Mississippi Advisory Opinions February 16, 2001: AGO 2001-0062 (February 16, 2001)

Advisory Opinion Text

Lamar County Election Commission

Post Office Box 369

Purvis, Mississippi 39475

Re: Mileage for Election Commissioners

Dear Commissioners:

Attorney General Mike Moore has received your letter of request and assigned it to me for research and reply. Your letter states:

Some precincts in Lamar County are rural areas without benefit of phone service. In view of this and other relevant facts, the election commissioners of the county feel that in the interest of quality elections it is appropriate that we visit each precinct a minimum of one time per election day. At this time we carry extra supplies, etc. Commissioners would travel 30 - 80 miles per day depending on the district. For this service we think we are entitled to mileage expense with supervisors approval, based on the following code sections from the Mississippi Election Laws, 1996 Edition, 23-15-219 paragraph 3, 23-15-939 and 23-15-227, paragraph 2, and the final paragraph of your opinion dated February 12, 1999 to Honorable Billie Pruett.

We respectfully request an opinion regarding this matter at your earliest convenience.

We do not find authority for county election commissioners to be reimbursed for travel expenses on election days in the code sections cited in your letter or any other code section. As we said in the Pruett opinion, also cited in your letter, there are no provisions for the payment of mileage in addition to the per diem authorized by Mississippi Code Annotated, Section 23-5-153 (Supp. 2000) . In Pruett we did say that election commissioners could be reimbursed for travel expenses when they performed duties other than purging registration books and conducting elections, provided it is first approved by the board of supervisors in accordance with Section 25-3-41.

Sincerely,

Mike Moore Attorney General

Phil Carter Special Assistant Attorney General