# Budget COW-Revenue Update, Recommendations to Date, Links-CMs Recommendations, Other Business - June 14, 2011 > Auto-transcribed civic record · June 14, 2011 - **Permalink**: https://meetings.lexingtonky.news/meeting/2053 - **Source video**: https://lfucg.granicus.com/player/clip/2053?view_id=14&redirect=true - **Date**: 2011-06-14 - **Last revised**: June 14, 2011 - **Length**: 51,977 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 Budget Committee of the Whole met on June 14, 2011, at 9:00 AM, with the Vice Mayor presiding. The committee addressed three agenda items during the session, including a revenue update and a summary of recommendations to date, both presented for informational purposes. The committee approved Links Recommendations, which constituted the substantive action item of the meeting. Five motions were voted on during the session. No public comments were received. ## Attendance The following council members were present at the meeting on June 14, 2011: - Council Member Ellinger - Council Member Stennett - Council Member Martin - Council Member Ford - Council Member Lane - Council Member Blues - Council Member Kay - Council Member McCord - Council Member Myers - Council Member Henson - Council Member Crosby - Council Member Farmer - Council Member Lawless - Council Member Beard - Vice Mayor No council members were absent or late. ## Votes and Decisions The council held five roll-call votes during this meeting, all of which passed. **Defer Police and Fire Pension Bonds** [timestamp: 00:58:55] Council Member Farmer moved to defer issuing the police and fire pension bonds until January 2012, seconded by Council Member McCord. The motion passed 10-2. Voting in favor were Council Members Ellinger, Stennett, Martin, Ford, Lane, Blues, Kay, McCord, Myers, and Henson. Council Members Crosby and Farmer voted against the motion. **Restore Security Guard Personnel Costs** [timestamp: 01:13:04] Council Member McCord moved to restore the security guard personnel costs, seconded by Council Member Farmer. The motion passed unanimously 12-0, with all council members voting in favor: Ellinger, Stennett, Martin, Ford, Lane, Blues, Kay, McCord, Myers, Henson, Crosby, and Farmer. **Restore 10% Cuts to Outside Agencies** [timestamp: 01:55:24] Council Member Myers moved to restore the 10% cuts to the outside agencies in the current proposed budget, seconded by Council Member McCord. The motion passed 11-1. Voting in favor were Council Members Ellinger, Stennett, Martin, Ford, Lane, Blues, Kay, McCord, Myers, Henson, and Crosby. Council Member Farmer voted against the motion. **Add Commissioner of Planning Position** [timestamp: 02:36:39] Council Member Stennett moved to add back $105,290 to the budget for a commissioner of planning position, seconded by Council Member Myers. The motion passed 11-1. Voting in favor were Council Members Ellinger, Stennett, Martin, Ford, Lane, Blues, Kay, McCord, Myers, Henson, and Crosby. Council Member Farmer voted against the motion. **Fund Police Recruit Class** [timestamp: 06:22:25] Council Member Stennett moved to fund a police recruit class starting January 1st with 25 recruits totaling $700,000, seconded by Council Member Ellinger. The motion passed unanimously 12-0, with all council members voting in favor: Ellinger, Stennett, Martin, Ford, Lane, Blues, Kay, McCord, Myers, Henson, Crosby, and Farmer. ## Budget and Financial Actions The meeting addressed several budget appropriations to restore and fund various positions and services: * **Security Guard Personnel Costs**: $513,750 appropriated to restore security guard personnel costs * **Outside Agencies Funding**: $314,612 appropriated to restore 10% cuts to outside agencies * **Planning Commissioner Position**: $105,290 appropriated to add back funding for a commissioner of planning position * **Police Recruit Class**: $700,000 appropriated to fund a police recruit class beginning January 1st with 25 recruits ## Contested Items **Police and Fire Pension Bonds** The council engaged in a split vote regarding the timing of issuing pension bonds. The central disagreement concerned whether to defer the bond issuance until January 2012 or proceed with an earlier timeline. Council members raised concerns about the long-term financial impacts of the bonds and weighed these against immediate budget needs. The split vote indicates that members were divided on the best approach to balancing these competing fiscal priorities. **Clear Officers Funding** The council held a heated discussion about funding for clear officers in neighborhoods. Members debated the importance of maintaining clear officer positions for community safety while confronting the practical challenge of securing adequate funding within existing budget constraints. The intensity of this discussion reflects the tension between the council's commitment to neighborhood safety and the financial limitations facing the municipality. ## Revenue Update Commissioner Driscoll and Mr. O'Meara presented an update on 2011 revenue and projected revenues for fiscal year 2012 [timestamp: 00:09:44]. The presentation covered multiple revenue streams including payroll withholding, net profits, insurance, and franchise fees. This agenda item was informational in nature, with no formal action or decision required from the meeting participants. ## Summary of Recommendations to Date Connie Underwood provided a summary of the budget recommendations that had been approved to date [timestamp: 0:36:59]. The presentation included information on the current fund balance and a review of items that had already been approved by the council. This agenda item served as an informational update to bring attendees current on the budget approval process and the financial status of previously endorsed recommendations. The discussion did not result in new decisions or actions, but rather provided a status report on the council's budgetary work completed up to that point in the meeting. ## Links Recommendations [timestamp: 1:56:26] The council discussed various recommendations from the links committees during this agenda item. Council Member Lane and Council Member Stennett were the key speakers involved in this discussion. The recommendations addressed items from multiple committee areas, including: - Strategic planning manager - Government communications - Council office items The council reviewed and considered these recommendations from the links committees before moving to a vote. The item was approved by the council. --- ## Decisions - **Motion** — passed (10-2): Defer issuing the police and fire pension bonds until January 2012 - **Motion** — passed (12-0): Restore the security guard personnel costs - **Motion** — passed (11-1): Restore the 10% cuts to the outside agencies in the current proposed budget - **Motion** — passed (11-1): Add back $105,290 to the budget for a commissioner of planning position - **Motion** — passed (12-0): Fund a police recruit class starting January 1st with 25 recruits totaling $700,000 --- ## Full transcript Music Thank you. The End Thank you. ¶¶ Thank you. Thank you. the budget. So welcome. And I wanted to go ahead and dispense of some housekeeping, and we'll see if this suits you. At 11 o'clock, our Commissioner of Finance and our, and, probably and, our budget director need to go sell the Eastern State bonds. So they will be out of the chamber for about 15 minutes, and I'm proposing that would be a good time to break and go grab some lunch to bring in. And Melinda will be circulating a lunch request for you. So does that, how's that work for you? Well, and we probably will need a stretch break around 1 or 1.30. About schedule or timing. Now, we have... Vice Mayor. Yeah, Council Member Ellinger. Before we get started, I think it's probably appropriate we wish you a happy birthday, because is this not your birthday today? It's tomorrow. It's tomorrow? Okay, well, I got an early birthday announcement, but I'm glad you're getting to celebrate it with us. A budget. Exactly. Aren't you going to sing, Chuck? No, go with it. Exactly. Well, and since we're on to that, we might wish Dr. Blues a happy birthday. His birthday is Thursday. So it's a big birthday week. We always celebrate by having a budget. Thank you. Now, our packet says that we are having a revenue update. So that would be Commissioner Driscoll. and then we'll move into the rest of our agenda. So welcome. Good morning. Thank you, Vice Mayor. What we'd like to do, if it's agreeable with you, is have the 2011 revenue update. I know that you were interested in how 2011 was the status of 2011 and how that impacted the revenue estimates for 2012. So what I would like to propose is that Bill go through revenue of 2011, Ryan, talk about the expenditures in 2011 and our plan, and then see how that translates into 2012 revenues, and that you have a three- or four-page packet that you should have in front of you. So is that agreeable? Do you think that will be about a 15-minute? Yes, it shouldn't take any longer than that. Okay, that will be helpful. I know Council Members asked for this so that at the very last minute we can feel comfortable getting our final revenue numbers. So is there any disagreement with doing that? If not, we'll go ahead and do that and welcome Mr. O'Meara. Thank you. Good morning. So as Commissioner Driscoll said, we would start with an update on the 2011 and then migrate into the adjusted revenues being proposed for FY12 budget. So the revenue side of the projected year end, which is coming upon us at June 30, is in front of you now. This shows also what we put into the late-item packet. I think it was last week. The days are kind of running together. But payroll withholding is currently May year-to-date $142.4 million, and we're projecting to end the year at $153 million. Net profits, May year-to-date is 27.2, and we're predicting a $29 million end of year. And I'll continue to remind everybody that includes $1.1 million of amnesty money that would be non-recurring. Our insurance is at $21.8, and that's what we're predicting year-end. The insurance is usually all put to bed by the end of May. And our franchise fees are currently at $17.1 million, and we're predicting a year-end of $17.6. The other license and permits are within striking distance of budget. The ad valorem is a little better than what was originally budgeted, about $200,000. The services line, we're showing a $3 million favorable variance to the original budget, And that includes end-of-year payments that we are anticipating getting from both the county clerk and the sheriff's office. It also includes some strong revenues in the detention side and below budget in the parks and golf areas. The fines, intergovernmental investment income, those things are very close to budget. But the other financing sources, that $200,000 is the transfer from the landfill fund. And then our other income is a mixture of all types of things and is predicted to come in at $2,066,000. So we are predicting at this point our total revenue for FY11 in the general fund to be $274,214,600. Council members, now is the time for questions. Council Member Stenet. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Mr. Mayor, good morning. Good morning. Thank you for this update. I appreciate you breaking down the other revenue streams so we can kind of get a better handle on it. I think this is significant because, if I'm not mistaken, it's the first time in at least two years that net profits have shown a pause by year end of a fiscal year. That is correct. Maybe three. It feels like a century, but I know for sure it's two years, and that's pretty significant. This is the first time we've seen a positive in net profits. We reached a high of $31.1 million in 2008. We had a 2.2 percent decrease for 2009. We had a 10 percent off of that decrease for 2010. And until the fourth quarter, we were trending another 10 percent off of that. So this is a turnaround for our net profit. It's what we hoped when we built the budget last year. It wasn't showing itself, and so we backed off and thought that it would happen next year. So we're pleased to see some good news in the net profit in this April and May. Thank you, sir. Thank you, Vice Mayor. You're welcome. One point, if I could, though, parse that just a little bit. When we break down the returns in net profits, it takes a little wind out of our optimism. We actually have $1 million less year-to-date in net profit returns versus net profit returns last year. The reason we're plussing is we're $1 million ahead in extension filings and $1 million ahead in estimated payments. So we have businesses saying they're going to make more, but until October comes, when those extensions come in, we won't know what that actual versus refund applications might be. So there's a little softness to the good news on net profits. First, I wanted to recognize Bill and his shop. I think they set a record in terms of closing the month of May to provide this information today to you all. So I was pretty impressed with that. On the expense side, I think Bill talked a little bit about some additional revenues. Jane's going to talk about parsing those out and break out some of the one-time revenue sources. Wanted to walk through the expense side. I think married with some slight additional revenue. When we talk about the beginning of the year, we talk about that $15 million structural imbalance. So how was the gap closed or what was the plan to close the gap? Bill went over the revenue side. I want to go over the expense side as well. The administration put in place three different things. They did an expense reduction plan via divisions assistance. There were some global accounts that were targeted, and there was a moratorium on discretionary expenses. as well as a hiring freeze that allowed the expense side to come to what you see before. The personnel line, I think we spend a lot of time on that, and we should. We're still projecting basically a $2 million below budget on the year there, which I think is an incredible accomplishment because health care, general fund health care, was paid out of that as well. So given the large vacancy credit, which was enhanced by the hiring freeze, were able to pay for health care and recognize some additional savings in that individual category. Operating is where you see the efforts of the expense reduction plan, both on the discretionary side and the voluntary side, divisions submitted. And we think we'll be able to get about, on a projected basis, another $2 million below budget in that particular category. Debt service is basically a push. There was a small refunder that we did. We recognized some slight savings. In partner agencies, there was a budget amendment done early in the year. So basically, that's on target and as projected. The insurance category, I think, is the same. The operating category, there's about $750,000 that council approved for general service repair and maintenance. We've moved from a proactive repair and maintenance to the $750,000 in this category for John Sheed's group to address things that break. Thankfully, so far, we were able to recognize that $750,000. So that more or less rounds out the expense category. I'd like to step down into kind of the one-time, it really should read transfers and one-time revenue sources. The property sale. The original budget, as we all recall, had some general surplus as well as $4 million, and that's the $4,236,000 number. Basically, that big, large $4 million property, that's not going to be hit, but Council tentatively approved the sale on Red Mile, which will be about $1.7, $1.8 million. Add on some of the general surplus, so we will not be as far behind budget in that particular category with the sale of that property, which will have a big impact on our bottom line. And then in terms of transfers, those are basically budgeted and are on target at the end of the fiscal year. So on a projected basis, I think it's important that basically revenues equal expenses. Now, that's not one-time revenues, but basically revenues equal expenses and through additional revenues for the budget and the expense reduction plans, It looks like on a projected basis we're going to end the year basically a push. So I think it's important to break down the revenue side in addition to we have recurring expenses. So as outlined in the budget address, try to marry the one-time revenue sources to the one-time expenses, and that's not necessarily the case. We happen to have the benefit of one-time revenue sources this year, and we highlighted three there. The tax amnesty plan, Bill was very successful in that and actually got additional revenue over the budget. But again, it's a one-time revenue source. The property sale, as I just discussed, it was basically $1,750,000. And then the end-of-term payments, which had a big impact. I think it's important to say that in our projections on the previous page, we're including both the property sale and both the end-of-term payments. We have not received checks for either. So there is some volatility there, but I think it's important to parse out the one-time revenue sources that it's over $5.5 million. So when you look at the fiscal soundness on the one-time revenues married with the one-time expenses and you back out that $5.5 million, you basically have recurring revenues of $268,000, and that's the number that you can compare against next year. So there is some slight increases because basically we don't have those one-time, those three large one-time revenue sources next year. So when you net out expenses in the transfers, basically on a net income basis, we're roughly $5 million in the hole or to the negative when you marry those two. So basically the year is going to end on the cash basis of the push, but when you back out those one-time revenue sources, it's basically a negative $5 million. It's a long way to come from $15 million structural imbalance to a $5 million structural imbalance, but basically that is the one-time merit against the one-time expenses. Thank you. Do you want to go on with the – If that – There is one Councilmember question which may relate to what's already been said. So if we want to go ahead and take that, Councilmember Martin. Thank you, Vice Mayor. In order to sort of boil this down for folks at home, So we, and I know the administration has been furiously cutting the budget and cutting expenses so that we can come in on track. But can you kind of help folks understand if we've got about $9 million more than we thought we were, what was the big source of the shortfall as we entered into this? Because I understand there was some health care costs that were not accounted for in the previous budget. Can you kind of help folks at home understand if we've got $9 million more than we thought we would, where was the problem? At the start of the year, I think we've said it many times in this chamber, we had a $15 million structural imbalance. Basically, on one-time revenue sources to one-time expenses, we're spending $15 million more recurring expenses than recurring revenue. That $15 million was plugged by one-time sources. If you recall, it was the property sale of roughly $4 million, Bill's tax amnesty program of $1 million, drawing out of our savings account, drawing out of our checking account. Basically, that's not sustainable. You can't year over year recognize one time and draw out a savings and checking. So when you total that up, it was a $15 million issue. How did the administration close the gap? And the 15 was a combination of one-time revenues, but also just ordinary expenses offset by one-time revenues, but also this $8 million that we didn't put in. Is that correct? Is that fair? Yeah, health care. Basically, if you look in the individual categories, health care was a large issue, but because of the hiring freeze and our veritrition rate, health care was basically paid within the personnel category. Do you want to try to take a shot? So to answer the question at home, we have cut back our personnel costs sufficient to absorb all of those health care costs, plus save $2 million. And so the $9 million that we're ahead was not enough to cover the 15 that we were short? Correct. We're still short $5 million on a recurring revenue basis. But because of the increase in revenues in the fourth quarter with holdings and net profit, as well as end-of-term payments, property sale, then we're able to pay our bills with the money we took in in 2011 with all the bills that we brought in for 2011. What we're showing here, though, is not all of that money is ongoing rolling into 2012, 2013, and 2014. Well, I just want to say that I just really commend the administration for the extremely hard work that went into making this up. I mean, this is into reaching this result. And that I know that there was a lot of difficulty, and I commend you and Commissioner Driscoll. And I know there's a lot of hard work and late hours went into this. This is good government, is bringing the boat in under budget. And so I know everybody here appreciates that. Thank you, Vice Mayor. You're welcome. I'm Council Member Ellinger. Thank you, Vice Mayor. My question is kind of just semantics. When we say original budget and then projected, is the original budget, that's not what was adopted, but that's when we changed to try to come up with our correction. Is that when you say original? The original budget should be the original adopted budget. Then throughout the year we have an amended budget when budget amendments pass. So this is the original budget. Because I'm looking back at the numbers as what was adopted back, and it looks like it originally was 274.5. Yeah, I think. And then we had the original budget, 265, under the revenue projections. The variance could potentially – this is the original budget, but the variance is the one-time revenue sources that were pulled out. The property sale, if you look on page four, Council Member, the property sale is budgeted as a revenue. But in terms of this illustration, I think it's what we've shown you repeatedly, that we've pulled out those transfers as well as the property sale and the surplus sale out of the revenue category. Okay. I think the page 5 shows you. This page shows you the 274. Right. Okay. I'm just trying to, when we talked about the original and then when we adopted it, we had to kind of correct it. I just wanted to make sure I was getting the right semantics on the wording here. Yes. This should be the original budget presented in a slightly different way to account for those one-time revenue sources. Okay. Thank you. Council members, are there any other questions? I guess my question would relate back to, I think on March 7th is when we first heard that the adjustments that were going to be made, and I'm particularly interested in the park acquisition fees and the SALT budget, and there was a great deal of discussion about not using the Urban Services Fund for the SALT budget. So where are we on that and where are we on the, we've all seen the letter from the home builders, and where are we on the park acquisition fees? None of those transfers are included in this analysis. Okay, thank you very much. Appreciate that. Now, if there's no other question, I think Mr. O'Meara wants to take us into the present. Well, the future. We were in the present. Yes. Back to the future. For the council's consideration, we have proposed this amended revenue based on the results that we're predicting for FY11. We have increased the payroll withholding and net profit, decreased the insurance, and left franchise fees alone. This schedule shows those new proposed numbers for the FY12 budget. Page 7. Page 7. Payroll withholding, we're proposing $156,060,000. The net profit, which is a 2% increase over where we're predicting FY11 to fall. The net profit, we're proposing $28,560,000, which is taking the amnesty out and then applying a 2% growth rate. The insurance, we're proposing $22,018,000, which is a 1% increase over our predicted FY11. And then franchise fees, we're proposing $18,500,000, which is a 5% increase over our predicted FY11. Those changes bring the total general fund revenue for your consideration to the bottom number on the right-hand column. It's $273,967,062. And that is the number that you gave us on June 7th, so that's very good. Okay, are there questions about this page, 7? Mr. Ellinger. Thank you, Vice Mayor. So when we're looking at this, even though you came back and told us that the revenues are up, net profits are up here, and they're trending better, We're actually still going to have, if you think, instead of having an increase, we'll probably have just a flat for revenues this coming year. Talking about the net profit line? I'm just talking about the total revenues in general when you start doing the numbers. You're basing on a 2% payroll withholding increase? Yes, sir. And then by doing everything else, it looks like we're actually going to be a little below this year's revenue projections? Well, if I could show you, we actually think the right number to compare it to is there in the middle of the page. The 268? The 268, 664 is recurring revenues. So we're about $7 million up then is what actually is what we're going to be this year. Five, I believe it is. Five, I'm sorry, five, correct. 268, right. Okay. It's about a 2% total increase on recurring revenues. Thank you. Council members, are there other questions? Well, thank you so much. I want to applaud all of you who worked hard to get these numbers in for us to consider at this last minute. So thanks to all the folks in revenue and finance and budgeting and probably accounting and all that good work. We appreciate it very much. Now, we will go ahead. Mr. Ellinger, did you? Yeah, Vice Mayor, and I'm not sure when you want to do this, but we always make a motion to accept the revenue. And at some point today, I think that we need to make that as kind of our baseline of what we're going to be trying to hit with our expenditure. So I guess at this point, if it's appropriate. I think this is the latest and greatest numbers. Don't you all think you're not going to have any numbers before 3 o'clock? So I think this way it will set our baseline for what our expenses will be. So at this point I'd make a motion that we accept the revenue projections of $273,967,062 as our revenue projection for fiscal year 12. So moved. Okay. We have a motion by Ellinger. If you'll log in your motion. And Dr. Blues, you're second. So the motion on the floor is to accept, for purposes of the budget, 273-967-062 as our revenue number. Is there a discussion? Mr. Lane. Good morning. Good morning. I was just going to ask, we had discussed perhaps raising the fee for pool usage since we were keeping the pools open. There was also a discussion of increasing or charging a fee for the Board of Architectural Review for filing for requested permits and review by that board. Are there any, and there may be other areas where we were talking about additional revenue. I just wondered if we should address those issues before we finalize this. Council members, do you want to address those? I think there are two ways we could do it, and I'll lean on my wingman parliamentarian for this. We could either vote on this number, and then as we go through the list today, we can make adjustments to the revenue. If we do raise any fees, that would sort of keep us orderly. Or we can go through and pick out the items which you've mentioned at this point. What's your pleasure? My thought, as long as we discuss the additional revenue sometime during the process, I'm in favor of going ahead and approving those numbers and then adding to them later in the day if we need to. Okay, we can adjust and amend as we go along. This could be our baseline. And Vice Mayor, also, I should have probably mentioned we were talking about raising the golf fees, too. That was another item that we discussed at one time. You might make a note on that. Okay, very good. Any more discussion on the motion? I see none. So all those in favor, will you please say aye and also do your electronic vote? All those in favor? Aye. Anyone opposed? Okay. Thank you for that. What we now will do is work our way through, and Connie Underwood, where are you? First of all, I want to give a gigantic thank you to you and Paul Schoeniger, who have been our council assistants for the budget and have carried the budget analysis for us on the council side. Connie, I know this is your last day with us, and we thank you very much and greatly appreciate all your hard work. and you can't leave until after 3 o'clock. But there's a motion up here. We may require that. But we do thank you both very much. It has helped us along the way. And you've prepared a summary of recommendations to date, and I wonder if you want to weigh in on that with any comments. It's on pages 7 through 9 in our packet. Do you want to say a few words about this? Is there a microphone right there near you? Okay. After your meeting last week, I went back and put in the spreadsheet the items that you had approved to date. So you could see by category where you stood on the items that had been approved and showed you the new fund balance number that you were working on. Of 1.5 million, as I recall. Page 9, at the bottom of page 9 would that be the restated fund balance after the pool adjustment, the Berry Hill and Constitution pool adjustment. Yes. That would be it. $1,511,182 is the current calculated or restated fund balance that we're working with. Okay. And this is available then for any counseling adjustments that you might want to make. Okay. And as we go through our work today, you're going to work your magic on the computer, readjusting and recalculating. And that has been extremely helpful. I don't believe we've ever had that. So we're back to the future on this one. We're trying to bring you forward. Okay. Okay. So, Councilmembers, the two things we have to consider next are LINCS recommendations and any, if there's any fund balance remaining, then we'll move to Councilmember recommendations. and will eventually need to, in some way or another, dispense with those non-budgetary recommendations. And I think I have a couple of ideas on that so that we don't spend a lot of time today on that if we don't have the time. So, Council Member Stennett. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I think in an effort to kind of put a framework around the revenue we have remaining, I think we have some larger ticket items that a lot of council members are very interested in, as well as our employees and the public, that we may want to dispose of at the beginning in an effort to get those off the table to kind of give us a better idea of how much revenue we really have going into our individual recommendations as well as the council link. So I would make a motion that we look at, in this order, the pension bond for the police and fire pension, the outside agency money, the supplemental pay money, and then the security guards funding. Those four items first before we get into the individual items, because all those are over $300,000 each and easily. Second. That's what I would do. Okay. We're on a roll here. Okay, so that was the pension bonds. and Council Member Stenet, have you located some of these, the outside agency, do we know what number that is? The supplemental pay, that's the IT issue, correct? Yes, ma'am. And then the security guard issue. Correct. issue. And so just so people know where we are, where are we? Have you located those numbers on our chart so we don't have to go? We'll take just a second here, and if somebody has the numbers. The security guard would be with your recommendations, Vice Mayor, because you're the first one I came to with the number. So that is on page 13 under those individual recommendations or 14. Okay, so page 14, and that's number 66, correct? That's the security guard issue. And then the agency issue would have been with District 8, I believe. Okay, that is on page 17. Number 98. Number 98. And hang on just a second, please. And the police and fire is 122. The pension bonding is 122, and that's page 18, number 122. No, that's a different. You're referring to something different, I believe. Okay. And we'll hear about that in just one moment. You're referring to what's in the budget. Okay. So scratch that number 122. And I didn't have anything for the item that you're referring to. Okay. That's okay. So the pension bond issue, I believe, is the current proposed budget pension bond. Okay. And then the supplemental pay for IT is? 82. Thank you, Bill. Number 82 on page 15. Number 82. So the motion on the floor is to first consider these four items, the current proposed budget pension bonds, and I believe, is that number $30 million? And $2.8 million is the general fund number. Okay, $2.8 million. Okay, that's the bonding, the debt service. Okay, thank you. And then outside agencies, number 98, supplemental pay for IT, number 82, and security guards, number 66. And we have two people who wish to speak to the motion, or do you have other? Okay, Mr. Farmer, you want to stay on for something else. Mr. Myers, do you wish to speak to the motion? And excuse me for having to ask this. Who seconded the motion? Council Member McCord. Okay. So does anyone wish to speak to the motion just to consider these four first? Okay. All those in favor of considering pension bonds in the proposed budget, number 98, outside agencies, number 82, supplemental pay, and number 66, security guard. And I think we'll take them in reverse, those last three in reverse order so we can go through the list. But we'll do pension bonds first. Okay. All those in favor, please say aye. And if you'll electronically log in, anyone opposed? Okay. That motion passes to consider these four items first. Now, first we'll do the pension bonds in the current proposed budget. And has everybody logged in with their vote? Okay. Mr. Farmer. Thank you, Vice Mayor. The motion I would bring to go along with this item is that we continue to keep the $30 million bonding in our proposed budget as the mayor has proposed it, but that we defer issuing those bonds for six months until January, which would put $1.4 million back to our bottom line today and still service our need in that area. So moved. Okay. The motion is to defer issuing the police and fire pension bonds until January 2012, Thus, restoring back into the budget $1.4 million in debt service, what was to be debt service. Correct? Okay. Now, we'll have discussion on this. Now, first, Mr. Myers, do you want to, are you on for discussing this? Okay. We'll keep you on. Then if you can log in, please, if you wish to discuss the motion on the floor. And that motion was by Farmer, and who seconded that? Ford? Ford. McCord. Okay. Mr. Martin. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I have a question for Mr. Barrows on this, and I would ask this to our legal counsel, but I don't see her here. So if we approve this for the second half of this budget year, I guess do we – do you all have to come back to the council to actually issue the bond? Yes, we need council approval to advertise and sell. Okay, so we would still have the ability to not approve that for this year. Thank you. I appreciate it. This is my concern about this bond is that I think, and we'll cover this later, but just the short version is I think we have to pay these out of cash and not bond these because over the next 20 years we can't put this payment off into future years, which is what borrowing and paying back over time does. we've got other payments due in the next 20 years that we have to make. And they will quickly sort of pile up on each other. We have to, we need to pay these out of cash. So that's my opposition to the bond is that we're putting off to future years what we need to really bite the bullet on and pay today. And so I just wanted to articulate that. Thank you, Vice Mayor. You're welcome. And just to be, if we can all be on the same page with that item, now what's in the budget is bonding, is debt service, correct? There's no cash in the budget for police and fire pension, correct? I think there's a couple layers. Just so we're clear about that. Annual required contribution is built in. Is that the minimum contribution? So is that the 11.06 up there? It's about 17. Can you blow up that chart? Yeah, it's about 17 million, if memory serves me. 17 percent, I'm sorry, is the ARC. That's built into the agency's budget. Those are in millions. Do you mind blowing up the box? Sorry. Sorry. So are we putting in 11.08 this year? Is that what we're putting in? About that? Sorry, I can't see. We've got in the annual required contribution built in the agency's budgets. You might let us know at some point as we go through this how much that is. Exact dollar. Thank you, Vice Mayor. You're welcome. Council Member Lane? My thought on this is that we need to have a structurally balanced budget with our regular operating expenses and our regular revenue, taking out one-time expenses and one-time revenue sources. Unfortunately, the Police and Firefighter Pension Fund is not a one-time payout. This is a sustained annual operating expense we have to pay. And so I, too, have a raise of concern about the way we're handling this. I felt like when we initially did the first two bonds for $105 million, that was to make up the deficit we had in the fund. But to continue to do bonding to fund the police and firefighter pension obligation, I think it needs to be an ongoing operating expense rather than a capital expense. That's just a thought that I'm having. Council Member Blues. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I can appreciate that sentiment, but my question would be, where do we get the cash at this juncture to fulfill that obligation, if we were going to do it? Well, you're absolutely right, Council Member Blues. This is really a key issue. The police and firefighter pension fund is a huge financial liability for our government, and we cannot continue to do bonding on that forever and ever and ever. We're going to have to start paying it in cash. So this is something we really need to address. And it's probably, if we don't fix this problem, you know, it could be financially devastating for our community. We do have to address this issue. and we don't have the cash to pay it right now, so that's another problem. Exactly. So you're thinking of addressing it not today, but at some point in the near future, I would think. Right. Well, if you look at the chart up there, you know, the amount we have to pay, I think I looked down in like 2015, and I believe that we would have to pay around $25,000 into the pension fund for each police and firefighter that we have working here, if my number is, if I remember that number accurately. So that's what I'm saying. It's a huge number, and it's not going away, and it's going to be every year, you know, until the, I mean, So we either change the fund, we have a new retirement plan, or we have other sources of revenue. Councilmember Martin. Thank you, Vice Mayor. This is sort of the overall look at the retirement benefits. We've got, this is as of last July, we had 221 in the pension fund. That's an unfunded actuarial accrued liability. So the numbers you saw on the previous page are just for this first column. They don't include the second column, which is our debt service on the pension bonds that we've already issued. And it also doesn't include any payments on this unfunded accrued liability on the medical benefits, which is $211 million. So actually the number that we would be required is more in the $25 to $30 million range to amortize this over 20 years. And that gets it only up to 69%. My proposal, which is in the individual links, is to essentially include an offset on either the general fund or on the public safety budget for the amount, if you show the previous page, of at least the $15.5 million that we owed last year. We did this on our individual council budgets. we put in an assumed, I think, $5,000 offset, and we had to somehow come up with that at the end of the year. I think we have to find $16, $17 million this year to put into this. We need to cut our budget that much, or we need to find additional revenues. Because what we've done is we've made promises that we're not keeping. And if we're putting them off to future years, well, we already have payments in future years. We need $17, $18 million this year. And this is how serious it is, because this chart only gets you to 69 percent funding, which is not very high. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Council Member Henson. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I agree that, you know, it's broken. It needs to be fixed. And I think by deferring the bonds for the six months, then maybe, you know, that would allow us some time to take a look at this. We've got to correct this. We're just, by bonding it, I feel like we already made promises we can't afford, and that's even adding additional cost by bonding it. So I'd be in favor of the motion. Now, is there anyone else who wishes to speak to the motion to defer the police and fire pension bonds issuance to January 2012? Council Member Lane? I just wanted to mention one other issue here too, is that if we don't put the money in at the beginning of the year, under the statute, we're supposed to at least pay the interest on the money we didn't put in at some rate. There may be somebody here that could give us advice on that, but the failure to fund means we still have to pay the interest on that. So maybe somebody could give us some information on that. Now this doesn't, and this motion does not have anything to do with the catch-up, the required money, correct? No, ma'am. This is the new pension. This truly services our legal need this year to provide funding, as previously worked out, for police and fire pensions. What it does for us right now, though, is gives us $1.4 million to use in the meantime, which I'm sure is something that those on those forces would want to help the rest of the government balance its budget while taking care of those needs. Thank you. And did someone want to, did you want someone to answer your question about interest? I think we have somebody coming. Commissioner Graham, welcome. Hey, how are you? Ed Gardner is the police and fire pension bond lawyer, and we're bringing him down to help with that question because he's more knowledgeable about that. So if that's okay, he'll be down in just a second. Okay. Mr. Barrow, did you have some thoughts on this? I think the interest is a key concept associated with pension bonds. Basically, the strategy, the reason anybody issues pension bonds, is to make money on your money. You borrow at 4%, you invest at 6. Rough numbers. Five, you invest at 8. Actually, our pension runs at 8%. They actuarially say they're going to make 8% on the money invested. We're going to borrow at a lot less than that. So I think the key concept is not that we would necessarily owe the money in the pension fund. And the key concept is when we put money in, we're going to make money on our money. At least that's the plan. So when you delay putting money in, you make less interest on your money. So, you know, economically, if you deploy the pension process, when you do delay, you make less money on your money, ensuring long-term viability of the fund. It does have an adverse economic effect, aside from the policy decision. Well, may I ask you a question on that, Mr. Barrow? Do we actually make less money or do we make our money later? You make less money. The day you put, as proposed, as the mayor proposed, $31 million, that day you start generating interest on it. Obviously, interest rates fluctuate. But the actuarial analysis uses an 8% return on our investment. We do not borrow at 8%. we borrowed a rate less than 8%. So we invest, pick a number, 4% or 5%, and we return 8% on that money. So basically that's why pension bonds in the past, it was a policy decision to deploy those, because you make money on your money, at least as projected. So when you delay, you make less money on your money. Yes. Okay, Mr. Stenet. I wasn't going to say a lot on this issue because I don't think it's that complicated. I think, you know, you've got three things at play here over the next six months. You've got collective bargaining contract. You have pension changes that need to be made no matter what. Something has to change going forward, and I agree with that. And then you have this budget, which we don't know how our revenue streams are going to play out. And, you know, I appreciate what Mr. Barrow said, but it's not a net. There's a net number in there somewhere. You know, we may pay 4% or 5% on this bond, maybe hopefully 4% or 3% even by then, but our 8% return is a net. We're not going to get a true 8% return on that bond or on the investment, so we don't know what it will do. So I appreciate the point you raised, Councilman Relain, but, you know, this is pretty simple. We have some time to work through our system, and I support the motion. Thank you, Mr. Farmer. Thank you, Mr. Stenet. Mr. Martin. Does the Council want to relax our rules? Mr. Martin, I think, has spoken twice already. Our rule is that you can speak twice on one issue, one motion. So the motion, okay, speaking to the motion, the motion is to defer issuing the pension until January 2012, and so I heard no objection to allowing council members to speak a third time. Correct? Okay, Mr. Martin. Thank you, Mr. Mayor, and I'll try to be brief. And I'm sorry, I do have another chart. So 2008 was an incredibly bad year. We were down 26.84%, and so that obviously offset a lot of things. But you can't just ignore that year because it's part of everything else. The ups and downs in 2002, we had a minus 5.3%. The last five years, our rate of return was 1.82%. The last 10 years, it was 5.3%. It is a game to assume 8%. It is Warren Buffett, probably the most recognized investor in America, calls it actuarial nonsense. Bill Gates is correct. It's not relative to the motion. I'm sorry, Mr. Martin. You've spoken three times. This isn't relative to this motion. I'm sorry, Mr. Martin. Well, Mr. Stenet made the point that we were going to get 8% out of this, and therefore it was worth issuing the bond. Well, the motion is specifically to defer issuing the bonds. Mr. Lane? Okay, I'd still like to go back to the original point that I made, and I would like to get the legal department to give me a word on this, but the statute that applies to the pension fund says that if we have an unfunded accrued liability, that if we don't put the money in, we have to pay the interest on it so that the fund is earning the equivalent amount as if it were invested as a cash investment. So we need somebody who's an expert on that to address that issue. Mr. Gardner has arrived. I think maybe he and perhaps the commissioner both want to speak to this. Welcome. I want to apologize because I was monitoring the meeting, but I did not hear exactly what the issue is. Mr. Lane will re-ask his question. Good afternoon. Good morning. Seems like afternoon. The point that I was making is that if we have an unfunded liability in the Police and Firefighters Pension Fund, the state statute requires for the Irving County Government to pay the interest on that amount, even if we don't put the principal amount into the fund, because that money is not earning interest as an investment somewhere else. And what brought the issue up is that we were talking about delaying the bond that we were going to place in this fund to finance it this year by six months, which means that that money would not, the $15 million would not be invested for a six-month period. Therefore, the fund would not earn the revenue on that. Does that make it clear to you? I understand your question. I have to say I'm not specifically familiar with the first premise that you raised, which is the obligation of paying the interest in lieu of there is a requirement in the statute that there be an annual contribution by the government to the fund, and there's a statutory calculation as to how that is determined. and it's not less than 17%, as I recall, of contributions of the police and fire salaries. The rest of what you're saying, I apologize. I may know it and just be drawing a blank, but I'm not sure about the idea of the interest. Well, do you think that you could review that state statute and see what it actually says? Because I'm not an attorney, and I haven't reviewed this in a number of years, but that's my recollection of what the requirement is. Commissioner. And I just want to point out one quick thing, which I know you all are aware of, and I'm not going to go into a great amount of detail about it, but there was extensive litigation about the pension fund, which I know you all know about, but it was six years of litigation regarding the funding of it. Just wanted to pass that along without getting into detail about it. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Now, Council Member Farmer, you were on the list. Are you, did you take yourself off or did you just disappear? I did. After her comments, I'm fine. Okay. Council Member Stennett. Thank you, Vice Mayor. To the legal issue, I want to make it clear that this council has bonded $105 million, and it's well ahead of what the legal issue was of $15 million a year bonding. So we're way ahead of the game. It's not that this motion relinquishes our obligation by any means. What it's simply saying is we defer it until June or January, issuing this bond right now for this budget purposes. And we could come back, maybe when we want to do it in October, and Ryan comes and says we can get it for 2% if we do it today. We may want to do that, but there still is a cost to the general fund, no matter when we issue the bond, as a negative impact, as Councilmember Martin has pointed out, to the rest of government. So it gives us the opportunity to really analyze that going forward. And, again, we're ahead of the game on what we're obligated to put into that pension at this point. Does anyone else wish to speak to the motion? All right. All those in favor of the motion to defer issuing the pension bonds until January 2012, please electronically vote, and all those in favor say aye. Aye. Aye. All those opposed, say no. There are two no's. And did our motioner and our seconder log in as the motioner and the seconder? Okay, good. Thank you. That motion passes 10 to 2. Thank you, Vice Mayor. And yes. Now, Council, do you have just simply for purposes of being organized on our chart, starting with 66, which comes first, then 82, then 98? Is that all right? Or we could work backward either way. 66 is on page 14, and that is the issue of restoring the security guard's personnel cost. Vice Mayor? Council Member McCord. I make a motion that we restore the personnel cost for the security guard. So moved. Okay. We have a motion from Mr. McCord and a second from Farmer. Mr. Farmer. Now, to restore the security guard personnel costs, and I guess my question first would be, do we have a solid number? This chart, number 66, says $513,750. Is that an accurate number? Do we have any information on that? Do our budgeting folks, or Connie, do you have some information? On the security guards? Yes. The 513,750 was what we had with the list of persons losing their jobs. and in addition there was $120,000 that was in the budget for the contract that they were going to implement. Yes, and I believe Council voted last week to about the $120,000. I think we've already taken a vote to take that out of budget. I mean, to pay that contract fund. We dealt with that last week, did we not? It's a net of 360, something like that? Yes. Last week's vote was a request by the administration to increase the amount the contract was going to cost. Okay. And you did not vote to increase the amount the contract was going to cost? That's right. Vice Mayor, I believe. Okay, now. I'm sorry. I was just going to let John Sheet speak to this number. I think you have a number. Yes, thank you. The proposed additional funding that you have on the list at 513-750, as it's been mentioned, is to restore the positions that were noted for layoffs back in, and that's above and beyond what was already proposed in the mayor's amount, which was 161-401. So is that 513-750 a good number? Yes. We can, that's a verified number. Okay. No. That is above and beyond what you've got. That's above and beyond what's in the budget. The 161-401 was what we already had as part of the outsourcing that to cover the three staff that we were retaining. So, what's been proposed addition is above and beyond what was already put in the mayor's proposed budget. So, Jamshid, can you clarify if this number, 513-750, is approved by this motion, will that fully fund the current security guards? It would only fund the ones that were... Proposed for layoffs. Marked for layoffs, yes. I think that's the intent of the motion, is it not, Mr. McCord? Yes, two were left in the budget, correct? Three. Or three. Yes. Three security guards. Okay. Okay, so that will fully restore that personnel cost. Okay, now, Council Members, do you have comments on the motion? If I may, there's one additional correction that needs to be made. The $120,000 which was proposed in the Mayor's budget for the security contract, that needs to be reduced by $100,950 because by putting back the other security staff in, we need to increase the operational funds. Not much, but the balance that we need is $55,950, which means in lieu of taking out $120,000, $125,000, it needs to be reduced by $100,950 in order to meet our needs for additional operational funds that's needed. If the current security guards are restored, Yes. And so the number for additional operational funds, again, is the number that needs to be in the budget. The number that needs to be in the budget is $55,950. And currently? We got $156,900 for the total for the operation. Okay. We'll get to that in a minute. Sure. Thank you for clarifying that. So the motion on the floor is to restore the security guard personnel costs of $513,750. Does anyone else wish to speak to the motion? Council Member Ford. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I would ask for clarity for the exact number of positions that will be restored and the actual number, because per my math, I think that it may require just a little more to the tune of about $24,000 or so. And so if the council will indulge, I think it's 11 full-time and one part-time position, if that's correct. Part-time position is funded through our operating budget. It's not part of the staffing. Okay. That part-time one has been funded part of what we request in adjustments to the operating funds. And Council Member Ford-Conney wants to give some information, too. I was just going to say I didn't include the part-time position because when I looked at their part-time budget, it was the same as last year. It had not been cut. Okay. Does that help? Thank you, Vice Mayor. Okay. Now, does anyone else wish to speak to the motion? Okay. Seeing no one, wishing to speak. All those in favor of restoring the 513,750 for security guard personnel, please say aye. Aye. And log in with your electronic vote. Is there a couple people? Okay, now we have all our votes. That passes 12-0. So now we need to, I believe, attend to, Jamshed, what you were referring to about the, if the security guards are restored, then there's a need for additional operational fund. Can you? I think it would be a good time to deal with the point that you brought up. The council just voted to restore this personnel money, and you said that there needs to be more money for operational costs with these. It's just the adjustment that you're proposing to the professional services, which was budgeted originally at $125,000. Rather than reducing the amount completely, it should be adjusted. The reduction should be $100,950. Then what's left in the budget should take care of our operational needs. So the proposed, just to be sure I'm understanding this, the proposed reduction was $120,000. Yes, on the $67,000. And you're saying that it needs to be $10950? That's correct. Okay. So do I hear, let's see, Council Member Stenet. I was going to make that motion, but just to be clear, we're adding back $100,950 to our revenue surplus. Just so everyone understands that it's a positive addition to what's available. That is correct. So I'd make a motion to add that back to the revenue. Second. And Council Member. The fund balance. Okay. Okay, Council Member Stenet moved and Council Member Myers seconded to add that $100,950 back into the budget. Okay. Now, let's discuss this motion. Is there any discussion? Council Member Stenet, are you still on or are you? You're off. Any discussion? All right. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? And if you'll vote electronically, please. I think we're missing one vote. Thank you. That passes 12-0. Now, that was number 66. Working down the chart, Mr. Myers, number 82 is next. Actually, I wanted to do 98, so do you want me to wait? Do you mind? We'll just work our way through the chart that way. Okay. Is that okay? Yes. Thank you. Okay. Number 82 is on page 15, and this is the supplemental pay for the IT personnel, computer personnel. And I'm thinking first we'll need a motion and then we'll need a confirmation, or perhaps someone can confirm the number here, the number on page 15, number 82, General Fund 306,090. Urban Services, well, and we could either do it all at once or do by service, by fund. Urban Services 10,360. Sewers 47,510. And Water Quality 9420. Can someone confirm those numbers for us? Are those good numbers? Connie, do you? I see numbers in a printout from computer services based on what was being paid today. Okay. Can budgeting confirm those? I think we need to have a... I apologize. Connie quarterbacked that. I haven't seen that, so I wouldn't be able to apply. So how did you know how much to take out of the budget? I mean, we have a personnel model that builds it up. And, for instance, you know, there may be additional pay, such as retirement, that's built on supplemental pay and stuff like that. So I'd have to have what resources she had and cost it out. Okay. Council Member Lane. Okay. This item is before our general government links to the committee, and we did not recommend funding the supplemental pay. There are several issues that we had to address. One is that this supplemental pay actually was started about 10 or 11 years ago, and it's supposed to be approved annually and reviewed, and it was not reviewed, from what I understand, for a period of 10 years. So I think that's been bad HR policy that the supplemental pay just keeps on giving without it having been reviewed by the council or approved by council. The second item is this really should be a decision made by the administrator, the administration, not the council, because this is a human resource item. And whether these numbers are justified, I don't think there's been any study to document that. Secondly, what impact approving this would have on the other HR policy within the government. And so I'm concerned that we should put this back over in the executive branch and let them decide what to do and come back with a recommendation. It's not our duty really to make this decision. Now, do we have the ability to budget it? Yes, we do. But I'm just concerned that there's a management issue, a human relations issue, and, you know, a policy issue regarding who is entitled to get supplemental pay. So that's the concern that the committee had. I just wanted to state that for the people to consider today. We don't yet have a motion on the floor, but we do have some folks who want to speak. Council Member Stemmett. Thank you, Vice Mayor. And I, too, was part of that same discussion with our council and can share the same concerns. But I think ultimately at this point, because we are trying to approve a budget, I would make a motion to keep the supplemental pay across all boards in the budget for now with the caveat that we do a market study by a third party and come back to this body within six months, at the maximum six months, and show us what the market pace should be for the entire division of computer services. And at that point, whether it be a positive or negative number, reduce salaries or have to deal with increases in the future, but we need to do it for the whole division. We need to do it once and for all. And in the light that we haven't done it for 10 years, I would make a motion to keep it in there again with the caveat that we could do a market study on the whole division and come back to this body within six months and show us the results so we can make adjustments through midyear in the budget. So moved. Second. Okay. We have a motion by Council Member Stenet, second by McCord, Council Member McCord, to restore the computer supplemental pay and do a market study and report back to council by six months. So that would be before we go on break in December. Okay. Now, discussion. We need our discussion screen, please. Well, we'll use the old way. Are you all able to restore the discussion screen? We're not voting yet. Please. Oh, I can stop voting. I've just discovered. That's real power. Council Member Farmer. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I wanted to speak in favor of the motion, especially the way it was couched. I think that several things we're working on during our budget process is the idea that we're not necessarily fixing them this year, but we're looking at the opportunity to make next year's budget better. I know that the folks that work throughout the government who receive supplemental pay work very hard for that supplemental pay, and it makes a real difference in their lives individually. I think the opportunity for us to study this as we go forward and to make changes as needed is what we should do, so I support the motion in its entirety. Thank you. Councilmember Myers. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I guess I have a question, though. I'm sort of in support of this, but Council Member Stenet, you said that if we do the market study and the study indicates that people are, in effect, being overpaid, then we're going to decrease their salary. I guess I have two questions about that part. One, there are employees that are in this division that are getting that low pay that the presenter talked about, in the council meeting on a Thursday night that never have gotten a supplemental pay. And that's one issue. Then there are those who are getting supplemental pay now. So if the study shows that those that are getting the supplemental pay now are being overpaid, we've just overpaid them for another six months while we're waiting on the study to be done. Plus, the people who weren't getting the supplemental pay and never have are still not getting it and won't get it for another six months. I would support looking at the entire division, whatever the market study shows is what they all get paid. But I think the people who are working right now without a supplemental pay need to be made whole, going back to some point. So are you going to go back to their original start date, or are you going to go back to the date of the study, or are you going to go back to the day? or... You can, Council Member, say that. To clarify the motion, it was to study the entire division of computer services, not just the people getting supplemental pay, but every pay grade. And then what would have to happen, I would think, from the administration side, is come back with an appropriate salary range for each of those positions. And how we adjust it and the timing would all have to be worked out, but to take it away from them, because they could come back the opposite, we may be underpaying all of them. We may have to pay them all more. So that all has to be fleshed out. But until we have that answer for the entire department, I would think we continue as we are until we get a solid decision to be made. Okay. So then if I'm thinking of one particular person in particular, if I'm him and I'm not getting supplemental pay now, and six months from now the study comes back and says that I should have been getting it all along, how far do we go back to pay that person? It almost seems to make more sense, and this is kind of what I thought your motion was in the beginning, correct me if I'm wrong, is to put the money in the budget but not pay it out until the study is done. So we've budgeted the supplemental pay, but I think it's a mistake to overpay them for the next six months if the study comes back and says that that's what we've done. So is your motion to just put the money in a budget but not pay out the supplemental pay until after the study is done and then do whatever the study dictates, or is it to continue paying them the supplemental pay for the next six months, hoping that the study shows that they should have been paid that? Well, I think you're making the assumption that the study is going to come back and say we overpaid them, because I think we're saying the same thing. Six months down the road, if we're underpaying them, the money will be there to pay them what they deserve. and vice versa. If we're overpaying them, you've only paid six months to date of income. You can adjust the final six months to make up the difference. Okay. If we change the job, salary range. Okay. So my question still is, I'm not assuming that the study is going to come back that they're overpaid, because I have no idea. My concern, though, is, excuse me, that if it does come back and say that, then we've overpaid them for another six months. And normally the government doesn't take money back from people. We're not taking it back, but it's in their budget line items, what we're talking about now. So there will be extra money in that budget line item. Okay, so I think we're on the same page then. So clarify this for me. Are you saying put the money in a budget but don't pay it out until the study is done? I'm saying pay it as we've been paying it. Nothing changes until we get the study back. And once it comes back, then we can make adjustments, but the money will be in the budget regardless. Okay, so answer this question for me because it's the same question I keep asking. If we do that and we pay them another six months and instead he comes back and says we've overpaid them, then we've overpaid them for six months and we won't take the money back from them. So what happens then? We just pay them over six months. You would stop the supplement. If it's appropriate at that time and we make the decision, then you would stop the supplement at that time. And you would have a net of that $306,000. Okay. But, again, the motion is not to change anything because we don't know what the answer is. You just said to yourself, we don't know, and that's the problem. We haven't done this for 10 years. We need to do it, and we need to do it right. Can I ask somebody from the law department or HR, whoever's going to do that study, how long it's going to take? Will it take six months? I guess I need a little clarification. I think at one point the council member didn't say he wanted an outside person to do the study. So I guess we'd probably go through an RFP process to do that. So there is some time or not. Okay. That's what, well, that's, yeah. So, you know, as soon as we get the person, I would think, I don't know, three or four months. I'm just guessing. I've never done one of these before. $25,000? Yeah, I mean, right now there's no funding for that. So that's the other issue. Okay. Okay. Okay. Thank you. My time is up. I yield. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Okay. Thank you. Mr. Lane? Yes. I just wanted to say I would support Council Member Senate's resolution. However, I do feel that at the end there should be no more supplemental pay, and what we need to do is to change the grade levels for all employees in that department to set the appropriate rate. So we won't ever have this problem again. Supplemental pay was a bad idea. Thank you. Council Member Kaye. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Ed Lane, Council Member Lane kind of took my speech away, but I agree. I think given that this has been going on for 10 years and has not been investigated, I would support the status quo and the motion and keep people who are in these positions receiving the same pay until we have good information about how it ought to be modified. Thank you. Council Member McCord. Thank you. I just was going to say if this motion passes, I'm prepared to bring a motion to add $10,000 to the budget for the study. So we'll see how it comes out. But we do need to put some money towards that study. Council Member Myers. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Could someone come up from HR? Ms. Jarvis, maybe? When we have these types of situations where we have an inversion and we go back and correct those who were harmed by the inversion, how far do we easily go back? We haven't corrected any inversions in quite some time. Right. But we look at any person who's, once they've passed, a new person passes their probationary period, then we go back and look at anybody that we have that's been inverted. Okay, so say there were 10 people that were inverted. How far back on their pay would you go to? Well, how far back would we go to correct that? Yes. I do not know. Well, we wouldn't give any back pay, I don't believe. We would just fix the inversion. So moving forward. See, and that's my problem with this, is that there are people who we know are not getting the supplemental pay, that if everybody else should get it, they should get it. And if we wait another six months, they don't get anything for the next six months, they're still being injured for another six months. And there has to be a way to fix that, too. So have we ever gone back and paid back pay? Yes. Okay. Then can we make it a part of this motion that we go back and pay back pay? I think because this is a budget, an item in the budget, it wouldn't be appropriate right now. Okay. Then I guess I'd say let's just keep this on the table when the study comes back and talk about how we make those people whole that have been injured. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I wanted to say a couple of things. I believe I'm the only Councilmember who was here when we put the supplemental pay on. And I was here in the previous century. But I think it would be important for those who were not here to understand that when we put the supplemental pay on by ordinance, we were having a very difficult time getting anyone to work for our computer services because they could make far more money outside. And this was the way, and it was appropriate at that time. You can go back and see the documentation of how we got to that point and why we passed that ordinance. So at the time, it was very appropriate, and it allowed us to hire people with computer skills to help work in our government. What I will say is that it is very distressing to me that we didn't follow the ordinance. The ordinance says this will be reviewed every year. the ordinance says that based on the review, then we'll make a decision on the supplemental pay. And so I'm fully in favor of the motion. I think that in the future we need to ensure that if we have a motion that requires a review on a regular basis, that we build into that ordinance how we're going to accomplish that so that we don't get to this kind of a point again with something like this. And I would presume we would follow the ordinance, which I believe says, and you can correct me if I'm wrong, that the director, and I'm thinking this is HR director, after the market study will bring us a recommendation, and that's how this should happen. So anyway, that's all I'll say. Is there anyone else who wishes to speak to the motion? Okay. All those in favor, please say aye and log in. And it might be that we should have 13 now. Has everyone voted? Dr. Blues, have you voted? Okay. That motion passes 13-0. And just to repeat the motion, because it did include hiring an outside firm, restore the computer supplemental pay and have an outside firm do a market study of all computer services and report back to the council in six months by December council, before the December council recess. Okay. Thank you. Now, we have Council Member Myers. Are you ready to put your off? Council Member McCord. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I just want to go ahead and add to that that we, I make a motion that we add $10,000 to the HR professional services line item in the budget to cover the cost of this study. So moved. So Council Member McCord moved and Council Member Myers seconded to add $10,000 to the Human Resources Professional Services account to do the market study, to hire a firm to do the market study. Okay. Discussion. Council Member Myers. Oh, okay. You're still waiting for that big issue. Okay. Okay. All right. Is there any other discussion? Any discussion on the motion? All those in favor say aye. Anybody opposed? And if you'll just log in so we can get that on the record. We have a couple more who need to vote electronically and then we're finished. Dr. Blues, no, you're on there. Council Member Henson, Council Member Stinnett, you're on there. Thank you. 13-0, that motion passes. Okay. Now, so we have now taken care of the pension bond issue, the security guard issue, the supplemental pay issue, and number four was the outside agency issue, number 98, and that is on page 17. Council Member Myers. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Considering the economic downturn that we're in right now, I think it's appropriate that while we have people out there hurting that we don't take a 10 percent cut to the partner agencies, and so I would move that we restore the full 10 percent that the mayor's proposed budget cuts from partner agencies that are in the current budget. So moved. An amount of, actually I want to ask Connie about that because I've got 385. That was in a press release from the mayor, but I think you gave us a number of 363. The 385 included the changes for the library, which are positive in nature, and masked some of the decreases the other agencies took. I actually went back through every agency, and I got 413. My question, though, was there were certain agencies that received funding last year that were not on the list for 2012? Right, and my motion does not include those. It only includes the ones that are in the current proposed budget that received a 10% cut. Okay. Then it's going to be a little less than my 413. So the motion by Council Member Myers and seconded by Council Member McCord is to restore the 10 percent cuts to the outside agencies which were included in the current proposed budget. And that would be 314-612. So that number is $314,612 as opposed to the 385 number. Okay. Yes, ma'am. All righty. Discussion. Council Member Lane. Yeah, I would just request that we read out the agencies and what the additional amount is. So we have that in the record, please. Okay. Does someone, Connie, do you have that? I do. All right. Very good. Will you read those, please? They're on the screen up in front of you. They should be Commerce Lexington. The change would be $11,432. Downtown Arts Center would be $10,140. Downtown Lexington Corporation would be $4,740. Kentucky World Trade Center would be $10,100. Score would be $610. Lyric Theater would be $15,000. Crystalis House would be $3,700. Sunflower Kids, $2,310. Baby Health Service, $1,660. Bluegrass Area Development District, $8,350. Bluegrass Community Action, $2,770. Bluegrass Domestic Violence would be $7,500. Center for Women, Children, and Families, 4,620. Community Action, 16,650. Comprehensive Care Center, 29,110. Environmental Quality Commission would be 210. Hope Center for Men would be 74,000. MASH Services of the Bluegrass would be 15,800. Nursing Home Ombudsman Program would be 4,620. Rape Crisis Center would be 6,940. Salvation Army, 20,000. Mobile Feast Lexington, 3,700. Moveable, sorry. Big Brothers Big Sisters would be 950. Human Rights, 16,700. Explorium would be 19,530. And the Downtown Development Authority would be 23,470. Okay, thank you very much, Connie. Now, Council Member Crosby. I just want to clarify, by restoring this 10%, we're cutting government across the board, and we're not going to cut any of our partner agencies at all? Yes, please respond, Councilman Myers. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Yeah, as I said in my opening statement, and I didn't want to get real detailed, But when you look at the number of people who have lost their jobs and this economic downturn, people are hurting, these partner agencies are the ones that help sort of the least of these in our community. I realize there are some that don't necessarily fit that description, but I think it's appropriate that we restore the funding. Because normally that's what happens. Every year we cut partner agencies 5% or 10%. And we have a proposal in Social Services Committee right now to address that issue. But in the meantime, what we wanted to do is restore this funding back. So, yes. Is there anybody with the administration? I guess I'm curious to know, too, whether or not these partner agencies were met with prior to the budget, and if you all had come up with any plans with them, or was there any? welcome Mr. Maloney thank you all there's a couple of agencies out there that a partner agency is coming in mostly out of social service and programs like that there are a couple agencies that came out of Irene Gooding budget and those are Urban League and also Road to Home Ownership Irene used to never have this kind of money in her budget to do these outside partner agencies. But in the last few years, they put them in her program. Point of order. Now, with her budget cut as bad as it had been, 24%, we asked her for recommendations, and Irene came to us and said. Vice Mayor, point of order. We have a point of order. What's your point of order? This motion is to the partner agencies that are currently in the budget, in the proposed budget, not agencies that were cut out of the budget. Okay. Did you, Mr. Maloney, before you sit down, did you want to add anything about the partner agencies that are in the budget? Okay. Commissioner Mills? Yes. Welcome. Thank you. The partner agencies in the social services arena, Council Member Crosby, which is the only ones I can speak to, we meet with them quarterly. And so we do go over what they're doing, what we're giving them. And so they did know that the budget cut was coming. but we do look at what they do and the value for our dollars. They've gotten cuts from several places this year. United Way funding is down for every agency. The federal government has cut CDBG money and home money to the $2.5 million for Fayette County. So they've taken cuts in several arenas and partner agencies. Thank you. Council Member Blues. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I appreciate Council Member Myers' concern for these agencies which are being asked to take these hits. But I also am concerned with the point that Council Member Crosby raises, that we are cutting expenses across the board. And if we pass this motion, we're not asking the partner agencies to share in these sacrifices. And I would ask where the additional $314,000 will be coming from if we restore these funds. Well, in just a minute, excuse me, but we'll be getting an update from Connie about where the fund balance stands. And that will tell us where we are on our expenditures. Is that all? Okay. Council Member Ford. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I have a question I want to ask Ms. Underwood. If you could, again, tell us what the new adjusted number for the reinstatement of the 10% cuts would be. It was 314. 314612. Okay. Thank you, counsel. I'm supportive of the motion. I recognize that these partner agencies, many of which that we fund, they provide services that government often does not have the capacity to do in-house. They provide a service for us, and they're carrying a lot of water on behalf of government and our citizens. I want to amend the motion, And I would amend the motion to also include funding in the amount of $65,000 to the Urban League of Lexington Fayette County. The reason doing so is twofold. The line item number 98 that we're proposing requests to put back $385,000 back into the general fund budget. We've just had a reconciliation that just has that under 315. The Urban League last year's general fund appropriation was $65,000, and they provide an invaluable service to minorities and disadvantaged residents of Fayette County. They've been doing so since the late 1960s. So that would be my amendment to the motion. So move. Councilmember Ford, this motion is about our partner agencies in the partner agency lines. So that would be similar, I think, to what Council Member Myers tried to do earlier, which was not the current proposed budget, and this is not a partner agency. So I would ask that maybe you hold this when we're not discussing the partner agencies that are funded through the budget as partner agencies. Vice Mayor, I would contend that I would request respectfully that my amendment stand. The partner agencies are the partner agencies that were proposed for funding. The reality is that no partner agencies as of just yet are funded. And to the argument of the Urban League, they have received, fortunately, general fund dollars in the last few budgets as a partner agency. So I would make my amendment, and we'll see how it goes. Is there a second? Okay. Thank you. That dies for a lack of second. Did you want to make any more comment to the motion? No, thank you, Vice Mayor. Okay. Council Member Farmer. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Mine was similar in the previous commentary. I was going to ask where we stood fund balance-wise. Do you want that now before the motion? I would like to. That would be fine. Connie, can you give us a look at our fund balance now that we've done the pension, the security guards, and the IT? 2,182,292. Currently at 2,182,292. Thank you for that information. Thank you very much. Yes, now Mr. Farmer. You know, I want to support part of this motion, and I'm wondering if the council would, and this is going to get a little messy, go through and do these individually, because I think some of them absolutely going to some of the commentary deserve the resources to help folks in need, and others don't necessarily go to that same mission. So I guess what I would make is a motion to separate these out into their component parts for individual votes. So the motion is to separate out and discuss partner agencies individually. Do I hear a second? Council Member Henson seconds. Now, is there discussion on the separation motion? If not, we'll take... Did anyone have any discussion? If not, we'll take the vote. All those in favor of separating out, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. And all those opposed? No. Okay. And please log in. Okay, so that motion failed five to eight. Oops. And so next on our list to speak to the motion on the floor, which is still to restore 10% for outside agencies in the current proposed budget. Mr. Stennett. I would just add a couple pieces of commentary. One is this will come out of fund balance. I think we just answered that. But the overall social service budget represents less than 1% or a little more than 1% of our general fund, less than half of a percent of our entire, every dollar we spend here. So I don't think it's too much to ask to put them back whole and allow them not to recognize that the cuts or the pain the rest of it are feeling. I would have one bit of housekeeping. This will be the second year in a row I've asked for this to be done. I'm not sure why it keeps showing up, but why is animal care and control still listed as an outside agency when it's listed in the Commissioner of Public Safety's budget? Can we please get that corrected next year? Because they are not an outside agency. They're performing a contract service for animal care and control that we are, by statute, required to perform. So can we change that, Ms. Driscoll, for next year, Mr. Barrow, and move it to the – I mean, it's already in the Commissioner of Public Safety's budget, but it keeps showing up here as a partner agency. Thank you. Councilmember Martin. I just want to add that I think this is the time and this is the type of economy where these folks who are serviced by these agencies can least afford to be cut back. And so I think this is the time where we show our humanity and which part of our community we care about. Those who are the least fortunate and the least available to them. So I support this motion. Councilmember Henson. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I'll support the motion, but with reservations that we still have folks slated for layoff within urban county government. Not all of our partner agencies provide social service functions, but the amount is not that great that I will support it. Thank you. Councilmember Kay. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I agree with a few of the Councilmember sentiments that this is a time when those partner agencies are probably impacted more heavily than any other part of government. And they do provide a service that in many instances the government is either unwilling or unable to provide. So I would support the motion. motion. And I also want to add that I did not second Councilman Ford's amendment because I thought it was not in order, but I think it can be raised separately. Thank you. Council Member Myers. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I would just add to this that not only are these agencies being cut in other areas by their funding streams, but if you talk to all of them, they will all tell you that the number of people who come through their doorway looking for services has drastically increased over the last several years. So this is the right thing to do. I appreciate your support. Thank you. Council Member Lane. Council Member Lane. Thank you. I just wanted to say I'm supporting the resolution, and I, too, feel that this is a time when people really need help and we should not be cutting these agencies. Thank you. Council Member Ford. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I will be supporting the motion as well. I think that many of the and most of the partner agencies are worthy. In lieu of not itemizing or going down each line, is it appropriate that I just ask for a total number of the agencies that will be benefited by Ms. Underwood, if you could. I know you listed them all, but how many agencies will be benefited by this? Thank you. She's getting a number. And after she gets the number, Council Member Stinnett, I think it might be appropriate for for you to make a motion relating to the animal care and control so that the Council has affirmed your point about them not being a partner agency? MS. I believe that would be 26 agencies. MS. 26 agencies. Thank you, Vice Mayor. MS. Okay. Now is there any other comment or question or discussion on the motion to restore 10% Funding for the outside agencies in the current proposed budget, and that number is $314,612. And all those in favor, please say aye and log in, aye. All those opposed? Need one more vote. Oh, we, okay. That motion passes 11 to 1. And I think it would be. Okay. Now, we have attended to those four items under Councilmember Stenet's original motion, the four big items. So we will go back to our links, recommendations, and those start on page 10. And we'll do about 10 to 15 minutes. Then we'll let the commissioner go sell bonds. Oh, you don't need to go sell bonds. We'll have to be up there at 11 sharp. Okay, so you'll leave a few minutes before 11. We may continue a little bit past 11, but take a break then. And so Lynx recommendations start on page 10, and we've dealt with some of these. So Connie will probably rely on you to be keeping us on the page where we're supposed to be. Okay. So the general government links recommendations. We have now, Connie, everything in yellow is, tell us about yellow. The items in yellow were included on the mayor's light item list and would have been approved with that list. So the council's already dealt with all the items in yellow. Yes, ma'am. Correct. And so we have a few items left from general government. And, Council members, is it okay with you to take them in this order? And the first link recommendation is to abolish the strategic planning manager in planning. And as we go through this, if there's a final brief comment by the chair of each link, I think that would be appropriate. Council Member Lane, you chaired this link. Do you have any brief comment about that? Yes, ma'am. This is an issue of where would this position be located. There was some question about, you know, how this would just be in the downtown development authority. Would it be in the mayor's office? Would it be under economic development director? Would it be in planning? So there was a question about the position. So that's why we deleted that from the budget with the idea that the administration could come back and make a recommendation sometime. And, Council Members, the way we'll do this is if there are any motions to be made, we'll all request a motion and we'll deal with these as they come. Council Member Stennett. Thank you, Vice Mayor. And then I would go ahead and make a motion on number 30 to delete the position or abolish the position or take it out of the budget, the strategic planning manager in the Division of Planning, and create a planning commissioner at the same salary range in the mayor's office. Second. Okay. So the motion by Council Member Stennett and the second by Mr. McCord is to delete the strategic planning manager. The mayor hasn't asked for it. from the budget and to add a planning, commissioner of planning? Funding for a commissioner of planning. Funding for a commissioner of planning. Okay. Now, first we have up Council Member Kay. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I think I have two concerns. I punched to speak before Council Member Stinnett added the additional information about where he thought the planning manager ought to be. My concern is I think this is a crucial position. It needs to be a person who has planning responsibility rather than administrative responsibility. And so I would not support removing the money, the funding. I agree with keeping the funding in. but I would object to the designation of that money for a person who then manages a division within government. And I'm not, well, I'm not sure how to proceed. Perhaps I'd like to amend, move to amend to take out the designation of the planning manager or a division. Commissioner of Planning. Commissioner. What was the, I'm sorry. Commissioner of Planning. Okay. I would move to delete that second part of the motion and to keep the funds in the budget. Thank you. So moved. Do I? Okay. Council Member Kay has moved, and Council Member Ellinger has seconded to amend the motion by deleting the portion which said create a commissioner of planning at the same funding level. Is there discussion about the amendment? Are those of you who are logged in for the amendment discussion? Okay. Council Member Blues, are you for the amendment? No. Council Member Farmer? I think that... Council Member Farmer, are you speaking to the amendment? I'm just going down the list to see... If you're giving me the opportunity, I will. You're on our list. I would speak against the amendment because I believe in the trueness of the original motion and the ability to reorganize with a commissioner that would have planning, PDR, and what's the third one? Historic preservation. Historic preservation reporting to that person. Thank you. Okay. Council Member McCord to the amendment. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I would vote against the amendment, and the reason I seconded the original motion was for the last seven years, we have been talking about our planning department being a lot more visionary, a lot more 30,000 foot, and there's been a number of attempts to do that, and this provides the very best opportunity and why I believe council and future councils and administrations would benefit tremendously from this in the city of Lexington is because at a commissioner level, the council now has the opportunity to ask the right questions during a confirmation hearing and people can see the types of vision that this person would have. We have a number of divisions of government like Historic Preservation, PDR, and other things that are kind of out here on their own and do their own thing that provide a very valuable key piece of planning. And the planning department itself has a tremendous load with planning and zoning issues and so forth. This would ultimately provide a fantastic way for the administration to task a person to oversee that vision, but also for council members and for the citizens to actually see who that person is and whether they do have the abilities that are necessary for moving us forward. And if we've ever heard anything said over and over and over from these council seats, from that microphone, it's that, well, we've built the city long. Well, wrong. We haven't had a big vision. We haven't seen how all these pieces fit together. Here's the opportunity to do it with the resources. So I would vote against the amendment and fully support the original motion. Council Member Ford, do you wish to speak to the amendment to separate and remove the second part? I would ask, Vice Mayor, a restatement of the original motion and the amendment, just for clarity. I apologize. The original motion by Council Member Stennett, and you all will correct me if I'm wrong, is to delete the strategic planning manager and to create a commissioner of planning at the same funding level of $105,290, correct? And then the amendment by Councilmember K, seconded by Ellinger, is to delete the second part of the motion having to do with creating the commissioner of planning. So the amendment is to delete that second part. My question is, I guess, sort of to a point of order, but I'm not going to call for a point of order because this is my first attempt at this exercise. But I guess I'm asking, how does this relate to the counseling recommendation? It appears I'm against the original motion because I'm of the understanding that we are to be voting up or down on the counseling recommendations. Subsequently, if a recommendation were to come from a council member, such as Council Member Stenet, to create a position in the mayor's office, it's not in the proposed budget, I guess is what I'm saying. My understanding is that these link recommendations, we're voting on what the link has observed per the proposed budget. And that's just my contention. If we do that, we'll be here all day. It's an excellent point. And so I think I'm gathering from your point that the second part of the motion could come later after all these things are discussed. I guess I would. Yes, ma'am, Vice Mayor. I'll make a point of order that we go down the link recommendations up or down per the link committee recommendations and that the motion is out of order. Our parliamentarian who made the motion originally is saying it is in order. Is that your? The point is there was a position in the budget that the mayor and administration felt strongly to put in there, and I'm not disagreeing with that position. I just don't want this money to be spent on something else. We can come back later and address it. I just thought the timing of it, while it's on the table, I don't want to send the impression that we're not in support of creating a new position in planning. I just think the issue is what it does. So I'm going to rule on your point of order, which I think is a very appropriate one. As we go through here, we will have motions and discuss only the items on the links recommendation. So that I'm not sure how to dispense with it now, but it would mean that the second part of the motion is not in order, the original motion. I would make a motion to override the chair and call to the full council for a vote on this, because the problem is, and I respect what you're trying to do, but if you go down to the next item, the government communications, if we're just going to do this and have to come right back to it at the end of the budget, it's going to be tedious. We should deal with the whole department and move on away from it, because there are going to be other motions that come back to government communications later on today. And if we keep doing that, it will be a longer process, and rather than dispensing of the whole department right now. So I would appeal to the full committee for a vote on that. Do I hear a second? So the motions to override the chair, and how many votes does that take? Does anybody know? Eight? Sixteen, I'm hearing. I'm hearing 16. Oh, goodness. Okay. So you're, okay. So I don't know if that's debatable or not. Well, again, I'm not trying to be opposite. No, I understand. I just know there's going to be other motions on government communications that are on this page. And if we wait until the end of this whole thing to come all the way back to it, I think we'll miss the point of being able to discuss it fully at this time. Okay. Okay, all those in favor of overriding the chair's point of order, please say aye. Aye. And log in. And all those opposed. Well, this is red and green all the way. Okay, so that motion fails five to eight. And so the point of order is taken that we will discuss just what's on the page, and then if there are other motions at the end, we'll come back. Okay, Council Member. I would say at the end of the link is what I'm thinking, unless someone wants something different. But he's shaking his head yes. But I'm okay with that. And, again, this is just my, this helps me in my learning process. If we get to the end of the link, I'm not opposed to that at all, Council Member. Stand in and thank you, Vice Mayor. Well, thank you for clarifying. That was the point I was trying to make. If we come all the way back, it would be tedious. We'll be here tonight. Okay. So the motion on the floor is to delete the strategic planning manager position at 105-290. Is there any – now, are those of you who are logged in to discuss the motion? Okay. Council Member Martin. Thank you. I support the – excuse me, I do not support abolishing the strategic planning manager. This was essentially a motion I made last year in budget. We need more urban planning experience if we're going to become a city that embraces urban planning and design, and then we need someone with a high level of expertise, and that's what this position is. So I support keeping the strategic planning manager, and I do not support the LINC's recommendation in this. Thank you. Okay. Council Member Stennett. Council Member Blues. I support the motion to keep this position on the table. The motion is to eliminate the strategic planning manager position. Then if you want to keep that position, you vote no on this motion. That's correct. Thank you. Okay, Council Member Kay. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Just to reiterate what I said, I think it's important that we have this position, so I would vote to defeat this motion, and clearly it's going to come back in some other form. But not to delete that at this point. Thank you. Council Member Crosby. This is, I guess, just a point of clarification that kind of relates to the motion, but probably not really. Is there any way that we can go down through the link or have Council Member Lane, where there may not be are there items on here that we're just going to accept and the ones where we're actually looking to make a change I know Council Member Stinnett mentioned we'll be here all day, this is just brutal the way we're doing it right now because we can't have discussion about alternatives if we accept or don't accept and this process seems a little silly how we're handling it right now I did not vote to overturn your ruling because I respect the chair and the ruling, but I think that this process is a little tedious and not being able to discuss until the end because right now, like I see, there are things on here that will probably approve, but there are several position changes and things that are going to need discussion. And hold those to the end, or if there's anything that anybody knows, that they can just take out now and say we'll discuss at the end instead of us discussing something that we know is going to have a motion followed up at the end of this discussion. Well, this is not a different process than we've used in the past. I like your idea of if council members know of something they want to take off, Well, the process in the past has been what we just overruled we weren't going to do because Council Member Ford brought up a good point that we're discussing things that are not actual recommendations by the link, but in the past, at least from my recollection of the past few years that I've been involved with budget, is that we have discussed alternatives at the time they were being presented. So for us to go through if there's an alternative and to discuss something that we know is going to have an alternative motion made, it seems like a waste of time. So I was going to defer to possibly the chair of the link. If they know that there are things on there, if there's things that we can just go ahead and approve and then come to the end and then do our recommendations and alternate motions, that seems like a little bit easier of a process because we've probably spent now, what, 20 minutes on this one that we know is going to have a motion later. It just, It seems backwards from what we've done in the past. And like I said, in the past we just didn't have somebody maybe as astute bring up the point, or maybe the other council members didn't care where the point of discussion came in. So thank you. So I want to be sure I understand what you're asking. And there is a motion on the floor. So are you asking that we do not go through line by line? I've always gone through line by line, but not, I'm basically saying what you were not overruled on, and I think many people didn't want to overrule the chair, but in the past we have discussed these items as we've gone through because we're still discussing now for 20 minutes about abolishing the strategic planning manager, or knowing that we're going to have a discussion at the end of the link. So we're going to basically, if you agree with abolishing this, you're going to vote in the affirmative, and then you're going to have to come back and have another discussion about it. It just doesn't make much sense. That's all. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Farmer. Thank you, Vice Mayor. First, on the motion to, because the motion actually is to abolish the strategic planning manager position, which I will speak in favor of that because this position has been vacant for five years, and I think that that tells the entire tale about why we should abolish it. Secondarily, I think going to your commentary about how to handle these items, it may be that it might be better to let the council-linked chair run through them rather than go through line by line because you might be able to have some summation of things that might go a little bit quicker. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else wish to speak? Councilmember Meyer. Thank you, Vice Mayor. To me, this is the same as when I tried to make the motion the other day in the council meeting, and we said that it was an inappropriate time to make the motion, but everybody was sitting here, and so it didn't make sense to make the motion then. Maybe we should just reconsider the motion and go back and vote again on the chair's motion to overrule Councilman's Senate's original motion, because it doesn't make sense that we're sitting here spending all this time, spinning our wheels and it's 10 after 11 now, we're not going to be done by 3 o'clock at this point. My feeling is that abolishing this position is worthy. People obviously think it's an important issue, so they're discussing it. I mean, that's kind of how the process works. And so if people know a future motion might come on this page, I mean, they will vote according to whether they think it should be abolished or not. Isn't it more efficient to amend that motion and deal with it at one time instead of talking about whether or not we're going to abolish the position and then come back and create a new position later on? I suppose some people might want to present something different for that money. I mean, that's always a possibility. We don't know for sure. That's why I'm favoring dealing with these one by one, and I like Council Member Crosby's idea that we hear from the chair if there's something that could be eliminated or some clarity on an issue. Does anyone else wish to speak? Okay, all those in favor of... Council Member Ford, were you on to speak? Yes, ma'am. Just quickly. I'm sorry, Vice Mayor. The reason that I think we ought to go through it this way is because the issue is about the manager position itself. It's a big difference between discussion and proposing action. I may want to keep the manager and not send it to the mayor's office. We may want to send it wherever we want to send it. But it precluded us from having discussion about how to address this issue for this thing. So that's why I propose we proceed line by line. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Okay. All those in favor of abolishing the strategic planning manager for 105-290, please say aye. Anyone opposed? No. Okay. That passes 10 to 2. Well, we have someone else who needs to vote. That passes 10 to 3. And so the next item is community development. Council Member Lane, do you want to work us through these? Council Member Lane Lane Yes, ma'am. This is where we were providing a $20,000 match to a grant we were going to receive, and either that's already been funded or that grant was not available. So that was a credit. However, there might have been an offset in the mayor's late changes which asked for that money to go in some type of a line item. Can anybody speak to that? No? Okay, well, then that's not the case, so I would say we should just vote to approve that. Is that a motion? I make a motion to approve item 32 to reduce the grant match by $20,000. Second by Crosby to reduce the grant match. So that's money that goes back into the budget. Anyone wish to speak to the motion? Mr. Martin? Yeah, I thought I would recall the administration saying that this wasn't realized and that it was a possibility that it would be less than $20,000. So I guess I'd like to keep the $20,000 in. We can always take it out later. Sorry to be controversial, but I recall someone speaking on this and saying that that was not a solid number. Okay, thank you. Any other discussion on number 32? All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? No. Okay, if you'll log in, this will help our... If you can vote electronically, please. Council members, we need another vote. We're doing both because it helps on the record to get the record. So one person has not voted. I guess that would be. Council Member Stennett, were you going to vote on number 32? You vote no. So Councilmember Stennett abstains. Okay, can you log Councilmember Stennett in, please? Jeanette, can you log his vote? It's an aye. Thank you. Council members, I would ask for a motion to recess for 15 minutes. Any discussion? All those in favor say aye. Aye. Anybody? Go back to our list. We do have a quorum. Yeah, while there are eight of us in here. And just as a reminder, we have seen every one of these items before. So perhaps if we can each, I know discussion is important, but if we can each, you know, hit the high points and we'll keep on rolling. So we're now to item 33, government communications, and we've lost our link chair. This is Lex Call Overtime. Is anyone on the general government link, Council Member Stinnett and Council Member Martin, do you have anything to add to help us out on this? Is this on 33? This is number 33, $4,700 Lex Call Overtime. The Lex call overtime was, again, for the emergency calls, for ice storms, things like that, any type of storm they have to call in staff to cover those extra hours. Is there any motion on this item? Motion to approve. Second. So Stenet moved and Myers seconded to approve Lex call overtime. Any discussion? All those in favor, say aye. Aye. All those opposed? and do you need us to do the electronic voting? Because you have to type it in if we don't, correct? So if you'll log in, please. Thank you. That passes 8 to nothing. All right. Vice Mayor? Yes. Sorry, I just want to go through it. House Member Stennett, have at it. The producer position was a producer in GTV3, and it was Stephen Sword. Make a motion to keep that position in the budget. Okay, and Council Member Myers seconded. And any discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? And if you'll... Uh-oh. We're going a little too fast for the electronic, aren't we? So did you put in the votes already on that one? We don't have an ability to vote. It was 8 to nothing unanimous. All right. Council Member Stenet, you're on a roll. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Again, this is another restore the audio-visual speech. This is our specialist position. This is our technician. And I'll make a motion to continue that position. Second. Council Member Stenet moved. Council Member McCord seconded. And if you'll log in as the motioners and the seconders. I can't. Is there any discussion on number 35? All those in favor, please say aye. Okay. Okay. That motion passes 10-0. Number 36, Council Member Stenet. The last one in government communications from the link recommendations was to restore the second graphic designer. And remember, there are two in that division right now currently. So moved. There was a motion by Stenet, second by Myers, to restore the graphic designer. Is there any discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Anyone opposed? And if you'll log in, please, with your vote. Bless you. There should be one more vote. Okay, that passes 10-0, number 36. Now let's move down to 38, 39, and 40, which are council office items. Do I hear any motions on these? Black summer number 38 was recommendations from our acting council administrator, Jeanette Williams, cost savings in our own office. So I have a motion to approve. Second. Council Member Stenner moves. Council Member McCord seconds. Any discussion? All those in favor say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? Okay. Number 39, is there a motion? Eliminate the budget analyst funding. Yes. Second. Council Member McCord moved and Council Member Stennett seconded. Martin seconded, excuse me, to eliminate the budget analyst funding in the council office as their discussion. All those in favor, please say aye and vote electronically. Anyone opposed? We need a few more votes on that one. Thank you. That passes 10-0. Council Member Lane, do you have a motion on number 40? I make a motion we adopt the increase in professional services. Second. That's the council office. And are there any questions or discussions on that motion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. And electronically vote. Thank you. Anyone opposed? We need a few more votes. Okay. We have a couple more people here who haven't voted. Please. Okay, thank you. That passes 12-0. Okay. Number 41. I make a motion to approve civil service salaries for $26,000. That's the interim compensation for the classified employee in that department. Okay. Motion by Lane, second by McCord. Any discussion? All those in favor, please say aye and log in. Anyone opposed? Okay. Is everyone able to vote? Okay, that passes 9 to 2. Okay, the next item is appointed official. This would be a reduction in the budget of $11,880 to, I believe the net amount is $40,000 for a part-time citizen's advocate. So move. Council Member Lane motioned. McCord seconded. Is there a discussion about 42? All those in favor, please say aye and log in. Aye. Anyone opposed? That motion passes 9 to 2. Okay. Okay, item 43, internal audit, budget of $3,600 to put in a tip line for employees. So moved. Second. Lane, motion. McCord seconded. To approve the tip line for employees, $3,600. Any discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Anyone opposed? Okay. Mr. Lane, you're on a roll. That motion passes 11-0. Okay. Item number 44 is a budget of $150,000 for internal audit. This is for professional services to engage a CPA firm to do an audit of our accounting and software enterprise system. That motion by Lane, second by Mr. Martin. And can you please state again what areas would be audited? I'm sorry. I missed some of the end of your motion. Okay. Let me restate that for you. The $150,000 is to provide professional services using a CPA firm to do an audit of our accounting system, software system, and enterprise system. Okay. Software, accounting, and enterprise systems. Is there any discussion? Any discussion on that item? Council Member Stenet. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Councilor Lane, this dollar amount, how did they come up with this amount? I've done some homework on this, and it seems to be reasonable to assume we could get this done for a little bit less, more like $100,000 or less. I'm just curious about why $150,000. Well, the estimate of cost was determined by the Internal Audit Board, and one of the acting chair, Jennifer Burke, is a CPA and does these types of audits. and she said that if we did a competitive bid for this service, that would be approximately the cost. That's how we came with that. So I assume a CPA firm would be the ones you would target? That is correct. The CPA firm would bring in an expert in PeopleSoft, and they would review our accounting system. And one of the concerns that internal audit has is that this system has not been audited since, you know, we implemented it, and we're running about a half billion dollars worth of payables through there each year. So, you know, if there's any fraud or, you know, any errors in the software, it's really important that we find that because the cost of this audit compared to the risk is very minimal. So we think $150,000 is truly the number? Yes, sir. Thank you. Any other discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? That item needs more votes. We need a couple more votes. Council members, log in please with your vote. Thank you. That passes 12-0. That takes us to the end of general government. Are there any other motions? Yes, we're still voting. Mr. Stenet. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I would make a motion to add back $105,290 to the budget, which would be funding for a commissioner of planning position. And again, just to clarify, this is not a department. This would be just for funding for a position and what that final position looks like and who would directly report to them within government would obviously be another discussion outside the budget that would have to be had. but this would just be the funding mechanism to allow the mayor and the council to find a planning commissioner-level position. All right. Second by Myers. Council Member Stenet has moved to add into the budget $105,290 to fund a position for a commissioner of planning, correct? Yes, ma'am. Okay. Is there any discussion on the motion? And that was seconded by Myers. Okay. Mr. Farmer. I just have a question. Do we put that line item in the mayor's office somewhere? It would just be its own line item. Okay. Well, line item where? Well, they'll figure out. Okay. I think they'll figure that out. Same as any other commissioner. I mean, I'm in favor of that. I just want to know where we're going to put it. Mr. Farmer. I believe the CAO wants to speak to this issue, and I'm just going to yield my time to him. Mr. Maloney. I just need to ask a question on that $105,000. Does that include the benefits and everything, or is that because if we add that in there, they're going to be making less than our directors. So I just need to know how much. I'm just trying to figure out what that's going for. Well, the motion is the starting funding, and I'm sure if you all find the appropriate person, you can find adjustments elsewhere or come back to the council if you need additional funds. Thank you. Okay. Mr. Farmer, are you finished? Okay. Anyone else wish to speak to the motion? Mr. Myers. Okay. Anyone to speak to the motion? Mr. Martin. Again, I think we need an urban planner and not an administrator. And so I think following what Mr. Kay said earlier, that I think we need someone with urban planning background and not just someone who can come in and manage department. Thank you. Anyone else wish to speak to motion? Mr. Farmer. I believe in our planning function, and I believe in the people that do it. I think that the fact that this position has been empty for five years speaks to the fact that they are doing that job. I think there's an opportunity within this government at this time to make a difference by having a commissioner of planning that would alter the escape and the structure of how all those groups interact. And that's why I'm very much in favor of this motion. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Kaye. Thank you, Vice Mayor. The fact that that position was open for five years may reflect more budget realities than the need for that position and whether that position, whether the function was actually fulfilled in planning. I think it's been a need in planning. I think it's still a need in planning. But I will also support this motion because I believe that a planning commissioner over the agencies is also appropriate. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else? Council Member Martin. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Would Council Member Stinnett accept a friendly amendment to have this be a commissioner of planning and development to include economic development items? No. I think no. Because we're going to have a very small department. and we have a lot of other functions that we could put under a, you know, have someone be the director of or commissioner of. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Thank you. Council Member Ford. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Council Member Senate, I do support the motion. I echo the sentiments raised around the horseshoe. I think it will help infield and redevelopment and other planning activities. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else wish to speak to the motion? Okay. All those in favor, please say aye. And log in. Anyone opposed? That motion passes 11 to 1. Thank you. Now, is there any other motion before we turn the page off of government? Yes, ma'am. Government. Hang on one second. Hang on. Let me get the. Okay. Council Member Myers. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I would move that we restore the rest of the positions in PIO. And what? I'm sorry. PIO. Now, can you please delineate what positions those are? I'm going to have to refer to Ms. Underwood. Motion by Myers and seconded by McCord is to restore the rest of the positions in PIO, which I think it would be good to know what those are. Okay. Okay, Council Member Stenner has it in his trustee briefcase. And Mr. Lane, while we're... Okay, Vice Mayor. Go ahead. The positions that we have not approved would be the one for... Give me a list of salaries or the individual's names. What's the easiest, Connie, to keep track? There was one position, a staff assistant senior with a cost of $53,987. There was the position of public information supervisor at $73,196. There was an administrative specialist senior at $66,977. What was that one again? Administrative Specialist Senior. Thank you. And then the last position was Director of Government Communications at 128, 228. And all those were with benefits. The last one was 128. 228. $128,228. Okay. I'm sorry. Okay. Thank you. These birthdays can be rough. Especially for 21 years. Okay. Thank you very much. Connie, did you get those numbers? And thank you very much. The motion on the floor is to restore PIO positions of staff assistant senior, PIO supervisor, admin, specialist, senior, and director of communications. Is there a discussion? Council Member Lane. I'm speaking. to another item. Okay. Council Member Ford. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Those four positions, just confirming, subtotal 322,388. Is that correct? Thank you. 322,388. Council Member, does anyone else wish to speak to the motion? No. Okay. All those in favor, please say aye, and log in with your vote. Aye. All those opposed? No. Okay. Please log in your votes. That motion passes 9 to 3. Is there anything else before we turn the page to the next link? Council Member Lane? Yes, ma'am. I just wanted to double-check item number nine on the late item, a council changes report, showed a social services professional services credit of $20,000 and a social services training of $20,000. I just wanted to make sure that wasn't the same $20,000 in there twice. That's a different item. Okay. Thank you. That's all I have. Okay. Thank you. All right. Council members, if we can turn to finance and social services. Oh, Council Member Stenet. Are we going to come back to the general government categories, if they're listed also in individual council member recommendations? Do we want to take some of those now since we're on the topic of general government? Some council members say no. We're going to come back because there's some that pertain to these items in here. Okay, we'll come back. We'll get to them in the individual. Okay. Finance and social services, and that was shared by Mr. Beard isn't here. Mr. Ford, are you prepared to go ahead and bring these to us? Okay. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Line item number 47 under the Department of Social Services is to reduce an appropriation towards the Affordable Housing Trust Fund. that reduction would be $116,500. Is that a motion? That's a motion. So moved. Okay. Motion by Mr. Ford, second by Mr. Ellinger, to reduce the Affordable Housing Trust Fund to item 116,500. Any discussion on the motion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. And anyone opposed? That motion passes 11-0. We have 12 here. So Council Member Henson, did you want to register your vote? It just makes it so much easier for the person on Granicus. Thank you. That motion passed. Council Member Ford. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Item number 48, both 48 and 49 apply to the Charles Young Community Center and its redevelopment. The Department of Social Services indicated a need for more senior programming. So on line 88, we're proposing part-time social work staff in the amount of $15,000. So moved. Council Member Ford moved and Council Member Bellinger seconded. Was that for item 48 only? Yes, ma'am. That is for the Satellite Senior Citizens Program at the Charles Young Center? Yes, ma'am. Of $15,000. Mr. Stennett. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I just had a question on that. I know there were some handicap accessible needs in parking. Would that be in addition to this? No, sir, Mr. Stennett. This is just for the senior citizens component. Just programming? Just programming under this Department of Social. Thank you, sir. Mr. Kay. Thank you, Vice Mayor. This item is relevant to the work of the Charles Young Task Force as well, and I would like to amend the motion to include that these funds will be expended only if they are consistent with the final outcome of the work of the Charles Young Task Force. Thank you, Mayor. Okay, so I have a motion to amend and a second by Council Member McCord to amend this to say that these funds would only be expended if they are consistent with the outcomes of the Charles Young Task Force recommendations. Correct. And so I'm presuming this amendment would mean that they would be delayed, these funds would be delayed from expenditure until the task force finishes its work. Yes. Okay. Now, discussion of the amendment. Mr. Myers. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Would the task force then come to the council and report out to the council so that the council would then have to move to extend these funds, or how would that work? Can anyone from budgeting answer that question about how these would be held until, I think you're asking about the process. Yes. The task force is due to come back. Council Member Ford chairs it. Vice Mayor, and just before Elizabeth comes up, the task force is due to report to the council, in late August, and we will hopefully be able to do so. It's important to note that the programming for this senior citizen program at Charles Young is planned on a half-year schedule. It's planned on hiring social worker November or so and to start programming in January. I definitely welcome and support Councilmember K's amendment because it is consistent with the wishes of the Charles Young Task Force. So by the time funds would be expended, we would have a report back to council as such. Elizabeth. There are a few things we could do on the people soft side of the world to encumber these funds or reserve them until the task force comes back. And if you all wanted to make a formal motion at that time to allow the expenditure of them, we can come up with something. Okay. Very good. Thank you. Anyone else wish to discuss the amendment? All those in favor, please say aye. Anyone opposed? All right. The amendment passes. Council Member, okay. Okay, 12-0, and the amendment is to say funds for number 48 won't be expended until the task force makes recommendations which are consistent with this item. Now, the motion on the floor then is as amended to approve number 48. Let's see. Anyone wish to speak to the amended motion? All those in favor, please say aye. Anyone opposed? We're looking for 11 votes, and it passes 11-0. Thank you very much. And so number 49, Mr. Young, Mr. Ford. Thank you. We're still on the Mr. Charles Young Center. Yes, ma'am. Thank you. Number 49 provides for the startup costs and operating supplies needed to staff the senior citizen program, And I would make that motion consistent with the findings of the Charles Young Task Force. So moved. Second. Okay. The motion is to approve number 49, $35,000 operating funds, which won't be expended until the Charles Young Center Task Force makes its recommendations, and these are consistent with those recommendations. Any discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? All right. Please log in your vote. That passes 11-0. Number 50. Number 50 funds the position of an Administrator Specialist Senior in the Division of Youth Services to support the new Director of Youth Services. So moved. Okay, this motion is to approve number 50, Administrative Specialist Senior in the Division of Youth Services, $66,500. Any discussion? Council Member Henson. is vacant at this time. Commissioner Mills, welcome. Commissioner Mills, currently we don't have administrative support for the Director of Youth Services. There hasn't been a director in that position for three years and we realize that there is not an administrative specialist for that director. So this would be creating this position? It would be a new position, yes ma'am. Is this a position that you and I had talked about last week? Yes, we talked about how if we didn't fill this one, we would be taking someone from another division back to this position. That's the one. Okay. Thank you, ma'am. Council Member Myers. Thank you. Commissioner? Council Member Henson asked some questions at an earlier meeting about people that were getting laid off and then positions that looked like they could be filled by some of those folks. And I've heard from a number of people that there is an administrative assistant specialist senior that is one of those that are slated to be laid off. Have we ever got that list reconciled? There is an ordinance right now. If a position is within this fiscal year, we do internal candidates first. So anyone who's scheduled for layoff. But that's within this fiscal year. Beyond June 30, I don't know the rules on that. Okay. The five that are slated to get laid off from social services, do any of them? None of them are administrative specialist senior. We do have five people scheduled for layoff. The two in the clerical series are both staff assistants. Okay. Thank you. Any other discussion on the motion? Okay. The motion is to approve number 50, administrative specialist senior for youth services. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? That motion passes 11-0. And we, Connie, can you, as soon as you're ready there, give us an update on the fund balance based on the decisions made so far? We are currently at $1,258,392. 1,258,000. What were the last three? 392. 392. Council Member Stenet has a question. Does that include the 522 that the mayor had projected in the fund balance? Yes, it does. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Very good. Thank you very much. Let's move on then to environmental quality and public works. and that was chaired by Council Member Farmer. And the yellow items have already been dealt with. Thank you, Vice Mayor. That's correct. The Valley View Ferry has been dealt with as item 18, and the traffic engineering signage was dealt with as item number 22. At the time that we were meeting, we were looking at some revenue generation ideas, one of which was to change the fee structure for the loan box fees to kind of bring them more in line with current practice and make them a little bit more expensive than they already were. So the bottom line is this would be raising that fee, but it would also be placing that income in the landfill fund. So I would so move on behalf of the link. Second. Motion by Mr. Farmer. Second by Mr. Dr. Blues. To adjust the loan box fees. Now, this is in the landfill fund. That's right. That's correct. So we'll deal with it anyway as it comes through, but it won't affect this fund balance we're working on. That's correct. Okay. And this will be an addition. It should be an addition. It should be an addition in revenue. That's correct. In the landfill fund. But we'll deal with it since it's right here. Any discussion? Okay. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? Okay, number 52. We need a couple more votes. There are 11 of us. Oops. Okay, we lost the ability to vote over there. So if you can put that back, and we'll vote again. This is the motion to approve 52. Council members, has everyone logged in? Thank you. That passes 11-0. And Mr. Farmer. The next one is item 54, which was a paving recommendation on our behalf, which has to a certain degree been obviated by the use of MAP funds. But I wanted to ask the commissioner if she would. She had mentioned to me in a separate conversation that there was something not quite right with the MAP funds or using them. I just wanted to make sure before we move forward here. Welcome, Commissioner Taylor. Thank you. Not quite right wasn't, you know, when you're in the elevator, you never have good conversation. But what was done is the unspent balance of the MAP funds for this year were identified to add up to $3,975,000. Yes, ma'am. Now, the one piece about that, though, is we do have several projects underway and other projects that we had planned to put underway that we'll have to inform the council about where we are status-wise on those because that money, although not encumbered, some of it was earmarked for other activities. So, you know, I just wanted you to know that there could be some changes in project schedules and that sort of thing. Can you give me a feel for how much we're talking about? I mean, $200,000, $300,000? How much? Well, it's a choice. We have a number of projects that are already active, and there should be some bills that would have to come out of the $3,900,000 to the tune of maybe $100,000, $200,000. The other items are projects that we had on the list that we may not be able to do when we move the MAP funds, unless we're able to find that funding in another source. So that would be up to $1.4 million worth. So our number might drop from 3.9 to 2.5? Well, it could. It's a choice again. I mean, if we choose to put the money toward paving, we've got plenty of paving to do, as you all know, because we have lists and lists of things that need addressing. We did have a number of projects on the map road project list. Some of them we have not started yet. And what we would do then would not start those projects or delay them or put them into a future year out and then address them at that time. But there are choices, each one of them. A lot of it is we have bike lanes, we have some trails, we have some intersections on Man of War, Citation Boulevard. Some of those sorts of things would have to be delayed. All right. Thank you very much. And that's all, just so you know, the money is earmarked for projects, and if we choose to use it for paving, that's fine. We'll just have to adjust schedule on the others. And Council Member Stennett wishes to speak. I guess where I'm coming from. We had this discussion last week, and we approved using $3.9 million. There was no mention of any of these projects. And in the budget, we get $3 million, a little over $3 million every year. We're only putting 2.1 of what we get this year towards road repaving. The rest of it is towards those projects. So something's not adding up. We have money in this project for small projects that you're talking about. So I'm trying to figure out why there's another list with other additional projects, because we're not using all of this year's current map money to repaving. We're only using 2.1 million of it. Well, I apologize. I wasn't here last week, so I'm not sure what happened exactly. but Mr. Fair. Yes, I appreciate the opportunity. As we talked about last time, the reason the additional paving was not in there is because we need to do extra level of due diligence with accounting, recognize fund balance, and meet with engineering. So Bradston and I and Marwan sat around. We looked at the list of projects they had upcoming the next couple of years. on page 304 of your budget book, there is $1,450,000 for the, as I understand it, what the commissioner is referring to as additional projects. Marwan provided a list to me at that date that would, his list of projects would work within that $1,450,000. So I'm a little confused as well, but it seems like engineering projects are funded at the level I described on page 304 of the budget book. 304. That's what you're saying. And that was my point. Is that not correct, Commissioner? Is that how you understand it? I mean, I see bike lanes on here. I see sidewalk ramps. I mean, total revenue is $5.2 million from our municipal aid money, but the fund balance of $4 million that we just talked about. This is starting on page 300, 301, 302. I'm sorry if I've made an error. I'll take a look at it. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Martin. Well, I was following up on this as well, and so I was trying to understand what projects we were looking at. And I guess what I want to make sure is that, you know, I support this motion because I think, as everybody knows, that we're way behind on our paving obligations. And I guess my question for the commissioner, if she's able to answer it, is are any of these funds for our matches for existing projects that we've already approved? I know. And just to be clear, there is no motion on the table. I mean, on the floor. Or on the table. Mr. Farmer, do you want to make the motion? Well, I mean, yes, I want to make a motion, but I want to couch it properly. If you talk to the streets and roads folks, they can probably easily spend $6 or $7 million in paving. And I'm trying to figure where we are in that total because using the two that the mayor had proposed plus the other four, that put us at six. Am I wrong? The mayor proposed three. Oh, how kind of him. There you go. So that puts us at seven then. Right. We're at seven. We're at seven. So I think in my mind, bonding for more than that might not actually work to our advantage because we might not be able to get it all done. But I was trying to make sure we got to a correct number. and we might take this $5 million down according to what other projects are or aren't going on. So I was kind of not going to make a motion based on the fact, even though the link reported on it, the fact we've changed the situation is where I'm going. Sorry. Council Member Martin. While we have this up, maybe Mr. Barrow or Connie can just confirm to us exactly what we have allocated so that because I know in previous years we thought we had some and engineering came back later and said we had something else. So maybe if you could just confirm what we've done so far and maybe we can be satisfied with that. In the mayor's proposed budget on page 305 in street maintenance and construction depth ID, there was basically $2,148,000 of funding that was in the map. Then, to my recollection, the county road aid funding had between $800,000 and $900,000. Then in the late item list, I believe it was the first day we addressed the mayor's late item list. Based on Council Member Stenet's request, we were able to do the due diligence that we planned on doing, identified additional fund balance in the MAP funds. That's where the approximately $4 million came into play, and council approved that late item. So I believe the math is correct. So that there is $7 million. $7 million? Approximately. Thank you. Okay. Is there anything else on item 54? I wasn't going to make a motion. Okay. Item 55 is the most consistent input that the link got was how many different places greenways are watched out for, maintained, and looked after. And the effort behind number 55 was to try to consolidate some of those issues under parks and recreation by removing it from engineering in this instance and placing it in parks and recreation so we could take the first stab at a more holistic approach at how we maintain greenways and even what we do with them. So the motion here is to remove $30,000 in the greenway maintenance budget from engineering and place it into parks. So moved. Second. Council Member Farmer moved, and Council Member Blue seconded, and that motion to remove $30,000 from engineering and place it into parks would deal with both portions of 55. Yes, ma'am. Okay. Is there any discussion? If not, all those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? Okay, that motion passes 12-0. Item number 56 is a derivation of part of the conversation we had about services that the city provides that they are not reimbursed for. In this instance, this item refers to dead animal pickup, and the idea that we as an entity might charge veterinarians and those of that ilk from whom we go and pick up dead animals. Sometimes they charge for that service and sometimes they don't, but we bear the cost no matter what. It is in the Urban Services Fund. It does not impact the general fund budget, but it does represent dollars that are spent that are not reimbursed. And so the effort on behalf of the link was to monetize that in such a way as to make it have a zero-sum effect by proposing that we add a fee for dead animal pickup that would provide $66,000 worth of income, and I would so move on behalf of the link. Do I hear a second? Second. Okay, Mr. Farmer moved and Mr. Dr. Blue seconded to add that revenue in for dead animal pickup. Any discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? And if you'll log in electronically, please. Okay, that motion passes 12. Mr. Farmer. Item 57 was truly an effort on behalf of the Link to balance our part of the budget. And the idea was that, for a couple of memorandums and some background information, there's an opportunity in our city to interest people in picking up their litter by fining them for it. And at the time, we were trying to balance our budget based on the fact we were going to be bonding out $5 million worth of paving. I do still think there's an opportunity for the citizenry to be more involved in picking up everything from cigarette butts to mattresses. But at this time, I'm not going to place a motion on behalf of the link because I think we have narrowed the gap we were trying to cover. So unless others want to make a motion at this time, I do think there is room for a great conversation in the City of Lexington about how we want to look better just by having individuals either not litter or pick up the litter that they have placed all over town. But on behalf of the link right now, I will not place any more motions, and that would include our report. Okay. Thank you very much. Now, Council Member, we'll do public safety, and then we'll do what we did with general government, which is to say take finance, environmental quality, public safety, and ask if there's anything else. So we'll go with Council Member Myers, who chaired public safety. Thank you, Vice Mayor. As you all know, we heard in our report out from Public Safety Link that a fire emergency has a situation where they have late runs. It constitutes overtime because the shift change happens in the middle of the run, and they didn't have the overtime to provide for that. So we move on behalf of the link to put $30,000 into their budget to cover that cost. So moved. Second. Council Member Myers motioned and Council Member Farmer seconded to place $30,000 into fire and emergencies budget for late runs. Is there discussion? Mr. Lane. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Could you tell me, and I don't want to put you on the spot, you may not have the number on you, but how much overtime is now budgeted for fire in addition to this amount? Zero. I like to hear that. Thank you. Okay. And if I might add, this $30,000 is based on FHIR gave the link a number of late runs that they did over the past year or three years. They looked at it. They studied it to see what the minimum was that they could get by with. Any other discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? And if you'll log in electronically, please. Okay, we need a couple more votes. There are 11 of us here, and we lost our screen. If you'll start voting again, please. Okay, that passes 11-0. Now, is there anything before we leave page 11 at the end of general government? We went back and made a couple extra motions. And then, Connie, maybe you can give us an update after this page of our fund balance. Any other motions to come up, Council Members? Council Member Stenet. There was one item I brought up during the link report out about the corrections cafeteria for the workers that was cut two budgets ago of about $80,000. This would provide a meal and allow them to stay on site while they're a 30-minute dinner break or lunch break, whatever it may be. Right now they only have 30 minutes to leave the site and come back, which is impractical given the location. would reopen the cafeteria to the workers who work out there, and I think it would be a benefit worthwhile for morale, one, being the situation it is. So I'd make a motion to put the $80,000 back in there for the employees' meals at the jail. Second. So the motion, and just to clarify, that was not in the LINCS meeting or report out, but you did bring it up in the discussion when we talked about that. So the motion is to restore $80,000 to the corrections budget for... That's for a whole year. That's for a whole year for the employees' meals. Okay. Any discussion? Council Member Farmer. I'm sorry. Tell me more about this. For years since we built the jail, Aramark provider, whoever provides the food service, we were providing a meal per shift to the employees out there that work at the detention center. They get 30 minutes to go have a dinner. So at this point either they have to bring it or they have to leave and go get it. Because we as their employer were paying for their lunch? That's correct, or their dinner in some cases. Whatever the meal was. Correct. And we cut it out two years ago. and we closed the cafeteria to the employees. So it's sitting there empty. So was this a budget saving at that time based on a recommendation from the administration or from the administration of the jail? It was one of the cuts that was proposed in lieu of cutting people and other services. In lieu of cutting personnel at the jail. Well, I mean, that obviously could have been one cut they could have made in lieu of that. This was one of the cost-saving measures, yes, when they were asked to reduce their budget. So in your link, were you in this link? I'm sorry. No, I wasn't. But I'm just wondering if current... Perhaps Council Member Myers, who chaired the link, could answer that question. Thank you, Vice Mayor. This issue never came up at all. I don't know if maybe the CAO has something to say, but during our link meetings, this issue never came up at all from the jail. So I'm not sure I'm going to support it. Do you have anything, Mr. Maloney, on this $80,000 corrections issue? Okay. Council Member Henson, did I see that you want to weigh in on this? Thank you. I do know that even though this did not come up in the links from visiting the detention center, touring the detention center and going out there for the celebration for community corrections officers. They have mentioned it, and that's the employees that have mentioned it, not the administration. So I think if it had come up in the links, it would have come up from the administration, and maybe this would be a good suggestion on their part to bring things like this up. But that would be in the recommendations from Chief Boggs. Does anyone else want to discuss the motion? Council Member Blues? So just for clarification, what we'd be restoring to the budget would be the opening of the reopening of the cafeteria and the paying for the meals. So do we in any other divisions of government pay for employees' meals? I do not have that answer right now, but I do not think so, but I'll be glad to find out for you. Did that, are you finished? Well, that does help. I'm reluctant to support the motion, not because I'm against opening the cafeteria, but I do have some reservations about paying for the meals. Council Member Kaye. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I would support the motion primarily because given the circumstance, the geographic circumstance of that facility, employees there have no option. If they have half an hour under regulation, they either have to bring something or go without, and I think it would be a good thing to add this as a benefit to those workers. Thank you. Councilmember Myers. Thank you, Vice Mayor. There was a question asked on whether or not we do this in the other division of government. And a few years ago, or up until a few years ago, we did provide free lunch for the employees at Day Treatment Center, and we cut that out. Thank you. Is there any other discussion? Council Member Blues. Just one final point, Vice Mayor. I could support the motion if the employees were going to pay for their meals at the cafeteria, but I'm reluctant to support it if the government is paying for the meals. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Ford. To this, excuse me, to that same note, is there an opportunity for us to, you know, I know we dislike this word at times, but to study it further in regards to what we can provide? Because the only my concern is that if we do offer this and I'm not supportive, to be quite honest, supporting it at no cost. But if we are to offer this, there's no guarantee that all employees will utilize. Some employees may still decide to bring their lunch or make arrangements. But I do support, however, us utilizing the facilities that we have out there and to offer an option to our employees. I'm just not certain of how we go about doing that. and if this expenditure gets us there or not. Is there anyone else who wishes to speak to the motion to put $80,000 in the corrections budget to open the cafeteria to serve meals for the employees? Provide. Provide meals. Okay. All those in favor, please say aye. Anyone opposed? No. We should have 11 votes coming in. Who has not voted? Okay. That motion fails five to six. Oh. Are you voting on the motion, Mr. Martin? That motion's tied, so it fails. Yeah, I'd indicated to her early on that I was voting yes on this, so I am voting yes. Okay, I didn't know that. That's okay. That's all right. But I'm locked out at this point. Oh, okay. So that motion fails, and we will return to, is there any other motion for that page? Let's move on then to general. Vice Mayor. Yes. I'm sorry. The motion was to approve. $80,000. And I voted yes. It was a 6-6 tie, so it failed. Is that counting me then? Yes, that was counting you. Sorry, I missed you. That's okay. And then, Commissioner Taylor, did you want to clarify something on the page 11 before we move forward? Yes, and you probably noticed it reminded me of being in church, like you need a crying room in the back to go straighten out things. And I apologize. I wasn't here last week, so I have been doing catch-up this week and what happened. And we, in going through the project list, assumed that money was in the MAP funds that were encumbered in it. In fact, that is not correct. The money is available for the projects, the list that you received. So we have money available in MAP funds to finish the projects that we earmarked for this year. We have money for next year. Next year is a pretty pared-down list, but a lot of it focuses on Clay's Mill Road. And then we are using the unspent balance to help bolster the paving plan. So anyway, I apologize for confusion and appreciate Ryan and Brad working with me there. Okay, thank you very much. Now, Council Members, I was just going to – did you have a point about that? I just want to make sure the number was correct. Okay, good. So it's just shy of – Commissioner? Commissioner? Commissioner Taylor, Mr. Farmer has a question. Just by way of summation, so the $3,900,000 figure is correct for paving? Yes. Thank you, ma'am. And I'm sorry for the confusion I caused, but we've got it straightened out, so I have no problem. Thank you. And, Council Members, we're ready to address the last page of the link recommendations, And then I would like to ask your approval. We have one council member who needs to drive two hours, four hours to a five o'clock meeting. And I would ask after we dispense of page 12 that you allow Mr. Martin's items to be discussed first under individual council members. So we can think about that. We'll go to the link. And if anybody else has to drive four hours to a meeting, let me know, and we'll move you up. Okay. General Services Link and the chair was Council Member Kay. Thank you, Vice Mayor. The first item is for replacing the ticketing and arm machines in the annex, which have been malfunctioning pretty regularly and causing a lot of tie-ups. this would replace those machines. I move approval. I have a motion to approve $15,000 for annexed parking garage equipment. Do I hear a second? Second by Council Member Ellinger. Any discussion? Council Member Stennett. Could this not be taken out of the money we approved last week, the $500,000 cash, to go towards the repairs? I believe this is a separate item. It's still all for garages. I mean, it's just for the annex garage. Not for the two arms in the annex garage only. Okay. Well, the bond, the money we approved last week is for all garages. Can you, John Sheet or Commissioner, do you want to clarify that? It's a small amount, but I think we're going to start nickel and diamond. The $500,000 that was brought to you was primarily dealing with a lot of structural and deferred maintenance items and so forth. The $15,000 that's been requested specifically is requested for upgrading, replacing the two automated ticketing. That's out there for you. Okay. Any other questions about the motion or comment? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? We're looking for 12 votes. Thank you. Okay. Can you, he's locked out. Well we are lacking one more vote. Did everybody vote? Okay. It should be 12 to 1. If you all can identify who didn't vote and please place them in. Mr. Myers. Okay. There we go. Thank you. That motion passes. Okay. Mr. Kay, Dr. Kay. It won't let you vote twice. The next item is to restore $41,757 to keep Middlebrook Golf Course open. I move approval. Motioned by Council Member Kay, seconded by McCord. Any discussion on restoring Meadowbrook Golf Course? That's a funding of $41,757. If not, all those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? And we're still looking for 12 votes. Thank you. That motion passes 12-0. Mr. Dr. K. The next item is to restore $10,000 to the general fund to keep the pools open on Mondays. So moved. And seconded by Council Member Lane. Any discussion? That item is $10,000 to keep all the pools open on Mondays. Seeing no discussion. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? And if you'll log in, please, with your votes. That passes 12-0. Dr. Kay. And the last item is a projection of potential revenue from adding Tate's Creek Golf Course to the list of golf courses that offer sales of beer. That would be $22,500. So move. Do I hear a second? Council Member Blue's seconded to additional revenues, $22,500 sale of beer at Tates Creek Golf Course. Council Member Lane. My question is, is that net income or is that gross income? Because of its gross income, we have to buy the beer and there's a cost of sales, which means our net revenue would not be $22,500. John Masheed. That is net. That is net after the cost of goods sold taken up. Thank you. I have one follow-up on that. There was discussion because we had so many people asked to keep Mennebrook Golf open. Many of the people sent in emails saying they would be willing to pay more. maybe there's somewhere else in here but there was also a discussion of helping to subsidize Meadowbrook Golf by raising the golf fees for all the courses it's in an individual recommendation thank you any other discussion the motion on the floor is to approve $22,500 in net revenues for sale of beer at Tates Creek Golf Course Council Member Henson I wanted to make sure this is to take out the revenue or put it back in. It's to put in extra revenue. Okay. Thank you. Any other questions? Okay. All those in favor, please say aye and log in your vote. Thank you. Anyone opposed? All right. We're looking for a couple more votes. Council members, has everybody logged in their vote? Thank you. That passes 12-0 with an assist. Okay. Now, is there anything else on general services before we can't? Connie, we might ask you to give us an update on the fund balance. $1,104,135 is the current working fund balance. Okay. Now, Councilmembers, we're ready for individual Councilmember recommendations, and I'd like to request a motion, if you wish to do so, to allow us to start with Councilmember Martins, because he has to, at 1 o'clock, drive four hours to a meeting. Move motion by Council Member Blues, second by Council Member Kaye to move Council Member Martin's requests first for discussion. All those in favor of that say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? Okay. Very good. Council Member Martin. Thank you. And this is page 18. With the vice mayor and council permission, I'd like to take these out of order so we can get the easy ones done first. Item 120 is a request for $5,000 in the council office budget to provide for five Lexis Research Database licenses. This is so our legislative aides can get on Lexis. There's a thousand different publications you can get through this, and I think as we move our council office more toward sort of research-oriented, this would be very, very helpful, and so I make that motion. Do I hear a second? Okay. Council Member Ellinger seconded. Is there discussion, questions? Council Member Stenet. Council Member Martin, what's the magic number of five licenses? How would we break those up? It's approximately 3,700. And so the five licenses, we can talk about how we would allocate them, but I would think we'd have, my thought is that we'd have five cards with the different license numbers and we'd leave them with Jeanette and whoever wanted to use the database would come just get a card from Jeanette and they'd log on and use the database. Very good. But we can, yeah. Okay. Other discussion of the motion on number 120? Council Member Kay? This is a license fee on an annual basis, or is this a one-time fee? This is an annual fee, and it's about $4,000, we think. So we were trying to – it's a small number. We're trying to provide enough in there. This is the first time we're going to be doing it. But we've checked and called and called, and so there's no print fees. We're pretty sure it's going to be quite a bit – it's going to be about $4,000. But this will give us a little bit of room for the first year to see how it goes. Second question. Is there some way to track how much it's actually used? I would think that they would have some be able to provide us information on that. It is a database, and they do track logins and things like that. So obviously if it's not being used, then it's something we shouldn't do in a future year. But given that we are dealing with $500 million a year, I think it's a small amount of money to learn more about some of the difficult issues we handled. Thank you. Mr. Farmer. I'm sorry. What do we get again? This is bouncing off a little bit. Lexis is one of the largest national databases. Lawyers use Lexis and Nexus on a daily basis almost. But this is a database with magazine and newspapers and articles and treatises, and I think we've emailed around what all the different things are included in this license, but it's a deep database of newspaper and magazine articles and journals and things like that to help us, you know, for those of us who are interested in researching particular issues. So it offers the ability to reference these things faster or differently than currently we do? Well, not all of them are available on the Internet, and this is a database that contains millions of articles. Okay. Thank you. Council Member Lane. Thank you, Mayor. I mean, Vice Mayor. Commissioner Graham, do we have it in our law office already? Council Member Lane, we use Westlaw, which is a, it's like Lexus, but it's a different company. So we're on a Westlaw contract right now. Will we be able to add on another use and pay a little bit extra and put it in the council office? We're actually in the process of trying to amend our Westlaw contract. So if you all wanted to do that, I didn't know if Council Member Martin had a particular preference for Lexus over Westlaw. Some people do. But, yes, we could do that. Does your Westlaw database have newspaper articles? Because Westlaw typically has legal cases and things like that. It's got a database called All News Plus Wires, which has – I use that for research on articles. It's a real good database. So, I mean, if you all wanted to – if you need information on what Westlaw has versus Lexis, we could probably provide that to you. Yeah, we could definitely add on other licenses. Is there other discussion? Council Member Lane, does that finish you? Okay. Anyone else wish to discuss this? All right. Will all those in, you brought that as a motion, I believe. And who seconded that? Mr. Ellinger seconded. Okay. Will all those in favor please say aye. Aye. And anyone opposed. And please log in. We're needing that electronic vote also. We have 13 in attendance. Thank you. That motion passes 13-0. Mr. Martin. Thank you, Vice Mayor. The next item is item 118, and this is coming out of, I guess, a report out from the Environmental Water Quality Committee, but we would need to provide it in the budget for next year if we were to do it. So I think this may be the time to do that. But this is a proposal for a $100,000 grant program that's going to be out of the sewers fund, not the general fund. So, Council Members, did you hear we need to move that $100,000 out from the general fund and put it over under sanitary sewers? Yes, that's correct. Is that correct? And the idea is that while we spend $700, $800 million over the next 15 years to fix our sewers, that some small amount needs to help address current immediate needs of those who have immediate sewage backup problems in their basement. Some folks, particularly in my neighborhood and Dr. Blue's neighborhood, a lot of us have folks who have current problems. And so we can talk about how this money would be, the grant program would work, but at least we need to, I think, reserve something in the budget so that we would have the funds once the program guidelines were set up. So I make that motion. Motion by Council Member Martin, second by Blues, to expend $100,000 out of the sanitary sewer fund for grant programs for homeowners. And is there discussion? Council Member Henson. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Thank you, Mr. Councilmember Martin. This is something that sanitary sewers water quality is already doing as far as backflows and redirecting sump pumps. Yeah, this is, I think, particularly for grinder pumps in folks' basements. Some of the redirecting is not working very well. they're doing a couple things one is they're eliminating the taps and so there's a program currently underway to eliminate the taps but this is would cover the homeowner's part of the fee in certain circumstances where we have sort of lower or low income neighborhoods and I think that was your question when this originally came up but I've got folks in my neighborhood who can't afford the three or four thousand dollars and they're getting sewage in their basement really every time we have a bad rain. Okay, so this could be funds for elderly, fixed income, low income. It could, and I don't know the exact limit on that because I've got a couple folks who probably don't qualify as low income but who I guess would be medium to low income. So we've got some folks in the Garden Springs area who have chronic problems with sewage backup in their basements. And so this is just an attempt to try to, while we do these long-term capital things, to have at least some money set aside to try to catch up with some of the more immediate problems. Thank you. Council Member Lane. Commissioner Taylor. Since our general fund is very tight, would this be something you could fund out of the Sanitary Surge System fund? It is. That's an error. It shouldn't have come out of the general fund. Okay. I think Council Member Martin had mentioned that. Right. Are you already doing something like this? Well, not exactly. I think Councilman Martin did a good job of covering the idea there is that we're going to put a little bit more resource against that. As you know, as we're making decisions about sizing pipes for the future, one way that we can make our dollars stretch is to get the inflow and infiltration out of the system as much as possible. And so this is really an investment in helping homeowners address problems at a local place, deal with their problems that they're having today. because people come in and they've had their basement flooded for the second or third time, and when you tell them that the fix is seven or eight years down the road, it's pretty distressing. So we're trying to put just a little bit more funding toward that, including some pumps, grinder pumps and that sort of thing that would address some of our more severe problems. The program so far just takes illicit taps that many years ago people just designed the stormwater to go into the sewer system. And in some cases, those are a little bit more complicated to repair and fix than we've really funded at that level. So we're just trying to beef that system up and that program up and add a little broader scope to what we're able to address. Thank you. Okay. Council Member Blues. I just wanted to follow up on this a little bit. But this proposal came out of Environmental Quality Committee to set up a kind of experimental grant program to deal with, as Council Member Martin said, intractable kinds of problems that some property owners experience. My understanding is that this would include stormwater problems as well as sanitary sewer problems, and I'm not sure whether the funding would come from the Water Quality Management Fund or from the Sanitary Sewer Fund. Director Martin certainly supported this proposal, and I support it as well, of course. Thank you. But again, I'm not sure it's sanitary sewer fund that we're talking about. It may well be, might be water quality management. Commissioner Taylor, do you know? It concerns me a little bit if it's water quality because the water quality isn't bringing in what was originally projected. Right. Well, I'm going to have to double check that, Council Member Blues, but my memory was it was coming out of the sanitary sewer fee. You could argue, in this case, it's one of those places where the systems run together and they should not. So it's a stormwater source, but it's going into the sanitary system that causes a sanitary problem. So you could arguably probably go either way, and we had defaulted to the side of what people in the homes are seeing is a sanitary problem. That's what they're seeing. So we thought that was probably the most appropriate thing to do. Right. You're probably right about this, but I'm just not certain in my own memory of how we moved that forward. But the key thing here is that it is designed to help those homeowners who, every time we get an inch of rain, face a flooded basement or some other water problem. Thank you, Vice Mayor. You're welcome. So the motion on the floor is to fund $100,000, and currently the motion says out of sanitary sewer fund for these grant programs for homeowners. Any further questions? All those in favor, please say aye and log in your vote. Anybody opposed? Okay, that motion passes 11-0. Mr. Martin. Thank you, Vice Mayor. The next item is item 119, and this is audit, but it's a police and fire compensation benefits study, I think. You know, everyone's heard me sort of talk ad nauseum about this, but I think what we need is really better information about where our benefits are vis-à-vis our other comparable cities, both in terms of our retirement benefits, retirement medical benefits, but also the salary for our current employees. and those include the collective bargaining we have, but we're paying folks outside of collective bargaining. And so I make a motion that we allocate $100,000 to a police and fire compensation and benefits study. Is there a second? I do not hear a second, so that motion dies for lack of a second. Thank you, Vice Mayor. The next item I have, I guess, would be in item 115 is the creation of an entrepreneurship liaison within a position in the mayor's office. The economic development study that was delivered by Angelou says that entrepreneurship and small business is really the future of Lexington's economy. and what this position would do, this is the position I recommended last year as well, would create a position in the mayor's office who would help steer city government and help inform us about how to better nurture entrepreneurship and become a forefront leading community in pursuing small business startups and entrepreneurship. So I make that motion that we create this position. I apologize. Did you make a motion on that one? I did make a motion that we create a position of entrepreneurship liaison. On number 15. Is there a second? I hear no second, so that dies for a lack of second. Thank you, Vice Mayor. The next item was an item I brought up last year on 116, creation of trails and rights-of-way project manager. and given the tightness of the budget, I understand that there may not be a desire to do this. What I'm told by our roads and pedestrian folks is that we don't have people to actually acquire right-of-way and manage these bike projects that we've done, particularly like the Legacy Trail. And so I make a motion that we create a position of a trails and right-of-way project manager within the Division of Engineering. The motion is to approve number 116. Do I hear a second? There is no second, so that dies for lack of second. Thank you, Vice Mayor. The next item is item 117, traffic engineering. This would be funds for traffic calming devices such as speed humps. In the current 2011 budget, there is no money allocated for speed humps, and I have a number of streets in my neighborhood who are having cut-through traffic problems in which speed humps would actually be a public safety benefit. So I make a motion that we allocate $150,000, which I don't know whether we can bond this or put it in a bond issue. And perhaps, Mr. Barrow, I might be able to tell us, is this something we can bond? I think in terms of that particular, that's probably more policy as a general rule. I think that would fall into renewal and replacement, given the usable life John Sheet gave me on the way up. But you potentially could capitalize it. Okay. So thank you. And so I make a motion that we allocate $150,000 from the general fund for traffic calming devices such as speed humps. Do I hear a second? Okay. That motion dies for a lack of second. Thank you, Vice Mayor. The next item would be item, I guess, 114, and I'm going to withdraw that because I think that probably fell within the scope of what was discussed earlier about the strategic planner, and so I'm going to withdraw the creation of an urban planner at the Downtown Development Authority. I think that was covered amply within the discussion. Okay, you've withdrawn 114. And then the next item, 121, is covered also as item 96, and these were funds for the PVA to meet their fiscal year 2012 requests. And so I guess I'm going to withdraw this from the 10th district. We did not approve that yet, did we? That's another council member. Do you recall? Connie? No, the PVA is not an outside agency. they're part of our constitutional and judicial. But have we approved that? Number 121, no. That's listed on Council Member Stenet's list. No, we haven't gotten to this yet. So you'll wait. I'll allow the Council to consider that in Council Member Stenet's list. And the last item, and I think it's been covered already, but I'm going to make the motion, though, is I think the contribution of the Police and Fire Fund has to come out of cash. I realize we probably already addressed this, but I'm going to make a motion that we allocate $15,470,000 to the police and fire pension fund out of fiscal year 212. Okay. Motion to approve 122. Do I hear a second? No second. That motion dies for lack of second. Thank you, Vice Mayor. And, Council members, thank you for allowing me to do these first. I don't recommend anybody else do it because not many of these pass. So it's best not to drive four hours. And so you did withdraw 113 because we already. I did withdraw 113. Yes, thank you. I did withdraw 113 because we already covered that. Okay. We wish you safe travels. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Thank you, Council Members. Okay. Very good. Now, Connie, before we start and go through, Do you want to give us a quick update on the fund balance? And I don't know if you need to do anything to the screen or who does that. There, you do that. I have our current fund balance at $1,179,135. One, $179,135? Yes, ma'am. And that's as of after Mr. Martin's items. Okay, very good. All right, Councilmembers, are you ready to move on to page 14? I'm going to turn the gavel, the invisible gavel over to Mr. Ellinger. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Oh, Councilmember Farmer first. I had a question about the amount. The $1,179,135. How does that contemplate the funding that the mayor had put in the budget for the council to use as a whole? The $1 million. Yes, ma'am. Connie, can you answer that question? Is that still? $1 million was in bond funds, and this would not include. Oh, yes. You did that the other day. I'm sorry. We spent the bond fund. And the bond funds are now in the $1,179,135. Okay. So the $1 million is inside the $1.1 million. Yes, sir. Question and point of clarity. So does everybody understand that $1 million that, well, it's not gone, but it's in the fund balance? I need to go to a meeting. Can I go next? How far away is your meeting, Mr. Farmer? So that $1 million is included in this updated fund balance. Okay, Mr. Ellinger, I'm going to give the chair over to you. Thank you, Vice Mayor. And the first person up is the Vice Mayor in your recommendations. Yes, on page 14, I think that we've already approved number 64, and we've already dealt with 66 and 67 and 68. And I will go to 69 as a starting point, if I might. Council members, I put raising the fees at Meadowbrook Golf Course only by $1 per round in here because, as Council Member Lane, I believe, already mentioned, we have received lots of emails and communications from the public who use Meadowbrook Golf Course. And they said, please don't close it. Raise the fees. Now, this is a small amount of revenue, $11,000. And I did talk with Mr. Hancock at Parks, and we had a broad discussion about all golf fees, And I do not think it's, well, I didn't want to include in this raising all golf fees right now, but I did want to propose and move to increase the fees at Meadowbrook Golf Course by $1 a round, and I see John Sheed. We have a motion and a second by Council Member Farmer. Are there any discussion? And John Sheed, would you like to? I just want to make a clarification. We did a profit loss modeling based on the trends for the past three to five years with the golf attendance. And the net that we could come up with specific in regard to Middlebrook, the $1 additional fee would result in $1,327 net additional. Oh, okay. That's different from what Parks gave me. Yeah. So say the number again, $1,000. $1,327. This is based on 4% to 5% reduction in a number of rounds of golf. That's been pretty much typical in that course for the past three, four years, as well as some of these other costs associated with it. So that's the best we could come up with in terms of net gain. Council members, any discussion? Mr. Stinnett? Well, this is just talking about how much we're going to increase the revenue number by, not the net. I understand the explanation, but if we go in there and say we're going to increase revenue by $11,000 to offset that, obviously the net effect on down the road after expenses would be the net of $1,000 gain eventually. And the adjustments are not across the border. They're going to be some in regard to the weekends and so forth. My point is I think the motion would be, and it's still okay, increase it to generate. If there's $11,000 rounds of golf, the dollar would generate $11,000. and then we'll worry about the net and expenses. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Farmer? I was just wondering, Vice Mayor, and I seconded your motion and I'm appreciative of it, what would be the effect if we were to raise the golf fees a dollar at all of the golf courses? May I, since Mr. Farmer asked me, I had this conversation with Jerry Hancock at Parks before I put this 11,000 in there, and it was his sense that that might decrease participation at some of the other golf courses. Now, I don't have numbers on that, and he did not give me that information in any kind of a document. He was hesitant that we do that right now. So we don't have a number. I can try to get that to you as quickly as possible. Just primarily, we talk about across the border, all kinds of golf places. Yes, sir. I can get you. I think that there's a whole lot of information about golf out there, and I don't see that there would be that much of a problem personally. I understand the director's risk-averse nature, but I also understand the fact that golf is a great opportunity within this community as provided by the Ervin County Government and I think the same expression that we've had on behalf of Meadowbrook we would have on behalf of the other courses that a dollar would not be a make or break thing but an opportunity for us to recoup a little bit of revenue and I was going to pursue an idea of amending your motion And I would make a motion to amend your motion to just raise golf fees a dollar at each of the public golf courses. So moved. We have a motion to amend, and we have a second by Mr. Lane. Now discussion on the amendment. Is there any discussion? Mr. Lane? Well, I would support that, too. I mean, there's other factors, too. There are a lot of private golf courses, and the rates that we charge also affect the rates that other golf courses charge, too. And if our costs are going up, the costs for other golf courses are going up, too. And for us to artificially restrain our pricing, I think not only is damaging to the taxpayers because we're subsidizing the operation of the golf courses, but it's also damaging to the private operators who are competing with us for price. So I would support a dollar across the board. And then my second point is that when we discussed, we originally were going to close this course. When the discussion came up, it was discussed, it wasn't agreed to, but it was discussed it would generate some additional golf course revenue to offset the cost of maintaining this course. And I think, you know, we should do that also. Thank you. Ms. Lawless? I would like some clarification on the difference, the $1,000-something you said and the $11,000. Yes, ma'am. Based on the numbers that we've got, 18 hold fees on Monday through Fridays at $12, we're holding those. On weekends, we're proposing going from $13 to $14 per round. Twilight, it's $8. We're keeping it the same. We're increasing it by $2 on Saturday through Sundays. Junior golf, we're keeping it at $7 during the Monday through Friday, bumping it up by $1. And on ladies, Monday through Friday, we're bumping that up by $1 to $9. and we're keeping the pool card fees the same, which is $5. So doing the math and based on about a 4% reduction in number of rounds that we anticipate happening, the best we could come up with, the increase would net under $1,400. We go from $119,373 to $120,700. So it's really not going to amount to much in terms of net. In regards to the golf numbers, I believe we have about 107,565 rounds of golf total that played. That is what we have so far. So even if you work in 3 to 4 percent reduction in it, that $1 will definitely generate some money. Any other discussion on the amendment? I'm still, I'm sorry, a little unclear. So you're proposing raises on certain populations at certain times at certain courses? Primarily on weekends we feel like that we could absorb some of the reduction in the fees. During the Monday through Friday when we really didn't feel like it is going to serve any purpose. Right now we're talking about the amendment to the motion, which would be a dollar on all courses. Are you suggesting a different kind of proposal besides doing that? No. The numbers that I was asked about, the total number of rounds on all the courses, was $107,565 for your information. Is there a discount for senior citizens? Yes. Yes, senior citizens. Every number would be increased a dollar, correct? Yes. from youth to seniors to... Yes, because that's total rounds, seniors, junior, weekends, all the number of rounds that were played. Ms. Lullis, do you have anything further? Mr. Lane? Could you clarify, how many rounds of golf do we have at Metathorpe per year? How many rounds of golf do we have? I don't have that handy right now, but I can get it for you. Well, if your estimate was... You talking about Meadowbrook? The Meadowbrook, we have total $1,169, and we anticipate for that to be reduced to 12. You're talking about gross revenue. I want to know how many rounds we actually play. Yeah, that's what I'm talking about, the rounds of golf. We're going to go a total of $12,623 at Meadowbrook, and we anticipate with that trend, if nothing changes, we're talking about going down to 12,200. So we're talking about 423 rounds of golf reduction. Okay. All right. Thank you. Is there any further discussion on the amendment? All those in favor of the amendment say aye. I was opposed. Say nay and vote, please. This is voting on the amendment to the motion that a dollar raise in all courses. We have ten. Is there any others that haven't voted yet? Ms. Lawless, I don't have you down. And she's a yes, so put Ms. Lawless as a yes. That passes 11-0. Mr. Stenet, now we would be on the original motion, but I think that would supersede that because that would include. My question was, what number are we going to use as a placeholder, Connie, on the revenue? Is it going to be $107,000, five-something, or is it just going to be $100,000? I put in at the moment $170,000 at 97%. $107,000. $107,000 at 97% because he said there would be about a 3% reduction in rounds played. Okay. That's fair. So it's $103,790. $103,790. Let's go ahead and vote on the motion as amended. All those in favor of the motion as amended, say aye. Aye. And those opposed, say nay. and please vote. And Ms. Lawless, she's a yes. She is on there. Who hasn't voted? We have 10. We're looking for one more. There we go. That passes 11-0. Vice Mayor? Yes, thank you. The only other item remaining on my list is keeping eight clear officers in eight neighborhoods. and $241,800. And I know that since I put this on my list, we did have the update from Chief Bastin at the police department, but I think it is worth discussing, and so I will make a motion to reinstate all the clear officers. We have a motion by Vice Mayor Gordon and a second by Mr. K. Is there any discussion? Mr. Stinnett? Yeah, I mean, I guess my concern is I'm not sure how the 241 is really going to put them back on the street using these dollars. I mean, it's not like we're laying them off or anything like that. They'll just be reassigned to other divisions. I'm more in tune to try to find additional revenue to hire or get them in the system for training new officers because that's where the real problem is going to hit us come January. And also I was wondering why we can't use the confiscated month-for-a-year funds to do a specialized unit because I think you can under a specialized task force or some type of unit. I don't know if the commissioner can speak to that. Commissioner, could you come forward and – This is a specialized unit with a specialized duty. I didn't know if that would be considered use of the confiscated funds. Did you hear the question, Commissioner? There are some capabilities of using the confiscated funds, but they cannot supplant recurring cost items. To bring in a new class I think is something you're talking about. To do the 241 that's here, that's to keep the clear officers in the beats. I'm not sure what that money would really do, if I really keep them there or not. It's not so much the money as it is, just the general numbers of officers are down and putting them in a higher priority area. Yeah, so putting this money towards it is not going to help the problem. That allows us to keep the officers, correct? Correct. I'm not sure. Dossamir, you want to explain? Well, I actually agree with you. because our real problem is getting new recruit classes. But I kept it in here just for purposes of discussion, and I agree with you on it. Do you want to withdraw your motion then? Well, I'll go ahead, yes, and withdraw my motion. If anyone else wants to remake it, they can. In a second. Is this a second? Mr. Kay? Well, since I'm inclined not to withdraw my second, I'll only explain my reasoning. It's also on my list. And my thinking about this is that what this gives is a directive to public safety about the allocation of officers and the importance of the clear officers. And I need to have a conversation with the commissioner, but it seems to me that one of the issues is whether or not the police department goes ahead and begins an effort to recruit a new class. And my understanding is they're not doing that because right now they don't have the funds. So. Well, would you like to withdraw your second and then come back? Because you're going to be next and you could make the motion then. Well, I was just thinking if I'm going to make it, we could just continue on. I would say probably cleaner if you withdraw your second and then you make the motion. I withdraw my second. Okay, thank you. Is that all then, Vice Mayor? Yes, thank you. We'll pass the gavel back then. Yes. Okay. Okay, now, Mr. Blues, did you – Dr. Blues was already on here. Did you have anything yet? Well, I regret that you withdrew the motion. I'm sorry. Dr. K is going to bring it back up. Okay, and then can I speak to that then? Dr. K, your report. Next. Thank you, Vice Mayor. So the same item is on my list, and I would move that we allocate the same amount of funds, $241,800, to keep the four clear officers who are now scheduled to be placed in another division. Okay. Council Member Blues seconded as their discussion. Council Member, I think Blues wanted to be back first. Dr. Blues. Thank you. I agree with Council Member Stinnett that this does not, if we restore clear officers, it doesn't move us toward recruiting and training and putting on the streets a new class of officers. where the problems with shortages of revenue is that we're always struggling between short-term and long-term. And I think the short-term is a serious need here. The clear officers are community officers. They are in the neighborhoods. They know the people. They keep close touch. In the interest of full disclosure, I have a neighborhood that's losing a clear officer and a neighborhood that really needs a clear officer. So I have a direct interest in my own district with preserving this cadre of officers. I think that we have areas in our city where they're of extreme importance. and provide a virtually indispensable service. And I also remember that when Chief Bastin spoke to us a week ago in response to a question I asked, I said if we could restore funding anywhere, what would be your first priority among the cuts that you have proposed? And, of course, he answered that the clear unit was his number one priority. So I think this is a good proposal. I think it's very much in the interest of preventing crime, preventing violence in vulnerable neighborhoods. So I support Council Member Kaye's motion. Council Member Stennett. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I don't not support the motion in theory, but the $240,000, what does that buy us, Council Member? My understanding is that that covers the cost of keeping those floor officers in the neighborhoods as presently. Is that overtime costs? No, that's the salaries. Yeah, but again, we're not cutting them in the budget. They're still in the budget whether we approve this or not. So I'm trying to understand where the 241 is going to go to. Am I wrong, Commissioner? I mean, they're still in the budget no matter whether we pass this or not. So this really doesn't keep our officers in there. Correct. And what it will do is there will be a different allocation because it's a matter of coverage with the resources we have. So it's going to be if four go back from somewhere else to clear, somewhere else there will be four that will then replace on patrol. So if we increase 241 and put it towards overtime to cover patrols, and would that help? Is that what we really should be saying here? I mean, can you even do that? I mean, with the measure. I'm not sure how that would pan. I think you're talking about full-time assigned officers as opposed to overtime, though, and that's a different type of. But if you pull the clear back to clear, then you're going to have openings in patrol, which would have to be filled by patrol and overtime. Yes, but it would not equate to four full-time officers. Right. So that's what I'm trying to get to. I don't think this number is correct because it doesn't hire new officers because we're not losing any officers by changing the clear. So I can't support the motion the way it's stated. I think putting the clear back is what I want to do because, obviously, I've lost one, too, that we need. But this money doesn't do it. I think it's more of a policy change. It's policy and it's personnel. I mean, it basically comes down to, as the presentation showed the other day, It's a matter of not having enough personnel to cover the patrol shifts, and the support units have been shrunk on this first step by looking at clear, by looking at mounted, by looking at some of the other activities, and those people are all being pushed back over towards patrol. Do we have a cost for a training class if we were to include it? Do you have those figures for a 15-person, 25-person training class? Can we get that number while we're debating today? We might be able to get it here in a minute. If you can get it as that number. Because, again, I think the real issue is personnel. It's not could you put them back in clear. Because if you move it to clear, you're going to have openings in patrol, and you've got to fill those. So I'm not going to support the motion, but I would like to know what the training costs would be to get 15, 25 new officers in the process. Sure, and then you've got to look down the road at how much room does the overall budget have to bring in 15 or 25 more employees. Thank you. Council Member Myers. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Commissioner, I guess adding this money won't put any more officers back in the clear unit, but I guess I have a question. We have two officers that are sitting downstairs at the guard station in this building and in Vines, and the council has moved to put the security guards back in place. So are you planning on taking those two officers and putting them back on the street someplace? And if so, could those two go into clear? They're not full-time, same person, same shift. It's been a rotation of personnel in and out during the time that we were looking at layoffs and the budget issue, which is a typically prudent thing to do in any organization when there are discussions of a budgetary situation where layoffs are discussed, one of the first things any organization does is to look at security of the facilities. And that's all we did on a temporary basis. By what's going to be voted on here today, those officers will rotate back. Instead of coming in at the end for part of an end of a shift of the bike patrol or the segways or something like that, yes, those officers are going to be back doing their normal routines. Okay. Thank you. Council Member Ford. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Just a few quick things. I think one of the long-term solutions is to put another class or another few classes through the academy. It would be very advantageous if we are successful even somewhat on the COPS grant that we're going to submit. But as it pertains to the motion, I support the motion to keep clear officers in our neighborhoods. I also want to thank the Vice Mayor and Council Member Kaye because what we're doing, it's a little more than policy. It's about leadership because we could easily, through policy says, keep the clear officers. We could send an unfunded mandate to the police department. And I have to thank the police department has been very honest with us, Chief Bastin, is that he's made some tough cuts, including cutting a program that he created to put more cops back on the street. So by leaving the 240 in there and whether or not that's the, I'll take it that that's a sufficient number, it's going to allow the police department to reshuffle, whether it's overtime or whether it's staffing patterns, to help do two things that are important to us, keep clear offices in the neighborhood, and then also supplement the needed patrols on the street. So I'll be supporting the motion, but also looking forward to what that cost that Council Member Sennett has requested on a recruit class. Thanks. Council Member Kaye. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Commissioner, if I could, same general area. On the question of a new class, a new recruit class, how is that decision made as to when you move forward on that? And the reason I ask is that when I heard the presentation, it sounded like normal attrition would reduce the force, again, by another 15, 20 officers. But there's no plans presently to move forward on a replacement recruit class. Can you speak to that? There are no definitive plans. There's no timetable. but at any time the police department, fire department corrections have a pool of people in the pipeline to be hired. In some instances, especially since it has been quite a while for police, it may take a little bit longer to get those people out of the pipeline because there may be some testing scores that have expired according to the regulations. There may be some additional background information that would need to be done, which is a routine matter anyway. But if somebody hasn't had a background update for a year and they've changed jobs, then they need to go talk to those new employers and things like that. So there is some timetable that needs to be adjusted. But there are people in the pipeline, but it's going to be a matter of fitting into the budget. My information is that a class of 25 would cost about $1.4 million. Normal attrition on a given year is about 20 to 25 with the police department. I think that question had come up here a moment ago as well. And that cost is specifically for training that class, or is that for training and then? That would be salaries and benefits for the class while they're in training, I believe. I see. So there's an additional cost even if they're replacing people who are leaving the force for whatever reason. What I'm trying to get at is, is the money freed up by the people who are leaving to fund that additional expense? Well, yes, it would be if those 20 to 25 all left at the same time and left soon. But it is a person here, a person there. I think last month we had one police retiree. You know, it's that kind of staggering. Typically, I think after the first of the year is the premium time when people hit retirement. So I think that kind of timeline is what we could be looking at. And your comments about people in the pipeline, those are people who are in the pipeline to be placed in a recruit class? Yes, those are applicants to be placed in a recruit class. Thank you. Council Member Lane, the motion on the floor, just to remind everybody, is to restore the clear officers. Council Member Lane. I have that clearly in my mind. Clearly. I just had a couple of thoughts. I was listening to everybody talk. The first thought I had is that I feel that the police chief needs the total discretion to run a department, allocate assets as he sees fit, and I think we're starting to micromanage when we start telling them to add a certain number of officers in a certain department of the police department. And I think the clear program is very good, but here again, you know, we've got a budget issue. The average cost of a police officer is around $100,000. So it would take about $400,000 to add four full-time officers with no overtime. But if we're talking about taking some officers and putting them in at overtime, they're going to cost more than that. And so the $241,000 maybe would only be comparable to one and three-quarter officers on an annual basis. So I don't see any value to that. Also, the policy of the council is to eliminate overtime, and now we're recommending putting officers and paying them overtime to go into the clear. So we're sort of countering our own policy of eliminating overtime. So I think this is a bad idea, and I think we ought to come up with another idea, but I'm voting against this. Thank you. Council Member Henson. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I agree with Council Member Lane that although I certainly understand how important the clear unit is, And actually, the one in my district, I'm fortunate enough that I get to keep them, but I would probably be very, I don't know. But anyway, I think this money would just be putting a Band-Aid on it. We need to come up with a better plan. And I do have a question for the commissioner. Did he leave? Oh. How many response officers are there in clear? Response officers, I'm not sure. They're down to about one squad worth. I do know that. I'm not sure how many bodies that is. It was my understanding that there's three squads of clear response, and they have approximately five to six officers. They're down to one squad. of response. I think the Chief said two in the meeting the other day. Okay, I'll find out. Will you find out? Because I just think the coordinators provide such a good service to the neighborhoods that I would like to know the answer to that and see if maybe some of those couldn't be moved to patrol, which they're really technically already out there patrolling. They're just not connected to the radio. There's 15. Okay. 15 in response and one squad in the neighborhood, which is the neighborhood liaison officers. Thank you. Council Member Stennett. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I'll just close by saying putting this money once again, based on this motion, does not add clear officers. The motion, the way it stayed, just gives $241,000 to use, however, in the police budget. It doesn't specifically do what we ask us to do because the problem is not money. It's personnel. Until we make a motion to add a training class, I won't support this. As much as I want my clear officer back, this will not do it. This will just take $250,000 away from the other things in the budget that doesn't accomplish what we want to accomplish. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Is there other comment on the motion? All right. We will vote. All those in favor of restoring clear officers to the neighborhoods, say aye. Aye. All those against, say no. And please register your electronic vote. They're 11. Okay, we got it. That motion fails 3 to 8. Okay. Thank you, Mr. K. And next up is Council Member Ford. And we have about an hour and a half, so we're still good on our time, being optimistic. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I'm going to bounce around just a little bit on my recommendations if it's okay with the council. Item number 72, the Charles Young Center accessibility improvements. Approximately $100,000 will be needed to provide for ADA accessibility and other improvements. So moved. Second. Your motion to approve number 72. Yes, ma'am. Vice Mayor. And second by Council Member Farmer. Discussion, Mr. Kay. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I have the same issue that I had before with changes to the Charles Young Center, and I would move to add an amendment that this not be, these expenditures not be approved until or unless they are consistent with the outcome of the Charles Young Center Task Force. So move. Second. Councilmember Kay moves and Councilmember Blue seconds to amend the motion that these funds would be approved but not expended until the report from the task force, Charles Young Center task force, comes in, and these are seen to be consistent with the report. Thank you. Okay. Discussion. Councilmember Stenet. Mine is on the original motion. Okay. I'll wait. Does anyone want to speak to the amendment? Council Member Henson. I guess I would say that any building needs to be accessible with or without. So I'm not going to support the amendment because I do think that this building, regardless of what goes in there, what the outcome of the task force is, will need to be ADA accessible. Are there any other comments about the motion? Council Member Kaye. I think that's true about any use of the building. What's not clear is whether there may be a partner agency or someone else who makes a proposal who would do that kind of improvement to the building themselves. So I'm reluctant to ask the expenditure of those funds until we know what the possibilities are. Thank you. Other comment? if we do amend it and do what we did with the other Charles Young Center items that would encumber the money. So if there's no more discussion of the amendment. Vice Mayor, I do have a question. Would this be a capital expenditure or is this going to be out of cash, a general fund? Do we have bond to cover this cost? I'm proposing general fund expenditure. Other questions? Comments? Are we going to open up to anything then? Because my question was on that, and that wasn't on the amendment. The amendment. No, it was on what Councilman Elaine is going to talk about. Oh, okay. Do you want to take those questions down? I think that we need to talk. I'm sorry. That's okay. We need to discuss the amendment. That's okay. which is not to expend these funds unless they are consistent with the recommendations of the Charles Young Center Task Force. And that's the only thing on the table. And I welcome the amendment as presented earlier. Thank you. Okay. Other discussion of the amendment? Okay. All those in favor of the amendment, please say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? That motion passes, 11-0. So that motion is amended and now the original motion has been amended to say that Council will place $100,000 in the budget for Charles Young Center accessibility improvements to be expended only after the Charles Young Center Task Force has reported out, and this is consistent with their recommendations. Any discussion of the motion? Council Member Stennett. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Council Member Ford, I assume you would like to have this done because the senior citizen programming that will go in there this summer? Is this the need or the urgency of it? Well, I think that, as Council Member Henson mentioned, I think that the building just needs to be accessible in and of itself. but I think it definitely does help the task force council in the community proceed on with the overall redevelopment contingent of whatever programming goes into the building. Again, the senior citizens program is not slated to start until it's not budgeted to start until January. And that's long after task force recommendations and such. So it would work in concert, but it needs to be done. So no one's using the Charles Young Center today. That's correct. It's vacant. I guess my concern would be we're spending cash, $100,000, on a very tight budget. I have no doubt it needs to be done, and it probably needs to be done before we have any programming. My thoughts would be that there are several projects looking down the list that would do very well on a million-dollar capital bond, which would be very minimal debt service to accomplish a lot of this. I'm just not sure paying cash is the right way to go for this type of improvement, as well as several others on the individual council members' list. So I'm not going to support it using cash, general fund dollars at this time. I think you can also use bond proceeds that we have left over that have been earmarked for the Senior Citizens Center at $267,000, in which there's no plan for right now. They're just earmarked. I think you can use some of those bond proceeds, Council Member Ford, and do it, because it would, in fact, help them get in that building quicker. So I don't know if Mr. Maloney, are you listening? You have $267,000 in unused bond proceeds earmarked for the Senior Citizen Center. I think this money can come from there and not have to either pay cash or even issue a bond to do it done personally. So I won't amend the motion again, but I'm just saying if it fails, then I'll come back and make a motion to use that money, part of that. Any other discussion? All right. All those in favor of approving number 72 to wait based on the task force reports and consistency, say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? No. Please log in. There are several saying they can't log in. Oh, we're getting there. We have two council members who haven't voted. Council Member Stenet, if you'll tell them your vote, they'll log it in. And Council Member Lawless, if you'll tell your vote. This is to encumber $100,000 for the Charles Young Center. So if you'll, oh, okay, you were able to. That motion fails three to eight. Councilmember Ford. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Number 73, the Cooler and Rail Trail project has been funded, 75,000 in a state grant, another 75,000 in local match. $30,000 is still needed to do the professional work, and the grant has a deadline of June of 2012. So I would move that we place $30,000 in engineering to do the professional work. So move. Do I hear a second? Second. Council Member Kaye seconded. Council Member Ford's motion to fund 73 at $30,000. Any discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. and go ahead and log in. Council Member Stenet still can't vote, so if you'll tell them your vote, they'll log it in. He's an aye vote. That motion passes 11-0. All right, Council Member Ford. Thank you. Number 74 is for... Excuse me for interrupting, but before we turn the page, did you want to do anything with 71? I wanted to come back to it. Hold on one second, Vice Mayor. I wanted to come back to it because it very well may lead back to what Councilman Stenet mentioned in regards to bond versus general, if that's okay. Go ahead. Okay, thanks. Number 74, for Douglas Park enhancement design. Douglas Park will be celebrating 100 years, just a few years, 1915 I believe, requesting $25,000 for design of the rear ball fields in the back of the park. So moved. Do I hear a second? Second from Council Member K to fund item number 74. Any discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? Please log in your vote. Okay, that vote failed five to six. Councilmember Ford. Item number 77 is to support a new partner agency, the Kentucky Black Expo for youth and teen development programs in the West End at the amount of $50,000. So moved. Is there a second? The motion is to create and fund a new partner agency, the Kentucky Black Expo Youth and Teen Development Program, at $50,000. It's item 77. Council Member, there's no second yet, so that motion dies for a lack of a second. Councilmember Ford. Number 78 is the reinstatement of a position to be laid off in Parks and Recreation for the distribution stores clerk. This incumbent serves an invaluable role in providing for the safety and welfare of the youth participants in our Parks and Recreation program. To date, he is the only person that provides this role for parks. It's a safety issue, and even more so, it's a health issue. So I will move that we reinstate the distribution stores clerk at $52,130. So move. Council Member Hanson seconded Council Member Ford's motion to approve number 78, the stores clerk at Parks. Is there discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Anyone opposed, same. No. Or say no if you're opposed. And please log in. That is approved 6 to 5. And lastly, Vice Mayor, is item number 71. This is in response to constituent and traveler's concerns for sidewalks along the North Limestone Corridor at the northern part of my district. The good news about this project is that it is in the works in regards under the Meadows, Norfolk, and Arlington Community Development Block Grant Project. However, it's not slated to come up on the drawing board for another four or five years or so. In talking to the Division of Community Development as well as engineering, we have an opportunity to basically work towards an advance of our grant funds from HUD. The City of Louisville utilizes the Section 108 loan program quite effectively in accelerating projects in its low- to moderate-income areas. The projected improvements of sidewalk and stormwater improvements of $3 million, the needed design would be for $240,000 to support accelerating this project. So I would move for that expenditure. Is there a second to the motion to approve number 71? Council Member Kaye seconds. Is there a discussion? Council Member Ford, you wanted to discuss the motion? I'll defer, yes, ma'am, but I'll defer to Ms. Lawless. Council Member Lawless? I think I'm wondering, we've already been awarded this HUD grant. We're awarded about, we use about a million dollars a year for infrastructure improvements from HUD through the Community Development Block Grant annually. And we always have, and hopefully we will continue. Can somebody speak to whether or not the community development block grant, I know it was cut. Ms. Maloney. I understand what Councilman Ford is saying, this is another grant money that we're applying for, not the same as CDBG grant money we get every year. Is that what I understand? It is actually the same CDBG grant money that we are awarded each and every year, The Section 108 program provides for a loan. I will say this in the convenience of time for the council, is that we have never done it before. But I do believe that there is interest within community development to kind of get us started on this plan. As if with any project, before you turn bricks and mortar or move ground, you have to have a design. And so that's what this request is, is to fund the design to get us in a position to apply for this section. For more money. That's correct. Now, what I will say, if appropriate at this time, is that this project is definitely capital in nature. So if Council Member Stenet is to, whether it's general fund or whether it's through bond funds, I would encourage the allocation of support of this project. We all saw the emails that came before us and the demand and need over there. Just want to get us moving towards that end. Councilmember Myers. Oh, Councilmember Lawless, were you finished? I just want to, I do support it. I just wanted to clarify if we do, in fact, have the CDBG grant funds available to make that loan. From what I think Councilman Ford is saying, as we use the design process, we then take that and try to ask for more money. We only get so much money a year for CDBG, both sides of our city. But from what I understand, what he's saying, we're doing something different by doing the design, taking a step further using our own money, and that will probably enhance our application and possibly get more money than just depending on the money we get now, because we're only getting about $900,000, if I'm correct, just to do these metal laying, and we're talking it's going to take 16 to 20 years just to finish that project. But what he's saying is we're going to be doing something we've never done before, is be more proactive, put the money, and start designing it and go after the CDBG different than what we had before. Okay, thank you. Council Member Myers. Thank you, Vice Mayor. For council members' information today, and if we get to it, the Social Services Standing Committee has the CDBG funding on its docket today, and this is why, because we need to bring into the council's purview the decision-making process for how that money is spent. So I would think that once we get a handle on that, we would be better ahead waiting to do that first before we take this action that the Council Member forged a question today. So I'm not going to support this motion. I am supportive of your project. And I think that we have a better opportunity to get at this by looking at CDBG and how the decisions are being made around that funding. Thank you. Council Member Henson. Council Member Henson. Council Member Henson. Council Member Stenet. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I was just going to follow up a little bit about what's been said. This area gets about $825,000 last year, and I do think these are capital funds. I do think it would be better served being bonded. So I'm not going to support the motion for cash, but I do think at the end of the day, At the end of the day, I think there will be an opportunity for a small bond that we could consider and accomplish this. So thank you, Vice Mayor. You're welcome. Any other discussion of the motion to approve number 71? All those in favor, please say aye. Anyone opposed, nay? Nay. And log in, please. we have we're missing one vote did everybody log in Council Member Farmer thank you sir that vote fails three to eight thank you Vice Mayor thank you and to page 15 And, Council Member Ford, the partner agencies were already addressed, correct. Okay. Council Member Blues, you're up. Well, let's ask Connie before we do, Council Member Blues, for a quick update on the fund balance. It's always good to know how much money there is in the fund balance. At the moment, $1,200,795. Okay. Thank you very much. $1,200,795. Council Member Bluse. Thank you, Vice Mayor. That was very timely, asking for that update at that particular moment. The request is for $150,000, $75,000 each to establish disc golf courses in Jacobson and Coldstream parks. I'll speak first regarding Coldstream, which is a park in the 2nd District that does have a facility for dog lovers and their dogs. because it is the site of, I think, one of our largest dog parks, but it has no recreational facilities for humans. And the disc golf movement is one that's catching on. That is, there are disc golf courses, I think, now in two of our parks, if I'm not mistaken. And if we can develop more courses which are relatively inexpensive, require far less dollars than for other kinds of play fields. We also have great potential for attracting tournaments from out of town and recovering the expenses of the park. Council Member Myers, who also has this proposal on his list, I think can speak in greater detail to the success of this golf cart parks in Gainesway and in Shiltoe and the potential for expending these funds as an investment with potential for a fairly sizable and relatively quick return. So if I can defer to him for further discussion of this proposal, but I do move to fund this program. The motion is to fund $150,000 for disc golf courses for Jacobson and Coldstream Parks. It's item 79. Is there discussion? Council Member Myers. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Thank you, Dr. Blues, for making this motion. As you remember, last year at the end of the budget, at the same point in the budget discussions last year, I tried to bring this forward, and I was remiss in not talking to Dr. Blues ahead of time. I had talked to Council Member Crosby, and I had some folks in my office met with Dr. Blues, and Council Member Crosby's on board, too. I think she told me today that a couple of you guys have asked her if she was on board with this, and she knew about it, and she told you guys yes. There's an opportunity for both of these parks to increase traffic out there. One of the things that Parks and Recs will tell you, and I can attest to that with River Hill Park in my district, When we put this disc golf course in, we had a walking trail there that was not very well used because it kind of went back in the woods and people were kind of afraid to use it for safety reasons. And once we put the disc golf course in the woods, it's brought a ton of people to the park. My neighborhood presidents and all the residents around there love it. And now there are people, ladies walking by themselves, ladies with kids, walking on that walking trail because those folks are in and throughout the woods. There's another opportunity we have here. Bowling Green has a tournament every year. They bring in 750 participants into their disc golf tournament. And the folks that are here involved in disc golf will tell you that it's the fastest active sport, fastest growing active sport in the world right now. And they have really done all of the footwork on our disc golf courses in our parks, with the exception of pouring the concrete pads and putting the poles in with the concrete there because Parks and Rec doesn't let them do that work because of the seriousness and the danger of that work. But they're a fantastic group of people who take the lead on this. They've gone out and done the clearing. They've designed the courses and put their own money and time into doing those things. And they continue to go out on a regular basis and clear the woods for the courses. So this will end up being one of those things that, you know, Council Member McCord and I always talk about being an enterprise aspect of parks. It's going to be something that will generate revenue. It will pay for itself. It's a very minimum cost. It's a low-maintenance operation in that it's not like a pool where you have to have an employee there to monitor it all the time. It's just an open golf course or disc golf course, and so people can come and play at their leisure. So I certainly hope that you'll support this. There's plenty of time to talk to Council Member Crosby. She's on board, as well as you've heard, Dr. Bluse. And my time's about up. Thank you. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I am supportive of this motion, but not in paying for it with cash. When we come to the conversational time where we add back, in my estimation, a million-dollar capital bond, I can support this along with several other things. But right now, there's not going to be enough gravy in the boat by the time we get to the 5th District or the 6th of those up to the 12th. So I think we need to amend around here a little bit to get something done. Council Member Kaye. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I support additional activity in the parks. I think we need as much of that as possible. I would support this motion, but I would also add that, as I've said, in relation to a number of other issues, I would prefer to have a range of options for activities in the parks, and we can evaluate them against one another. We can get a sense of who might use them and who might not and where they stand in relation to one another. I think it's very hard to make a decision about these things kind of in isolation, but I'll still support this. Thank you. Council Member Myers. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I would like to add to that because Council Member K. brought up a great point that Parks and Rec is behind both of these projects. And that may not satisfy you, I know, I'm not expecting it to, but I want you to know that we didn't just pull this out of the hat, is what I'm saying. And parts and rec were at those meetings that we've had throughout the whole process. So I would like to move that we amend this motion so that the funding, rather than coming from the general fund, come from a later to be discussed bond issue. So moved. There's a motion and a second to approve number 79 through bonding. And so what would the, do we have a good number for debt service? It would be I guess added to other bonding since it's fairly small. We don't have any other bond package, do we? So can you help us out with a number here for the motion? Could it be tagged on to the pension fund bond? Actually, the pension fund bond would be taxable because essentially you're borrowing from operating. When you look at a bond package, we would need to actually have the full list, look at usable life, and then amortize it. If we go bits and pieces, similar to last year we had that challenge, it's not cumulative. You put a five-year deal on a 20-year deal, you don't have a large payment on the first for five years and then drop off. You level, at least we've taken a level debt service approach. So it's not as simple as project number, project number. We would need a complete list to cost out any level debt service payments. So you wouldn't have a number for this? I can give you a number for, I would assume this is a five-year amortization. I'd have to check with finance. But I can give you a number for that. But, again, when you put different length projects in there, if it's a land purchase we'd amortize over 20 years, you know, for level payments, it's not cumulative. Okay. Thank you. Council Member Lawless, did you want to speak to the amendment? So this. So is there any further question or discussion about the amendment? Council Member Ford. Yes, Vice Mayor. The question is, I think I understand to support this project by the issue of a bond. I guess my question is, will this be part of a bond package of similarly related projects, or would this just project itself be bonded at $150? I think, Ryan, or Commissioner, if you could speak to this, we don't have a bond package, correct? We are not bonding. So is that correct? The only bonds that are general fund bonds are the taxable pension bonds. There's no package of project bonds per the percentage of debt service. We're over 12% of debt to revenue right now. So the decision was made not to do any package, at least proposed in the mayor's budget. So in that regard, thank you, Mr. Barrow. So in that regard, how does this, what's the proposed amendment then, if Mr. Myers, if you could restate it? I believe the motion is to, who made this motion? Let's see, Myers, to fund number 79 through, as a capital project through bonding. As it is proposed on the sheet, it's cash out of the general fund. Let's do this with cash. I don't see it working. Any other discussion? Council Member Lawless? I really support this. I don't know anything about disc golf courses, but I've heard of it. I mean, I don't even know what that looks like. And my concern, and I will support this, but my concern is it looks like we're doing a lot of things with parks, as we have done with our planning and zoning and streets and traffic, traffic, that it's piecemeal rather than a plan that is comprehensive and has public input and support. So that's my, I will vote for this, but I think that that is something that is absolutely critical for us to, and was a recommendation from our link that we get on, we really get on that. Thank you. Thank you. Any other, Council Member Stenet, you were on and then went off? Okay. Okay. Is there any other discussion about the amendment to bond this item? All those in favor say aye. All opposed? No. So that motion passes 9 to 2. And so the amended motion is to approve funding the disc golf courses for Jacobson and Coldstream Parks through bonding. Is there discussion? Council Member Myers. Council Member Myers. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I didn't add to it when I talked about the tournament that happened in Bowling Green. The tournament that they're going to have here, they will be able to add $10 to $15 on the entrance fee per entrant, which would come directly to LFUCG to help pay back the cost of the course. So that's going to be an annual tournament. They'll have other tournaments beside that one, but that big annual tournament they're going to do that with for sure. So this will bring money back into our coffers. Thank you. Does anyone else wish to speak? Council Member Blues and Council Member Myers, I'm actually very supportive of putting disc golf courses at both of those parks. I'm very concerned now that it's adding to our bonding, which we already heard is at 12 percent. And I'm also concerned because I am hoping at some point we can fund another police recruit class. I think that is getting to be at a critical point for our city. So although I'm going to vote no, I'm hoping at some point, I mean, this may pass, but I'm in my heart supportive, but given the other conditions, I'm not going to support it. So any other discussion? If not, all those in favor say aye. All those opposed, nay. And that motion passes 8 to 3 to bond two disc golf courses. And thank you, Council Member Blues. Now, Councilmember Beard is not here, and we've already dealt with Meadowbrook Golf Course, and we've dealt with number 80 and number 82. Does anyone know about the issue of the guardrails on Zandale Park? Connie, do you have any information on that, Zandale Drive? Councilmember? Councilmember? Vice Mayor, I don't want to think about it specifically, but it seems like that would be in Rosen maintenance area because replacing a guardrail would be a maintenance item. Yes, he has that from Streets, Roads, and Forestry. Does anyone have any information? Okay. Yes. and number 83, thank you. Okay. Did we already deal with 83? We did, didn't we? So now, Council Member Farmer. Yeah, we could take, we have 50 minutes, and we have, we've really cleared out a lot of the rest of the issues, So let's take a five-minute recess for amenities. Forty-five minutes before our ratification meeting, and legislative aide Willie Fogle is here to answer the question on page 15, Council Member Beard's request for $18,500 for guardrails on Zandale Drive. Mr. Fogle. Yes, Vice Mayor. This request has been asked for several years now from streets and roads. There's a part of Zandale Drive where they have a guardrail protecting the stormwater basin, and the worst part of it is from Heatherway to Belafonte. and in the past they've discussed possibly spraying it to treat it and repaint it and so forth, but since it's stormwater, they said definitely not, you know, EPA and so forth. So for public safety risk and also for, I guess, water quality, they've asked to see if we could replace that part of the guard well on Zendale Drive, and that's why Councilman Beard has put that on his wish list. And do you know why he proposed this out of general fund and not water quality? No, because I guess the main thing is it would be two things. I mean, one aspect is to keep vehicles out of the basin for public safety, and the other is water quality. I guess Streets and Roads is who's brought this to him several times, not, you know, the Division of Water Quality. So that's where he got the estimate from Sam Williams, I guess, about a year ago, that that's what it would cost was $18,000-some dollars. So that's why he requested $18,500. Thank you. Council members, do you have – well, we've – yes, we need to round up some more council members so we can hurry up and finish our budget. Okay, thank you. I believe we have... Council Member Blues moves to approve $18,500 for guardrails on Zandale Drive. Do I hear a second? Lawless seconds. Is there any discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? Eight. We need one more vote up here. Well, no, there's someone at the course you didn't vote. Okay. Council Member Farmer. Okay. That passes 8 to 1. Thank you. And so now we move on to Mr. Farmer, Council District 5, and we've got 42 minutes. Vice Mayor, I'll be fairly brief here. The list is submitted. It isn't current with the needs of the district. After we had submitted these lists, the project to resurface the tennis courts in Acton Park doubled from $4,000 to $8,000. We had set aside $4,000, but this time I would make a motion to take $4,000 from our fund balance to finish resurfacing the tennis courts in Acton Park. So moved. Is that item, I'm sorry, where is that on our list? It's not there. It's not there. That's my conversation with you. It was supposed to be there. That's correct. I see. Or it would have been there at the time had I had the information that it was going to be $4,000 more Okay. So you didn't have the information and thought that the resurfacing was completely covered? Correct. Yes, ma'am. Okay. Did I hear a second? Meyers seconded discussion. Councilmember Lawless? 4,000. It seems to me that that would be an appropriate thing for NDF funds. Is there any other comment about the motion to... Now this, Connie, this is not on the list, doesn't have a number. Other discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. And log in. And that passes 8 to 1. Mr. Farmer? Well, before I move forward with any of these, I guess, what is the true possibility of us doing a million-dollar bond for capital? Talking about it and doing this is two different things. Connie, do you have a current fund balance? $4,000 left. And number 85 is completed and number 87 is completed. Charles Young Center, we did that earlier, I believe, and the disc golf and cold stream we did earlier. So, Councilman, I was just wanting to have an updated fund balance because Councilmember Farmer has asked about the possibility of a million-dollar bond. We need to know about, I think there's other people behind me on this list, and if truly it is a possibility, I think we want to play into it. If not, then I think we need to kind of wind down here. After my big $4,000, yeah. I have $1,178,295. $1,100. $1 million. $1 million, excuse me. $1,178,295 is the current running fund balance. So what were the financing numbers on the possibility of doing that? Or is there even room on our credit card to do that? I guess this would be my gays. Commissioner? My gauge of questions at this time. The questions are, is there room on our credit card to do this, number one? And number two was? Let's just see. I mean, how much it would cost. I mean, if we can bond $1 million for capital projects, how much will that cost us? Let's take that out of our bottom line number here, and then we can play into what the council may want to do with the rest of that since we've made two declarations already to use some of that money if it were to become available. I'm just saying for purposes of those council members behind me on the list, I think it will be fair to let them know what's going to happen and what's not going to happen. I'm not really going to make a whole lot of presentation on the rest of the things on my list until we kind of know there. I do think that there's good things there, but until we can kind of figure out what our opportunity is or isn't, I'm reticent to act just yet. Okay. Commissioner? I guess I have two answers. If you go by our debt policy, then no, there's not room. We're over the percent that we have deemed to be fiscally prudent. But if you bond a million over five years, it's approximately $225,000. $225,000. Thank you. So the debt service would be $225,000 on a million-dollar bond over five years. Okay. Which that would bring our fund balance to right around a million dollars, it strikes me, Vice Mayor, if we had that as a separate motion at this time. Yep. Which I would, so for purposes of discussion, I would make a motion that we do a $1 million bond for capital projects that would encumber $225,000 to the current fund balance for its first year payment out of five years total. This is what she said. And what would be, and did you say what you want in that bond? No, ma'am. I did not. I was just, I mean. Okay. All right. There's a couple things we've already approved. I think we might go back and look to that. I'm just trying to pave the way for others. So the motion on the floor is to approve a $1 million capital bond to be over five years with debt service in the current budget at $225,000. Did I hear a second? Is there a second? Council Member Myers seconded discussion. Is there any discussion? Councilmember K. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I'm uncomfortable with additional bonding at this time, given what we've been told by the Commissioner. It just seems to me that just postpones our fiscal problems. I think if we can't find the money to do what we need to do this year, then there are projects that just simply should not be done. Thank you. Councilmember Stennett. Thank you. Thank you, Vice Mayor. At this point, I'm 50-50 on this issue because I have a feeling next year, and maybe you all don't have this with you, but don't we have some bonds dropping off next year on debt service, another drop? Do you all know what next year looks like, what the projection is? If we don't bond anything this year, what comes off next year? If I recall, and I don't have it with me, Ryan can back me up on this. When we consider the debt service for the pension bond and what was rolling off, it was close to even. Yeah, for this fiscal year, but in FY13, we have another big bond dropping off. I guess you're trying to get down to 10% within a few years of the revenue ratio, and if the revenue jumps $25 million, we'll be there. I can't remember exactly some of the other ones. I know this year was a large drop-off. I'm not recalling that next year is. However, keep them on the pension bond, the $31 million that was just approved, that will be the full hit next year. So for sure that will be a big hit in fiscal year 13. Yeah, another $1.4 million next year. Okay, thank you. Thank you, Vice Mayor. You're welcome. Council Member Lane. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I'm sorry I was delayed in returning to the meeting. Could you tell me the use of the proceeds from the bond we're going to? It's not determined yet. Well, we've passed one capital project, correct? Let's see. It was the... Let's see, Connie, do you... We did not, we have not done. So 150,000 for disc golf. For the disc golf. What about the repairs to the building for accessibility? Is that going to be bonded or is that? We have that in another bond already. Are you talking about the Charles Young Center? Anyone else have comments or questions on the motion? I will take this opportunity to say I appreciate Mr. Farmer's attempt to find some money to do these projects. I'm going to vote no because I'm uncomfortable with doing more bonding, and I also am waiting for the possibility that we might do a smaller police recruit class. Council Member Ford. I think I appreciate Mr. Farmer's motion. I think it's important to know that coming into the budget cycle, we recognize an opportunity with bond proceeds that we might be able to address some of the community and capital projects throughout our district. We did show some leadership in addressing the E911 issue. but I still think it's important that if we have an opportunity that we can still, perhaps through a very, very, very small bond, address some of the capital issues that our neighborhoods and communities would greatly appreciate. So I'll support the motion. Thanks. Is there any other discussion? Okay, if not, all those in favor of $225,000 to go into the budget to debt service a $1 million bond over five years, please say aye. All those opposed, nay? Nay. And please log in. We need a couple more votes, Council Members. We have one. Okay. That motion passes seven to four. So Connie. Okay. Can you update our fund balance? We're now, I think, below a million. Can you – do you mind to say that in the microphone? Currently at 953-295. 953-295. Okay, thank you. Mr. Farmer, we're still on your – Thank you, Vice Mayor. I'd like to take up item number 84, the demolition of Constitution and Berry Hill pools after the season's end. We have a second from Council. Was that from Council Member Myers? It was. To approve number 84 for demolition of Constitution and Berry Hill pools after the end of the season. My thought was, in preparation of the budget, if we wanted to put ourselves in a position next year to not have to approach whether or not to keep these two pools open ever again, the idea is to go ahead and put money in there for their demolition so that the district council members can move on with a new situation. So I would propose that we do this $150,000 out of the bond proceeds that we just passed. That was going to be part of my motion had I gotten to the end of that conversational point. Any discussion on the motion? All those? Okay. Council Member Henson. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I'm not going to support this motion. I think that we need a better plan for both these pools. and I would like to see some studies done as we have things within Parks and Rec that decrease in attendance, lack of interest. I know, Council Member Myers, you brought up an aquatic plan, but I think we need plans for programming and everything. I have seen it through parks where maybe the neighborhood changes and there's different interests in the area, and we still even the attendance and the participation in programs continues to drop off, and yet we still are trying to provide those programs. programs. So like, for instance, at Constitution and Berry, could these pools be replaced with skateboard parks or something like that, something that would benefit that neighborhood more appropriately? So I will not support this motion. Council Member Stennett. Thank you, Vice Mayor, and I appreciate Council Member Farmer thinking of it as a constitutional pool. I have this in my recommendations as well, but I'm going to defer it, Councilman Farmer. I'm going to vote against it because I do think there's an opportunity to sit down with the neighborhoods in August, September after the pool season and determine what the real cost is. I think those numbers are very soft. I don't think those are actual numbers that it's going to cost. I think it costs a lot more to take them out, actually, than $75 each. So I'm going to vote against it for now. I hate to not support Barry But I just think those numbers are soft right now. I think who knows what will happen after we get a better plan. Council Member Lawless. I'm not going to support this either for the same reasons Council Member Henson and said I think that to put that money, encumber that money right now when they're always closed in the winter anyway, that we have several months to get a plan for those two parks and have neighborhood input as to what they want. and it could be that demolition of those pools would in some way hinder what they come up with. Council Member Myers. Thank you, Vice Mayor. If the gentleman from the 6th District would concede his 75 over to Berry Hill, I'll take the full 150 and keep rolling here. Council Member Crosby and I have already had conversations about, and I appreciate Council Member Henson talking about the skate parks and the different opportunities to reclaim these pools. We've already had conversations, and they're starting to work with our neighborhoods. And so I'm in favor of the motion. It was made clear to me by this council a month or two ago that they didn't want to be in the same position this time next year that we were this year, and that was trying to decide what we're going to do with these two pools. So I was under the understanding that in keeping them open this year, we all pretty much agreed that they would be closed next year. And if that, in fact, is the case, I would like to have the $75,000 that's being offered up, even if it's a soft number, because we are starting to formulate a plan in my district and working with our park is on the boundary of the 7th and 8th district. So I always bring Council Member Crosby into this conversation. But we've already started to have the conversations, and we're already having conversations with our neighborhoods about what we want to do with this. So I'm in favor of the motion. I don't know if you want to bifurcate it and just do the 75 or what you want to do, but I would like to have the 75 for my pool so that we can continue working towards what we want to do this time next year when the pool doesn't open back up. Thank you. Council Member Stennett. Thank you, Vice Mayor. And I would just say a couple things. One, two months ago we didn't know our public safety situation, how dire it really is. And I guess my methodology at this point is I'm more concerned about the public safety crisis than I am demolishing a swimming pool at this point. That's the only reason I have a different viewpoint at this point. Given the chief's presentation last week, I think every dollar we can save to get more officers on the street is worth it. I'm not saying Berry Hill's not. I'm just saying for Constitution, I think I'd be willing to hold off. And I'm not saying I want to keep it open next year by this. But I'm saying at this point today, I think I'd rather save the money. Thank you. Well, I am one of the council members who voted to close Berry Hill and Constitution Park, but I am definitely not in favor of doing this bond, and so I'm going to vote no. Is there other discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. Aye. It's bond. It's supposed to be in the bond. So all those in favor say aye. Hello? Is there anyone in favor say aye. Aye. And those opposed, nay. Nay. So that motion fails three to eight. and Councilmember Farmer. Vice Mayor, tell me, we're supposed to ratify the budget at 3 o'clock. Yes, sir. What if we're not ready at 3 o'clock? Well, my sense is maybe we can delay a little bit. We've accomplished a lot on the last page. We're almost finished. All right. Yeah. We could call it to order and then continue with our process. We're going to continue with our presentations, but I think we're almost finished. Councilmember Farmer, you have a few more items. Well, I don't want to take the council's time on all of them, to be quite honest. I think the one that strikes me as the most important, again, I was trying to put things in there as what I would think of as partnering opportunities. And the one that, what page are we on? Page 16. Okay. The one that I think is the next best partnering opportunity, at least as far as the things I have proposed, is number 86. There is room for some lacrosse-slash-multipurpose fields in Shillitoe Park, kind of between the fire station and the Lexington Christian Academy area. There's some interested partners in the lacrosse community for fields of that nature. and if you talk to the Director Hancock, any bit of flat ground that can be positively used is what he has most interest in. So I would tender a motion at this time to use $75,000 of the bond proceeds that we had just approved for the preparation of lacrosse slash multipurpose fields in the Shillitoe Park area. So moved. Council Member Farmer moved, and Council Member Meyer seconded to bond $75,000. to build La Crosse multipurpose fields in Shelatoe Park. Discussion? Council Member Stinnett? Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Farm, for bringing this back up. We had this a couple years ago, and we were having those discussions. We were talking about much larger numbers. What does this 75 actually get us towards? This gets us the stripped-down version. This doesn't do any plumbing. This flattens land and gets us started, gets us in a position to work with partners out there to get further along. Because with nothing to work with, it's tough to ask a partner to come in and be an equity partner when we are only offering just merely the opportunity of the ground. And does this seed and get it ready for play in how many fields? This would get at least the first two of the four. Okay, very good. Thank you. Council Member Henson. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I just have one quick question. and Council Member Farmer, is there a plan already in place then with Parks and Rec? There's a drawing that Jerry Hancock has, and the field is the one that would be closest to Reynolds Road would be the one that would be done last because it is the one that is at least flat, if you will. This plane flattens out as it goes back into Chillitoe Park, and that's where we kind of do the easiest ones first just to get a foothold on the opportunity. And I know I've heard expressed needs for La Crosse. Yes, ma'am. Yes, ma'am. Thank you. Yes, ma'am. Council, is there any other discussion? Council Member Lawless? I appreciate the intent, but again, we're in very dire economic straits. And again, it's several of these things are piecemeal. They aren't an overarching plan that we can move toward. And I don't think that's a good way to approach things, especially in these economic times. certainly looking at ways to raise money for parks and having something more than a drawing from Jerry Hancock, I think is important to approve this when we're in the financial situation we're in. For that reason, and for all you lacrosse lovers out there, it's nothing about that. It's just we're in bad shape. Thank you. Is there other discussion of the motion on the floor, which is to bond the $75,000 for number 86? Okay. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? Nay. Nay. I heard that. Okay. Do we have... Council Member Lane? Okay. That motion passes 9 to 2, and so that will go on the bonding list. Now, Council Member Farmer. I will make one more attempt here. You said we had decided, have we really taken care of number 85 or not? We did not. We did in terms of general fund. I think we were of the understanding we would consider a general fund towards that as opposed to the opportunity we have with capital. So we funded it out of general? It did not fund it out of general, but I would hope we were considering capital. This failed three to eight to fund Charles Young Center accessibility. Okay. Then let me, pursuant to a follow-up conversation, The number I got was $102,000 for Charles Young Center, Handicap, Accessible Interest, Entrance, and Parking. I thought that was, is that the correct number, 102? The number that I received from Jomsheed General Service was 102. My recommendation rounded it to 100. But Jomsheed could speak more to it if needed. then, Vice Mayor, what I would do is make a motion to use $100,000 out of the bond that we're working on. And I would add the caveat that these funds would remain encumbered until such time as the Charles Young plan has come to fruition, but that that $100,000 would be used for handicap accessible entrance and parking. So moved. Now, did the 100, the motion is to bond $100,000, I heard you say, for handicap accessible entrance and parking. And the parking for that, yes, ma'am. Okay, that's related to the access. Yes, ma'am, yes, ma'am. And that $100,000 included that parking access. Okay. Council Member Stennett. Thank you, Vice Mayor. This goes back to my earlier comments about the unused bond proceeds we have sitting out there that have been earmarked, Mr. Maloney, for the Senior Citizen Center of $263,000. Could part of that money not be used for this since they're going to be an immediate occupant in January of this same property? Since you all don't have a definitive plan, couldn't you use $100,000 of that $263,000? We'd still leave them $163,000 to do some remodeling out there. Well, as the Vice Mayor requested when we talked about this a few weeks ago, that we were going to put a commission together. There's a lot of work that needs to be done on the existing Senior Citizen Center, and I think that was part of the money was for that. But we're also looking at other options, and that's what this committee was going to look at, and look at possibly either rehabbing that building with the fund we have or looking at another option. And I mean, what I would advise is once we meet with this committee we put together, I think we're going to look at all those options. And not only that, the satellite offices, and so I think that I would like to see us at least get that chance. I mean, Vice Mayor might want to follow up on that, but I assume that's what you were kind of wanting us to look at, except what we were going to do with the Exist Senior Citizen Center. Is that what the committee you were going to put together, Vice Mayor, that you wanted to look at all that, the bond for that existing building we have now? It needs a lot of work, as we know. But we also have the potential. That is a great location for real estate if we were to sell that and move the senior citizens into a larger. So there's a lot of opportunity there. So I think the committee or commission would like to look at. No, I don't disagree with the work it's going to do and everything. I guess we have unused bond proceeds, and there's no definitive use for them, and part of the senior citizens' mission and program will be utilizing the Charles Young Center at this point, correct? I would just think $100,000 would go a long way towards making it more accessible for seniors to be able to use that building personally. Thank you for those comments. And the other possibility is to have a subcommittee of social services look at that, which might be a way to move that along, but instead of a commission. Well, I think that the motion stands on its own. Council Member Ellinger. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I was actually going to recommend the same thing that Council Member Stenet said. So you made the motion, did you not? Okay. Well, then I will amend the motion then to take the bond proceeds from the senior citizens. What was the bond that we have the excess with the unused and use this towards this? Is it $102,000 or $100,000? 100 to 100,000. So moved. Second. So the amendment is? The amendment is to take 100,000 for the Charles Young Center for the accessibility and parking out of the bond proceeds that were from originally from the senior citizens. And who would like to speak to the amendment? Council Member Lawless? Are you to the amendment? I just want to put out there that these bonds are written so that there is some flexibility. There's a million-dollar bond that we issued for design and location of a new government center, and it's been sitting there for two years, and we were told it was written so that it could only be used for that. So if Commissioner Driscoll could look into that, that would be great. But I caution that. Thank you. Council Member Kaye. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I'm going to ask people to vote against this amendment for the reason that it makes what I consider an unwarranted assumption, and that is that the Charles Young Center is going to be used as a senior citizen center. That remains to be determined. That may or may not happen. If it does not happen, then those bond funds would not be able to be used at the Charles Young Center. So I would urge voting against this amendment. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Ford. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I think the cleanest way in the preferred way, and I thank Council Member Ellinger for his amendment, because I know he stands committed to this worthy project. But I have to echo kind of what Council Member Kay has alluded. We just passed a bond of a million dollars, and only 150 thus far has been dedicated to the disc parks. The debt service is $225,000, but the bond itself is a million. That still leaves us $850,000, of which I think $100,000 towards this worthy project would be or warranted. So while I'm appreciative of the amendment, I support the original motion out of the bond. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Thank you. Any other comment about the motion to the amendment to fund the Senior Citizens Center, through the Senior Citizens Center bonds, the handicap accessible Charles Young Center for $100,000? Council Member Stinnett. Thank you, Vice Mayor. We currently have $100,000 for the disc golf and then $75,000 that was just passed for the lacrosse field. So we've already spent $250,000 for disc golf. And $75,000 for lacrosse field. So it's $225,000 we've already spent of the million dollars. If we pass this, it's another $100,000. So we're at $325,000. But the point I'm trying to make is we have unused bond proceeds. I don't care what you earmark it for. That's our choice in this budget, to be able to earmark it any which way we want it. Right now the administration has asked the earmark it towards the Senior Assistance Center for maybe improvements in the future or towards a new building. So we're not talking about taking money away that they've already had. this is unused bond proceeds from the downtown design for a new center from several things that have not been used. So we can allocate those any which way we want. Council Member Myers. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Could we get, I'm not sure which commissioner to call up. We only have one. Can someone, okay, I'll put my question out there and then see if someone can answer it. The question that Councilmember Stinnett was talking to and also Councilmember Kaye is that unused bond proceed that is earmarked in terms of the administration's review towards the Senior Citizen Center, is that only earmarked towards seniors or could that be used for another capital project that doesn't involve senior citizens? We should check the bond documents for that. It was not one of the ones that we reviewed because we wanted to maintain those dollars because of the issues surrounding the Senior Citizen Center, but typically they would have language about public purpose expenditures. Is it usually that specific, though, public purpose, and then all the way down to seniors? Okay. It's specific to projects. How soon could you find that out for us? We need to review it with bond counsel so we can. Okay. It's not something you just look at a document and, okay. I can go look. I can go take that document, but I can go get the document and look at it to see if it's clear. Is it that simple? I don't know. So I'm asking, I'm not telling you. Possibly. Okay. Okay. Thank you. Council Member Kaye. Thank you, Vice Mayor. So just to be clear, I think we share an interest in making bond funds available if they make sense for Charles Young Center, if they're needed. If those funds can be shifted from another bond fund, that's fine. If they cannot, my interest is in making sure that those bond funds are available. Right now we have not come close to the million dollar limit, so I would still urge leaving the bond capacity for Charles Young in the general bond fund. Thank you. Is there other? Council Member Lane. Can we bring up other items now or are we still on stand-up? There's a motion on the table. Okay. Well, I think we need to vote. We're getting there. Be patient. There's a motion on the table, on the floor, excuse me, to bond the Charles Young Center Handicap Accessible for $100,000, and it is an amendment to say it would come through the Senior Citizen Center bonds. Any more discussion? All those in favor of the amendment? Thank you. Okay. So all those in favor of amending the motion and taking the funding through the Senior Citizen Center bonds, and that includes the encumbering. Well, I guess the amendment does not include. That's in the original motion. Okay. So all those in favor, please say aye. All those opposed, nay. And we have one more person who needs to vote. Council Member Ford, did you vote? You're deciding? Okay. Okay. That is a six to six tie, so that vote motion fails. The amendment fails. and so the motion on the table on the floor, I'll get it here in a minute, the motion on the floor is to fund $100,000 for Charles Young Center Handicap Accessible Entrance to be encumbered until the task force reports out and there is consistency with their recommendations and to bond it. And through the million dollars that was approved earlier. Is there discussion on the motion? All those in favor, please say aye. All those opposed, nay. Nay. We need two more council members. Okay, that motion passes eight to four. and that $100,000 goes on the list for bonding. Council Member Farmer, did you? I have one other item that is not on the list, but I would be glad to yield the other Council members before I came back. Okay. And I wanted to just say I would recommend on number 90 you work with Parks and the Friends of the Dog Park who are the fundraising arm which has funded the dog parks and work that through that. Yes. Council Member Stimmit. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I guess we're looking at my list, and obviously number 91, I'd wish to defer at this time. Number 92, reducing the mailing cost of the Parks Fund Guide by $20,000. The postage for it is around $25,000, $26,000, I think. This is not taking away all their postage if they do want to mail some, But I think mailing the fund guide to every single household at Fenton County in this day and age is not appropriate, expensive money at this point. We can place them in libraries. We can place them in government centers. We can place them a lot of places. And if people call in and actually need a physical one, they can still have postage to mail people that request it as well. It's online as well. So I would make a motion to reduce that budget by $20,000, still leaving a few thousand for postage if they still need to mail. Second. Okay. Okay, so that takes $20,000 out of the proposed budget for funding for the Parks Guide, so that becomes... It's not printing costs. This is just postage. Yes, postage. Discussion? Mr. Lane? Yes, Council Member Lawless seconded. Did you want to discuss the motion? Any other, anyone to discuss? Council Member Lawless. They can also be sent home with every kid in every public and private school. If there's no other discussion, all those in favor, please say aye. Anyone opposed, nay. Log in, please. That passes 12-0. Okay. And then number 95 we've already taken care of. Number 93, 94, and 95 we've already taken care of. Yes. Number 96 was the PVA issue Doug brought up earlier that we brought up during the link, is to restore him to his even amount because he had already personally reduced his own budget before the additional 10% was laid up on top of him. So I would make a motion to restore to $26,640, which is what he had last year. Okay. Council Member Myers, excuse me, Stenet motioned, and Council Member Kaye seconded to approve $26,640 for the PVA. Is there discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Anyone opposed? And if you'll log in, please. We need two more votes. That passes, 12-0. Number 97, I'll defer as well until we have a better number on that intersection. We actually had another wreck yesterday, but we're going to meet on the 22nd with traffic engineering to figure out a solution. I'll hold off on that. I had two other items, Vice Mayor. One, we had a destruction of a neighborhood entrance sign in a very old neighborhood off Brown Station Road here recently by a, let's just say, an unfortunate incident with a vehicle that was driven by an impaired person. So I'd like to assist the neighborhood, and while we're trying to get restitution through the proper channels via insurance, to go ahead and rebuild the wall rather than waiting six months for a destroyed wall to an entrance. We all can know how crucial that can be to a neighborhood and what it looks like. So I'd ask to put $6,000 in this year's budget so we can go ahead and rebuild the wall now rather than waiting until later. So moved. Okay. Okay. There's a motion to approve $6,000 to, and the second was Councilmember Farmer, to rebuild the wall that was destroyed in the accident. Questions, comments on the motion? Mr. Myers? Thank you, Vice Mayor. So once the insurance pays, will that be refunded back to the government? Yes, if we can get them to pay. Excellent. For the court system. Thank you. Okay. Is there other discussion or questions? So that eventually will become a wash. Yes. Okay. I hope. We hope. And then the second item. Oh, we didn't vote. I'm sorry. Is there any other discussion? All those in favor say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? That passes 12-0. And the last item, Vice Mayor brought this up again last week. This is in the water quality budget on page 433 of our budget book. But this has to do with the small capital project money that was set at zero in our stormwater budget, the water quality fee budget. The ironic thing is we have $50,000 in here for design of these projects, but how can you design if you don't have capital money in there to actually do the projects? We've always had $150,000 each year in there. So I would make a motion to change the fund balance and the water quality fee so that we place $150,000, the same as last year, in the water quality budget. Again, this has no general fund effect, but in the water quality budget to continue the construction of the small capital projects. And that line item would be account number 92211. Second. Okay. The motion is to fund $150,000 in water quality projects in the water quality fund, not the general fund. Discussion. Council Member Crosby. Council Member Stinn, and I just have a curious question. Why didn't they request that as part of their budget? Well, as Mr. Burrell said last week, it's a policy decision. They made the decision not to, and it's our decision whether or not we want to. They left a fund balance in there of $1,113,000, so we'd be reducing that down by $150,000. Water quality folks do want it because we do have projects ready to be spent on. That was my follow-up. The actual division would like to have it. I think the administration as a whole made the decision not to put it in there to continue to increase the fund balance. Okay, thank you. Any other discussion? All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? And okay, that motion passes 10 to 1. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Thank you. Now, are you finished, Council Member Stennett? Okay. Yes. We have a 3 o'clock special council meeting for ratifying the budget, and it's now a couple minutes after 3 o'clock. And I would say we have maybe a 3 o'clock Social Services Committee meeting, and we have a few minutes left on the budget. So what would be your pleasure if we could – I'm hearing finish this. So I think out of respect to the mayor, I think we would ask Mr. Maloney, if you could ask the mayor if he could delay the special meeting a few minutes for us to finish the budget. And then Council Member Myers wanted to. Thank you, Vice Mayor. We took a vote, sort of a straw poll on Thursday of last week, asking if we could postpone the social services meeting if we needed the time to get this budget done. And I think all the council members, all the committee members voted in the affirmative. So if we could go ahead and if everybody's still in agreement, then canceling the social services meeting so we can get done here today, that would be great. Is that a motion? That's a motion. So moved. We're in a committee of the whole, so I'm not sure about, I mean, we can do this motion. It just, we're not in an official. May I make a suggestion? Yes. I realize that there's procedural difficulties. It may be useful simply to say that the committee will convene after the other meetings, and then we can just adjourn. If we don't have time. Okay. Excellent. That'll work. Excellent point, Mr. K. Thank you. Okay. Council members, so as we move on to page 17, Council Member Myers, I think everything on your list except for number 107, number 109 have been attended to. So do you want to speak to 107 and 109? Yes, Vice Mayor. Thank you very much. I would like to start with. Okay. And as you're thinking about this, Chief CIO Maloney says that the mayor is okay with delaying a few minutes. Thank you very much. Okay. 107 and 109. Okay. 107 was just an idea. We talk about golf courses and which ones are making money, which ones are not making money. And it's always been my understanding that Kearney Hills is the albatross around our neck. And so I put it here to – some people say it's making money. Other people say it's losing money. So when we get those real numbers, I think we're going to – yes. Okay. So I think it's losing money myself. I think that's when we get the real numbers, we're going to find out that it is. And at that point in time, I would like to take up the issue of thinking about selling that golf course. Because that's the – when you look at our sweet spot in terms of golf, we do seniors well and we do youth well. And that's what everybody says day in and day out, year in, year out, month in, month out. And so when we get those real numbers, I would move that we would, and maybe I just move right now that we put this into our committee, General Services Committee. General Services. The idea of getting those real numbers on what golf courses are bringing in and then looking at selling Kearney golf course. So move. Do I hear a second? Council Member Ellinger seconds. And I know just I just had a conversation, what, two days ago or a day ago, I don't even remember when, with John Sheed. They're already looking at the whole golf picture and are going to be able to bring that to us. So that whole issue is being studied. So this motion would put that issue into General Services Committee. Yes. Any discussion? All those in favor? Please say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed to putting it in committee? Could I have a couple more votes electronically, please? Thank you. That motion passes 10 to 2 to refer item 107 with a full look at Gulf to General Services Committee. Now, Mr. Myers. Thank you, Vice Mayor. And one thing that's not on here, actually, rather than do the $75,000 for the partner agency proposal, one of the things that we did was move that from today's meeting docket because we wanted to focus on restoring the funding that was cut. We're still working on that in committee, so I may not be able to find the money next year if I don't try this now, but I think I'm actually going to defer that. and that was number 110, and that was to put the $75,000 in the budget in case we end up doing the RFP for social services. So the last thing I want to do is circle back on the $75,000 for reclaiming Berryhill Pool. I know that we voted down to do the $150,000 for both pools earlier today, But as I said earlier, you know, we have a plan that we're starting to work for the Berry Hill Pool closure. And so I would ask that the council would provide $75,000 in that bond that we're talking about to go towards the reclaiming of that pool. But also would like to add in $125,000 to go towards what we're going to do with that pool afterwards. And Jerry talked about doing either the splash ponds that were going to be $125,000 for a small one, $250,000 for a big one, or the skate park. As I said, we've already got a plan in place that we're starting to work. And so I've moved that we get the $75,000 to reclaim the pool and then $125,000 towards reuse of the pool. So moved. Do I hear a second? Okay, that item dies for a lack of a second. Okay. Okay. Can I do one more thing? You're on. I want to walk us back just a little bit. I note that we just do the $75,000 for reclaiming the pool. So moved. Okay. Will you restate your motion, Mr. Myers? That we use that bonding proceeds that we talked about earlier to do $75,000 to reclaim very helpful. So moved. And who was the seconder, Council Member Farmer? Okay, is there discussion? Okay. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Anyone nay? And this would go on the bonding list. So I'm in A. Okay. We need a couple more. Has everyone voted electronically? Thank you. That passes 9 to 3. That ends our report. Thank you, my senator. Thank you very much. And we now move on to District 10, which is done. District 11, Council Member Henson, we have already done your 124 resurfacing, I believe. So you have one item. I didn't put a dollar amount in here, and I've talked this over with a few folks, and I'm not sure that it's necessary to do a study of the For Sale's Road corridor. I know it's obvious that sidewalks are a real safety concern for pedestrians. They're not wide enough. The curbs are nonexistent. And I'd like to make a motion. I was thinking that I would just like to go ahead and get the process in motion, replacing the sidewalks and curbing, even if I have to do it a block at a time until as funds become available. but I'd like to make a motion to place $150,000 from the bond money into for sales road sidewalks. So moved. Do I hear a second? Council Member Ford seconded the motion to bond $150,000 for sidewalk and curb replacement on Versailles Road. Discussion? Council Member Henson, I would ask, do you know if this has been considered by the MPO? It has not. And, I mean, the Tates Creek sidewalk issue went through the MPO where they can get funding. I'm on the MPO. We have not had a meeting. And I was, it just seems to be a very, very slow process. and I'd like to see something. You know, in the meantime, we've got folks that are pushing people in wheelchairs up a sidewalk that's maybe two feet wide, sits right on the roadway, and, I mean, it's just a very serious situation. Okay. And if... And for Sales Road has been neglected, in my opinion, for quite some time. Okay. Is there any other discussion? Council Member Crosby. Council Member Henson, you just threw out a number. Was that a number that they have given to you that the actual costs are going to be, or are we just guessing a number, hoping that that can get the process started? Correct. Okay, thank you. Thank you. Any other questions or discussion? All right, Council Members, all those in favor of bonding $150,000 for sidewalks and curbs on Versailles Road, please say aye. If you're opposed, say no. No. Okay. Well, that motion fails four to eight. and Council Member Henson, I would just simply say I think those of us who are on the MPO would be willing to go with you to the MPO and ask for it to be put on the list there for the time being. When do they meet? There's one next week. Because I don't get notices of the meetings. Okay. Perhaps you could. And I know that it was voted on by council that I was placed on that. Could, could, I'll, we'll have Jeanette and Jennifer. You know, I just want to make it very clear to all of you all. I understand, but my district is neglected time and time and time again, and I'm very, very tired of it. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Crosby. Council Member Henson, I don't believe we've had a meeting since we approved you for this board. I'm not sure, but I remember we voted on you, and the meetings are not as often as we meet as a body here, so that may be why you haven't gotten noticed, but certainly if it's next week, you should have gotten noticed. And there was a training also. I know that many of the board members went through with the NPO, so you may want to meet with them so that you understand the process prior to that meeting because it's a few counties that are represented, and we do vote on priorities, So you may want to, prior to that meeting, the ones here I'm sure would be supportive, but also making sure that you understand because it's not just council members. There's judge executives from other counties, the mayor of another county. So I would just make sure that maybe you try and get that training. Thanks. Okay. Thank you. Now, Connie, could you give us, I believe the million-dollar bond package has $450,000 of projects in it. Okay. And then a fund balance. I have 600. Hopefully I didn't miss something. You have 600? Yes. Let's see. We had $150,000 for disc golf, $75,000 lacrosse fields, $100,000 Charles Young Center ADA, $75,000 Barry Hill Pool reclamation. Did you have something? No, that was what I had. I'm sorry. So that's $400,000? I think she has some more money on there for Barry Hill Pool. The list? 20. Okay, $150,000 for disc golf, $75,000 lacrosse fields, $100,000 Charles Young Center, and $75,000 Barry Hill Pool Reclamation. And I believe that's $400,000. And I have six left out of a million. I see. I'm sorry. I thought you said you had $600,000. Okay. So my first question is, does the council want to keep that $1 million bond, or would you like to put $600,000 of it back into the general fund for something like a cut-down recruit class? Right now what we have is a million dollars in a bond package with $400,000 of it identified to be funded. So, and our fund balance is $940,000.655. Is that, Connie, is that without the $600,000 left over in the bond? Or is it with? No, what? The $9,455 would just be general funds fund balance. Not the capital bond. Does not include the capital bond. So $600,000 could be added to that fund balance? Is that what you're saying? There's additional $600,000 to be spent out of the bond funds at this point. Yes, and is that $600,000 in the fund balance? No. Oh, okay. So what does Council want to do? Council Member Stenet. You want to go by your list? Yes, Council Member Lane. Thank you. The item I want to discuss, which may not fall right into this, there is a recommendation by the General Services Links Committee to establish a fee schedule for the Board of Architectural Review to generate, I think we recommend $40,000 per year in filing fees for the review and approval of renovation and modifications requested on behalf of properties that are within a historic designated area. And we have not addressed that yet. Yes, you're right. We have a list of other recommendations that don't have, they start on page 22, that don't have numbers attached to them. And my thinking was we can either, either I can just move them all into the appropriate committees or we can take them up in Budget and Finance Committee. But I think we don't, unless you all want to, I don't think we necessarily need to address them today since most of them don't have a number attached. Okay. Many of them have to be fleshed out with the numbers and the policies, was my thinking. Okay, while we're discussing this, We also had discussed if we were going to keep the swimming pools open, that we were going to adjust the fee for swimming pools to compensate for the additional cost. Whether we do that or not, it's up to the council. I just wanted to raise the awareness that that issue was still out there, too. Thank you. Okay. Council Member Ford. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I just want to ask for confirmation again, and I'm sorry if I missed it. I understand that there's $600,000 left in the bond that we allocated. And what is the general fund fund balance? I'm sorry if I missed it. $40,655. $940,000? Yes, sir. Okay. I know there are still some things that we want to do on the general fund side. In regards to the bond, I think that since we've passed the bond, and it took a great deal of political will for us to do that collectively, we still have some capital needs. And I want to go back to what Council Member Henson mentioned. I travel parts of Versailles Road every day, and I understand perhaps a little better than others, not Ms. Henson, that area and that district. because I expect the same thing on North Limestone. And so this is sidewalk improvements and stormwater. These are needs that we need to have. If, forbid, one of our citizens were to get hurt in a pedestrian fashion trying to access these roadways, then I would argue that we would really scramble and make it a priority. Let's make it a priority and be proactive, I would say, since we do have the availability of the bonds. Vice Mayor, I want to, at the appropriate time, if we're going to still consider using the remaining $600,000, I want to bring forward a recommendation for that, but I don't know if this is the appropriate time. Council Member Stennett. I'm sorry. Yes, ma'am. I'm sorry. I was basically said all that to say is that I think that we should continue to dedicate the resources we have and the $600,000 in the bond that we've approved. And if we decide to do that collectively, I would like the opportunity to make additional recommendations in support of sidewalks both in my district and in Council Member Henson's district. But I understand we may not be there yet, but if we get there that we want to decide to do that, I would make that motion at that time. Okay. Can we work through the list of council members who wish to speak? Okay. Council Member Stennett. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I was going to bring up another issue while we're talking about it. Is Commissioner Mason on the public safety, did we get firm numbers on that police recruit class? I don't know if you had any other information, but if we bond or schedule those for January, what would be our cost? That's a new question. Well, you said a year was $1.4 million. Right. The cost is about $53,000 per recruit. Now, is that just salary or is that salary and equipment? That's salary and benefits. The equipment can be paid for out of the asset forfeiture monies. So when you say equipment, you mean uniforms, cars, et cetera? uniforms and ammunition, guns, those types of things. Do we have vehicles for at this stage? I'm not sure. By the time that a class would get through with attrition, we would. That's one of the things we're looking at is as attrition mounts, being able to create the space within the personnel budget to do a class. Now, one thing to keep in mind, you know, some of the discussion of a small class, you're also dealing with economies of scale. It's easier to do a bigger class because you're going to lose, typically in a law enforcement academy situation, you lose about 20% of the people that walk in the door on the first day. That's just normal across the country, the way things happen. So $700,000, we can get 25 recruits started in January, and we have enough in the pipeline to do that in terms of bodies who have applied and been screened and we're ready to go? I would say by January, yes. And $700,000 will be enough to cover the first six months? That's a rough figure, but I believe that's pretty close to what would work. Okay. All right. Well, then, Vice Mayor, I'm not going to debate the bond. I mean, if we want to look at the rest of the $600,000, Obviously, we can just do a $400,000 bond and use the difference in payment back to our bottom line, a general fund. But I would make a motion to use $700,000 of the 940, which will leave us a fund balance of $240,000 in the budget for passage towards a new police class of 25 officers beginning in January for training. So moved. Second. So your motion is to fund a police recruit class of 25 starting on January 1st from the current fund balance. Correct. And assuming the equipment needs that we normally fund from the general fund do come from asset forfeiture, not from the general fund. Now, we have several people on the list, and you said that would be 675,000. Okay. Are those of you on the list, Council Member Ellinger, do you wish to speak to the motion? Mine was going to be similar to that, so I don't know if I'm going to speak to the motion. I agree with it. I wanted to also look at the bonding and just try to look at our general fund to make sure that we're going to probably be left with about half a million dollars left. I think if we do what he says with 25 officers January at 54,000, officer, it looked like that would be 675,000. It would cost us less the 675 for the 940. Then that's going to leave us a little over 300,000. And then if we add in the $135,000 from the $600,000 left on the bond, that would get us close to a half million. So I will support this. Yes. And the motion is only to fund a police recruit class starting January 1st, 25 recruits totaling $675,000. Council Member Myers. I support the motion. Okay. Okay. Council Member Farmer. Okay. Is there any other discussion? Council Member Stennett. The only other, Commissioner Mason, do we have the money in HR to do any of the training or background or anything? Because I think we're missing that, the background checks and the training tests. Right. According to Commissioner Driscoll, we do not at this point. So we can't hire a recruit class without, correct, they haven't been through any of the background checks and all the tests and everything? Have we have a group that's been through that? There is a group that has been through parts of that. Now, whether or not they took the test long enough ago that they would have to retake it and what the costs are of the backgrounds and things, I'm not sure. So we have an unknown. I would leave it at $700,000. I made the motion at $700,000 and just leave it at that. So we have to understand that some of them may have to go to HR to help cover some of that cost. Because I don't want to take out of HR's budget. Right. Council Member Farmer. Oh, I'm so sorry. Does anyone else wish to speak to the motion? Council Member Crosby. Thank you, Vice Mayor Gorton. I don't disagree that we desperately need to have more police officers. I think anybody who deals, I know my sector, is very stressed right now because we're so short-handed. I'm a little uncomfortable, though, with the fact that we don't know. We have not been told an exact figure how much this is going to cost. We don't know if we have money and human resources to do the test or how many people have been through the process and where they stand. It's my understanding that the recruiting process and who can be accepted has been changed somewhat recently, so I'm not sure where that stands. And then also just the vehicles. We could not get an answer of whether that could come out of asset forfeiture, which is another unknown for us. We have put in our budget for the past, I don't know how many years, to hire a class, and it has not been authorized year after year after year. So I'm just a little uncomfortable with as bad as we need this, not having any more solid figures in front of us. Thank you. Thank you. Commissioner, I have a quick question. If the Chief's predictions come true that we have 20 or 25 retirements come January, Would that not free up vehicles? Yes, it would. Okay, thank you. Council Member Ellinger. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I hope this doesn't muddy the waters too much, but I support the $700,000 for the recruit class, but I think it's also important that we leave a fund balance. And if we do the $700,000, that would leave us with $240,000. I think we need more than $240,000. So I would make an amendment that would also include capping the bond at $400,000 and therefore only not using the excess $600,000 from the $1 million bond. So that would save the general fund $135,000, which would leave us $375,000 in fund balance. So moved. Okay. So there's a motion on the floor by Council Member Ellinger, second by Council Member Myers to cap the bond at $400,000 and to put the extra what would have been debt service for the $600,000 into the general fund. Okay. Yes, it is. It's an amendment. So, Council Member Ford, did you want to speak to the amendment? To the amendment only? Yes. It would be very helpful if Chief Bastin or somebody from the police department could really come and address some of the issues that Councilmember Crosby has raised and guide us through this. I appreciate the amendment, though. That's just my thoughts. It may help us as we consider the amendment and the original motion in this very important issue of a new class. Council Member, Mr. Farmer, are you still on for another issue? Okay. Does anyone else wish to speak to the amendment? All right. All those in favor of amending the motion to cap the bond at $400,000 and place the additional debt service money into the general fund. Say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? and please vote electronically. We need a couple more votes. Vice Mayor, I don't have a screen to vote on. Oh, okay. Would you tell them how you're voting and they'll plug it? It's a yes vote. Okay, a yes vote from Mr. Blues. And who else are we missing? Mr. Farmer? Okay, that motion passes 9 to 2, and so that motion was to cap the bond at $400,000. Okay, the amended motion is to fund a police recruit class starting January 1st with 25 recruits totaling $700,000. And so the idea with the amendment was that money was added back into the general fund to help cover that. Any discussion? Council Member Ford. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Is it possible, Commissioner, that the Chief could visit with us or somebody from his leadership to address some of the concerns as we consider this? The information I've gotten from the chief's office is that the $700,000 plus attrition would cover a good-sized class and would cover the HR costs. Well, what about, and I appreciate that, but I'm, as a newcomer, very interested in what Casey mentioned in regards to that. We've authorized classes to go, but for some reason or another, they've never come to fruition. If you can, well, you're just as new as I am. Right, yes. That would be helpful to me, or if members from the council can address that in the chief's absence, I would ask that from around the horseshoe as well. I think that's important to understand the history of that process. Council Member Stenet. I was just going to address Council Member Ford's question. the money went to the deficits we've ran the last two budget cycles. That's why additional costs have not been incurred by hiring employees because, and I haven't brought this up yet, but the problem is not getting this $700,000 this year. It looks like we'll be able to do it. It's next budget. Can you keep and sustain the reoccurring assets of salaries, basically is what it is. So that's why they haven't been hired. The money has been put, but the administration at the time, and we have a new administration, made the decision in order to balance the budget by year in, which we have to do, to not hire them and save that personnel cost. Council Member, does that finish both of you? That's the last question, Vice Mayor. I know it's been a long day. So are we saying that in the past we've had folks go through the class? No. Never started. Council Member Ellinger. Well, as I said, we've had people in the past who have gone through part of the process through. Not the class, the process, yes. Yeah, have gone through, and it's been a cost to government. Anytime you take them through any of the processes through human resources, that's a cost to the government. And then there was a decision made in order to meet the numbers for the next budget that they would not hire a class, but they could have at any different time during the year made a different decision. but they chose to put it towards the balance. Thank you. Does anyone else wish to speak to the motion? Council Member Ellinger wishes to speak to another issue, as does Council Member Farmer. So with that, all those in favor of the motion to fund a police recruit class starting January 1st, totaling $700,000 from the general fund. I'll say aye. Anyone opposed? Please log in. Council Member Blues is yours. My vote is yes. I don't have a screen. Blues votes yes. I will vote yes, but I'm not sure if I will vote for this for the final budget because I want to get numbers from Chief Bastin. Thank you. Council Member Henson, we have a motion to fund a police recruit class starting January 1st with 25 recruits, and thank you for your vote. That vote passes 12-0. Now, Council Member Ellinger. I think Mr. Farmer was before me. If you'd like to... Yes. Mr. Farmer. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I would like for us to look back in the big budget book at page 308, which is the Summary of Revenue Appropriations for the County Aid Fund. And at the bottom of page 308, it shows that the proposed fund balance at the end of the year would be $1.66 million. Earlier today, in the work we've done today and previously, we have a total right now of $6.976 million for resurfacing, repaving road work. I was going to make a motion to take out of this $1.6 million fund balance $523,310, which would make our resurfacing total $7.5 million even. So moved. So your motion is to add more funding for resurfacing? By realizing a transfer from the fund balance in the county aid road fund. And can you please state the amount of money again? Yes, ma'am. $523,310. $523,310. Added to this $6,976,690 for a rounded total of $7.5 million towards a paving need that's roughly four times that amount. Okay. Or more, actually. Do I hear a second? Mr. Myers seconded. Is that correct? All right. The motion on the floor is to take $523,310 out of the fund balance of the County Aid Road Fund to make the total resurfacing in this budget $7.5 million. Yes, ma'am. Okay. Is there discussion? Uh-oh, Connie has her hand up. This could be bad. Well, I just wanted to remind council that one of the things that the county road fiscal court does is to create and approve the county road program budget. So that would maybe not be appropriate for the council to take on that? Well, I think it might be something you would want to refer to them. I do know that historically they had talked about saving up some fund balance in order to do some major bridge projects that they don't have money in a given fiscal year to take care of. Well, Connie, we appreciate your information. The motioner and the seconder have withdrawn the motion. Council Member Stennett. Thank you. I appreciate that advice. Was the $728,000 the mayor used run by them as well? I would presume that it came directly from them. Budgeting has historically gotten their information from them and then placed it in the budget for your approval. So that can be used on any road in the county? I think they have a plan. Can we get a copy of that letter? Absolutely. And their plan, their council member is asking for the plan. Commissioner? Thank you. Thank you, Connie. Okay. Okay. Now, Council Member Ellinger. Thank you, Vice Mayor. In order to expedite this process on page 22 to 24, we have different council links, other recommendations, and I move that the Vice Mayor put the recommendations into the appropriate committee so they can be looked at by that appropriate committee. So moved. Second. Okay. We had a motion and a second from Council Member Kay to ask the Vice Mayor to place what he was sitting beside me and said it first, sorry, pages 22 through 25 into the appropriate committees. Is there any discussion? Okay. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? And if you'll please vote electronically. Okay. Council Member Blues, is yours working? Susan's working on it. Okay. Would you say your vote? My vote is yes. Okay. That motion passes 12 to 0. Now, could I ask Connie for a couple of things, an updated fund balance, and are there any items we've missed? We've approved a revenue number. We've approved and gone through all the links, individuals, late items, non-budgetary have been or will be referred. Is there anything? Do we need to officially approve a fund balance? No, you do not. I mean, once these items have been approved to be included in the budget, I mean, you might have a motion that all the items approve to be included in the mayor's or the council proposed budget and move forward for first reading when you do your meeting. For ratification. Okay. What is the current fund balance? And I adjusted the debt service payment to $90,000 a year, and our current fund balance would be $375,655. $375,655? Mm-hmm. And that took into account lowering the bond to $400,000? Yes, ma'am. And, okay, those final items. So, Council Members, the final fund balance is $375,655, which might create a little nervousness. But, okay, so I guess what we need now is a motion to refer all these final recommendations to the meeting for ratification and placement on the docket. I'll move. Second. Council Member Farmer moved and Council Member Myers seconded. Is there any discussion? If not, all those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? And please log in. Council Member Blues, are you good? We need a couple more votes. Okay, that motion passes 12-0, and I'd like to thank Connie and Paul and the commissioner and her entire staff for your good hard work. Council members, thank you. And we'll have a one-minute break to get the mayor down up here and proceed with our ratification meeting. Do I hear a motion to adjourn? All those in favor say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? We're adjourned. Thank you. Thank you.