Louisville Metropolitan Area

Starting near the northern central part of Kentucky and sprawling into a portion of Indiana, the Louisville metropolitan area is sometimes called Kentuckiana. Its population of approximately 1.3 million occupies twelve counties: five in Indiana – Clark, Floyd, Harrison, Scott, and Washington – and seven in Kentucky – Bullitt, Henry, Jefferson, Meade, Oldham, Shelby, and Trimble. Louisville and Jefferson County merged into one county in 2003.

Once primarily a hub for river-based commerce and transport, Louisville today boasts a uniquely resilient manufacturing sector along with world-famous distilleries producing bourbon whiskey. Significant employers in the area include Ford, GE Appliances, and distiller Brown-Forman.

With many manufacturing jobs and a major city anchoring the region, the Louisville metro area attracts job-seekers from throughout its 12 counties with many choosing to commute across county lines for work. Louisville businesses benefit from this employee mobility as it creates a lively labor pool that is constantly infused with new talent—but not every applicant is a good fit for your business. Determining who represents an appropriate and safe choice is a responsibility that depends on the strength of your background check procedures.

Background checks and criminal history reports have an important role to play in protecting your business from the potentially costly consequences of an ill-advised hire. To be effective, your policies should account for the unique situations created by metro-area operations. Restricting your search to Jefferson County in Louisville might mean that you miss the opportunity to consider important records held by a court in Harrison County, Indiana. Zoom out with your background check policy and look at the entire Kentuckiana region for a more complete picture.

While retooling your policies so that they work in a metropolitan area, do not forget to review any regulations for fair hiring that apply to your company.

Neither Kentucky nor Indiana uses a “ban the box” law to restrict when and how employers ask applicants about criminal incidents in their pasts. However, the city of Louisville bans the box for government applications and considers whether businesses applying for city contracts use similar hiring practices. Employers enjoy discretion in this area if they remain within the bounds of federal labor laws.

Once you have a clear view of how to retool your vetting procedures while remaining compliant, procuring the right vetting resources should be your next move. backgroundchecks.com has a strong record of success with businesses of all sizes across many industries and can connect your company with the information that you need.

For counties in the Louisville metro in Indiana, including Clark, Floyd, Harrison, Scott, and Washington, our powerful US OneSEARCH provides access to instant criminal history results. For Bullitt, Henry, Jefferson, Meade, Oldham, Shelby, and Trimble counties in Kentucky, businesses enjoy an easy way to tap into a direct search of courthouse records. Focus in one state in its entirety with our state-level background checks or choose the regional US OneSEARCH to include all of Kentucky, Indiana, and up to three other states.

Courthouse searches typically yield information from the state Administrative Office of the Courts. For instant results generated in Indiana, data sources include the Department of Corrections (updated monthly), the state sex offender registry (updated bi-weekly), and county courthouse records. Reports generated from these sources can include the subject’s: 

• Name
• Offense
• County
• Sentence date
• Disposition

Working in the Louisville metro enables employers to locate the talent necessary for growth. To make the right hiring selections now and in the future, take steps to guarantee that you have all the facts in hand.