Date: 04-06-2017
Kentucky Legislators Change Local Option Election Law
FRANKFORT — Final approval was given by the Kentucky Senate recently to help cut election expenses for the state’s 120 counties.
House Bill 319, sponsored by Rep. Kenny Imes, R-Murray, now allows local option elections, like those that deal with a wet/dry vote, to be held simultaneously with primary and general elections.
Mason County Clerk Stephanie Schumacher said the state’s county clerks were in support of the bill, because holding a special election can be costly. She said the expense to hold primary and general elections are a line item in all clerks’ budgets when it is an election year. However, when there aren’t regular scheduled elections, footing the cost of a local option election is a financial strain for some counties.
“We’ve had these (local options) on a small scale here, but other counties might have several a year…it might be for a golf course or a restaurant. For a lot of counties, it has been a problem,” Schumacher said.
She went further, adding it can also be a logistical issue if the local option election is held too closely to a scheduled primary or general election. One such issue is the quarantine of election machines following an election. If a local option election occurs too soon prior to or after a scheduled election, the county might have to rent additional machines for the next election.
Costs associated with any election involve paying poll workers, paying the polling place rental fee, advertising costs and payment to the voting machine vendor which includes the printing of ballots.
“Elected officials have a duty to be responsible with every tax dollar spent,” said Imes. “This measure will allow county officials to be fiscally conservative in the way tax dollars are spent on elections by no longer having special elections on county-specific issues.”
The measure also requires the individual or group filing the petition for a local option election must cover all costs of the special election if they want the measure to be considered separately from regularly scheduled elections.
House Bill 319 passed the House and Senate in a bipartisan manner and now heads to the governor to be signed into law.
By Marla Toncray
The Ledger Independent
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UPDATE: 4-6-17 — (Lawrence County Clerk Chris Jobe the new law does not pertain to the nickel tax election.
“This is for local option elections pertaining to the sale of alcohol, mostly,” Jobe said this morning. “The recallable nickel tax is not connected to this issue. The BOE will have to pay for this election but they have the option as to whether to wait for a regular election (which will be in 2018).”
Jobe has said it will cost the BOE $30,000 to have a special election for the petition election since there are no public elections in this “off year” for elections in Ky.
