Opinion ID: 1789963
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: constitutionality of krs 350.0301(5) & 405 kar 7:092, section 6 and section 15

Text: Based upon KRS 350.0301(5), 405 KAR 7:092, Section 6(2)(b) requires the Petition to be accompanied by full payment of the proposed penalty assessment which is to be placed in an escrow account pending final determination of the assessment. 405 KAR 7:092, Section 15 allows for a waiver of the prepayment of the proposed penalty for individuals. The waiver is not available for corporate permittees, notwithstanding that the General Assembly has vested in corporations, the same power as an individual to do all things necessary or convenient to carry out its business and affairs... KRS 271B.3-020(1). In reviewing the parallel procedures which the General Assembly enacted after Franklin, supra  one procedure with formal evidentiary hearings on the record to contest the fact of the violation, but another requiring prepayment prior to the formal evidentiary hearing to contest the penalty  we note the wisdom in the Court of Appeals' comment that as a practical matter, the amount or propriety of the penalty imposed could be as critical as or perhaps even more weighty, than the fact of the violation itself. [5] With this in mind, we are not unmindful of the rule of construction in constitutional considerations, that [w]hen the constitutionality of a statute is challenged, the court should try not to destroy it, but to construe it, if consistent with the will of the legislature, so as to comport with constitutional limitations. United States Civil Service Commission v. National Association of Letter Carriers, 413 U.S. 548, 571, 93 S.Ct. 2880, 2893, 37 L.Ed.2d 796 (1973). However, hard as we may try, we cannot construe the word corporation as an individual as specifically referenced in KRS 350.0301(5). Section 2 of the Kentucky Constitution provides the Commonwealth shall be free of arbitrary action. With respect to adjudications, whether judicial or administrative, this guarantee is generally understood as a due process provision whereby Kentucky citizens may be assured of fundamentally fair and unbiased procedures. Smith v. O'Dea, 939 S.W.2d 353 (Ky.App.1997). As noted in Pritchett v. Marshall, 375 S.W.2d 253 (Ky.1963), the state is enjoined against arbitrariness by Section 2 of the Kentucky Constitution which, we have held is a concept we consider broad enough to embrace both due process and equal protection of the laws, both fundamental fairness and impartiality. Id. at p. 253.