LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WDRB) -- Jefferson County will have 12 polling locations for a special election in February.

This comes after the county's initial plan was rejected by the Kentucky Board of Elections last week, saying Louisville officials had not provided enough polling places.

The Jefferson County Board of Elections offered four polling places for the election, according to Kentucky Secretary of State Michael Adams, who serves as the state elections board's chairman. 

He said in a statement that four locations for a Senate district of nearly 100,000 voters is "insufficient." 

State elections officials worked with Jefferson County Clerk Bobbie Holsclaw to find additional voting places, including buildings owned by Jefferson County Public Schools.

"I am grateful to Superintendent Marty Pollio and Clerk Bobbie Holsclaw for working with us to ensure fair access for our voters," Adams said in a statement Monday. "When we focus on solving problems instead of politics, miracles happen. I'll keep fighting to open our polls."

The new polling locations are:

  • Atherton High School
  • Audubon Elementary
  • Hawthorne Elementary
  • Highland Middle School
  • Seneca High School
  • Smyrna Elementary 
  • Southern High School
  • Watterson Elementary

The plan will also include the four originally planned polling locations: The Cyril Allgeier Community Center, the Central Government Center, the St. Matthews Community Center and the Jefferson County Clerk's Office Election Center. Adams' office said the four locations will also serve as early voting locations from Feb. 16-18.

The plan is not yet final, however. Adams said the revised plan would be voted on during the State Board of Elections' special meeting this week.

JCPS said last week that it would open schools as polling locations for the special election. Of the four polling locations in the previous plan, two of them were not in the school district.

That announcement by JCPS came after Holsclaw claimed the district previously declined to use schools for the May primary, in part, because poll workers would need access to the buildings for three days.

But a spokesperson for the school district said that Gov. Andy Beshear, not Holsclaw, reached out about the special election and the district agreed because it was already out of class both the day of the election and the day before.

"JCPS has always been willing to provide schools as polling locations as long as the voting takes place when students are not in school, there is no need for extra security and our gymnasiums, cafeterias and auditoriums are not being used by our students," said Carolyn Callahan, chief communications officer for JCPS. 

The Feb. 21 election, called by Beshear in December, will decide who replaces former state Sen. Morgan McGarvey, a Democrat who resigned after winning a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. 

Democrat Cassie Chambers Armstrong, who recently resigned from the Louisville Metro Council, and Republican Misty Glin, who was defeated last year in a race for the Jefferson County Board of Education, are vying to replace McGarvey. The 38-member state Senate currently has six Democrats.

The 19th Senate district takes in a swath of central Jefferson County from Interstate 64 south to the Gene Snyder Freeway, including neighborhoods and small cities along Bardstown Road and areas near Seneca and Cherokee parks. 

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