The Kentucky House passed a bill Tuesday requiring criminal background checks for prospective nursing home employees. Applicants' names and fingerprints would be run through state and national databases. Bill sponsor, Democrat Carl Rollins, says the Commonwealth would get $3 million in federal grant money to initiate the program and fund it until May 2014. The program would then cost the state about a million a year.
The proposal met resistance from other House members over cost and privacy concerns. A floor amendment to sunset the bill once the federal grant money runs out failed by two votes. The measure now goes to the Senate for consideration.
