WQXE News

Voter registration in Kentucky saw another surge ahead of the deadline for the primary election. 

Kentucky Secretary of State Michael Adams says more than 8,300 new voters got registered between April 1 and the pre-primary registration deadline on April 22. 

In turn, about 4,600 voter registrations were removed. About 3,300 removals were for deceased voters, 543 for felony convicts, and 562 for voters who moved out of state.

Adams says Republican registration in the state rose by a little less than 2,700 voters, and independent or other registrations went up by more than 1,700. Democratic registrations decreased by about 700 voters.

Voters that qualify for in-person excused absentee voting may do so Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday at the Hardin County Clerk’s Office. Hardin County Clerk Brian D. Smith says the same qualifications for a mail-in absentee ballot apply to in-person absentee, but voters can cast a ballot as they would on Election Day.

“Some of those qualifications are if you’ll be out of town or scheduled to work all dates and times of in-person voting,” Smith said. “The law uses the phrase ‘age, illness, and disability.’ Sometimes those words ring a little harsh on our ears. There is no definitive age, illness, or disability. We don’t ask. You just attest to it.”

Early voting for all will run at the clerk’s office and at the Colvin Community Center this Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. The primary election will be held on May 21. Find more election information at govote.ky.gov.

Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear is highlighting new recognition of the commonwealth’s economic success.

The governor’s office says Site Selection magazine ranked Kentucky in second place for its South Central Region rankings and in eighth place nationally in its 2024 Prosperity Cup rankings. The Prosperity Cup “recognizes the competitiveness of state-level economic development agencies and their success in landing capital investment projects according to data from 2023.” Expanded facilities, new jobs created, and sales tax climate are among the criteria for the rankings.

The governor touted some of the state’s accomplishments during the ribbon cutting for the ECTC BlueOval SK Training Center Wednesday.

“We’ve now had over $30.6 billion of new private sector investment in us in just 4.5 years, a record by far, over a thousand new location and expansion projects, 52,700 new jobs,” Beshear said. “We’ve broken every export record, every tourism record. It is an exciting time to be a Kentuckian right now.”

Beshear has cited BlueOval SK as being the catalyst for making the electric vehicle industry a central part of new development in the state.

“We are leading this country in the EV sector with $11.7 billion announced in just 3.5 years, and 10,250 full-time jobs,” Beshear said.

More information on Kentucky economic development efforts can be found at ced.ky.gov.

Government, business, and community leaders joined officials from Elizabethtown Community and Technical College and BlueOval SK as the ribbon was cut on the college’s new training center located just outside the battery park in Glendale.

ECTC President and CEO Dr. Juston Pate said cutting the ribbon on the facility is a testament to the investment, vision, and commitment of the many community partners that have helped bring the project to fruition.

“It is kind of hard to think that a year ago we were just breaking ground on this,” Pate said. “We were here not even really a full year yet. It was a nice, beautiful, warm day, and we were thinking about what could be, and here just a short year later we’re celebrating what is.”

The ECTC BlueOval SK training center is a 42,000 square foot facility that will host training with a primary curriculum focused on battery knowledge, roles, and skills.

“The ECTC BlueOval Training Center is going to serve trainees who are looking to enter an innovative, high-wage, high-demand career, and at ECTC we could not be more proud to serve such a critical role in preparing those employees for those careers, and we could not be more proud to support the historic investment that BOSK has made in not just Hardin County but the Commonwealth of Kentucky,” Pate said.

Kentucky Governor Andy Beshear said the investment of BlueOval SK and the partnerships that help support ECTC will help change lives.

“This is advanced manufacturing with cutting-edge technology, so even with a workforce second to none we knew we would have to rise to the challenge to make sure we could fill all of these good jobs,” Beshear said. “We are facing this head-on with three great Team Kentucky partners: Elizabethtown Community and Technical College, BlueOval SK, and Ford.”

The governor credited BlueOval SK with sparking development in the commonwealth that has revolutionized Kentucky’s image.

“We are the first call that world class businesses are making right now,” Beshear said. “We are the first destination they want to come to. Never a flyover state ever again. Never a place anybody looks down their nose at ever again. We are truly together building a new Kentucky home.”

Beshear recognized the center’s ahead-of schedule completion in part by honoring Trace Creek Construction Vice President David Milam and Superintendent Scott Dalton as Kentucky Colonels. The training center will start onboarding classes in June.