Mississippi Advisory Opinions May 25, 1994: AGO 000009519 (May 25, 1994)
Collection: Mississippi Attorney General Opinions
Docket: AGO 000009519
Date: May 25, 1994
Advisory Opinion Text
AGO 000009519.
DOCK 1994-0245
AUTH Phil Carter
DATE 19940525
RQNM Jimmy Culberson
SUBJ Municipalities
SBCD 142
TEXT
Alderman Jimmy Culberson
c/o Marvin E. Wiggins, Jr., Esquire
Post Office Box 696
DeKalb, Mississippi 39328
Dear Mr. Culberson:
Attorney General Mike Moore has received a letter of request from Marvin E. Wiggins, Esquire on your behalf and has assigned it to me for research and reply. Mr. Wiggins letter states:
"I am an attorney practicing in DeKalb, Mississippi. Our board of aldermen has five (5) members. Pursuant to an agreed judgment entered by the federal district court, the towns of DeKalb and Scooba in Kemper County, Mississippi, changed their forms of government prior to the most recent municipal elections in 1993. To my understanding, DeKalb now has the 'strong-mayor' form of government.
During the past few months, a number of issues before the aldermen of DeKalb have been contested. Due to tie votes, these issues were not resolved by the board.
However, in certain instances, the mayor voted to break the tie. In other instances, the mayor refused to break the tie.
One of the aldermen, Mr. Jimmy Culberson, has asked me to request an opinion or other guidance from your office. He has not received any satisfactory response from the town attorney regarding this matter.
There are two (2) questions presented. First, does the mayor, as the head of the executive branch of the town's government, have the power to vote to break ties during the proceedings of the board of aldermen, a legislative body? Second, if the mayor does have such authority, is the mayor required to vote to break ties in every instance in which a tie vote occurs?
Since Mississippi municipalities are categorized by size, I did not know if the separation-of-powers rules might vary with smaller municipalities. If you could provide any assistance in this matter, it would be appreciated."
It is our understanding the DeKalb is a code charter municipality that is now divided into wards. Based on that assumption, the controlling statue is Mississippi Code Annotated Section 21-3-15 (Revised 1990) which provides in part:
"(1) The mayor shall preside at all meetings of the board of aldermen, and in case there shall be an equal division, he shall give the deciding vote. ...." (emphasis ours)
Sincerely,
MIKE MOORE, ATTORNEY GENERAL
BY: Phil Carter Assistant Attorney General
PC:sm