Long time Whitley County public servant Charlie Siler dies at the age of 94

During his long career of public service, the accomplishment that former 82^nd Representative Charles “Charlie” Lewis Siler was most proud of wasn’t a building or a roadway.

“The single most thing I am proud of is the gigantic jump in educational standing that we were able to bring about,” Siler during a 2011 interview with the News Journal.

Siler noted that his vote for the Kentucky Education Reform Act (KERA) was costly for him and several other legislators, who were defeated in the 1980s largely because of the vote and subsequent tax increase to support it.

“The need was a new system of accountability and application, and adequate funding to make it work. Without one, the other means nothing,” he said.

Before KERA passed, Kentucky was ranked 49th out of 50 states in education. In 2011, it was near the mid-point of states, Siler noted.

Siler, who was also a retired U.S. Army Lt. Colonel, died on April 23, 2024, at the age of 94 at Baptist Health Corbin.

“It is with great sadness that I offer my deepest sympathy to the family of former State Representative Charlie Siler. Charlie was a friend, a beloved member of the House, and a well-respected leader who never forgot where he came from and never walked away from a difficult vote,” Kentucky House Speaker David Osborne said in a release Thursday.

“He served our nation with great distinction, with a military career that included every major military event of the last half of the 20th century. While he served throughout the world and was heavily decorated, Charlie was as humble about his service as he was proud of his Kentucky roots.”

Siler had a proud military career in the U.S. Army that traced the narrative arc of the last half of the 20th Century.

It began with the end of World War II and the beginning of the Cold War. He served in occupied Japan then in the Korean War. He was with the troops protecting Dr. Martin Luther King’s Civil Rights march on Montgomery in the 1960’s. His military decorations include two awards of the Legion of Merit, a Meritorious Service Medal, a Bronze Star for Valor, an Army Commendation Medal, a Combat Infantry Badge, Master Paratrooper Wings, and as a member of the Infantry OCS Hall of Fame.

Siler was first elected to the state legislature in 1984, and served three terms from 1985 – 1990 as 82^nd Representative.

Siler was defeated in 1990 by Jo Elizabeth Bryant.

He ran in 1994, and was elected again as 82nd Representative. Siler served from 1995 until the end of 2010.

He rose to the rank of vice-chairperson of the powerful appropriations and revenue committee until his defeat in 2010.

In the 2011 interview, Siler said that one of his top priorities was bringing jobs to the region.

He said this isn’t as simple as just asking a company to locate here, but rather laying the infrastructure to support not only businesses, but also so there will be houses for people to move into with things like running water.

“My pattern was essentially to prioritize those things, which built the infrastructure necessary for there to be a modern economy,” Siler said.

Siler said he thinks that he has largely succeeded in his goal to have water available to everyone, who wants it.

“We have every major route covered with waterlines. We have people that don’t have it because they didn’t ask for it,” he said.

Siler said were are several other projects that he was proud of his role in helping the district or region get, including the Corbin Technology Center, the Williamsburg Tourism and Convention Center, upgrades to the Corbin water system for fire suppression purposes, and improvements to Ky. 92 among others.

Siler’s choice for his favorite governor to work with might surprise some.

He was glad when Republican Gov. Ernie Fletcher was elected, and noted Fletcher was extremely good to the area, but “his own worst enemy.”

“The governor I could do the most with was Paul Patton,” Siler noted during the 2011 interview.

While Patton was Pike County Judge-Executive, Siler served with him on the Coal County Coalition, and developed a lasting friendship with him.

“He’d ask me a time or two to do something, I would tell him that I couldn’t go that way and it was contrary to my principles,” Siler said.

“He would back off right away, but he included me. He often called me at home on weekends to talk about things. At one point we were considering the reform of higher education.”

During one conversation, Patton asked Siler about the University of Kentucky being over the community colleges.

Siler told him that he thought a flagship university had a higher calling than to shepherd a dozen community college and produce a basketball team.

“They had poor graduation rates, and a degree in four years was a rare thing,” Siler said.

Patton told him that he was putting together a small group to brainstorm about higher education reform, and asked Siler to serve on it.

Out of that group the idea came about to form what is now the Kentucky Community College Technical System, which oversees about 57 campuses.

Siler said his relationship with Patton came in handy since he was the first two-term governor in the state.

“For eight years, I knew I had a friend in high office. I went directly to him on some of the things I needed to get done,” Siler said.

In 2012, the Kentucky House of Representatives and the Kentucky Senate both recognized Siler as the recipient of the 2011 Vic Hellard Jr. Award for exemplary public service on Feb. 1, and adjourned that day in his honor.

The Vic Hellard, Jr. Award was created in 1997 to recognize outstanding public service in the spirit Hellard brought to it: good humor, compassion, vision, a reverence for history but a questing thirst for our great shared future, an unwavering belief in the workings of democracy and in the innate American goodness of the people of Kentucky that Hellard expressed through his core conviction that public service is a citizen’s highest civic calling, according to a resolution based in both chambers in Siler’s honor.

Each year the award goes to someone, who embodies the values that Hellard brought to his long career, including a public servant of vision, who appreciates history while finding innovative approaches to hard problems, someone who champions the equality and dignity of all, nurtures the processes of a democratic society, and promotes public dialogue while educating and fostering civic engagement, and who approaches that work with commitment, caring, generosity, and humor, according to the resolutions.

“Charlie Siler embodies all of these criteria and attributes perfectly,” the resolutions noted.

“Charlie served two notable stints in the Kentucky General Assembly before saying farewell in 2010 as one of Frankfort’s most beloved and respected lawmakers. Charlie was a quietly passionate voice for the people of his beloved Laurel and Whitley counties, and a leader of vision and good humor whose tireless work made life and the future better for all Kentuckians, whether they knew his name or not.”

Visitation will be at 1 p.m. until the funeral house on Saturday, April 27, at Calvary Missionary Baptist Church with the Rev. James Hodge officiating. He will be laid to rest in the Moses Addition of Pleasant View Cemetery.

Military honors will be conducted by American Legion Post 88 of Corbin.

For complete obituary information, see https://www.thenewsjournal.net/charles-lewis-siler/.