by Liam Niemeyer, Kentucky Lantern
March 28, 2025

A controversial bill that would significantly roll back Kentucky’s ability to regulate water pollution will become law after the GOP-controlled legislature on Thursday overrode its veto by Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear. 

Senate Bill 89, sponsored by Sen. Scott Madon, R-Pineville, would considerably narrow the definition of state waters that are regulated by the Kentucky Energy and Environment Cabinet. Madon, with the backing of the Kentucky Coal Association, has touted the bill as a move to relieve industries from housing construction to coal mining of bureaucratic barriers.

Environmental groups have lambasted the bill as potentially opening the state’s water resources to pollution, threatening the groundwater of hundreds of thousands of Kentuckians who rely on rural public water utilities and private wells. 

Rebecca Goodman, the secretary of the Energy and Environment Cabinet, had previously said she had “grave concerns” with the bill. Beshear in his veto message wrote SB 89 by “failing to protect all water sources” would result in “pollution, sickness and more dangerous flooding.” 

Sen. Stephen West, R-Paris, on the Senate floor said he believed changes to the bill made as it advanced through the legislature, after hearing concerns about groundwater pollution, helped improve the legislation. 

“We protected our (coal) operators from overreach of the agency, and after listening to constituents, after listening to comments on this floor, provisions to protect groundwater were put back in,” West said.

Environmental groups and the cabinet have said the changes made to SB 89 don’t go nearly far enough to protect groundwater resources across the state. Democrats opposing the bill referenced a letter from Goodman, the cabinet secretary, who wrote Kentucky would be the only state in the country to cede its authority to regulate water to the federal government. 

Sen. Robin Webb, D-Grayson, who voted against overriding the veto, said the “compromise” made to change the bill did not “go far enough.” 

“The origination of this measure arose from agency overreach, but the pendulum now has swung far to the other end,” said Sen. Robin Webb, D-Grayson, who voted. “I have utilities in my district that rely on groundwater sources. I represent sportsmen and women across this country in the state that have reached out.” 

Kentucky Waterways Alliance executive director Michael Washburn — in a statement also representing leaders from the Kentucky chapter of the Sierra Club, the Kentucky Resources Council and the Kentucky Conservation Committee — said the legislature sided “with polluters over Kentucky’s people and the industries that rely on clean, safe water.” 

“This decision gives coal companies greater freedom to pollute our headwater streams, at the expense of the tens of thousands of homes, farms and businesses that depend on groundwater from private wells in rural Kentucky,” Washburn said. “To the polluters who championed this bill: we are watching. We have built a resilient, determined coalition — and we are ready to act.”

Kentucky Lantern is part of States Newsroom, a nonprofit news network supported by grants and a coalition of donors as a 501c(3) public charity. Kentucky Lantern maintains editorial independence. Contact Editor Jamie Lucke for questions: info@kentuckylantern.com.

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