State Rep. Chris Freeland – House Week In Review

FRANKFORT (Mar. 6, 2020) — Months of work with government and citizen stakeholders paid off this week when a $23-plus billion Executive Branch state budget made it out of committee and advanced to the floor of the Kentucky House of Representatives where it was approved on Friday.

The plan laid out in House Bill 352 addresses challenges that, weeks ago, saw many state lawmakers advising government agencies and other stakeholders to focus on budget needs over wants. And focus they did. The result is a budget that proponents say would help many agencies across Kentucky meet their funding obligations while simultaneously keeping the state’s debt ratio low and maintaining the state’s budget reserve fund at $392.4 million.

Budget needs accounted for in HB 352 are many, including teacher pensions. The measure would provide over $1.1 billion to the Teachers’ Retirement System to help the system fully fund its pension obligations over the biennium.

Then there are Kentucky’s most vulnerable, who would benefit from more than $33 million appropriated by the budget to hire dozens of additional state social workers and keep the ones we have.

School districts would receive around $18.7 million to implement school safety requirements required under 2019 SB 1 (the School Safety and Resiliency Act) as well as an increase in guaranteed per pupil base funding, or SEEK. And HB 352 would deliver more than $63 million over the biennium for the performance-based funding pool to serve clearly-defined needs of Kentucky’s postsecondary institutions, among other provisions.

It’s also important to note that we were able to restore $11 million in boater registration fees to Kentucky Department of Fish and Wildlife Resources to combat the Asian carp problem at Kentucky Lake and Lake Barkley. The money had been swept in the Governor’s proposal, but is vital for the future of our lakes and broader Western Kentucky economy.

There’s much, much more to be found in the proposal – pay raises of one percent for each year of the biennium for all state employees and all certified and classified public school employees, extra funding for prosecutors, and additional funding for personnel serving our state’s constitutional offices including the Auditor of Public Accounts and the Office of the Attorney General.

HB 352 passed the House on a vote of 86-10. Its next stop will be the Senate, where changes to the bill are possible, if not likely.

There’s no doubt that the Kentucky General Assembly is eager to finish work on all essential legislation, including state budget bills, by the governor’s scheduled veto recess in early April. Doing so would give lawmakers a couple of days to vote to override, or cancel out, any gubernatorial vetoes before session’s end in mid-April – an advantage that many lawmakers want to keep.

Other priorities also made headway this week, including HB 2 – a top bipartisan priority for improved prosecution and prevention of human trafficking crimes advanced by the House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday and now before the full House. Should it become law, HB 2 would ensure those convicted of certain human trafficking offenses are placed on the state sex offender registry. And it would increase awareness of human trafficking by increasing the number of signs printed with the national human trafficking hotline number and related information in public restrooms at airports, train stations, bus stations, and truck stops.

Back on the House floor, a bill given the same priority status in the Senate as HB 2 received in the House also made strides this week. That bill is Senate Bill 2, known as the “voter ID bill,” which was amended and passed by the House on Tuesday on a vote of 62-35.

SB 2 proposes voter ID requirements that would require eligible voters at the polls to either show a government photo ID, or provide another form of ID (photo or otherwise) while affirming under law that they have a specific ‘impediment” to getting a government photo ID. If a voter has no approved form of identification and wishes to vote in a federal election, he or she could cast a “provisional ballot” allowing them to vote as long as they meet provisional voting requirements of the federal Help America Vote Act of 2002.

Supporters of SB 2 say they believe the bill would improve integrity of Kentucky elections by reducing election fraud. Opponents say the bill would make voting more difficult, possibly leading to disenfranchisement of minorities and low-income voters. Now SB 2 is back in the Senate, where lawmakers will decide whether to agree to the House changes or negotiate a bill that is agreeable to both chambers.

The House also moved ID legislation of its own on Tuesday with floor passage of a bill that supporters call the final step toward statewide implementation of the federal Real ID requirement.

HB 453, approved by the House on an 81-14 vote and advanced to the Senate, builds on a 2017 state law that created a new state “voluntary travel ID” to bring Kentucky into compliance with strict federal ID standards under the 2005 Real ID Act. The bill would reflect in statute that regional Real ID offices that are being rolled out across the state are under oversight of the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet, while requiring all driver’s licensing, permitting, and personal ID card duties be moved to the Cabinet from Kentucky circuit court clerk offices by late June 2022.

For now, all Kentuckians who plan to travel by plane or enter certain federal facilities, including military facilities, should note that they will be required to have state voluntary travel ID or other federally-accepted form of ID in their possession before they can board commercial flights or enter specific facilities after this Oct. 1 per federal mandate.

The state budget and other top House priorities, including HB 2, certainly have the momentum this week although dozens of other bills and resolutions aren’t far behind. Proposals that could lead to more broadband infrastructure in unserved and underserved areas of the Commonwealth and a bill to benefit Kentucky National Guard members also make this week’s legislative review:

HB 362 would create a framework for future funding of broadband deployment grants in the Commonwealth. The statutory framework would set out a program under which government agencies or private entities could apply for project grants—should funding become available—to bring broadband internet to high-cost deployment areas. The Kentucky Infrastructure Authority would administer the grant program, which would require applicants to pay 50 percent of the project cost. The bill passed the House 82-11 and now goes to the Senate for its consideration.

HB 315 is designed to make information about a state-sponsored group term life insurance option more readily available to Kentucky National Guard members. That bill passed the House 93-0 and is now before the Senate.

Please continue to stay tuned in throughout the remainder of the 2020 Kentucky General Assembly by following all the daily legislative action on the Legislative Research Commission website at https://legislature.ky.gov/, or by calling the LRC toll-free Bill Status Line at 866-840-2835. For committee meeting schedules, please call the LRC toll-free Meeting Information Line at 800-633-9650. To comment on a bill, please call the toll-free Legislative Message Line at 800-372-7181.