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Wayne: Balancing Kentucky Budget Shouldn't Depend on Leveling Licensure Fees

Kentucky LRC

The legislative scrutiny has begun for Kentucky Governor Steve Beshear's proposed budget.

Some lawmakers are critical of the proposal for relying on professional license fees to balance the budget.

From barbers to doctors, blue and white-collar professionals in Kentucky must pay licensure fees in order to practice their given trade. Those fees then go back into funding and staffing the licensing board.

But Beshear’s budget proposal transfers about $370 million in surplus fees to the General Fund, creating a structural imbalance.

Rep. Jim Wayne calls that robbery.

“It puts the boards and commissions in a position where they have to raise the rates on people who are being regulated by their boards and commissions," the Louisville Democrat said. "So, if they don’t have the money to sustain them because it’s been robbed by the governor, they have to go back and then tax, in essence.”

Wayne says the practice has become so commonplace, it’s become a “new normal.”

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