# Services Committee - September 1, 2009 > Auto-transcribed civic record · September 1, 2009 - **Permalink**: https://meetings.lexingtonky.news/meeting/1021 - **Source video**: https://lfucg.granicus.com/player/clip/1021?view_id=14&redirect=true - **Date**: 2009-09-01 - **Last revised**: July 17, 2026 - **Length**: 16,265 words > ⚠️ **Auto-generated content.** Audio from the official Granicus video was auto-transcribed with OpenAI's open-source Whisper large-v3-turbo model, run locally by The Lexington Times. Structured facts were extracted with GPT-4o; the narrative summary was written by Anthropic Claude. Verbatim wording may contain errors. See [methodology](https://meetings.lexingtonky.news/about/methodology) or [report a correction](mailto:editor@lexingtonky.news). --- ## Meeting Overview The Services Committee met on September 1, 2009, at 1:00 p.m., with V. Steele presiding. The committee addressed three agenda items during the session, taking three votes and hearing nine public comments. The committee approved two measures: a proposal on Slaughtering Livestock presented by Henson, and a Sign Ordinance presented by Lane. A third agenda item regarding Items in Committee was deferred. Overall, the meeting resulted in two approvals and one deferral of business before the committee. ## Attendance The following individuals were present at the meeting on September 1, 2009: * Henson * Lane * Lawless * Beard * Feigel * Crosbie * McChord * Martin * Myers * Ellinger No absences or late arrivals were recorded. ## Votes and Decisions **Livestock Slaughter Ordinance Amendment** [timestamp: 0:33:29] A motion was made by Henson and seconded by Feigel to direct the law department to draft an amendment to the ordinance disallowing slaughter of livestock, not including fowl, within the urban service boundary without a permit. The motion passed by voice vote. **Temporary Neighborhood Signs Amendment** [timestamp: 1:14:16] A motion was made by Martin and seconded by Lane to direct the law department to draft an amendment to Article 17-6: Permitted Signs in all Zones. The proposed amendment would change wording to allow temporary neighborhood signs with specific size, duration, and removal requirements. The motion passed by voice vote. **Friendly Amendment to Neighborhood Signs Motion** [timestamp: 1:34:57] A friendly amendment to Martin's motion was made by Feigel and seconded by Lane. The amendment would limit neighborhood signs to 10 per event, require display no more than 7 days prior to the event, and require removal within 2 business days. The amendment passed by voice vote. ## Public Comment The meeting included public comment on two primary topics: backyard livestock slaughter and commercial real estate signage. **Backyard Livestock Slaughter** William Smith [0:03:50] described a traumatic experience in which his children witnessed a goat being slaughtered in a residential backyard. He expressed concern about public visibility of such activity and the lack of legal restrictions. Will Sampson [0:05:53] argued for the right to raise and slaughter animals in residential areas for personal consumption, emphasizing local food sovereignty and urging regulation over prohibition. Jeremy Porter [0:07:32] shared his family's experience raising hens for eggs and planning to harvest them humanely. He requested that any new ordinance respect responsible personal food production. Ryan Koch [0:09:15] supported backyard slaughter as a humane alternative to industrial meat production and urged the committee to regulate rather than ban the practice. **Commercial Real Estate Signage** Tandy Patrick [0:52:07] advocated for increasing real estate sign size from 6 to 64 square feet, citing industry standards and the need for consistency with other major cities. Crystal Blackburn [0:58:12] emphasized that real estate signs are critical for home sales, affordable, and non-discriminatory, and highlighted their economic importance to Fayette County. Don Sebastian [1:00:52] stressed that current signage rules are not followed in practice and would severely harm the commercial real estate market if enforced. Todd Johnson [1:04:38] reported that developers have no major issues with current signage rules but emphasized the importance of directional signs for new subdivisions. Emma Tibbs [1:14:47] supported temporary signs for neighborhood events but expressed concern about signs remaining up for extended periods, often over a year. ## Contested Items ### Regulation of Backyard Livestock Slaughter The meeting featured a heated discussion regarding the regulation of backyard livestock slaughter. The debate centered on balancing multiple competing concerns: property rights, public safety, cultural practices, and humane treatment of animals. Some members expressed concern about the potential trauma to children and public nuisance issues associated with backyard slaughter operations. Other members emphasized personal food sovereignty and advocated for humane alternatives to industrial meat production as a rationale for allowing such practices on private property. ### Commercial Real Estate Signage Enforcement A second contested item involved commercial real estate signage enforcement. Business groups and real estate professionals strongly opposed the current 6 square foot sign limit. These industry representatives argued that the existing regulation is unenforceable, outdated, and harmful to economic development. They contended that enforcement of the current signage restrictions would be detrimental to the business and real estate industries. ## Slaughtering Livestock - Henson The committee discussed a complaint regarding the slaughtering of a goat in a residential backyard. [timestamp: 00:01:00] **Legal Status and Findings** The law department confirmed that no existing ordinance currently prohibits personal consumption slaughter of livestock. However, they noted the potential for the committee to develop new regulations on this matter. **Concerns Raised** Public testimony and committee discussion highlighted several concerns: - Public visibility of slaughtering activities in residential areas - Potential trauma to children who witness such activities - Questions regarding cultural and personal food sovereignty **Committee Discussion** Key speakers in the discussion included Henson, Lawless, Beard, Feigel, Martin, Lane, Rick Curtis, and Luke Mathis, though specific positions and arguments from individual speakers were not detailed in the available information. **Outcome** The committee approved a motion to draft an ordinance that would restrict livestock slaughter without a permit. This action moves toward establishing regulatory requirements for such activities in residential areas. ## Sign Ordinance - Lane [timestamp: 00:34:04] The committee reviewed proposed amendments to the current sign ordinance, which had generated concerns from multiple stakeholder groups. The discussion centered on three main issues: the existing 6 square foot limit for commercial real estate signs, regulations for neighborhood signs, and challenges with enforcement of sign regulations. **Issues Presented** The current ordinance's 6 square foot limit for commercial real estate signs was identified as problematic. Real estate and homebuilder associations, represented by speakers including Tandy Patrick, Crystal Blackburn, Don Sebastian, Todd Johnson, and Emma Tibbs, urged the committee to allow larger signs to better serve their industries' needs. **Proposed Amendment** A draft amendment was introduced to address neighborhood sign regulations. The proposal would permit temporary neighborhood signs while establishing specific rules governing their size, duration, and removal requirements. This approach aimed to balance community needs with aesthetic and practical concerns. **Committee Action** The committee passed motions to advance amendments on two fronts: one addressing commercial sign regulations and another addressing neighborhood sign regulations. Both amendments moved forward for further consideration, indicating the committee's support for modifying the existing ordinance. **Key Participants** The discussion involved committee members Lane, Martin, Myers, and Beard, along with stakeholder representatives Tandy Patrick, Crystal Blackburn, Don Sebastian, Todd Johnson, and Emma Tibbs. **Outcome** The agenda item was approved, with the committee advancing both the commercial and neighborhood sign amendments for continued development. ## Items in Committee Council staff reviewed a range of pending items during this portion of the meeting. Paul Schoninger presented updates on multiple matters awaiting further action or information. The items under committee review included: * Taxi cabs * Special permits * Golf carts * Underground utilities * Ice storm response * Solid Waste updates * Horse cruelty * Glendover petition * Curb replacement Most of the items discussed were deferred, with several awaiting additional information before the council could take further action. The review allowed staff to provide status updates on these various matters and identify which items required further development or clarification before returning to the full council for decision. [timestamp: 1:37:37] --- ## Decisions - **Motion** — passed: Motion to direct the law department to draft an amendment to the ordinance disallowing slaughter of livestock, not including fowl, within the urban service boundary without a permit. - **Motion** — passed: Motion to direct the law department to draft an amendment to Article 17-6: Permitted Signs in all Zones, changing wording to allow temporary neighborhood signs with specific size, duration, and removal requirements. - **Motion** — passed: Friendly amendment to Martin’s motion to limit neighborhood signs to 10 per event, require display no more than 7 days prior to event, and removal within 2 business days. --- ## Full transcript Music Thank you. One o'clock, September 1st. Let's go ahead and begin the Services Committee. The first item on the agenda is the slaughtering of livestock that was put in by Council Member Henson. And Ms. Henson, if you would go ahead and take care of this item, we'd appreciate it. Thank you, Chair. I, after receiving a complaint from a resident of the 11th District regarding, it was actually a slaughtering of a goat, I felt that this was an ordinance that needed to be looked at. We have several people here to speak on the issue, I believe. We do. We have about four. If we could, is the law department here? Could you go ahead and tell us what the code of order to say about this? I don't know if I have anything to add. You all should have a memo from Keith Horn dated July 16th in your packet today. I think it kind of speaks for itself. In summary, if it's not a slaughterhouse operation, there's really nothing currently on the books that addresses this specific issue. And Mr. Horn was of the opinion that there probably would not be a significant legal obstacle, and you all adopting an ordinance that did address this type of issue if you all thought that that was something that you all wanted to do in your purview. Any questions for Mr. Barbary slash Mr. Horn there instead? Ms. Henson. After reading through the articles, I could not see anything in there where it spoke about for personal consumption. It seems like our current articles refer to commercial-type slaughtering supervised by the Department of Agriculture. I'm not sure the term personal consumption is actually in the ordinances. I think they're directed at commercial activity. Otherwise, there's nothing on the books that addresses the slaughter of livestock whatsoever. Okay, thank you. Would the committee like to go ahead and hear from the people on the list and hear their responses? Okay. The first one I have on, if you would give your name and your address, is William Smith. Just come to the podium if you would. You have three minutes. Three minutes. Woo, that's a long time. My name is William Smith. I'm president of the Holiday Hill Valley Heights Neighborhood Association and president of Valley Park. I live at 1274 Bordeaux Drive, which backs up to the house, and I'm probably the reason why we're here right now. On the 3rd of July, it was a day about like today. Everybody's getting ready for the 4th of July. So I have my three daughters in the backyard, 17, 11, and 4. I go out front for a little bit and come back, and my kids are crying. I said, what's going on? They showed me. They had about five gentlemen holding down an 80-pound-plus animal, slitting its throat, bleeding it out in the yard, throwing it on a table, field dressing it, peeling the hat off of it, quartering it, putting it in a cooler. My 11-year-old daughter wants to be a veterinarian. It was kind of a traumatic experience for her. So I told her, I said, well, we'll call the police and see what they can do. Well, there is no law against that. You can do it in your front yard. You can do it in your side yard. You can do it in your backyard. I was kind of taken by that. So then I called Councilman Henson, and she called the health department because we were worried then about what they did with the carcass of the animal. As today, I still don't know where the carcass is to them, whether it was put in their herbie or what. But I just think it was kind of strange. I'm a hunter myself, and I believe there's a place for that. And in your backyard, backed up to a bunch of kids, I don't think that should be done. So I appreciate you all hearing what I have to say. and I've addressed it to the mayor and the president's meeting, and everybody I talk to seems pretty shocked about what goes on in a residential area. I appreciate your time. Thank you, Mr. Smith. Will Sampson. Hi. My name is Will Sampson. I live at 511 West 3rd Street, and I'm a sociologist who studies food, so I have certainly a point from that perspective, but I'm also a resident of Lexington who raises animals in my backyard to eat. Like a lot of people, my age, education level, income level, we move back into the city from the suburbs or from rural areas because we like to pace the timing of the city. But we also like to be connected to our local food and to the food that we eat. And so one of the things that we really appreciated in moving to Lexington was the freedom to be able to do that, not to scare small children by slaughtering goats in front of them, but generally within normal guidelines to keep food and to raise meat in our backyard, to slaughter it when necessary, and to eat it. And so I would urge you, you know, if there's a problem that needs to be addressed, address it. That's great. If there's a place where people drive too fast, you don't outlaw driving, you figure out how to rationally and reasonably regulate traffic. So if there is something to be done, I would urge you to act with caution, in part because cities around this country are recognizing the need for local food. Durham, North Carolina, for example, just passed some landmark legislation that would let people keep animals in their backyard. So I would urge you, if you feel that you need to act, that you act forward and not backward. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Sampson. Jeremy Porter. My name is Jeremy Porter, and I live at 905 Bryan Avenue. And like Mr. Sampson, I choose to raise some of my own hens in my own backyard. And I'm also representing Wes and Angela and Jordan White, who I believe might have emailed some of you council members. Wes had begun about a year ago raising some hens in his backyard for eggs and being their friends we began to take an interest in that. We both have interests in local food and issues of food health and safety. And so these are important to us as well as issues of affordability. Unfortunately when it comes to local food, organic food, things like this, as you all well know the cost is pretty steep. and being in the position that we are, unable to afford much of this food for our families, we chose to go in together to raise our own hens for eggs and then began to discuss raising a flock of birds, hens in particular, for meat. And so I have a small flock of 10 birds in my backyard that we have been planning to harvest for meat and to do it discreetly, to do it in a way that we believe is sanitary. We have educated ourselves on the guidelines that are needed to be able to process and harvest these birds in a sanitary manner and would do it in a way that would respect our neighbors. So, again, as Mr. Sampson said, my request would be that if you choose to create an ordinance in light of this, that you not outlaw or remove the possibility of this, but that you regulate it in such a way that shows a respect for neighborliness as well as the personal needs of a family. So thank you. Thank you, Mr. Porter. Ryan Koch. My name is Ryan Koch, and I live at 931 Idlewild in District 1. And I wanted to say, Mr. Smith, I am sorry that your daughters had to witness that. Whenever we've harvested our birds, we try to be sensitive to what's going on in our neighbor's yards and try to do that when children aren't present. My wife and I keep chickens like the Porters and the Sampson's. We are omnivores, and we are lousy vegetarians. we tried didn't go well. We needed an affordable source of protein, and so we've chosen to raise hens at home. Occasionally we do have to harvest one for our own use, and we think this is an important thing for us to do because we're concerned about the humaneness of a larger organization, larger thinking about confined animal feedlots. Some of the things we've been reading and hearing about the way meat is produced in our country is fairly sickening, and we don't think it would benefit our family's health to participate in that. Try to raise some of this meat at home to get what we need in our diet in a humane and safe and clean way. So that's part of our motivation. We do hope that if you all make any sort of new ordinance, that you think about those of us who are doing this thoughtfully and humanely and that we continue to be able to do this at home. Thank you all. Thank you, Mr. Cook. Is there anybody else that's not on the list that would like to speak on this issue? Seeing none. Ms. Henson, did you want to bring forth a motion or did you have anything before we go to the other council members? I actually would just like to hear from the health department. Luke Mathis is here, I believe. Okay. Welcome. Hello, with the Health Department. Your name again? Luke Mathis. Thank you. Currently there are no regulations or requirements preventing slaughtering animals at your residence, so long as you don't offer the meat for sale to others to the public. If it's for your own consumption, there are, unless you cause a public health nuisance with the remains, there are no regulations. Any other questions for Mr. Matthews? Any council members have any questions? Thank you. Mr. Matthews, one moment, please. Oh, you didn't have a question for him? You did? Okay, you're good. Okay, Ms. Henson, did you want to bring forward a motion or did you have anything or you may open up to the other council members. Okay. Ms. Lawless? So this issue is just about the slaughtering of the animals. Is that correct? Or the proper manner of slaughtering the animals, not whether or not they can be raised within the city limits. Ms. Henson, do you want to address that? The issue we're dealing with is the slaughtering and method or process of slaughtering the livestock, not whether or not they're raised within the city limits. It's my understanding that raising, harboring livestock within the city limits is prohibited. But do chickens fall in that? No. Foul does not. Okay. Any other questions? Mr. Beard? While we're on the subject, what about rabbits? You know, I've had people in the deep, dark history of my youth who had rabbits. I think Mr. Schoeniger probably could address this for you and read that. I don't think it will completely answer your question, Council Member, but Section 411 of the Code of Ordinances, which is on page 7 of your packet, says the keeping of hogs, goats, or pigs within any area of the urban county except those zoned agricultural, hereby prohibited and declared to be unlawful. I don't think there's any mention of rabbits in at least that portion of the code. I guess I don't consider rabbits, squirrels, so forth, as livestock. That would fall under the game issue, and I think it is legal to trap within Fayette County, is my understanding, within the urban service area. But I just, I would like for David with the law department to come up if he could. Yeah, David, Mr. Barber, with law. I know he's excited to step in here today for Mr. Horn. I wanted to maybe put some wording in the ordinance that would disallow slaughtering of livestock within the urban service boundaries with the exception of a, where you would require a permit. Do you think that's something that can be done? You're interested in pursuing, you're generally prohibiting livestock-only slaughter, but you can get a permit to do it on a limited basis? Okay. And that's what you want? my department to come back with a draft for you to look at. And would that be permitted through the health department or through... My understanding that they are overseen by the Department of Agriculture, the slaughterhouses. Now, I'm not sure if, Luke, if you want to come back up and address that. It's difficult. We don't have any sort of permit like that. Slaughterhouses, food manufacturing, that's regulated some by the USDA. The slaughterhouses, manufacturing is regulated by the Department of Public Health in Frankfurt. But I think in both cases, if this once again was for their private use, I think both of those organizations wouldn't get involved. so it would probably have to be a local agency, whether it be the health department or another agency. Thank you. Did you want to make that in the form of a motion then? Sir, I make a motion that the law department draft to amend the ordinance to include disallowing the slaughtering of livestock within the urban service boundaries without a permit. So moved. We have a motion second. Now discussion on the motion. Anybody? Ms. Lawless? And this is not including foul? Is that correct? That's correct. It would be, David, the definition of livestock would include, will you include that in there, the definition of livestock? We can, but can I get clarification of whether your intent is to include the fowl in there or not? Right. It is or not? Not including fowl. Okay, so you want a definition of livestock and you want to make sure it does not include fowl in there. Correct. Or fish. Which is the game. Ms. Hinton, could you restate your motion for my colleagues? A motion that the Law Department draft an ordinance disallowing the slaughter of livestock, not including FAL within the urban service boundaries and without a permit. All right, Ms. Lawless. It's my understanding that there is no permitting process, though. So if we had a permitting process, we're going to have to have that as an accompanying ordinance. So would it be possible to disallow the slaughter of livestock, excluding fish and fowl, within the urban service boundary period? And then along with that, possibly adding that it be done not in the view of the public, like that there be some kind of way to shed or something like that, so little children aren't seeing the chickens get their necks run. Did you want to address that, Ms. Ensign? But I think we probably could do a permitting process. That could just be on a parallel track with this, and I think the Health Department could be maybe the agency that would do that. Does the Health Department have the funds and means to do that? I'm sure we could discuss it. I mean, I wouldn't be the appropriate person to really say yay or nay on that, but I can bring it up for discussion. I don't know what the quantity of permits we would be talking. I don't think that this is something that probably happens on a regular basis. regardless. I was going to suggest that if the law department can draw up an ordinance, we take a look at it in our next committee meeting. Right, I think at this point we're just asked for a draft ordinance and then we can bring it back for next meeting and if we need to we can ask somebody from the health department to come back here that can also address this about the permitting aspect of it too. Sure. Thank you, Lou. Thank you. Ms. Crosby? I guess my question is if we were to go through all this, who would be responsible, Council Member Henson, for enforcing this? Would it be the health department or would it be the division of police? I know that there was an opinion from law saying that they could possibly work that out amongst themselves, but it seems like it might be kind of difficult to actually enforce this. Do you have any thoughts on that? My thoughts would be I thought there would be someone from the police department here, but maybe I was wrong. We have Rick Kearse here. Rick, would you like to... Can you address it, Rick? The problem first and foremost with enforcement would be specifically whether or not the police department would know what they're actually looking at if something is slaughtered, hence the reason why it would be permitted by the health department. The other thing is, and I noticed in his memo he suggested the inclusion of animal care and control specifically because if someone is caught with livestock for the purposes of slaughter and stop, then someone has to specifically take care of that animal once it's removed. What you all don't know, in the last three months there's been 27 goats that have been captured and taken to animal care and control. We had to have an ordinance amended specifically just to take care of livestock running at large, in particular goats themselves. The other thing that when I spoke to Keith Horn before we left, and he wanted me to bring up the fact that this may be a cultural issue and not a food issue as far as what's going on, so maybe we need to actually address the community at large that this is happening in because there is a section of the community where this is happening more and more because we're seeing animals that are running at large that it may very well be an issue with them specifically. And if you take into account all livestock, do you get on the slippery slope of what happens when people start to slaughter animals that they've captured or whatever it may be, wild animals? And there are animals that are turned from wild animals into livestock, herd-type animals that are slaughtered as well. So it's an issue that needs to, in my opinion, needs to be looked at more so than just a permit or a ban on the slaughtering of livestock itself. Thank you. I'm looking at the definitions of it because I see a different definition when you look at wildlife, you know, fish, and livestock. Very much so. There is a different definition. So if we specifically say livestock and word the definition goat, pig, hog, cow, to me that would take care of. I think it would specifically if it was worded that way. I still would like to hear comment from that area. In the incident of Mr. Smith, he contacted the police and they notified him that that was not illegal. But if we make this ordinance and he contacted the police, then he would, they could ask to see a permit. But it would be my understanding that the permit would have certain limitations about the proper ways to slaughter. Don't just take a go down in your backyard for all to see. I would think so, yes. Okay. And I think with the expertise, I think they would also call animal care and control to go with them as well, just in case the animal hadn't been slaughtered, because you're going to have to have somebody that actually takes the animal into custody. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Lane? She's already spoke. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Yes, well, I wanted to sort of speak out against too much regulation. When somebody buys a piece of property, they get a certain amount of property rights. And I think every time that we pass some type of legislation like this, you can't do this, you can't do that, you're ultimately taking away the rights of individuals to own and and use their property the way they want to. I believe the current law is it's illegal to slaughter equine animals in the USA anyway, so those animals are automatically excluded. And then if there's a restriction already on having poultry and other hogs and pigs and all that in the urban service area, those items would be excluded already too. So it seems if we were going to do this, the restriction should be for commercial application. However, when you say we can't do it in the urban service area, I believe if you look at the zoning ordinance, they're probably in the I-1 and I-2 zones, slaughterhouses are permitted. So, you know, you have to look at you can't just put a blanket, no slaughtering of anything in the urban service area. I think that a better approach, which would protect the property rights, protected the current zoning ordinance would be that a person could slaughter an animal for personal consumption in their property with the provision that it's done out of the public view so it would be, you know, private use of their property. Something like that seems to me would be a more amenable and more reasonable approach to protecting the property rights and also protecting the neighbors from being offended by the killing of an animal. That's all I have to say. Thank you. Mr. Beery. Thank you, Chair. It seems like we're putting an ordinance together a line at a time, and really we don't have enough information at this point. I would like to know what the scope, and if anybody could even estimate what the scope of this is, the need and requirement for being able to slaughter animals. Is it 15 people? Is it 150? Is it 1,500? I don't know, and I don't know whether there's any way to even make an educated guess, but maybe from complaints called in, the police might be able to give us some idea. We'll have a draft orange brought next meeting, and along with that, we'll invite the police, we'll invite Ammo Control and the Health Department here, and I think we can probably hash out this a little better. Okay. I just didn't want everybody to get fixed in their mind what it is, and we tell these gentlemen here, and then it turns out to be something entirely different. Ms. Feigel? I would probably just agree with that. I think there are some cultural traditions that are observed in this manner, and I'm not sure that we can disallow that. I don't know if it's religious or not, but I don't know that we can disallow it, but certainly I would think that we could put some parameters on it, and that's basically what I would like to see maybe in the residential neighborhoods rather than just inside the urban services area. Mr. Martin. Thank you. I share Council Member Lane's concerns, particularly if it might impede upon an existing zone. I mean, that said, I'd love to see a draft of it and to see how they might actually put it to paper. And so I'm going to support this sort of tentatively, but obviously we don't want to sort of create a tempest and we don't want to create something that's going to be inconsistent with the rights of the citizens to use their property and inconsistent with our zoning ordinance and things like that. So I'm happy to sort of go with it for a little while to see how it comes out on paper, and maybe we can revisit this if we get a draft. Thank you. Anybody else like to speak on this? Ms. Henson? I was going to suggest that we also maybe have someone from the religious community come and speak, because I know in some cases it could be the Hindu religion. And I don't want this to affect diversity in our community, but I do think that there's a right and a wrong way for these things to occur. I'll have Mr. Schoeniger try to locate anybody. It seems to me, and I'd like to ask you, and I'm sorry, sir, I've forgotten your name, about your experience. William Smith. Mr. Smith, sorry about that. Would you like to come to the microphone, please? It sounds to me like for you the biggest issue was that it was in public view. Is that correct? Well, sure. It's within public view. The way the police department told me is that I could bring cattle in my yard, raise them, and I could slaughter them in my front yard. Like Ms. Henson said, there's a right way and a wrong way to do something. I can't shoot a BB gun in my yard, but I can slaughter an animal. Right. So it seems to me that the ordinance at least should address with all within public view. I'm with these gentlemen right here. If they want to raise fowl in their yard and use them for consumption, I'm all for that. But I don't want to see them bring them out in their front porch and behead them. And if you can explain a non-cruel way to slaughter an animal, I would sure like to hear that. So the humane slaughter and not within public view are the issues. Have you ever heard of 80 or any animal, what the noise they make when that happens? Yeah. No, I grew up in a rural area. I'm very familiar. So you're very, you know. And in 1958 in Davis County, I lived in a neighborhood, and we raised gang birds, quail, pheasants, and banny roosters. And believe it or not, police showed up and said I had to get rid of my banny rooster because he crowed too loud in the morning. That would be a noise, and I've had that happen too, and we've brought that issue there. My main concern was just in the eyes of the public. I'm all for being able to do what you can do on your property, and I've been told several times what I can't do on my property. And that's where my issue is. And that's just what I wanted to clarify. Thank you. Mr. Martin, did you have any? I think that. Mr. Lane? I just wanted to add a footnote. is I think it might be good, too, to have maybe some hunting groups because if you go out and shoot a deer or an elk or something and you bring it back and you want to, you know, butcher it for consumption in your own home, that sort of falls in that category also, and so maybe we ought to look at that perspective. Mr. Barber, you stood up, so it appears that you want to make a comment. I want to clarify. So the ordinance, I don't recall whether you voted on the motion. We have not voted on the motion. Okay, so it remains to be seen exactly what kind of draft ordinance we're coming back with at this point. Right. At that point, we're just looking at a draft. And you've heard kind of some of the suggestions we'd like to put in there. Any other comment? Any more discussion? Mr. Beard. One quick one, and that relates to dressing out of deer and other animals. There used to be a commercial enterprise here in town where you could take deer and they would, obviously a dead deer, and they would cut it up, they'd make sausage, they'd do all the various and sunny things you might do in your home, but it was a commercial, and I don't know whether it still exists or not. Somebody who's a deer hunter may know. Could you go to the microphone if you'd like to answer that, please? Again, Jeremy Porter. And Wes White, the gentleman that I raise hens with, he is a hunter, and he has told me that this place does still exist, but, again, it's an affordability issue. And he knows how to field dress his animal and knows how to store that and do that in a safe way and a sanitary way and would be willing to do that in a discreet way as well, in a way that's not going to offend anyone, his neighbors. Thank you. Any other discussion? All's in favor of the motion, say aye. All's opposed. That passes, and we'll bring that back as a draft ordinance next month, and we will also invite the individuals that we've discussed in here. Thank you all for coming. The next item on the agenda is the sign ordinance. Mr. Lane has put this in. We have about three or four different items in here that deal with the sign ordinance. So this kind of might be the omnibus sign ordinance that looks at all of them. So I'll go ahead and let Mr. Lane start, and then I'm sure we'll have a lot of issues that come from this. Mr. Lane. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'd like to call David Barbary up, who is, I understand, going to be handling the sign ordinance. you're not handling it? I've been involved in some elements of it. Normally that's a planning issue that would be done by our planning attorney. My understanding is she has a conflict this afternoon as far as needing to attend some other hearings. But the sign ordinance is in the zoning ordinance technically, so normally it gets handled as a planning matter. All right, I'll tell you what, in that case maybe Mr. Sally would volunteer to answer a couple of questions. Or Mr. King, anybody. Welcome, Mr. King. We brought a number with us. We'll all take our turn. Now I'm really intimidated. Here's what I was going to ask you to do is that we have people here from the home builders, the Board of Realtors, the Commercial Property Association of Election Day, and the Neighborhood Association that all have some problems with our current signed ordinance or are concerned about it. And I thought to put things into context that maybe you could address the procedure, and there's three or four ways, I guess, that you can ask for a change in the zoning ordinance. But I thought to help all the parties involved sort of get an overview of what that is, you might be able to address that. And then secondly, say that, you know, I got involved mainly because the commercial real estate brokers asked me to be involved. I think that Mr. Martin may be involved because the neighborhood associations have asked for a change here, and there may be other council members that are involved for different reasons. So rather than just to do one section of it, the idea was let's do it all at one time and try to clean up the ordinance. So with that being said, maybe you could address that issue, cleaning up the entire ordinance and how this will be done and the fact that the planning commission is involved. Certainly. I'd be glad to kind of in five minutes or less maybe kind of give the history where we are. The sign ordinances that are in effect today are a part of the zoning ordinance for the most part, and these are the signs that are regulated primarily on private property. The current ordinances were developed in the early 1980s. There was a strong push from the community when we were doing a comprehensive rewrite of the zoning ordinance in the early 1980s to look at the visual pollution that many people felt were associated with the signs that were permitted in the community at that time. And actually, although the sign ordinances themselves were probably less than 10 percent of the total legislation, they probably took 60 to 70 percent of the effort because it's a very difficult issue. There are a lot of aspects, technical, aesthetic, land use that were involved in that. And over the course of about two or three years, there was extensive testimony. There were many task forces and committees. And in the end, the Urban County Council did pass the ordinances that are basically in effect today. So, and even after that, the mayor appointed a broad-based committee that reviewed the ordinance once again and some implementation measures that were also put into place at that time. So, again, those, they've been amended from time to time. Just recently, you all made a major amendment in the downtown sign ordinances to allow certain types of signage that had been prohibited in the past. So, but basically the core regulations were adopted in the early 1980s and with a ton of public input. The sign regulations are permitted through the Division of Building Inspection, and Dewey Crow is here to explain if there are any questions about how the permitting is handled, and any enforcement issues are primarily also handled under the Division of Building Inspection. The Planning Commission nor the Division of Planning do not approve sign permits or things like that. Although, again, they were part of the process to create the regulation, given that they reside in the zoning ordinance. With that in mind, there are a number of ways the sign ordinances can be amended. State law gives us remedy for that. The Urban County Council can initiate any specific amendment to any zoning ordinance. The Planning Commission can also initiate an amendment and start that process. And also in Fayette County we do allow landowners to make application to file a proposed draft text and have it reviewed through the process. process. And that process includes first of all review by planning staff and we will bring in any others from the government or sometimes even outside for whom we need to get information about the proposed legislation. The planning commission has its process, its subcommittees that review all applications. The planning commission must hold a public hearing on the proposed legislation, regardless of who initiated it. And then that recommendation is made by the Planning Commission and communicated on to the Urban County Council. You can hold your own public hearing if you choose. You can act as recommended by the Planning Commission, or you can even just take testimony, because it is legislation. It's not a change of ordinance. It's not a change of zone of property. So you have some flexibility in how you address that. But in the end, all roads lead back to you to make the decision on what those laws will be. My understanding is that there are also separate provisions in the Code of Ordinances, perhaps in some cases, that deal with signs in the right-of-way. I've been told that one issue may be things like subdivision entry signs, which appear on corners in the right-of-way and things like that. And I believe there are different laws that are not a parting of the zoning ordinance that may regulate some aspects of those as well. You mentioned specifically the real estate signs. And we are aware that recently building inspection, I think in response to some complaints, had sent out a very broad enforcement sweep might be the wrong term, but sent out a lot of letters noticing folks that they had violated what are very restrictive real estate sign regulations. Six square feet is the rule. In response to that, folks associated with commercial real estate groups, property association, have been in discussion with the staff. And, in fact, they have filed a text amendment proposing to change the regulations related to commercial real estate signs. And that is an active case in our office right now. They chose the third of the three ways to amend the zoning ordinance that I described to you by actually filing an application. Right now we are in review and communication to see if we can achieve a consensus on what that legislation might be as we proceed through the Planning Commission and then ultimately a public hearing and reporting back to the Council for your final action. Would that help? Yes, sir, it does. Well, let me ask you another question. Do you feel that it would be better to address this one category like commercial signs and neighborhood signs as individual increments, or do you feel like that we could do the whole thing at one sitting, so to speak? My feeling is that if you all are generally satisfied with the signed regulations that the community has at this point, regardless of your point of view, whether they're too liberal or too restrictive, and you can probably find a lot of opinions both ways, if you're generally happy, I would think kind of defining the issue areas and dealing with them maybe one at a time might be the best way, because I can tell you that if you say, well, we're going to review the entire regulation and put it out there, you're probably looking at a very involved, very lengthy, very intensive process, just from my experience from the early 80s. I had hair when it started. What if we sort of targeted Section 17-6, which covers government signs, political signs, real estate signs, construction signs, tract signs, incidental signs, temporary signs, historic markers, and I think that would cover most of the issues that I'm aware of that have been brought. Signs that are permitted in all zones. Generally. Okay. I'd like to yield to Council Member Martin. He wants to address there maybe another area that needs to be looked at too. Certainly. My only comment to Council Member Lane was that there are a number of sections, as you're probably aware, that would need to be conformed in order to do a commercial signage. And so that was sort of my comment to it. One of the things that I came across and have been trying to get both in the budget process but also in this process is that, you know, I've got a neighborhood where they put a sign up for a meeting and the city comes and takes it down. And so there were some angry words and things like that, as those things frequently do. So to the extent we can craft an exception to, I guess, Section 17.6 to allow an exception for a temporary neighborhood sign that doesn't fall within the triangular line of sight and that kind of thing. Neighborhood meeting next Tuesday. That's right, neighborhood meeting next Tuesday. And obviously we want to have sufficient parameters. I have – Mr. Barbary has graciously and expeditiously crafted a sort of a quick peek at that. So I'm going to pass that out and let folks take a look at it. But that's one issue I'd like to try to get fixed during this because there's a lot of neighborhoods that do have regular science that come out, and they are presently in compliance, as I understand. The other thing of great concern is that, and that's a fairly small sort of housekeeping matter while we do this, but I strongly support our fixing the commercial sign problem. I can't tell you how many property owners and commercial folks in Lexington for how many years are not in compliance with this ordinance. And it's not a, you know, it's just not, it doesn't follow common practice in Lexington and Fayette County. I mean, these are not the kind of signs that are being used. And later, maybe I asked for Don Sebastian from the commercial CCIM group is here. I'd like to maybe get his thoughts about it as well. And I know there's some other speakers as well. But that's sort of my comments on it. Right. And I think we would agree generally we may not agree at this point on what the magic number is, but the six square feet, you know, the typical residential real estate sign. We've gone back in our preliminary investigations into the early 80s, found that this was not brought up as an issue despite the hours and hours and hours and hours of, you know, discussion and testimony. So, I mean, we're open and as a part of the text amendment process that's going now, we are reviewing what other communities are doing, what their standards are, and see if we can find a number that pleases everyone. If we can't, then there will be alternatives for folks to choose from. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I would also like to add, I actually am in the commercial real estate business, and I started my company a little over 25 years ago. And at the time I started, there really weren't that many, if any, commercial real estate firms. Most of them were development companies. And so what's happened is as our community has grown, more and more commercial real estate firms have expanded here. And it's not really practical to have a six square foot sign for commercial development. And I believe that most of the commercial real estate brokerage companies are following the construction sign ordinance for the 64 square foot sign. And I'd like if I might also yield to Council Member Myers, who has also put this into the committee and there may be an issue that he wants to address in this section here. Mr. Myers. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you, Mr. Lane. The issues that I have with the signed ordinance, I really don't have a problem with the change that you're wanting to make here. center around businesses using yard signs to advertise their business in the right of ways and our inability to find them in a way that de-incentivizes them to do that. Obviously, it's cheaper to buy a bunch of yard signs than it is to advertise on TV or radio or in print media, and so that's why they do it. And, you know, we've worked with you and Building Inspection and Code Enforcement, county attorney's office to try to come up with a plan to curtail that activity. And I know one of the things that we all agreed upon is that the fines are too low and that the court system doesn't want to waste its precious time dealing on a $10 fine. And so I guess my encouragement to this body would be that we all band together and maybe do a resolution to our state contingency to see if they will change that law. so that we can increase the fine. And then that will, I think, give us a handle on people putting out the illegal signs. But the change that you want to make here, I think it doesn't create any problems for me. Thank you. I would say that those probably fall under the category of incidental signs and temporary signs, which are also in that Section 17.6. So if we target that section of the ordinance, I think that would streamline the procedure, accelerate the time frame, and touch on many of these areas. All right. Mr. Chairman, I'm going to turn this back over to you, but we do have some speakers here. I noticed that Council Member Beard wanted to say something. Do you want to go now, or do you want to wait until we have the speakers? Mr. Beard. In case somebody might want to speak to these subjects, this is something that's been a burr under my saddle for some time, and that's the designation of the Lamar billboard on Nicholasville Road being a flashing sign and not permitted. And I thought it was an extremely innovative 21st century type of approach to the billboard business and maybe could, in some cases, reduce the number of billboards that we have throughout the community. But again, it was not permitted, and they've had to go another route with that. They have a pretty expensive original billboards up there now with a movie screen, not a movie screen, but probably a plasma screen behind it. The second thing, and I might ask Harold Tate, There have been some discussions about signs that marquee type signs versus ones on the faces of buildings and the effectiveness thereof. Something was brought up, I believe, when we were doing the planning, the downtown master plan situation. And if you'd like to speak to that. We, being in the downtown area, we've had quite a few companies that are coming to us saying, you know, technologies change. We like to liven up downtown a little bit more. So we've talked to planning, and we have not come up with anything yet. And I'm sure it'll be something we'll continue discussing. but new ways of having sign, because with technology changing the way it is, it does add, you know, some interest in terms of how downtown is. I remember back in the early 90s when I was with the city, we did the ticker tape allowing you there at the Filler Lions building there at Broadway and Main, which we've had a lot of people talk about it, how at night it's been pretty good to add some interest. And so I think what we're looking at is what we can take with that and expand it a little bit more strictly in the downtown area is what we'd be looking at. All right. Thank you, Chair. Thank you. At this time, I'm going to open up for people in the audience who would like to speak. I have one individual on the list, and I think we do have others that probably want to speak. But first, I have Tandy Patrick. If you would, give your name and your address, and you have three minutes, please. Thank you. I'm Tandy Patrick of Greenbaum Dollar McDonald here in Lexington, 300 West Vine, Suite 1100. I am here on behalf of the Commercial Property Association of Lexington, which is a local group which Council Member Lane referred. And we have, last month, filed our proposed text amendment, and I believe a copy of it is in your packet as well as our justification statement. This came to light when several of our members were cited having signs in violation of the ordinance. And to be honest, I think it was something that everybody was not even aware of. So we are proposing that commercial real estate signs have the same area restrictions as are currently applicable to construction signs, which is a total of 64 square feet. And I'm happy to answer any questions. So I suppose we will be going along on a parallel track because we, there is a committee meeting of the zoning committee on our application on Thursday of this week. So we're happy to answer questions. Any questions for Ms. Patrick? Mr. Martin? Ms. Patrick, how would you address vacant land under your definition of commercial real estate sign? Vacant land. We have, and Council Member Martin, we did, you're correct that this would involve a restatement of the definitions because we have merely proposed to have signage defined as either residential or commercial. So if we've got farmland in Fayette County under this, it would require a? Use, I think that whether or not it's vacant is irrelevant. It's the use of the property. So if it's farmland, it's going to remain agriculture, residential, as opposed to commercial development. So under your proposal, vacant farmland, like a sale of a horse farm, would require a six-square-foot sign. Correct. So high. Correct. And also, if the Webbs wanted to advertise the sale of CenterPoint downtown, would that require a six-square-foot sign or something different than that? Well, I believe that's a mixed-use, proposed to be a mixed-use development, which would involve office and retail. So I believe that would be classified as commercial. And we were only addressing, we're not proposing to tell the other industry groups what their signage should or should not be. We are merely addressing commercial real estate signage and trying to change this current six-square-foot limitation. I guess my concern is what defines what the use is. Obviously, a building inspector or someone who's enforcing the signage ordinance may not, if a property, for example, is zoned agricultural, that would exclude it from this. We are proposing a definition of commercial real estate as sale or rental of office, warehouse, retail, industrial, business, or multifamily. Okay, so if they're going to just sell the land as is and not propose the sale of a building on the land or a condominium unit in that building, it would require a six-square-foot sign. Again, it doesn't fall within the definition of commercial real estate. I just think that commercial real estate, we ran across, as you know, where I wrote the commercial licensee law last year, and we ran into a lot of problems with the definition of commercial because it's a fairly fungible thing, whether you include agricultural in it. And while commercial we think of as something that is business-oriented or trade or business, it does sort of spill over into other types of signage that might want to be addressed here at the same time. And my biggest concern here is vacant land and whether we would exclude. A global view, overview of the whole ordinance you might want to. Right. And whether, you know, whether we should address, for example, the sale of a horse farm, which at this time would require a small sign, or, you know, the springs is getting ready to come down. And so if there's not a current building that's proposed for that, excuse me, I'll turn my phone off here. But, you know, would they run into problems with the regulation and enforcement of the thing if they don't presently have a building plan, for example? So anyway, I just want to try to think more expansively about how the definition might work in application. I've got some questions later for someone else. Thanks. Any other questions from Ms. Patrick? Hi. At this time, is there anybody else who would like to speak and address this issue? If you would, just come give your name and your address, please. You have three minutes. Hello, I'm Karen Angelucci, 2908 Sweet William Court, and I'm here on behalf of the Lexington Tree Board, and we're just voicing our opinion on larger signs and hoping that the larger signs don't mean less trees or cutting down trees to put up a big sign. And that's really all I have to say. Thank you. Any questions for Ms. Angelucci? Thank you. Thank you. Anybody else like to speak? Crystal? Thank you, Mr. Chairman, Council. I'm Crystal Blackburn with the Lexington Bleagrass Association of Realtors, LBAR. And my direction today is to thank you for allowing us to comment on this and share with you the importance of real estate signs to the residential sales market. They are critical to the sellers, buyers, and fair housing. They are inexpensive and they do not discriminate based on race, gender, income, creed, color, et cetera. But in Fayette County, real estate is very important. as of June 30th, real estate sales impacted. 1,695 reported sales totaling $313,556,944 in Fayette County. In 2007, we polled homebuyers who had purchased in the last two years and found that 51.4% of respondents say they drove around the area as a part of their home search, with 20.8% saying that it was the most helpful tool in their home buying process. So just as a reinforcement, signs are very important, particularly as Lexington has a remarkable dependence on tax revenues tied to the strength of our local economy. We certainly want to promote that commerce and not hinder it. Having said that, Mr. Chairman, we invited the certified commercial investment members to comment on the commercial sign ordinance as well. And we do have their president here today, Mr. Don. Sebastian. Mr. Sebastian. I'm sorry, Mr. Lane. I think Mr. Lane has a question for you. Sir. Under the current sign ordinance we have, construction signs not exceeding 64 square feet are permitted for, well, all types of developments. That would include multifamily developments, and then also 32-foot signs would be allowed for single-family developments. Do you feel like those sign sizes are okay? Do you feel like you would ask for a modification in some way? Perhaps. I do not have a comment on that today. We can take a closer look at that. I do apologize. But as for now, I've been given no direction to not oppose those sign sizes. I would just suggest is that if you had a concern about that application for the residential developments, that it might be appropriate to try to address that so we could include it in the revised ordinance. As we go along, sure. And if you would, could get back with us. That would be great. Thank you. Any other questions for Ms. Blackburn? Mr. Sebastian? Thank you, Mr. Chairman. As I'm here representing the Kentucky CCIM chapter, we're the largest, internationally the largest group of commercial real estate practitioners in the world. And just wanted to comment that we definitely do need to move forward with items that are in this amendment. Certainly a six square foot sign on just about any commercial property that we run across is inadequate, unless it just happens to be an extremely small piece of property. And one thing I would like to possibly address, and I don't know, I haven't spoken to Patrick about this, but I hadn't planned on being in town today. But, you know, one of the issues down here, when we get under here, under temporary signs, for instance, will you allow the developer, let's say down here on the main and rows, to have their signs up, yet we've got some vacant retail on the first floor of that, which is rather unsightly unless you're using these new electrostatic signs that they sort of cover the windows up and things like that. Are we going to differentiate between those types of signs or would it even fall under this ordinance or would that go under your construction ordinance for signage? I think that's something that needs some careful consideration, not only in representing the owners of the property or the marketing of the property, but also just as a city as far as how we look when we have all these visitors coming in next year. I think those are very attractive signs for our buildings as well. So two comments I have right now. I'd be glad to address them. Mr. King, could you address that issue that he asked? Mr. Salee? No. Okay, good. That's why he brought the whole team here. I think Mr. Sebastian was speaking of something in the sign ordinance that's called a window sign. Generally, that's restricted to only 25 percent of the area of the window. So it could be that what he said is proposing a possible change to that restriction, but that applies to almost all of our commercial zones, types you'd see at a restaurant or other types of office and commercial uses. Thank you. Any questions for Mr. Sebastian? Mr. Martin? Don, thanks for coming out today. I called Don and asked him to see whether he had an interest in coming down. I'm on the board of the CCIM group, and I've been a commercial real estate lawyer for a long time. And this is just I can't overestimate or understate, I guess, how important this is to the commercial real estate community. This is a really, really big deal. Practically none of the commercial real estate sites in Lexington are in compliance with our current ordinance as written. And it would be really a very devastating thing to the commercial real estate community for our sign ordinance to be enforced the way it is. This is just not the practice either in Lexington but really in any other major city in the country. And so I'd hope that we could take the opportunity to get this fixed. I'm willing to separate the neighborhood sign issue out if that is what's needed to get this done. I would like to sort of make sure all the words are right and that we address things that we need to address. But, you know, I want to make sure that this gun is done. I also want to make sure the neighborhood thing gets done. But that's more of a neighborhood relations issue. This is a rock-bottom economic issue that we really should address. Do you have any other questions? Thank you. Thank you. I think, Mr. Johnson, would you like to give some comment? Just briefly, thank you, Mr. Chair. I'm Todd Johnson with the Home Builders Association of Lexington. Appreciate the opportunity to be here with you guys today. I put out the information that I had received on the changes for the text amendment from CPAL to our members, our developers, our sales and marketing council. As far as my sense goes among our members, there are not any outcrying problems existing right now with the signed ordinance regulations that are in place for residential construction. Like Ms. Blackburn stated, the only feedback that I did get was to impress upon you all to realize the importance of directional signs on main arterials to get back into new subdivisions or newly developing areas within subdivisions. As Ms. Blackburn pointed out, it is a vital part of getting the consumer back to where the product is inside the development so that they are aware, one, that it's there, and two, to locate the sales offices and everything. But in terms of the overall requirements and regulations, my sense is that there's not a widespread problem with either enforcement or issues that our folks are having with the current rules and regulations. Thank you. Thank you. Any questions for Mr. Johnson? Thank you. Mr. Lane? I think in closing that I would just like to say that Council Member Martin just made me think of something I had thought about previously. is prior to setting up my own company, I worked in corporate real estate, and I traveled throughout the country and visited a lot of markets acquiring real estate for companies. And in every other market I've been in, you know, the signage that we currently have now for commercial real estate is pretty much what you see everywhere else around the country. And so just to be on equal footing with these other markets, I think the ordinance that is currently being reviewed right now would be appropriate. That's all I have. Thank you very much, Mr. Mayor. Thank you. Were you going to come back with any kind of motion or kind of direction on where you want the committee to go? I don't know that we necessarily need to have a motion since CPAL has already made an application. And what I think would be very, very helpful is maybe if there are any suggested changes in the residential area that they'd be done maybe at that hearing so they might be incorporated into the new revised ordinance that then can come out of Planning Commission back to us. So I don't know that we need to make a resolution. Do you think we need one, Mr. King? I know we have a little more latitude than usual because this is a legislative act, but please remember that what we find is that if something comes up, it's probably better not to amend it unless it's directly germane to what's on the table. Otherwise, all the notice that we've put out and, you know, invited people to come and participate, something might slip through the cracks and folks would not feel that they had gotten a chance to adequately speak. I know that you indicated that you were mainly interested in perhaps reviewing the signs that are permitted in all zones. Was it 17-6, I believe, Mr. Lane? And I didn't know whether this committee would want to have some kind of presentation on those signs, what the current rules and regulations are. We could do that at a later meeting for you. If you'd like to do that, then consider whether any of those category areas are ones that you would like to have revisited. I agree with you. we don't want to go too broad on this, but because the modifications that are in the CPAL proposal do touch on residential issues, that maybe that would already be included in the thing that's before planning right now, the provisions, and therefore the residential people could comment on it, then you could incorporate their comments into it. But I do agree, we don't want to broaden it any wider than that. You know, we send notice of text amendments out to something like 250 or more registered neighborhood associations. They may look and see their information, says, well, this has to do with signs on commercial property. And they, well, we don't care about that. But if it were changed to greatly enlarge, say, the for sale signs in a residential neighborhood, they may well want to comment. So I think we'll all just use common sense. certainly any good ideas or new ideas that come out of the hearing process on this text amendment, they'll either be incorporated or parked and brought back and discussed. And I generally got the impression from the comments here today that nobody's really that concerned about the residential. It seems to be adequately, appropriately working. The signs are large enough, and so it's primarily a commercial area. Thank you for your input on that. And let me just ask, do you think we need to make any comment here or resolution or anything, or just go with where we are and let you all send that back to us? Given that they have filed a text amendment so there is an active proposal in progress, I don't think that you need to take any action here today. After we have the hearings in front of the Planning Commission, the recommendations are forwarded back to you and all comments are gathered, I think would be a good time at that time to assess whether there's anything else that you'd like to initiate. Okay. Yeah, that suits me. That's all I have, and thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you. Mr. Martin. Thank you. Mr. King, so from a legislative standpoint, do we have to just vote this up or down, what's currently pending before the Planning Commission? Ultimately, yes. That's correct. So we're not going to have an opportunity to do any wordsmithing of it? Well, actually, I apologize. I misspoke. You will vote it up or down, but since it's legislation, you will have the opportunity to modify it. If a recommendation, you know, you're going to have a staff recommendation that we will prepare, which may or may not be the same as what the Planning Commission recommends to you, sometimes when you get that legislation, if you want to have it vetted further, sometimes you can either hold your own public hearing, oftentimes you may refer it to one of your standing committees for more conversation. But, yes, you do have the opportunity to modify. And once we modify, does it then have to go back to the Planning Commission again? Generally, I think the law department would say that would depend on the scale of the modification. I mean, if you're talking about real estate signs and all of a sudden you switch to another whole category, they may be uncomfortable with you making that modification without remanding it back to the Planning Commission for another hearing. But if you were changing it from, you know, 64 square feet to 60 square feet or something like that, probably you wouldn't have to do that. That's good to know. Thank you. Mr. Chairman, because this was put into the committee at the time the motion, the entire thing, the signage issue was put in, I'd ask that the residential issue be put in. I have brought, and Mr. Barbieri was very kind to put together for me, sort of a sample draft of what an amendment to Section 17.6 would do to allow neighborhood signage. And I passed this out, and for those who don't have a copy, there's a copy up on the corner of the desk back there. But essentially this would be temporary signs related to events sponsored by a residential neighborhood or an owner's association. and we would keep the same type of residential sign requirements, being that it would be six square feet in size and not more than six feet in height. And I've added, I think appropriately, that it not be displayed more than ten days prior to the neighborhood meeting and must be removed within five days after the completion of the neighborhood meeting. I mean, this happens all the time, and in a lot of my neighborhoods, they'll have an annual meeting or a monthly meeting, and recently it had become a problem with them putting signs out and having them sort of be taken up by someone. So I think this is a good place to start. I'd like to try to get it done at the same time, but again, I certainly don't want to stop the effort on the commercial signage, and so to the extent we can get both done, great. If we just need to get one of them done, I'd rather get the commercial signage done. We'll try to take this. Mr. King, could you come up here, please, with the microphone, if you don't mind? If we do this, would we, this we would be just asking the Planning Commission that at this point just initiate a text amendment? Is that what we would do with this? Actually, what you could do on this item is what I would recommend. Mr. Martin. Certainly this draft is more than adequate to initiate the process. process, this committee could make a separate recommendation to the full urban county council that you initiate a text amendment of this text that will then be referred to the Planning Commission. We'll do our thing with it and then come back to you. So I wouldn't, don't link that to the application that the commercial real estate folks have pending. Just go ahead and initiate that if that's the council's will as a separate matter and it will be handled. Mr. Chair, at this time I'd like to make a motion that the draft that's been presented be recommended to the full council for approval to be submitted to the Planning Commission for putting put in the zone change process and I would ask that the the third word on the second line and be changed to or so they be read neighborhood residential neighborhood or owners associations so We have a motion and a second. I second. We have a motion and a second. Any discussion? Mr. Myers? Mr. Chairman, I noticed that Emmett Tibbs is here, was here to speak to this issue. Would you like to say something about it? Sure. Would you like to speak now or wait for the council? Go ahead, Ms. Tibbs. Why don't you go ahead and give comment and then we'll hear from the council. I agree with Councilmember Martin's concern about what's happening with these temporary signs. I have a concern about how temporary is defined. We see a lot of temporary signs that stay up for a year, as you know, and they stay in medians. Just drive out to Hamburg. We've got every sign imaginable out there, but just to put up a sign for a meeting notice. And they're never put up more than a week in advance and usually less than that. I don't think that that's a problem. With respect to real estate signs, there are many homeowners associations that have specific deed restrictions that deal with signage, all kinds of signs. I know of no neighborhood association or homeowners associations that prohibit real estate signs for sale, for lease, or for rent. And the Lexington Board of Realtors has been very cooperative in sending out notices to their members about where they should put signs, not in the right-of-way. And additionally, some neighborhood associations do not like to have signs put in their front entrances, and some have deed restrictions prohibiting that. But for the most part, if someone is having an open house and wants to put that in front of the subdivision, there's no problem with that, and it's always taken down, almost always taken down as soon as that's over. So we certainly agree with what we see in here about residential signs and keeping them the same size is fine. I won't speak to the commercial. That's out of my – I'll leave that to Mr. Lane, Mr. Martin. But we don't have a problem with that other than what Council Member Martin has said about temporary signs. We would like to see something put in there that will address that. Thank you. Any questions, Ms. Tibbs? Thank you. Mr. Myers. Thank you, Mr. Chair. I've got a couple of questions. Mr. Barbary, can you come forward? And also Mr. King, whichever one wants to come first. Okay. Thank you. My concern with the second piece is, is it possible legally for us to distinguish between a temporary sign for this purpose and any other kind of sign? My question goes to, it seems to me that we're going to end up legislating content. If we say that one group can put their sign up temporarily, but, for example, someone who has a yard sale, someone who has any other business to advertise can't temporarily put their sign up. So I guess I want you to speak to that and also speak to the temporary, because that is another issue we do have, as Ms. Tibbs said, you know, we can go from, you know, apartment complexes to businesses to churches, whatever you want to name, that have temporary signs up, daycare centers, temporary signs that have been up for 10 years and never come down. So before we start making amendments to temporary signs, I want you to speak to that aspect of it, and then also if Mr. Barber can speak to whether or not we're starting to regulate content. Sure. Well, I'll practice law without a license. I do it quite often. But my understanding on this, you are right, that when you start to regulate content, that you start to get into issues of constitutional rights for free speech. There's free speech and commercial speech, as I understand it, and the playing field and the rules for that change quite often due to Supreme Court decisions and things of that nature. So that'll be a part of what we'll have to look at in reviewing this amendment. You know, my gut feeling is common sense would say that, you know, a neighborhood association that has no product that makes no profit would be treated differently. But, again, would you allow a church to advertise every Sunday in the right way? I don't know. Those are the kinds of issues that when this is referred to us, even a simple text amendment like this can raise and will have to be researched and we will get information back to you on those kinds of issues. Okay, and then can you speak to? On the temporary issue, I would like to defer that to Mr. Crow because the issues in the permitting and regulation of temporary signs is definitely something that I know is an issue in his department all the time. He could much better speak to that than me. Okay, thank you. I understand the concern, and it will be looked at more thoroughly during the review process in front of the planning committee, but I'm not as concerned as it's currently drafted as I would be if it expands further to other groups and stuff like that. One of the reasons it was, I mean, I specifically share your concern if it gets beyond the neighborhood per se, because then I think if you allow this type of advertisement to take place outside the neighborhood, I think you've got a huge issue with opening up your door to allow anybody else to put whatever they want in the right of way. Okay, now when you say outside the neighborhood, you mean outside the neighborhood association or home association? This is, the way it's currently drafted, it would be, the expectation is that these would be legally recognized groups that more or less speak for the neighborhood. And they would be limited, the placement would be within the right of way in that neighborhood. and it would be temporary in the way that Mr. Martin described it where it would be for a limited period of time. So I think if those things remain in place, it's still something that we need to look at, but I don't think there's going to be a huge concern there. If you start expanding the field of who else can put the sign in there or start expanding it beyond the neighborhood into other rights of way that are not in the neighborhood, I think you're going to open up the door to pretty much allow other types of signs that maybe you did not want to allow to be in the right way. Okay. Thank you. Mr. Crow? Yes, Council Member. Oh, I don't know if you heard the conversation. We were talking about the temporary sign, and my office probably calls your office more than anybody on the council. Not more than anybody, but we do hear from you frequently. Temporary signs are a difficult enforcement issue for us. Partly it's we don't have the manpower to do a continual comprehensive review of all the locations where temporary signs are placed. The ordinance allows a fairly broad amount of temporary signage to go up. You can have banner signs, for instance, in most business locations, and other locations can be up to 100 square feet placed for 30 days with a renewal up to 180, I believe, if memory serves me. Then there has to be a break in their display time. The problem is when has that break occurred? Has there been a break? we simply don't have an effective method for determining when those occur to know if that sign has exceeded that maximum amount of display time that it's allowed under the ordinance, which is fairly generous when you read the ordinance as far as that on the temporary signage. Of course, you've mentioned the temporary signs that go out in the medians in the right-of-way. The Division of Code Enforcement actually takes an active role in the removal of those out in their medians. The small little signs advertising all types of products and services, they continually pick those up literally by the hundreds throughout the, you know, certainly in the warm season of the year. We do support with them on if someone has erected one that they can't remove, then we step in and do that enforcement of that where it may take actually filing criminal complaints through court and those type of things to get action. All of that slows the process down again and can be very lengthy, especially when we file court action. It can take weeks, if not months, to get final resolution to those. And usually it ends up being a minor fine, as you're aware. We've discussed that before. The fines are not sufficient to deter individuals from violating those aspects of the ordinance. And as I voiced support for before, I feel that those fines should be increased. And, again, that has to be done through the state legislature, but I certainly support that as an effective deterrent to stop people from abusing the length of time they have signs up or the types and numbers that they have up. Okay. A couple questions. The temporary signs. Is there a permit process that they have to go through to be able to put the sign up originally? We currently don't issue permits for temporary signs. We've actually not done that for many years. In fact, it wasn't being done when I came on board. They simply felt that the volume of those and the tracking of that was not something that they could do on an effective basis. So we've never issued permits for temporary signage. Okay. It sounded like you said there was a process, though, once the time limits run out on the temporary date. The ordinance spells out certain time frames that you can display that. And it basically says, if memory serves me, that a temporary sign can be up for 30 days, and then it can be renewed for another 30 days, and basically up to, I think it's 180, which is roughly six months. And, again, I'm going from memory here on what the ordinance says. the problem is it basically kind of, if it just says it's more or less an automatic renewal. So if you're putting it out, you're going to get to keep it for 180 days. Whether you make a phone call and say, hey, can I keep it up another 30, or whether you don't, you're going to, you know, that's going to be kind of a default anyway. The problem is knowing if you have put that break in there, you've removed it for an amount of time after you've obtained that 138 display time. And as you probably are well aware, lots of them don't do that. Now, we enforce that mostly through complaint. If we receive complaints that a particular signage has been over-displayed or it's improperly displayed, that's how we deal with that. We go out when we receive a complaint, we review it, and make an appropriate enforcement action at that time. Okay, so when it's reissued, it's just as simple. They need to call in and say they want to renew? That's effectively all it is. they would notify us that they're going to continue displaying it for another period of time. Okay. And the break that has to be made between that 180 days and the next 180 days, if you will, is there a time frame on that? Is it 30 days or is it just one day? I don't believe there's any particular time frame. Again, I don't have the ordinance in front of me with me today, but there's not, again, a specific time frame. They just can't display it longer than that. So theoretically, yes, you could remove it today, have it down a day, put it back up, and go on. Do you know what the thinking was behind being able to reissue that for the 180 days? Actually, I don't know what the original reasoning for putting that particular provision in there. Chris King may have some information on that. He was there during when that was rewritten in the early 80s. Okay. What we found were a temporary sign might be a banner advertising a sale that a business would put up. And it necessarily wouldn't be the same event, but it would be a different event. I don't think anyone envisioned that someone would be continuing for six months. But the idea was that six months out of the year you could have temporary signs, but six months out of the year you couldn't. Okay. So, you know, whether the ordinance was drafted well, whether it's been enforceable, those are the kinds of things you can look at when they become an issue. But what we weren't talking about were those signs stuck in the right-of-way. Right. Those were always forbidden. Okay. So what we're talking about is, again, like a banner that someone put up sale or, you know, special this week beer, you know, $10 a 12-pack or something, you know. Okay. What about in gas stations on the poles that they have? Can they advertise on all those individual poles? If I recall, my guess is that for the most part, most of those probably might be technically illegal. Again, I'd have to go back and look at the specific ordinances and regulations for business zones. Could the two of you do something? and I'd be more than happy to work with you. We've kind of already done some of this groundwork, but can you come up with some recommendations to strengthen the law that would make it either, one, more enforceable, or two, I guess it's really more enforceable, I guess. You're talking about those incidental small signs as opposed to the... Well, that and the temporary also. For example, if the regulation were changed to say that you could put the sign up for 30 days, and even if you could renew for 180, let's say it had to come down for four months. I think that would make it easier for a Dewey's crew to see that they were in compliance because there had to be that four-month window as opposed to one day right now. It's impossible to enforce that. So could we work together to come up with some recommendations on that? And then also your recommendation, and I know you've already given it to us once, given it to me once, on what you'd like to see the fines change to. and then we can work with the council to maybe put a resolution to go forward to the state. And the last question would be, what does it take to change our ordinances so that the fines could go to an administrative hearing court rather than go to our local courts downtown? And that might be for Dewey. Technically, we have that ability now to do some of that civil penalty process This is what you're stating. There are some legal questions involved with the signs, and I'll leave that to Dave Barber to explain a little bit further. It depends on which signs you're talking about. The obstacle with the right-of-way signs and the civil enforcement is that the placement of a sign on public property without permission is a state law crime. So unless you can either change the KRS that sets up your administrative hearing boards to allow for enforcement of criminal fines like that in a civil manner, or change that state law, and I think it's in the actual criminal code, so it's in KRS 500-something, unless you've got that state law changed, you also indicate that it could be duly enforced criminally or civilly. you're kind of stuck on the right-of-way sign issue with that being the case until there's that state law change. Do you think the dual enforcement would be the best avenue to take in trying to get legislative change? Well, I don't want to speak for the legislature, but I think you'd have an easier time politically getting dual enforcement through rather than making it civil only, because there are some communities in the state where perhaps they'd like to keep it criminal instead of civil. Okay. One more question. And is there a way that because we're a merged government that we can get an exception that wouldn't create a change for the rest of the state? We could attempt to do that. I don't know how defensible that would end up being. Well, I just mean the way that our city is set up as an urban county government. There's really a common law, and it's not really constitutional, whether it's a common law underpinning regardless of what the statute says. The issue is you can't make conduct less than criminal in a jurisdiction if the state has determined that it's a crime within the state. That's the overriding issue. So unless the state comes in and says that we recognize that this could be addressed in a non-criminal fashion as well, that's the legal issue that's underpinning all of this. So you probably could have something like that done, but I don't know how defensible it's going to end up being that it's a crime everywhere else in the state of Kentucky except Fayette County. So that's the legal problem that comes up with that. Okay. Can I ask you to go ahead and draft the legislation? Could you look at the KRS and then maybe draft a change that would get us the duality of that? Sure, and I'd assume you'd like us to go ahead and get our legislative – I'm trying to remember what his position title is. I get to get Ned involved in that process as well. Yes. And then also, would you be the one that would draft the ordinance change to change the dollar amount of the fine? I hope not, but maybe. That may end up being through the regular planning process. Okay. We can get that done as well. Okay. Thank you. Sure. Thank you. Ms. Feigl? Thank you, Mr. Chair. We're working on a little amendment here. Would you leave it at 10? No. I was just talking with Council Member Martin about the neighborhood signs, and I would suggest an amendment because there could possibly be abuse of this and there is no limit on the number of signs that we would also, we would like to add to this that it shall not exceed 10 signs per event. And in addition to that, to change where it says not more than 10 days prior, change that to 7 days prior, and must be removed within 2 days of the completion of the event. The reason for that is those signs are probably going to be placed in the same location every time. And I have a corner house, so I know that my house would probably be, not my house in particular, but a corner house is going to be the location where these will go. And whoever is mowing the grass has to pick this up and move it. And the way this is worded, there are only about two weeks per month that a sign would not be there, assuming they had monthly meetings. So that's why we're limiting the number of days that the sign can be there. We have a motion to amend? I would accept that as a friendly amendment. Okay. Yeah, I second it. I'll accept it as a friendly amendment. Okay. Is there any other discussion? Hi. Mr. Myers? I guess I'd ask, are the neighborhoods that big that we need 10 signs to advertise a neighborhood meeting? Shall not exceed 10, so that would be the maximum. It could be one, it could be 10, but no more than 10, I think. Go ahead. We were trying to figure out how many a large neighborhood like Andover might need. A neighborhood like Chevy Chase, for example, has a lot of different types of entrances into there because it's on a grid pattern. So we were trying not to be so overly restrictive. You know, for my neighborhood, Beaumont, is a very large neighborhood, but I would accept we would I can't imagine they put out more than three or four. but I didn't want to try to be unfair to neighborhoods that might be not as set up like my particular neighborhood was. And Masterson Station, too, I think is a real large one. Any further, Mr. Myers? That's it. Thank you. Mr. Lane? Yeah, my neighborhood is very frugal. I'm sure they would put as few signs up as possible. Thank you. Any other comments? Mr. Beard? Yeah. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Mayor. Council Member Feigl, would it bother you to amend the friendly amendment to two business days as opposed to two days? That's fine. Does that work with... All you seconders and everybody can jump in whenever you want to. Does that work as a friendly? Okay. Is there any other comments, discussion? Mr. Myers, did you? Okay. We'll vote on the motion as friendly amended. All those in favor say aye. Aye. All those opposed, that passes. So that takes care of, I think, two of the items. The commercial one's dealt with, the neighborhood's dealt with, and I guess, Mr. Myers, the only one I guess would be the right-of-way one that you have, And I guess you've asked for some something for law, so that one's indirectly. So I think all of the issues with signs that we've talked about have been addressed at this point, I think. Have they not? Right away and temporary. Okay. With that, the only other items we have are items in the committee. And I think we're getting down to we're almost caught up here. Mr. Schoeniger, is there any here that, let's see, do you want to go through these real quick and see where we stand? Well, there's three that definitely, and it's my bad, that haven't been taken off. Taxi cabs, special permits, the golf carts, and the underground utilities, the new development. Okay. This committee has all dealt with those three, I believe. All right. The ice storm, I believe, I have a memo from KU from David Fryberg, and he would like to give a presentation to us, so we'll be hearing that in the near future. This next item, I think we're still waiting on some information from Solid Waste about some information they're receiving from the private providers. Animal cruelty. Mr. Myers. We've got that done, don't we? Yeah, that's actually done. And this is, again, my bad. It now should read horse cruelty. Council Member Beard put that in the same time you dealt with the animal cruelty issue. and we're working on that. Okay. We're still waiting on a petition back for Glendover and the employee usage and reimbursement? To be honest with you, I think we're waiting on a – General Services had indicated they wanted to provide an update after the present policy had been in existence for six months or a year. Okay. And then the last one is the curb replacement, and that one's been here for a long time. We need to deal with that or move on. So I'll take a motion to adjourn. All those in favor? I was opposed. We are adjourned. Thank you. The End But I became a man At the hands of a girl Almost twice my age And she came to me Just like the morning sun And it wasn't so much Her words as such As the way they were sung It was the way they were sung Desiree, oh Desiree There I was found by the sweet passion sound of your loving song Time was right, the night was long Remember Desiree, oh Desiree Somehow I knew I could only have you to the morning light If only for that single night Sweet Desiree you made it right Then came the fourth of June On that sleepless night When I tossed and I turned While the thought of what burned Up and down my mind For she was there and gone Without one regret But she continues on Like the words of a song I could not forget I could not forget Desiree, oh Desiree There I was found by those sweet passions Sounds of your loving song The time was right, the night was long Remember Desiree, oh Desiree And though somehow I knew I could only have you Till the morning light The night was long, the time was right Do you remember Desiree? Oh, Desiree. Do you remember Desiree? We'll be right back. I'm talking with my father and my feet doesn't fall Crazy people like it doesn't want to talk more Let me in, baby, I don't know what you got But you better take it easy, this place is high So glad you made it So glad you made it You got it Give me some love Give me, give me some love Give me some love Give me, give me some love Give me some love Hey, yeah. Hey! Well, I feel so good, never think it's gonna hurt. You better take your drinks and get the presents on fire. Been a hot day and a half for what you do We made it baby and it's half a deal And I'm so glad we made it So glad we made it You got Give me some love it Give me some love it Give me some love it Give me some love it Give me some love it Yeah Yeah Hey! Maybe you got to give me some love, baby. Give me some love, baby. Give me some love, baby. Give me some love, baby. Baby, give me some love. I need to give me some of your love, baby. Give me some love, baby. Give me some love, baby. Baby, give me some love. guitar solo I didn't think that I'd remember How could I forget? We sang Bobby McGee on the hood of my car Little wish on every star In that clear September sky One bottle of wine and two Dixie Cups 3 a.m. I fell in love for the first time in my life. Oh, that's something that just don't happen twice. To this day, I still taste that first kiss. How I prayed it wouldn't end. And in a way, seeing you like this I guess I never really did And we sang Bobby McGee on the hood of my car Man, we shone every star In that clear September sky One ball of wine and two Dixie Cups 3 a.m. I fell in love For the first time in my life Oh, that's something that just don't happen twice One bottle of wine and two Dixie Cups 3 a.m. I fell in love For the first time in my life Oh, that's something Baby, that's something Oh, that's something That just don't happen twice Oh, yeah We sang Bobby McGee on the hood of my car Let a wish on every star One mile, one and two dixie cups Yeah, we fell in love I was a fool to ever leave your side Me minus you is such a lonely ride The breakup we had has made me lonesome and sad I realize I love you cause I want you back I spent the evening with the radio Regret the moment that I let you go Our quarrel was such a way of learning so much. I know now that I love you cause I need your touch. Reunited and it feels so good. Reunited cause we understood. There's one perfect fit And sugar, this one is it We both are so excited Cause we're reunited Hey, hey I sat here staring at the same old wall Came back to life just when I got your call I wished I could climb right through the telephone line And give you what you want so you will still be my favorite I can't go cheating, honey I can't play I found it very hard to stay away As we reminisce on precious moments like this I'm glad we're back together Cause I missed your kiss Hey, hey, hey Reunited and it feels so good Reunited cause we understood There's one perfect fit And sugar this one is it We both are so excited Cause we're reunited Hey, hey Yeah, yeah, yeah Baby Oh, lover, lover, this is solid love And you're exactly what I'm dreaming of All through the day and all through the night I'll give you all the love I have with all my might Hey, hey, we united and it feels so good. We united cause we understood. There's one perfect thing and sugar, this one is it. Thank you. Home wheels drive you crazy. Lighten up while you still can. Don't even try to understand. Just find a place to make your stand. Take it easy. Well, I'm standing on a corner in Winslow, Arizona. It's such a fine sight to see. It's a girl, my Lord, in a flatbed board Slowin' down to take a look at me Come on, baby Don't say, baby I gotta know if your sweet love is gonna save me We may lose and we may win But we will never be here again So open up, I'm climbing in So take it easy