Opinion Letter No. 377-74
Contents of letter
December 31, 1974
WITHDRAWN
Honorable Robert Feigenbaum
Representative, District No. 59
605 St. Marie
Florissant, Missouri 63031
Dear Representative Feigenbaum:
This letter is in response to your request for our opinion on whether the Division of Professional Registration of the Department of Consumer Affairs, Regulation and Licensing, may move the office of the State Board of Registration for the Healing Arts to an office location outside the city limits of Jefferson City in light of Section 334.125, RSMo, providing for office facilities in Jefferson City. Although your opinion request deals specifically with the State Board of Registration for the Healing Arts, a review of the various statutes creating the several licensing boards reveal that there are three other boards with provisions similar to Section 334.125. These are: Board of Accountancy (Chapter 326), the Board of Architects (Chapter 327), and the Missouri Real Estate Commission (Chapter 339). Because we believe the issues are the same with respect to each board, this opinion will be applicable to all of the boards listed herein.
The question has arisen because the Division of Professional Registration in carrying out the duties imposed on it by the Omnibus State Reorganization Act of 1974 has decided to consolidate the staff, equipment and records of the various boards at one central location. The Division has located and leased a suitable office building which is located at 3523 North Ten Mile Drive, Jefferson City, Missouri. We have been advised that this is approximately one-half mile outside the city limits. We have been further advised that the Division intends to move all of the personnel, equipment and records of the various boards, including the four listed herein, to this new location within the near future.
Section 326.170 (4) (accountancy) states:
"Said board shall maintain its office in Jefferson City, Missouri."
Section 327.061 (1) (architects) states in pertinent part:
"The board shall establish and maintain an office in Jefferson City, Missouri, where its records and files shall be kept. . . . "
Section 334.125 (healing arts) states in pertinent part:
. . Provision shall be made by the division of planning and construction for office facilities in Jefferson City, Missouri, where the records and register of the board shall be maintained."
Section 339.130 (real estate) states in pertinent part:
. . . The office of the commission shall be at Jefferson City."
Assuming, that these statutes mean that the offices of each of the respective boards must be within the city limits (which we need not decide here), it is our opinion that such requirements have been repealed by the Omnibus State Reorganization Act (C.C.S.H.C.S.S.C.S. Senate Bill No. 1, First Extra Session, Seventy-Seventh General Assembly). The legislature has specifically decreed in Section 1, Subsection 4, that one of the purposes of the act is to provide for the most efficient and economical operations possible in the administration of the executive branch. Section 4, Subsection 15, creating the Division of Professional Registration, provides in pertinent part:
"There is hereby established a division of professional registration in the department of consumer affairs, regulation and licensing, headed by a director appointed by the director of the department. The division shall provide clerical and other staff services relating to the issuance and renewal of licenses to all the professional licensing and regulating boards assigned to the division.
Section 4, Subsection 16, further provides in pertinent part:
"The division of registration and examination, department of education within chapter 161, RSMo, and others, is abolished and the following boards and commissions are transferred by specific type transfers to the division of professional registration, department of consumer affairs, regulation and licensing: . . . The boards and commissions assigned to the division shall exercise all their respective statutory duties and powers, except those clerical and other staff services relating to the issuance and renewal of licenses, which shall be provided by the division, within the appropriation therefor. All clerical and other staff services relating to the issuance and renewal of licenses of the individual boards are abolished. . . . Notwithstanding any other provision of law the director of the division shall exercise all management functions of the boards and commissions, including but not limited to the allocation and assignment of space, personnel and equipment." (Emphasis added.)
It is clear that in enacting a comprehensive plan to reorganize state government, the legislature intended to vest all of the management and administrative functions previously performed by each of the various boards in one central agency to eliminate duplication, waste and inefficient use of resources. The legislative intent is being carried out by transferring all of the personnel and equipment to one central location from which the management services required by the various boards will be performed. The Division of Professional Registration specifically is to carry on the clerical function of issuing and reissuing the licenses. This reasonably includes the duty of maintaining the various records for the boards. Furthermore, the legislature has specifically abolished the power of the boards to maintain their clerical and other staff relating to the issuance and renewal of licenses.
Although the boards no longer have their own separate staff and equipment, it is the boards which have the exclusive authority to make the substantive policy decisions regulating the professions. The boards, not the Division, adopts substantive rules and regulations. The boards, not the Division, establish examination standards. The boards, not the Division, decide which individual is qualified for licensure. The boards, not the Division, institute license suspension or revocation proceedings. The relationship of the Division of Professional Registration to the boards is that of providing administrative and management support to the licensing agencies to carry out the above duties. Thus, the boards have been relieved of those nonsubstantive administrative and management functions, in order that the board members need only expend their energies on substantive problems in their respective areas of expertise.
It is well settled that if there are two laws on the same subject which are repugnant to each other, the latter will have the effect of repealing the former. Bullington v. State, 459 S.W.2d 334 (Mo. 1970). Since the Omnibus State Reorganization Act of 1974 is a later and specific statute insofar as it relates to the precise allocation of functions between the Division of Professional Registration, its terms control. State ex rel. American Institute of Marketing Systems, Inc. v. Missouri Real Estate Commission, 461 S.W.2d 902 (Mo.App. 1970). The legislature expressly used the words "notwithstanding any other provision of law" in delegating the managment and administrative functions including the assignment of personnel, equipment and space to the Division of Professional Registration. It is our opinion that this language indicates a clear legislative intent to repeal any provisions which are inconsistent.
Since there are no provisions in the Reorganization Act which require the Division of Professional Registration to maintain its office within the city limits of Jefferson City, it is the opinion of this office that the Division of Professional Registration, Department of Consumer Affairs, Regulation and Licensing, may transfer the personnel, equipment, etc., of the various licensing boards and may perform the management and administrative functions for the boards in the proposed location one-half mile outside the city limits of Jefferson City, and that the restrictive provisions to the contrary in the statutes creating the boards have been abrogated.
Very truly yours,
John C. Danforth
Attorney General