight Whitwell Opinion No. O-2332 Ii e: Should fees of officers ba deposited with the county depository each day instead of every thirty days? Your recent .request for an opinion of this depart- ment on the above stated ouesticn has been received. Your letter reads, in part, as follows: "Our local county depository has made the contention that all fees of officers should be deposited with them as they are collected by the officer instead of the officer waiting until the end of each month and filing his report and mak- ing his remittance to the uounty Auditor whc ;Fn deposits the fees in the county depository. other words, the depository wants this money de- posited with them each day instead of waiting 30 days t "In this connecticn I call your ottenticn to Art. 3912E of the Civil Statutes, Subsection 5, which provides that it shculd be the duty cf all officers to charge and collect in the-manner auth- orized by law all fees and commissions which are permitted by law to be assessed and collected for all official service performed by them: as and when such fees are collected they shall be depcsited in the officers salary fund. In the same article, sub- section 0, the statute says that officers receiving an annual salary as compensation for their services Honorable Roland Soyd, page 2 O-2332 shall on or before the 5th day of each month file with the County Auditor on forms prescribed by him a detailed report of all fees collected by him during the proceeding month and shall forthwith pay into the officers’ salary fund for his office all fees collected by him during said month. “Also in Subsection P of the sune statute we find this language: lWhere any officer receives a srlary payable from the salary fund created for such officer, all fees, commissions and other compensation received by him in his official ca- pacity shall be by him deposited and paid monthly or oftener into the salary fund created for such officer and such remittance shall be accompanied by his report thereof. “These last two above quoted provisions appear to apply only to counties in excess of 190,000 pop- ulation as shown in Section 19 of the act. If our conclusion on that is corr.err,t then the only langu- age applying to our county would be the language first quoted above from section 5 and this apparent- ly couId be construed to mean that the officer would have to report and pay their fees each day. “Our officers have been filing the monthly re- port and remittance s stemunder the supervision and direction of our Eounty Auditor. We do not find any court decisions under this statute upon this question and are therefore unable to furnish l brief of the matter, but it occurs to us that in as much as the County depository is only entitled to have all county funds deposited with it that the question to be decidid is whether or not officers fees under the present salary set-up become county funds immediately upon being collected or whether they only become county funds at the end of a 30 day period when the officer reports the collections to the auditor..” Sections 4 and 5 of article 3912e, Vernon’s Annotated Civil Statutes, reads as follows: “Sec. 4. In all counties of this State con- taining a population of less than on hundred and ninety thousand (190,000) inhabitants according to the last preceding Federal Census wherein the county Honcrable Roland hoyd, page 3 O-2332 or precinct officers are compensated on a salary basis under the provieions of this act, there shall be created a fund to,be known as the ‘Officerat Sal- ary Fund of County, Texas. ) Such fund shall be .Jcept soparnte and apart from all other county funds, and shnll be held and diajwrsed for the pur- :_- .pose of paying the salaries of officers and the sal- aries of deputies, assistants and clerks of officers who-are drawing a salary.from said fund under the provisions of tLir;ilr;Act, and to pay the authorized expenses of,thier offices. Such funds shall be de- posited in the county depository and shall be pro- tected to the same extend as other county funds. "Sec. .5. It shall be the duty of sll officers to charge and collect in the manner authorized by law all fees and commissions which are permitted by law to be assessed and collected for all official service _ performed by them. As and.when such fees are co lected _ they'.shall be deposited in the Officers~ Salary ~&d or funds provided in this Act. In event the k!ominiaa- loners' Court finds that the failure to collect any fee or commission was due to neglect on the part of the officer charged with the responsibility of col- lecting same, the amount of such fee or commission ahrll, be deducted from the sa&ry of such officer. Before any such deduction is made, the Commissionerst Court shnll furnish such ofi'icer with an itemized - statement cf the un#Nected fees with which his ac- count is to be char$edi and shall notify such officer of the time and qirce for a hearing cn same, to de- termine whether such officer wi$:,guil~jy"?fi,::~~~gli~ence, which time for he*fing shall be at leastten days subsequent to the dste of notice. Unless m officer is charged by lavv with the responsibility of collect- ing fees, the Commissioners' Court shall not in any event make any deductions from the authorized salary of such officer." The two provisions of Article 3912i, quoted above, apply to all counties containing a population of less than 190,000 inhabitants according to the last preceding Federal census, wherein the county officers are compensated on a salary basis. Collin County has a population of 46,180 in- hab'ftants according to the last preceding Federal census, and the county officials are compensated on an annual salary basis therefoae, the above quoted provisions would be appiic(LbWto said county. In view of the foregoing statutes, you are respect- Honorabla Roland fioyd, page 4 O-2332 fully advised that it is the opinion of this department that when a county has selacted.&?@ounty depository in,the manner required by law, all moniss collected by various county of? ficials, should, as and when collected, be deposited in the variousfunds to which they,ri@#ul~ly belong, in the county depository. APPRPPDy l$U&O 1940 ATTORNEY'GENERALOF TEXAS APPROVEDOPINION COMMITTEE BYBWF, CHAIRMAN