§ 8.01-525.Who are officers and employees of cities, towns and counties.

Section 8.01-524 subjects local government wages to garnishment, but “local government employee” needed a definition broad enough to cover the range of people paid from municipal or county funds. Section 8.01-525 supplies it.

The test has two parts: the person holds a position by authority from the General Assembly, or from city, town, or county authority, whether by election or appointment, and draws compensation from that locality’s money. Meet both, and for garnishment purposes, the statute treats that person as an officer, clerk, or employee of the city, town, or county, regardless of how the job might be labeled elsewhere.

That breadth matters in practice: it keeps a creditor from being blocked by an argument that a particular local position, one created by state statute rather than local charter, for instance, somehow falls outside § 8.01-524’s reach.