Gov. Andy Beshear announced Thursday a new round of State Aid Funding for Emergencies grants, with Caldwell County receiving more than $130,000 from the West Kentucky version of this fund.
Beshear noted the award is intended to help offset recovery costs from devastating storms that struck the region earlier this year, and this award is part of a larger $10 million distribution from the SAFE 4860 Fund, which supports communities impacted by federally declared disasters.
The fund, created through legislation signed in March, aims to ease financial strain caused by February’s storms and floods.
Established in 2022 following tornadoes in western Kentucky, the West Kentucky SAFE Fund helps to provide emergency financial assistance to communities after natural disasters. Since 2020, Beshear reaffirmed that Kentucky has experienced 14 events federally declared as such — many of them catastrophic in nature.
These funds can be used for debris removal, infrastructure repair and essential services.
To date, more than $35 million in SAFE funding has been awarded to storm-stricken areas in just 2025.
More than $90 million in federal aid has been distributed for weather events in February, April and May, but Beshear is hoping more specialized declarations are on the way.
He said he plans to meet in the “next week or two” with legislative leadership to talk about potential SAFE funds for the last round of flooding in April, and tornadoes in May — and during that meeting, he added they will “have to talk about a range,” because each past disaster received public assistance valued at 75% federal help.
Beshear said “now is not the time for politics.”
In other highlights from the “Team Kentucky” update:
+ Nearly $70 million in investments across Kentucky, including new manufacturing jobs in Simpson, Powell, Montgomery, and Warren counties.
+ Kentucky’s state property tax rate has dropped for the fifth straight year, now at 10.6 cents per $100 assessed value.
+ Dr. Steven Stack promoted July’s Our Healthy Kentucky Home theme of addiction awareness and available resources like FindNaloxoneNowKY.org.
+ When it comes to permitting and new driver’s licenses, Beshear said there has been a record-setting demand met with 125 new hires and a 23% increase in credentials issued — putting more drivers, young and old, back on Kentucky’s roads. The state, meanwhile, has seen a 23% drop in crash deaths compared to last year.
+ And a $291 million project will fully renovate the Capitol for the first time in more than 70 years.
FULL UPDATE:
