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In 1998, the Kentucky State Supreme Court’s new chief justice, Joseph E. Lambert, embarked on an ambitious program to build or improve courthouses in all 120 counties in the state. But a decade and $880 million later, has the courtroom boom been worth the cost?

A new Dawn?

A Kentucky mother's struggle with drug court

At 21, Dawn Nicole Smith has three kids she adores, a marriage that's deteriorating and a gut-wrenching addiction to painkillers. In March 2004, she entered Fayette County Drug Court for forging prescriptions. Since then, with her and the court's permission, reporter Mary Meehan and photographer David Stephenson have followed her struggle to stay clean.

This series of stories is looking at how Kentucky's incentive programs and what they have done to attract lasting jobs to the state.

Project dateline

An occasional series of backroad adventures were we visit Kentucky towns with fascinating names.

The McConnell Machine

About this report

Herald-Leader staff writer John Cheves, 34, reported and wrote The McConnell Machine. Cheves joined the newspaper in 1997 and has reported on Kentucky courts, politics and government. He is a graduate of the University of Missouri School of Journalism. Next month, he begins a yearlong congressional fellowship with the American Political Science Association in Washington.

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The Tragedy of Flight 5191

The crash of Comair Flight 5191 near Lexington on Aug. 27, 2006, killed 49 of the 50 people aboard – many of them from Central Kentucky. As the region mourned and the lone survivor fought for his life, investigators uncovered the alarming cause of the disaster: The pilots took off from the wrong runway.

Degrees of harm

A three part series about doctors, who received their medical degrees from online schools with no accreditation, and the consequences faced by their patients.
Kentucky Top Jobs