Charter School Funding Proposal Is Inefficient, Costly and Will Harm Public Education
Legislation introduced in the Kentucky House would create a duplicative, wasteful and unaccountable system for authorizing and funding charter schools...
State Funding for Education Has Been Stagnant for Many Years, But the 2022-2024 Budget Presents a Unique Opportunity to Begin Reinvesting
In 1991, following a Kentucky Supreme Court decision finding that Kentucky’s system of funding education was unconstitutional, the Kentucky General Assembly responded by increasing taxes to begin reinvesting in Kentucky’s...
3 Ways New Legislation Would Make Kentucky’s Unconstitutional Voucher Program Even Worse
During the 2021 Kentucky General Assembly — as public school advocates were prevented from being in the Capitol by the COVID pandemic — lawmakers passed legislation to fund private schools...
A Decade Without Raises and Weakened Benefits Have Created a State Workforce Crisis. Addressing it Adequately Should Be a Top Priority in the New Budget
Updated on Feb. 2, 2022 Fundamental to providing services like P-12 education, legal defense and child welfare is the state workforce that delivers them. Despite these workers’ critical roles, Kentucky’s...
A Time To Invest: Preview of the 2022–2024 Budget of the Commonwealth
The General Assembly faces a critically important opportunity with the 2022–2024 Budget of the Commonwealth. The state has a historic budget surplus and unspent federal aid that provide the resources...
In Decade Since Major Criminal Justice Reform, the Kentucky General Assembly Has Passed Six Times as Many Laws Increasing Incarceration as Decreasing It
This year marks the 10th anniversary of the passage of 2011’s House Bill (HB) 463, “The Public Safety and Offender Accountability Act.”[efn_note]2011 Ky. Acts, ch. 2, https://apps.legislature.ky.gov/law/acts/11RS/documents/0002.pdf.[/efn_note] HB 463 was...
New Federal Infrastructure Law Moves Kentucky Forward
The bipartisan Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, which the President has now signed into law, includes much-needed new investments in modernizing Kentucky's physical infrastructure. The law funds a broad array...
School Funding Task Force Recommendations Include Steps Toward Adequacy and Equity
In 2021, the Kentucky General Assembly created a School Funding Task Force to meet in the interim to review funding for K-12 education in Kentucky and other states and identify...
The Golden Key: How State-Local Financial Incentives to Lock Up Kentuckians Are Perpetuating Mass Incarceration
Incarceration is harmful to individuals, families and communities, yet Kentucky incarcerates 40% more people per capita than the United States average, which is more than 5 times larger than other...
How Kentuckians Would Benefit from the Build Back Better Act
Kentuckians’ economic future and family well-being hinge on passage of the Build Back Better Act (BBB) now in front of Congress. The legislation contains landmark policies that will create millions...