Jefferson County voters will elect five members to the Jefferson County Board of Education on Tuesday, November 3, 2026. The races are nonpartisan. You vote only in the board district that covers your home address, and you choose one name on that district's ballot.
That date is printed on the Jefferson County Clerk's 2026 Candidate Filings packet, marked Revised 10/2/2026. The Kentucky Secretary of State's election ballots page points Jefferson County voters to the clerk's Where Do I Vote / Sample Ballot tool. JCPS's 2026 to 2027 parent and family school calendar lists Election Day on November 3 and marks it as a day with no school for students.
What changed under the new five district map?
Kentucky Acts Chapter 154 from the 2026 Regular Session, the enacted version of Senate Bill 4, cut the elected Jefferson County Board of Education from seven members to five. The five members are elected from five divisions. A candidate has to live in the division they seek to represent.
Section 17 of that Act ends the terms of the seven member board on December 31, 2026. All five new seats are filled at the next regular election after the Act took effect. That election is the November 3, 2026 general election. Within ten days of January 1, 2027, the superintendent must call a meeting so the newly elected board can organize.
The first terms are staggered. Members first elected for Division Four and Division Five serve a two year term, then later terms are four years. Members first elected for Divisions One, Two, and Three serve a standard four year term. Section 18 of the same Act set the temporary assignment rules for sitting members until the five newly elected members take office after that January organizing meeting.
JCPS posts its "School Map by Board Member" set for 2026 to 2027, with separate elementary, middle, and high school PDFs. The public data page lists the set as created July 1, 2026. The high school map PDF Insider opened shows District 1 through District 5 labels over JCPS high schools and carries a June 9, 2026 map date line. Those maps show which schools sit in which board district. They are not a street address lookup by themselves.
Who is on the clerk's filing list by district?
The names below come from the Jefferson County Clerk's 2026 Candidate Filings PDF, Revised 10/2/2026. The clerk lists candidates in the order they will appear on the general election ballot. Every school board contest on that packet is labeled Nonpartisan. Insider checked that packet on October 11, 2026, and the school board names match the September 21 revision. Names that appeared only in June news stories and are not on this revised clerk list are not treated here as certified.
District 1: Jody Hurt; Gail Logan Strange.
District 2: Tim Shaughnessy; Alante' J. Gaines; Robert Kahne; Lillian Brents; Phil Haming.
District 3: The candidates whose votes will be counted are Veda Pendleton, Taylor Everett, and Neil Seftor. The clerk filing PDF revised October 2, 2026 also prints Gay P. Adelmann, but a judge ordered her removed and votes for her will not be counted. Louisville Public Media reported on September 21, 2026 that Jefferson Circuit Judge Melissa Logan Bellows ordered the clerk to remove Adelmann. WLKY quoted the ruling: "The Court finds and declares that Gay Adelmann does not reside in Jefferson County Public Schools Board District 3 as required by KRS 160.210(5)(a)." The Revised 10/2/2026 clerk PDF still prints her name even though that September 21 order came first. The clerk must post notices at affected polling places, and ballots were not reprinted.
District 4: Kimberly Ann Vinegar; Michelle E. Patrick; Trevin Bass; Deja B. Jackson.
District 5: William E. Snawder; Kyle N. Killebrew; Carrie Donovan. TraShaun Spencer also filed on June 2, 2026. The same clerk packet marks that filing "Withdrawn: 9/21/2026." Treat Spencer as withdrawn on the clerk's certified list. Louisville Public Media reported on September 21, 2026 that Spencer's name may still appear and those votes would be disregarded. If a printed ballot still shows Adelmann or Spencer, the sample ballot for your address is the check to trust for what you will see at the polls.
The revised clerk list still prints eighteen names that are not marked withdrawn, plus one marked withdrawal in District 5. One of those eighteen, Gay P. Adelmann, is not an ordinary active choice. Anchorage Independent has a separate school board contest on the same filing packet. Anchorage is not the JCPS five district election.
Insider did not pull campaign platforms, donor lists, or questionnaire answers into this piece. Those change and they are not what the clerk certifies. If you want a candidate's own words, ask the campaign, attend a forum, or read materials the candidate publishes under their own name.
What does the school board control?
Kentucky law sets the job in broad strokes. KRS 160.290, effective July 15, 2010 for the text Insider opened, says each board of education "shall have general control and management of the public schools in its district." The same statute gives each board control of school funds and public school property, the power to appoint the superintendent, and the job of fixing employee pay. Boards also adopt rules for meetings, property, employees, and pupil conduct, and those rules have to stay consistent with state school law.
KRS 160.350 is the superintendent appointment statute. After a screening committee process, the board appoints the superintendent for a term of no more than four years and sets the salary. Removal for cause takes a four fifths board vote and approval by the commissioner of education, with the statute's notice and investigation steps.
Staff run schools day to day, but board votes change the policies they carry out on buses, student assignment, discipline handbooks, budgets, facilities, and magnet or choice frameworks.
The board does not set Kentucky's statewide testing rules, and it does not rewrite Acts Chapter 154. Frankfort already redrew this board's size and map.
What issues are worth comparing before you vote?
Stay on decisions a board member can actually touch.
Ask how they would weigh classroom spending against central office and contractor costs when the budget is tight. Ask what they would change, or keep, about student assignment, magnet seats, and transfers. Ask what "safe and orderly schools" means to them in handbook language, not slogans, and how that sits next to due process for students. Ask what they would measure on bus reliability and route length. Ask how they would publish board goals and whether they support posting votes, contracts, and major packets in a way a parent can find without filing an open records request. Ask whether they would keep, replace, or rewrite the superintendent's evaluation criteria, because that hire is the board's clearest lever.
Then compare the answers you get to the minutes and packets the current board already posts. A candidate who will not say how they would vote on a concrete recent type of item is leaving you without a test you can use.
How do you confirm your district and your ballot?
Start with Where Do I Vote / Sample Ballot. That is the clerk tool the Secretary of State links for Jefferson County. Read the Jefferson County School Board line. It should name one district and list the candidates for that district only.
Use the JCPS "School Map by Board Member" PDFs for 2026 to 2027 if you want a school based view of the five districts. Pair that with the sample ballot. If the map view and the ballot ever seem to disagree for your address, trust the clerk ballot for Election Day and call the Election Center to sort it out.
The Jefferson County Clerk's voter information hub is its Voter Info page, along with LouisvilleVotes.org. The clerk's main phone on that hub is 502 574 5700. The elections Contact page lists 502 574 6100. The Kentucky Secretary of State Voter Information Center is the statewide registration check.