LOUISVILLE, Ky. — Across Kentucky, voters made their position on Amendment 2 clear on Election Night, overwhelmingly voting "No" on the ballot measure that sought to allow state funding of non-public schools.
Election results Wednesday morning show nearly 1.3 million Kentuckians voted "No," accounting for roughly 65% of the vote.
“I don’t think we expected the overwhelming avalanche of support that was illustrated last night,” said Maddie Sheppard, president of the Jefferson County Teachers Association.
Sheppard is a member of Protect Our Schools Kentucky, a statewide coalition that opposed Amendment 2. None of the state’s 120 counties had more "Yes" than "No" votes on the amendment.
“That’s a stat that we are really proud of, and this is something that we’ve talked about a lot throughout the campaign, is that public schools have shown up for communities again and again," Sheppard said. "And every single Kentucky community across the bluegrass showed up for public schools this election season."
State lawmakers passed the ballot measure earlier this year, mainly along party lines. Some rural Republicans joined in voting against it.
Kentucky Senate President Robert Stivers, R-Manchester, addressed the results Wednesday morning.
“It was many of our concerns that we wanted to focus, not as people were saying on rich people or allowing tax credits," Stivers said. "It was to focus on the poorest and the most needy, like the west end, to create a different type of educational opportunity to give them a better economic trajectory."
Stivers indicated lawmakers will retool their approach in the future.
“Public has spoken," he said. "They’ve said they don’t like that pathway, so we are going to look at other pathways to have accountability and performance in poorly performing school districts, and I think everybody is for that."
“It’s our hope that moving forward, the politicians in Frankfort have heard Kentucky on this and read this as not only can Kentucky communities believe in public schools but want further investment in public schools,” Sheppard said.
Teacher raises, pre-K funding and educator retention are all subjects Sheppard hopes the state legislature addresses, she added.
“Though the results may not have been in our favor, this campaign has been a powerful force for standing up to the Kentucky education bureaucracy,” Kentucky Students First, an organization advocating for Amendment 2, told Spectrum News in a statement. “Kentucky students deserve better, and our resolve to serve students over systems remains unchanged.”
A spokesperson for Jefferson County Public Schools, the state’s largest public school district, said in a statement, “Kentucky voters have sent a clear message that their tax dollars should only be spent on public education. Families understand that the money that would have gone to private school tuition for students selected by those schools will be much better spent on supporting families, teachers, bus drivers and, most importantly, ALL students in JCPS and other public schools in Kentucky regardless of their family income, disability or ethnic background.”