The push to create a registry of domestic violence offenders in Kentucky isn't the first. Two bills filed earlier this year failed to get a vote. But this new legislation, which is still in the works, comes with a lot of asterisks.
Rep. Kim Holloway began testimony in a committee last week by listing off what the proposal does not do.
"We are not attempting to create a registry of people who have merely been accused of domestic violence," she said. "An allegation does not put a person on this registry. An arrest does not put a person on this registry. The filing of a protective order does not put a person on this registry."
Nor would a first-time conviction.
Instead, the list would be made up of individuals with at least two eligible convictions. The rationale, Holloway said, is that Kentuckians should have relatively easy access to records showing people with a pattern of abuse in their past.
"A person beginning a relationship may have no practical way of knowing that the one sitting across the table from them has multiple criminal convictions for violence against previous partners," Holloway added. "Technically, many criminal convictions are already public record. Practically, that does not mean they are readily available to the average Kentuckian."
The bill would also require online dating services available in Kentucky to conduct criminal background checks and flag profiles involving qualifying domestic convictions.
Lawmakers have opportunity to take up the bill when they return to Frankfurt in January.