Tagged: wkms

A Louisville lawmaker is pressing for changes to Kentucky's domestic violence laws to allow them to apply to dating couples.  Democratic Senator Denise Harper Angel says 48 other states already have amended their domestic violence laws to protect victims of dating violence and she says the Commonwealth should follow suit.  

In an effort to prod more attorneys to provide free legal assistance to people who can't afford a lawyer, the Tennessee Supreme Court has announced it will begin giving special recognition to lawyers who spend at least 50 hours doing pro bono work. 

Tennessee House leaders who last year fended off a bill to overrule businesses seeking to ban firearms in their parking lots appear to be giving up the fight. House Majority Leader Gerald McCormick says he and fellow Republicans just want to put the measure behind them so they can move on to other more pressing issues.  

A Prohibition-era ban on the sale of alcohol at Kentucky’s restaurants, bars and retail stores on Election Day would be lifted under legislation the Senate passed Tuesday.  The measure would allow alcohol sales during the hours that polls are open.  It’s will now be taken up by the House.  Kentucky and South Carolina are the only two states that have such bans in place. In the past five years, similar bans have been lifted in Delaware, Idaho, Indiana, Utah and West Virginia.  Similar measures filed in the Commonwealth in past years have failed.

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.