Kentucky faces a housing shortage.

So what can the Kentucky General Assembly do about it?

State lawmakers and housing advocates met earlier today at the state Capitol for a groundbreaking announcing priorities for the 2026 session.

We know that the reality is, is that housing works.

Housing provides shelter.

It provides stability.

It provides a foundation stone that people can build their lives upon.

And so we are incredibly grateful for the amount of work that the Kentucky General Assembly has put in over the last two years with the Kentucky Housing Task Force.

We need more housing that people can afford to buy.

We need more housing for people to rent.

We need more shelter availability across the country, across the state.

We need to make housing more available.

We need to make housing more affordable.

And we're going to try to do that work for you this year in the legislature.

There are several bills.

There are several budget requests that have already been made to make sure that we have, funds in the affordable housing, funding mechanism in our state to make sure that we can help cities and state, cities and counties work well with, developers in our communities.

House Bill 333 does just that.

And it's about empowering faith based institutions and churches.

To use their land to serve these means, houses of worship and religious organizations want to help and obviously they're there, and that's what they do.

And we're so thankful.

The proposal, the bill respects, local control.

It exists, and existing zoning laws.

Too many working Kentuckians are struggling to find affordable and safe places to live.

So today, I'm going to share a bill, that I'll be filing soon.

That would take meaningful, responsible steps to expand access to housing while respecting the rights of property owners.

This proposed measure would address eviction expungement by requiring automatic sealing of dismissed eviction filings, and protecting youth from public disclosure.

Right now, even when a case is dismissed, it can follow individuals for years, showing up on their background checks and limiting their housing options.

I've struggled with housing my entire life.

People see numbers, but they don't realize that behind those numbers are people.

The date that I had my quote unquote eviction, I had actually came to my court date with the money owed.

I paid roughly $5,800 to resolve my eviction, only for it to follow me still.

And I'm not.

I'm not a commodity.

I'm not special.

There are plenty of other people that have done that.

You know, so it it would be a clean slate even if it hasn't touched you yet.

It may.

You never know.

And, everybody should have the right.

Everyone should have the right to be able to be a judge for what they are now, not for what they've done over the past.

There's also another bill that's filed addressing this, and it's called the Affordable Housing Trust Fund Bill, which would help develop 6000 units over ten years.