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Kentucky Politics Distilled: Teachers Run For Statehouse

Henryk Sadura
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123rf Stock Photo

This week in Frankfort, nearly 300 candidates announced they’re running to be state representatives or state senators, many of them educators. A bill that would make it less affordable to have solar panels on your house gets a life vest. And lawmakers again say they’ll have a bill to overhaul the state’s pension system…coming soon. Capitol reporter Ryland Barton has this week’s edition of Kentucky Politics Distilled.

To Democrats in the statehouse, it must have sounded like the cavalry is coming. 

“Education is a number one issue for voters in this state and for our families” 

That’s secretary of state Alison Lundergan Grimes. She helped announce the 40 educators—37 of whom are Democrats—running for seats in the state legislature. 

Democrats are scarce in the statehouse these days—they make up only 36 of the 100 seats in the House and 11 of the 38 seats in the Senate. 

Josie Raymond is running as a Democrat for the 31st House District seat in Louisville. She said teachers are reacting to what they see as attacks on public education made by the legislature and Gov. Matt Bevin. 

“You’re seeing people fired up based on what they perceive as slights or attacks and they’re not wrong. They’ve been insulted and we’re not going to stand for it anymore” 

Teacher candidates spoke against a new charter schools law that passed last year, cuts to public education in Gov. Matt Bevin’s proposed budget and Republican’s proposal to overhaul the state’s pension systems, which affects teachers. 

But Democrats have a long way to go to regain a majority in the state House of Representatives. 

Kelly Smith is a librarian at Eastern Kentucky University and is running in House District 89, which includes parts of Jackson, Madison and Laurel Counties. 

“I decided to do it because there’s generally not a Democrat running for that seat. There’s not a big apparatus in place, they don’t think they’re going to win. So I’m going to try to win.” 

Of the almost 300 candidates that announced they’re running for the statehouse, 100 of them are women. There are currently only 22 women in the House and Senate. 

Shifting a gears, a controversial bill that would scale back incentives for people with rooftop solar panels was in trouble this week, but its life might have been extended by a legislative trick. 

Rep. Jim Gooch is chair of the House Natural Resources and Energy Committee. He’s a Republican and says that power companies have give too much in credits to people who have solar panels that put extra energy back on the electric grid. 

“If you put in a larger solar panel than what you need to meet your needs, any excess that you sell back to the market will be sold back at a wholesale rate” 

Gooch is proposing House Bill 227, which would reduce the solar credit by about two-thirds. 

The bill has had trouble passing out of committee. 

On Wednesday, coal country Republican Rep. Tim Couch voiced skepticism. 

“I need the utilities to explain to me how they’re not breaking even or making money off of this purchase or this excess of net metering.” 

Then on Friday, Gooch got approval to add two Republicans and two Democrats to the committee. 

Tom Fitzgerald, an environmental advocate who opposes the bill, called the move “highly unusual.” 

“The timing of it is troubling. And the potential impact it’s going to have the longevity of that bill.” 

House Speaker Pro Tem David Osborne said he expected the bill would get a vote in the full House if it passed out of committee. 

Osborne also gave an update on the long-promised overhaul to the pension systems. 

After saying a bill would be presented before Christmas, then during the first weeks of the legislative session, Osborne now says a new pension bill could be released next week…that is unless new information about the proposal creates more questions. 

“…which is what’s happened the last couple times we’ve gotten more information back is it’s created more questions and we just try to get additional information, clarify things.” 

That’s it for your distilled rundown of the news out of Frankfort this week. For the Kentucky Public Radio Network, I’m Ryland Barton.

Ryland Barton is the Managing Editor for Collaboratives for Kentucky Public Radio, a group of public radio stations including WKMS, WFPL in Louisville, WEKU in Richmond and WKYU in Bowling Green. A native of Lexington, Ryland most recently served as the Capitol Reporter for Kentucky Public Radio. He has covered politics and state government for NPR member stations KWBU in Waco and KUT in Austin.
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