Bluegrass Politics

House, Senate appear close on congressional redistricting plan

By Beth Musgrave and Jack Brammer
jbrammer@herald-leader.com

FRANKFORT — House and Senate negotiators appear close to an agreement on new boundaries for Kentucky’s six congressional districts.

“We have a map that shows great promise,” House Speaker Greg Stumbo said late Thursday.

Senate Majority Leader Robert Stivers, R-Manchester, said the Senate has had “little time to analyze anything” from the House, but “hope springs eternal.”

Stumbo, D-Prestonsburg, said the staff of U.S. Rep. Hal Rogers, R-Somerset, has been instrumental in helping the Democratic-controlled House and Republican-led Senate come to a consensus after weeks of negotiations.

Senate leaders were looking at a proposed map after the chamber adjourned Thursday evening. If the Senate agrees to the new map, it’s possible for the legislature to approve the plan before the Feb. 7 filing deadline for congressional candidates.

Senate panel approves bill to let local school districts decide whether to keep students until 18

By Jack Brammer
jbrammer@herald-leader.com

FRANKFORT – The Senate Education Committee unanimously approved a bill Thursday that would let each local school board on the recommendation of the superintendent and approval of the state Department of Education require children to attend school until their 18th birthday.

The sponsor of Senate Bill 109, Sen. Jack Westwood, R-Erlanger, said he favors local control over Gov. Steve Beshear’s support of a House Bill that would raise the school dropout age from 16 to 18 statewide, beginning in 2017.

That measure, House Bill 216, has been approved by a House committee and is awaiting action in the full House.

Budget cuts will delay implementation of new core education standards

By Beth Musgrave
bmusgrave@herald-leader.com

FRANKFORT — The state’s top education leaders told a legislative panel Wednesday that proposed budget cuts to the Department of Education will delay implementation of new standards called for in a 2009 overhaul of Kentucky’s education system.

Terry Holliday, commissioner of the Department of Education, told a House budget subcommittee that cuts proposed under Gov. Steve Besehar’s two-year budget will also mean less money for teacher professional development and less money for technology assistance for local school districts. There also will be no new state money to help some schools that have been deemed low-performing schools.

Beshear’s proposed budget does not include cuts to the main funding formula for Kentucky schools, commonly called SEEK, or Support Educational Excellence in Kentucky. However, other parts of the education budget would be cut, including an 8.4 percent cut to administration and technology and a 4.5 percent cut to instruction, assessment and curriculum programs and to the Kentucky School for the Blind and the Kentucky School for the Deaf.

House panel rejects bill about Lexington child’s playhouse

By Jack Brammer
jbrammer@herald-leader.com

FRANKFORT — A House panel rejected a proposal Wednesday that grew out of a Lexington mother’s fight with a homeowners association over an outdoor playhouse used by her 3-year-old son with cerebral palsy.

Only six members of the House Local Government Committee voted for House Bill 160, which would do away with deed restrictions that limit structures deemed medically necessary for children 12 and younger. Six members did not vote and two voted no. The measure needed nine votes to clear the committee.

Opponents of the bill said it would have needlessly involved the legislature in a “local turf battle.”
House Local Government Chairman Steve Riggs, D-Louisville, said it’s hard to predict whether the bill is dead for this year’s legislative session.

“I think it’s on hold for awhile,” he said. “I don’t know if it’s dead. That depends on whether the local people can get together. If they don’t get together, it’s probably not dead because we don’t have a set of statewide rules in place to deal with this.”

For-profit college regulatory bill proceeds to House

By John Cheves — jcheves@herald-leader.com

FRANKFORT — The private, for-profit college industry would stop regulating itself at the state level under a bill that a Kentucky House committee approved Wednesday.

“This is not everything that we probably all would like to see in the bill, but it is doable and it is a start,” said Rep. Carl Rollins, D-Midway, the bill’s sponsor. A stronger bill last year was passed by the House but died in the Senate in the face of aggressive industry lobbying.

House Bill 308, which proceeds to the full House, would abolish the controversial Kentucky Board for Proprietary Education, which licenses scores of for-profit schools offering two-year associate’s degrees, technical certificates and other diplomas in different career fields.

Industry representatives hold six of the board’s 11 seats and frequently serve as chairman. A state audit last year sharply criticized the board, calling it an inattentive watchdog that fails to protect the interests of students. At the same time, student lawsuits and investigations in Kentucky and elsewhere have raised questions about deceptive marketing and the quality of educations sold by the schools.

Beshear accuses Williams of trying to intimidate pro-casino senators

By John Cheves
jcheves@herald-leader.com

FRANKFORT — Democratic Gov. Steve Beshear on Tuesday accused Senate President David Williams, R-Burkesville, of trying to intimidate Republican senators who support his casino gambling proposal.

“He is using intimidations and threats against fellow senators, including some in his own party,” Beshear said.

Williams later denied Beshear’s claim. He told reporters that he opposes the expansion of gambling in Kentucky, but he is not punishing senators who support it. Nobody is losing their committee chairmanships or other choice assignments because they disagree with him, Williams said.

“The governor has been untruthful about this issue for four years, and he continues to be untruthful,” Williams said.

Specifically, Beshear tied Williams to a story Tuesday in the Lexington Herald-Leader that raised questions about $208,835 in horse industry consulting fees collected by Sen. Damon Thayer, R-Georgetown, during 2010 and part of 2011.

Judge issues restraining order in filing deadline case

By Jack Brammer
jbrammer@herald-leader.com

FRANKFORT — A judge issued an order Tuesday that extended the filing deadline for state legislative candidates by at least a week as he considers a legal challenge of Kentucky’s new legislative district boundaries.

Franklin Circuit Judge Phillip Shepherd, in a four-page order, said the filing deadline for state House and Senate candidates won’t come before 4:30 p.m. on Feb. 7. It was scheduled for 4 p.m. Jan. 31.

Secretary of State Alison Lundergan Grimes said her office will continue to accept nomination papers from candidates for state senator and representative until the new deadline.

Despite the extension, several candidates filed Tuesday for Kentucky’s General Assembly, while two longtime state lawmakers — Sen. Walter Blevins, D-Morehead, and Rep. Lonnie Napier, R-Lancaster — said they have decided not to seek re-election. Their terms will end at the end of this year.

Prosecutors warn of layoffs, furloughs if budgets are cut again

By Beth Musgrave
bmusgrave@herald-leader.com

FRANKFORT — The state’s prosecutors warned lawmakers Tuesday that they will have to layoff or furlough workers under Gov. Steve Beshear’s proposed two-year state budget.

“We’ve got two options — layoffs or furloughs,” said Chris Cohron, the Commonwealth Attorney for Warren County and legislative chair for the state’s commonwealth attorney association.

Beshear has proposed a cut of 2.2 percent to the state’s commonwealth and county attorneys. That’s less than the 8.4 percent cut he has proposed for most state agencies for the first year of the two-year budget. Under Beshear’s proposal, the agencies would generally receive the same amount in the second year of the budget.

Cohron and John Estill, the Mason County attorney, told a House budget review subcommittee on Tuesday that more than 95 percent of their budgets are spent on workers. Any cuts will mean a reduction in hours for current employees through furloughs or layoffs.

Senator backing casinos won’t name his clients in horse industry

By John Cheves
jcheves@herald-leader.com

FRANKFORT — State Sen. Damon Thayer, who is expected to file a casino gambling bill in coming days that could bring big bucks to Kentucky’s horse industry, collected at least $208,835 in consulting fees from the industry during 2010 and part of 2011, according to court records.

Thayer, R-Georgetown, runs Thayer Communications and Consulting out of his house. According to his firm’s Web site, Thayer founded it in 2007 to serve “companies in the equine industry” following two decades of executive jobs in horse racing, including a seven-year stint at Turfway Park, a racetrack in Florence.

From his consulting firm, Thayer earned $132,835 in 2010 and $76,000 during the first eight months of 2011, according to an asset disclosure that he signed Sept. 12 in his divorce records. In an interview Monday, Thayer said those income figures “sound in the ballpark.”

By comparison, Thayer said in court that he makes $35,000 a year as a part-time senator.

However, Thayer declined Monday to identify his clients or explain if they would gain financially from casino gambling. His annual financial disclosure statement at the Legislative Ethics Commission does not require him to name his clients, he said.

Ethics Commission levies fines in state worker misconduct cases

By John Cheves — jcheves@herald-leader.com

FRANKFORT — The Executive Branch Ethics Commission levied fines in four state worker misconduct cases Monday, including Danita Fentress-Laird, who worked at the Kentucky Department of Agriculture last year under then-Commissioner Richie Farmer.

Fentress-Laird signed a settlement agreement, acknowledging that she violated the state ethics law and agreeing to pay a $1,500 fine.

As a political appointee under Farmer, who left office in January, Fentress-Laird tried to burrow into the state merit system by creating a merit job for herself and taking actions to ensure that she would get it. By law, merit jobs are supposed to be filled competitively by the best qualified applicant.

New Agriculture Commissioner James Comer fired Fentress-Laird after taking office this month.