Comprehensive bill on sports wagering clears committee hurdle March 11, 2026 Rep. Michael Meredith, R-Oakland, (right) and Rep. Matthew Koch, R-Paris, present House Bill 904, which would bring many changes to Kentucky’s sports wagering and charitable gaming statutes. The bill advanced from th e House Licensing, Occupations and Administrative Regulations Committee on Wednesday. A high-res version is available here. FRANKFORT — A Kentucky House bill that would raise the sports wagering age from 18 to 21 and regulate fantasy contests advanced from the House Licensing, Occupations and Administrative Regulations Committee on Wednesday. House Bill 904 is sponsored by Rep. Michael Meredith, R-Oakland, and Committee Chair Rep. Matthew Koch, R-Paris. They told the committee HB 904 would bring many changes to Kentucky’s sports wagering and charitable gaming statutes. “Fantasy sports have been offered in Kentucky for a long time, but there’s never been a direct licensing statute or tax statute related to them,” Meredith said, adding that a separate measure – House Bill 757 – would create a taxation framework for fantasy sports. HB 757 advanced from the House Appropriations and Revenue Committee on Tuesday. Another change Kentuckians would see under HB 904 is the banning of proposition bets on Kentucky college athletes, which involves bets placed on an individual athlete’s statistics. On prediction markets, Meredith said Kentucky is limited in its ability to directly regulate this type of wagering due to federal law. However, HB 904 would ban any license holders in Kentucky, such as tracks or providers, from affiliating with prediction market platforms, he said. Another provision of HB 904 would create a purse stabilization fund for fixed-odds wagering, Meredith said. HB 904 would also update Kentucky’s charitable gaming statute, Koch said. He said the committee will continue to study charitable gaming, but in the meantime HB 904 would address some of the charitable gaming issues. One provision of HB 904 would increase the charitable gaming prize limit from $599 to $1,499. Another section of the bill would “eliminate the middleman,” Koch said. “You have a charity that’s out there operating, you have a retail store location that’s out there – the middleman is simply the agent,” Koch said. “It’s combining those. We’ve had quite a bit of examples of bad players within that space, so that’s one of the things we’re going to take on immediately.” The charitable gaming age would also increase from 18 to 21 under this bill, Meredith added. In discussion of HB 904, the prediction market aspect of the gaming industry became the lead topic of the conversation. Rep. Kim Banta, R-Fort Mitchell, said she’s heard from constituents on the prediction market issue. “I had a question from a constituent about voting on elections and things like that,” she said. “This is more of a curiosity question because I don’t even buy lotto tickets, so can somebody run a betting on elections?” Meredith said the prediction market space allows bets on elections along with other betting on politics in the U.S. and globally. “We’ve been told we can’t regulate them directly, preempted by federal law, but there’s nothing that says we can’t tax them,” Meredith said. Meredith told the committee HB 757 would tax the prediction markets at 17.25%, which is a higher rate than the licensed operators are taxed. Banta said she “hates that” Kentucky can’t do more to regulate prediction markets. Meredith said he hopes there will be a change at the federal level soon. “This prediction market space has been something that has happened very quickly, and we’re all trying to adapt to it the best we can,” he said. “We would love to see change at the federal level that would allow this to be addressed in a little different way.” Koch said the committee doesn’t have an issue with gaming, but he believes regulation of prediction markets should happen at the state level like other forms of gaming and gambling. “We don’t want to run them out of business. That is not our goal,” Koch said. “Our goal is to make sure that we can have state regulations on this… We can’t have one that’s not operating by our rules.” HB 904 received committee approval by a 19-0 vote with one pass vote. It will now go before the full House for consideration. The post Comprehensive bill on sports wagering clears committee hurdle appeared first on The Lexington Times. ...read more read less