After weeks of political finger-pointing over who was to blame for massive budget cuts to the state’s lone clinic for adults with developmental disabilities, Kentucky Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear said Thursday he has found enough money to keep Lee Specialty Clinic open for the next year.
Beshear said he was pulling some money that had been set aside to go toward renovating the Capitol Annex—an office space for lawmakers and staff that supporters of Lee flooded Wednesday to demand lawmakers reverse the budget cuts—to keep the clinic going for the next fiscal year.
Without the new funding, Lee was expected to lose around 80% of its budget and drop care for more than 1,000 of Kentucky’s most vulnerable adults within the coming weeks.
Caregivers, patients, and providers tied to Lee told lawmakers Wednesday that they often cannot find quality care within the traditional healthcare system. Without Lee, they said, many have simply nowhere else to go.
“For weeks, families served by Lee Specialty Clinic have been living with uncertainty,” state Rep. Rachel Roarx, a Louisville Democrat who represents the area of the clinic, said. “Today, they can breathe a little easier.”
Calling the one-year fix a “band-aid,” Beshear implored those supporting the clinic to keep pressure on lawmakers to amend the state budget in the 2027 legislative session to provide more stable, long-term funding to the clinic.
Kentucky’s Republican-led legislature is responsible for crafting the state budget, while cabinets that fall under Beshear’s administration are responsible for implementing cuts handed down to them.
Beshear has warned in recent weeks that cuts to services would be necessary, thanks to the budget. But Republicans have countered that Beshear has the power to move money around to stop devastating cuts to social and health services programs—a power that Beshear himself says he has weaponized recently to provide temporary fixes to deeper cuts.
A top Republican blasted Beshear Thursday afternoon, claiming Republicans had fully funded the Lee Specialty Clinic in the state budget.
“Once again the Governor created a crisis just so he could appear to save the day,” House Speaker David Osborne said in a statement. “Suggesting that this program was at risk when the funding was there all along was both irresponsible and unnecessarily cruel to those already facing difficult circumstances.”
Some of those who testified against the budget cuts to Lee in front of the Medicaid Oversight and Advisory Board in Frankfort Wednesday expressed frustration with the political back-and-forth and demanded officials stop using some of Kentucky’s most vulnerable residents as political pawns.
Cutting services like Lee’s signals that state officials view those with disabilities as the most “expendable,” one speaker said. Others pointed to the fact Lee has a lengthy waitlist for services, and if anything, the state should be finding ways to expand care.
House Majority Whip Rep. Jason Nemes, a Louisville Republican who attended the hearing, posted on social media Thursday that a silver lining to the situation is that “everyone with power knows what the Lee Specialty Clinic is all about and their hearts go out to these families.
“I’m going to use this as an opportunity to expand Lee’s services across the commonwealth.”
This story has been updated.
