Rowan County | Kentuckians For The Commonwealth

Chapter: Rowan County

If you believe “what we do to the land, we do to the people,” then you’ll find friends in KFTC’s Rowan County chapter.

Members from Rowan and surrounding counties work together to address problems and have a say in policies and actions affecting the land and people here in our own communities and throughout the state. We raise awareness about mountaintop removal, air quality, water quality, tax fairness, clean and affordable energy, and other issues important to our members.

Our monthly chapter meeting is a great way to learn about our local and statewide work, share your own ideas and get involved.

 

Recent Activities

Celebrating 40 years of action for justice.

 It’s an important time for the organization.

KY Public Service Commission establishes a fair process for calculating compensation credits for rooftop solar

The grassroots campaign to protect rooftop solar in Kentucky and prevent electric utilities from rigging the rules against locally-owned distributed solar generation won a major victory in May, ending (for now) a multi-year dispute between solar advocates and monopoly utility companies over the value of fed-back rooftop solar energy.

On May 14, 2021 the Kentucky Public Service Commission (PSC) issued a ruling rejecting Kentucky Power Company’s proposal to slash by seventy-five percent the value of the credit that new solar customers would receive for electric power from their panels that is fed back to the grid. Importantly, the PSC order established a methodology to determine a fair value of that fed-back distributed solar energy. The Commissioners then applied that new framework to calculate that, for Kentucky Power customers, the value for that credit is just twelve percent below what it would have been under the old policy.  

Despite challenges, Kentuckians make an impact in Frankfort

You’ve made an impact during the 2021 General Assembly. Some of these impacts have been on legislation – a key meeting with a legislator that changes the course of a bill, or a push of calls and tweets that makes the will of the people more visible and harder to ignore. We also set a goal this session to continue to build the power we need. So many impacts have been in our own communities, talking with neighbors and networks about the bills that impact us, and the work of our legislators. 

RECLAIM Act and AML pass the House as part of The Moving Forward Act

Kentucky will have a better chance at seeing its $400 million backlog of mine reclamation projects move forward thanks to legislation passed by the U.S. House of Representatives on July 1.

Both the RECLAIM Act and reauthorization of the Abandoned Mine Lands Program were included in the INVEST in America Act (a.k.a The Moving Forward Act), a broad bill addressing the country’s infrastructure needs.

"I am overjoyed that Congress is finally helping to clean up abandoned mines and polluted waterways," said Joanne Hill, a retired nurse originally from Harlan County now living in Pulaski County. "For too long, Kentuckians have been pleading for action with no response.”

ORSANCO work continues, hearings in early April

For more than a year, KFTC has worked with allies to protect the Ohio River Valley Water Sanitation Commission’s (ORSANCO) mission to clean and protect the Ohio River through monitoring and enforcement. This commission, made up of representatives of the federal government and 8 members states (New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, West Virginia, Virginia, Kentucky, Indiana and Illinois) of ORSANCO maintains pollution control standards that are higher than the EPA or state enforcement agencies.

While these standards have not solved the Ohio River’s pollution issues, it has made considerable progress since the founding in 1948. Yet some political appointees in ORSANCO want to make these essential standards optional for states to enforce, giving states the ability to ignore damage to our water systems that disproportionately impacts lower income people and people of color across the region.

Page

Regular Meetings:

St. Alban's Episcopal Church
145 E. 5th St
Morehead, KY 40351
Monthly chapter meeting:

Third Thursday of the month, 6:00 p.m.

Chapter Organizer:

Morehead, KY 40351
859-278-8644