The new General Assembly of Kentucky, which will take office on January 3, 2023, will have to decide whether or not to legalize sports betting and medicinal marijuana. Wed. at the Louisville Forum, Senate Majority Leader Damon Thayer and House Majority Whip Jason Nemes discussed the impending legislative session.
During the 2022 session, the House of Representatives approved a bill to legalize sports betting, but the Senate failed to take up the measure. Thayer was a leading proponent of the initiative in the Senate. “We’ve got some new members, we’ve got six new members,” he announced, “and I believe some of them replaced people who were no votes on sports betting, and they may be yes votes.”
Senate President Robert Stivers and Damon Thayer remain staunch opponents of medical marijuana legalization. The Senate did not approve a bill as the House did concerning sports betting. I’ll never support medical Marijuana, he declared.
One thing seems certain: the personal income tax will likely be decreased from 5% to 4.5%, but I won’t be one of the people voting for it. “I’m not going to vote for it,” one lawmaker said. “If we have the votes for it in caucus, I’m not going to stand in its way.”
Early this year, state legislators passed a package that would lower and eventually eliminate the state’s personal income tax, provided that revenue and emergency funding met specific benchmarks. Each half-point reduction, when those conditions are met, requires the approval of state legislators.
Read More: The Covina, California, Grow House Where Illegal Marijuana Was Being Produced Caught Fire.
To that end, we will also be giving special attention to reforming the juvenile justice system. Due to a lack of funding, Louisville’s juvenile detention center closed in 2019, but this bill will allow it to reopen. Proponents of the law think that keeping minors charged with violent crimes in detention until they can speak with social workers is another benefit of the legislation.
