200g flour 1 tsp cardamom powder 1 tsp cinnamon powder A pinch of salt seekoo blossom live it It is 10.30 on January 18th and today we have our organizing meetings for our various standing committees and this is economic and community development committee and the item on our agenda today is to elect a chair and then the chair will select a vice chair and the voting members of this committee are Gorton, Ellinger, Beard, Stennett, Crosby, Myers and Lane and then we welcome our extra friends council members Martin, Farmer, Kay, Blues and McCord and I think that what we'll do today is because I think perhaps more than one person will run for chair of some of our committees today is that we'll have nominations and then we'll ask each person who's nominated to express in 60 seconds why they would like to have the chair and then we'll vote if that suits committee members that seems like maybe the fairest way to go so if you want to nominate someone please log in to the computer and we'll keep our list now I'm anticipating a list here of people nominated so first case councilmember Crosby yes after talking with councilmember Beard I think this is something that he would very much be interested in so I would like to nominate Julian okay motion to nominate Julian Beard and second by councilmember Ellinger are there others to add to the list councilmember Myers now yeah councilmember Myers thank you vice mayor if I could say just a couple words before I make my nomination I'll keep it brief you know it's sort of the architect behind this whole restructure one of the things was important that we fought and many of us fought for this all the way down to the end was to separate this committee from economic development from budget finance and I think that this is the most important committee that this government has because with the economy the way it is with jobs being scarce I know Bernanke the Fed chair said it's probably gonna be four to five years before the economy gets back to where it was before 2008 and another economist said that the unemployment rate may never go back down to 5% as a country and so this is the committee that reaches outside the rest of my view more setting policy and doing things inside this committee reaches outside allows this government to position itself to create economic development to foster a environment where people feel free to come here and develop economically and create jobs and retain the jobs that we currently have so to me it's important that we have a person that chairs this committee that is currently doing some of those things and so the format that you announced is going to allow the person I'm going to nominate to give you the 60-second commercial on why they should be this but I'm nominating that person because I believe that this is the most important committee that we have as important that we have the very best candidate on the council chairing this committee and for those reasons and the reasons that are gonna be stated shortly I nominate Kevin Stennett. Thank you. Okay are there other nominations? No. Councilmember? Yes. Was there a second for Councilmember Meyers? Okay thank you. Councilmember Layne seconds. And actually so now we have two motions that have been made. My intent was to develop a list of folks who want to run not to have two separate motions because my intent is that we'll you know have one vote so I'm not sure Mr. Parliamentarian what what would you recommend at this point? Or do you want to recuse yourself? It's not about that it's just you do have two motions on the floor you would have to dispose of the first one first okay all right or do you need a motion to nominate that's the decision of the chair do you need motions to nominate? We can dispose of the motions to not these are simply to nominate so we can go back and there was a motion to if you'll indulge me to nominate Councilmember Beard for chair and there was a second I believe by Councilmember Ellinger so all those in favor of that nomination please say aye. Opposed? Okay and there's a nomination for placing Councilmember Stennett on the ballot and the second was by Councilmember Layne motion by Councilmember Meyers to nominate yes just a place for nomination. Any discussion about that one? All those in favor say aye. Anyone opposed? And is there any other nomination? Okay if Councilmember Beard will take 60 seconds to tell us why he would like to be chair and then Councilmember Stennett and then we'll proceed with voting. Thank you. 60 seconds. I'll do that in less than time. Councilmember Meyers. Thank you Madam Vice Mayor. Since this is the only thing on the agenda today, besides looking at what's referred to the committee and we have a half hour, I say let them talk. Do you want to break the five-minute rule or go with five-minute rule? I say break the five-minute rule. I mean this is the most important meeting that we have in terms of putting together our chair. Okay is that a motion to give them let's see that would be giving one ten minutes the other ten minutes and we'll take two minutes to vote. So moved. Do I hear a second? The motion dies for a lack of second. All right are there any other motions about speaking time? Okay I mean I'm happy to go with the five-minute rule if that and then you can use as much or as little of it as you want. So if you'll set the clock please. Councilmember Beard. Again, thank you Chair. Through my career, banking is economic development. Banking concerns itself with economic development. That's the way banks grow. Otherwise all banks do is swap deposits and loans around within a relatively small circle of entities. And I did that for probably 30 of my 49, 50 years of banking. Economic development. I have also been involved, the mayor had asked me to actually be on there's a dual transition team. One which involves the interface with Commerce Lexington and another one that's just a little bit more high in the sky as a group. I've been going to those meetings and following those and there seems to be, as Councilmember Myers mentioned, it seems to be a pretty hot topic and everybody is very concerned about the situation we're in in relationship to the economy. And it, you know, just looking at the Dow Jones industrial average doesn't necessarily get it. We add jobs in Lexington but sadly enough in the last three or four years most of the jobs that we've added are replacing the $60,000 jobs with $25,000 jobs. So as far as we're concerned, we're somewhat behind the eight ball is our occupational license fee. It gets cut essentially in half or better from that pool of people. I did serve under Teresa Isaac as economic development director and the job I didn't really seek. We couldn't find an economic development director that would come for next to nothing and I was on that transition team also and so I went to Teresa and asked her if she so wished I would be glad to serve for six months until we could find somebody. And she said no, you got to take, you got to bite off four years rather than six months or not at all. And so that's how I ended up as economic development director for four years. You overlay all that with the four years I've had, four years and two weeks that I've had on council and it's obviously, you know, we have thrashed around with economic development. We've, Mayor Newberry had worked on, I've got 22 seconds. I'll just stop for there. We all know what problems are with economic development and we're struggling to find out exactly how we're going to get there and there are going to be some suggestions from the transition teams and I'm sure you'll be interested in those also. Thank you all. Council Member Stennett. Thank you, Vice Mayor. You know, three years ago this government and this council for the most part wasn't even in the economic development game. We were lacking leadership and a direction to where we're going to focus our economic development efforts. I made the motion three years ago to form the economic development task force. I was co-chair of that task force with now Mayor Gray. A lot of good came from that task force and one of the things that came out was this committee. In addition to those things internally, externally, I'm on the Chamber of Commerce's economic development team composed of about 15 other individuals from all walks of life and businesses in Fayette County, including UK, including major employers such as Toyota. So I'm part of that team as well as was on the infancy and selection committee for the current study that we're doing with economic development through Angela Economics. I helped select that consulting firm. I was there from the beginning. I'm also on the 40-member steering committee that will help implement that economic development study, which is a major crux and will be delivered to this council in February. And then we paid half of the money for that study. So we'll also be half responsible for helping implement it and meet those six targets. So those things that I've accomplished the last three years aren't by accident. I take economic development very serious. As former chair in budget and finance, I understand the importance of finances. I understand the importance of growing jobs, of growing the economy. Now that's just half of what the committee will be responsible for. The other half, community development. Let's talk about that. We have several outside agencies that will be reporting to this committee. I'm on the Lexington Center Board. You know, we all know the critical need for discussion on the downtown arena. That will report out to this committee. Commerce Lexington, once again, will report out to this committee. I'm on their economic development board as well. Not to mention the neighborhood bond council or the neighborhood grant that goes through community development will also come through this committee, which I'm the council representative on determining those neighborhoods that get grants. So there's two pieces to the pie. There's economic development and there's community development for this committee. I put my qualifications out there. They are what they are. I would argue that no one's worked harder the last three years to get us into this spot of economic development. And again, I'll be managing and helping implement the new consultant study, again, once we'll have the first week of February. So that's why I want to be economic development chair. For all those things that I've been involved with and represent the council on already, we'll continue to do so no matter what. This is not about me being on or off budget and finance. Apparently there's, you know, there's efforts out there by some council members to keep me off it for whatever reason. This is not about that. This is about economic development. This is about this committee and doing the right thing for council and putting the best person in the best spot to be our representative in the community. And that's what I've done the last three years. And I hope you can see that and vote me chair. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Stennett. Is there any other comment? Council Member Myers. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I was just wondering if, just to kind of keep things equal since Council Member Beard got to speak first, if we could take the vote first on Council Member Stennett. Council Member Blues. Thank you, Madam Chair, Vice Mayor. I'm not a member of this committee. I, with permission, would like to speak on behalf of one of the two candidates. I would defer to members of the committee who might want to go first. I have no members of the committee listed yet who want to speak, so why don't you go ahead and speak. With permission. Thank you very much. I think the committee is blessed with two highly qualified candidates with good experience. It's been my experience, four years on council, of working with both Council Member Beard and Council Member Stennett, that both have not only qualifications, but also an interest in this. But I would say that I think that Council Member Stennett has been most actively, energetically, and consistently involved in the economic development enterprise over the last several years, and that we do, I think, need to keep that momentum going, the experience that he has built up, and the knowledge that he has. I think that's what tips the balance here. So I would ask the committee to take those qualifications into consideration as you vote in a few minutes. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Thank you. Does anyone else wish to speak? Mr. Myers. Thank you, Madam Vice Mayor. I have to agree with what Dr. Bluth said. We have two good candidates. Council Member Beard was Economic Development Director for four years, and so that's, you know, that's there in his resume. But I look at Council Member Stennett's resume, and I see that he's currently doing these things of economic development, and he's currently representing the Council, this government, in various facets, whether it be on Commerce Lexington's Economic Development Board, whether it be on the Steering Committee for the Angelou Study, which is going to be coming back, I guess, pretty shortly, to co-chairing the Economic Development Task Force for the City. So what I think is important is that we have someone that's currently doing these things because they're already engaged and plugged in to the system by which economic development takes place. So I encourage my colleagues to vote for Council Member Stennett. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else wish to speak? Council Member Ellinger has a question. Thank you, Vice Mayor. What is the procedure that we're going to use in voting? Because when Council Member Meyer said would you do either or, I thought we'd probably just vote them at the same time, would we not? I don't see this. It's one motion. Yeah, it's one motion. Are we going to? Well, someone's name has to come first. Well, I think we just say who you. We could, let's see, we, I mean, we could use electronic voting, which wouldn't be any different than hand vote. I would think that would be better. Do a paper ballot or however we do it. Now, Mr. Farmer was here when we used to use paper ballots. Do you remember? We used to use a paper ballot when more than one person ran. I still have some with me. So that's also an option. What is the pleasure of the committee? Because we have two candidates. We can either do a paper ballot, we can do electronic voting, or hand count. But do you have a reference? Council Member Ellinger. I think sometimes a paper ballot is the best way and I think it that way. Feelings aren't heard on our council members that have to work together, but that's just my opinion. I don't mind raising my hand either way. So. Mr. Schoeniger, could you make us a paper ballot? Vice Mayor. If it's what we decide to do. Council Member Crosby. I'm one point through. And just in that, I spoke to Mr. Beard prior to this and he'd asked for my opinion long before I knew Mr. Stinton was going to be involved. I already gave him my, told him that I would support him. So like I said, a paper ballot or a hand doesn't matter because I've already made my commitment. And the second thing, Mr. Stinton, you'd raised this issue and I wasn't going to bring it up, but you talked about being on the budget finance and the six chairs and the three at large are on the budget to make up the nine. Does that mean that if you're on, you raise that issue, would you then consider then also being on the budget chair then also? Because you are presently in the budget chair right now. And that would probably give you the two most powerful positions. With it being this, if the economic development, if you won that, then would you run for that too? Or would you just consider just being economic development and not run for that one? Do you want to answer, Mr. Stinton? I'd be glad to. First, I don't think, you know, I think the discussion for who should be chair should be in this room. You know, I know you gave your commitment to that and therefore the discussion who should be chair of budget and finance should be members of the budget and finance committee. I wasn't going to raise that issue until you brought it up. No, I didn't bring it up. I never said I want to be chair of budget and finance. Today we're talking about economic development and I want to be chair of economic development. I could care less about budget and finance right now. Did you have anything else? Okay, now Councilmember Crosby was on the list and you went off. Okay, Councilmember Lane. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I just have a problem with doing secret ballot. You know, we're in government. We're supposed to be full disclosure and for us to do a secret ballot I think is sort of chicken. I think we should vote for who we feel is the best person and let the cards fall where they may. To do the secret ballot I think is inappropriate. So I would encourage you to rethink that. I don't see why I mean I don't know why we couldn't just vote, you know, for both parties at one time. Have a simultaneous vote. Thank you. Councilmember Myers. Councilmember Lane said my sentiments. Thank you. Councilmember Crosby. Yeah, I was going to share some of the same sentiments about doing a written ballot except for the fact that it could be confusing with both names up there, but I agree. I think we need to be transparent with our votes and I will say I talked to Councilmember Beard when he expressed interest that he wanted to do this and certainly we are very blessed to have two very highly qualified people. I didn't know until I got down here that Councilmember Stinnett was wanting to do this and again it's a good thing when you've got very qualified people who who want to chair the committee. That's not, that's a great problem to have. I will say that they're both, they both have a lot of experience and the one thing that just kind of struck me as I was listening to Councilmember Beard is that a lot of his experience, his professional experience within business and actually doing this position and it was a different time when he was our economic development director. We weren't in the same type of economy and and the focus was a little different I believe at that time which hence the job would be a little different that he had to do at that point. I listened to the great experience that Councilmember Stinnett has and you know he's been very blessed to be appointed to boards that allow him to do some outreach and to be appointed as chair of budget and finance. Last time those were good appointments and got him a lot of experience so you know it's it's difficult when you have two people who have a lot of great qualities and attributes but you know I think that looking at how you got there and that really is I think important in this decision process. Thank you. Anyone else? All right it seems that the sentiment is not to do a paper ballot. Does that suit everyone? We'll just vote by name, by hand. We'll just raise hands. Does that suit the committee members? Just keep in mind there are people watching us on TV. I think it'd be nice to have a just vote on the electronic electronically so we have a record of it. That's fine. That's the same as a hand vote really. Are you able to set that up? Madam Chairman what if we did a voice vote and just call the council members name and we say the party we're voting for? That way we would have a good record and it would simplify the process. Does anyone have a concern with that? We'll just roll through the voting. Do you have a concern with that? Okay. Okay. And while we're waiting for that I will go ahead and make my comments. I agree with everyone who's spoken that it is a good thing to have two well-qualified candidates. We won't necessarily have that in every committee I think. You know I mean that didn't sound like what I meant. What I meant Mr. Farmer is that we might only have one person running. We might have several well-qualified ones but only one will run. Oh dear. Oh well. I will say four different people spoke to me about running. So I'm and I thought any one of the four would have been really good. I know how this goes with elections. At the last moment some drop out. But we will have good quality candidates for every committee Mr. Farmer. It's just that we may not necessarily have two or three running every time. So I think this is a good problem to have. And so with that will you go ahead and can you call? We're gonna do it individually right? Yes. Council Member Gordon. Beard. Council Member Ellinger. Beard. Council Member Beard. Council Member Stennett. Council Member Crosby. Council Member Myers. Stennett. And Council Member Layne. Stennett. Council Member believes to be four to three for Council Member Beard. Thank you for doing that. I think that'll work for future committees too. Council Member Beard, do you have a vice chair that you'd like to ask? I've had a couple of names that I've been struggling with and if in fact I was going to have an opportunity to actually name a vice chairman. I was sitting here listening to this whole thing and my competition I guess. I hate to call him an opponent because he's not an opponent. My competition for this job, he makes a lot of very strong points about what he has done in economic development recently. And I would like to ask him to be vice chair if he would. So you know this way we can have two big guns working for economic development at the same time. So I would like Kevin if he would to be my vice chair. Very good. Very good. Thank you very much. Seeing as how there's no other business to come before the committee, all those in favor of adjourning say aye. Anyone opposed? We have about two minutes before Social Services Committee.