# Council General Government Committee - January 24, 2011 > Auto-transcribed civic record · January 24, 2011 - **Permalink**: https://meetings.lexingtonky.news/meeting/1865 - **Source video**: https://lfucg.granicus.com/player/clip/1865?view_id=14&redirect=true - **Date**: 2011-01-24 - **Last revised**: July 17, 2026 - **Length**: 13,630 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 General Government Committee met on February 1, 2011, at 1:00 p.m., with Ed Lane presiding. The committee addressed four agenda items during the meeting, hearing six public comments and taking two votes. Two items—Utility Franchises and an Update on Internal Audit Board Members, Charter, Bylaws, and State Auditor Report—were deferred for future consideration. The committee received an informational presentation on Employee Wellness Programs and conducted a first reading on New Business Items. ## Attendance The following individuals were present at the meeting on January 24, 2011: - Ed Lane - Jay McChord - Steve Kay - Chris Ford - K. C. Crosbie - Doug Martin - George Myers - Jerry Southers - Scott Seymour - Dave Barbary - Bruce Shelley - Jennifer Massadi - Jennifer Burke - Richard Maloney - Rebecca Langston No absences or late arrivals were recorded. ## Votes and Decisions **Motion on Utility Franchise Negotiations Follow-up** [timestamp: 00:33:15] A motion was made by Ed Lane and seconded by K. C. Crosbie to have David Barbary and Jennifer Massadi return on March 22nd with a follow-up report on utility franchise negotiations. The motion passed by voice vote. Those voting in favor were Ed Lane, Jay McChord, Steve Kay, Chris Ford, K. C. Crosbie, Doug Martin, and George Myers. **Motion on Internal Audit Board Ordinance Amendment** [timestamp: 00:51:04] A motion was made by K. C. Crosbie and seconded by Steve Kay to refer the Internal Audit Board ordinance amendment to the General Government Committee for consideration. This motion was withdrawn. ## Public Comment Council members raised several topics during the meeting: **Utility Franchise Renegotiation** Council Member Beard inquired about franchise processes used in other jurisdictions and whether they align with IRS requirements [timestamp: 00:12:48]. He clarified that there is no legal requirement for coterminity and that franchises are negotiated independently. Council Member Martin suggested benchmarking against other cities during franchise renegotiation [timestamp: 00:21:53]. He recommended reviewing agreements from cities like Louisville and Cincinnati to avoid duplicating work already completed elsewhere. **Employee Wellness Programs** Council Member Ellinger shared findings from a USA Today article about Oakland County, Michigan [timestamp: 00:14:41]. The article highlighted a wellness program that reduced health insurance costs by nearly 12% over two years through risk assessments and preventive care initiatives. Council Member McCord proposed an ambitious goal for the city [timestamp: 01:07:33]. He suggested making Lexington Fayette Urban County government the healthiest public sector workforce in America within five years, emphasizing the importance of culture change and prevention strategies. Council Member Beard recommended researching Ashland Oil's on-site gym facility [timestamp: 01:18:51]. He noted potential benefits of workplace fitness facilities while acknowledging challenges with employee retention of gym memberships. **Internal Audit Board Bylaws** Council Member Crosby raised a concern about information sharing [timestamp: 00:38:08]. He asked whether external audit reports should be shared with the Internal Audit Board, noting a discrepancy between 32 audits completed and only a few known to the board. ## Appointments The following appointments to the Internal Audit Board were made: * **Richard Maloney** was appointed to the Internal Audit Board * **Rebecca Langston** was appointed to the Internal Audit Board ## Contested Items **Internal Audit Board Ordinance Amendment** A procedural dispute arose regarding an ordinance amendment related to the Internal Audit Board. The disagreement centered on whether the committee should proceed with action on the amendment without conducting a full review. Concerns were raised about the lack of prior committee consideration of the ordinance amendment and the incomplete information available to members at the time of discussion. These issues prompted questions about the appropriateness of moving forward with a vote under those circumstances. Following discussion of these concerns, the motion was withdrawn. ## Utility Franchises [timestamp: 00:04:30] Dave Barbary provided a briefing on utility franchises, covering the legal framework governing these agreements, current franchise terms, and the negotiation process for their renewal and modification. **Key Topics Discussed** Barbary explained the structure and requirements of utility franchises, with particular attention to franchise duration and fee rates. He noted that current franchise fees are set at 3%, with the potential for these rates to increase to 5%. A significant focus of the presentation was the need to update older franchises, specifically those covering water and cable services, which require modernization to reflect current conditions and standards. **Outcome** The committee deferred further action on this item and agreed to receive a follow-up report scheduled for March 22nd. This timeline allows for additional analysis and preparation before the next discussion. ## Update on Internal Audit Board - Members/Charter/Bylaws/State Auditor Report [timestamp: 00:34:26] Bruce Shelley provided an update on the Internal Audit Board's current status and organizational matters. The board is operating with two vacancies that require attention before proceeding with certain governance actions. **Key Issues Discussed:** - **Vacancies:** The Internal Audit Board currently has two open positions that need to be filled. - **Bylaws Adoption:** The board has delayed adopting bylaws until it is fully constituted with all members in place. - **Ordinance Amendment:** The committee discussed the need to approve an ordinance amendment to add two new community members to the board. This action was necessary to address the existing vacancies. **Outcome:** The motion to approve the ordinance amendment was withdrawn pending further review. The committee deferred action on this item, indicating that additional consideration or information is needed before moving forward with the proposed changes. Jennifer Burke participated in the discussion alongside Bruce Shelley. ## Employee Wellness Programs Council Member McCord introduced a proposal to transform the city's workforce into the healthiest public sector workforce in America within five years. The discussion centered on the financial and cultural benefits of implementing comprehensive wellness initiatives for city employees. **Key Speakers and Support** Council Member McCord led the discussion, with support from Council Members Ellinger, Crosby, and Beard. Multiple council members expressed backing for the wellness proposal during the meeting. **Proposal Highlights** The proposal emphasized both the health and economic advantages of employee wellness programs. Council members referenced examples from Oakland County, Michigan, as a model for successful wellness initiatives in the public sector. **Outcome** The agenda item was presented as informational, with no formal vote or binding decision recorded. The discussion served to introduce the wellness proposal to the council and gather input from members. [timestamp: 01:07:33] ## New Business Items [timestamp: 01:24:30] The council addressed two new business matters during this portion of the meeting. Council Member Myers referred a matter concerning facilities occupancy policy for consideration. Council Member Martin proposed legislation to establish electronic public access to government data. The key speakers on these items included Ed Lane, Doug Martin, George Myers, and Chris Ford. In response to both proposals, the council agreed to form work groups to address each item. This approach would allow for detailed examination and development of recommendations before further action. The outcome of this discussion was a first reading of the proposed legislation. --- ## Decisions - **Motion** — passed: Motion to have David Barbary and Jennifer Massadi return on March 22nd with a follow-up report on utility franchise negotiations - **Motion** — withdrawn: Motion to refer the Internal Audit Board ordinance amendment to the General Government Committee for consideration --- ## Full transcript Music Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. guitar solo guitar solo Thank you. Thank you. And then Doug Martin, who's the 10th District Council Member, and George Myers, who's the 8th District Council Member. The first item on the agenda today is the – do we need a roll call on this? Okay. The first item on the agenda today is utility franchises. Mr. Barbary from the legal department is here to give us a short briefing on that. For those council members that don't know me, I'm Dave Barbary with the Department of Law. Now, I've been the Department of Law contact on franchises since probably about 2002, and this will be the fourth time, I think, in that time frame that we will be in place to renew some of these different type utility franchises, and we'll get to that in a minute. Historically, we've used a telecommunications advisory officer position to assist with the negotiations when we do these. I'm not aware that that position was ever refilled after Mr. Starkweather left our employment a couple years ago. I think the current plan is to have Jennifer Massadi be the point person for the administration in conjunction with me on negotiating the next round of franchises that need to be negotiated. This first, and I guess what I'll do is I'll present some brief background, and then if you all have any questions, feel free to ask me. The first sheet that you all have in your packet just gives you some general background on what utility franchises are. The Public Service Commission actually is the entity that grants the jurisdiction for a utility to provide the service within territories in the state of Kentucky. I think I provided the statute that goes along with that in your packet as well. Well, that pretty much applies to all of the utility types we're going to talk about except cable, which is only regulated at the federal and local level but not at the state level. The franchise is the legal mechanism that allows us to grant the utility the use of our public right-of-way space. that's pretty much laid out by constitutional provisions 163 and 164, which are also in your packet that's been provided to you all. A franchise by its nature under the law is non-exclusive in nature. The way we do it procedurally is we come up with a franchise ordinance which has the requirements of the franchise itself. You all publish that in the form of an ordinance. We pre-negotiate that with the larger utilities and allow the smaller ones to also take part in those negotiations, but typically they have not played a meaningful role in those. As an example, on the electric one, we will spend a lot of time negotiating provisions with Kentucky Utilities, and then I think there's two or three other electrical franchisees that are aware that that's going on are invited to do that as well, but normally they do not directly partake in those negotiations. We advertise out that franchise ordinance, and then it's just like anything else we advertise out for bid. There's a time period for them to submit their response to that advertisement, similar to your other purchasing-type situations. A franchise under the Constitution cannot be more than 20 years in duration. As a practical matter, your current franchises that have been most recently renegotiated, I think, are on three-year timeframes. So we've drastically gone down from the 20-year maximum in the last couple rounds of negotiation. That is an area probably for further discussion before it gets back to you all as to whether that three years should possibly be extended out to a larger duration. On most of these franchises, with the exception of cable and telecom, we are compensated through a franchise fee. The way that works is it's a separate line item that appears on the customer's bill. Right now, they are more or less at a 3% of gross revenue amount. We have the legal authority, and this would have to be inclusive of whatever other extra fees are being applied to go up to 5%. But 3% is pretty much what your standard going rate is for our current franchises. We adopted a comprehensive regulatory scheme that applies to right-of-way permitting back in 2002. That's codified. As a result of that, a lot of what might be historically included in a franchise is instead included in there, and that document is incorporated by reference into the franchise agreements. We currently have franchise agreements for water, electric, gas, telecommunications, and cable. And once again, they range in duration from three years, that's on the newer ones, to 20 years. The Kentucky American one is the current one that you have that's 20 years in duration. This is actually a summary of your existing franchises by type of utility. I believe this is the order that they come up for expiration. You have a natural gas franchise with Columbia Gas and Delta Natural Gas. That is set to expire in July of this year. You had an electric franchise with those three electric utilities. That is set to expire in August of this year. You have a telecommunications franchise with the entities that are listed on there, and that is to expire in December. Moving down that list, you also have a single franchise with one cable entity. That's Insight. That is set to expire in September of next year. You all renewed that with a five-year extension back in 2007. So that franchise is actually more or less the 1992 franchise. So it's probably in the 20-year variety also because it hasn't had any substantive changes to it since 1992. And then you have the water franchise, which is set to expire in 2015, and you actually have a smaller company that obtained that same franchise in 1999, but it is coterminous with the Kentucky American franchise. And I think the process that we would, I think what we're going to end up doing is we have the right to audit the financials on what we're getting in franchise fees on the electric and gas companies. I think the plan administratively is to go ahead and do that before we enter into the next franchises. I think the plan is for Ms. Massadi and I to open up negotiations probably in the short term with the electric, gas, and telecom franchisees with the idea that we would have franchises for your approval before those dates that are listed up there. I think the big picture items that probably are up for discussion, although there may be some smaller ones as well as some newer issues, Normally the duration as well as the amount of the franchise fee are the big picture issues for discussion. A lot of that's resulted in the fact that with three of these types, gas, telecom, and electric, we've actually negotiated them three other times in the last ten years. So we've kicked around a lot of the other issues, and I think maybe some of those have been resolved more or less and would not necessarily be something unless you all or the administration had an interest in bringing that up and having those things revisited. and I'd be happy to answer any questions that you all have. Does anybody have a question to ask? Mr. Beard? Thank you. I'm not a member of the committee, but I'm auditing today. Were one or more of these utilities or in other jurisdictions, Do the other jurisdictions go through a process themselves, coterminous with IRS? I think that they are required to go under a similar process. I can't speak to how closely they follow. I mean, there are some variances in how different municipalities actually advertise these out and some other nuances like that. But what happens is the municipality negotiates out the franchise. By the way, they're not coterminous with IRS. There's no requirement that they run in conjunction with ours. There's no requirement legally that they be identical to ours, although obviously if KU is providing service in 25 different counties, they'd like the franchises to look as much alike as possible. That's one of their strategies in negotiation. They don't want a great deal of variance, understandably, for them, in what these franchises look like, because then the idea is if you gave it to Lexington, you have to give it to me or vice versa. So there is no requirement that they be coterminous. They do take these to the Public Service Commission for approval. Once you all actually enter into it, they're required to go ahead and do that as part of their regulatory process. But there is no requirement that they be coterminous anywhere else or necessarily even identical in other jurisdictions. So what, this gets a little complex, but if we were to decide that we wanted to terminate a franchise and we have the lion's share of the revenues of that entity, what do the other folks do? I mean, they're kind of left hanging, I would think, if we were to enforce our right not to renew the franchise agreement. I mean, it's a practical matter, but Jessamine County, for instance, I think has pretty much the same things we have. How would that work, Dan? Well, once again, the right to do business in the state is set through the PSC. Our franchise authority is for use of our rights of way. There is some case law that suggests you have to be reasonable in how you treat a utility with respect to renegotiating an existing franchise. So I think you'd have to have a good faith basis if you chose not to renew a franchise with a utility. And I think ultimately, if you are successful in not renewing the franchise, if they decided to challenge that reasonability basis, what they are left with is over time they would be required to remove their facilities from our rights of way. That may or may not, as a practical matter, put them out of business in Fayette County. I don't know that it really impacts another county one way or the other unless it puts them out of business and they're no longer able to provide that service to that other county either. But if, in fact, the revenues generated are 90% or more of Fayette County, The practicality is that they, whomever they may be, and I guess everybody already guessed who that. Depending on the utility, it may have the practical impact. If you did not have that service being provided in Fayette County anymore, it may have a detrimental impact on another county. Okay. Thank you, Chair. Anybody, any other council member have a question? Okay. Thank you, Chair. The reason I put this in committee was I thought it was important that we be proactive in our agreements. It looks like we have quite a few that are coming up here in this next year. So I'm glad you're going to be getting together. So the way that it's going to work is you and Ms. Massadi are going to be working with the different utilities on coming up with an agreement. And I guess what I'm implying, what I stated earlier is, and we're going to have some internal meetings to see if there's something we're missing other than this duration and fee issue. I suspect unless there is something like that, they are going to look a lot like what your franchises look like now for these respective utilities because we have been through the process of renegotiating them almost constantly in the last eight or ten year period. It's probably going to look substantially different when you get to cable and water because we have not renegotiated those pretty much in the last 20 years. So I think this go-round may look a little bit different than the next go-round in that, to my knowledge, I certainly haven't had the time to do it. I haven't sat down and compared what's in the current water franchise with what's in our newer utility franchises. And I know the water franchise, for instance, does not cross-reference Chapter 17C in our permitting requirements, and I believe it's probably the case that they do not fully comply with that section of our code of ordinances as a result of having a franchise that predates our enacting that law. So those two franchises, the cable one and the water one, I suspect are going to have the most just per se changes made to the existing franchises, and that's pretty much as a result of their age. One of the issues that was raised back with the water is that we requested the water company to come speak to us. And I know when we talked about something that we might put in or look at our agreements might be an issue, and I guess with all of them is I know the PSC regulates the utilities, but what can we also ask from the utilities? As far as presenting information? Exactly. And request to come for the council. I don't know that it would be, I mean, and that would be something we would discuss with them as part of the negotiation process, if that's what you all want to do. But I don't know that it strikes me as being unreasonable to require a utility to provide regular updates. I think the nuance that you all may – I mean, we may need some specifics on exactly what you all want them to do and in what fashion you all want them to present that information to you all in. But as far as presenting regular, you know, informational or updated status reports, I don't think there's anything inappropriate about requiring them to do that as part of a franchise agreement. And I guess when you look at the present agreements and the negotiations, I think something when you all do that is to look into that and see what our options are and what the negotiation would allow for that. One of the issues you talked about was the current fee on newer franchises of 3%, and you could defend increasing the fee to 5%. Could you explain what you mean by that? Yeah, the case law kind of draws a line at 5% or greater than 5% of gross revenues when you use this as your model of obtaining a franchise fee. And historically, for whatever reason, cable is the only one that I'm aware of that we ever raised to 5%. And that was immediately before the implementation of the telecom tax. We are still involved in a lawsuit over that tax because we've experienced a revenue shortfall of in excess of $1 million a year ever since that's been on the books because it's underfunded at the state level. They came up with an amount of money that was supposed to apply throughout the state for anyone that had franchises of that nature, us being one of them, and they underestimated what that amount was. So as a result of that, every year that that's been in effect, which I think 2006 is the first year it was in full effect, we've experienced $1 million or more of revenue shortfall that we used to get from that type of franchise. We are in a lawsuit right now that we've been successful on so far every step of the way that if the Supreme Court doesn't take it up, it'll be the law that hopefully we can go ahead and get at least $400,000 of that a year back on a recalculation going forward, not going back. The other ones, for whatever reason, we have never, we being the Irving County government, have never gone beyond the 3% amount. even though that arguably is something that if you all wanted to do, you could go up to a thought. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Chair. Mr. Martin. Thank you, Chair. As we look at renegotiating these franchises, one of the questions I have is whether and to what extent we look at other cities of similar or larger size as a model for how we do these. Do we, like, for example, with the upcoming, I guess, electrical utility or cable utility, do we, I guess, get a copy of their agreements and see what kind of things, bells and whistles they've built into their relationship? I'm not aware of that having been done probably the last two times we've negotiated the franchises. If that's something you all would like us to do, we'd be happy to do that. The question that comes up is whether you'd go beyond. I mean, once you get outside Kentucky, you've got different nuances, and then once you possibly get outside of that particular utility, you may have some nuances as well. KU, as a practical matter, we are the largest customer for KU. And when you get over west of here, it's LG&E, a separate entity. Technically, they're under the same corporate umbrella. But, I mean, if you all want us to look at what Louisville has, for instance, in their franchises, that's fine. Well, I think what Louisville or Cincinnati or Indianapolis, I think it's always helpful to sort of eyeball what other things folks have thought of and other types of protections and other types of things. I just think it helps not to reinvent the wheel and we could get just an easy check on where we are. And I agree with Council Member Ellinger's comments about their coming to talk to us. That obviously became an issue last year. And certainly I think that whether they can come down on a certain number of days' notice or something like that, but I think that would have been an easy way to have them come down and talk to us. and they took the position that because they were pending before the, I guess it's the Public Services Commission, that they didn't want to jeopardize their case or prejudice their case, and therefore they're going to deal with them and not us. But I think that that certainly would have been a way to force them down. And the way I saw it, I didn't think we had a right to – we didn't have anything to throw at them. And so I would agree with seeing that in the franchise agreement. I think that's certainly a reasonable thing, and that would certainly take that away from being an issue in the future. To what extent do you all plan on sort of updating counsel on the negotiations? And is that a better question for Jennifer or for you, David? I don't know. I think we're going to take your direction from you all today. I mean, normally what happens is you all obviously have to approve what gets advertised as the franchise. What level of involvement, whether you all want to have somebody as a point of contact that we would deal with from a negotiating standpoint that would just be aware of what's in these franchises, whether you all want us to give you copies of the three that are going to get negotiated first so you could kind of look them over and give us some ideas and input about what you'd like us to possibly look at. I don't know how you all want to approach that. But what I think we don't want to do is open up the negotiations and then all of a sudden have a whole new list of things we want, you know, two months into it. And we are once again meeting administratively to get some input tomorrow. But, I mean, I'd be more than happy if you all would like me to. I can send you all copies of the electric, gas, and telecom franchises for you all to peruse if you'd like. And if you want somebody, if you want to give Jennifer and I somebody's appointed contact that we need to keep abreast of how things are going, that would be fine too. I'll turn back to the chair. Thank you. Mr. Peer, did you want to speak again? Yeah. Just a continuation on something you said concerning KU and LG&E. I guess I had the perception that they were one entity, not two separate corporate entities, that they'd actually merged the entities. At the time that they went for their latest rate increase, Part of the justification for that supposedly was that they'd gotten hit so hard in western Kentucky on the most recent ice storm that they needed the funds to replenish their coffers and were coming to us for that. We, of course, had very little ice and very little problems ourselves, and yet we're carrying the rest of the state. It didn't make a lot of sense to me. Do you know anything about this discussion? I'd have to look back at the nuances, but they are, I believe it is accurate that they are, in fact, technically two separate companies. When we have a franchise with Kentucky Utilities Company, I believe it's the case that Louisville has a franchise with Louisville Gas and Electric Company. I also believe it's the case that they are owned by the same entity, And then I believe that I think there may be another layer above that where that entity in turn is owned by what's now PPNL instead of the German company that transferred control of them to PPNL. Beyond, I guess, was German. Well, that would be interesting to investigate a little bit as to how much we have to carry on our back in relationship to rate increases than our citizens have to carry on their back for problems that occurred pretty far afield from here. Thank you, Dave. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Mr. Peart. Chuck, you want to make another comment? Yeah, thank you, Chair. A couple of other things, and I always like the technology that comes about as we grow and get more information from people. Well, I received a text or an email while I was sitting here on some questions that I thought were probably pertinent to this discussion. One of them might be requiring the utilities to present an annual report and have them come present to the council, and that might be something that we can talk about. That way it not only comes to us, but they also come and let the citizens know who are paying the fees for these utilities. And then another one, and not to say that you're all not capable, But I know we had Mr. Starkweather in the past who did negotiations. Have we looked at potential trying to have a consultant or negotiator with you all to go to that? And if we are, is there going to be additional costs that we need to look into? I'm not aware that we've looked at that, but I will assume there would be anyone outside the government, there would be an additional cost to that. Do we have somebody, but you haven't thought about that or looked at that at this point? You feel capable of doing that? because I know with Mr. Starkweather, he pretty much did a lot of that. I'm comfortable on the three we're going to do this year because, like I said, this is the fourth time around pretty much with the same group of entities in the last eight or ten years. And I've been involved in all of those negotiations each time. I think part of the reason we want to meet administratively is to see if we're missing something that could be better done and addressed through these franchises that we're aware of them not doing appropriately in the last three years because I would not necessarily have that rise to my attention depending on what the circumstances were. So that's one of the reasons we're meeting is to make sure that there's not some big issue with one or more of these utilities that we could probably potentially address through these franchises. But I think, from my view, unless there is something like that, I think a lot of it has been kicked around enough where we would not necessarily recommend to you all changing what some of the existing provisions are. I guess my only concern, I'm not sure which councilman brought up, is just looking at the communities around us and see if there's anybody that might have consulted with them and try to keep that in mind. Well, thank you, Chair. Thank you. Thank you, Councilmember Ellinger. All right, I have a couple of questions for you, too. Just to clarify, the point is the only revenues we receive would be the fees that would apply to utilities that are utilized in Fayette County. So it really doesn't matter who the entity is so much as the fees that are generated within our boundary. Yeah, it's correct that our gross revenue application is only for services provided within Fayette County. Because, once again, it's akin to renting our right-of-way space. They're paying us for that space. And so they're not going to pay us. And there would be some legal issues, obviously, with this. We can't ask them to pay us for space that's not ours. Okay. Having heard all the questions and your comments, I have a couple of thoughts here that perhaps it might be nice for you and Jennifer Massadi maybe to come back to our next meeting, which is on Tuesday, March 22nd, with the idea of doing a follow-up report. I just made a couple of notes of things that were discussed, and perhaps you could cover these items in your report back to us. The first thing is we probably would be appropriate to have a schedule of your negotiating plan, like when you start and when you think you'll be completed, since this does have to be submitted to the council for approval. And that way, you know, it would be, I think, beneficial to have some type of schedule. I think it would also be helpful if we could look at the historical amount of revenues that were created by each utility company and have sort of a projection of maybe what the revenue flow would be for the next couple of years or the next three years if it's a three-year agreement. So just to have an idea of how that would impact our budgets for the coming time frame. If there are any changes in the agreement that the administration felt was appropriate, perhaps you could itemize those items in the, by the way, I don't want this to be a huge report. I think it could be like an executive summary of what changes like. like we're going to ask for approval to approve the type of telephone poles or utility poles that are going to go up, whatever things like that you think you needed to ask for. And another item is asking, I like the idea of the annual report, which here again could be a brief, and maybe even the CEO or site manager for Fayette County could come in once a year and ask any questions we might have. The issue of if there are any other similar franchise agreements in other cities that maybe you feel are a good standard, that you might provide a copy of that. I think those are the items I think will be helpful. So if it's all right, I would like to make a motion that you do come back for that meeting and try to provide that type of information to the committee. Would anybody like to second that? Okay. Is there any question on that or discussion? Okay. Yes, sir, Mr. K. I'm just not clear about that date. I don't have that on my calendar. Is that not the correct date for the next meeting, March 22nd, 3 p.m.? March 22nd is a Wednesday. Is that correct? Okay. Tuesday, March 22nd at 3 p.m. March 22nd. Yes, sir. Okay. All right. All in favor of that motion, please say aye. Aye. Okay. Thank you, Mr. Barber and Ms. Mazzani. I appreciate your coming in. Okay, Mr. Shelley, the head of the Internal Audit Board is here, and he's here basically for several reasons. Council Member Crosby asked for an update on some of the issues from the state auditor's report, and also Vice Mayor Gordon did too. So I thought since I am on the, I might mention I serve on that board, it would probably be appropriate to have Bruce Shelley give us an update as to where the board stands on many of these items and sort of a time frame of when you feel like you can report out of your internal audit committee to this committee so we can then refer it in to the general counsel. Thank you for coming. Thank you, Chairman Lane. On January 24th, as you know in your packet, a memoranda was sent to Vice Mayor Gorton from the Acting Chair of Internal Audit, Jennifer Burke, and she explained that the Internal Audit Board met on December 6, 2010, to consider a draft version of the Board bylaws. Some changes were recommended, and they asked me to be prepared to present those changes to the board in the meeting that was scheduled for January 14, 2011. In a January 13 email, a board member, internal audit board member, George Myers, asked that the board postpone this meeting until February so that appointments to fill the board vacancies could be made. Currently we have two vacancies. These are both voting members. the vacancy created by the departure of Dwight Heisel and the vacancy created by the departure of Linda Rumpke. Mr. Meyer stated it was imperative that the composition of the board be complete before we proceeded, and so the January 14, 2011 board meeting was therefore counseled at his request. In the letter, as it states, we assure the vice mayor, and I want to assure this committee and the whole council, as well as the citizens of Urban County, that the Internal Audit Board takes the development and the adoption of its bylaws very seriously, and we will address this matter as expeditiously as possible. It is the intention of the Internal Audit Board to meet again and consider the adoption of the Board bylaws once the vacancies have been filled. The Board bylaws, I will tell you that the draft that has been produced for the Board's consideration are very extensive. It's ten pages long. It has 18 different sections within it, and within those sections, the various recommendations from the State Auditor's Report, which are included in parts of the handout that you received here. Each one of the items, the actionable items from the State Auditor's Report that relate to the Internal Audit Board or the Office of Internal Audit are being addressed in these bylaws. Once the bylaws are adopted by the Internal Audit Board, they will then be produced for the council for the council approval. So that basically is where we stand with that. And if there are any questions, I'd be happy to answer them. Council Member Crosby has a question for you. Thank you so much. I appreciate you explaining the process and how you're adopting these into your bylaws. One thing that came up, and I was just curious if you all would be handling this or if this is something we need to recommend with the fracks that get filled out with external auditors. I know that there's a point that where they're turned over to certain divisions within government. Have you all talked about the appropriateness as to whether those should just come to your office so that you are aware of all of them? Because I think there was some misunderstanding, too, like where we learned through the process that like 32 of them have been done and you maybe only were aware of a few of them. So have you all discussed that? Is that something you'll be handling or that you think we as a body need to maybe recommend they come to you? I think that's a very good point. I think probably the first step would be a dialogue with the external auditors because they have some very specific requirements from their professional standards that require confidentiality, be protected. I know that one of the recommendations that the state auditor had, I think it's the very first one here, LFUCG should develop procedures as to when and how information provided in a confidential manner to the external or internal auditors should be reported into which entities and persons. I certainly think that it is a valid question to ask the externals to what extent they feel that they can and should, under their professional standard requirements, share the information with the Audit Board and the Office of Internal Audit. So I believe that would be the first step in that process. Is that something maybe that we could ask you and maybe our Division of Law to work with them, since there's confidentiality issues and things of that nature. And it looks like to me with what you're recommending is excellent right along the lines of what the state auditors said we should strive to do. But that's one area that I could see still kind of being a little fuzzy. And surely you don't want to be surprised. I would imagine finding out there's indeed like 37 instead of two. No, I don't want to be surprised at all. Two. I would be pleased to begin that dialogue with the external auditors. One of the things that are in our draft bylaws, and it is a draft, so it could change, but one of the things that we do want to point out is that if there are any allegations of fraud, that they should be brought to the internal audit board. So I can speak with the external auditors about how that will agree with their professional requirements and just kind of see where that dialogue begins to take us. And then, you know, depending on their response, what they think they can and cannot share, then we can move forward with that. Does that answer your question? It does. Thank you. And then the other question was, you said this, and I think it was indicated on the letter, that you all will be taking this up with your board once the additional members are appointed, so that you have a – is that already one of the recommendations? recommendations you're just going to head and move forward with is the fact that you might need more board members from the community and that you're going to, or are you waiting until the two who are no longer on the committee are filled and moving forward? That was not clear. Well, I can't really speak specifically to the board unless Chairman Lane wants to add to this. But my expectation of what the intent is, is that after the two current vacancies are filled, the existing vacancies, Mr. Heisel's and Ms. Rumpke's, that then the board would go ahead and meet and would discuss and adopt the bylaws. Now, if in the meantime, if the changes to the ordinance are approved, the other positions are filled in the meantime, then I think that's an excellent process as well if the additional members are on board. But I believe the intent of the internal audit board is get the current vacancies filled and then move forward with adopting bylaws so we can get those in place and have that process ready and working. Perfect. Thank you so much. Mr. Martin. Thank you, Chair. Thanks for coming down and talking to us. Am I correct that Fayette County is one of the few or only counties in Kentucky with a separate internal audit board? This is the only county in the state that I'm aware of that has an internal audit board. Well, I just, you know, I think it is a groundbreaking, trailblazing kind of thing that we're doing. And I appreciate everyone, the members of the board, for donating their time to really, you know, create a new thing here in Kentucky and to develop some of these new procedures and working out the kinks with it. I think it really should set an example for many other communities in Kentucky that we can take this and remove it from politics and take it outside and have professionals take a look at it and give a sort of objective view of our audit process and things. So I just appreciate what you guys do and just keep at it. Thank you, Council Member. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Anybody else have a comment or question? I might just say that it was my impression that we would try to expedite the approval of the new charter and bylaws and get this back to the Council and this Committee as soon as possible. But we still, you know, we have to wait on the appointments to the Board in order to get that done. That's all I have. Thank you. Thank you. You want to... I want to make sure something didn't fall through the cracks for you guys. At the December 2nd meeting of the Council, there was an ordinance amending the Internal Audit Board ordinances. for the new membership and whatnot, that you guys took off your docket and put into committee that night. And I didn't see it in your packet. And I just wanted to make sure that you knew that there's an ordinance amendment out there. What committee was that put into? Intergovernmental. Okay. Well, I think one of the problems we have is we've scrambled up everything. And as the chair, I've taken the position that we're not going to transfer stuff from one committee to another because our board members here are new and I'm the new chair. We don't have any really historical perspective on that. But I do believe we've – I understand where you're coming from. I do believe we've addressed that by the way we've handled this. But if you have a suggestion or think there's some legal issue that we need to have, I'd be happy to have your input on that. Well, I guess my question is, if the recommendation of the auditor, which is to add members and make some changes to the internal audit board, ordinance is to go forward, you either need to put it into this committee or a committee or do something at some point with it. And I just wanted to make sure that you all had not forgotten that that was out there someplace, perhaps in the cracks. of what occurred with your new process. Right. Okay, I think my recollection is we did discuss this at our last board meeting, and I think the issue was that under the ordinance under which the internal audit committee operates, its board is supposed to provide governance for the internal audit board and then to submit, you know, any modifications to the way it operates or its charter or bylaws to the council for approval. I think that here again, I can't say categorically, but I think almost every change that was suggested in that ordinance that was drafted by the mayor's office, I think has been reviewed and incorporated in the new bylaws that we have. I think we're talking about two different things. The changes to the ordinance will have to come through the council. They can come through internal audit board, if that's what you want. they have not examined the amendments to the ordinance. There was a recommendation that the actual ordinance be amended to add two additional members and some other changes to the ordinance, which will not be picked up in your bylaws. Okay, you're absolutely correct. I understand where you're coming from. So I think your point is well made, and we should probably go ahead and maybe have you refer that resolution ordinance into this committee, and we'll put it on as one of our pending items. We'll work at it simultaneously with the recommendations from the Internal Audit Board, because you're correct, because that would be adding two new board members, and that would not be part of our bylaws or charter. So you're correct. Thank you. You got a question, Council Member Crosby? Yeah. As I recall, too, during that discussion when we tabled it, part of it was we didn't know what Internal Audit was going to come back with recommendations and how they were going to incorporate things, even though they don't do the changes to the ordinance with the board members. It was kind of one of those things where we got it last minute, and we weren't sure what we were going to get from them. And then I don't think we realized at the time either if that was consistent, it was not clear in the writing of the ordinance that that fell into what the state auditor recommended, which it sounds like if two, that would mean there's four from the community, So that would be a majority of the community, which tells me it falls in line with the recommendation. But I'm not sure that that was really spelled out to council at that time, and we didn't have enough information. And it would appear that that would be something that could possibly just move forward if. Well, I don't disagree with you that you didn't have adequate time to look at that ordinance. and certainly the proposed changes, something you can examine and decide if you like, if you don't like, tweak, whatever you want. If that was table, could we just take it off the table and then, because did it have a timeline? I don't recall what. Well, I think the prior administration was acting because the state auditor wanted certain action by a certain time, and so they went ahead and put the amendment on the docket for December 2nd. When I read the minutes of your meeting from December 2nd, it indicated that you actually referred it to a committee. Now, you can obviously, if you prefer, decide to pull that out of the committee and place it on a docket for consideration. I guess the problem is we don't have the same committees we had. And our chair just explained, too, that he has, because of all the confusion with transferring committees, he's kind of started. it hasn't gotten transferred anywhere, I guess, is the point where it's like kind of up here in no man's land. And so we either have to, I guess, take it up here or we can say in council meeting we'd like to take it. Could you possibly get us a copy of the ordinance? Would you like me to send it to all the council members? Yes, sir, that would be good. And I might say I would like to compliment you because I've reviewed that carefully. And, you know, I thought the draft of it was very well done. There might be a couple of minor tweaks, but I believe it's pretty much consistent with what the Internal Audit Committee anticipated anyway. So there shouldn't be any problem on that. Is there anything else you'd like to add? I just wanted to make sure that didn't go away. Yeah, no, I was just saying, though, I don't think at the time we had that information to make a decision where now that Mr. Sully has presented today and you've told us also how it fits in, it just makes sense that we go ahead and do it. Thank you. Yes, ma'am. We actually have that. That's what Willie's getting ready to tell you. We do actually have that in general government. It was just a miscite on our part of transferring information, but we do actually have that already moved over to the general government. Internal audit board membership, we actually have that listed. I think in this process, we may have left it off the list, but we do actually have the four-channel government on it. Chair, could we just then make a motion? I don't see where we have to have another presentation on this, and there can be discussion when we vote if there has to be. Can we just maybe make a motion to clean it up to move this forward to first reading for our council meeting? or have her refer it today somehow during our meeting, refer it out of committee. Could you do that? Right. I think you want to make a motion on that. What would be your motion? I'd like to make a motion that our chair recommend to the vice mayor today that we move this forward for first reading. On our agenda, I'm sorry, I forget the word. Move this forward, that the vice mayor move this forward for us on Thursday night for full council, for first reading. Okay, here's the only problem I have is that this document is going to sort of coordinate with the charter and the bylaws, and I think it would be more appropriate to get the information from the internal audit and then put them both in simultaneously for approval by council so that you could see them side by side. That would be my thought. I don't see that there's any. The only benefit here, I think, is we're just adding the two additional board members. And see, it says that we'll adopt bylaws, rules of business, and be approved by the council. That's in here. And I think just putting it all in at one time would be more appropriate. Well, I think they're two separate things. I think Mr. Horn explained that they're two separate things, and that also it gives two more people on the internal audit board. I mean, it just, clearly there will be new members, but they'll also be starting the process just at the same spot you are, and it gives two more people from the community the ability to be able to vote on bylaws. Point of order, Mr. Who's got the point of order? Mr. Chair. Mr. Martin. I think Ms. Crosby has a motion. I don't know if it's been second or not. So I think we're debating something before the motion has been seconded. So I guess my request is that it either be seconded or not. Okay, we have a second to Ms. Crosby's motion. Mr. Kaye, you're seconding? Ms. Crosby? Oh, yeah, second. Is your mic on? Yes. Yes. Okay. All right. Okay, now, does anybody want to discuss this further? Mr. Martin. I guess I would like an opportunity to discuss with, I guess, the chair of the audit board what their recommendations are. Since they haven't been meeting, I don't know if they've had a chance to discuss this. Have they discussed this yet, Mr. Selleen? I don't think there's been a formal discussion about the recommended amendment to the ordinance. So I can't speak specifically to what the board's position would be on that. I'm not particularly opposed to this. I haven't focused on it particularly, but I guess I would like to hear from what the audit committee itself recommends. But that's just my thought. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Council Member Ford. Thank you, Chair. I guess the question that I would have, as the attorney stated, that this matter was referred to committee in December. And, of course, we've had a restructure of government, so that committee's work has been transferred now to this general government committee. My question would be, has any committee work or consideration of this proposal and this change been done? And I think, I guess that's my question. Has any committee a previous committee? Or, well, I know this committee has not. No, to my knowledge, this has not been reviewed by any committee. Okay. So in that regards, Chair, I would be reluctant to support the motion. This is my first time having a look at the ordinance. I would encourage the committee, this general government committee, to deliberate on it further. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member. Anybody else wish to comment? Ms. Crosby. Again, I would just say I'm fine keeping this in committee, but I would question to the state auditor's timeline and whether we'd be within the timeline. I think that was the issue back in December was that we were trying to stay on their recommendations. And I know Council Member Ford, Ian Kaye, for that fact, didn't have the opportunity to be here, but this was clearly a result of many, many months of council work. So I would just remind those that this has been months and months and months of work has been spent on this. Thank you. Mr. Martin, you're speaking again. Thank you, Chair. Mr. Horner, one of the things that I guess I would like to see when we bring in a new ordinance that amends an existing one is that we get a black line on it or something. I was just going to ask if you all wanted a dirty copy of this ordinance or the clean copy. Yeah, and I don't know whether we want to put that in as a general rule, because I know this came up last year when we were looking at revising the definition of family. It came down to kind of a critical moment, and we couldn't really tell. It was a fairly lengthy thing. and it's really helpful to see the black line, see what was added, see what was taken out. I think our general practice has been, at least mine has been, to provide a dirty copy. The way this particular one advanced at the end of last year, it's very possible you all did not see a dirty copy because it may have been even the week before that they decided to put it on your docket. But I can send everybody a dirty copy of the... What I might suggest is that we consider, and I don't know, well, maybe I'll put this in at the council level, but circulating the dirty copy as the general course and then authorizing folks to take that out at the end as a ministerial or administrative thing. Anyway, regarding this, it would be nice to see what the change was. Thank you, Chair. Mr. Kay. Thank you, Chair. I had a question and a comment. The question has to do with whether the Internal Audit Board at this point is not able to function because they're waiting for the approval of the additional members and the reconstitution. And the comment is that my understanding from the outside was that this was a topic that had had a fair amount of discussion. And if the answer to the question is that they're not functioning, one way or another, but I'd just like to see it move forward as quickly as possible. If it makes sense to put it in this committee, then I'd be in favor of that. If it makes sense to put it on the docket, I'd be in favor of that. If the question is can they legally function, yes. They still have a quorum of members that can meet and conduct business. But whether or not, I don't think they've discussed in a meeting the ordinance changes. Is there other business pending before the audit board that they feel it would be inappropriate for them to move forward because there is a pending change in their constitution? There is a substantial amount of other business pending. And when Council Member and Board Member Myers asked that we postpone the meeting until the other two positions were filled, The chair, the acting chair, Ms. Burke, stated at that time that the board would meet, as she said, in February once the positions are filled. So I think, again, the intent, as I understand it, with the board is that they were willing to wait until the positions were filled to move forward. But I don't – there are other matters that the board can probably consider that are not related to the bylaws or anything that's attached to that. We could probably go ahead and have a meeting and get some of the other work out of the way. Of course, it's up to the board to set their meeting and establish what their agenda is. Okay, thank you. Thank you, Chair. I would like to just make a short comment on this, too, is that the Internal Audit Board is supposed to provide governance to the Internal Audit Committee, and I feel that under the ordinance currently exists that if any changes or modifications are going to be made, that it should be recommended out by the committee to our committee, which in turn would recommend, if we approve that, to the council for approval. And, you know, this draft ordinance sort of came out right at the end of the year and it was sort of quickly rushed out. I don't think it was discussed in any meetings that I'm aware of. So I feel it's a little premature personally to go ahead and try to put that into council for approval. Having said that, I believe Council Member Crosby had something she wants to say. Well, I would say along those lines is that I would find it not a good thing if we have right now the current board, which would exist of three people advising, and only one really from the community, two council members and one community member advising. And I would think that the internal auditor probably also would want more input from a full board. And I would venture to say that we may not even have two board recommendations from the new administration for February. I mean, that could very well be the case. I don't know that for sure, but we're in February right now, and we don't have any, I don't believe, even for the next meeting, and then it will be another few weeks. So you all may not even be able to function with a full board under our current ordinance unless somebody gets appointed or two people get appointed in the next two weeks. And so I would have trouble with three people, two council members and one member of the community, probably providing advice on the direction of the internal audit board, given the situation of the committee. And then that was not going to be my comment, but it is what it is. And the other thing was I think I'm going to ask Law this. I think I probably have to withdraw my motion because on our actionable items or things that we can take action on today, I don't think I can ask the chair to report out and move something forward based on what I'm looking at, our review of docket on what we can do. So I'm just going to have to ask you that question because what I see is we can only refer a matter to a council committee, recommend that the administration provide additional information or recommend that an item be removed. That's the only action we can take. You mean at your? At our Cal today. I think that you can ask the vice mayor to report out at one of your meetings that something be added to your docket. Okay. If I'm answering the question I think you're asking. I guess the question is, is the motion appropriate for the action we can take for the committee of the whole? If this committee decided to, at your work session, ask Mr. Lane to report out and ask the Vice Mayor to report out Thursday and add a resolution or ordinance to the docket, I think that that would be appropriate, if that's what you decided to do. Okay. That answers my question. So have you withdrawn your motion? I thought that I had to because of what we could do, but I think laws just clarified that. You know, I'm torn. I'd be happy to withdraw it, but I still see the issue that we have three people on the internal audit board right now, and really only one with community input. I mean, I'd be happy if we knew where we stood with the board recommendations, but I don't think we know where those are going to be, and that would mean there would be four additional ones, assuming that one, well, actually three. If one's from government, if it's a finance person, that's going to just be a matter of that person being confirmed. Let me clarify. There are currently five members on the internal audit board. There are three voting members currently on the board and two vacant voting positions. The two non-voting positions that are in place is the CAO, Richard Maloney, and the Council Administrator, Rebecca Langston. So we do have a functional board, but what we're missing is two of the currently existing voting positions that need to be filled, the positions vacated by Heisel and Rumpke. And then moving forward with the ordinance amendment that you're talking about, If the council decides it wants to approve that ordinance, then we would have two more voting members from the community at large. So we do have a functional board, and right now I think probably the most pressing need is for the two current vacancies to be filled. That helps to clarify. That does help clarify. And if Mr. K will allow, I'll withdraw the motion, but I will request that law provide us with a dirty copy of the changes, and then we can review those, and we can maybe, if the chair, I won't make a formal motion, but if the chair could have communication with the mayor's office on the urgency of appointing two qualified. I guess one, because one of those, I don't have the ordinance in front of me, is one of those the finance commissioner, or is it the mayor's will to? One is the mayor or his designee. So it is at the mayor's discretion who he would want to appoint for council to approve. And the other one would be the other vacancy, which was Mr. Heisel's vacancy, is a position to be recommended by council, but it still has to go through mayor, appointment, and council confirmation. So I would suggest that maybe we have a discussion with them to get those two positions filled as quickly as possible and then bring this back up in the next couple weeks. Thank you, Council Member Crosby. I think that's the appropriate way to go because, you know, this is an important committee, and we need to take the time to go through all the details. And when we report out to the council, I'd like for this committee to have had a full briefing by the internal audit and everybody be on the same wavelength. Council Member Kaye, you have a comment? Yeah, I just, for clarification, I'm concerned about where it now goes. What happens? I'm sorry. Can I say that one more time? My understanding is that you will convey to the administration our interest in having the present vacancies filled as soon as possible. Right. Well, yes, sir, just for the record, I have spoken with the mayor and explained that that is a priority. And Council Member Gorton has received a memorandum, I believe, requesting her assistance on that, too. So that is a priority, and I agree with you. Okay. The second question is, is the ordinance as proposed now, is that coming back to this committee? Yes, sir. It would come back to this committee. And so, you know, we'll get a draft of the, what's the dirty copy, as you call it, and we'll be able to review that before our next meeting. And I think that would work fine. Thank you. I think that, does anybody else have anything I want to add to that? I have a question for you. If council determines that there's not any issues and the internal audit board meets, in the meantime, since our meetings are kind of not few and far between with this, but we're not on a routine schedule with general government as much as probably our work session, our committee of the whole work session, we can always walk it on to a council meeting if we decide as a body that's what we want to do. Is that correct? I'm sure you could, yes. I just want to make sure. Thank you. Thank you. All right. I think that covers that issue. Council Member McCord has got just an update on employee wellness programs. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Just let me kind of give a background as to what this is because it's a fairly large topic. But this issue of wellness is something that everyone around the country and everyone around this state is dealing with. And here locally it came to the forefront, I guess, back in December when the health insurance shortfall all of a sudden became to be realized that our employees were not necessarily very healthy and that it was costing us more and more and more, and health insurance premiums and costs were going sky high. But every person, company, organization, institution, government is wrestling with health insurance. and the dilemma of rising health care costs. And those costs are going to continue to go up. And what drives those costs up is simply that every person, company, institution, government, is the health of those entities and those people. And if you have a healthier bunch, you don't go to the hospital as much, you don't go to the doctor as much or the pharmacy, costs go down. And one of the things that we do know is that 70% of what causes us to go to the doctor, hospital, and pharmacy is preventable. It's more lifestyle choices, and that's smoking and what we eat and lack of physical activity. And those types of choices lead to things that cause us to go to the doctor, hospital, and pharmacy. One other thing that we brought up in this discussion is that people need to realize that the Lexington and Fayette-Urban County government is a self-funded health insurance plan, which basically means that every citizen of Lexington, every taxpayer of Lexington, pays for our health. And when we go to the doctor, hospital, or pharmacy, it's the taxpayers that are paying for that. It's not Humana, it's not Anthem or whoever our health care provider is. It's the taxpayers of Lexington. And so there's really two issues that I want to try and segment to the public. One is the health insurance rates. And we've got a group that is working on that. And what is our health insurance going to be? How much is that going to cost? What kind of out of pocket? Those types of things. That's on one track, and that's not necessarily what's happening in this committee, although it will be reported out and dealt with in this committee to a certain degree. But what this issue is is more about the overall health and wellness of our employees and their families. And I want to make sure that we put that on record, that this isn't just about the nearly 3,000 employees that work for us, but it's also about their families. And it's about that 70 percent that is preventable. It's about that 70% that causes us to drive health insurance costs up. It's that lifestyle thing. And what we want to see and what I have proposed and why this is becoming an issue is I believe that there's a real desire to see a change in the culture, not only here but in our city, and that we would become more of a healthier city, more of a physically active city. and the 3,000 employees that are here would become a great deal more healthy, not just for their own benefit, but also for the benefit of their productivity to the citizens of Lexington. Now, there's a number of organizations, Mr. Chair, that want to lend a hand and be a part of this discussion. Just a few, you know, the United Way, the U.K. Extension Office, Commerce Lexington, U.K. in general, leadership Lexington and a number of non-profits and institutions have come to various council members and said, hey, we want to be a part of this solution and we want to help. And so there are numerous council members that have stepped up and said, this is something that's near and dear to my heart. Not only Council Member Kay, Council Member Ellinger and Myers and Stennett and Blues, Vice Mayor Gorton. I know everybody shares that, but this is something where I think that we have a tremendous opportunity to leave a legacy and really change something that's vitally important, not just from a budgetary standpoint or a fiscal standpoint, but really for the quality of life of the people who work here and work for folks. So the goal that I set out or I've articulated is what if the Lexington Fayette Urban County government became the healthiest public sector workforce in America in five years? What would that look like? What would it take for us to do that? What would we need to be doing? And, Mr. Chair, that's really what's going on with this issue as it relates to this committee is how could we set that as a goal? What would we have to do? What types of policies and procedures, what types of activities, what types of sticks, and what types of carrots would have to be incorporated to make us the healthiest public sector workforce in America? And if that was to happen, what kind of attention would that draw to us and what kind of ripple effect would that have? And the reason why that's so important is every single taxpayer in Lexington pays for our health. That's why we should do it. So what is happening, Mr. Chairman and other members of the committee and folks watching is Council Member Kay and I are convening some meetings with folks from the outside that have interest. Council Member Myers and I are doing that. A number of folks are approaching us, and right now we are just in the process almost of inventorying what is out there, who wants to help, and how can we change this culture. And so I know that Council Member Ellinger and Council Member Kay have been very outspoken about this, as well as Myers and Stennett. And this is really all I want to do is sort of set the groundwork for what we're going to do. But at the end of the day, this doesn't change overnight, but it's about the health and wellness, and it's about our people and making them healthier, and it has a ripple effect for all of Fayette County. So leaders lead, and I'm going to be bringing forward challenges to this council, to the 15 members that sit up here that are representative of this city, for us to lead. If the administration wants to join in, that's great. But what we're going to bring forward are some specific challenges for this body and the individuals that make this body up to lead this health and wellness initiative. So that's just the tone. That's all I wanted to put on for today's meeting was just sort of set what we're doing here. It has to do with the health insurance rates, but that is something that is another track, and that's a little more short-term than what we're talking about. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you, Mr. McCord. I recognize Council Member Ellinger. Thank you, Chair, and I want to thank Mr. McCord for putting this in while I was traveling over the holidays. I think if you would put that on the overhead there. I ripped it out. I just took a piece of paper. It was in the USA Today, and it says healthy living is paying off. And if we could be healthier and we could save money, then that would be two great things we could accomplish. And I'll just read just a little part of this, but it's happened in Pontiac, Michigan, and there are 3,500 active employees. So what made me think of the size and also the cost that we're having with health insurance costs that happened when we received that, as Mr. McCord said, in December. And what it says, county's wellness plan has cut insurance costs. Employers looking for ideas for coping with rising health care costs might want to take a look at Oakland County, Michigan. And this would be something I think I'd like to follow up with them is, for four years ago the county government gambled on a new idea, spending $400,000 a year to promote better health for its employees. After several years of double-digit increase in health insurance costs, the county costs declined nearly 12 percent over 2008 and 2009. Before the county started the program, it had projected that the health care insurance force nearly 3,500 active employees would be around $50 million in 2000 instead. Instead, they paid $38 million this year. The secret, healthy surveys, risk assessments, blood pressure screenings, glucose tests in nutrition exercise classes. In 2011, the county will do more to help employees quit smoking. And as the article continues, it just talks about what they did and the results that they've had in the last four years. And I think this is exactly what we need to do. If we can make our government a healthier government and save money in the process, I think that would be a win-win for everybody. And as Mr. McCord said, it is the citizens and taxpayers are paying this cost. So if we can lower the cost and make our employees healthier, I think that would be a great opportunity. As you go down in the article, the heart of the wellness program is a volunteer confidential annual health survey and risk assessment for employees who get a $100 incentive each year to take the survey. Participation has increased every year. Fifty-six of the employees are now on board, and the people who return are actually having better outcomes. So if an employee tests for high blood pressure or cholesterol, he or she will get a risk referral to and can be taken to a physician for follow-up. In 2007, 15 percent of the employees were deemed at risk for existing or anticipated health problems. This year it was 4 percent. So it's not all part of this program. It certainly has a lot to do with it. And I think it's something we need to look at, and I'm glad you brought this up, and I look forward to working with you on this. Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Dowsinger. Ms. Crosby. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member McCord. First, I just wanted to offer I actually have a lot of research. There are some communities across the country that are doing very simple changes within their starting, whether it's a school system or a government, are doing very small things preventatively. As we all know, prevention is key for risk factors such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and those types of diseases that tend to be a burden on our health care costs. So I do have some things I could probably offer you. I would just say that sometimes, even though it sounds overwhelming at first, what I found through this research was that even very simple changes within the workplace is, for example, putting up a sign. And this was presented. We ran it through a few committees within LFECG. It's been several years ago, and we got lots of pushback because of cost. Well, some of the things that proved to be effective were putting signs by elevator stating, if you walk up two flights of steps, it reduces your risk of this by so much. And so it's not necessarily something that has to be a huge burden on government. I think we can take some very simple steps and do some very simple things if this is the goal that we decide to try and achieve as a body and probably make some significant changes. And hopefully the community would see that and follow, because I know one of my passions is children and health issues. So thank you. Council Member Beard. Thank you, Mr. Chair. We've had these discussions on several occasions concerning participation in health clubs and the city subsidizing for employees. And one of the issues is that we have situations where we can't monitor the employees. They may start out in January, as many people do, either joining a health club or rejoining a health club. and by July it's all gone and they're more concerned about yard work or a golf game. I thought it might be valuable for us, Council Member McCord. I know that Ashland Oil on their campus out on Dabney Drive has a very complete gem right there on site. There are two buildings. One is a Valvoline building and the other is their data center. And there's a tunnel that runs between the two. And right in the middle of this tunnel is where this gym is. And whether Ashland Oil, being at one time a Fortune 35 company, has done any measurements and what they found the benefits of spending as much money as they spent to put this thing together. It would be interesting for us to be able to have that information to support this whole idea of expanding what the general employee base does as far as exercise. I mean, obviously there's walking and running and bicycling, but, you know, a circuit training weight program is pretty cardio effective also. Anyway, I support what you're doing, and I myself go to a rehab session three times a week and belong to two health clubs. So I'm obviously in the ballpark with you all. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Mr. McCord. Let me circle back around, and I appreciate everybody's comments. And I think that it's just indicative of the sentiment that folks really want a culture change. They really do. We want this from a leadership standpoint. But I know employees have called and emailed after we set this out a month ago and said we really want this. A couple of things Council Member Crosby said that's really important is it's about some small things. And to change the culture, it's about a lot of small things happening simultaneously. And we have control over a lot more than we realize, all the way down to what is in the vending machines downstairs. And is there any healthy option in that vending machine? And how much does that cost? We can make the apples $0.25 and the Cheetos $4 if we wanted to. But at the end of the day, it's about drilling down that far. And it's a lot of little things and making it accessible and easy. But it needs to be a culture change. It needs to be something that we all do, and this is the thing to do. And what we're doing right now, just for council members' sake, is we're starting to inventory what is available to us internally and externally. You mentioned what Ashland Oil has done with their gym and so forth. You know, we actually have a lot of gems inside of LFUCG, police and fire and so forth. And we get into this sworn versus non-sworn thing. If we're looking at the employees as a whole, we have opportunity to use our resources for everyone's sake. The number one story that came out of Kentucky, Mr. Lane being in the publishing business and in the news business, the number one story that came out of Kentucky in August of last year was about the State Fair and the State Fair's wonderful Krispy Kreme burger. And it was a hamburger, and the two buns were two Krispy Kreme donuts. Okay? Bottom line is that's the culture you're up against. And it's so much more than these little things. And the bottom line to it is you can change and do anything if you've got political will and community will. And you have to address the Krispy Kreme burger. That's what we're up against. and Council Member Ellinger said something very important, and that is that with regard to Pontiac, Michigan's success, every single place says that the first thing you have to do is take a health risk assessment. You've got to have a baseline of where an employee starts. So I'm just going to go ahead and say this now. I'll bring it forward to the full council. The first challenge that I will lay out to this body is that we organize and all 15 of us take a health risk assessment. Where are we? and it doesn't necessarily have to be public knowledge, but where will we be in one year? Leaders lead. If this is the issue of our time, nationally, state, and locally, then I'd say step up to the plate and let's take a health risk assessment and see where we are in a year. Mr. Chair? Thank you, Mr. McCord. We move to item number four on the agenda, new business items, and I had sent a letter out to all council members dated January 24th, stating since this was a new committee that any items referred from any other committee, I was requesting that the party referring send us some basic information so we have information to brief the chair who's new in this position and the members of the committee who are also new here. I received two such requests. The first item came from Council Member Myers. It has to do with facilities occupancy. and our policy and, you know, what we charge for real estate that's used by other parties in the Irvin County government. And I would like to, if there's no objection, have that put on for consideration in our meeting, our next committee meeting. Secondly, I also received a memorandum from Council Member Martin. There's some supporting documents. I don't have all those with me today, but his request here was to provide legislation that would make it possible for citizens on demand to obtain electronic access to information and data that Durham County government currently stores internally in an effort to improve transparency and accountability. So if there's no objection on that, I'd like to also add that to the agenda for our next meeting. Are there any comments or objections? Please let me know. And if you have an item you wish to add to the agenda for our next meeting, that would be fine. And then if there's anyone here that wants to speak to these two items today, you know, they can speak for three minutes. Do you have something just for it? Thank you, Councilman Lane. Didn't have anything in regards to these two items, but I did want to, at the appropriate time, talk about some items that were referred to this committee last week by the Committee of the Whole, particularly the position of the citizen's advocate. I just would ask the chair's consideration and the committee's consideration. Right. I'm glad you asked on that because I was going to propose that we have a work group to work on that, And I thought perhaps that Vice Chair McCord could sort of ramrod that and have Council Member Martin, Council Member Kaye, serve on that committee. And then we also had on the facilities use policy, this will be coming in, but I think that requires a team also, a work group, to work on that. I'd like to ask Mr. Myers, Ms. Crosby, and Mr. Ford to be on that committee. This is for facilities use. Okay. Is that everybody happy with that? Okay. Does anybody else want to speak? Any other items to be brought before the committee? Do I have a motion for adjournment? So may. This meeting is adjourned. Thank you. Thank you. I'm leaving town, baby. I'm leaving town for sure. Well, then you won't be bothered with me hanging around your door, but that's alright. That's alright. That's alright.