Planning and Zoning Committee meeting for May the 3rd. All members of the committee are present. I appreciate that. And this is the core of our planning staff, Chris King and Jim Duncan. And as we begin to take up, really the only issue that's active in our committee right now is the beginning of the part that the council plays in updating our comprehensive plan. And our part in that are the goals and objectives which we deliberate on and deliver back to the Planning Commission for them to take action on. So I thought today, in our current format, we wouldn't meet again until July. So today would be a good time for us to take up just kind of what Chris and I have talked about as Goals and Objectives 101. And he's going to take about 10 or 15 minutes just to run through really what's in the packet and kind of this handout that he's given to us. And I would encourage you all, if you have a question, to voice it or let me know, and we'll interrupt him, or just to save it until the end. Because I want to have ample time for each and every person to ask questions that they would like to about this process, about the particulars of it, and about our role in it, as well as other roles others may play. So with that as a background, Mr. King, thank you for your expertise. We appreciate it today. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We greatly appreciate being here and giving you a little primer on the comprehensive plan. The Chairman, I think, very clearly stated just what the most important message that I was going to bring first is, and that is the Council's role in the comprehensive plan. Under the statutes that guide comprehensive planning in Kentucky, the Council does have one role, and it really is very significant, and that is to adopt the goals and objectives. And that is after they are presented to you with recommendations from the Planning Commission. Now, you know, that may feel like not a whole lot given all the rest of the comprehensive plan that we typically adopt and last adopted in 2007. However, in Kentucky, the statute very directly requires that the plan must follow logically from the goals and objectives. So the goals and objectives lead, set the vision, set the policy, set the mission, and the rest of the plan elements all fall from there. So it is very important. And as some of you that have been around these processes in the past know, the time that the Council takes on the goals and objectives usually is fairly significant. And with that in mind, I'm going to put up a schedule at that first page, Chris. Thank you. And this is a very, what I would just call an overview schedule of the comprehensive plan process, and really broken into two years. And this is the first of the two years. And basically, as we look at this process, the two-year process of the update, year one is pretty much devoted to background duties, research, and some other kinds of activities, but primarily focused on the goals and objectives. So beginning in January of this year, we began our conversations both on staff and also with the Planning Commission at their monthly work sessions, looking at the goals and objectives, setting themes, and thinking about how these goals and objectives may wish to differ than ones in the past. So again, just reviewing this schedule, we hope, and again remembering that the Planning Commission, as the Council does not necessarily follow the staff schedule, proposed schedule. They are a citizen body that will review and have their own ideas. But the idea is that roughly, probably sometime while you're on break this year, the Planning Commission will hopefully have finished their work on the goals and objectives and deliver a proposed document to you, and then during the rest of the year, Council would have that time to look, deliberate, make adjustments if you wish, and then adopt the goals and objectives again, which will lead all the rest of the plan work which will occur during 2012. And again, we're working back from a target adoption date of the end of 2012, which we have on the second year of the handout. Now, again, dealing with all those other plan elements, the transportation element, the community facilities, the land use, environmental sustainability, those kinds of things that we envision being major plan elements and themes in this particular update process. So, again, that's the overview. Where we are now is that for January, February, March and April work sessions of the Planning Commission, they have been working, reviewing and setting their own thoughts about the goals and objectives. And as we have communicated to others and based on our research, the goals and objectives that you have in your packet in your packet and that are from the 2007 plan, we can't find any in the country that approach that level of detail and that level of mass. And as we've been working and talking about things we'd like to do with this comprehensive plan, one of the things that both staff and the Planning Commission said, they would like to streamline and condense. and the work that's been going on so far has kind of been geared to some of that and we've already had some conversations with the chair and the vice mayor about will that serve council's needs. We don't want the planning commission necessarily to go off in a direction that would then bring a whole lot of work to you, but we're still working through that and still talking about that and considering that with the planning commission. who seem very much to want to see if we can go in that direction somewhat and also have the objectives, more true objectives, which would be more measurable rather than just statements and things like that. So, again, that we're still, I would say, fairly early in that process. In some degrees with the planning commissions, we still work on that. and actually we believe as staff that the work session we'll be having with the Planning Commission here in May may be pivotal on that point and in which direction we go because what we want to do and what we're working is to prepare a draft that then we will go and vet in the public not just by having a public hearing but through focus groups and other outreaches, social media, things that we're going to use this time and no doubt some public meetings. to gather some feedback before we come back for the formal public hearing on the Planning Commission and adoption, pardon me, their action on what to recommend to you for the goals and objectives. So again, as you see, we've dedicated almost the whole first year of the process to that being the most public portion. At this point, I'd be glad to entertain any questions. I know you were also given in your packet the vacant land information and absorption projections, which were pivotal. Knowing the kinds of issues that come up in the Comprehensive Plan and that dominated the 2006-2007 update process, One of the things we as staff decided last year that we really wanted to have first was to look at what has happened in the absorption area of land within the urban service area. What vacant land do we have left? What policy implications that may have? And given the trends with the slowdown in development and everything led to the announcement that many of you participated in last week to kind of let the community out there know that from a standpoint of a large consensus of community leadership that the need to expand the urban service area did not look like it would or should be a dominant issue in this process. Clearly, given that we have to have public hearings, citizenry can bring forth whatever comments or ideas they want to these formal hearings. But, again, I think we were kind of advising folks it might be a good idea just to not spend their effort and community calories in that area this time. And I think that message went out and I think generally well received. I agree. I agree. But I'd be glad, again, we have that information. So if you have any questions about the data, we'd be glad to answer that also as well today. Your call for questions has yielded a couple. Council Member Beard. Thank you, Chair. Chris, the public input piece, it seems like we've got seven of them on the sheet. I'm kind of curious, and I'm not having any history to go on, or lean on, I'm going to ask you about it. But the people who give public input to the Planning Commission and then to the Planning Committee and then to the Council, is it generally the same people? Is it harping on the same thing? Quite often. I mean, as you know, we get the range all the way across the board. We get individual citizens, individual property owners, representatives from, you know, known community groups, neighborhood associations and others. So certainly we get a mix of folks that are very familiar with the process and have been involved before and some folks that have never interacted with it before. And it's always that mix happens in every comprehensive plan update. I noticed on the land use piece, you have two back-to-back almost. Well, actually, they're five months apart, but they look like they're back-to-back. Sure. Well, you know, it's so funny. In the sense of the community, quite often the comprehensive plan is really only the land use map, which is, of course, not correct. And in that, there's a whole section of the community that thinks the urban service area boundary is the only thing that's involved in the comprehensive plan, which is also incorrect. But, again, those are the kinds of threshold issues that people latch on to and represent a lot of other things. But certainly we know, particularly the land use element, is the one that dominates public interest and public involvement. And we expect that and are planning for that, both in terms of the formal hearings and also the kind of informal things where we go out. Frankly, the last two times we did the series, two different series of library meetings across the community, and the last time that, you know, when you have 300 to 400 people in a junior high cafeteria all wanting to speak, it doesn't become a very effective form. So we're exploring how we still allow those kinds of things, but also have some other forums for, you know, face-to-face involvement and input into the plan in addition to the formal public hearings that are required by statute. Okay. Thank you. Yes, sir. Thank you, Chris. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Council Member. Vice Mayor, you're next. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Yes, ma'am. Thank you for being here, Chris. And just a couple of things. I know I've talked with you about this first one, and I hope that by the time the goals and objectives come to the Council from the Planning Commission, that we have a good sense that the baby hasn't been thrown out with the bathwater. And by that, I mean that someone has gone through the current goals and objectives to determine the most important pieces and to be sure they're not gone. I think, yes, this is what we have now is very detailed, but sometimes detail can delineate what the community really wants. And so that's just something I want to express publicly. I appreciate streamlining and condensing. On the other hand, I want to be sure in that process that we're doing what's right, and we end up with goals and objectives that are truly reflective of what we as a community want. And then I had a question. I was thinking back to there's the 96 plan, there's the 2001 plan, and then somewhere along the line it became a six-year plan to the 2007 one. And I think that was that reflection of all the community input and the length of the discussions and meetings. Partially. Key elements were adopted in 2006. And again, the five-year update, if you look at the history, we've actually in the last 10 years done a lot better. We've always initiated review. And again, there is no mandate in statute that it be adopted every five years. It just says in every five years the community must review. So you had the 67 plan. The next one was 73. You had from the 73 plan it was 1980, seven years. From 80, it was 88, eight years. So it's very... And then it went from 88 to 96, another eight years. And then we've kept it on pretty good track here in the last 10 years and have been very aggressively trying to do that. So we've had 96 to 2001, 2001 to 2006 and 2007 with key elements, such as the land use element was actually adopted in 2006. The community facilities elements were, and others were brought in in 2007. And again, this time, again, we see it's really 7, and if we get it done by 2012, and the fact that we're already in very active review, we feel very comfortable with where we are. Well, I appreciate all your work. I know it puts a lot of stress on your staff when one of these comes up. You can shake your head. I know it does, and especially with the public meetings. I wanted to turn to the last page, which I've seen a number of times, the vacant land, and have heard discussed. I was in the Planning Commission meeting when this was discussed, I think that was last week, and then the press conference. And can you just confirm for me that this vacant land total of 6,715 acres, that that does not include what you consider underutilized land? That's correct. And would, if I'm trying to remember, is underutilized land, land like the Lexington Mall that has something on it? that's not being used, or is that considered vacant land? I'm not sure that when we actually did the analysis it was one or the other. It wasn't vacant. Oh, okay. So that wasn't a very good example. No, we don't use those. What we did when we did the underutilized survey a few summers ago, We had a team of student interns that we sent out under the direction of one of our planners. And we inventoried properties. We went down every street in Lexington and even looked at structures, if they were boarded up, you know, and we did different categories like that. And what we were emphasizing, this was a major thing we thought would be very helpful for our infill program. And in fact, something that providers, particularly of housing, looking for small vacant lots, faith-based providers of affordable housing and others, you know, as part of what we did was to identify those and we created an address database that, you know, has helped them look for sites and other folks. But it also gave us an overall picture of where and the type of land that's inside the urban service area that we could strategically try to work on to have it used for more than it is now. Because as we've pointed out many times, everybody sees the big splash of a 100-unit new development in downtown or near downtown. It's all big, good things are happening. just as much if you get 50 to 100 little vacant lots and a little house come up that wouldn't have been able to be used. All of those things make a difference in our infill redevelopment strategy. So I guess I'm giving you a longer answer than you're looking for, but in addition to the 6,700 acres, We have identified about 2,500 acres of uses of, you know, excess surface parking lots, things like that, that we certainly feel could be put to more productive use and also serve as a part of our growth base, not just always expanding out or filling the greenfield spaces, but to also lands that have been developed or used for one thing that clearly aren't being well used, that could be upgraded. Thank you. Did you have anything else? Well, no, I was hoping you would say how much was underutilized, and you said 2,500. About 2,500 acres we've identified. Okay, thank you. Next we have Council Member Dr. Blues, Tom. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Chris, as you move forward toward all of the various components of the update, how do we assess where we are with reference to the current 21 goals and objectives? Do we have some kind of table that says we're this close or this far away? I'm going to – nothing quite like that, because if you look at the goals and objectives statements, they really, beginning back in the 90s, became, I say, a very large statement of policy directives. And again, not so much the pure goals and pure measurable objectives. But what we've done in both the 2001 plan and in the 2007 plan that had never been done before was we took the plan, and as the plan was adopted, the last thing we did was to adopt an implementation table. And I have said this is basically a strategic plan document as we've been evolving our plan from a map-based plan back in the 70s and 80s and partially the 90s, evolving it to a policy-based and strategic type of plan for the community in that process. what we have done is maintain that implementation table, look at those, and every year report back to the Planning Commission where we are in those things. And it's recognized out front that you're not going to get to everything, not everything's going to happen. Some things are going to evolve into something else. And I believe in February is typically the month that we've done that. In February of this year, we again prepared that document of all those things, what has happened, where they stand. And, you know, we think that brings accountability to the plan just not being something that's adopted and sits up there, that then a whole lot of things happen. Like it was identified that the Planning Commission wanted to do small area plans and that the priorities were the central sector and the east end and a couple other places. That happened. You know, and those are the kinds of things that we have indicated and documented just as a couple of examples. And we'd be glad at some point if this committee would like to see a presentation of that kind of information. We'd be glad to do that. I think that would really be helpful. That would give us a kind of measuring stick, so to speak, although you're absolutely right. I think this is a constant pursuit, and I suppose the goals in some ways are always and probably should be receding ahead of us. But to have some mileposts, so to speak, I think would be useful. And Mr. Chairman, I think that would be helpful to the committee. So this would be kind of a document that would show what parts of the goals and objectives have been obtained? Again, if I picture it this way, you have the goals and objectives, which then lead the plan, and the plan then led the implementation strategy. So they lead each other, but what you really look at is the assumption is the implementation strategies were the things that were seen to move the goals and objectives and things forward. So in that sense, you know, everyone that was in the plan is listed, and I give you an update on what's been accomplished, what's in progress, what's, you know, stalled, and if so, why, things like that. Is that the tenor of what you're after? Is that what you're looking for? Yeah, exactly. I'm not, I think it would just be helpful to have that information that's already been catalogued, catalog, so to speak, not to do some extra task. It's up to date as of February. I know that. Thank you, sir. Thank you, sir. Let me just dovetail on to the end of his question. Sure. Do you ever go through the goals and objectives and just line out things that we have accomplished or things that are no longer policy emphasized? We never have, except when we do the review. Now, as we go into the next, you look to see if there are things that aren't relevant anymore. Yes. Usually the goals and objectives haven't been stated in that precise type of – if you know what I mean. It's not like the goal is to do a project. It's to achieve some, you know, you can go through and look at the examples. Well, I was looking at the one for downtown. Ensure the desirability, diversity, and vitality of downtown. Goal 12, page 14. And we must be achieving some of those. I didn't know if that would change some of, I mean, you have objectives A through O there. and I didn't know if that's a different kind of question than what Dr. Blues was asking because there must be certain things to which we have satiated the need, found the policy, made the decision. And I didn't know if you ever went through and just kind of said done or not needed or obviated. Basically, yes, we've done that kind of thing, But never in the sense of like a comprehensive document that would list everything that has been done to, say, streamline the development process for downtown projects. A whole bunch of things that have happened. I mean, that one may not have done. But to list all those and prepare a written report like that on these how many goals and objectives, Jim? Two hundred and thirty-six. Two hundred and thirty-six goals and objectives, no. Let's go with Tom's first. Thank you. Well, you really will pick up a lot of those things through the implementation chapter. Again, the implementation chapter are the things that were decided would be the activities that would further the goals and objectives and achieve those of the plan. So, but we've never reported them back out that way. We've reported them out based on the implementation list. Well, you've alluded to the conversation we had last week in public about the urban service boundary itself, which gives us the ability to approach this differently than we have before. So we may look at things a little bit differently in getting through this process, but I appreciate that opportunity on both ends. Vice Mayor Gordon. Thank you, Mr. Chair. And I think you're – I agree with you. I don't want to spend a lot of my time right now, my five minutes on it, but I think you have a very good point about looking through to check off, because on the same goal that you pointed out is Objective K, which is encourage maximum use of the downtown transit center site. We've been encouraging that for generations. Okay, so anyway, I would agree you're on a good track there. But I want to go back to the vacant land, the last page, because, Chris, I'm interested in your criteria for identifying 9,000 or 9,000 and a few odd acres. LFUCG did that market study a couple years ago, and I think the number is very different. Is it not? Did that market study not find 12,000-plus acres were vacant, underutilized land? And where did the 3,000 go? Tom Blue says that an acre, the 3,000's gone to heaven, but I don't believe that. So is there, you know, what's the criteria for your 9,000 acres number? Well, the 9,000 acres is based upon what we really found when we went back in and benchmarked using every technique that we had available to us up to this point to look at what has not been absorbed. Okay. I'd have to go back and review the housing market study. I know that, if I recall correctly, Stan Harvey worked on that part of it and used some of the information that we had on vacant and underutilized land as well. Of course, in the older iterations, we didn't have a lot of the undevelopable land, which we indicated is about 800 and some acres. That doesn't count for everything different, you said, but that's got to be part of it because we now have the redelineated floodplain. It's all GIS. We could pull that information off. But that's in here, correct, on your little vacant land box, other? No. The other is not that environmental land. But your note says you've already deducted floodplain, green space, undevelopable land. So if you could, if someone could get me why this number is different from the 2009, I think it was maybe 2009. It's only been a couple years ago. Yeah, and I think they were working off of older land. I think they were working out of, first of all, numbers that included floodplains and all of that. and also was probably the 2005-2006 numbers from the last comprehensive plan update, that will account for a good hunk of it. Okay. Can you confirm that for me? Absolutely. Okay. I appreciate it because 3,000 acres is, or what, about 3,000 acres is a fairly significant difference. Well, again, part of it will be what land has developed in the last five or six years. Part of it will be the floodplain and other lands that we've now deducted. And another part of it may be that 2,500 acres of underutilized land is subjective in a lot of ways in terms of what you include in that. And I can go back and talk to Stan and see which number he used. And if they were working off of old numbers, I mean, I can't imagine they were working off of four- or five-year-old numbers, but maybe they were. Well, I think that was the best data available at the time. Okay. They were doing the housing market study. But, again, we'll be glad to check that. Thank you. I appreciate it. I don't think you'll see a huge disconnect. Okay. There'll be some differences, sir. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, ma'am. Council Member Kaye. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you, Chris, for being here. Just a couple of questions, some of which are related to questions that have already been asked. The first one is about the available vacant land. I presume you've got figures on how much of that, what percentage of that is in the expansion area, as opposed to in other parts of the community. Is that correct? Correct. We break it down, and as we're working on it at staff level, we have what's in the expansion area. I mean, we can sort out by what's in or out of the expansion area, what of the myriad land use categories in the comprehensive plan, what they're in. Not so much the absorbed part. We can do that, but that's kind of chasing the older. But in terms of what's still vacant and what it's assigned to is a very critical thing. And we've given you some aggregations, you know, here in terms of residential and employment, things like that. You know, other includes retail, you know, things like that as well. And we can break that down into infinite numbers of detail. Good. There's also been a fair amount of conversation about the vacant buildings, not just vacant land. So the question of what percentage of the existing residential and commercial properties that have been built are not occupied. Is that information that you are? I mean, that changes so rapidly, and we have no government tracking of vacancy. I mean, there are groups out there that, for instance, track the vacancy in apartments. I'm sure there are commercial realtors that track vacant spaces, but it's way beyond our resources to do any kind of meaningful tracking of that. we'd have to know occupancy that turns over hourly. Would that information be available from another source, do you think? Some of that available. But the point is, that is land, or facilities that are available to absorb growth. And clearly that underlies all this as well. And that's why even when we look at this, even in this vacant land, if I'm not mistaken, Jim, And we have, you know, lands that have been subdivided and maybe even lands where houses are under construction. But if they haven't been occupied yet, they're still vacant and armed. Great. Okay. In relation to the simplifying the goals and objectives, have you given enough thought to that already that you have some ideas about the strategies that you will use to simplify? I heard you talk a little bit about more measurable, but I wonder if there are other criteria you would use for ruling things in or out. We really work starting with the vision statement, which everyone seems pretty comfortable with, with some tweaking in the planning commission. And again, we have a very dynamic planning commission. I would say it's too early to say what that product will look like or what they will recommend at this point, but we've been working with drafts, different ideas. Some like it, some don't like it. It's still too early, I think, to talk in specifics on that. Okay. I have a similar question that may get a similar answer that has to do with the plans for public input. But I know that that's been tweaked over the years. There seems to be a new standard way to do it. There was an old standard way that people were not happy with, and there's a new standard way. I, for one, am not happy with a new standard way. Has there been some thought given to ways to make that a more effective process? We have tried. Again, as you know, any of those are so labor and time intensive that you want to slow down the process. more and more public input and that's not wrong. It's just a fact though. One thing that we did feel the last couple times we started out before the goals and objectives going to the community, giving a brief presentation, getting feedback. And because we felt that that needed to be the visioning process of getting people and finding their wishes and desires. One thing that we felt, that after having gone through Destination 2040, that would just be a waste of everybody's time to kick that off this time, because Vision 2040 virtually validated the same things that we found that we see over and over again that the community really values. So at this point, we decided on this process that we would try to at least craft something for the community to react to in the goals and objectives and put that out there in a lot of different ways and places. And we're still talking about how we do that. We know there will be some face-to-face. There's going to be use of social media. There will be the formal public hearings and those things as well. But, again, we're always open to suggestions. You know, the paradigm used to be the staff did. The plan came down from the mountaintop and the public reacted to the whole plan. That was the 60s and 70s version, and that didn't work. So then we went to the supercommittees. So for a few years in probably the 1988 update and at the start of the, you know, you had a comprehensive plan update committee that met for three years. This is why you see eight years between plan adoptions. And in the end, the last one crashed and burned very tremendously with half the people being kicked off back in the early 90s, if I remember correctly. And then we went and using the expansionary master plan model of opening the community-wide meetings. And I remember when this room was configured into a mini arena with a table in the middle for that expansionary plan process. And we built on that idea of using an open community process and used that in 2001 and 2006 and 2007. And, again, our opinion and feeling as a staff that that process can work when there's communication. But, again, if you're having 300 people that all want their one minute microphone to shout about something, you've lost the value of that model. And I'll be honest, we have thought a lot. We've been struggling a lot. We've been reviewing a lot of other processes in other places. and, you know, we'll come up with something that we think the community will be satisfied and will feel that they've had a chance to give meaningful input. If I can, just one comment, and then a thank you for your input, and that is that one way to think about public input, and I think you're moving in that direction when you talk about social media, but my take on the history of public input is that what has happened is that people have come up with one thing that they're going to do to get the public input. Then they do it over and over and over. Over and over, right. I don't think those, whichever one thing it is, it doesn't work. So my suggestion would be to think about diversifying the opportunities and the kinds of opportunities. There may be some people who want to sit around for three or four hours or three or four months. There may be some people who want to come once and shout into the microphone. I think it's important that they all have that opportunity in some way, but that nobody, no one form is really going to suit all. So that would be my thought. I think so, too. We've also know that, and have always tried even with the formats we use, that there are people that like to get up to the microphone and speak. There are people that will never do that but have really strong and great opinions, so we always try to provide an alternative way for them to express themselves as well. And again, we're just trying to build on that to use the tools that we have. have and within the limitations of our resources. You know, we have 20 to 25 percent less staff than we had at the last comprehensive plan start. All those things weigh into how we do this. But again, our commitment always is to the community that even if it takes longer, the community should have the opportunities for meaningful input. And that's what really stretches out the processes. Thank you, Chris. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, sir. Next on our list is Council Member Ford. Thank you, Councilman Farmer. And good afternoon, Chris. I want to turn my attention to goal number eight, which is infill and redevelopment. And as we embark upon this update, and a mention has been made earlier about how our planning staff and the planning commission and the council and community at large kind of evaluates what has been in the plan former, Just for reference for those watching, I'll read the goal for infill and redevelopment. It says to create strategies that enable and encourage appropriate infill and redevelopment of established developments in neighborhoods. Chris, if you could just briefly talk a little bit about how planning staff and how the Planning Commission has evaluated infill and redevelopment in the context of the current plan. Certainly. Let me talk about what really happened after this plan was adopted. And again, what has happened in a number of times. Maybe if you indulge me just five minutes, a little bit of context and history. Terms in film redevelopment have appeared probably in every comprehensive plan, certainly since merger. However, I will say the community did not pay serious attention to it. And they did, not serious, but as a strategic thing until after the 96th comprehensive plan, the first time we had to face the finite land inside the urban service area, In 1996, the decision was made to have a moderate expansion, and a whole bunch of things followed that. First of all, it made us get serious about our rural area and realize that it was more than just the green area outside the urban service area. So we did the rural land management plan and did those strategies. The flip side of that coin, if you were going to preserve and aggressively try to do what we are doing with the rural service area, that meant that the inside had to be treated differently. And in the early 2000s, with the assistance of funding from various council members, we created the residential infill and redevelopment study that led to the largest revision of our zoning ordinances that we had ever done and also laid out the strategies of trying to do facilitation, which council followed up on by giving us a staff planner who has been dedicated to facilitating those things. It looked at incentives, which has been very difficult to do because incentives involve money, and money has been in very short supply throughout this decade. And also education, and we've done a lot of things education-wise, kind of a four-legged stool to infill and redevelopment. And the council created an infill and redevelopment steering committee that was chaired for a number of years by Dr. David Stevens. We met regularly and strategized. We had development community neighborhoods involved and were moving things along. When the issue again surfaced about expansion in the 2006 and 2007 update and a decision was made not to expand, all of those efforts, which were greater than what had ever been done in the past, got another big shot of adrenaline Because as the changes that happened at the council and with the adoption of the plan and that aftermath, the community once again realized we need to put more effort into infill and redevelopment. And after these goals and objectives and everything were laid out and the strategy was done, there was another major effort embarked. We had a task force process with professional facilitators that we outreached to the community to set a whole new series of specific strategies to advance infill and redevelopment. And that document was created. The infill and redevelopment steering committee was expanded. More people were brought in, other council members, other community groups. And a report was done that has been followed and being benchmarked working on those activities. So that wasn't even anticipated when this was done. But that, again, has led to two additional rounds of major ordinance renovations, countless other initiatives. It's a very, you know, cross-the-board kind of thing. And that list is being worked and reported on. I think Council got a report within the last year, 18 months, on where those implementation efforts were. So, again, these are the things that quietly change the business of what we're doing and how we do it. What are your thoughts, Chris, in regards to going forward with the update and what role will infill and redevelopment play, I guess, in regards to its identity as a goal and how can we get it onto the implementation schedule that's listed at the back of the report where we can continue to make progress, and particularly progress that our established residential neighborhoods can see and appreciate? I think clearly where we are on that, and I'll be very honest, is that one of the reasons that we feel it's very important and we wanted to put the urban boundary issue beside early is that we think, again, continuing what we've already put in motion, trying to implement the ideas that are already out there, is where we should spend effort versus reinventing the wheel. That said, through this process, we should again benchmark and check those things, reprioritize using the infill and redevelopment steering committee is the focus to, you know, what have we had that just, you know, are we ever going to fund a major land make? Are we going to fund the Affordable Housing Trust Fund? I mean, you know, those are the big kinds of things that, you know, involve a lot of dollars. Folks, on this horse you're going to have to make decisions about one way or another. But at the same time, you have all those other things that we keep working that can advance those kinds of efforts. So we want to keep that momentum going and not lose it. And again, infill and redevelopment will be a major theme. But, you know, we've pretty much exhausted the regulatory things we can do. There are still some others. There's the whole question of design, regulations, other kinds, form-based codes, other things you might do that can impact infill and redevelopment strategies. You've got folks working on that. And we go out and tweak the regulatory part of it. This part doesn't take any money. It just takes the effort to do that. And I think we're pretty much at the end of that, and we're down to where we've got to spend money. But we've got to have initiatives to really move the things forward. And that's just my personal opinion. Okay. Thank you, Chris. Appreciate your explanation. Thank you, sir. In the work that the Planning Commission is doing, and based on your timeline, I don't get the feeling that you're, and I've got no problem with this, that you're necessarily on schedule so far. And our next meeting would be on July the 5th, which would be just before we would have our recess. And so what I'm thinking is you've been asking a couple of questions here that some people want some follow-up and some more information on. And I think inside the council office what I'll do is ask the entire council if they have any goal and objective questions that they might want answered, and we would kind of roll those things into the core of our meeting for July the 5th, because I don't believe you all will have necessarily finished the work to project to us, and that's okay. Well, we certainly hope so. But again, we can only recommend to the Planning Commission, as you know. And, you know, my sense, Jim and I were talking about this, and we feel that we're maybe behind but only slightly, and the Planning Commission could turn that around this month. We just don't know. And, again, it depends on some of the public input we get and when the Planning Commission sets the hearing. But I think we're still hoping to have a document before you, before or about the time you return from break. Well, and that works perfectly. And it also gives us an opportunity to answer a few questions that have been posed in a couple different ways today and to initiate the rest of the council into the discussion because under our new committee system, And this committee does not represent a majority of the council as it did before. So what goes on here would have to have another step up in terms of, you know, paying out or being reported out to the full council. So I want to involve them in this front end, too. And that's wonderful. I mean, the comments that we've already gotten today, I was thinking, you know, when the vice mayor was speaking earlier about her thoughts. And, you know, our ability to communicate those thoughts to the planning commission are very important in terms of informing them of where the council may want to go. In the end, they may say, well, we're going in this direction regardless. But, again, that will all come to you, and you all will have the final commentary. But, again, as much of your thoughts and sentiments that we can communicate to the Planning Commission, I think the better the process will be for all. Well, I think that keeps us on schedule, invites more people to the process, And then once we're back from recess and you all have had full value of that time, I think we can take it up. And if we want to as a committee have extra meetings, we can decide to do so as other standing committees have done so too. I think underneath this is just kind of a question of, you know, you're the professional and you all look at what other jurisdictions and municipalities do. how different are our goals and objectives from those in our peer group, I would say? Longer, shorter, more detailed, more broadly themed. I think broader, deeper, and more detailed would be generally from the ones that we've reviewed. Most communities, Lexington is unique in so many ways. Amen. And that's one thing that when I interact with my peers across the country that comes out, some of the themes are the same, but in so many communities, they go, I wish we could get people care as much as they appear to where you come from. And we're blessed with that. I do feel that way. The worst thing you want is an apathetic community, and certainly we do not have that here about planning. but again our sense is that the goals and objectives in the 90s went through a great expansion I think you were involved in those I think the planning committee had a subcommittee that we met night after night after night after night and went over every comma I just remember the early morning meetings where there was coffee back there and I think the table in the middle here I would watch that at home while I was getting dressed and people are already here doing things, which just goes back to your point of how interested and I think how vested our community is into all parts of this process. But let me define further. When we look at goals and objectives for other entities that have boundaries such as ours, are ours more detailed than usual in relation to other municipalities who have planning boundaries? Most don't have an urban growth boundary. Understood. Most don't have their identity tied up in their vacant land. Their vacant land may have environmental value and open space value, but in a whole lot of communities, one of two things, either they don't have any open space. Most communities that have a comprehensive plan would be kind of like doing a comprehensive plan inside New Circle Road because they just don't have vacant land unless they annex. That's a whole other thing we don't have here. So you've got all those kinds of issues. But in a lot of places, you know, if you're in the middle of a corn field, a lot of people don't. That's not the same as being their brand. You know what I'm saying. So it's a very different situation here. I'll be honest with you, compared to most places, the legislative body here pays a lot more attention to planning and zoning issues. In many places, that's what we have a planning commission for, and we don't care. We don't have that here. And I think that's good because despite the tensions that it causes, you know, you have different roles and different checks and balances, and the commission has some duties, you have others. And I think it works. It's not always painless, but I think it works very well. That's what made last week's press conference so extraordinary. I mean, it was a true coming together at a time and a place that lets us utilize your smaller staff for better outcomes during this planning horizon. So I think we're on a right path here. I'm just interested, as I've already intoned, we have the opportunity to do things different, but that doesn't necessarily mean we have to do them differently. Correct. Correct. But I think we want to be very, I want to be very open to any opportunities that are presented to us, especially in this planning iteration. And we're all sensitive to that, that since it is planning and zoning issues and development issues are so important in Lexington. Yes, sir. And the goals and objectives are the only true tool, other than your incremental zoning decisions and the ultimate power that you have to write the laws and do that. The goals and objectives are the only way you communicate back to the Planning Commission what you want the plan to have or what you would like to see the plan have. And I think that's why they have become so detailed. They are. And truly, you know, if you were breaking down, for the most part, there aren't really goals and objectives in the classic sense. But they are and have been a good method for Council to communicate to the Commission. Our discussion has engendered more questions, and I would go back to Vice Mayor. Mine are actually comments, and I'm glad, Mr. Farmer, that you brought up what you did, because I think that we are a very unique community, very unique. And if we looked across the country to see how many other communities have emerged government with a tight urban service growth boundary, we would find just maybe a handful, if that. So I would just simply say I agree we have an opportunity to do this differently, but it doesn't necessarily mean we have to change everything, because some of the things in the past might be things that we want to keep. And it reminds me of a few years ago when a colleague here on the council said to me, Linda, if we would just loosen up on our comprehensive plan, we could be like Atlanta. And my response was, why on earth would we want to do that? We would never want to do that. I enjoy flying in and out of Atlanta. But, you know, you have to be very careful. I think we all have to be very careful of what the end result could be with our changes and to be sure we're going where we want to be with any changes that we do. So change can certainly be good and helpful. It's not necessarily true that we have to change everything. So no question, just comments. Fine comment. Thank you. I would like to spend time with you on – I bet I can guess that colleague in two guesses, but not in public. No, agreed. Council Member K. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Also, I think I've got comments rather than questions. Although, if Chris wants to weigh in on any of this, I'd be happy to hear it. The first comment is that I think the reason that this community pays as much attention as it does to zoning and planning issues is embedded in what has been confirmed by Destination 2040 and just about every other study, and that is the people value the balance between rural and urban. But balance is a tricky word. And what that says is that there's two sides and they have to be somehow or other rationalized. So the focus on that balance, how to maintain it in a way that keeps this community as attractive as it is, I think is really important and key. Second comment about the goals and objectives, there's an old acronym, KISS, which is Keep It Simple, Stupid, or Keep It Stupid, Simple, whichever way that works. What underlies that, I think, is that there's a tendency in any planning process to treat the basic skeleton like a Christmas tree and to hang everything in the world on it. Everybody wants to get their little piece in, and when you've built all those pieces together, what you come up with is a document that is unwieldy and that people, although they'd like to pay attention to it, their eyes glaze over. So if you're conveying things back to the Planning Commission, which I know you are, I think one of the suggestions I would make personally, I don't know if the rest of the Council would buy into that, and that is that really to work on simplification. They're too long. They're too general. There's so much in it. And let me say one more thing. I see you getting ready to respond. But the third thing is that anybody who's watched the actual day-to-day proceedings of the Planning Commission knows that one of the standard moves of any attorney that is before the Planning Commission is they get up and they say, Goal 13 says blah, blah, blah, and that's exactly what we're trying to do. The fact that there's nine other objectives that might not exactly support the position, they do not want to share with the commission, but that's standard. So the more you put in here, the more fuel you give to somebody who wants to do something that otherwise people might not be excited about. They say, look, it says right here we're supposed to promote and enhance existing tourist attractions, and that's what my plan does. So simplification is important, really in part to provide some protection for the Planning Commission. Thank you. Thank you, sir. And Council Member Beard. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Chris, you started out by saying that this process is mandated by state law. Yes, sir. Is it targeted toward communities or is it targeted toward counties? It's targeted to planning units, which in Kentucky can be a municipality. It can be a joint agency. We have all kinds of models throughout the state. I was talking yesterday with folks from northern Kentucky that has 19 different political jurisdictions, 19 different planning commissions that recommend. And that, they do a unified comprehensive plan. For the first time last year, Jessamine County and Nicholasville joined together and did a unified comprehensive plan where they had been independent planning units. You had Jessamine County, Wilmore, and you had the city of Nicholasville, and they each did their own comprehensive plan. So there are a lot of different ways that it can be done, but when you do it, and remember that if you want to regulate land through zoning or subdivision regulations in Kentucky, you have to have a comprehensive plan. You can't have the regulation without having the planning to go with it. So when communities do that, they create their model that works for them. and go from there. Now we had joint planning here, even before merger, although the decisions in the end were made by the city commission and the county fiscal court. Well, we're fortunate, it sounds like, then, being in the model that we're in right now, and probably will be in forever. At least none of us will bother worrying about it. Louisville, in their situation, they have all these various and sundry communities that still have some independence in relationship to their merged government. Are they separately planning, or is that all covered? And this is just curiosity. I'm just, really, it's not totally pertinent to what we're talking about. They had Jefferson County, Louisville. My understanding, though, is they're undergoing some very, very fundamental changes over there. Planning is being actually moved under building inspection and things like that. There's just some – I'm not sure exactly what's going on. Unfortunately, with our situation, I've not been able to go to conferences and interact with folks like we used to. But I was talking to Stan Harvey, who's on our state board in the Kentucky chapter, and he was telling me that since the first of the year with the changes over there, there's a lot happening over there. So I'd be kind of afraid to talk about what I know. Well, I just was curious, and you mentioned northern Kentucky and all those entities that are slammed right up next to each other, and I can see where it, in at least three counties, how they're able to say grace over that, and let's say it's crisp as to who's in charge. Well, up there it is very much, and it's different. And there even, my understanding in the Northern Kentucky Area Planning Commission, that they even have a taxing authority that generates the revenue for their staff and other activities up there. But my understanding is that that is under, I'll just say, scrutiny. They were asking me for information about our budgets and trying to benchmark with other agencies and things because they are feeling some pressure, as everyone is, as you can imagine, the problems that we're having budgetary-wise here, the epidemic all over the country and state. I'm sure, and probably worse in many places than we are. Thank you, Chris. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you, sir. Maybe as we come back for our July meeting, we might look at an example of what other jurisdictions might use in terms of a simplified version, just for us to get a feel for it, since this discussion has come up in about three different ways during this meeting. I'll tell you, as follow-up from this, we'll be glad to check some comprehensive plans. We've tried to look at ones that are recognized as being outstanding examples. And we're always appreciative when people look to us as an example across the country to check as well, because, you know, we have that going on as well. But we will do that, and I will also, if you'd like to, I will send you the written report we gave the Planning Commission in February, if you would like, or would you like me to hold back on that, on the implementation status and things like that? Well, let's look at it. I'd like to look at all of it. And, you know, if we're going to indulge public comment, let's give them plenty to comment on. So that's just part of what I was thinking about. And then, although this hasn't really been mentioned, and I just remember it from, you know, we talk about our rural activity centers and holding them where they are. But didn't we have another kind of conversation about parcels in the rural service area that were zoned differently to a certain degree? Yes. And it strikes me that at that time kind of the underlying discussion was to try to eliminate or change those. Yes. And kind of since then we've had the advent of the success of what I call, I mean I've had a good lunch at Windy Corners out there, and the potential advent for some of these uses for agritourism. Have we gone back to reconnoiter about those parcels any at all? Well, it's funny you should mention it. Let me give you the history. That was an offshoot of the rural land management plan that somewhere back in the 50s, probably a fiscal court took a whole bunch of major crossroads in the rural area and put business zoning on them, in many cases where there had never been a business. Never historically, not even an old country general store. Just, it's a good place. And when we drafted the Rural Land Management Plan in 99, we recognized potential for those to be threats. When you literally had, in some cases, four and five acres, you could build a shopping center right in the middle of the rural service area. By right, you're zoned for it. And to deal with that, we embarked on a case-by-case review and proposed government-sponsored rezonings. And the council did one or two, and then when some of the landowners, we started with the ones we thought were easy, and even the first ones, the landowners came and objected, even if they didn't intend to, they said, you know, potential cash in pocket someday, and they fought it. And the council said, we're not doing that anymore. Go find another solution. So then the Planning Commission spent a great deal of time and energy working on a text amendment to the neighborhood business zone primarily, proposed to scale down when it's in the rural service area, B1. And the Planning Commission conducted public hearings. There were some rejections. There were some modifications. And that was forwarded to the council. The council referred it to the planning committee where it sat on the docket for many years and then was removed from that docket and died its death in committee. So that's the history. I'm glad I asked that question. Thank you very much. I appreciate that. And we have a follow-up from Councilmember Ford. Thank you, Chairman. My earlier question was in regards to infill and redevelopment and in regards to kind of where we go from here. One thing that I would encourage, hopefully for the council as we consider the updated goals and objectives, is first to implement. I want us to follow through and get some things done, realizing that it's going to take some sacrifices of time, the time being the resources of our staff here in government, our partner agencies and thus of us around the council, and it's going to take money. And I know as we face this budget year, that's tough to say, but the updated comp plan, which arguably is the, well, one of the most important plans and tools that this government has, these tough budget times won't last always. And so we need to set our priorities and be prepared for when economic times do rebound, that we're able to make infill and redevelopment a reality. We're able to help our established neighborhoods. Because I will say in closing that some refill has happened. I've been here long enough to see, just long enough to see Lexington change, to see some real developments go. But when I think of midfield and redevelopment, I think of our established neighborhoods that are growing older and are in need or have passed the need for improved housing stock and commercial resources. So if we're going to put it and if we're going to adopt the goals and the plan, I hope that we take our due diligence and put our best effort forward to implement, realizing that implement is going to take some cash and capital resources. Thanks. Good, sir. Thank you. Unless there's other comments or questions, I think we've fleshed out our beginning point here and made a nice plan for at least our July meeting and the follow-up work that we'll have to do. Unless there's other comments, I would ask for a motion to adjourn. So I'll move it in a second. All in favor? Opposed? Like sign? We're adjourned. Chris, thank you very much. Thank you all. Much appreciated. Thank you. I'm moving yesterday Nothing