By Jack Brammer
NKyTribune reporter
A Northern Kentucky legislator is backing legislation to legalize marijuana while another has a bill to provide more health care access through community health workers.
Rep. Rachel Roberts, D-Newport, joined two Democratic senators – Senate Minority Leader Morgan McGarvey of Louisville and David Yates of Louisville – at a Capitol Annex news conference Thursday in Frankfort to unveil legislation to legalize marijuana “for responsible adult use.”
Meanwhile, Rep. Kimberly Moser, R-Independence, held a news conference in the Capitol Rotunda earlier in the day to present a bill to provide more community health workers to help people get better access to health care.
The marijuana bills were filed by Roberts and Yates in their respective chambers. They face an uphill battle in the Republican-led General Assembly.
Legislation to allow medicinal marijuana has been presented in the Kentucky General Assembly for several years with no success.
Moser’s health care bill is expected to fare better. She is chair of the House Health and Welfare Committee.
Rachel Roberts
Marijuana Bill
Roberts said the Democrats’ cannabis legislation is “a comprehensive plan that Kentuckians deserve and it builds on what has worked in other states while deleting their mistakes.”
Roberts and her colleagues said the legislation would be a boon for the state’s economy and farmers. She also said it would give state and local governments a major new source of revenue, provide marijuana for medical use under a physician’s control and ease prison overcrowding.
The new legislation, Roberts said, is known as “L.E.T.T.’s Grow.”
“The letters in the acronym stand for Legalizing Sales; Expunging crimes that should never have been charged; Treating those who deserve to benefit from cannabis’ medicinal properties; and Taxing sales for those who want to buy it for adult use.”
McGarvey noted that 37 states already allow medicinal marijuana with 18 of those reaping economic benefits such as tax revenue.
“By decriminalizing low-level marijuana offenses, it allows police and the courts to re-prioritize their resources toward addressing more serious crime,” said Yates.
“Minor marijuana possession offenders, many of them young people, should not be saddled with a criminal record and the lifelong penalties and stigma associated with it.”
The legislation calls for creation of a Cannabis Control Board, made up of seven members. None of whom could be tied with the cannabis business.
The board would act like the Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control, establishing and enforcing regulations from seed to sale.
Helping the board would be four advisory committees focused on medicinal and adult use.
A separate Social Impact Council would use a part of state proceeds to develop and administer scholarship programs and award grants to groups that have been adversely affected by substance abuse.
The state’s 6 percent sales tax would be applied to adult-use sales. Local governments would be able to levy license fees up to 5 percent. Cities and counties would be able to split the revenue from the license fees.
The legislation also allows automatic removal of misdemeanor cannabis convictions within a year. Affected persons could ask the court sooner for expungement of records.
Roberts said the legislation is comprehensive and caring.
“It helps those who are sick; it gives a second chance to those who shouldn’t have been charged; and it would put Kentucky almost overnight at the epicenter of a multi-billion dollar business.”
Kim Moser
Community Health Workers
Moser said the goal of her House Bill 525 is to expand the use of community health workers in Kentucky, creating more help to help others in medically underserved communities “navigate the health care system.”
Her legislation will streamline with the Kentucky Community and Technical College system the certification process for community health workers and standardize the curriculum for them.
This, in turn, she said, will expand access to care in medically underserved communities.
She said her bill would make these services a reimbursable Medicaid service.
The state now has less than 100 community health workers, said Moser. “I want to increase that number by leaps and bounds.”
Under her legislation, the funding would come from Medicaid. It is not certain at this time how much it would cost.
Community health workers are not clinicians but they connect people with health care resources and social services, said Moser. They help people understand what resources are available, she said.
The lawmaker said community health workers work in such offices as health clinics, primary care offices and local health departments.
“Our goal is to close the health disparities gap, which starts with meeting people where they are with someone they know and trust,” said Moser.
“Because of their familiarity and the nature of their region and resources, they often create a more comfortable environment for those otherwise hesitant to seek medical care.”
Kentucky ranks near the bottom nationally in many health statistics, said Moser, contending that her bill would try to improve health care in the state.
Emily Beauregard, executive director of Kentucky Voices for Health, said her group has worked since 2014 to build a network of community health workers in the state.
She said they not only can assist in health care but in other social services like housing, food and transportation.
Christian Libby, a community health worker with the Homeless and Housing Coalition of Kentucky, said she appreciates Moser’s bill.
She said each work day for her is different, “connecting people to services they have access to but are not sure how to connect with them.”
The most-asked question she gets, said Libby, is from people who do not understand health insurance letters.
