KY gov moves millions to fund Lee Specialty Clinic in a ‘Band-Aid’ fix
Gov. Andy Beshear is moving $4.5 million from a Capitol Annex renovation project to fully fund Lee Specialty Clinic in Louisville through this fiscal year.
Beshear announced the decision a day after hundreds came to Frankfort and pleaded with Kentucky leaders to find a way to work with each other and fund the clinic, which has discharged more than 1,000 patients and lost 83% of its staff because of funding cuts.
Several said they felt they were being used as political pawns in the funding controversy process and asked leaders to work together.
“What a bipartisan approach could look like was coming back and Democrats and Republicans voting together to fund it moving forward,” Beshear said Thursday during his weekly press conference. “I’ve never used people as political pawns and I never will.”
He called the money shift a “Band-Aid” fix.
“This isn’t guaranteed funding that only the General Assembly can provide through the budget unit,” Beshear said. “This is me finding money and moving it to prevent these cuts from happening this year. It’ll not permanently fix the problem. We’ll face it again if the legislature doesn’t come in in January and ultimately provide the funding that’s needed, but hopefully it gives enough time for all the families that are worried, that are online, or that showed up yesterday, to say ‘come back in January and provide the money directly that’s needed.’”
Families plead with KY leaders: ‘Work together to find a solution’ and keep Lee Clinic open
On Wednesday House Speaker David Osborne, R-Prospect, said in a statement that Beshear had failed to “prioritize essential programs.”
The legislature, he said, is “equally frustrated about the administration is moving in this direction, but are hopeful that we will hear within the next few days that they will use the money provided to continue contracting with Lee, as well as avoid provider reimbursement rate cuts and cuts to other essential services.”
The clinic is the only one like it in Kentucky, offering medical, dental, behavioral, and therapeutic services for adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities.
Beshear first announced cuts to several social service programs in early June, including a 4% cut to Medicaid provider reimbursement. Beshear blamed the two-year state budget passed by the General Assembly this year, which he said underfunded the programs. The legislature has said it gave the executive branch sufficient funding and that the cuts were unnecessary.
This story will be updated.