Kentucky’s dispute with a Baptist adoption agency that turns away LGBTQ foster parents could be affected by the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in favor of a Catholic organization that also rejects same-sex couples.

On Thursday, the high court sided with Catholic Social Services, a private agency that sued the City of Philadelphia for refusing to renew an adoption and foster care contract due to local anti-discrimination laws.

Kentucky has been locked in a similar battle with Sunrise Children’s Services, a Baptist organization that has so far refused to renew its contract because of a clause that bans discrimination based on sexual orientation

The fight has become a top priority for elected Republicans in Kentucky, who accuse Democratic Gov. Andy Beshear of violating the organization’s religious freedoms.

A former teacher at a Louisville Catholic school says the archdiocese fired her because she had sex outside of marriage. 

Former St. Andrew Academy middle school teacher Sarah Syring is suing the Archdiocese of Louisville. According to the complaint, after Syring told her administrators she was pregnant last fall, they gave her a choice: resign or marry the child’s father. She declined to do either, and the archdiocese fired her, saying she had broken provisions in the employee handbook. 

“I was shocked,” Syring said. “I just had a nice rapport with so many of those kids, and—man—I cried. I cried a lot.”

Syring is alleging gender discrimination. She says she, a woman, was fired for having extramarital sex. Meanwhile, she says, the archdiocese was aware of an male employee who had extramarital sex, but did not terminate him.

Another Kentuckian has been arrested for allegedly participating in the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol.

Law enforcement arrested Kurt Peterson, a resident of Hodgenville near Elizabethtown, on Wednesday in connection to the riot, according to the FBI’s Louisville field office. Federal officials have charged Peterson with obstructing an official proceeding and aiding and abetting, destruction of government property and entering and remaining in a restricted building or grounds. All together, those charges carry a maximum sentence of up to 31 years in prison or fines totaling more than $250,000.

City leaders in Bowling Green have passed a $122 million budget that increases spending without tax hikes.

The city commission gave unanimous, final approval to the spending plan during a meeting Tuesday night. The budget is for the 2021-22 fiscal year beginning July 1. 

Coming off spending cuts in the current year’s budget due to uncertainties surrounding COVID-19, the next one boosts funding thanks to increased revenue projections. 

The spending plan also increases wages for the city’s lowest paid employees to $15 an hour.  Bowling Green Mayor Todd Alcott said the minimum wage increase was given “out of necessity” as the nation faces a pandemic-related worker shortage.

“We’re in the same competition to get people to work," Alcott told WKU Public Radio. "We’ve got to entice people to come work for us just like everyone else.”

Kentucky lawmakers will get data they need to draw new legislative and congressional maps later this summer after 2020 U.S. Census results were delayed by the coronavirus pandemic.

In a normal year, legislators would have gotten census data before this year’s legislative session and could have already drawn new district boundaries.

But the delayed release means lawmakers will be scrambling to redistrict the state ahead of next year’s elections for all Kentucky’s congressional seats and most legislative seats.

Legislators discussed the timing issue during a meeting of the Interim Committee on State Government Tuesday.