# Council Work Session - October 25, 2011 > Auto-transcribed civic record · October 25, 2011 - **Permalink**: https://meetings.lexingtonky.news/meeting/2221 - **Source video**: https://lfucg.granicus.com/player/clip/2221?view_id=14&redirect=true - **Date**: 2011-10-25 - **Last revised**: July 17, 2026 - **Length**: 28,676 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 Lexington-Fayette Urban County Government Council met on October 20, 2011, under the presiding of Mayor Gray. During the meeting, the Council took 7 motions and votes, heard 7 public comments, and addressed 11 agenda items. The Council approved several items including the docket, summary, budget amendments, and a correction to Item E regarding transit advertisements. The Council also held a first reading of Ordinance No. 4 and received informational presentations on the work session agenda, continuing business, and council reports. Public comment was heard on an Asbury zone change and on issues not on the agenda. One item—a discussion on the health insurance crisis—was deferred to a future meeting. ## Attendance The following individuals were present at the meeting on October 25, 2011: * Mayor Gray * Council Member Blues * Council Member Farmer * Council Member Martin * Council Member Stenet * Council Member Henson * Council Member Beard * Council Member Myers * Council Member Lawless * Council Member Kay * Council Member Crosby * Vice Mayor Gordon * Council Member Ellinger * Council Member McCord * Council Member Fort Worth * Council Member Kaye * Council Member Cochran * Council Member Mars No council members were absent or late. ## Votes and Decisions The Council took the following actions during the October 25, 2011 meeting: **Motion to suspend Council reports** [timestamp: 0:14:53] Council Member Farmer moved to suspend Council reports until later in the meeting. This motion was withdrawn. **Motion to approve NDF for the week** [timestamp: 0:15:24] Council Member Beard moved to approve the NDF for the week, seconded by Council Member Ellinger. The motion passed by voice vote. **Motion to place multi-way stop controls on docket** [timestamp: 0:15:57] Council Member Beard moved to place on the docket a resolution authorizing multi-way stop controls at Belafonte Drive and East Laherty Lane, seconded by Vice Mayor Gordon. The motion passed by voice vote. **Motion to amend Masterson Station Park Advisory Board** [timestamp: 0:20:45] Council Member Blues moved to place on the docket an ordinance amending the Masterson Station Park Advisory Board from 20 to 19 members and allowing reappointment, seconded by Vice Mayor Gorton. The motion passed by voice vote. **Motion to grant Richmond Road Landscape Plan waiver** [timestamp: 0:21:50] Council Member Blues moved to place on the docket an ordinance granting a waiver to the Richmond Road Landscape Plan for 3043 Richmond Road, seconded by Council Member Kay. The motion passed by voice vote. **Motion to commit additional health insurance funding** [timestamp: 2:53:04] Council Member Stenet moved to commit an additional $1.9 million to buy down health insurance rates based on 2011 Platinum plan rates, seconded by Council Member McCord. The motion passed by voice vote. **Motion to adjourn** [timestamp: 3:06:21] Mayor Gray moved to adjourn the meeting, seconded by Council Member Crosby. The motion passed by voice vote. ## Budget and Financial Actions The meeting included consideration of an amendment to provide additional funding for health insurance premium buy-down purposes. The amendment allocated $1,900,000 to reduce health insurance premiums. ## Public Comment Seven speakers addressed the council regarding proposed health insurance changes and their financial impact on employees and retirees. **Employee Premium and Deductible Concerns** Wade Miracle, a fire captain [0:30:18], criticized the proposed health insurance plan for doubling employee premiums and imposing $5,000 deductibles. He called the plan irresponsible and unfair, urging the council to include employees in planning and emphasizing the need for education and collaboration. Jonathan Bastian, a police employee [0:38:27], presented a spreadsheet demonstrating that proposed premiums would equate to a 22% pay cut for hourly workers. He noted that many employees would spend over 25% of their income on health care, raising concerns about employee retention and financial hardship. **Family Budget Impact** Charissa Crobo, a teacher and firefighter's spouse [0:49:29], shared a family budget showing a negative $50 monthly balance after the proposed health insurance changes. She raised concerns about the clinic's readiness, lack of pediatric services, and the financial burden on families with young children. **Health Clinic Capacity and Accessibility** Alice Bruner, a city employee's spouse [1:07:27], questioned whether a single doctor could adequately serve 6,000 employees. She criticized the plan as unaffordable and inaccessible, challenged whether the city had explored other insurance options, and expressed frustration over lack of communication. **Retiree Coverage** Rock Vance, a retired police officer [1:13:57], expressed concern that retirees would lose free health care and now face $280 monthly premiums. He urged the council to ensure continued single-coverage health insurance for retirees. **Additional Employee Concerns** Jeff Jones, an employee [1:18:50], emphasized that employees cannot afford the proposed changes and warned the plan would force them into second jobs or welfare. He urged the council to reconsider and support employees who serve the community. Missy Norris, a police employee [1:20:57], shared her family's medical struggles and financial strain. She questioned why changes were finalized with little time for employees to understand and adjust, urging a more gradual, transparent process. ## Contested Items **Health Insurance Plan Implementation** The proposed health insurance plan generated intense debate during the meeting. Public and council members expressed significant concerns about the financial impact on employees, citing fears of financial hardship and potential loss of health care access. A central point of contention was the lack of transparency surrounding the plan's details and implementation. Participants also objected to the compressed timeline for decision-making, arguing that insufficient time had been provided to adequately review and consider such a consequential policy change. **Council Member Involvement in Rate-Setting** A procedural dispute emerged regarding the role of council members in establishing insurance rates. Council members questioned whether they had been involved in the actual rate-setting process. Clarification was provided that council members were not involved in setting the rates themselves. This revelation raised broader concerns about accountability and the transparency of the decision-making process, as it became unclear who held responsibility for determining the rates that would directly affect employees' financial obligations. ## Work Session Agenda [timestamp: 00:00] The meeting opened with discussion of the work session agenda. Mayor Gray, Council Member Blues, and Council Member Farmer participated in the opening remarks. The council addressed a motion to extend public comment time related to the health insurance crisis. Council Member Blues raised this motion, which was subsequently withdrawn before proceeding to the work session agenda items. The outcome of this agenda item was informational in nature, establishing the framework for the remainder of the work session. ## Public Comment on Asbury Zone Change [timestamp: 02:21] The council considered public comment on a proposed planned neighborhood residential zone change at 564 Asbury Lane. Mayor Gray presided over this agenda item. No members of the public spoke during the public comment period on this matter. Following the absence of public comment, a motion to place the ordinance on the docket passed unanimously. ## First Reading of Ordinance No. 4 [timestamp: 02:51] A motion was made and seconded to place Ordinance No. 4 under first reading with or without a public hearing. Council Member Ellinger and Council Member Myers were the key speakers on this agenda item. No discussion occurred following the motion. The motion passed unanimously, advancing Ordinance No. 4 to first reading. ## Approval of Docket [timestamp: 00:03:22] The council considered the approval of the docket. No discussion was held on this item. The motion to approve the docket passed unanimously. ## Approval of Summary A motion to approve the meeting summary was made and seconded by Vice Mayor Gordon and Council Member Crosby [timestamp: 00:03:52]. No discussion followed the motion. The motion passed unanimously. ## Budget Amendments A motion to approve budget amendments was presented during the meeting. Vice Mayor Gorton and Council Member Myers were the key speakers on this agenda item [timestamp: 00:03:52]. The motion was made and seconded by the council members present. No discussion or debate followed the presentation of the amendments. The motion passed unanimously. ## Correction to Item E (Transit Ads) Council Member Blues brought forward a correction to a previously discussed transit advertising figure. [timestamp: 00:05:34] The correction addressed an error in the transit ad cost calculation. The original figure of $33.40 was found to be incomplete due to an overlooked installation fee. The corrected amount was $6,535. Council Member Blues moved to amend the record with this correction. The motion passed unanimously, indicating full council agreement on the need to update the transit advertising cost to reflect the accurate total including installation fees. ## Continuing Business Presentations During this agenda item, reports were presented by three standing committees of the council [timestamp: 0:08:44]. **Committee Reports** The General Government Committee, Social Services Committee, and Public Safety Committee each provided updates to the full council. Mr. Lane, Council Member Myers, and Council Member Lawless participated in presenting or discussing the committee reports. **Public Safety Committee Recommendation** The Public Safety Committee recommended forwarding the fireworks ordinance to the full council for consideration. This recommendation emerged from the committee's review and discussion of the proposed ordinance. **Outcome** This agenda item was informational in nature, with the committees sharing their reports and recommendations with the broader council membership. The Public Safety Committee's recommendation regarding the fireworks ordinance was advanced for further action by the full council. ## Council Reports Council Member Farmer moved to suspend Council reports but subsequently withdrew the motion. [timestamp: 00:14:53] Council Member Beard then presented two motions, both of which passed unanimously. ## Public Comment on Issues Not on Agenda [timestamp: 22:56] The council opened the floor for public comment on matters not included on the meeting agenda. Mayor Gray presided over this portion of the meeting. No members of the public spoke regarding redistricting during this comment period. The discussion then shifted to the health insurance crisis, though the extracted data does not provide specific details about the comments made or positions expressed on this topic. The outcome of this agenda item was informational in nature. ## Health Insurance Crisis Discussion [timestamp: 23:29] The council held a public hearing to discuss a proposed health insurance plan. Mayor Gray, Council Member Stenet, Council Member Kaye, and Council Member McCord participated in the discussion. **Concerns Raised** Employees and community members expressed several concerns about the proposed plan: * Premium increases * Deductible levels * Clinic readiness to implement the plan * Lack of transparency in the planning process **Outcome** The council committed to re-evaluating the health insurance plan in response to the concerns raised during the public hearing. The agenda item was deferred, indicating that further discussion and review would take place at a future meeting. --- ## Decisions - **null** — withdrawn: Motion to suspend Council reports until later in the meeting - **null** — passed: Motion to approve NDF for the week - **null** — passed: Motion to place on docket a resolution authorizing multi-way stop controls at Belafonte Drive and East Laherty Lane - **null** — passed: Motion to place on docket an ordinance amending the Masterson Station Park Advisory Board from 20 to 19 members and allowing reappointment - **null** — passed: Motion to place on docket an ordinance granting a waiver to the Richmond Road Landscape Plan for 3043 Richmond Road - **null** — passed: Motion to commit an additional $1.9 million to buy down health insurance rates based on 2011 Platinum plan rates - **null** — passed: Motion to adjourn the meeting --- ## Full transcript Every time I look at you, I don't know where I'd be without you here with me. Life really makes places, my best friend. Are issues on or not on the agenda for today's work session? Yes, sir. As I understood, the motion and Councilmember Blues has suggested a 60-minute, that would be one hour, for the comments and conversation regarding the health insurance. So we have a motion to that effect. We have a second. Is there any discussion? Councilmember Farmer. I'm logged in, but it won't come up here. I'm sorry. In looking at our docket for today, our regular business docket, I would think that we could take care of it rather expeditiously and then spend more than 60 minutes with these folks. Because I think we can move through our regular docket and then disperse with the professionals that are here weekly with us so we can keep the crowd that wants to spend more than 60 minutes with us. So I'll be voting against the motion. What's that? Okay. All right. Okay. All right. Sounds like that'll work then. Council Member Martin. I withdraw my motion. All right. All right. We will then move to the work session agenda. Dr. Blues, you're okay with it, Dr. Blues. All right. All right. Is there public comment on issues on the agenda? Okay. Here we go. All right, I don't have anybody signed up, so we will go to, is there a second on our agenda? Is there a docket approval? Actually, since there are a number of people here, and I would ask whether there's any public comment on the Asbury zone change, which is to go on the docket for Thursday night. So is there anybody in the audience who wants to comment on the proposed planned neighborhood residential zone change at 564 Asbury Lane? I see no one, Mayor. Thank you. All right. There does need to be a motion made. There needs to be a motion made to put ordinance number four under first readings on with or without a public hearing. Is there a motion? So moved. Second. Council Member Ellinger makes a motion second by Council Member Myers. Is there any discussion? Hearing none, all in favor, please say aye. Aye. All opposed, no. Motion carries. Move through the docket. Second. There's a motion and a second to approve the docket. Is there any discussion? All right. Hearing none, all in favor, please say aye. Aye. All opposed, no. Motion carries. Move approval of the summary. Second. Motion by Vice Mayor Gordon to approve the summary and a second by Council Member Crosby. Is there any discussion? Okay. Hearing none, all in favor, please say aye. Aye. All opposed, no. Motion carries. Roman numeral four on our agenda, budget amendments. Any questions? Is there a motion to approve the budget amendments? Move approval. Motion by Vice Mayor Gorton. Second by Council Member Myers. Is there any discussion? All right. Hearing none. Yep. Council Member Stenet. Thank you, Mayor. On page 12, we have various grants that these funds are matching. Could we not get a list of all those grants instead of just saying the word various? We can get an actual list of the department. Would that be a possible, Mayor? I'm not sure because there's actually one, two, three, four, five, six of them and several million dollars here. So it'd be nice to get what grants those are for. Thank you, Mayor. All right. You're talking about that as a follow-up? Okay. We can do that. We want to go ahead with... All right, we have a motion then. Is there any further discussion? Motion and second. Any further discussion? Okay. All in favor, please indicate by saying aye. Aye. Opposed? No. Motion carries. Second. There's a motion to approve new business by Council Member Beard, second by Council Member Ellinger. Is there any discussion? Councilmember Blues. Thank you, Mayor. I have a correction on E at the request of E911. The figure 3340 should actually be corrected to 6535. It's on page 9? This is on page 9, item E. Item E on page 9. That's right. And the explanation is that the transit ads were mistakenly stated as $33.40. However, the invoice amount is for ad production only, and an additional fee of $3,195 for the installation of the transit ads was inadvertently overlooked. So the blue sheet should actually reflect $6,535. So moved. Second. Motion by Councilman Blue. Second by Vice Mayor Gordon. Is there any discussion? All right. Hearing none, all in favor. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. All right. Vice Mayor Gordon. Thank you, Mayor. I don't have a question so much as I wanted to comment on Item J, just because this is a good example of an issue with the spay and neuter fund, which Council wanted to put into committee. and we went ahead and saw that it was a purely administrative issue and the administration went ahead and fixed it and put it on the new business so that it didn't get tied up in committee. And I really appreciate the work that various folks did on that. Thank you. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Council Member Farmer. Thank you, Mayor. Mine is on item A, the authorization to enter into an agreement with an auctioneer to sell surplus property of the government, which Council Member Henson had asked for some follow-up on that. Is it really this 20-page document of an awful lot of pieces of property or parcels of property? I'm just trying to get my arms around what it is we're trying to sell here. Mr. Baradaran. Mr. John Sheed, thank you. The properties in question are the ones that were offered for sale, and we either had bids that were way too low or no beds at all, so we decided to go ahead and combine those for auctions. So are these like little leftover pieces? These are all leftover odds and ends. All they are right now is liability in terms of maintenance to us. They do not serve any purpose at all. All right, that answers my question for now. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you. All right. So is there no further discussion? All in favor of the motion? Please indicate by saying aye. Aye. All opposed, no. Motion carries. All right. Next on our agenda is continuing business presentations. Is there a report by General Government Committee, Mr. Lane? Thank you, Mayor. The General Government Committee met on Tuesday, October 11, at 10 a.m. after an extended presentation by General Services Director Jamshid, Barah Darun, and after further discussion by the committee members. The committee voted unanimously to approve a Facilities Use Policies and Procedures Ordinance, and that ordinance has been finalized, but there are two exhibits to the ordinance. One is a lease agreement, and the other is a Facilities Use Analysis Form. And as soon as those two documents are ready, I will be having those submitted to each council member for review, and then we will bring up a vote on that at a future work session or council meeting. In addition, the Director of Parks, Jerry Hancock, advised the committee that he will update the council on the master aquatics and golf plans in November, and he would also like to have a special meeting to discuss any issues with the council maybe in December. That's my report. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you. All right. No motions coming out. All right. Next, Social Services Committee. Council Member Myers. Thank you, Mayor. Social Services and Community Development Committee met October 18th to continue the discussion about partner agency funding. During that meeting, we heard from the Commissioner Mills, the University of Kentucky deans from the Martin School of Public Policy, Dr. Bill Hoyt, and the College of Social Work, Dr. Ike Adams, and they continue to talk about how they can work together to put together a needs assessment. There was a motion that was made and passed to encourage the commissioner to move forward with those two deans to put together the framework for a needs assessment, and then that will come back to our committee at the next meeting, and then we will probably have something coming out of committee for the full council to vote on. The committee will meet again on November 29th and hear back from Commissioner Mills on the best way forward with the needs assessment. Also on the agenda will be the issues around the partner agencies and races, as well as community development block grant. That's it. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Council Member Myers. Next is Public Safety Committee, Council Member Lawless. Thank you. The Public Safety Committee met at 1 o'clock on October 18th. There were two items on the agenda. the chronic nuisance ordinance, and the fireworks ordinance. All of the committee members were in attendance, in addition to Council Member Kay and Council Member Blues as non-voting members. The chronic nuisance ordinance discussion began with Keith Gaines, with Trifection Consulting reporting out on a draft of Sections 12 through 60 through 12 through 70 of the chronic nuisance ordinance. Council members asked questions about the draft ordinance and requested some additional information be added to research, specifically contact with the apartment association and real estate community, and two, documentation or reporting elements of the ordinance. There were several members of the audience who spoke on the issue. One property owner in the vicinity of the community inn spoke in favor of the ordinance, Others representing interests of the community in and Catholic Action Center were asking for exemption from the ordinance as a faith-based organization or nonprofits. The committee discussed having the issue back on the agenda at a special meeting that is scheduled for November 1st. It seemed that that may be too soon, having been only two weeks. Council Member Henson will be meeting with Mike Sanner from Law and Keith Gaines to modify the draft as per indicated by the committee, as well as contacting real estate associations and the apartment association. The fireworks ordinance was presented for the second time in committee. Council Member Stennett restated its intention and purpose. Public safety came and spoke in support of the ordinance. There was a motion to move the issue to the full council for approval by Council Member Stennett and seconded by Council Member McCord. It passed with one dissension. So I'd like to make that motion to forward that to the full council. It's a motion and a second. Is there any discussion? Hearing none, all in favor, please say aye. Aye. All opposed, no. Motion carries. The meeting adjourned at 2.53. the November 1st meeting of the Public Safety Committee is likely to have to be canceled and rescheduled, and I will let people know about that ASAP. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Lawless. All right. Next on our agenda, Council reports. If the Council member just signed in electronically, you've got Council Member Farmer. Mayor, actually, I was going to make a motion to suspend the Council report at this time until later in the meeting. All right, Council Member, there's a motion by Council Member Farmer to suspend Council reports. Until later in this meeting, yes, sir. All right, okay. Second, is there a discussion? Council Member Blue. I just want to make sure that those of us who have motions and walk-ons have an opportunity to do that. And I'd rather do that now while we do have a motion. I will withdraw. All right. There's a withdrawal of the motion. It's okay with the seconder? Yes. All right. Council Member Beard. Thank you, Mayor. I have two motions. First is approval of the NDF for this week. Second. Motion by Council Member Beard, second by Council Member Ellinger related to the NDF. Is there any discussion? Hearing none, all in favor, please say aye. Aye. All opposed, no. Motion carries. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Beard. Second one is I move to place on the docket for the October 27, 2011 Council meeting a resolution authorizing and directing the Division of Traffic Engineering pursuant to Code of Ordinances Section 18-86 to install multi-way stop controls at Belafonte Drive and East Laherty Lane. Second. It's a motion by Council Member Beard, seconded by Vice Mayor Gordon. Is there any discussion? Okay. Hearing none, all in favor of motion, please indicate by saying aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Council Member Beard. All right. Council Member Myers. Thank you, Mayor. I'll try to be brief on this, but I need somebody from probably building inspection to come up and answer the question quickly. with respect to a daycare located in a residential area we've got a situation where a daycare was approved by the board of adjustments and then also by the state but they've moved location into our district if the number of kids in a daycare is 8 does that have to go back through to the board of adjustments being that they moved locations Any time a daycare relocates and they have to operate under conditional use, which in residential situations, if you have more than six children on site at any one time, you then would have to get reapplied to the Board of Adjustment and have a new approval for the new location. Okay. If that has not happened, and I'm not unclear as to whether or not it has, If it has not happened and the daycare is operating with more than six kids, what happens then? If the daycare is operating in a new location with more than six children, then they are operating without a license from the Division of Regulated Child Care at the state. The state will investigate those issues and require them to reduce the number to six or less, which is an automatic, you can automatically keep six children or less in a residential zone without approval from the Board of Adjustment or without licensing from the state. Okay, here's where I guess the confusion comes in. The state says that they're okay, and the state has come out and inspected a new property, but the state is only interested in the condition of the daycare, not our zoning ordinances that say you have to have a variant if you have six or more kids. So I guess the question is, do they have to submit something to the city so that the city understands that they've moved location, that they have more than six kids? Again, if they have more than six children, they will have to reply to the Board of Adjustment and get approval to have them at the new location. The state will not issue a license in violation of the local government zoning requirements. We issue letters virtually on a continual basis to daycare operators verifying what our zoning ordinance will allow at any particular location. The state then will issue licenses based on what our zoning verification letter indicates. If we indicate that they can only maintain, have six maximum at that location, that's all the state will allow them to license for. If they intend to have more than that, the state says bring us verification that the local jurisdiction will allow more than six at this location. The maximum the state allows and the maximum our zoning ordinance will allow in a residential setting is 12. And the location, I'm aware of the location you're referring to. In fact, we have checked with the state on this. They currently do not have a license, and they are currently operating under the six or less rule. Now, as long as they don't have more than six at any one time, they can actually have more children on, let's say, their roster, as long as they don't have more than six at that location at the point that they would be checked by the state. So they could actually be working with maybe eight, ten children, but as long as you have maybe six up until five o'clock and some leave, some others come in, as long as the total at any one time never exceeds six, then they're in compliance with local zoning and the state's regulations involving daycares of six or less. Okay. Thank you very much. Council Member Blues. Thank you, Mayor. I have two walk-on items. The first, Council Members, I sent you draft ordinances on this item, along with the rationale for some changes in the Masterson Station Park Advisory Board ordinance. I move to place on the docket for the October 27, 2011 Council meeting an ordinance amending the Masterson Station Advisory Board from 20 to 19 members and allowing for members to be reappointed for additional terms. So moved. Second. Motion by Council Member Blue, seconded by Vice Mayor Gorton. Is there any discussion of the motion? Hearing none, we can vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion count. Thank you, Mayor. The second item was generated from this morning's Corridors Commission, meeting a request for a waiver to the Richmond Road Landscape Plan. the motion as follows. To place on the docket for October 27, 2011 Council meeting an ordinance granting a waiver to the Richmond Road Landscape Plan, Ordinance No. 212-83 for 3043 Richmond Road. So moved. Motion by Council Member Blues. Second by Council Member Kay. Is there any discussion? Council Members, I will send that draft ordinance and the rationale before Thursday night's council meeting. Thank you. Is there any discussion? Hearing none, all in favor, please say aye. Aye. All opposed, no. Motion carries. All right. Any further? All right. Then we can. Are there going to be more council reports later? or not? Okay. Just so we get our sense of where we are. Okay. I'll just acknowledge the mayor's report. There is not one today. And now we can move to public comment for issues not on the agenda. First, is there anybody here to comment on redistricting? I don't think so. Okay. All right. Vice Mayor Gorton wanted me to mention that. So it's okay now. It's appropriate for us to move on to the health insurance issue. I'd like to begin by thanking you all for being here. You know, sometimes you may think, what in the world is the mayor saying that for? Well, I've learned in this job that even when there is dissent, even when there is disturbance, that it's better in a democracy in this kind of world to go ahead with it. So what I'd like to do is first put a little bit in context and then ask for a public comment. Some of you all have signed up. Now, first off, I want you to know that I'm not here about lecturing at all. We've all had updates on our health insurance crisis, and I've routinely said that we can expect tension, we can expect distress, we can even expect anger when the reality sets in of what past mismanagement of health insurance means to our employees today. For almost a year, we've been working to manage the crisis. The council's been engaged. The public's been engaged. Employees have been alerted to the emergency conditions. And there have been stories in the newspaper, on TV, and emails from me to employees. But the reality is setting in now. And we are finding, as Vice Mayor Gordon said to me last week, bad news just doesn't get better over time. And she's right about that. But that doesn't make us like it any better. The whole world doesn't like what's going on with our economy, doesn't like what's going on with health care. And we don't like the bottom line, but the bottom line is this, that we cannot continue to allow mismanagement and concealment of the real costs of employee insurance to continue. We've made a pledge to be transparent. We've made a pledge to be financially responsible. We can't pretend to manage an institution when the numbers today are off 60.6% on 12% of our total budget. That's $35 million over budget in a three-year period. that's the problem that we inherited. Again, you know, government subsidy of the true cost of health care was not known to me or to the council until two days after the November election last year. Now, I've asked it before, and I ask it again. I don't think anybody on the council knew about it, did you? Nobody on this council knew about those numbers. It was kept secret from the council, secret from the citizens, and secret from the employees. As mayor, I need, just like the council, we all need to weigh and must weigh putting our financial house in order with hearing from our employees. That's the council's job. That's my job, to be fair to our taxpayers and to be fair to our employees. I know I've been listening to our employees. I know the council members have been listening to our employees. Over the weekend, Charest and Bobby Crovo invited me to their house. It was from 8 o'clock, starting at 8 o'clock on Saturday night to 11 o'clock, to listen to a group of about 15 firefighters and their wives talk about their concerns. That night, in fact, Drew Short said to Benji Mars over here, I don't know if Drew's here today, but Benji said, I've learned more in the last two hours than I've ever learned about health care since I've been working here. Last week, several employees called me. I invited employees to call me, to email me, to call me. Christine Wu, who's a member of our building inspection division, Christine told me that her husband, Ping, had just lost his temporary job at Toyota and she needs her insurance really badly and is very worried about the cost. I've heard from you in emails. I've read your comments in the newspapers. And as a result, I'm examining options. Our administration is examining options. I know the council is. Considering the financial situation we have today, We've put before the city health insurance options that represent a responsible plan for bad financial times. They include an employee health clinic that represents something that some will be skeptical about. I understand that. But we don't suggest things like this casually. A lot of work went into examining these options and alternatives and benchmarks in other places. We put in this plan reduced pharmacy expenses and a variety of plans. That costs have increased is not a secret, and we have to make tough choices. If we spend more on health care, then we need to spend less somewhere else. There's just no fat in our budget today. But with that in mind, we now need to listen to the folks who are here with us from you all today. Just so we understand, there are council rules that have been set in place for a long time for public comment, and those rules include that public comment is limited to three minutes. and in fact I know that you all already understand that because I think some have signed up to speak and to represent others. I've got the sign-up sheet here. So what I'd like to do is just ask you all, I know that everyone here clearly has a passion about this issue and has responsibility and we'll just ask for civil representation of the position today and ask, since there is a large number of people, I don't particularly want to use the gavel, so we'll just ask if you need to applaud, hold it to an applause if you can, and that'll be great. Thanks very much. Now, what we've got is, what I've got here is, I have one, two, three, four, five folks signed up. Wade Wade Miracle Wade Miracle Wade is first okay Wade and guys if you all would Wade if you could yes stand there and our rule also includes just give your name we know who you are but for the record and where you live Wade Miracle 1061 Autumn Ridge thanks Wade and Wade you're representing I believe you're representing two other folks, right? Yes, sir. They have donated their time to me. Yes, sir. Thank you. It'll take about seven minutes. Council members, Vice Mayor, Mayor, esteemed colleagues, thank you for allowing me the opportunity to speak before you. I also appreciate the fact of you giving some of your time to listen to some of our concerns of your city employees. First of all, let me introduce myself. My name's Wade Miracle, and I've had the pleasure of addressing this council on three previous occasions, the last of which concerned the Browning out of Station 4 last year. I serve as a captain with the Lexington Fire Department and have been with the department for almost 17 years. I'm here today to speak on behalf of the members of the fire service and to some extent other city employees. At the previous work session on the 18th, Benefits Insurance Marketing gave a presentation on a new health care plan that will be instituted for all city employees starting January 1, 2012. Even though the presenters stated that they began working with you last November on the health care plans and costs, city employees only started receiving emails from the mayor's office in the last couple of weeks, enlightening us on the upcoming increases and changes to our current health care plans. For whatever the reasoning, nothing in those emails ever stated the exact increase in cost to employees, but there were warnings of suffering stress and anxiety because of neglecting a problem. There was no mention as to what that problem was or where it originated from, but it sure seems that you have decided that the employees will be the ones who have to pay to fix the problem. Did we as employees do something wrong beforehand? Did we miss a payment? Did we use too much health insurance? Mayor, you stated that when council votes on a certain issue, it is not for praise or recognition, but to do the responsible thing. I agree. Let's be responsible and not drop a huge financial burden on the employees and retirees. Many of your city employees have not had a raise in three years. Your firefighters, including myself, recently agreed, with much angst and trepidation, I might add, to concede over $2 million in savings to the city. This was money out of our pocket to help the city, yet it was the responsible thing to do. In less than a week of the ink-drying, you send us an email outlining health insurance plans requiring us to pay 100% more for premiums in addition to $5,000 deductibles. In fact, your cheapest family plan will cost more than the most expensive family plan that we have currently. How is this responsible? Council Member Myers asked a great question the other day to presenters. He asked, do they have a model or ideal of which plan the majority of employees will gravitate to when they see the new premiums? The presenters did not know, but they assumed that the majority of the employees, 89% who are currently enrolled in the Platinum Plan, will gravitate to the PPOC or the HSA-2 Plan, which are the cheapest offered. What they didn't say was that the PPOC Plan is about $200 more a month on top of a $5,000 deductible. That's what a great bargain for the city employees and retirees. I also enjoyed the presenters' comments at the beginning of the presentation when they said that the employees will have to pay, quote, a little bit more, end quote, for health insurance premiums. Obviously, their definition of little bit is quite different from that of city employees. I believe doubling your payments would require changing little bit to a heck of a lot more. It was stated that 89% of your employees participate in the current Platinum Plan. That must mean it's a good plan. Explain to me and to those in attendance why such a great plan now becomes the priciest plan. You took the most popular plan that was somewhat affordable and raised the rates to such an astronomical level that it's equal to a monthly payment for a $200,000 house. That's not responsible planning. If the health care consumption of 65% of our employees is less than $1,000 per year, as was stated in the presentation, why are the employees being burdened with these unjustified rate increases? If this plan is too expensive to maintain, which you state is in the top 1% when compared to other plans nationwide, let's tweak it to where it can be maintained. Utilize the Wellness Center and modify this plan to where it will work for both the employees and for the city. Mayor, you stated that the key to getting through this challenging time is education. I believe you failed in that endeavor. A letter sent to the employees via Mrs. Straub on the 21st of this month stated that there had been multiple public presentations to Council about the increasing health insurance costs. The letter also stated that some Council members have been involved in putting together the 2012 health insurance plans, and therefore it is disingenuous, and I like that word, for anyone to now express shock and disbelief about these changes. I, for one, do not remember receiving notices about discussions of raising our health insurance rates 100%. Who were the council members? As we would like to talk to them about what process and fact-finding they used to come up with these rates. You threw this change in our faces when open enrollment is only two weeks away, even though Benefits Insurance Marketing started working on this program in November of last year. Thanks for educating us and at least keeping us up to date. If the goal was to force the majority of employees to seek health insurance elsewhere, you succeeded as well as failed. We can't afford your self-insured premiums any longer, but you did not give us enough time to go out and research other options. You have a lot of talented people within this government, and I'm pretty confident that with 3,000 employees in this group, someone could have found a better and more economical plan than what was presented to us last week. In the fire service, failure usually leads to injury or death or unneeded destruction of property. In this case, your failure just led to a lot of scared and disgruntled employees. Talk about being proud to work for the city. Now, how do we turn this failure into a positive outcome? For one, educate us. Teach us the positives for these plans. Show us how these plans will save us money, as the presenter stated. Two, include us. Include us in the discussions and proposals before the final product is delivered to us. In fact, it is a violation of our collective bargaining agreement not to include us in these discussions. We're not a bunch of lemmings that will follow blindly without thought. We are educated and talented individuals who want to help and contribute to our community. There is still time to look at other plans and find some type of common ground that is both economical to you and affordable to the employees. We are your most valuable asset. Utilize us. Three, show us our worth to you. Don't insult us by stating you have the responsibility to carefully weigh either putting salt on the road, blacktop to repave roads, activities for parks and rec, or salaries and health insurance for employees when spending the taxpayer dollars. Part of being a business is providing quality and affordable health insurance for its employees. That is one of the reasons why people want to come to work for a company. Part of the price of being a business is taking care of your employees and making them feel like they're part of a team. It also means taking care of their families as well. I hope you as council members and as mayor place your employees above Frisbee golf and road salt. A well-respected leader in the fire service talks about pride and ownership, taking pride in what you do and ownership in the community that you work for. We put our lives on the line daily for this community. If you want us as employees to take some pride and ownership in this great organization, this city, and this community, then show us our worth to you. Work with us to find some type of medium ground that will be beneficial to both the city and to its workers. Thank you. Captain, thank you. It was very thoughtful and we appreciate it. Next is Jonathan Bastian. Jonathan, you're representing, I think, four, right? I believe so, yes. Yes, sir. My name is Jonathan Bastian. I'm an employee of the Division of Police. and I live on the south side of Lexington. Mr. Mayor, Madam Vice Mayor, members of the Council, I know your time is valuable, and I thank you for the opportunity to talk to you. I think you'd be hard-pressed to find any citizen or employee of Lexington who does not understand that we have a budgetary crisis. I also believe that most of your dedicated government employees expected an increase in health care premiums, as well as a reduction in options. The mayor has, in fact, regularly communicated that the city's health care expenditures cannot continue on their unabated path. However, the proposed premiums for next year created a devastating burden on all of the city's employees. I imagine that when the administration and the council approved these health insurance plans, they were forced to look at the overall numbers to deal in generalizations with the the overall goal being to stay within budget. I've created a spreadsheet designed to demonstrate to you the true personal cost to your individual employees and what these proposed increases mean. With your permission, I'd like to approach and hand these out. And I apologize at this point if it looks like I'm just reading, but it's a lot of numbers, and I want to get the numbers right. And I don't want to go off. Jonathan, excuse me just a minute. Was this two pages or one? It should be only one page. All right, okay. Do you mind if I share this with the benefits consultants? Thank you. In creating the spreadsheet, I'm going to add-lib a little bit here. The top three columns, or excuse me, the top three tables of the spreadsheet are labeled Family Platinum, Parent and Children Gold, and Family HSA. The Family Platinum chart takes a look at what the Platinum plan from 2011 would have cost an employee and compares it to the PPO1 from 2012, or PPOA. I forget how it's referred to. Because all of these plans cost more than the employee benefit pool, any increase is automatically absorbed by the employee. The Family Platinum Plan, or the PPO-1, increased over $7,000. If you have an employee making $15 an hour, that's a 22% pay cut that they've just absorbed. For anyone who stays on the Platinum Plan, it's the equivalent of $3.37 every hour that they lose off their paycheck just for health care. If you look at the parent and children in the Gold Plan, for example, a single parent supporting his or her children, the increase is almost $4,800 annually. That equates to $2.31 an hour that comes out of the employee's pocket. If you have an employee making $25 an hour, it's a 9% pay cut. If you have an employee making $15 an hour, it's a 15% pay cut. The HSA family plan compares the only HSA we have currently in 2011 to the HSA 1 rates of 2012, even though the benefits are slightly less beneficial for us in the HSA 1. The total increase is over $4,100 per year. That equates to $1.98 an hour. And I apologize to my brothers and sisters in the fire service. I didn't include you in these because I don't know that you work the same work year that we do as far as total hours. But the numbers will be similar for them. At $25 an hour, the employee is taking an 8% pay cut. At $15 an hour, the employee is taking a 13% pay cut. If you look at the column to the right of that, where it says $4,000 max family pay, the current HSA includes a $5,000 family deductible. The government has agreed to deposit $1,000 into the HSA account. So in effect, the employee is responsible for a $4,000 maximum out-of-pocket on health care expenses. If that employee has a bad year and maxes out their health care expenses through the HSA, at $15 an hour, 26% of his or her pay is going to nothing but health care. At $25 an hour, it's 16%. The collective bargaining members of the police department receive by contract a larger benefit pool than the civilian employees. Still, the increases will cause hardship among those members. An officer on the HSA plan, which is the bottom table on the spreadsheet, If the officer makes $22 an hour, 9% of his paycheck or her paycheck will be spent on health care premiums. Not dental, just health care premiums. And again, if that officer makes $22 an hour and their family maxes out on the HSA with $4,000 of incurred costs, 18% of their pay is going to nothing but health care. You add on top of that 20% for taxes, 11% contribution to our pension, and 28%, which is the normal rate for someone to pay for rent or a mortgage, and 77% or more than three-quarters of that person's salary is already accounted for. If the officer makes $28 an hour, he has a 7% loss per check, or one-seventh of his total income if he has to pay the maximum family deductible. But I'm not here just for the sworn employees. Everything that the firefighters do and that your police officers do cannot happen without the help of civilian support staff. They do everything for us. They answer the telephones. They dispatch us. The good dispatchers can tell in our voice when we're in trouble and get help to us. They run reports. They juggle due dates. And in the end, they make sure we get paid. Nothing happens without them. These civilian employees also receive a smaller benefit pool and are generally paid less. And that is the table, the fourth table on the spreadsheet, where it says civilian, single parent, gold plan. Comparing the gold plan to the PPO2 or PPOB, the civilian benefit pool is $4,268 a year approximately. After the benefit pool, if that single parent wants to keep his or her children on the health care plan, If he or she makes $15 an hour, 23% of his or her paycheck is going to pay nothing but health care premiums. Not dental, not taxes, not saving for retirement, not paying a house. Almost one quarter of that person's paycheck does nothing but pay for health care. At $18 an hour, you can see it's one-fifth of the check goes to paying for nothing but health care premiums. And again, at $18 an hour, if you consider a single parent paying 19% of his or her check for health care, 20% for taxes and or retirement, and another 28% for mortgage, then this single parent has to raise children on one-third of his or her pay. With the proposed premiums, many of your employees will be working mostly to pay taxes and pay for health care. This risks disastrous consequences. First, and I think probably most importantly, you risk driving away talented employees in search of more balanced health care options. Whether an employee is a single parent or the primary provider in a conventional family, a few of us can afford to spend upwards of 25% of our income on health care costs. Second, you risk driving away the healthiest employees to private insurance. And my understanding on how insurance rates are set is that they look at premiums collected versus total expenses paid out the prior year and calculate what the new rate has to be in order for them to make their profit because they are a for-profit company. Well, if you drive away your healthiest employees to private insurance, you are insuring what can be called nothing else than a death spiral of increasing health care. In just 15 minutes online, while multitasking, I've already found an HSA plan comparable to the HSA-1 in total family expenses for $230 a month less. If you drive away your healthiest employees, your future employees will do nothing but work to pay taxes and health care benefits. I'm not knowledgeable enough about the numbers or how the budget works to give you an adequate solution, but I have no doubt that the premiums proposed cannot be your budget solution. You'll drive away good employees to other jobs, and you'll drive the healthiest employees out of the insurance pool, ensuring exponentially increasing premiums in the future. I know that time is of the essence. We have open enrollment coming on, but I urge you to consider different options. Remembering the serious financial challenges, the proposed premiums will cause the vast majority of your employees. I thank you. And if you have any questions on that spreadsheet, I would be happy to answer them right now. Jonathan, thank you. Thanks very much, sir. Next on the sign-up sheet is Charissa Crobo. Charissa? Hi, Charissa. You can go ahead and start with that, yeah. Why don't you pull that? There you go. I know I'm a little vertically challenged. but first I'd like to thank you again for coming out and meeting with us I know it's kind of last minute but we appreciate any answers and and all the three whole hours you stayed I know that was pretty painful probably but it did answer a lot of questions and there have been some new questions and other things I'd like to share with the council members from what we talked about and other things as well. So go ahead to the first. Okay, so this is just an example average family budget before collective bargaining and new health care plans and after. So, and this is just our basic kind of nuts and bolts of our budget. So, you know, this is my husband's kind of take home. All right, so $3,200. You take away housing, which for a family of five to even find housing for $900 a month. That's not somewhere where you're going to be scared to go outside at night. It's pretty hard in Lexington. Whether you're renting a house or an apartment, a car payment, $200. That's not a great car. That's just an average car. Car insurance, $50 a month if you're a decent driver. Food, $600. I'm not including diapers in this as well. We have three children, four, three, and two. A lot of the other members of the fire department also have small children. A lot of the guys who aren't retired are younger and have younger kids. So that's something that we really face that's going to be hard to deal with. Gas prices, $300. I mean, that's if you have a car with decent gas mileage. Health insurance was $200. Child care, about $500 a month. And that's probably for one child. So leftover, we had about $450 a month. After collective bargaining and new health care plans, you can see, go down through the budget. I did, when I subtracted the health insurance from that, I did $600, which was kind of an average of the $330 to $900, which left us with negative $50 a month. A lot of wives don't work if they have younger children. I'm lucky enough to get to work, but child care is so expensive, it sometimes makes sense to stay home until your kids start elementary school because you're actually paying more than you're making a year, depending on what kind of job you have. So I just wanted to give you kind of a snapshot of what this is doing to our family budgets. And that's not even picking the most popular PPO plan. We're in negative numbers already with negative 50. So let's go to the next one. Okay, so how are families supposed to afford 300% and 4,500% out-of-pocket increases? And if you could put the spreadsheet up. Actually, let me give you this while he's getting the spreadsheet. Do you want to pass it down? Sorry, I'm the teacher. Pass it down. Okay, so. All right. Economics teacher, too. Okay, so if you can zoom in on that. I think it's the sixth line where it says out of pocket. And if you look across there, so the first PPO, PPOA, and Sandy Witt, her husband's also a fireman, and we are both teachers, so we took what we make and what we get with our health insurance plan. So this is with another plan figured in. This isn't just our husband's insurance. This is our state employee insurance figured in with our husband's insurance as well. What we get, and we're comparing plans to decide what's best for our family. So PPOC was an increase of about 4,500 percent. I'm sorry, 4,795 percent increase. PPOA was a 319.65 percent increase out of pocket. So potentially, if you go down to the very bottom, we could be out of pocket with another insurance plan figured in. This isn't even without our own insurance from our employers. You could be up to almost $14,000 out of pocket a year on top of our negative $50 family budget a month. And that's not entertainment costs. That's not clothing. That's not shoes. that's not all the other things that we have to pay for and I don't expect any handouts I went to college I have a master's plus I'm in between a master's and a doctorate and I'm not asking for anybody to give me a handout but and I keep hearing oh in the private sector we have to pay for our health insurance guess what in the private sector you usually get a higher salary so that offsets the health insurance I mean my husband's working 56 hours a week already for the fire department in the summer he works another job when I can stay home with the kids I mean I'm working on two other grants and we still are not going to make ends meet so I don't and other families aren't even as lucky as us to have all these other opportunities so I you know I just that first point you can go back to the PowerPoint if you want or if you could please not if you want. But okay, so that first bullet, it's just really, I just wanted you to see what we're up against because I know it seems like a lot of us are being whiny or complaining, but there's a really good reason behind it. It's not, we don't want to have to go and ask for handouts, go to a food bank, go apply for welfare, any other kind of stuff. We are hardworking people and we just want to be compensated appropriately. Okay, the, I'm sorry, go back. I wasn't ready. Okay, will the clinic be ready by January 1st? That was a really big concern, which, you know, bam, we're hit with all these costs. Are we going to have a health clinic to go to, or are we going to start paying deductibles, which could be spiraling out of control over, you know, through January, through February, going to regular doctors if that clinic is not ready? The CHIP rewards program we talked about at our meeting, a lot of people are asking, What kind of rewards are there going to be? I'm healthy. I don't go to the doctor very much. What am I going to get out of this? So it would be nice to have some clarity on the CHIP rewards. And like other people were saying, education would be extremely crucial in how we can utilize the health clinic, because it doesn't sound like a lot is going to change, how we can utilize the CHIP rewards. Next, what will families with small children do? Six and under can't go. I threw out the idea to Mayor Gray. could we recruit pediatricians to volunteer their time and maybe use it as a tax write-off. Maybe Tuesdays and Thursdays could be pediatrician days or something, or Monday, Wednesday, Friday, whatever. Or maybe if we could get someone to come one day a weekend. It's very hard for us to get off work when we already are scared about losing our jobs to go down to this health clinic and wait. I'm wondering what the, I know Benji was his name, told us. you know i don't know where benji is if he's here or not hi benji okay so um if if you know there's only one doctor and two pas how long are we going to be sitting at that clinic am i going to be there all day i mean that's what i want to know so um and my children i'm still paying those deductibles and every time you go to the pediatrician it's hundreds of dollars and if We're looking at up to $14,000 a year out of pocket that I can't pay. Am I going to maybe not take my kid to the doctor? And could they get worse? Who knows? So not to mention there are lots of women that I've talked to, their children have kidney problems or are borderline diabetic. I mean, just lots of chronic issues that aren't just a cold that they have to deal with constantly. What are the employees who live out of town going to do? So over half the fire department, or nearly half, live outside of Lexington and commute every third day. They live several hours away. Are they going to drive several hours to come to this clinic, then sit there all day, and then drive several hours back? Probably not. They're going to end up meeting that out of pocket once again. Okay, next. All right. Will health care costs be amended in the 2011-2012 budget? Everyone's asking, is there anything going to be done? or are we stuck with this? Any comments? I think what we're doing is listening today. And maybe change something. And the process that a council goes through and an administration goes through is we examine these issues and that's what we'll be after you all talk. There will be a healthy discussion. We can pretty much promise that. about this. You didn't mean to stop right there, did you? Oh, no, I didn't. You can keep going. I've got a couple people that gave me their time, so I thought I would need it. Okay. I have the PowerPoint. I thought I had the PowerPoint. Okay. Another question a lot of people were asking, I know he talked about we were comped with Chattanooga, Tennessee. of the cities who use the clinic. He said there was 20 cities around the United States. So have there been customer service surveys to see if people are satisfied with these clinics? Are they happy with the care? Are they sitting there all day waiting to get treated? And what does it look like? We have no idea. We can't go see the clinic. We can't meet the doctor. We can't meet the PAs yet. And part of having healthy health care is to have consistent health care and have consistency with seeing the same doctor? You know, especially with our kids in the pediatrician situation, you know, you want to have somebody that knows you, knows your face, knows your name, you know, that can give you that good care and that quality care. So that's another question that people asked after our meeting on Saturday night. What will the fire department families do if spouses become ill and cannot pay 10 to 15 out of pocket? So what are we, you know, I've said that before, already. They help the sickest people in our cities every day. They're exposed to a lot of sickness. And I'm not just talking about a common cold. I'm talking about, you know, things like meningitis and people with hepatitis and lots of stuff that I don't see when I go to work. They're around sick people and they're in hospitals and out of hospitals. Plus they're not sleeping. My husband sleeps three to four hours a night. Granted, he's on a buggy, but I I mean, when you don't sleep, your body gets worn down. And then he comes home, and to save money on child care, watches our 4, 3, and 2-year-old so that I can go to work. And we're literally high-fiving each other in the morning as he comes in the door at 7.15, and I'm running out so I can make it to Dumbar on time. I mean, we are not seeing each other. He's not sleeping. Andy's around sick people all the time. It's just, you know, it's hard to even get to the doctor if he is sick. So I'm just saying they're exposed to a lot more. and I would expect them to have better health care. And I know the other people that are city employees, they want the better health care too, but I'm just picturing all the people that he has to help every day. And he has no problem helping them, and he loves his job, but that's just something to consider when you're taking away this health care that they have. Next, please. All right, more education before these cuts are taking place. We've already discussed this. I don't want to keep saying the same stuff, but obviously could we get newsletters when there's going to be something major going on? Can we get emails? Can we sign up for something? And there may already be something in place that we just don't know about. But two months to restructure our whole entire family budget for thousands of dollars is going to be very difficult, and I don't know where people are going to find that money. It's just not there. City Employees Child Care Center, I mentioned this and I know I talked to you after the meeting. And sorry, that's one of my flock of children. Okay, so, but, you know, doing something to help because child care costs are so expensive. Like I said, we don't want to hand out, but we would be willing to pay for child care. But if you could get some kind of something set up where people that are coming into the city, that could help. I'm just trying to think of ways to save money. Recruit volunteers, like we said before. Work with UK, maybe. I don't know if you've tried this or talked to UK. To maybe talk about health care plans through UK. I know that wouldn't help with people that live out of town, but maybe that would be cheaper. I don't know if Benji mentioned if they did that or not. But we talked about other ways to create revenue at the meeting, like a restaurant tax. I know you talked about this happening with the state legislature, and I know it's a lot of work, and I know it takes a lot of time and a lot of hassle, but I think it would be worth it in the long run because every year we are just going to keep facing these same problems. And I know you have an army of people behind you if they know that you're working to help them and create more money in the budget. And if you want people to email state representatives, you've got a whole room full of them if they know that it's going to create more money in the budget and help everybody out because obviously everyone's here because they want to help everybody out. and I mean if you put a couple extra dollars on a ticket to a concert at Rupp Arena or a ticket at Keeneland or a football game or a basketball game whatever or you know lots of people that don't live in Lexington come here to eat dinner like you were saying restaurant tax is a great idea if we can make it happen and I think that we can make it happen I teach government sorry so I'm all about just go ahead and lobby our government let's get these taxes because these aren't something like a payroll increase tax that's going to drive businesses away. It's something that is I think realistic and could work. Charestan, excuse me just a second. I think I suggested to you the other night, I said you ought to run for city council. I also was going to say, I usually have to do, I usually say I have the unpopular role of being the timekeeper. Am I going over? You're on, but that's okay. I think everybody will agree that we need to see the rest of the presentation. Yes. Okay, really quick. I'm almost done. That's good. Is this it? Is that the last one? I think there's one more. Okay. Are we applying for enough grants? I talked to you about that on Saturday. I know that is somebody's exact job because I read the budget. And I want to know, you know, what are we getting? We talked about the Bloomberg grant. Louisville got it. We didn't. Why not? Like, what are we, why aren't we applying for? That's free money. Get it in here. So what will happen if we do have brownouts? Will there be brownouts? And what's going to happen to the ISO ratings? Okay? So I'm just thinking ahead because a lot of people might be retiring because of what's going on. And maybe already we're considering retiring. So I know that's probably going to come up from some other people. And we're talking about we don't have any fat in our budget. I know you cut the PDRs from $2 million to $1 million. Why are we still paying $1 million? I know you talked about our brand, our city brand. But why are they still getting $1 million? and us people who cannot afford to feed our children are bearing the burden of cost. That doesn't make any sense to me. Still, we may need to talk more about the PDRs. I just don't get it, and it does not seem fair. And then the payroll tax, I know it has not been increased in eight years, but if we really are that desperate and hard-pressed for money, that may have to be an option. I know you said it may drive business away, but eight years is almost a decade. I mean, what's the average that they increase that, I guess, is my real question. Okay, I think that was it. And I'm sorry, I talked really fast. There's another page. There is? Well, we can go to the last, the conclusion. All right, I love the conclusion. Let's go ahead. All right, no city employee is doing their job for the money, like I said, but they did expect the solid benefits. City council can do better. I know I heard today that you did not know anything about what was going on, so I can't necessarily blame anybody and say it's anybody's fault. because if you don't know what's going on, how are you supposed to take care of it? So increasing benefits on the fire department employees days after collective bargaining felt like they were stabbed in the back, and I know I'm not just speaking from my family perspective. And Mayor Gray, you know, I loved you. I worked very hard on your campaign, but, you know, my family comes first, and the fire department is my family, and I just, these people feel really stabbed in the back. But whether it's intentional or not, I know you also were shocked by the premium increases, but we need to keep a strong relationship because it's going to hurt the future collective bargaining process if there is not trust in the system. And so we really need to reestablish trust and know that you and the whole council is working the best they can with what they have to provide us the best that they can. Okay, I'm done. Thank you for your time. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. All right, nobody else. Okay. Nobody. I didn't know about the sign-up sheet. Okay. That's all right. You want to come up? If you'll just give us your name. It's Alice Bruner. As you can see. And your address, Alice? I'm sorry. And your address, please. I live in Rolling Meadows Subdivision. I actually live outside of Lexington in Geary County. But I was born and raised here my whole life, and I have numerous family members that still live here. They serve in parks and wrecks and sanitation. So it's not just for my husband who kills himself every day for the city on that fire department. It's also for them, too. But as you can see, every single one of those little faces up there are mine. I wanted you to realize that they're not a number in your budget. They're not a piece of paper laying on your desk that gets you broke down to where you want to be in your budget. They have faces. They get sick. As their mother, I want to have the freedom to say, I can take my child if she has strep throat and get her medical care with the doctor that has been with her since the day she was born. With your plans, the only way that I could do that was to go with the health savings account, and that's to take her to a clinic that has no idea who she is. And let's get real here. There's 3,000 employees in the city that's going to be opted to use this facility somewhere, give or take a little bit of employees there. You take them having half of them being married, so you're going to add another 1,500 on top of that. Let's say I have one child. You're going to add another $1,500 on top of that. So you're looking at 6,000 people using your free facility that you say, well, it's free, but realistically it's not. We're paying for it per check. It's coming up as check. Whether you want to say that's exactly where it's coming from, he's paying for it regardless. We're just paying ahead in our paychecks. We can walk in the door and it doesn't cost us anything, but I guarantee you we're paying for it. And so is the city of Lexington. They're going to be paying for it next year when you need the extra money to keep it going. But to break it down, you have one doctor coming there. You have one nurse practitioner, I think is correct. You have a phybotomist coming in there. You have two nurses coming there. How long is 6,000 people going to wait that has strep throat, that gives a common cold, that needs a physical? How long is that wait going to be in that free clinic, your so-called health department? How long are they going to be waiting to get medical care there if there's 6,000 people in line to get it? Who's going to be able to miss all the second and third jobs if they're working to be able to afford that medical plan, the cheap medical plan, because they're waiting in line to get their flu shot, because they're waiting in line to get antibiotics? It's not affordable. And the bottom line is we can sit here and break it down 50 different ways. The bottom line is it is not an affordable health plan for anyone, single or family or anybody else. I cannot sit here and say that we have $600 and some extra dollars of paycheck laying around at our house to go and pay for this care that I'm already getting at this price. We expected a plan raised. Everybody, I think, expected that. But to raise it, that extreme amount, just seems kind of vicious to me. And I think that it could have not have. I think it could have been avoided. And I have a question for you real quick before my time is up. Did you guys ever even look at other medical places? Did you even call Anthem and say, give me a quote? Did you search around for different bids from several different insurance companies and see who could give us the best rate, who could give us the cheapest policy rates and the premium rates and the deductibles? Did they even do that? Or did you guys go straight through Humana and say, hey, slap me a number down. We'll go with you because we want it, and we're going to triple the rate up, and then we're going to tax it on their paychecks. It's okay. They'll pay it because they had no other choice. But I'll tell you, our choice is a $475 policy through Anthem. For a family of six, $475 a month, we have a zero copay on any of the policies. Our doctor visits our zero copays. It's 100% deductible. They pay everything after that. And we pay a $2,500 deductible. And it's 100% on every bill at their regular doctor's office and also at their specialist office. So I don't understand how a city as big as you could find a deal like that for all these hardworking people that sacrifice their life every single day to serve, and they'll continue to do it. Whether or not you rape them on these charges or not, they're going to continue to do it. But it's up to us. Other people that can, that won't get in trouble, get up and speak for their rights and say, this is criminal. What you're doing to us is criminal. You're just doing it the legal way. Right. Okay. You're three minutes. I just have one more thing to say real quick. I have called you every single day. I've called to the point where your mayor's office has actually asked me to stop calling and inform me that you received my messages. I think you probably know my name by now. If you haven't, you're foolish. Because they told me, Mayor Gray has received your messages. And he will return your calls. So there's no need to call back, Alice. And you know what my response is? Mayor Gray may have received my messages, but he's going to receive my calls until he returns my message. That's the point I'm trying to make. And I've emailed you every day, too. So you don't return your emails. You don't return your calls. I haven't received one for you, and I've done it daily. Not harassing. I have questions. You've made several questions there, and we will be able to answer those questions. Is that good now? I mean, I have lots more to say. Listen, since I can't get you on the phone or an e-mail, I mean, if you'd give me the time to voice my concerns, I'd like you to look at this little girl here and come in January when I can't take her to the doctor and get her shots because we literally can't afford to. And when my husband comes in and we start having marital problems because we only get an hour with each other a night between me leaving now for a nighttime job and staying with my kids during the day and him working two jobs now. I'd like you to look at her face real quick because that's the one I want you to remember. Come January when that little girl gets sick and I can't afford medical care for her. And then we're either going to go to K-Chip or we're going to go to food stamps or something else to even be able to live. All right. Thank you, Alice. Some of these questions I'd like to be able to ask our consultants to answer, so they'll need to come up to the microphone to do that. Okay? Thank you. Thank you for listening. Thank you. Briggs, I think it would probably be appropriate now. Does anyone else wish to speak? Okay. We'll come back. Mayor, Vice Mayor, Honorable Council Members, my name is Rock Vance. I worked for the Urban County Government from March 4, 1974 to September of 2002. Amazingly enough, the last time I stood at this podium was spring of 2002. There was about 250, 300 cops and firemen. We took over the parking lot down there behind Rupp Arena and walked down here. And I won't identify the ones of you who were here then, because that would show your age. Vice Mayor Gorton. Councilman Farmer. And Ms. Lawless, I believe you might have been there then. I can't remember. I wasn't on council, but I'm that old. And the topic of that conversation then was health care insurance. It was the very first budget after September 11th. And to paraphrase what I said to you then, we didn't really expect a raise. We knew things were bad. but we didn't think you'd raise our health care and basically cut our pay. Now, I listened to the guys that are still active, but I looked around a lot of the police and fire retirees and I wanted to make sure that you understood where we are in this situation. Now, I sent each and every one of you an old-fashioned letter through the mail, postmarked everything, because I wanted to make sure you got it. And I hope you did. But as I looked around the room at the guys that I worked with, I'll bet you there's 500 years of service police and fire in here, probably more. I'm trying to be conservative. Now, let me give you a little history for you new guys that are here. It's not a popular time to be a police and fire retiree. It seems like we've got kind of a bullseye on our back, basically due to all the news media attention that's drawn to our pension plan. But one of the things in our pension plan is that we had had, being the key word, free health care insurance for our retirees. Now, again, I mentioned our pension plan. The reason I brought that up is because we were compared, perhaps unfavorably, because of the disability rates, to CERSHD, the state plan that a lot of other police and fire departments are throughout the state. The reason I bring that up is when those people retire, they have paid family plan health insurance. Myself and some of my colleagues marched the halls of Frankfurt in the late 90s asking for something for our retirees because they had nothing. They could pay for health insurance, but they had nothing. We succeeded, and I happen to know the political tradeoff that was made back then. It was rather interesting. But we got paid single coverage health insurance for our retirees. Unfortunately, I wasn't pleased with the way that legislation was worded, and I was afraid it would come back to bite us, and it did, because all it does is give us what's in the benefit pool for a single employee. So if the benefit pool doesn't cover, it comes out of pocket. So for my personal story, my health insurance with this new plan went from zero to $280 per month to keep the same plan. Even the worst plan, or the least expensive I should say, is $10 a month, but I can't afford it with all the co-pays and the out-of-pockets and the deductibles, etc. And that's going to be true for the rest of us. The spirit of that law, that legislation was passed, was to provide paid single coverage health plan insurance for our retirees. Again, I realize it's not a popular time to be a police and fire retiree. However, that was the spirit of the law. The letter of the law has bitten us. And I hope you will look to see fit to make sure that we still provide single coverage health care insurance. Or if you want to go crazy, you can make it family plan, but at least single cover health insurance for our police and fire retirees. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Vance. I'm Jeff Jones. The address is 1792 Greenleaf Drive. Came down here to support the fire and the police and the rest of Irving County Government employees. I think it's said when you have employees that's looking for another job because they can't afford it. As I was talking to some of the employees at work, we have three employees right now. When they get through with this benefit plan that y'all have created, they will owe the city for working for you all. And I think that's not what y'all designed, but that's what y'all came up with. Police and fire is very important. We need them, but the rest of Irving County government, you need also. I think what y'all need to really take time out to do, one council member said today, and I'm going to get out of your way, he said, if I want to, I can get off of this plan and get on my wife's plan, and I could put that money into something else. But for this council, I want you to know, we as employees, we all don't have that option. We can't get on another plan. My son, if he needs a shot, I want to be able to take care of him. I don't want to have to work a second job where I lose the valuable time of raising him to be a man in this city. So what I ask of you all, to go back to the drawing board, think about your employees who come to work every day, provide for their family, and to provide a good service for you all. And we will really appreciate your time and the effort that you do for us. Thank you, Jeff. Thanks, Jeff. All right. Oh. have another. I would just like to read a letter from the Lexington employee to you guys and then I have a couple questions. Give us your name, please. My name is Missy Norris. And I live in Georgetown, Kentucky. It says, sir, I'm an LFUCG employee, Division of police. My wife has cancer and my two-year-old son has medical issues continuously since birth due to an unforeseen and unpreventable issue during my wife's pregnancy. Obviously, I'm extremely displeased with the recent decisions put forth by the mayor, especially, as you noted, with little to no warning to the increases. Neither I nor any member of my family engage in risky health or life choices. We're simply dealing with the health issues that we were given. God knows that my wife didn't ask to be stricken with cancer and numerous other health issues to say nothing of my son's issues. Today, on 10-20-20-11, my two-year-old endured a surgery. During the new... This one was to create a deficient testicular issue that was classified as elective. The result of not doing the surgery now would have likely been part of his lower intestine seeping into his scrotum, and it would have occurred with no mention of the excruciating pain that would have accompanied my son, he would also likely have been forced into emergency surgery to correct the problem. Under the new plan, elective surgeries would have been a terrible financial burden to our family. I am writing you simply to share my frustration and encourage you to pursue any reasonable end result possible. I live in Scott County, yet I serve the citizens of Fayette County with diligence and professionalism. I agree fully that change is warranted and it's inevitable in the current system. I am also painfully aware that as an employee without a vote in local politics, my situation or opinion may not mean as much. However, if I choose the same level of medical care plus any additional out-of-pocket expenses for specialists and other medical treatment that is out of the realm of normal general preventative medical care, you again will be penalized. Again, we support change for the greater good of the balanced budget, but we also agree that this extreme measure on the backs of the very people who keep Lexington running is unfair and inequitable. I along with many of my colleagues whom I believe I speak for, they do support reasonable adjustment over time, which is common in the private sector, and they do support you guys along with the other reasonable council members who pursue more just and reasonable measures to this abrupt policy change. And I have two questions. In the end, I do work a full time job too. This is my husband. I have cancer. Didn't ask for it, don't want I work a full-time job, make significantly more amount of money than he does. However, I pay $200 a week for child care. My mortgage payment, my car payment, and my ordinary bills, taking an additional amount of money from his paycheck, $400, which would be what we would have to do because of our medical issues, is ultimately me filing bankruptcy. And it would be easier for my family to live on welfare and not to work than it is for us both to work a full-time job. So the first question is, you made it very clear the changes were coming. Why were they finalized with so little time for the employees to decide and understand them? And then, why wouldn't you provide more time and explain to the employees to understand why not a more graduated and gradual increase so that we could adjust our finances? Thank you. That's it. Thank you, Richard. Does anyone else wish to speak? Okay. All right. Thank you all again very much. We have some council members that have signed on to speak, And we also have, I think, the consultants who have worked on the plan are available also for some comments and questions. So, Council Member Lawless? My question, I have some questions for the consultants. I also want to say I appreciate the service of all our city employees. I was a single parent, and back then they didn't have major medical insurance. I had a child who had very serious health issues, and I have been there. I've lived it. I understand it. And I am very sad about the predicament everybody is in that is suffering right now in this economy. So that being said, the second thing I want to say is I don't know about, and I can appreciate, Allison, your frustration, but I know I have received close to 200 emails and or calls a day since this came out. And finally, there's just not enough hours. So speaking on behalf of the other council members and Mayor Gray about trying to return all those is an impossible task. I actually had six council members email me back personally and actually answer personal questions in those emails. So I've actually had quite a few take the time in the day. And I've answered some, but I've also been working. And you were actually one of the ones that answered mine. So, I mean, you did find time in the day to answer mine. I think you didn't attend so many parties, but not people take the time in the day. Well, I don't know about the partying, but I wasn't. So anyway, I just want to say it's hard, and it's hard for everybody. I like the ideas that I heard about volunteers and other options. I've been preaching about volunteerism in this city since I got here. I've been an active volunteer my whole life. My question here is for the consultants. I think one of the issues that is difficult for everybody to understand, including myself, is how HSA works, the wellness clinic. This is an enormous amount of work that has been done in a short period of time, given what we as a council and the mayor were handed last November. And I'm not one of the council members that was involved in the health care plan, But I think that one of the questions I have and has been posed to me by several people have been things like on the HSA, too. It's like a savings account. And it says deductible and then, you know, how much your medications will cost. The questions I've gotten have been, does that mean I have to pay the $2,500 or $5,000 deductible before I can pay for my prescriptions out of my health care savings account? And the answer I have researched is, of course, no. HSAs can be a very good deal for a lot of people. and also that at the end of the year, if you go with HSA-2, a single person, it will cost them $10 per month. And with the city's contribution, they will have in the bank $4,889.84 by my calculations. I'm curious, it says max out-of-pocket single family. So if they go over that $44,889.84, will the city pick up what is over the $2,500 out-of-pocket max? That's correct. The self-funded plan has a maximum exposure of $2,500 plus that $2,500 deductible. So somebody consumes about $15,000 worth of health care and out-of-pocket $5,000. The city's self-funded plan would pick that up 100% thereafter. So for a single person, it would be $10 a month. They'll have $5,000 in their bank account. Have $500 in their bank account and exposure of $5,000. Well, they have to also pay the premium. Correct. So I was adding the premium, and the $500 for the single would be right at $5,000. So basically with the HSA-2, a single person would not have any exposure beyond what would be in their health savings account with the HSA-2. The HSA-2 has a $2,500 deductible. Correct. Then the city pays 80% of the cost, the employee pays 20% of the next $12,500 in expenses. Once the employee is out of pocket 20% of $12,500, which is $2,500, plus their $2,500 deductible, they get the maximum exposure in that year of $5,000. Offsetting that would be the $500 health savings account as a credit. I guess an additional expense would be the $10 a month of payroll deduction that you're mentioning. Right. So my point here is that for $10 a month on an HSA-2, the employee's maximum exposure beyond their premium, which is $10 more than their benefit pool, and the extra $500 the city puts in would amount to about $12, $13 a year. That's worst-case scenario. I'm not sure I'm following your math there at the end. Excuse me? Yeah, the plan, just real quickly, for single employee, non-collective bargaining, the payroll deduction per month is approximately $10. Correct. So to have health care as a single employee and HSA-2 as your option, you're going to contribute about $120 a year to be in the plan, to have the insurance protection. Plus the $355 the city pays. That's going to be net. Each employee gets $300. Excuse me. The gross premium is $365. The city pays $355, so that creates a payroll deduction of $10 a month. Correct. $10 a month times $12 will be $120 is what they would pay in payroll deduction to participate in the plan. Correct. All right, now let me just make a couple other clarifying comments there. They will also get a $500 contribution from the city into their health savings account. Correct. So if they consume zero health care, which is probably not a good thing. We want them to consume some preventive health care. If they consumed zero health care, they would have paid $120 in in payroll deductions and be left with a bank account that has $500 in it. That doesn't make sense to me because they would get $500 plus the $365 a month that goes into it, $10 out of their pocket, and $355 a month from their benefit pool. And that's at $10 a month to the employee's cost. Right, and the city puts in $350 out of their benefit pool. No, the gross cost is $365. Okay, so we're going in circles here. So obviously I have worked on this for hours and hours and consulted with several insurance people, and so we can answer this, but this I think shows the confusion. and the math. I understand. And I'm a math person, so I'll let somebody else speak, but I think that these are the kinds of things that need to be talked about with employees in small groups. Right. And certainly I would like to be in one of those small groups because, like I say, It says here an employee premium is $365 a month plus another $500 a year. Health savings account contribution by the city. And when I add those numbers up, it comes to $4,889.84. So we'll move on, and Vice Mayor Gordon's up next. Thank you. Vice Mayor Gordon. Thank you, Mayor. I don't really have any questions for you. I want to talk about maybe the broader picture, which I think we have all realized since we first saw these numbers and heard from our employees that most of our employees cannot absorb this change this year. And one of the questions I asked today at Budget and Finance was, whether there had been discussions over easing this in over a period of two or three years. And I realized the budget situation, but I also think these benefits plans will harm many of our employees terribly. So what I really think is that even though we've got the printed book, and even though we have open enrollment set for November 7th, that this is a great opportunity for the council and the mayor to work together to bring a better plan back. And it should be, I'm sure that gives a lot of people big nerves because this work is already done. But we cannot do this to our employees. I'm sure some of them will be on food stamps. They will have to sacrifice day-to-day expenditures to pay for health care. I don't have the solution. Maybe some of my colleagues do, and maybe you could brainstorm with us. But I think this is a good opportunity, Mayor, to put our heads together and get some better plans to comb through the budget, to figure out how we can pay for it. and maybe to spread it out over two years' time. That's really all I have. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Briggs, do you want to comment? Yeah, let me just make a couple of clarifying comments, and I've enjoyed the richness of the discussion here this afternoon. Back on July 12th when we first reported to Council a forensic study, this is the reality of what we were dealing with. In 2009, the budget for health care was $20 million. The city consumed $30 million of health care in 2009. In 2010, despite consuming $30 million of health care the year before, what did you budget in 2010? You budgeted $20 million again. What did you spend in 2010? You spend $30. You go to 2011. Even though you spent $30 million the two years previous, 2009, 2010, what did you budget in 2011? $20. What are you on track to spend? $33 million. So the sobering reality is if you make no changes in your benefit structure, if we keep everything as is, I can tell you with a great deal of certainty, the insurance companies are going to send you a due bill for $33 million. Period. End of story. If everybody stays in the current plans that we have, the bill that the city is going to receive is going to be $33 million. There's no getting around that. The other clarifying comment I wanted to make is that this is self-funded. You know, when we talk about does Anthem have a better quote, does UnitedHealthcare have a better quote, does Bluegrass Family have a better quote, we're not quoting. The city pays the bills. So 95% of the $33 million cost is directly related to sticking checks in envelopes and sending them to hospitals and doctors and labs and prescription drug stores. So you're not going to go budget 20, spend 30, budget 20, spend 30, budget 20, spend 33 million, and magically wave a magic wand over this and not change the benefit structure and spend $20 million in 2012. It's just not going to happen. And so our charge as a consultant was to help you calculate the correct gross premiums. We're not in charge of saying what does your benefit pool need to be. We're not in charge about how much money you want to allocate to this. Our charge is to tell you what it's going to cost. And if you make no change in your benefit structure in 2012, the city will get a due bill that's made up of checks being sent to envelopes to health care providers of about $33 million. So I just offer that clarifying comment, Mayor, just to start the discussion. Thanks. All right, Biggs. Thanks. Vice Mayor Gordon wants to add to her comment earlier. Well, all of us up here do understand the budget situation. My comment, and I think our employees expected to pay more. They did expect they were educated and expected to pay more. I think the situation is they didn't expect to pay this much more. So that's where I was coming from. Right. Let me just... And we know that you're going to explain, I think, the level and the severity once the numbers were calculated by Humana, which does this. You know, folks, believe it or not, it's as confusing to some of us as it probably is to you. And one of the challenges of a situation like this is, it's sort of like Drew, you said, you know, when we're in a condition like this, we sometimes have to learn and we have to educate. And usually in some education, there's some pain associated with it. When we were informed by Humana of these rates, the level and the severity was significant. And that's what we're certainly hearing today. Been hearing for about two weeks now. Yes, sir. So that's what Vice Mayor Gordon is talking about. I think what the Council is also saying, in recognition of the severity of some of these plans, the absence of a complete understanding, perhaps, and education yet that is still emerging. I, for example, am one who has been told, you know, I can move from my former employee to employer here, for a premium that is lower. And so I'm trying to understand that. But as we're going through this, I think what we're going to have to consider quickly is what can we do, if anything, associated with budget cuts to meet these needs? And that's what you all have been asked to do. as a consultant to us. Now, you might give us some context for, I think, what you're doing, though, when you share with us those numbers, I think it's like, okay, what's the headline of this? We know it's bad. We all know that. Right. And what you've tried and what the mission and through our budget was, was to achieve what you all call a cost of service. Correct. Where the cost of our health care is actually paid for by the government's contributions and the employees' contributions. And that's what then Humana worked with in order to develop these rates. Correct. And that's what we have today. Now, what we have the challenge of doing today is meeting the employees' needs and trying to be fair and responsible with our budget that we all know. And, again, I'm not lecturing. You all know this better than I do even. That is tough. So that's what we've got to work on, it seems like to me, pretty quickly. I fully agree. That is the cost of service that the premiums reflect. Right. Okay. Council Member Stennett? Thank you, Mayor Briggs. Thank you for coming. We appreciate your time as well today. But I first want to address our employees and people in the audience. Thank you for your calls, e-mails. There's been some very good suggestions out there. And, again, a full disclosure, I do health insurance for a living, as Briggs does. And so I may know a little bit more than some of my colleagues. But at the same time, looking at these rates, comparing them to what else is out there, it's hard to fit one size fits all with each employee situation, each family situation, as to which rate's better amongst our plans. so there's a lot of educational opportunities amongst just our plans, but even in the private sector because, as you know, Briggs, there's a lot of hurdles you have to jump to qualify for those plans privately. So I think we need to take a step back. I think we're rushing this forward. I think there's a lot of opportunities here to make it right with the employees and with our citizens in the budget. You know, the mayor said something about being financially responsible earlier. Well, what about being morally responsible? Because when I tell these men and women here, When you all leave this room today, it's not just about you. It's about your wives, your kids, your families. It's about the rest of our community out there that supports you. But at the same time, we owe an obligation to the other 270,000 citizens to balance our budgets. We don't want to continue to be in a budget hole, and that's what the mayor's trying to keep us from continually being year after year. He and I both learned this problem last November, And we vowed that over the next year we would have to fix this problem. And without going into the weeds and asking how you calculate and how he managed to calculate each single individual, family, et cetera, I'll accept these rates, but what does the council, the solution is what does the council need to do to buy the rate down, to keep the rate the same based on last year's rates for the Platinum Plan? What does that plan benefit look like? And I guess my first question to you, Briggs, is did we look at that option? Did we say, hey, let's just freeze the rates? We understand it's going to be troubling to expose our employees to these added costs, given the economy, given no raises for our non-sourced last three years, given the outcomes of our health claims over the last several years. Did we look at that even? Did we even explore that option? The answer is pretty simple. The top line is not going to change. It's still going to be $33 million. The premiums for 2012, the employee premiums, are based on an aggregate LFUCG contribution of $16 million. And $16 million is simply a function of multiplying the number of non-collective bargaining times 355, police, fire, corrections, etc. And when you take the census of 2,959 employees and you bump that up against their respective benefit buckets, that totals $16 million is what the city should be paying now and was proposed to pay in 2012. If we want to keep the employee payroll deductions where they are right now and have the same benefits, LFUCG's contribution increases from $16 million to $28 million. So to keep the employee premiums exactly where they are right now and the same benefit structure, LFUCG has to increase your contribution from $16 million to $28 million. Does that answer your question? No, but I understand what you're saying. And you're saying if we stay from platinum to PPOA, it would cost us that. What I'm asking is, what if we just kept the rates the same, the exact same rates we funded last year? What would the benefit look like, the plan design look like? Did we even take that into consideration? Well, those premiums that you're talking about, a $720 premium for platinum family. It's $745, right. Or whatever it is. It is so grossly underpriced with the reality of what the actual cost of service is. I think you'd probably be doing a disservice. I think we need to deal with the right top-line premium to fund the actual liability, state it, and then figure out how much allocation of LFUCG resources. The fact that if I took the $745 premium for 2011, which is understated by $600. For the Platinum Plan. For the Platinum Plan. I'm not talking about other plan designs. rolled it forward, the same reality is going to happen. What I just said is going to happen. The city is either going to budget $28 million or they're going to budget $16 million and get hit with a bill on the back end for $12 million that they didn't budget for. The premium be at $720, $1,300, it doesn't matter. You're still going to consume $33 million of health care with 89% of your employees enrolled in the Platinum Plan. And so if you want to leave the employees' payroll deductions there and budget for it, it's going to cost $28 million. If you want to pay what the benefit pools were designed to pay, you're going to pay $16 million. So the premiums, we just took the amount of health care that's being consumed, again, 95% of that $33 million. It's not insurance. It's simply sticking checks in envelopes and sending them to health care providers. And it's really our charge as a consultant is to tell you what the correct premium should be. And if I went into the new year with a $740 premium for Platinum Plan A, that's not the correct premium. Well, and I'm not asking that. I think we still aren't getting to the point. The point is, what would the plan look like if we wanted to charge our employees $745 for our family? Well, look at HSA-2. HSA-2, I think, cost $764. Right, so it's close to that. So that's what that plan is. I'm sorry. Took a long way to get there. That's okay. That's why we're here. It's hard to get down the weed sometimes, but that's why we're here. All right, thank you. So, you know, looking at our calculations back on what we had in November of last year based on employee only, employee single, employee spouse, do you have those updated numbers based on the breakdown? I think you all would because I'm not sure anyone else in government has. Do you want to know the number of employees in each category? Yes. Do you have that? You don't have to give them to me now, but I'd like to get them at some point. But using November numbers from 2010, we had 3,193 employees, so almost 200 more employees. If I were to buy down the rate as a council and find an extra funding of HSA-1 and PPOC, it comes to about $1.9 million. And to me, $1.9 million is a very small number compared to what these families will have to go through in our city. And I don't say that necessarily to give applause, but I'm trying to characterize it in our overall scheme of things. We had a budget surplus beginning this year of $1.6 million, just to put it into perspective. We have other things out there that may need to be cut at the end of the year, and the big thing is we don't have to find that today. Because, as you said, we don't know exactly what our claims will be the next six months, 100%. And within certain, we can pay some platinum plan, yeah. But we know in logic speaking, we're not all going to stay on the platinum plan. We can't afford to. So we're going to look at other different plan options. And I think over the next six months, to steer people towards the wellness clinic once it gets up and running, to look at give people an opportunity, the flexibility. Do I want to put extra money away for my health care? Or do I want the rent-to-own, so you speak, with the PPO, that I'll pay these low co-pays in the early on, but it's going to cost me later? Give them the flexibility options, and making those two plans, the PPOC and the HSA-1, the same rates as last year, would cost about $1.9 million, which is conservative, because I used November of O10 numbers, so probably a little less. I think there's an opportunity for the council and the mayor to work together to find it and to make sacrifices somewhere else in our budget to show our employees once and for all, they've done everything we've asked them to do for three years to save their budgets, save your operating budget, come to work every day with very little displeasure. You've done it. But I think it's now time to pay you back and show you we mean what we say sitting around this horseshoe. So thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you. Council Member Farmer. Thank you, Mayor. First, I want to thank our employees who have represented themselves today here exceedingly well. I and all the other council members appreciate that very much. I want to follow up a little bit on what Council Member Stennett was asking about. And, Breeze, you did indicate, in my opinion, that you did have those individual breakout numbers. And I would really like to know. And there's employee only, employee and spouse, employee with children, and employee with family. Correct. So last year employee only was 1,580. How many is it this year? 1,376. Last year, employee and spouse was 509. 463. 163. 463. Thank you. And employee with children was 285. That's 284. Thank you. And employee with family was 819. That's 836. And of my 1376, 463, 284, 836 should add up to 2,959 employees. And that's the number that was at the bottom of the sheet that was handed out, but we just never had the breakdown. I think we wanted to follow up on what Council Member Sending has worked on. We were trying to find out what those individual groups would be and how much that buy-down would be so that we could offer an option for HSA-1, or is it in PPOC? That's the point. I want to make sure that we understand kind of what we're talking about here. And then, Mayor, my question is, between last week and this week, Did you all have any other kind of conversation about trying to change any of this? Or is what it is is what it is? I think we're working on it as we speak. The illustration of the severity, I've tried to say it before, being with several of the employees on Saturday night, engaging in the conversations that we have. We are clearly recognizing and appreciate folks coming out. What we're trying to be is transparent with this and illustrate what the problem is. That hasn't been something we've been aware of in the past. Now we are. and looking at different options and how if the city needs to either cut the budget or subsidize, then those are issues that we're going to be having to look at, and we are as we speak. Well, I think we're dealing in the... We haven't known that we were subsidizing it before. I appreciate the reality of the situation, but I think we're dealing in the here and now. And, yeah. And, like, at this meeting, at this time, in this place kind of stuff. Real time. So you have, and I don't want this to sound harsher than it is, you have nothing else to add to this conversation today in terms of what was proposed last week and this week? I think what we are doing is we are listening and we are working on alternatives and we are hearing suggestions just now. Now, I believe that the consultants have done a responsible job in examining the costs and what it's going to take to fix the hole. And they've relied on specialists in order to provide the different plans, right? Mm-hmm. Okay. You think that they represent, not in terms of how they're paid for, But you think that they represent credible, responsible options. Absolutely. Right. And together with the wellness center, which is significant, that that represents the total plan. I just feel like we're trying to fix this all at one time on the backs of too few people. And I think that the suggestion that Councilmember Senate brought forth, which I think was some of the numbers that we kind of got just now, there's a motion that could be made today, and there's a funding mechanism that could be put in place today that could alter open enrollment for next week. And that's the here and now I'm talking about. There's a leadership opportunity right now, and I think the council needs to seize it, because you're right, this is tough. This has been tough all year long. The businessman's budget, it's getting a little old, man. And I'm glad we've made plan for the first three months of the new year. But we've got to find a way to mitigate this pain on this day. And I would appreciate a motion or something from Council Member Stenet after some of the other conversations, because I think there's an answer here today that we need. It's easy to go online and post about any kind of comment you want, but it's not easy to get up and go out and be a policeman, be a fireman, collect the trash, make sure the sewer is okay. And we have to take care of our own here, and that's what we should be about today. And I appreciate your leadership getting us to this point, but we need to turn the corner right now. Thank you, sir. Council Member Fort Worth. Thank you, Mayor. I'll try to get right to the point in my comments on this issue. I do thank the employees for being here, those that have had the courage to express to us their concerns. And I think that we all recognize by now that their concerns are real, that their anxiety is very high and great, as we understand it should be in a time of not only local but national economic uncertainty. But simply, we collectively, in my opinion, cannot afford this. The administration, the council, and the employees of urban county government. And I say that collectively because I, as many of you guys know, not long ago I was in the seat at the desk providing the service of a civil service employee. And I know I sworn folks are here and they provide value. But what we hear today from the employees is not a sworn versus civil service. These are the employees standing united trying to stand up for their rights, what's owed them through compensation, fair compensation. And I consider health insurance in the benefit package, although the fringe benefit are part of the compensation package. And one of the speakers did a great job illustrating the negative impact that these costs will have to the compensation package of our employees. No raises for three years for civil service employees. And then attrition has greatly hurt our employees. So when we have friends and co-workers that have the benefit of retiring, somebody has to do their work because we're not filling their positions. That also resorts in a pay cut. But all in all, our employees have stood strong to provide a service. The reason I say we cannot afford this is because to provide that service, we need motivated, capable, alert, attentive, responsive employees. And that's hard to do when staff morale is at an all-time low. And it's going to also result in diminished service delivery. if our employees are going to be distracted because of the economic burdens placed on them, if they're going to have to resort to second and third jobs to bring in income to cover this. So I understand our challenges as a government, but I echo Council Member Farmer and what's been said. I think it's unfair to put a great deal of the weight on the backs of the employees. I think that now is our time, Mayor and Vice Mayor Gordon and Council members, to solve this problem. I think we recognize, as presented right now, there's going to be great harm to our employees. But again, I hope that we can quickly. Open enrollment starts next week. And I don't foresee open enrollment going forth as presented, in my opinion. I can't support the numbers presented. right now. But I will say, in closing, it's going to require us to make some tough decisions. What I'm asking for is an alternative to help us address this issue now with the reality that there will be some tough decisions to be made. I just don't think that the answer is what we have right now. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Councilman Ford and Councilmember Farmer as well. I think what we are certainly hearing is, what we're surely hearing, is the need to balance these tough decisions. And what I want to commit to is that we as an administration will work to answer just that question as much as we can and any suggestions that anybody on the Council has for reducing the budget, for cutting the budget so that we can supplement, so that we can provide the subsidies beyond the cost of service. Let's get those together. Please give them to us as quickly as you can. All right. Council Member Martin. Thank you, Mayor. Briggs, thank you for coming. Thanks for taking a moment to speak with me this morning. And I, too, appreciate all the folks who are here today, and I know how really difficult this is for everybody. We have to do better. We have to challenge the numbers, and this is not acceptable. We can point fingers as to how we got here, but really we have one question. is we have a $14 million hole, and how do we fill it? The decision that was made was to have the employees pay the $14 million. When your company came in July and presented the phase of this project, phase three was council, employee, and retirement. I better not show that. I have written comments on it that aren't very friendly, but I'll read it. Council Employee and Retirement Engagement, Retiree Engagement. And one bullet point was Council Health Care Planning Sessions. And I think that's the piece that was missing, because the planning and the discussion of how are we going to pay for this $14 million basically never took place. We were all waiting for the plan to see what the proposal was. And I think the proposal ended up being basically the plan and was going to be implemented in a couple days. I think that's what we need here is the conversation about how do we as a council want to fill that $14 million hole. Because we understand the numbers are real. Okay, so one of the first questions in designing a new plan is whether Lexington is making contributions that are comparable to what other folks make. Commonwealth of Kentucky, for example, or University of Kentucky. Chris, you got some of those? So page three of these materials. You can blow it up as big as you can. This is the Commonwealth of Kentucky smoker rates, I guess. And I apologize to both the audience and the folks at home. This is the best we have. But the point that I wanted to bring out, and I think perhaps Willie sent this around, was that the employer contribution by the state of Kentucky is higher than we made. For singles, it's $470. For parent plus, it's $704. For couples, it's $810. For families, it's $932. And I'm not sure I understand the family cross-reference. It has something to do with smoking. But it's different levels for different circumstances. And so that is not only are the payment by the government higher, but it's also different based on, I guess, different circumstances. And the same with the different kind of plans at the Commonwealth. There are different levels of co-pay. So I think, and if you'll go to the next one, Chris, and the smoker's rates, the non-smoker rates, it's the same premium, but the contribution is less. And so the employee is essentially paying more for the lifestyle choice of smoking. And so that's one thing that we have because smokers have higher rates. They have more health issues. So I think one of the things we can do is to look at our rate structure so that it's not one size fits all, so that it does take into account family circumstances, and then it takes into account different lifestyles. Chris, if you would, the next one is the University of Kentucky rates. And again, same thing. They have different rates, and I apologize again for the difficulty to see that. But it's basically different contributions for employees or employees with children, employees with spouses, and employees with families. So one thing that these things we looked at, they're higher costs for nonsmokers and smokers. There are higher cost for smokers. There's higher employer contributions for various types of families and different for families and individuals. So I think there are things that we can do with our plan to make it sort of more appropriate for our employees and their families. We as a council, as we look at what are we going to contribute, I think we are, under this proposal, we are going to be contributing less than both the University of Kentucky and the Commonwealth of Kentucky seem to be doing. And so I think we should look at, when we determine what part should we be paying, to compare ourselves to others. And as the folks on the pension know, I like comparing to other cities and things like that, and it does actually work the same way. So the other thing is to reduce the cost of our plans. I mean, we've talked and said what someone mentioned earlier is that do we actually have to have the super platinum plan? And what we need is basically lesser costs with lesser benefits, I think. And so how do you do that in a way that most people get the most benefits every day, but their extraordinary costs start costing more? And I'm not a health insurance person. And I guess the very last thing, Mayor, if I just had a second, is that we all must be healthier. Council Member McCord, Council Member Myers have made this point time and time again. If we are going to lower our costs, we have to be healthier. So we have to put in more. I think the costs are going up. There's no doubt about that. But I think there's a way to look at these benefits in a way that is reasonably comparable to what other institutions similar to LFUCG are doing. and hopefully that we can have a terrific health care plan that our employees are proud of that is reasonably advantageous to our employees and our retirees and that we can find a way to get through in our budget. So thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Mr. Martin. Before I call on Councilman Myers, The vice mayor and I were just talking, and based on the conversation tonight, this afternoon rather, the thoughts, the comments that we've heard, the work that has been being done, the transparency of it in this effort toward problem solving. We discussed meeting first thing in the morning. and she actually has a nursing job that she's going to take off from in order to have this meeting. And I'd like to ask, since Council Member Stennett has the experience that he has in this issue, I'd like for him to join us as well, and along with you guys, along with the consultants. And then we will get back with other members of the council, and we will keep working. this, as you all have suggested, and recognizing the severity, clearly, of the challenges that we got and the need for us to address it in as meaningful a way as we can. All right. Council Member Myers. Thank you, Mayor, and I appreciate your willingness to slow this thing down and take another look at it. I think that Council Member Stenet does have a solution here that, if he makes a motion today, I think I'm ready to support that motion. But I want to say, you talked also again, Mayor, about transparency, and I just want to say that you talked about sending emails out and letters out and things, and in your letter you talked about council members being involved in setting the rates, and I was just wondering if somebody could tell us who those council members were that were involved directly with setting rates. From a timeline perspective, we approved Humana as the carrier for January 2012 on September 20th. Once that was done, we immediately started working with underwriting and our expertise in that area, developing plan designs, knowing full well that we were going to have to express $14 million of unfunded premium in the form of premium. and started developing those plan designs. It was on October 7th that Humana finally signed off on the various plan designs, and we delivered that to council, I think, on the 13th. Through that process, we were looking at some benchmark data, working with HR. I think, George, from my perspective, the takeaway is I don't think that the implications of $14 million of underfunding expressed in the form of premium, the sobering reality of that probably wasn't caught to the depths. We see it now in black and white. But that was the timeline in terms of us developing the premium. And once we finally got sign-off on the premium on October 7th, I know that we worked diligently to get this over into your council packets on, I think, October 13th, which is six days later. And then, of course, we met and presented them to you on October 18th. But there's some comments. Okay, because I still didn't hear what council members were involved in directly saying the rates. And I will tell you that. I will tell you that I got the rates in a sealed envelope that said confidential marked on the outside of it, and that's the first time I saw the rates. So I don't think that any council members were involved in the rate setting. So I wanted to make that clarification. If I said that, I apologize if that was the way it was spoken, if that was written. Okay. I accept that. Thank you very much. The council members were involved in the process of selecting the vendors. Okay. Yeah. It's not the email you got for me. Okay. If you said that. I accept the mayor. It's a lot. Okay. All right. Okay. Okay. The second question I had is, I think it was said earlier that about 65% of our employees have less than $1,000 in claims each year. Do you know if that's accurate? I think that's a commonality across all employers that you'll find, you know, Central Kentucky, Kentucky, all across the United States. And what I was trying to communicate there primarily is everybody, when they make health care selections, they're always thinking about what is the worst thing that can possibly happen to them. So that's part of the education that we've got to get in. And then, George, even if somebody has a horrific claim, what's the maximum exposure on the other end of that equation? But that is a correct statement. Okay. So before I get into a little bit of detail, when we set up this plan, when this plan was presented to us, and it has that children under six don't have access to the clinic, it seems to me that that puts an even greater burden on families because at that age, under six, they're not in school yet, which means the parents may be paying for child care. Once they get into school, the child care cost goes away, so they can see that we have a little more money in their budget that they could spend if the kids weren't eligible to go to the clinic at that point in time. So could you talk about how you guys arrived at a plan that excluded under six children from being? A best practice of a wellness center, certainly if you were in a real rural area where you didn't have a robust pediatrician community, I think that a wellness center would lend itself a little bit more gravitating to that kind of a model. With health care reform, federal health care reform, preventive care is covered at 100% under the Humana plans. Now, I'm not going to try to get away from some of the realities of kids breaking their legs and stitches and this type of thing, But general pediatric care, preventive care, is covered at 100% under the Humana plans accessing, if you would, the retail pediatrician market, so to speak. But that's a best practice in terms of where to set that age. So if a two-year-old has pneumonia, is that preventive care? No, it's not. No, it's not. Okay, so the health care issues that kids have, getting sick, colds, that kind of thing, is not going to be covered with the Humana Plan. Is that correct? It will be covered. It will be covered, but it's not. It could be subject to a deductible. It could be subject to a co-pay, depending on the election the employee makes. Okay. Let me read something to you. And I'll tell you, for folks who want to get online, there's a website called the Wellness Council of America. Hill, Wakula. And I just did a Google search a couple of days ago when we got these premiums and started looking at wellness plans. And this website just has a ton of documents and research that's already done, case studies of other cities, school districts, private sector companies that have a wellness plan in place and the money they're saving. One of them is a school system that has a 15-to-1 return on its investment on its wellness plan. so this isn't a question for you but a couple of years ago this government decided that all the people that were on our health care plan that were not either employees of the government or retirees from this government would be removed from our plan and Mary, this is for you when we did that, you were on the council when we did that we gave all those organizations or agencies a year to plan for that in advance. The council consciously voted to give them a year to find other health care. So we did that for people who are not employees of the government or retires of the government. It seems to me that when I talked about this plan not being just or balanced, that we could have provided an opportunity for this to be kind of phased in. And I know that you weren't here then and you didn't have anything to do with that decision, But I guess I would ask, were there any conversations about trying to phase this in so that the employees didn't take this big a hit all at once? What we've been going through for almost the last year was recognizing what the problem represents and how much, and now today, what we're doing, continuing to do, is to recognize that. and if we need to make adjustments because of the severity of it, then that's what we are working toward doing. And, George, I do want to ask you, go back and look at that letter again because I don't believe I said what you quoted me as saying. But what we've got to do, all of this represents that we have to keep working on this issue, and despite the feelings of some toward some of us, especially me, My commitment is that we keep working on it. Okay. So the wellness program aspect of this, where does that come in? Because Council Member Martin talked about the different smoker rates, and I've been advocating that for years. I left a company back in 1995 to go to the U.K. Three or four or five years before I left that company, they had already instituted smoker rates back in the early 90s. The state's done it for years. I keep talking about, and Council Member McCord and I, and actually Council Member Kay, when he came on the council, were working on these things as well. Arguably, anywhere from 50 to 70 percent of health care costs are caused by personal choices that are preventable. And it seems to me that when you talk about this $33 million and the cost for service and that cost isn't going to go away, But if we, rather than put a static increase on everybody, we looked at this whole wellness piece and came up with incentives to change behavior, that would have decreased those costs. That's how you impact that $33 million. So when does that come into play here? Because it seems like the low-hanging fruit would have been simply because the state does it and other people do it, charge more for smoking. We all know that that wreaks havoc on health care costs, from the person that smokes to the children in the family that have ear infections and all the rest of the stuff that results from secondhand smoke. So if you can talk a little bit about when those things are coming online, what are the incentives going to be for employees to make healthier choices, and what do you guys think about that with respect to decreasing that $33 million number? I think that once we stabilize and everybody enrolls in coverages that are aligned with their family's needs, council decides what the employer contribution is, and once we settle into what our gross spending is, in fact, I personally think and believe that you're going to see a gravitation from a $33 million number maybe down to a $27, $26, $25 million number because people are going to choose PPOC or HSA1. But we are not at all satisfied with just allowing that to take back off again on a 9% trend line. In fact, the second part of our strategy to make it a sustainable health care plan would be to really focus on improving the clinical health of LFUCG employees and their dependents. The solution that's going to give us absolutely the most traction is going to be Marathon Health. And I don't want to go into a dissertation about that. I'd be glad to talk about that. Not only are they going to be providing primary care and acute care, but their real value proposition long term for LFUCG is to improve the clinical health of employees with prevention and wellness. There will be some targeted initiatives to try to come along beside people that might be potential high consumers of health care. And then also, I know we had up on the slide today, the city of Chattanooga has adopted the CHIP rewards program through our selection committee process. We as well, it hasn't gone to council for first, second reading and put them on the playing field, because what we're doing right now is we're working with them on what are potential incentive solutions to incent the type of wellness activities we want employees of LFUCG to take advantage of. So part of our strategy is solve this problem, and then once we establish where we are, it's not going to be acceptable to me to watch the premiums take off again. What I want to do is watch them flatline, and employers that concentrate on improving clinical health are the ones that are achieving that. And the tools we've got are wellness center, potentially CHIP rewards. Okay, last week when you were here, I asked you about what type of modeling did you do that helps you come up with these rates that X number of employees and their families will go into each one of these different plans. Then I asked you, did you do any additional modeling that showed that after your educational program starts to be successful, will you end up in a different place in terms of placement in those plans? It seems to me that that's part of where we went awry here, is that all of these things, I think, should have been started back in January. Because the whole wellness plan works in two ways. You've got sticks and carrots. It seems like you guys are saving the carrots until later on. But I think you're saying the carrot is the marathon plan, the marathon piece. That's a piece of the strategy. I wouldn't characterize it holistically as the carrot. Yeah, I would characterize it as the stick because what you've done is set up this situation where if you don't go there, the cost to go to your own doctor is so astronomical that you don't have any choice but to go there in most cases. But the carrots come in. And the other question I would ask is, where are you getting your incentives from? Because it seems like, as a government, we can't give away cash incentives, which private sector does all the time. But we do have free rounds of golf we can do. We do have swimming passes we can do. Or shelter rentals, free shelter rentals. And there's a lot of things that we can do and provide to the employees and their families as incentives to get well and to make better choices. But where are you going to get that information from? Correct. Are you planning on setting up committees to talk to the CHIP program? That's where that comes in. Where are you going to get the information for what our CHIP's rewards would be? Sure. First of all, the selection committee, which had two council members on it and Steve Cave served at large, heard a pretty informative discussion about do we want to set incentives around just straight-up economic benefits. Let me give you an example. I take a blood pressure medication. Previously, prior to me having skin in the game, it cost $50 a month, $600 a year, for my blood pressure medication. And I've been off of it so long I can't even remember the name of it. I think it was called Avapro. And so working through my doctor, I found that I can split a pill. It costs me about $90 a year for a 12-month supply. And rather than my health care plan getting caught with a $600 bill, I'm controlling my blood pressure with a $90 pill, and my blood pressure is perfect. So if we wanted to base incentives on encouraging employees, giving them choice, potentially if it doesn't compromise quality of care, moving from a brand name drug to a generic drug. We can incent them to do that. If we want to, you know, probably the more futuristic thing, George, would be incenting all the men in this room to have a PSA test. And I would beg to say that if you looked at how many men are compliant with a PSA test for their age, probably we're not at the percentage we need to be. So one of our metrics might be, see, look, we want 80%, 90%, 100% of the men in LFECG who are eligible for a PSA test to take it. And if we find one marker for prostate cancer by incentivizing them to take a PSA, we could potentially save about $45,000 by avoiding that cancer claim. So that's a cost-avoidance strategy. So how we can build incentives around direct economic cost consequences, such as the drug example I gave. So what's the incentive? The city will set that. The city will set that. If you set it on this pure-up economic, obviously you're going to save more by redirecting care than you're probably going to incent. But the employees will be incented to take advantage of that opportunity. So the chip rewards piece, again, after we get settled in to how much you all want to allocate to employer contribution, will be something that we'll be looking at to deploy perhaps during the first quarter of 2012. But we're looking through different strategies, again, tying back to the budget. We obviously can't invest $300,000, $400,000 in chip rewards without an ROI on it. So we're working through strategies, and we'll be reflecting those or showing those. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Myers. Council Member Henson. Thank you, Mayor. I was one of the Council members that sat on the RFP, and we selected the providers. So up until that point, I got very excited to hear the out-of-box thinking about how we could save on health care costs. So I was impressed up until the point that I saw these premiums. I went up to Briggs and I asked him, did you come up with these premiums? Did you really come up with these premiums? because I just thought they were all just out of sight. So needless to say, I was disappointed along with you and council members and so forth, but yet we understand where we're coming from, and I appreciate, Mayor, your willingness to work with Vice Mayor Gordon and Council Member Stinnett to get the issue, hopefully, within a reasonable range for the employees. But I just felt like the plan, when we went through the RFP, there were a lot of things that would be a cost savings for the health insurance. and if we base it on what was spent last year, that's maybe not a true cost because if I maybe have an issue, a medical issue, I'm not real sure whether I should go to the doctor. The wellness clinic is free so I can go there. That would be a cost savings. also the reinsurance that we spoke about would be another cost savings. So it could be that, wouldn't you agree that the projected cost is in reality going to be less? Well, let me say it another way. If we had done nothing at all, Peggy, we would have been working off a $35 million number. Okay. The fact that we've got a new prescription benefit manager in place and we've got greater deal strength on drugs. The fact that we've got the wellness center going in place and we're going to start bending the trend line a little bit. The strategies that we've taken actually did take cost out of the 2012 budget if we had done nothing at all. What we've got to do is we've got to get settled into it. We've got to get people in plans that they understand, and they understand that they're protected in a case of a horrific claim. And we've got to get premiums that are budgetable from a payroll deduction standpoint. And then once we get that stabilized, I think there's all kinds of things we can do to have a sustainable long-term health care plan. I'd love to have a flat line on whatever that number is we end up in. That's our strategy long term. But we've got to turn the page, get stabilized, and then start working on health improvement, which will produce those results. Well, I do appreciate your work. I have to say that I was very pleased. I learned more about insurance than I guess I ever knew. But I also want to make sure that if the wellness center gets a considerable amount of patients, that we would be able to accommodate. Absolutely. Capacity. So I know that we would have a contract for a certain amount of money, but does that restrict the number of people they will see? Well, there's, you know, if this thing really takes off, you know, there's certainly ability to add additional clinicians on to handle the capacity. But it's pretty much an exact science. I know I heard somebody talking earlier about having to wait all day with 6,400. I mean, Marathon Health and their book of business, it is really an exact science in terms of how many people will use the health center, how often they'll use it. And so we feel good in 2012, as we take off, that we've got capacity. However, as we really leverage that going forward, there's ability to bolt on additional clinicians in the contract and take full advantage of that. It would be a neat thing to do. Okay. And I prefer to go with the assessment process that we talked about, where if you chose to go into the wellness center, become assessed, and they will set goals for you to become healthier, to me that is a better route to go than picking on a certain population of people. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Henson. Council Member Beard. Thank you, Mayor. I, too, was part of the selection committee. Excuse me. At least. How could I forget you? Pardon me? How could I forget you? But we were selecting again vendors and hearing presentations by vendors. I didn't know anything about the numbers at all any sooner than you all did out there. And when I first saw them, I take blood pressure medicine. I had to double the dose after I saw that for the next three days. it was quite significant. Actually, there are other people in government who are in worse shape than the police and fire are. And I really feel for some of those folks also. What is the real logic? I don't think I got a total answer on the children six and under requirement. Is that something that, I mean, can we change that? You potentially could. You potentially could. I'd like to get our subject matter experts to really entertain that discussion and point out the pros and the cons to you, which would be marathon health. I can carry that idea so far, but certainly we can have that as a takeaway to discuss. Well, I think that's something we need to look into, obviously. I made a note here, Mayor. First step, I guess. Can we move enrollment up two weeks or back two weeks, whichever you're... Well, I think that's one of the things that we need to talk about in the next couple of days and report to you all back on Thursday night. Well, I would suggest that we do to give ourselves plenty of time to do it right. Well, I think, you know, considering all the moving parts to it, the amount of money that we're dealing with here, and the time for understanding, we need to consider yes. And then the other comment I had was the University of Kentucky and the state of Kentucky and how they're handling their premiums. And all they're doing is swapping dollars and putting dollars out of one pocket and put it into another. They just take the benefit pool and they raise the benefit pool so it looks like the premiums are lower. But they're paying one way or the other, and it doesn't make a lot of sense. Specifically, they would have about the same problems we would have, I would think, and maybe greater for that matter. That's all I had. I just wanted to get that out on the table, the question about, Thank you. Moving that. Council Member Kaye. Thank you, Mayor, and thank all of you for being here. I want to build on what has been said by some of the other Council people, and I think I'm not ready to make a motion, but I'm ready to support a movement in a direction. But I want to kind of explain the way that I think about this. First, there is an undeniable reality that one way or another the employees of this city will use about $33 million in health care costs in this present fiscal year. That's not going to change. There are only two ways to pay for that, the benefit pool and premiums. The government has been basically having a much larger benefit pool than it had imagined because it was taking a loss. But again, either the government pays for this or the premiums pay for this. I think we can reduce costs over time with the measures that have been suggested, the clinic incentives for wellness, the way that the rates are structured to put more responsibility on people for choosing better health options and better health care. But that will take time. We will not see the benefit of that in this fiscal year. We probably won't see it in the next fiscal year. Maybe we'll begin to see it in the next fiscal year. In fairness, I think we need to share the burden. I think it is not fair to put the entire burden on our employees. So there's been a lot of talk about ways to provide some more money from the general fund, maybe as much as $2 million, to buy down the cost of premiums across the board. I would support that effort. I would leave the structure of the plan in place because, in part, it's designed to place more responsibility for our own health on those of us who are employees. But I would urge us to find somewhere around $2 million, which is about a third of the increased cost, to make those premiums affordable. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Councilmember Kaye. All right. Councilmember Lawless. Thank you, Mayor. First of all, there's been a lot of, I don't know, heroics and great ideas and et cetera. But I don't think there is any of the 16 people at this horseshoe that have not been spending a lot of time and a lot of energy researching, looking for alternatives, trying to educate themselves. That includes the mayor and the council members. Is there a single council member or mayor that has not spent a great deal of time over the last two or three weeks and spend a lot of time and energy trying to come up with other alternatives. Anybody? So we are in this together. I think Council Member Kay's ideas are really good. I think one of the things we're going to have to do is, I think using the Wellness Center and the Marathon Program, will give us some idea about how it will right the ship so that we'll have a better understanding next year before we're blindsided like we have been by what's coming up. So possibly, maybe, hopefully, with the powers above us, this year will be a test year. And so this year, maybe we can share the burden of the cost to the employee, and we can try to find ways to do that. Maybe that means we're going to have less paving, Council Member Martin, or maybe it means we're going to have less trails, or maybe it means we're going to have something else that we were hoping to have that we're not going to have. But if we have a year where we can find a way to share the burden and see what the benefit of the wellness center and what the usage is with the alternative plans, then we're going to have better data to work with. And I also would like to ask Mayor Gray, it was a generous offer from Vice Mayor Gorton to give up some time tomorrow on her nursing job, and Council Member Stennett. I know the full council can't meet because we don't have time to pull that together, but I would appreciate and suggest that possibly Council Member Kay or Council Member Ellinger meet with you all in the morning as at-large members so that there is more involvement and can be reported back to us. That's a good idea. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Lawless. I think, Briggs, you might want to speak to the... We've got a couple of questions on the table or suggestions on the table related to the restructuring. I think what I've heard from Council Member Stennett, what we've heard from Council Member Stennett, from Council Member Kay, my suggestion that we meet with you guys in the morning to examine the full plan and then report back to the council. Can you tell us why that would be an appropriate thing to do, given the plan that's been developed? Yeah, I think there's a number of decision points there. One, if you allocate additional monies to it, do you weight it towards a single? Do you weight it towards a family? Do you weight it towards an employee spouse? Do you weight it towards an employee child? So we can lead you in a discussion around that. I also think some of the benefit pool dollars can also be allocated to alternative usage by current employees. And I think if you decide to subsidize, if that's the appropriate word, a question would be if it's not used for health care, it cannot be used for anything else. So there is some decision points. And I think that if we had a chance to vet those things and really get everybody's collective wisdom, it would be beneficial. All right. Councilman McCord. Thank you, Mayor. Thanks for everybody coming down. Thank you for the e-mails and the phone calls. I sincerely appreciate everybody's concern. um benji i mean uh briggs you said something that i think everybody needs to understand because it gets glossed over um you mentioned the progression that for the last number of years we put 20 million into the budget and we spent 30 million so what people need to understand is if you've been on this council for four years you really did know what was going on you you may not have realized the magnitude, but you realized that we put 20 and we were covering it. And in February of 2010, I went to see a worksite wellness conference put on by Kentucky Chamber of Commerce. It changed my life. It changed my life because I thought of all these employees, and we have a very sick pool of employees. Let's face it, guys, we are not a well group of people. We got a lot of health problems and concerns. And in that meeting, I sat there and I thought about 3,000 employees, and I thought about how could we change the culture of this place? How could we make life better, not just save budgetary dollars, but how could we make life better for us so that we can enjoy those kids and can enjoy those grandkids? And I came back and met with former members of the past administration, met with Council Member Myers, and the carrots that he mentioned, golf and swimming and shelter rental, along with a number of others, are exact things that came out of that meeting, those meetings that we had. Those were carrots that we created at that meeting. We invited the United Way to come in and start working with us to bring in outside resource. I sat down with Council Member Kay, and he put together a wellness group to start meeting on this issue. How could we incentivize a culture change? Because that's the only way we get our health premiums down. Logan Aluminum in the most, Logan County has the Tobacco Festival. And Logan Aluminum was ranked the number one company in America for worksite wellness. Their premiums have gone down every single year because they made a commitment in 1993 to start really focusing on the wellness of their employees and the investment into those employees. That presentation I saw and that interaction with Logan Aluminum and some of these other companies absolutely changed my life. And I was committed to try and changing the culture here. And so you hear me talk all the time about these types of things. And I was after solutions then. Now, we knew that health care was going to go up, and we didn't know the magnitude of what things were going to look like, and we certainly didn't see declining revenues, those types of things. But last Tuesday, when I saw the rates like you did, I began to have two series of questions. And I want to talk really frankly with you all, if that's okay, and everybody watching. I had two lines of questions. What, as a council member, can I do? What role do I play? Because I don't set the rates, and I think that's been established today, that the council members don't set the rates. Do I approve the rates? Is that something that we do? These are the questions that we've been asking, but this council member talking to you right now has been asking. The second line of questions, guys and gals, is, as an employee of this government, what am I going to do? Because let me tell you what, my friend, the police officer, and you want that $12-hour rate, that's what a council member makes. And as a single parent on that plan, you do the math. That's what I'm looking at. So I'm asking two different sets of questions, personally and professionally. And I want to be really open with you all and tell you who's sitting up here, at least on this seat, where I'm coming from. I think it's about solutions, you all, because we can unsure quarterback this thing to death, But the bottom line to it is that, as Council Member Farmer said, we're dealing in the here and now and right here, right now. And so I think what you're seeing, and you're going to see, because Council Member Stenet is going to speak after me, and I firmly support this motion, and I want to go ahead and be the second on this motion, he's bringing forward a solution. Council Member Stenet has been working on this all weekend. He's been sitting down trying to do this. And what you're seeing now is outside expertise, outside this council role, someone who's in this business and does something else, The value that they can bring to the government and to you and to the city. That's leadership. And I want to applaud Council Member Stenet because I couldn't see that. I can't see this. That's not my area of expertise. But it is his, and he stepped up. And the motion he's going to make today is not about a meeting tomorrow that we might get back with, maybe Thursday. Here's what we're going to do. It is a let's look for one point. Let's make the motion. 1.9 million. Let's adjust these plans, and let's offer a solution and then go forward. that that's leadership and i applaud him for that and you should too and at the end of the day i want to i want you to know that what's tough is about this is that we've got a tough tough problem of how do we change our culture that's the bigger problem the only way this is going to go down we're going to have this discussion every single year if we don't start doing this together and that's what i want you to leave with today is you got to realize it's about you and me and all of us kind of changing some things we do and getting healthier so that we don't have this problem. But at the end of the day, gang, I just want to tell you that as a council member and as an employee of this government, there's not been a decision that has weighed heavily, more heavily on me personally. I've heard your emails. I've responded as best that I can telling you my situation. And I think that what you're learning today and what you're seeing today is the separation between what the council does and what it's in charge of and what the administration is in charge of and what they're tasked with and how difficult those decisions are. Do not get them confused. They are different. But it's about a solution, and it's about a solution today. And that's what I firmly support when Council Member Stenet speaks next. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Council Member Stenet. Thank you, Mayor. Briggs. Briggs. Yes, sir. Again, you reiterate to us, the plan design was based on if the claims stayed the same as they were this year, right? The claims would have been pretty popular. Yeah. Excuse me. I'm going to make sure I understand what you're asking here. Say it again, please. So the rates that were presented last Tuesday were based on what the claims have been in the past year, two years, three years down the road? Correct. And that's how they come. So looking, I know we don't have a crystal ball, but given the steps that we've already taken, and we've already saved $1.5 million on the prescription benefit. We are going to have the two $1 million claims again because we bought reinsurance. Looking at the wellness center, looking at other issues, I assume we don't have a location yet, Mayor. We're still close? Maybe. I know there's some hesitation out here about the HSAs because we're not sure about the wellness center. I think so. The commitment's still there January 1. Yep. Okay. So given your crystal ball, given those things in consideration, it would look to me saying our claims won't be that high as they were in the past year. They'll actually be probably lower. And with the employees sharing the burden on some of these deductibles and some of these out-of-pockets, we're not going to have a $35 million deal. That's correct. So it seems to me it would be feasible to look at alternatives to put additional money, or we don't have to find the money exactly today and pinpoint it. We can wait and see what happens the next six months. in May and June, start identifying the exact source. So there's a lot of opportunity there. And when I mentioned the proposal earlier about buying down the rate that Councilman McKay alluded to, we would not put additional benefit pool money in. That would not help, as you correctly pointed out. That wouldn't help the medical rates because there are a lot of people on this council and in government that don't use the benefit pool for health care. So we're talking about just health care, what it would cost. So as you're thinking tonight, what dollars would we have to assemble as a council to put towards one of the five plans or maybe a new plan, if we have to go back to a drawing board and draw a new one up, to meet the rates so that our retirees don't have any additional out-of-pocket this year, so that our non-sworn don't have the extra burden this year, and so that our sworn officers can meet their budgets and identify those benefit-poor dollars they want to put towards health care. So as we're thinking tonight, and I appreciate the mayor offering to meet with us, I think it's a good thing. I think we should have probably done it a week ago. I think it's a little long overdue, but I'm willing to sit down and try to hash this out. But at the same time, I want to leave for today with skin in the game from the council. I want to put our money where our mouth is and draw a line in saying, here's the least you can expect leaving here today. So I want to make a motion to commit and make a resolution that the mayor and administration put an additional $1.9 million towards the health care benefit. And I won't identify specific plans yet because I'm willing to sit down and pick those plans so that we can freeze the rates based on the platinum plan rates last year for all employees. Second. And it could be less. It could be maybe more when we come back, but at least we're going to commit to 1.9 before Thursday night and come back to the table and make it finalized if we can do so tomorrow. Thank you, Mayor. All right. Thank you, Mr. Tenet. There's a motion and there's a second. Do you want to restate the motion? Yes, sir. That's a resolution asking the mayor and administration to commit an additional $1.9 million to buy down the health insurance rates based on the 2011 platinum rates for all employees. So that would be just changing the health insurance rates, not benefit pool dollars. Second. All right. There's a motion and a second. Floor is available for discussion. on the motion. Mr. Blues. Thank you, Mayor. Let me say first that I think this has been a remarkable conversation. Since I've been on the council, the first one that really comes close to being a dialogue between our employees, the mayor, the council, and our consultant. some very productive thinking, some passionate voices, some ideas that we can use to get through this very difficult passage. We know that health care is not only a major issue in this room and for our employees, it threatens the whole issue of health care threatens to tear our country apart at the highest levels. And we are dealing with it on the local level, and I really applaud everybody here today for the seriousness and the thoughtfulness of this conversation. And I will say I think that we've come to a point where we have now something to do tomorrow. Council Member Stenet's motion makes great sense to me, and I will support it. And I look forward to the product of the discussion tomorrow morning between the mayor, vice mayor, council member Stenner, the briggs, the consultants, and perhaps others. So thank you, mayor. I think this has been a good conversation and a good day. Thank you. Thank you. Council member Blues. Council member Myers. Thank you, mayor. On this motion, I want to say I want to support this motion. I applaud Councilmember Stenet and his leadership on this. And I would add to the conversation that the culture change that Councilmember McCord talked about is what's key. That's the only thing they're going to bring down rates. And getting an employee to split a pill and all that stuff isn't the answer. The answer is getting the employees healthy so they don't need any pills. So I hope that we keep in front of us this wellness program and the incentives to get people exercising, to stop smoking, to lower their blood pressure, their cholesterol, those kinds of things, because that's what's going to drive down the cost of that $35 million or $26 million or whatever it's going to be. So I applaud Council Member Stenet. I support this motion, but I ask that we continue to work up front with this wellness program. Thank you. Council Member Kaye. Thank you, Mayor. I also support the motion. I just want to be sure that I'm clear about the intent. But as I understand it, what we would be doing today is committing essentially to increase the government's exposure to the liability for health care by roughly $1.9 million. As we're not finding that money, all we're saying is right now the premiums are projected to cover the, after the benefit pool, to cover the costs of projected health care at whatever it is, $33 million. What we're saying is we're going to knock that number down to $31 million. And so that will reduce all of the premiums accordingly. Is that correct? Yes, in a roundabout way. It is. It is. But, again, we don't have the crystal ball of what exactly our claims will end up. And we could see a spike in an epidemic or something out there. We may have to find more money anyway. So this is not a great thing. They put forth a great first-time effort. because keep in mind, we've never had an outside consultant manage this for us or give us advice. We've always done it in-house. And the mayor and I were caught at a surprise last November. We didn't have the expertise in-house to manage this. So we're going on his word. We're going on the word of a lot of employees and what their needs are, and people up here are putting in. So there is no crystal ball, but, yes, in a nutshell, that's what it is. Okay. So, as I said, I'm in support, and I would reiterate what Councilmember McCord and Myers and others have said about the need for all employees to work diligently on improving their own health care outcomes. Getting those costs down is what's going to save you money, and it's going to save government money. It's going to make you healthier. It's going to make your families healthier. And I guess I'll close by saying in agreement with Dr. Blues, I think the conversation has been a good one. I think people have conducted themselves well. I think we've shared information that's useful, and I think we're headed in the right direction. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Council Member Kaye. Mr. Cochran and Mr. Mars, I just want to make sure, because Council Member Stenet's motion as i understood council member standard you were talking did you you mentioned you said employees i think in parts i believe this was yesterday that when you all were doing some scenario developments you were saying that to include employees and retirees that a number so we may be looking at did not you say 2.1 to 2.3 million as scenarios right so So, I'm asking. Do you want to do this? In some of the scenarios we were looking at yesterday, 2.1 to 2.3 million. To include the full population, right? Right. So, this is part of what I think. Yeah, the numbers, and I can put it up on the over if we need to, but it includes every single employee in the plan. And retirees. Yes, it does. It includes them too. 2,959 employees. I think that's what we need to confirm. I did it on 3,193 employees, so I know my number's overkill. We can go back and confirm. Yeah, it includes retirees, Mayor. That's a good point. But if it does, what I'm saying is when we continue to examine this tomorrow, that 1.9 may not be sufficient to cover that full population. If 2,959 is not coming up. And we've still got to find how we're going to take it out somewhere else. We've got some ideas there, too, Mayor. I hope we don't. Another suggestion that we've talked about, too, is to maintain the rates as they are, but if there is a quote-unquote subsidy to buy down these rates, to line item that so that we're continually aware that the actual cost is the premiums as set, because if you're reducing the premiums that are presented, then you're given a false illusion that those are the premium equivalents to fund the entire cost of health care. So if this works out, then we would recommend that you line item your benefit pool and then a subsidy for health care in addition to that so that the true cost is still present. All right. Council Member Lawless. I would like you to repeat the motion. To a resolution authorizing and directing the mayor and administration to add an additional $1.9 million to the health care rates, keeping the rates at the same as the platinum level rates for this upcoming year. So basically, your motion is to continue to keep the Platinum plan at no cost to? No, ma'am. The rates only. And whatever plan that would best match up with that would identify those rates with a 1.9, which is buying the rates of the PPOC, HSA-1, PPOB, whichever plan will work out in the morning. I'll be glad to recommend it today, but I think with Briggs and the mayor working together with us, I think we can find maybe a better plan than maybe one of those. Just the rate. We're talking about the rate only. The rate to the employee. That's correct. And continue to offer the wellness program and the different options and see what shakes out. Absolutely. Okay, I can support that and thank you. Okay. Council Member Crosby. I'm sorry, Mayor. My answer was question. It was regarding, I forgot to take myself off. It was regarding the retirees. Thank you. Council Member Martin. Thank you, Mayor. And I appreciate Council Member Stenet bringing this forward. I think that this is a great first step for us. I've got a question for Mr. Bartley, Mr. Sweeney, and Ms. Brandenburg. Will your unions help us and work with the city to aggressively work on wellness? Because I know I need to do it. I need to lose weight myself. Chris, we'd love to hear from you. Last year, I was a size 16. For healthy eating, I'm a size 4. Good for you. I need to work on that because I have picked up about 25 pounds being up here. Because of this planet, that's on 4 pounds. Pam. Pam. I understand. Ms. Brandenburg. You want to come up to this? That's all right. Hey. Thank you, Chris. I thought I'd come up here. You guys should step up to the plate, and we all know. No, I'm not talking about this. I'm talking about firefighters nationwide are the leaders in the fitness wellness plans. Pretty much all these cities borrowed from us. We have an initiative with the International Fire Chiefs and the International Fire Association. We also proposed it at the table, and it was declined. So we were looking at it, and we'll be in the leadership role of that. Well, I think in hard times we all work together, and I appreciate it again for the firefighters. And I look forward to stepping into the wellness plan here and trying to get back to my pre-council weight, as it were. So I will support Councilman Stenitz's motion. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Councilman Martin. anybody else showing up on anybody else we wish to speak no all right all right we have the motion then we if we can vote now all in favor of the motion please indicate by saying aye all opposed no motion carries and mayor if i can sum up by saying this this won't be without pain we will have to cut somewhere else or do away with something else so as we work over the next six months that has to be in the back of all our minds and we ought to be willing to work together so thank you appreciate that i appreciate what you all had to say and uh i want to thank again everybody has you all have been thanked and we appreciate your being here uh i think councilmember blues you know he has seniority here whether he wants it or not and he said it pretty well that um as challenging and as difficult as conversations like this can be, and they are, that there is a healthiness in having the conversation, even though it's painful. And I'm glad, Pam, you're back there smiling a little bit because you've been hollering at me. I understand. I hear you. Yes, ma'am. Thank you. And thank you. You know, through this kind of dialogue that Council Member Blues described, through the kinds of contributions that people here on this council contribute, people with experience. You know, we do come out oftentimes as challenging as it may be with better solutions. So thank you all very much. Do we have anything else on the agenda? Council Member, I'm sorry. Yeah, I'd like to make a motion. Can we stick around for another couple hours and just say hey and enjoy each other? No, I just want to announce very quickly that there's going to be a multi-way signal installed at the corner of Old Park and Central. The date is expected to be at the October 28th. Okay. Caution. Okay. All motorists. And I make a motion to adjourn. Motion and a second by Council Member Crosby. Y'all in favor, please say aye. We are adjourned. Thank you.