The Kentucky Senate Committee on Transportation on Wednesday advanced Senate Bill 87 with a committee substitute that would tie procurement thresholds for the state’s three largest commercial airports to the Federal Aviation Administration’s simplified acquisition threshold and direct state education and transportation officials to study options for air‑traffic‑controller credentialing, committee members said.

The move, taken at a committee meeting in Frankfort, is designed to let airport procurement thresholds adjust with the FAA’s simplified acquisition threshold, which is indexed to inflation, so the airports will not need repeated legislative changes as contract sizes rise, Seth Cutter, representing CVG (Cincinnati/Northern Kentucky International Airport), told the committee. "The bill streamlines the procurement for Kentucky's largest airports by tying the acquisition threshold to the Federal Aviation Administration's simplified acquisition threshold," Cutter said.

Why it matters: supporters said the change aims to speed procurement for hundreds of millions of dollars in planned capital work at the state’s largest commercial airports and reduce the need for frequent statutory updates. The bill also instructs the Council on Postsecondary Education (CPE) and the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet to assess whether Kentucky postsecondary institutions could host the final credentialing or a second site for air‑traffic‑controller certification, a step backers said could help address a workforce shortage in the industry.

Senate President Stivers told the committee that the state and universities should examine ways to increase the pipeline of air‑traffic controllers. "There is a severe lack of air traffic controllers," Stivers said, urging that CPE and the Transportation Cabinet explore whether Kentucky could add a site for final credentialing. The bill’s text, as discussed in committee, directs CPE and the Transportation Cabinet to report on possible paths and sites in coordination with postsecondary institutions, including KCTCS and public universities that have aviation programs.

Committee members also discussed the bill’s fiscal implications. Chairman Higdon noted that the fiscal note on the underlying bill shows "no impact" but said the fiscal effect could change once the committee substitute’s provisions are costed. "The fiscal note is back, and it says no impact. That will probably change a little bit when we get the fiscal impact on the committee sub," Higdon said.

Procedure and votes: the committee adopted a committee substitute and then voted to report Senate Bill 87 favorably with the substitute attached. A roll-call portion of the record shows a series of aye votes and the committee reported the bill favorably; members recorded as voting in the transcript include Senators Berg, Douglas, Elkins, Smith, Storm, Wheeler, Williams, Wilson and Chairman Higdon. The committee transcript records the substitute’s adoption and the favorable report with committee substitute attached.

What remains: the bill now moves from committee with a favorable report; the committee noted the fiscal impact for the substitute is pending. The directive to CPE and the Transportation Cabinet is a study/coordination task in the bill text, not a grant of new funding, and committee members indicated CPE already performs studies of program alignment.

The committee had no further business and adjourned after the vote.