FRANKFORT, Ky. — A Kentucky senator is hoping to bring a statewide change for non-white children and adults in Kentucky. Senator Whitney Westerfield, R-Fruit Hill, once again filed the CROWN Act, protecting against discrimination on natural hair in the workplace.

What You Need To Know

  • State Senator Whitney Westerfield once again filed the CROWN Act protecting from discrimination based on natural hair in the workplace 

  • Westerfield filed the bill on behalf of his two bi-racial children

  • Previous sessions' CROWN Acts have failed to get out of the Senate 

  • Lexington, Louisville, Frankfort and Covington all have local adoptions of the CROWN Act

It’s a fight Senator Westerfield said is worth fighting; passing a CROWN Act in Kentucky to protect race-based hairstyles and natural hair in the workplace. It’s an issue that’s become more personal for the western Kentucky senator; the father of two bi-racial children.

“They shouldn’t have to conform to somebody else or to some other standard. They should be able to wear the hair God gave them, it’s what I said last year, and I believe it today,” Westerfield said.

Westerfield’s Senate Bill 230 would introduce a statewide CROWN Act, banning discrimination based on natural hair and styles at work and at school.

“It doesn’t do anything to prohibit or stop a business from taking steps to make sure safety standards are met, sanitary standards are met,” Westerfield said.

The other bill Westerfield filed Tuesday, Senate Bill 231 would strike punishment for crime as an exception to slavery. If passed, it would be a constitutional amendment for voters. While case law and the U.S. Constitution protect against slavery, Westerfield said this would be a symbolic gesture.

Only four constitutional amendments can be approved to go before voters at the ballot box.

“Let’s let this be one of those four (constitutional amendments) so that we can stand up and say this is what we believe; the voters of Kentucky believe this is a change worth making in our most important governing document, the constitution of the Commonwealth of Kentucky,” Westerfield said.

Westerfield is the second Senator to file legislation related to fully banning slavery in Kentucky’s constitution this session. Senate Minority Leader Gerald Neal, D-Louisville, has a history of filing similar legislation. He said modernizing Kentucky’s constitution is overdue.

“That being in the Constitution is a historical vestige of our history, which included slavery and it’s time for us to remove that. We don’t want anyone subjected to involuntary servitude,” Neal said.

Neal also supports Westerfield’s renewed push for Kentucky to adopt the CROWN Act. He cosponsored the bill last year and will most likely do the same for this session.

“I’m always gratified to see one of my colleagues you might think not have a direct connection to that type of sentiment, but for him to step out there and declare himself by filing that bill is laudable for him and I stand with him on that,” Neal said.

Last session, Westerfield’s CROWN Act made it to the senate floor but failed to get a third reading. He hopes to win over more members of his party to pass it through this session.

“I would ask those legislators to put yourselves in the shoes of somebody that didn’t have hair like them. I don’t think I would have opposed this bill a decade ago, but before I became a dad of my little girl and son, I don’t know that I would’ve been thinking about it,” Westerfield said.

The outgoing senator hopes to make his last mark; changing Kentucky’s civil rights laws for children like his everywhere in the state.

Lexington, Louisville, Frankfort and Covington have all passed their own versions of the CROWN Act at a local level.

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