Week 1 of the 2024 Legislative Session
As we convene the 2024 regular session, I would like first to wish you a happy new year. I hope your holidays were filled with joy and laughter while spending quality time with family and friends.
As the father of a special needs daughter, I want to bring awareness to an effort to relaunch a treasured program in the state Senate that my former colleague, Dennis Parrett, helped me establish in 2017. It’s called the Sunny Page Program and allows special needs children to engage with the legislative process. It raises awareness about the challenges children with disabilities face.
Participants join their respective senators in the Senate chamber in Frankfort to help with essential tasks. These incredible kids are provided the recognition they deserve. It can be a life-changing event that, in my experience, has created lasting memories that participants will carry with them for a lifetime.
Participation in the program suffered because of the COVID-19 pandemic. In the coming weeks, I will work with excellent Legislative Research Commission (LRC) staff to revamp LRC’s Senate Page Program information and application page and create a media campaign to raise awareness. I would appreciate everyone’s consideration to assist in this effort.
The Senate convened for day one of the 2024 Legislative Session on Tuesday, January 2, with incredible renditions of our national anthem and “My Old Kentucky Home” by the 100th Army Band, Fort Knox.
Legislative sessions in even-numbered years are budget sessions, consisting of 60 legislative days, unlike the shorter 30-day session in odd-numbered years. Short session years are intended to evaluate previously enacted policies and address any necessary legislative clean-up. As the Constitution of Kentucky outlines, the General Assembly must gavel into session on the first Tuesday following the first Monday in January and requires lawmakers to conclude legislative business on April 15.
The primary focus in the Senate on Week 1 was to pass this year’s Senate rules, officially confirm committee assignments, and introduce initial legislation. The only two items constitutionally required by the General Assembly in this year’s legislative session are to enact a new two-year state budget and road plan.
The Kentucky Constitution vests the exclusive power and duty to tax and spend the public’s money to the General Assembly. Our state constitution requires balanced spending with available financial resources, which is good. While the federal government can borrow and incur trillions of dollars in debt, this is not an option for our state government. The tax dollars you entrust to your government must be spent with care and discipline, which is my intent as your state senator.
The total amount of taxpayer funding for the next two-year budget and road plan will be based on what was recently set by the Consensus Forecasting Group. According to this group of economic experts’ best estimates, total general fund revenues—which result from sales, income and other taxes—are approximately $31.6 billion over the 2025-2026 biennium, with road fund revenues resulting from gas and motor vehicle taxes being roughly $3.7 billion. The state budget provides for state government operations and essential government services, and the road plans provide for investments in our roads, bridges, and highways.
The state Senate will have the final crack at proposing a state budget and road plan. Our fingerprint will not be applied to the document until a proposal is passed out of the state House of Representatives. I will keep you updated throughout this critical process and will remain an advocate for our district.
On January 1, the second automatic reduction of our state income tax went into effect. House Bill (HB) 8 from the 2022 Legislative Session established the framework by which working Kentuckians’ income tax could be decreased responsibly. During the 2023 Legislative Session, the General Assembly passed HB 1 and codified the first two tax reductions after HB 8’s criteria were met. The January 1 income tax reduction lowers your income tax rate from 4.5 percent to 4 percent. By the end of 2024, HB 8 and the resulting individual income tax reductions will have resulted in approximately $1.8 billion left in the pockets of taxpayers and consumers, providing you more of your own money to spend as you wish.
My session priority will include:
- Child Care: Having professional experience in this field, I am greatly concerned about the future of child care in the state. Federal COVID-19 funding is drying up. Those funds were utilized to create what I believe were many beneficial programs through the Kentucky Cabinet for Health and Family Services. I will advocate using surplus general funds and monies in the state’s budget reserve trust fund to support such programs. The child care business model is unique and must be treated as such.
- Nuclear Energy Efforts Continued: Last session, my resolution to establish a nuclear energy commission was successful, and efforts are ongoing. I will ask my colleagues to be careful to balance our state’s energy needs and not make decisions that could impact the future of energy because I don’t want us to fall behind other states. I believe nuclear energy is the future and that the commonwealth can be a leader. Additional focuses on nuclear energy for me in this session will be licensing, certification, and training necessary for workforce needs.
- Juvenile Justice: Last session’s reforms to the Kentucky Department of Juvenile Justice (DJJ) and funding support came through a piece of legislation I sponsored. This session, I will be working with my colleagues, such as Sen. Steve Meredith, a former hospital administrator, to emphasize mental health treatment for troubled youths, including such topics as children in the state’s care reported as having to sleep on office floors without access to food or showers. While I’ve been informed those earlier reported issues have been resolved, it’s something we never want to see again, and the same goes for the reports last year of crises within DJJ facilities.
Feel free to share your thoughts throughout the session. Find the status of legislation by calling 866-840-2835, legislative meeting information at 800-633-9650, or leaving a message for lawmakers at 800-372-7181. You can watch and follow legislative activity at KET/org/legislature and Legislature.ky.gov.
If you have any questions or comments about these or any other public policy issue, please call me toll-free at 1-800-372-7181 or email me Danny.Carroll@LRC.ky.gov.