Kentucky’s latest Tobacco Settlement Master Agreement payment is worth more than $100 million. Attorney General Russell Coleman made the announcement Friday, saying the state has received $2.8 billion dollars from cigarette manufacturers since the 1998 settlement.
“This money benefits all Kentuckians, but primarily our rural communities. This money goes to a large fund that the Department of Agriculture, Commissioner, distributes through the grant process.”
Coleman said he grew up working on tobacco farms and is pleased half of the settlement funds go to agriculture diversification grants designed to help farmers and communities hurt by the changing tobacco landscape.
“This money is helping to mitigate the loss of some of this economic activity, and so $100 million is nothing to slough off. This money is coming back to Kentucky to help our rural communities.”
The other half of the settlement money is split between the state’s Early Childhood Development Fund and the Kentucky Healthcare Improvement Fund.
