FORT THOMAS, Ky. -- Campbell County teachers are among the latest group of Northern Kentucky educators to protest state budget cuts directed at school districts.
Teachers participated in a rally at 7:15 a.m. Monday at Johnson Elementary School so the school day would not be disrupted.
Members of Kenton County and Boone County school districts participated in demonstrations Friday.
Republican Gov. Matt Bevin’s two-year budget proposal would keep per-student K-12 funding at the same level in the next two fiscal years, but it would inflict cuts elsewhere. He unveiled a spending plan in mid-January that would impose reductions across most of state government.
His proposal would cut more than $138 million from public school transportation. The state currently covers on average 58 percent of what local districts spend on school buses. Bevin wants to lower that to 25 percent. School districts would have to make up the difference. Bevin says the money can come from the school districts’ savings accounts.
Additionally, Bevin’s proposal would require districts to cut administrative costs by 12 percent.
Kentucky Education Commissioner Stephen Pruitt told reporters that districts are “under extreme financial distress.”
Pruitt told a House budget subcommittee that cutting the state’s education achievement gap in half in the next 13 years is unrealistic without sufficient funding.
