Louisville Metro cannot enact local firearm ordinances — Kentucky Revised Statutes Section 65.870 expressly bars any city, county, or urban-county government from occupying the field of firearm transfer, ownership, possession, carrying, or transportation. Carry, purchase, and possession rules are uniform statewide.
K.R.S. Sec. 65.870 declares that 'no city, county or urban-county government may occupy any part of the field of regulation of the transfer, ownership, possession, carrying or transportation of firearms, ammunition, or components of firearms or combinations thereof.' Louisville Metro Government — a consolidated city-county under K.R.S. Ch. 67C — is fully covered by the preemption. The statute permits a person adversely affected by a non-conforming local ordinance to file suit for declaratory and injunctive relief and reasonable attorney fees. Louisville Metro retains a narrow set of remaining powers: regulating firearm possession by its own employees on duty, restricting firearm carry on local-government-owned property under K.R.S. Sec. 237.115 (where permitted in narrow circumstances and subject to state-law limits), and applying generally applicable zoning and business ordinances to firearm dealers. Statewide, Kentucky has been a permitless (constitutional) concealed-carry state since 2019 (SB 150) — any adult 21+ who could lawfully obtain a concealed-carry license may carry openly or concealed without a permit.
Any Louisville Metro ordinance conflicting with K.R.S. Sec. 65.870 is void. The statute creates a private right of action with declaratory and injunctive relief and reasonable attorney fees against the local government.
See how Louisville's local firearms preemption rules stack up against other locations.
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