Thursday, August 12, 1999
Suit delays enforcement of state abortion law
Ruling on related regulation awaited
The Associated Press
LOUISVILLE — The state will delay enforcing a Kentucky law that sets licensing requirements for abortion clinics until a court rules on the constitutionality of another abortion law passed last year.
Lawyers for the state Cabinet for Health Services determined they could not enforce the rules because they require clinics to comply with another new law that is being challenged in court, said cabinet spokes man Gil Lawson. That law requires women to obtain state-approved information at least 24 hours before their abortions.
Mr. Lawson said his agency cannot force abortion providers to comply with that law because a federal judge has ordered the state to delay enforcing it until a ruling is made on its constitutionality.
The American Civil Liberties Union and several Louisville doctors sued earlier this year to block that legislation.
The rules include requirements that clinics have certain staffing levels, provide tuberculosis tests for employees and keep certain records.
The General Assembly passed the law requiring the regulations in 1998 and ordered that they be written by October and put into effect by March 1. But because of delays in writing the regulations, the legislature's Health and Welfare Committee did not approve them until March.
Margie Montgomery, executive director of Kentucky Right to Life, said she had never been told that the clinic regulations would not take ef fect until the “informed-consent” law takes effect.
“It sounds perfectly ridiculous,” she said. “I don't see why you can't enforce it. That has nothing to do with the informed consent.”
Meanwhile, a Louisville gynecologist who was the target of a state effort to close his abortion practice in the early 1990s has quit performing abortions.
That leaves Louisville with only one — and the state with only two — abortion clinics. The other clinic is in Lexington; a private physician in Lexington also performs abortions.
Dr. Ronachai Banchongmanie, who operates Women's Health Services in Louisville, quit performing abortions about six weeks ago, according to abortion-rights activists and foes.
Dr. Banchongmanie and his lawyer did not return telephone calls; a receptionist at his office said he no longer performs abortions but continues his gynecology and obstetrics practice at his clinic.
As a result, some women are being directed to out-of-state clinics, including one in Cincinnati, for abortions.
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