Kentucky Gov. Andy Beshear gives the State of the Commonwealth address in Frankfort, Ky., on January 3, 2024. (Kentucky Lantern photo by Arden Barnes)

FRANKFORT — Kentucky legislators enacted more than 200 laws this year, most of which take effect today, July 15.

At least 20 new laws are in limbo, however.

Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear says the Republican-controlled General Assembly failed to fund them — to the tune of $153 million — even after he informed lawmakers of the problem on April 10.

On April 15, the session’s final day, the legislature passed Senate Bill 91, a budget cleanup bill that the administration says made $372 million in appropriations.

“But none of those appropriations addressed the unfunded mandates outlined in the Governor’s letter,” said Crystal Staley, a spokesperson for Beshear, in a statement to the Lantern. “We have consistently said — even if some of these bills represent good public policy — if the legislature does not provide the funding, it does not intend for the executive branch to perform those services.”

Republican lawmakers are unconvinced. Dustin Issacs, a spokesperson for the Republican supermajority in the Kentucky Senate, in a statement said the governor’s “constitutional responsibility is to execute the law.”

“The administration’s excuse for not implementing bills enacted by the General Assembly during the previous legislative session rests on their flawed interpretation and application of a Supreme Court case dating back to Governor Fletcher’s administration,” Issacs said.

The bills in limbo range from House Bill 271 — which mandates creation of a statewide system for reporting child abuse 24/7 that the administration estimates would cost $43 million — to a school safety bill, Senate Bill 2, which authorizes school guardians with a price tag estimated by the administration at $220,000.?

Rep. Nick Wilson, R-Williamsburg, primary sponsor of the child abuse reporting bill, said he was unaware of any funding problems until being contacted last week by the Lantern. He also was unaware of the governor’s April 10 letter.

Stephanie French, a spokesperson for the Cabinet for Health and Family Services, in a statement said the cabinet sent a fiscal impact statement on March 15 saying Williams’ HB 271 had an estimated annual cost of $43 million to implement.??

However, no fiscal impact statement is attached to the bill on the legislature’s website.

Of the 22 bills and two resolutions that the governor warned were unfunded, only two have fiscal impact statements published on the legislature’s website. Beshear said a request was made for a fiscal impact analysis on most of the bills that he says ended up as unfunded mandates.

Any lawmaker may ask for a fiscal impact statement; the fiscal impact of a bill has traditionally been estimated by nonpartisan Legislative Research Commission staff in consultation with the executive branch agency that would be responsible for implementing the new law.

French, the CHFS spokesperson, said, “Team Kentucky is 100% focused on the children who rely on us for their safety and well-being,” adding that the cabinet was supportive of the bill. “We were not allocated the funding to be able to implement therefore, there is a fiscal impact that must be addressed before implementation can occur.”

‘Flabbergasted:’ Help for kinship care families passed unanimously. $20M price tag could derail it.

This dispute spilled into public view last month over Senate Bill 151 intended to provide financial relief to grandparents and other kinship caregivers raising children in Kentucky. Beshear in his letter said he supported the law, which he signed, but that it lacked approximately $20 million in funding to implement.?

The primary sponsor of the law, Sen. Julie Raque Adams, R-Louisville, pushed back against the Beshear administration’s reasoning and argued implementation of the law is non-negotiable.

Michelle Sanborn, president of the Children’s Alliance, an advocacy group supporting at-risk children and families, lobbied for HB 271 and the law providing relief for kinship care. She wondered why fiscal impact statements weren’t attached publicly to those bills.

“I don’t know where the breakdown was, whether it was one side or the other, or both,” Sanborn said.

The dispute will be revisited July 30 when the Interim Joint Committee on Families and Children plans to seek more information ?on what’s holding up implementation of the kinship care bill.

Wilson, an attorney who’s worked in family courts, questioned the $43 million price tag on the bill creating a new statewide child abuse reporting system. He said children’s lives and well being are at risk when investigations do not proceed in a timely manner. The bill had bipartisan support and was signed by Beshear.

“I don’t see how it could cost that much,” Wilson said. “The children are the most important thing in Kentucky. If any law is going to get implemented, I think it should be this one. It’s pretty upsetting to me. I mean, it’s heartbreaking.”

French, the CHFS spokesperson, didn’t respond to an emailed Lantern question asking for more specifics about the costs associated with the $43 million. In the previous state budget, Kentucky lawmakers allocated $19.6 million to support a different hotline to help Kentuckians in mental health crises.

Other Republican lawmakers have been skeptical of fiscal impact statements associated with bills in the past, and a member of Republican leadership in the Kentucky House passed a bill this session requiring more documentation from state agencies for fiscal impact statements.

Generally, fiscal impact statements are requested by a bill sponsor or legislative committee chair asking about a bill’s costs and financial impact on state government.

In his April 10 letter, the governor cited a Kentucky Supreme Court decision from 2005 dating back to former Republican Gov. Ernie Fletcher’s administration as legal reasoning, saying if the legislature doesn’t provide funding to implement a policy, then it “does not intend for the executive branch to perform those services over the biennium.”

Beshear in the letter enumerated $153 million in new costs to implement the 20 bills and two resolutions that he listed.

The Lantern previously reported a constitutional law expert and past president of the Kentucky Bar Association agreed with the Beshear administration’s interpretation of the state Supreme Court decision in question, saying the executive branch can’t spend money that hasn’t been appropriated.

Other laws described as unfunded mandates in Beshear’s April 10 letter to the legislature cover a wide range of topics and policies, including:

• A GOP-sponsored law passed unanimously requiring school officials to report truancy to a county attorney after a certain period of time.
• A Democratic-sponsored law allowing foster parents who work outside the home or teleworking inside the home to receive child care benefits
• A bill and joint resolution sponsored by Sen. Danny Carroll, R-Benton, creating a nuclear energy research authority and directing the state utility regulator to prepare for siting nuclear energy facilities.?
• A bill prohibiting the sale of kratom to those under the age 21 and ordering the Kentucky Department for Public Health to regulate it.

Staley, the governor’s spokesperson, said the executive branch will implements provisions in the questioned laws that don’t require new funding.

Money is available to lawmakers. The dispute is unfolding as state tax revenues remain robust; the state budget office anticipates Kentucky’s budget surplus will top $1 billion for the fourth consecutive year.??

Sen. Chris McDaniels, the chair of the Senate Appropriations and Revenue Committee, in a statement about the rosy budget projection said the legislature has remained “steadfast in our goal of fiscal restraint” amid “progressive and executive branch pressures” and that the state’s economic success has happened while lowering Kentuckians’ income taxes. Many Republican lawmakers and the Kentucky Chamber of Commerce want to make sure the legislature can afford to keep lowering income tax rates in future sessions.

A bipartisan effort in limbo

Wilson said he wants to make sure a new child abuse reporting system is at least funded in a future legislative session.

“I think everyone wants this,” Wilson said. “I’ll do whatever I can. I’m willing to work with anybody.”?

In the 2024 session, it took weeks of family court judges testifying, forming a working group and deliberations among cabinet officials, lawmakers and other stakeholders before a version of HB 271, the child abuse reporting bill, passed a Kentucky House committee on its way to eventual final passage. HB 271 passed unanimously in both chambers. Beshear signed it on April 9.?

“It’s been a true bipartisan effort, and I think that’s something that we sometimes miss in Frankfort,” said Rep. Samara Heavrin, R-Leitchfield, the chair of the House Families and Children Committee, when the bill passed. “We had several late nights and several hard conversations.”?

For Wilson, passage of the bill came down to ensuring the safety and welfare of Kentucky’s children.

“The wait times were so bad that it made it hard to report, and it was actually pretty hard to just receive a phone narrative or a written complaint and decide whether or not a social worker should investigate,” Wilson said. “The sad result is that there’s just not enough investigations from social workers on child abuse cases.”

Read Gov. Andy Beshear’s April 10 letter to the legislature and list of unfunded bills