FRANKFORT, Ky. (AP) - Democrat Andy Beshear released a plan Tuesday to improve job opportunities for military veterans in his first major policy rollout as his party’s nominee for Kentucky governor.
Beshear said his plan will increase access to job-skills training for veterans. The state’s attorney general is challenging Republican Gov. Matt Bevin in the November election.
Beshear’s plan includes expanding opportunities for veterans to convert their military experience into credit hours at colleges or vocational/technical schools.
The Democratic challenger said that if elected he’d launch a program to help veterans land jobs in Kentucky’s agritech sector. He also wants to expand a program, in partnership with trade unions, to help find jobs for veterans as craftsmen and engineers in the construction industry.
Beshear said his goal is to implement policies that “make a meaningful, real-world difference” in the lives of veterans and their families.
Beshear said it’s the first in a series of policy priorities aimed at veterans. His campaign said that about 300,000 veterans live in Kentucky.
Bevin’s campaign manager, Davis Paine, responded that the governor has secured grant funding to improve workforce training initiatives for veterans and has signed numerous military-friendly bills into law.
Bevin, a former Army officer, wants to make Kentucky the “most military-friendly state in the country,” Paine said.
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