Kentucky school tip line law

What does the Kentucky law require?

Every local school district must provide an anonymous reporting tool for reporting unsafe, harmful, dangerous, violent or criminal activities. KOHS must make an anonymous reporting tool available to each local school district, after working with the Center for School Safety, the Department of Education, the Department of Criminal Justice Training and the Kentucky State Police. The tool must be reachable at least by phone call, email and a mobile device app. KOHS must maintain and update the tool and consult those partner agencies before making substantial changes. The district duty names only local school districts; it does not mention private or nonpublic schools.

Can a district use its own tool?

A district can meet its duty by using the state's anonymous reporting tool. Instead, a district may provide an alternative anonymous reporting tool, as long as it meets all the requirements in the statute's first four subsections, which cover how the tool is reached, anonymity, routing and awareness. A district that chooses an alternative tool must also develop and provide a full training and awareness program on that tool.

How are tips routed?

Tips must be sent immediately to the affected school district's administration and to the law enforcement agencies that protect it, including the local sheriff, city police and Kentucky State Police. KOHS says a school safety analyst at its Kentucky Intelligence Fusion Center passed school safety tips quickly to school administrators, school resource officers and law enforcement. In its 2025 annual report, KOHS lists 24-hour operations for its fusion center as a future goal, so the tip line can be monitored more closely.

What is the state's tip line called?

KOHS runs the S.T.O.P. Tipline, an online reporting and prevention tool. According to KOHS, students, parents and community members can use it to anonymously report unsafe school situations to school staff. The S.T.O.P. Tipline phone number is (866) 393-6659. KOHS's state reporting tool site describes the S.T.O.P. Tipline as an email tipline it provides to all Kentucky schools. The site tells users they may report anonymously or choose to be contacted, and to dial 911 in an emergency.

Who must be trained and told about it?

KOHS, working with its partner agencies, must develop and provide a full training and awareness program on the state tool. Law enforcement dispatch centers, school districts, schools and others KOHS identifies must be made aware of the tool.

Are reporters anonymous?

The tool must tell reporters that they may report anonymously. If a reporter chooses to give their name, it is shared with law enforcement and school officials, who must keep it confidential.

What happens with false reports?

The reporting tool statute itself sets no penalty for false reports; general criminal laws cover false threats and false reports, and neither names the tool. Reporting to law enforcement an offense or incident the person knows did not occur is the crime of falsely reporting an incident. That is a Class A misdemeanor; a false fire or emergency report that results in an emergency response is a Class D felony. A court sentencing someone for falsely reporting an incident must order restitution, including the reasonable costs of the emergency response. Terroristic threatening in the second degree is a Class D felony, or a Class C felony when the person also takes substantial steps to carry out the threat, such as gathering weapons or ammunition. Someone who innocently passes along another person's threat to school staff or law enforcement, believing it true, is not guilty of that offense.

Does the state report tip data?

KOHS's 2025 annual report counts 4,630 tips to the statewide School Safety Tipline in the 2024-2025 school year: 2,444 bullying, 886 violence and 1,300 other. KOHS publishes this on its own; the statute does not require it.

How is the tool funded?

The statute provides no funding or appropriation for the reporting tool.

Has the law changed recently?

The law was created by 2019's SB 1, an act relating to school safety, effective March 11, 2019, which required KOHS to make the tool available by July 1, 2019. 2024's SB 2 amended it; it became law without the Governor's signature on April 10, 2024, and the current version took effect July 15, 2024. The official statute page, re-read October 28, 2026, shows no 2025 or 2026 change.