By Charles Wolfe
The Associated Press

FRANKFORT - Gov. Ernie Fletcher said Friday he intends to shake up the Kentucky Athletic Commission after Mike Tyson's boxing license was quietly renewed.

Tyson's upcoming bout in Louisville was "not a fight that I would have promoted, and it's not a fight that I will attend," Fletcher said.

Tyson is to fight Danny Williams on July 30 at Freedom Hall in Louisville. It is the first of seven fights calculated to get the former heavyweight champion out of debt.

Fletcher said he was thinking of "the image of Kentucky." Tyson served a prison sentence for rape and to many became synonymous with mindless violence.

"I would hope that Mr. Tyson has rehabilitated himself and wish him the very best," Fletcher said. "But when it comes to promoting Kentucky and the things I want to promote, it's not something that I would have spent an effort in promoting."

Fletcher said the athletic commission's chairman, Michael Cunningham, renewed Tyson's boxing license without a hearing or consultation with other commissioners. That was not illegal, but it "wasn't vetted as extensively as I thought it should have been," Fletcher said.

Attempts to reach Cunningham were unsuccessful.

New Jersey also granted Tyson a license to fight but Gov. Frank McGreevey barred the use of any state-owned arena. Freedom Hall is part of the state-owned Kentucky Fair and Exposition Center.

Fletcher said the hall had been contracted for the Tyson-Williams fight before he knew about it. "The agreement has been reached. The fight will proceed," he said.

Tyson, in Louisville on Tuesday to promote the fight, said he had been "addicted to chaos" but had reformed. "I think I deserve another chance to prove my checkered past can be swept away," he said.

Fletcher said he would decide later how the seven-person commission should be reorganized but referred to his previous reorganization of the Kentucky Racing Commission, which he effectively abolished and replaced with an all-new Kentucky Horse Racing Authority.