As we prepare to enter a new year, 2010 could bring additional changes to Kentucky’s political makeup if the national trend of electing gay candidates extends to Kentucky.

Earlier this year, Democrats won additional seats in the Kentucky Senate, and the Commonwealth has two openly gay men running for the Kentucky House of Representatives.

United We Stand – Kentucky’s LGBTI News™ has interviewed one openly gay candidate, Mr. Matthew Vanderpool (D-Lexington) who is challenging conservative Stan Lee (R-Lexington).

Kentucky’s only other openly gay lawmaker, Ernesto Scorsone resigned from the Kentucky Senate after being appointed by Governor Steve Beshear to the office of Circuit Judge for the 22nd Judicial District, Division 7 in 2008. However, Scorsone wasn’t openly gay when he was initially elected.

There are currently at least 445 openly gay and lesbian people holding elected office in the United States, up from 257 eight years ago, according to the Gay and Lesbian Victory Fund, a political group that supports gay candidates.

Election 2010 will also include Jim Gray, Lexington’s openly gay Vice Mayor. Gray is running for the city’s top office as he challenges incumbent Jim Newberry. If Gray is elected, it would be the first time a large Kentucky city has elected an openly gay chief executive.

Some political scientists say the rise in openly gay candidates’ winning public office is a better barometer of societal attitudes than are the high-profile fights over same-sex marriage.

“Gay marriage ballot measures are not the best measure,” said Patrick J. Egan, a political scientist at New York University who studies issues surrounding gay politicians. “They happen to be about the one issue the public is most uncomfortable with. In a sense, they don’t give us a real good picture of the opinion trend over the last 30 years.”

For instance, the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago has been polling people since 1973 about whether homosexual behavior is morally wrong. In 1973, 73 percent of the people polled described it as always wrong and only 11 percent as “not wrong.” By 2006, those saying homosexuality was “always wrong” had dropped to 56 percent, and 32 percent said it was not wrong.

One reason for the shift in attitudes, some political scientists contend, is a rising number of gays acknowledging their sexual preference openly in various walks of life, from workers on factory floors to Hollywood stars.

“More and more people have been coming out,” said Sean Theriault, a political scientist at the University of Texas who tracks gay politics. “Ten years ago, you could talk to a lot of people who didn’t know a single gay person, and now, especially in the cities, you would be hard pressed to find someone who doesn’t know anyone who is gay.”

Yet, most of the openly gay politicians who have won races recently have done so by avoiding being labeled as single-issue candidates, several gay politicians said.

One key to victory for gay politicians has been building reputations in their communities as candidates well qualified for the job. Voters who may be uncomfortable with homosexuality in the abstract are often willing to vote for a gay individual they feel they know, political strategists claim.

* Pictured is the Seal of the Commonwealth, and The Great Hall in the Kentucky Capitol.