After 13 years of annual Kentucky legislative sessions, the verdict is that this model has failed to deliver on its promise to improve and save money in law making.

The first annual session in an odd year was held in 2001. This was the direct result of the Constitutional amendment passed in 2000 calling for the conversion to annual from biennial sessions. During the late 1990s, the idea of annual sessions sounded like a needed breath of fresh air to rejuvenate the process of managing the state budget.

The standard legislative year back in those troubled times was for several special sessions to be called. Special sessions were the result of failed leadership to take care of business during the regular legislative session. At $60,000 a day, this option soon proved too costly for the state budget.

Annual sessions have now been turned into party time for many of the legislators. Special interest lobbyists spend between $4 and $7 million, each session to take care of the House and Senate members. This care is in the form of parties, food and drink special favors. It’s all ethical as long as everyone is invited. Writing draft legislation has become a function of outside interests.

With each new legislative session of this new 21st Century, the legislative branch of Kentucky state government has proven that, as a collective body, they are the pawns of large corporations and special interests. King Coal owns Kentucky politics and politicians.

With the 2008 collapse of the American economy, 10 years of foreign wars, millions of Americans foreclosed on, out of control price fixing on medical costs, and rising energy costs, Kentucky leaders have failed to provide a vision and plan to help Kentucky citizens weather this economic storm.

This 2014 legislative session was a great opportunity to move forward, to establish new laws to help the people who are suffering find jobs, to help cut down medical costs, and to embrace new energy technology.

Rep. Jeff Hoover, Republican Floor Leader, explained how the 2014 legislative session will be remembered.

“The unadorned truth is this session of the Kentucky General Assembly was lackluster at best. In my eighteen years serving as a state representative, never before have I seen a session where political fear thrived more than this previous one.”

“With nearly every major piece of legislation, it became obvious that it would not pass because of concerns of how it might affect some legislators in their upcoming elections.”

During the past fourteen years, the Kentucky Legislature has developed an imperial attitude. Legislators hunker down in the Annex behind guard posts, steel barriers, thick glass (maybe bullet proof) blocking any direct entrance into the offices of the members. They work in plush office space in the Annex Building.

More and more, Kentucky legislators only listen to big money and power. Their 2014 single job was to produce a budget. That they did. It is a $20.3 billion core state operations budget with a $4.1 billion transportation plan.

The biggest indictment of the Kentucky Legislature is that they no longer have a shared vision of Kentucky’s future with the people of the state.

When issues such as tax reform, medical costs, roads, tourism, new energy sources, pension reform, size and function of Kentucky state and local government, real world property valuation, and disaster planning are annually dismissed in favor of the interests of KU, AT&T, King Coal, and other special interests, Kentucky has lost the ability to move forward into the future. We cannot even agree on our present.

It is time to scrap annual sessions where the peoples’ voices are heard less and less. Open up this government with local legislative committee hearings, more time spent with experts studying the future needs of Kentucky, and a creation of a vision where the people help lead with their representatives into this 21st Century.
As Linda Boileau of the State Journal depicts in her cartoon, the General Assembly has become a clown car, rolling into the Capital for laughs and rolling out again when the show is over.

Bring back biennial legislative sessions.