Kentucky's top Republicans put housing first for 2027, and the speaker wants to pitch Texas businesses

COVINGTON, Ky. (Nov. 12) — Kentucky's two most powerful lawmakers say housing will be near the top of the list when the General Assembly returns in January, but Senate President Robert Stivers says money alone won't fix it.

"If you were to give us $100 billion [for housing] we wouldn't know what to do with it," Stivers said Wednesday at an event hosted by the Northern Kentucky Chamber of Commerce, according to WVXU. "We don't have the workforce to build the houses." His answer, he said, is getting more people through Kentucky's colleges and universities and into jobs.

Stivers and House Speaker David Osborne, both Republicans, also named Medicaid and workforce development as major issues. On health coverage, both said the state can mostly react to whatever Washington does with Medicaid and Medicare. Stivers, of rural Clay County, said Kentucky should invest in technology so rural residents can get care virtually.

Stivers also defended data centers as a way to grow local tax revenue, pointing to a project in Mason County he said will help its schools. Where they go matters, he said, suggesting that few people would object to one built on a brownfield next to big fuel storage tanks.

Osborne looked south. After Democrats won the governor's race and a U.S. Senate seat in Texas last week, he said Kentucky should be recruiting from there. "We need to be gearing up planes at CVG right now and flying banners over top of Texas saying 'Kentucky is open for business,'" he said.

The housing push has backing from business groups. A new report from the Kentucky Chamber, the Home Builders Association of Kentucky and Kentucky Realtors, called Let Kentucky Build, says home building in the state dropped 46% in the decade after the 2007-2009 recession, NKyTribune reported. It estimates the shortfall cost Kentucky $3.7 billion in economic activity and 32,600 jobs from 2008 to 2025, and says homeownership among adults slipped from 60.1% in 2006 to 57.9% in 2024.

The report recommends 12 changes for lawmakers, including loosening parking requirements for new homes, letting builders use qualified private inspectors to cut delays, and making it easier to convert old buildings such as offices into housing.

The 2027 session starts in January and runs through March.