Beech Tree News Network

After a productive 58^th day of the 2018 Legislative Session that saw the passing of several significant bills to benefit the Commonwealth, we have now entered a 10-day “veto recess” where Governor Matt Bevin will have the opportunity to sign and veto bills passed by the Kentucky General Assembly. The most significant measures to pass on Monday, April 2, were a budget and a revenue bill that will dictate how our state collects and appropriates funding for the next two years.

 The budget bill, House Bill (HB) 200, did many good things which I support. However, two major Hopkins County projects were cut. The program at Trover Clinic that trained health care professionals and the coal program at Madisonville Community College that trained coal miners had their funding removed from the budget. While some educational programs were funded, others were still underfunded. Because of these actions and the lack of support from the majority of my constituents, I voted no.

 The tax reform bill, HB 366, cut the income tax to five percent and those who earn less than roughly $18,000 (133 percent of the federal poverty level or less) will still not owe state income taxes. However, the expanded sales taxes could raise taxes on Kentucky’s most vulnerable. This bill also hit Kentucky agriculture rather hard. Again, because of concerns about these tax increases from the majority of my constituents, I voted no.

 In addition to passing the Commonwealth’s budget and revenue bills, the Senate passed a number of other measures this week. House Bill 1 is a comprehensive overhaul of Kentucky’s foster care and adoption system. More than 8,600 Kentucky children are now in foster care and awaiting permanent homes, and the need for such reform has been obvious for a long time. House Bill 1 includes major provisions that would expand the definition of blood relative for child placement.

The legislation would also require more case reviews for each child in foster care, create a “putative father registry” so that a child’s possible (but not verified) biological father can be notified of the child’s prospective adoption, and allow the state to seek termination of parental rights for new mothers who will not seek drug treatment after giving birth to a drug-addicted baby.

 Senate changes to HB 1 that made it into the final bill include provisions that would protect a mother from losing her parental rights if she was properly prescribed and using medication that could have caused her newborn’s addiction. The amended bill would also clarify that foster parents and child placement agencies be given a 10-day notice before a foster child is reunited with his or her birth parents or placed in a new home.

 Senate Bill 5 was also given final passage this week. This bill levels the playing field for small-town, locally-owned pharmacies. Senate Bill 5, as amended by the House, would make the Kentucky Department for Medicaid Services in charge of setting the reimbursement rates for a pharmacist. The rate is currently set by pharmacy-benefit managers (PBMs) hired by the state’s Medicaid managed-care organizations (MCOs). Kentucky Medicaid spends $1.7 billion annually on prescriptions and SB 5 would help authorities track that money and determine whether locally-owned pharmacies were being reimbursed fairly. I proudly cosponsored this measure.

We also passed House Bill 362, which allows for the phase-in of increased pension costs for local governments. Recently, the Kentucky Retirement Systems Board adjusted their assumptions to require cities, counties, and other quasi-governmental entities to increase their pension contributions. If those increased pension contribution costs were not phased in over time, several of these local governments would be at risk of bankruptcy.

 Passage of major pension reform legislation in recent weeks allowed us to justify the decision to allow counties and cities to phase-in these costly pension contributions, which was the language passed in House Bill 362. While this measure represented a win for local governments and quasi-governmental entities, it reiterated the need for raising revenue through tax reform, as we did in House Bill 366.

 There are only two days left in the 2018 Regular Session. We will reconvene for those final two days on Friday, April 13, and Saturday, April 14. Kentucky’s constitution requires the General Assembly to be adjourned by April 15, and since April 15 is a Sunday and we cannot constitutionally meet that day, we must finish the state’s business by midnight on April 14. It has been an honor to represent you and our district in Frankfort, and I thank you for engaging in the legislative process.

If you have any questions or comments about these issues or any other public policy issue, please call me toll-free at 1-800-372-7181 or email me at [email protected].  You can also review the Legislature’s work online at www.lrc.ky.gov.

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  Senator C.B. Embry, JR (R-Morgantown) represents the 6th District including Butler, Hopkins, Muhlenberg, and Ohio Counties.He is Vice Chair of Veterans, Military Affairs, & Public Protection Committee and co-chairman of the Tobacco Settlement Agreement Fund Oversight Committee. He also serves as a member of the Agriculture Committee, the Natural Resources and Energy Committee, the Transportation Committee, and the Budget Review Subcommittee on Education.