State budget clears House floor, heads to the Senate February 26, 2026 Rep. Josh Bray, R-Mount Vernon, speaks on House Bill 500 on the House floor on Thursday. The bill is a first draft of the state budget for the next two years. A high-res version is available here. FRANKFORT — Two bills related to Kentucky’s spending plan for the next biennium advanced off the Kentucky House floor on Thursday. House Bill 500 would appropriate billions each fiscal year to the state executive branch. Rep. Jason Petrie, R-Elkton, serves as the committee chair for the House Appropriations and Revenue Committee. He was joined by the chairs for the House Budget Review Subcommittees in presenting on HB 500 on the House floor. In his opening remarks, Petrie said the legislation is a “good first draft” as the general assembly moves through the lengthy budget drafting process. “We focused on the near-term needs for the next two years,” Petrie said. “And I stress, we focused on the needs, not wants.” State government offices and agencies and other stakeholders have spent the last several weeks meeting with Petrie and the budget subcommittee chairs to share what the spending needs are in Kentucky over the next two years, he said. “We focused on the needs. And ultimately, we ended up at …a restrained growth of spending in each year of a little less than 2%,” Petrie said. While the budget calls for an overall reduction in spending, Petrie said there are areas of the budget that are exempt. Those are: veterans affairs, SEEK, county costs, Medicaid benefits, behavioral health, family resource centers, youth service centers, juvenile justice, corrections, community services and local facilities. A previous call to limit spending on the state employee health insurance plan was removed, according to the bill. Looking at projected revenues, Petrie said HB 500 calls for 2% of revenues from each year to be deposited into the budget reserve trust fund. He projects that would result in about a $614 million allocation to address long-term needs in the future. The House debated HB 500 for more than two hours Thursday afternoon, during which several lawmakers called for an increase in funding for public education, affordable housing, Medicaid and more. Rep. Kim Banta, R-Fort Mitchell, serves as the chair of the House Budget Review Subcommittee on Primary and Secondary Education. She said the budget calls for a 2% increase in SEEK, or per pupil spending, in each fiscal year. Rep. Adrielle Camuel, D-Lexington, said she is thankful for the budgeted increase in SEEK funding, but feels it doesn’t go far enough. “Those increases are welcome, but they’re just not enough to keep up with the rising cost and the growing expectations that we keep putting on our public schools and our school staff,” she said. Camuel called for a floor amendment that would provide a salary increase for public school teachers and support staff, but the amendment failed. “If we truly value public education, then our budgets have to reflect that,” she said. Rep. Josh Bray, R-Mount Vernon, serves as a vice chair of the House Appropriations and Revenue Committee. He said he would also like to see more funding for education and other things, but Kentucky must “live within its means.” “I trust you all when you say you want these things, because guess what – we want them too. But there are things we can afford to do, things we need to do in order to move the commonwealth forward,” Bray said, adding the state can’t afford reckless spending. The House passed HB 500 by an 81-18 vote. House Bill 504 – the state judicial branch budget – also advanced off the House floor on Thursday after receiving a 94-4 vote. Rep. Stephanie Dietz, R-Edgewood, also described the judicial bill as a “good first draft” that supports infrastructure needs, flood recovery, workforce stability and more. Both HB 500 and 504 are now before the Senate for consideration. The post State budget clears House floor, heads to the Senate appeared first on The Lexington Times. ...read more read less