Order. And ask for, first on our agenda is public comment for issues on the agenda. Floor is available for public comments on the agenda, but I don't have anyone signed up. Chris is not public commenting, okie doke. I don't have anyone signed up. All right, so we can move on then to the next rezoning docket approval. Is there a motion to approve the docket? Mayor. Councilmember Lane, yes, sir. Could I just get an explanation of ordinance number two about three signs on a business with two or more frontages? Okay. I'd just like to go. Mr. Sally. I haven't briefed on that. Thank you for being available so quickly. No problem, Mayor. Wonderful rescue. Thank you. You're welcome. This was a text amendment heard by the Planning Commission a little over a month ago. This was filed by an applicant who was not initiated by the Council or the Planning Commission, and it deals primarily with larger office buildings and professional office parks. There is a tenant in one proposed office building here in the community that is interested in a wall sign on a, I believe, three- or four-story office building. The current ordinance has a limit of two wall signs or a further limitation if there happens to be a freestanding sign on the lot. It so happens the property they're looking at already has a freestanding sign. The Planning Commission recommended one change to their proposal, and that was that the third wall sign be on a different wall, and so there wouldn't be more than one wall sign on a single wall. Would this apply to if you had a building and you had three tenants, each tenant could have a different name on there? Is that what would happen? Yes, and that's basically what they were interested in. Okay. Thank you so much for your explanation. You're welcome. All right. Thank you, Mr. Salley. Thank you, Council Member Lane. All right. Is there a motion? Motion by Council Member Lane. Some of you would depend on the docket without a hearing. This is a motion for the hearing, right? Without a hearing. Without a hearing, right. Okay. Motion by Council Member Lane, second by Council Member Ellinger. Is there any discussion? All right. Hearing none, all in favor, please indicate by saying aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. Move approval of the summary. No, hold on. I'm still trying to talk on the docket. I've been on. Wait just a second, please. I'm trying to log on myself. All right, Mr. Stinnett. Thank you, Mayor. I have a motion to amend No. 5 under second reading of ordinances on the docket. This is the ordinance on the fireworks, and that's in front of everybody. If you'll turn to page 2, there's some language we needed to insert into the docket to clarify the difference between a consumer firework and a display, which would be like the Legends or the University of Kentucky, football games, et cetera. So I'll make a motion to amend number five and add the language that's underlined on page two. And this is the completed ordinance at that point. So moved. Motion by Council Member Stennett. Second by Council Member Blues. Is there any discussion on the motion? All right. Hearing none, we can take a vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. All opposed, no. Motion carries. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, sir. Move approval of the summary. Vice Mayor Gordon has moved approval of the summary. Is there a second? Second. Second by Council Member Farmer. Is there any discussion? Is there any discussion? All right. Hearing none, we can take a vote. Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh. I don't think we approved the docket. We didn't. We'll go back and do that after we take this vote. How's that? Thank you so much. All right. All in favor, please indicate by saying aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. All right. Dial back. Reverse. Docket approval. Council Member Beard Blues, would you like to make a motion? I thought it was moved to approve, but I don't think we voted. As amended. Oh, all right. I got it. All right. We didn't vote. Is there any discussion? No more discussion. Okay, now let's take a vote. All in favor, please indicate by saying aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. Thank you, sir. Now we can move to item number four, budget amendments. Move approval. Is there a motion by Council Member Beard to approve? Is there a second? Second by Council Member Henson. Is there any discussion? All right. Vice Mayor Gorton. Yes, thank you, Mayor. I just had a question on page 9 about, and maybe Chris is here, about the GTV3 emergency overtime funds. Sheila, is that something you could clarify? Currently there are zero dollars in the budget for GTV3 producer overtime. And we would like to move that money over so that we have money in the event of an emergency. So you don't have an actual plan for this? No, that is for unplanned emergencies in the event there's a weather emergency or anything that we have going on right now. now. Okay, because I think now GTV3 is no longer doing, is it still the policy, they're no longer doing weekends or evenings for anything? Yes, ma'am, that's correct. Correct? Yes, ma'am. This is outside of any planned programming that we have. Okay, so this is for the winter, for the upcoming challenges. Yes, ma'am. Okay, thank you. Thank you. All right, any further discussion? Okay, we have a motion and a second. Without further discussion, we can take a vote. All in favor, please indicate by saying aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. All right, next on our agenda is New Business, pages 7 through 61. Are there any questions? Is there a motion? Okay, we have a motion by Dr. Blue, seconded by Councilmember Ellinger, question by Vice Mayor Gorton. Thank you, Mayor. I just wondered about two items. On item F, item F is the one where we are accepting a private street into the public right-of-way. and so who's the point person on that? Commissioner Taylor? I know that a number of years ago there was a lot of concern about private streets because they did not meet the standards of the public streets and so the council put into place some controls on that. And so I guess my question is, does this street meet all of the specifications, including the width of a public street? I'm not the expert on this, but I spoke with Kevin Wente just before I came downstairs, and he reviewed all of that and assured me that they did meet the specifications. Of a public street? Yes. Okay. And do you know why are we continuing to allow private streets, excuse me, and then we end up taking private streets into the public right-of-way? Why are we allowing private streets to be developed, or why are we accepting them? To be developed. that's a question that i'm not sure i'm qualified to answer why we continue to allow that other than you know on private property uh certainly we have lots of business owners that develop private streets and that sort of thing and then over time sometimes they um it makes sense to take them into the public venue but i don't know a lot of the history certainly i can research that and get back to you okay but we're but we're not accepting streets that don't meet our standards is my main point yes that's that is correct we we expect a standard before we accept the street now i do know that having been in this role for a little while we have in the past apparently taken on a number of streets that were substandard too narrow had problems with maintenance and we're trying to be very very particular and make sure that each street that we look at does meet the requirement that we're set by the council but i'm sorry i don't know a lot about the background but we can We can get back to you on that. Okay, very good. Thank you. Okay, thanks. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Anybody else? All right. Okay, we have a motion in the second. On new business, is there no further discussion? We can take a vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. All opposed, no. Motion carries. Next on our agenda, Roman numeral 6, continuing business and presentations. I ask Council Member Ellinger for a report on budget and finance. Thank you, Mayor. The Budget and Finance Committee met on October 25th, and we had three items. The first one with the monthly budget report. Commissioner Driscoll informed the committee the audit is progressing in a timely manner. They anticipate the audits will be done with their testing on the 31st of October, and the audit should be finished by the end of the year. Commissioner Driscoll informed the committee that we have been given notice by the Kentucky American Water Company that they no longer want to collect user fees or bills for us. She stated they are looking at options and have been visiting with other utilities who want to help with this issue. They collect $65 million in revenues, and we pay $1.6 million for the year, and this contract will be up on March 31, 2012. We are looking at external right now because we don't have the capacity with the current staff to do the collections. Bill Amaro stated they are currently documenting needs for an RFP for full service provider. And the fees that would be packaged together would be the sewer fee, land, fill, and water quality fees will come off the Kentucky American bill. Mr. Mayor gave the monthly budget update. The first revenues for the month were slightly above average, about 1.2%. The expenses were down, $2.5 million. But these are timing issues, and we're on pace for the first quarter. And it was the questions asked, is September a good predictor of how how the rest of the year is going, and they said we need about six months of data to predicate how the year will go. Sixty percent of our net profit revenues occurred in the last quarter. Mr. Barrows gave a monthly update on the expenses, and he stated, as we said earlier, that we are on budget. Commissioner Driscoll went over the major budget assumptions, the revenue, the health care, collective bargaining, and efficiency savings. The last item on the agenda was the economic contingency ordinance. The current amount in our fund is $14.470563 as of June 30, 2010. We have suspended for the last two years, adding money into it, but we are presently putting our monthly $50,000 into the economic contingency. And we will know when we get our fund balance, if we will put the 25% into the, if there is a surplus, but that could be suspended as it has in the last couple of years. And we were adjourned at 2.21 p.m., Mayor. Thank you. Thank you, Councilman Ellinger. Any questions for Councilman Ellinger? Okay. We move on. We've got two presentations. The first one is on leaf collection and Tim Clark. Mayor, Council members, thank you for this opportunity to come and talk about leaf collection again. This seems to be an annual track that I make here to update the Council on leaf collection. I prepared a brief presentation, and we'll run through that, and then we'll answer questions that you might have. Parks and Recreation is responsible for collecting the leaves. However, we rely on a number of divisions to help us with this whole process, and it wouldn't be successful without them. Fleet Services, Environmental Quality, LexCol, Streets, Roads, Forestry, GIS, Government Communications, all those divisions assist us with some aspect of the leaf collection program. Okay, vacuum leaf collection. Basically, we ask the citizens to rake the leaves to the curb, and we then collect those. I've got a brief video that I'd like to show to give you an idea of how that process takes place. what you see there is a vacuum unit behind one of the dump truck units with a vacuum hose and we have a crew there that's using backpack blowers and rakes to get the leaves to the hose Occasionally we have problems, as you'll see here in a minute, with this hose, where the hose gets stopped up. But that's just some of the challenges that we face in our attempt to collect the leaves. All citizens in the urban service area who receive urban county government waste collection services are eligible for the vacuum leaf collection program. That's about 90,000 residential addresses. You may recall several years ago that we fixed or made changes to the Urban County Government website to assist citizens in being able to determine if they are eligible. And if you would like, you can click on the Urban County Government website, lexingtonky.gov. We have an icon of a leaf that citizens can click on. There are instructions there to tell citizens how to type in their address and go about the process of determining if they are eligible for the service or not. So we think it's a good service and a good tool for citizens to use. Leaf collection typically begins in the first week of November. However, this year we're not starting until November 28th after Thanksgiving. The reason for that is we're only doing one leaf collection round this year. As you guys recall, we've done two passes for all the residential addresses this year. It's only going to be one time. So we've got all these addresses, the city divided into four separate zones, which is depicted there. Each one of those zones will get one round of leaf collection service. basically citizens need to simply rake their leaves to the curb we will then come along with the vacuum units and collect those we emphasize to not put the leaves in the street the rain and such will wash the leaves down the storm water storm sewers and we want to keep those out of that so if they'll just get them to the curb we'll get them picked up We don't want them to put rocks or limbs or anything like that in there because it will stop up our vacuum units. There are other options that are available. These options have been out there for a number of years. Citizens can use their Lenny yard waste container. The yard waste bags, which are free, can be used. When you mow your yard, you can mulch the leaves. use a compost operation, or they can take them directly to their landfill. We communicate to the citizens a variety of ways. As I mentioned earlier, the website, there are a number of newsletters that have gone out. The Division of Waste Management's Waste Not newsletter went out and had some information about that, government communication news releases. We've sent all the information to the local media. There's already been an article from the Herald-Leader about leaf collection. So we try to get the word out and communicate to the public what's going on so that they will know and so they'll know when to get their leaves raked to the curb. What changes have been made this year? Probably the most important one is that we're only doing one round of collection for each zone. And in order to help us make sure we get leaves collected in that zone, we have built in some Saturday collection for our work crews. Typically, we worked a Monday through Friday shift, but in order to make sure we get all the leaves collected, We had to build in some Saturdays. And then also we're still exploring the possibility of an alternate dump site instead of having to take the leaves all the way to the Haley Pike landfill. So if that comes about, then we'll save travel time. So what questions do you have? We'll try to answer. All right. Got several signed up for comments or questions. Council Member Stenney. Thank you, Mayor. Jim, thank you for giving us our leaf update each year. I know this has been a hot topic of conversation in the last couple of budgets about our cost. What is the cost of leaf collection in this year's budget that we're spending? Because we are going down to one time per area. What was our final budget this year? I do have that here. I've just got to get to it. Thank you, Tom. That's not good. I think it's just under $200,000. In the past, it's been over half a million. Half a million dollars in the past. Let's see. Tim, I think you're getting some help perhaps coming from Commissioner Taylor. Is that? Cheryl, I thought you were coming up to the podium, but if you weren't, that's okay. You were just talking. It's basically just under $200,000. I think what we had moved in a budget amendment was $132,000 for the labor and that kind of thing. And then we also have another, what I can't remember, is the fuel and maintenance, and it was around $69,000, $70,000. So total is just under $200,000, but it's about $185,000 to $190,000. And I'm sorry, I don't have that right. So in the past, we've been spending almost a half a million. So you're saying cutting it down to only one time per area saved us $300,000 this year, and we're not paying the cost anywhere else? That's a big saving. Last year there was a budget of over half a million, but actually going back and taking a look at the numbers, Parks spent about $440,000. I'm going to round off a few thousand. So it does save money. Parks has done a really good job. We've tried hard to be just as efficient as we can be and get that one loop done in the most effective way. So between Parks and Waste and our office and general services, We've had a lot of people involved in trying to make this the most efficient year we can. And trying to prevent people from having to drive to Haley Pike all the time is going to help us a lot. So that was another efficiency. And remind those watching, whose budget this comes out of? Urban Services Fund. The Urban Services Fund, which is the Waste Management, Street Lights, and Street Cleaning Fund. And have we, I know Councilman Farmer, I think, were you the godfather of this ordinance of leaf collection? Maybe back in 2000? But I know in my areas, you don't get there until after December 1st. And I can tell you by December 1st, most of the people in my area have their leaves picked up. If they don't, you're going to have inches deep. So I'm trying to figure out, are we still going to keep doing leaf collection in perpetuity? Are we going to look at ever doing it differently, outsourcing it? Or are we going to do all the city at once? Is there a way to do that last week in November so everyone in town knows to do it all at once? I mean, are we going to look at anything different after this year? I congratulate you for cutting our cost and saving us money there, but it seems like we're going to areas in Alaska. It snowed on most of the leaves by the time we got there. Are we going to look at anything different on the horizon? Well, we have looked at quite a bit different, and when we came forward with our first budget proposal with the committee, of course, Council Member Farmer was part of that, that was one area that we proposed just going away from vacuum collection and using our linen bag system. because we do believe, as far as I can tell, we are the only city that offers the bags at no charge other than if you're in the service district, you get the bags and we don't charge additional for that. So that's what we're encouraging people to do is to bring the leaves into the bags and the lenny, and that's a program that wasn't available 10 years ago. So 10 years ago or so when the ordinance was passed, the ordinance actually was originally passed to do one pass through, And we've evolved over the years into two passes because we don't have enough equipment or people, and we can't fund that much equipment and people for a whole year to be able to go do it all at once. Contracting, we did look at that a bit this year, and it appeared just from the surface. The problem we have is that contractors do not have the leaf vacuum equipment that we already own. The equipment that we do own, it costs, I think Dave Loney told us, it was about $50,000 per vehicle. to fit those up, and the equipment that we have now is aging. So for somebody else to take that task on, they would either have to come up with a system that would allow them to use our equipment, lease it from somewhere else, or they'd have to own it themselves. And that wasn't something we could get in place this quickly. Yeah, and the only reason I ask that is because I do know the equipment is aging, and we're going to have to be in a position here soon to invest more money into it. So we're going to have to reach a decision. Do we keep doing it? Do we only do it in areas where it affects stormwater? dramatically because we do provide the Lenny roll card service, which we do pick up and pay for through the soil waste or the waste management tax. And those are areas which people can already do and most people do now. So I'm just trying to, are you tracking your numbers in terms of how many residents are participating in this? Do we track that from year to year? ARCS has done a good job and they gave us the data. So do you have your data with you or I can tell them? I don't know. The number of residential. Are we tracking? I mean, you don't have to give me the exact numbers today if you don't have them, but is that something we are tracking, the utilization? Yes, we do know how many people use a lini and what kind of bags we're picking up and tonnage. We actually do have tonnage. I don't have it with me. What I did find is in our first meeting with parks, they were very efficient in showing us over the years. The total number of leaves that we pick up through the vacuum system has dropped off significantly. It's almost half each year. So at this point, we pick up significantly more leaves. with our waste program than we do with the vacuum program. Well, good. It looks like there's maybe some opportunities ahead of us. So thank you all both for giving us that information. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Council Member Stenet. Council Member Farmer. Thank you, Mayor. Could we go back to the slide that has the map and the dates on it? I think that's probably the most important. There you go. Can I read it? I don't believe truly it is widely known that we're only going to have one leaf pickup this year. So we are going to concentrate on efficiency, which is always good and has been the byword of this administration in this entire budget year. I do know for a fact that we were still trying to pick up leaves in January. I think the idea here is we are trying to make the other modes or ways for people to have their leaves picked up or for them to take them to Haley Pike as readily available as possible. In the planning committee meeting earlier today, we talked a lot about the trees, the tree protection ordinance, the amount of tree canopy in the city of Lexington. And I would just say to you that in the 5th Council District, there's a lot of timber. And we know that every time we have an ice storm. We also know it every fall when the leaves come down. So I think it's going to be very important for us to really have a lot of outreach in terms of when you're going to be on what street. Because we've already had a lot of calls to the Council Office, and I appreciate them. because when people do rake their leaves into the street, it causes a problem. You can rake them to the curb, but it's really only going to be best to rake them to the curb in the week when we're going to be coming along to do the leaf pickup. Short of that, go and get the bags. I know that we'll err on the side of picking up as many bags as possible because it helps the problem go away. Make the trip to Haley Pike. There's so many yards in mine and so many council district neighborhoods that can be filled up with leaves. You can fill up a trunk or your trunk or whatever conveyance you may have to take the leaves out to Haley Pike. We're trying to just get this harvest down because we make the richest mulch around out of those leaves because it's an excellent stock for it. But I think it's going to be – I don't want it to be viewed as anything other than a service that we're doing in a different way. I don't know how we could wean ourselves off of it in some areas because there are so many leaves that come down from so many trees. I just want to make sure that all of the constituents in all the districts can use as many of the conveyances as possible, making sure they know what day the leaves are going to be picked up on their streets so they can get them to the curb, making sure that they have the use of their their linney weekly as well as all the bags as possible and then you know don't hesitate to call the council office because the more we know in terms of where there's a problem or where there's a need or an opportunity that's the best place for us to go out and make something happen so I appreciate it and Tim I have no questions just presentation value but thank you for what you've done today I appreciate it thank you Mayor. Thank you Council Member Farmer Council Member Henson Thank you Mayor Tim I'm not a big fan of this program, and I like all the other options that you spoke about. I actually thought it was much more costly than what you had described, but my biggest concern is on the environment. The best way, I think, would be not to send it to the landfill, but mulch it up, put it on your garden, put it in a compost pile. Something more natural would benefit our environment much better. Would you agree? I would. And just to make it very clear, you have to receive city garbage pickup, correct? Yes, ma'am, that is correct. You have to be in the full urban service area and receive. And that's the most simple way to look at it. If you receive urban county government waste collection services, then you're eligible for leaf collection program. And again, you can go to lexingtonky.gov website and check their specific address. We've got all the addresses populated. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Henson. Council Member Blues. Thank you, Mayor. Tim, if I'm not mistaken, the leaves that are collected, whether in the lanny or in the bags or by the vacuum collection, they are mulched, are they not? return to free to the citizens who can pick them up at designated dates? They are. They're taken to the Haley Pike landfill. The city has a contract with the company where the leaves are mulched, and they are available to the public for pickup, free mulch. And then you mentioned earlier that you're looking for an alternate site to Haley to save some of those trips. Well, if you find an alternate site, will you be able to mulch them on that site, or will they still have to be hauled out there? I'm not sure about that detail yet. we were looking for a dump site to save us travel time and downtime of the guys, you know, riding in the truck to the dump site. So we were looking at both options, one just the dump site and then allowing the contractor to take those leaves then to the Haley Pike landfill and looking for a mulching on site. That is still in the works, perhaps. do you have anything else to add to that okay i think you all probably remember from the ice storm when we brought the mulching equipment on site and actually chipped up logs and that sort of thing and that's what we're trying to work with red river ranch which would be the most effective but what we're trying to do is minimize the number of trips that they have to make and compact all the leaves into the trucks so that we can be more efficient in fuel and time so Well, I appreciate you looking for those efficiencies, and I think going to the one-time collection is a very promising option, get it done faster. And I know there are weather factors. Last year we did have the problem of snowstorms and the delays that were caused by the weather. But I wish you well this fall. I think it's a good program and it's a big help to keep the leaves out of the storm sewers. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Councilman Blues. Councilman Beard. Thank you, Mayor. Tim, would you bring up the map again? Yeah. Just for the GTV viewing audience, would you verbally read those? It's a little blurry to me, and I'm not sure that they can see it. So if you could read the four districts and what dates. Sure, absolutely. And this is also available on the website, so citizens can go and look at that. But essentially, we're going to start November 28th in Zone A, which would be the southeastern area there. I don't know exactly where it is. Okay. And then December 5th, we will be starting in Zone D. December 12th we will be starting in zone B that area indicated and then also on December 19th zone C that's all I needed thank you thank you thank you Mayor thank you Council Member Beard Council Member Lane All right. We were looking at the map. I said, well, there's a lot of the area out there that's in the 12th District that's a rural area, and we do not pick up leaves out there. Just for the people that live out in that area, would you explain how the fees are structured so the people that are in their service area pay more for that service? How the fees are structured? I'm not sure. I'm qualified to answer that question. Sorry. Okay, well, there's an additional tax assessment on the home of this service. I don't know that I'm qualified either, but what you're saying is exactly correct. We have a number of services that are covered under the urban services fee, and we have different tax designations. And so if you're in the full urban services district, you receive waste services, and that includes the leaf collection, and then also the street light and street sweeping. And street sweeping, unfortunately, also picks up quite a few leaves, so that's part of it. Thank you very much. Thank you, Councilman Lane. All right. I have no other, no one else signed up, Tim. Thanks. So thank you very much. Thanks very much, Tim. Cheryl, thank you. Commissioner Taylor. All right. Next on our agenda is the next presentation, which is an update on the BEAM project, which is an acronym for Bluegrass Economic Advancement Movement. And in order to tee this up, I'm going to introduce Scott Shapiro, who's acting as our project manager for the city. And I'm going to introduce Scott, and then I'm going to introduce the fellow who's sitting right beside him, Mr. Jim Host. First, Scott and these two are going to tag team on the presentation for us today. As you guys come up to the seat, I think many of the council members, you all have been working with Scott already since he's joined us about three months ago. I like to describe the recruit process for Scott as representing one of these repatriation projects. His wife, Karen, is a doctor out at the university, grew up here in Lexington. They went off to New York, had three kids, were working up there. Karen was offered a position back here at the university. She took it, and we had an opening here in the government. Scott also had a shot at a job in Washington. It felt like we really didn't have to hardly recruit at all because his three kids and his wife were the best recruiting agents that we had. Scott has taken on the role of project manager representing us on our side, working together with thank thank you Bob quick for being in the in the audience with us today and Jenna Greathouse from Commerce Lexington you guys have been great allies in this project helping us to raise the private funds to support the project together with Louisville this and the project for a little bit of context for our viewing audience goes back to give the credit to it to Greg Fisher. We were at the University of Louisville and UK game last December and Greg said, you know, he said, we've got to start working together more, even though we compete. And there's been a long history of that. And Greg said, I thought he'd get over it, you know, but he kept talking about it. And he said, Greg, he said, you know, we got to prove that Mark Twain fellow wrong. What's that? I said, I couldn't remember. He said, you know, when he said that when the end of the world comes, I want to be in Kentucky. Why? Because everything happens ten years later in Kentucky. We need to prove them wrong. So that's really the context. He then, Greg, we talked about, said, well, now who in the world could we get to work with the Brookings Institute? We'd gone to see the Brookings folks in Washington and they were very persuasive, very persuasive about the notion of examining Louisville and Lexington as twinning cities, examining the economic clusters and opportunities and leverage potential. And at the end of that conversation, it was like the Brookings folks said, okay, so who can you rope in to help steer this thing? And Greg didn't miss a beat there either, and he said, well, the only person who's got a leg in Louisville and a leg in Lexington that I know is Jim Host. So I'm going to introduce Jim Host, too, at the same time, because Scott's going to take half the presentation, Jim's going to take the other half of the presentation. In the 1950s, Jim Host left Ashland, and he received one of the first two baseball scholarships the University of Kentucky ever awarded. After that, he went to the Chicago White Sox for a while. And at 29, he was named the youngest parks commissioner in the nation when Louis Munn was governor. Ran for lieutenant governor. The only thing, I guess, that he didn't quite perfectly succeed at. He then built his own company, Host Communications, the hallmark company for sports marketing in the country. He became secretary of commerce. He did that job. he then became the engine and the visionary behind the Young Center that we all hear a lot about today, whether we want to or not. And today he is the president, the CEO, the founder of iHigh, which is a high school sports internet multimedia platform for high school sports. He's agreed to chair this BEAM project. So, Jim, with this career, we want you to know that it's still not too late for you to top it off by considering city council. All right? And at 73, I like to describe him as the, that was spoken generically. At 73 going on 40, I like to refer to Jim Host as a happy bulldozer who is always set on go. So, Scott, if you'll take it off, and then our chairman will take it up when you get halfway through. Thanks. Great. Well, thank you, Mayor. Happy to be with you guys talking about something I've been working on with the mayor and Jim Host for the past couple months, the Bluegrass Economic Advancement Movement. So today we're going to give you a little bit of background on what's happened so far, sort of why we embarked on this, and what we hope to achieve down the road in the next 18 months. So here's the official definition of the Bluegrass Economic Advancement Movement. I'll just say BEAM from now on. It is an innovative economic development partnership. started by the two mayors, Mayor of Louisville, Mayor of Lexington. And the idea is to create a regional business plan. And we're focusing on advanced manufacturing for reasons that we'll get into in a bit. I think one of the most interesting parts about this definition is the mayor's parts. I've worked in my past life as a consultant. I've worked a lot with entrepreneurs. And for me, I've always seen that entrepreneurs see patterns where others don't see, don't have a clear vision. And I think that's one of the prime drivers of this project is that we have two mayors who have sort of an entrepreneurial bent and can see patterns and can envision what this super region that we've started calling the Lexington and Louisville metropolitan regions to sort of see what that might look like 10, 20 years down the line. Now, there are only two goals of this project. First and foremost, creating high-quality jobs for Kentuckians. We are talking about this super region, Lexington and Louisville, but in terms of high-quality jobs, one of our goals, we are talking about the state of Kentucky. We're also going to look at industries that are primarily export-based, That's one reason why we're focusing on advanced manufacturing. We want to be able to bring money, bring energy into Kentucky, into the super region. Now, one important component of this economic development initiative, and I don't say plan because it's not a plan that's going to be written and put on the shelf. It's more of an initiative. is that we're working with the Brookings Institution, the world-renowned think tank based in D.C. They bring an enormous amount of energy, an enormous amount of brain power to this project. And they've done this before. So we're the second cohort of cities or regions that they're working with. They've already worked with Northern Ohio, the Twin Cities, and Puget Sound to develop what they call these metropolitan business plans. So I want to talk a little bit about what that means. So what this approach means is that we're looking at the region's economy from a business perspective. So that means three things. We're first going to assess and understand sort of the market position of this region together. So what's the inventory of assets that we have here, thinking about Lexington and Louisville, together that we can leverage. The second part of that is to look at if there are any interventions that can be made to really dial up, as the mayor likes to say, to really improve the climate for these high-potential industries in the subaregion. And then third, sort of the last part of the Metropolitan Business Plan, is to create the vehicle for carrying this forward. So this is not going to be, again, as I said, a plan in so much as it's an initiative. We are going to end this project with financing the infrastructure in place to carry forward this, what we're calling, what Brookings calls the LEAD initiative. What's the intervention we can make in this super regions economy that can create jobs, create an export-based economy down the road? So when we talk about the super region, I mean, it is interesting to look at some of these numbers. So more than half of Kentucky's population now lives in an urban area. When we start to think about the numbers and the ideas that pop up when we combine Lexington and Louisville and start talking about them together, over 2 million people, we're sending 60 cents every dollar to the state, and that benefits the entire state. When we think of these two regions together, as part of this plan, we're looking at what are the unique assets. So when you're creating a business plan, we're not trying to sort of impose some sort of image of what we'd like to have in the future in terms of economic development. We're really doing an inventory of assets. So what do we have that gives us sort of a comparative advantage when we're looking at other cities, other regions, at home and abroad. So this inventory of assets, when you think about the two cities, we have sort of a world-class educational institution here in the U.K., enormous amount of research money in there. What if that were paired up with in some way with what's happening in Louisville with the UPS hub? Just thinking of those two things together, I think, sparks a number of ideas. But when we think about the main idea that we're focusing on, advanced manufacturing, that's what's bubbled up to the surface as we've started to do our research as a place where we potentially have a comparative advantage, again, with other regions at home and abroad. And Jim's going to talk about that in a moment. But I wanted to, in thinking about this comparative advantage, I want to just draw a parallel. So here in Lexington, we have the equine industry. And it is an amazing thing to sort of look at it and see all the different parts that combine to make it a success and to make it something that cannot be just simply replaced or moved elsewhere. So there's not just the horses and the farmland here, but there are world-class equine veterinarians that are here. I mean, if you're a world-class equine veterinarian, you're not going to live in Brooklyn. You have to live here. I was just talking, as part of this process, we're doing interviews with leaders, and I was just talking with PG Peoples and Dr. Box over at KCTCS, and they let me know that they have a training program for jockeys. So that's based here. There's Altec that's here. There's bloodstock agents that are here. So all of these together sort of combine to make this an industry that is very difficult to move. There's also a gravitational force sort of pulling in talent, pulling in money, pulling in energy from around the country and around the world. And it's that kind of industry that we're looking to better understand in terms of the entire super region so that we can build a larger export-based job-creating industry here that can have that same kind of gravitational pull. We think that that is in the area of advanced manufacturing, and that's what I'd like to have Jim Host come and talk to you about. Thank you, Scott, Mayor, members of the council, and distinguished members of the audience. I want to make one thing very clear when I start. I'm going to answer the question that all of you have got to have on your minds, and you've asked yourself, what in the world is a big blue guy like you building an arena in Louisville for the Cardinals? Why did you do that? Well, let me tell you what. I didn't do it for the University of Louisville. I did it for the Commonwealth of Kentucky because 40 cents out of every tax dollar that we're generating with all the stimulus downtown helps the rest of the state. I grew up in eastern Kentucky. I was never west of Lexington in my life until I came to UK. I thought Louisville was another nation, and most people in eastern Kentucky still think it is. The point is that Louisville and Lexington are the economic engines of this state. And as Louisville and Lexington go, so goes Kentucky. And that's what this initiative is all about. I'll tell you the other reason I got involved in the arena. Guess where UK plays a first and second round NCAA game that will be scheduled in March of this coming year. For years, everybody here has complained that in North Carolina, where does North Carolina always play? They play in Greensboro. Where does Duke always play? They play in Greensboro. We've never had a place for Kentucky. because you can't play on your home floor. And the NCAA made a decision in 1991 never to bring an NCAA tournament back to Louisville until they built something downtown because they wanted walkability downtown. So you either went to Indianapolis, Memphis, or Nashville. Now, guess what? There will be a rotation. And if Kentucky's a first or a second seed, guess where they'll play? Louisville and Louisville for a first and second round of regional. And there's a first and second round in March of this coming year. So now you know the rest of the story. And understand that that's so meaningful. And as I was driving back and forth from Lexington to Louisville on the I-64 corridor, I built my company in two places, here and in Dallas-Fort Worth. And I drove back and forth on that Dallas-Fort Worth corridor on a continuous basis. I had more employees at one time in Dallas than I did here. and I always felt the I-64 corridor could be like the Dallas-Fort Worth corridor in terms of its impact not only in Kentucky but in the country. So our manufacturing, 55% of the population, and wait a minute, am I on the right? Go to the next. You know how to run that, I don't. All right, no, go back one. Why advanced manufacturing? Think about what's happened in the European Union. Why is Germany eating the European Union's lunch? 35% of their gross national product is in advanced applied engineering because they made this decision 11, 12 years ago. So, we make this decision now, why should all of we, everything we're doing be imports? Why can't it be exports? We've got two great universities on both ends. We've got two great manufacturers of automotive on both ends. Why not join that all in the middle and make this the advanced applied manufacturing center of the United States? That's what this is all about. is all about. I want to thank Bob Quick and Gina Greathouse of Commerce Lexington, together with Joe Reagan and Eileen Piggott of Greater Louisville, Inc., for the fact that we met many, many times on this to put together the collection. We made a presentation last week, Mayor Fisher and I did, to the Metro Council in Louisville. And the idea of this is to have you and the Metro Council of Louisville come together in some sort of a joint resolution endorsing this for the betterment of the area of Lexington, Louisville and the corridor, but not only that, for the betterment of Kentucky. Next slide. The footprint is Lexington, SMSA, plus Madison County, Louisville, SMSA, plus Hardin County and the I-64 corridor. But the project, because of the impact on it economically, will affect every family and every county in Kentucky. Mayor Gray made the statement when we had the first super region thing, this is not about Lexington and Louisville, this is about Kentucky, because of the economic impact and the tax structure of the state, and how Louisville and Lexington, everything that happens here, benefits the rest of the state. But let me tell you something else that has happened as a result of this. For the first time, UK and UofL are talking on engineering level and on literally every single grant that's been done between the two universities, been in health and in other areas. We could not find one area where those two universities had worked at that level. And today the deans of the School of Engineering and the dean of the School of Engineering at UofL are talking, and the two presidents have already spent more time talking about this initiative than they have ever done, talking about any initiative between the two universities in the past. That's what's beginning to happen as a result of this initiative. Next, you see the working group. The working group is the group that's getting the job done. The full board appointed by the two mayors will be announced on the 21st of November in Louisville with a press conference. but we already have Commerce Lexington, Greater Louisville, Inc., Kentuckiana Works, Bluegrass Area Development District, and the Kentucky Association of Manufacturers all involved, along with Paul Costell of Chase, who is the chairman of our finance committee. And this board, when we announce it, will include the cream-dollar cream of Lexington, Louisville, CEOs of business, CEOs of community, and obviously of the two universities, both President Capilouto and President Ramsey, both of whom we've met with, both of whom both mayors have met with, have agreed to serve on this board. So what's the timeline? Over the next 18 months, we will have this entire thing completed by 2012. its role is to identify our authentic assets, our centers of excellence, and then to identify the challenges and move to correct. But I'll tell you one thing, as long as I'm involved in this, this is not going to be one of these studies that is 15 pounds high and sits on somebody's shelf for the rest of time. There will be something that will come out of this that will be definitive, And I'm convinced that Tom Lester, who I really like, if you don't know him, you need to know him. He's a retiring dean of engineering at UK, been there 22 years. He said this is the single most exciting initiative he's ever seen in the time that he's been in Kentucky and what it can do in terms of changing the whole paradigm of economics for Kentucky. So how can you contribute? We're not asking you individually to contribute. We're not asking the council to contribute. What we are asking, however, is that you be the champion for the project and help spread the word. We need your thoughts, your ideas. We got a number of emails from various members of the council in Louisville when we were finished. We got a lot of good questions from members of the council in Louisville when we were finished. And we are still getting them about their involvement, about what they can do to help. And we need the same thing from you. I want to say, Mayor, that I don't know anything much about the rest of your appointments, but if they're as good as this one, then you're going to be an all-star. This guy is an all-star and has done a great job in working together with us through this entire initiative. And I deeply appreciate you putting somebody who's spending some time on it from the city. Now, we're open for any questions that you might have or observations. Why don't you just take the lead, Jim, and recognize, well, Councilman, I have a whole slew signed up already. Council Member Beard, then McCord, Vice Mayor Gorton, and Council Member Martin. Get the lights back up, Chris. Thanks, buddy. A question for Mr. Host. 56 years ago, this past September, we were put on a group at UK of 50 people, incoming freshmen. And Mr. Host was on there, as was I. And that's how long I've known Jim. Plus basketball in your backyard. Well, a little bit of that, too, yes. What about or has there been any discussion about the old, I'm calling it the old now, Golden Triangle, leaving Northern Kentucky out of this initiative? The reason for that is that Northern Kentucky is connected to Cincinnati. And so what happens there is going to affect Cincinnati and is going to affect Northern Kentucky. It's not the fact that Northern Kentucky is being left out. It's the fact that this region, according to Brookings, has more opportunity because of how we're connected and of what we're connected between than literally any region that they've seen in the country. And I think we have to stick with that. What we will do will benefit northern Kentucky because they'll benefit as a result of what we attract as a result of this. But we had to have a specific focus of the I-64 corridor. This whole initiative is commendable. I have no doubt about it. I just was curious about that part of it because we'd gone around and said golden triangle for years and years and years, and actually nothing much ever happened. And actually, to a footnote to this, Julian, which is thanks for your inquiring about that, The county judge of Boone County, Gary Moore, in January called me up. He called Greg Fisher up. He's been county judge now for 12 years. And he said he wanted to start meeting to examine the developing of what amounts to, and he calls it not an urban caucus but a growth caucus to actually illuminate the significance of these urban areas, and that's occurring once a quarter, too. There have been three meetings already, and the focus on working together for the public policy issues that affect the urban areas of the state, especially the northern Kentucky, Louisville, and Lexington areas. We're in illuminating numbers, so it all really does go together at the end of the day. Well, very good for the communications between us and Louisville because we kind of, at one point, we were very much competitive with each other, whether it be the high school basketball tournament tournament or whatever, and then quite recently, the Yum Center and Coach Patino and Coach Calipari. Anyway, I just wanted to mention that 56 years thing. You said middle of the 50s, and that's exactly right where it was, Jim. It's an amazing day. Thank you, Mayor. Council Member McCord. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Host. appreciate all that you do for this state, not just our communities, but for the state. I want to encourage you with a couple of things that you may or may not know, though, that are already in place that can play into this. In 2005, when I first came on to council, I had the good fortune of meeting Councilmember Robin Engel in Louisville, and we started talking roads and the road formula and how we could potentially change that by partnering. And we found that we had so much fun together that we started looking at a way to put the councils together. In 2006, we put the Lexington City Council and the Metro Council together at the horse park to discuss the World Equestrian Games that were coming. In 2007, we came to the Louisville Zoo to do the exact same thing. So what I would like to commit to you is you have two council members that have been working for the last six years on bringing those councils together and looking for an opportunity to do that again using this as the platform. And so, again, I am all for this, and the things that come off of this are tremendous. I spend a great deal of time in Frankfort and Shelbyville and looking for opportunities to physically connect these two communities via trails and other means of transportation that I believe these types of things spin off. So, again, you've got my commitment not only as a council member, but personally Robin Engel has come and spoken from that mic to let this council know what's happening in Louisville. And so I think you've got not only two cooperative mayors that are communicating, but you've got two councils that you may not realize the level of communication. No, I knew about it because Robin made a very distinct point when Mayor Fisher and I were before the council two weeks ago to say the same thing. And so he commended you, commended this council for already the cooperation that exists. Well, I look forward to whatever cooperation we can offer. Thank you for everything. Thank you, Council Member McCord. And Robin mentioned the same thing to me in thanking you, Jay. Council Member, Vice Mayor Gordon. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you very much, Mr. Host and Mr. Shapiro. I do think that this effort will have a phenomenal effect on our whole Commonwealth. I think that people are very excited about it. I have been in communication with Council President Jim King, whom you know from Louisville, and we are working on a joint resolution. It's still in the phase of wording, some wording changes, but we're both pretty excited about the councils actually collaborating among themselves in regard to this initiative. I think it will add just another aspect to it and for each of our councils to say that we are so supportive and we'll do what we can from our perspective, the legislative and policy perspective, to help make this all work. So we're hoping that our councils can roll this out about the same time. Our meetings aren't exactly on the same weeks, but we think we can work with that. So I appreciate all your hard work and your leadership and look forward to hearing more. Thank you, and I would encourage all of you to support an enabling resolution, that is, joint resolution of both cities, one indeed that comes before you. I think that's very important. It's very important that we show unanimity between these two cities for the first time on anything like this. And if you think about what that can accomplish educationally and legislatively, it sets a new tone for Kentucky. So thank you. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Council Member Martin. Thank you, Mayor. Mr. Rose, thank you for being here. And as your councilman, I would encourage you to maybe consider council at large. I am not running against you. It really is great to have someone of your vision and energy in this. And there's two questions I have for you. Maybe this is not the time to sort of get into the details of things. But, you know, when I was at the Economic Development Cabinet, Jen and I were there at the same time. The sharing of tax revenue was a huge obstacle to regionalism, and we, I think, started approaching the regional industrial concept at that time. But I'd love to hear your thoughts on that. But second, about the availability of build-ready, develop-a-land for manufacturing. I think we're very short on land that you could actually bring a company to, And to be able to recruit a company, you have to have some place to put them, and they want to know that the infrastructure is there, that it's sewerable and things like that. This may or may not be the time to get into that. I just love your thoughts. Well, I'm not going to get into the thoughts about available land because that's not what I do and not what I'm going to do with this. What the study will show will be to show all of that, will be to show how it works and so on. And so I'm not going to get into my thoughts in that regard because that's what they're supposed to do. I'll have my opportunity with my thoughts otherwise. As far as the tax structure is concerned, it's very simple to me. I think for years and years and years, we here, I've lived here for most of my life, We here have always fought the battle of saying, well, we want everything that we've been distributing out in tax dollars. That's not realistic. The fact is urban centers have to support the rural parts of the state. Now, if everybody accepts that and understands that, then what's going to happen is the rural legislators are going to be more supportive about what they can do to help Louisville and Lexington than they have been in the past because of the fact that if they do more, then more happens. I had so many calls from people saying, what in the world are you doing? I'm talking about my old county, Boyd County. What are you doing building an arena for Louisville? And my comment is because 40 cents of every single tax dollar that's new generated in downtown Louisville is going to help Boyd County. Oh, how does that happen? And I said, because that's where you think your money comes from. Do you think you generate enough money in Boyd County to support what the state does in Boyd County? Do you think you have enough money in Hazard to support what happens there? It happens in Lexington. It happens in Louisville. It happens in northern Kentucky. But it happens more in Lexington and Louisville than any other place in the state. Now get on board and understand that the more we do to help support the economic engine of the state, the better the state's going to be. And that's the message we've got to deliver, and that's the message we've got to continue to say over and over and over again. And if we say that enough, then a lot of these people are going to get it. And that's the difference. Thank you, Mayor. Council Member Kay. Thank you, Mayor. And thank you for being here, Mr. Host, and bringing your kind of what I consider world-class perspective and energy to our community and keeping a lot of it here. The question I have is I'm excited about the regional focus, and I understand the emphasis on advanced manufacturing and how important that can be for exports. My question is, are there other aspects? When you look at the assets of the region between Louisville and Lexington, it's a lot of rural land. Has some thought been given to looking at the ways in which agriculture will figure into this, even though it's not a part of the advanced manufacturing picture? Sure. We are going to focus on one area and one area to really do it well. I think the study will show a lot of other things that can be done. But the mistake that I think most things that have happened in this state and most studies have been done is you try to be all things to all people. And we've got a chance. Understand that 14% of our jobs between Lexington and Louisville are in manufacturing. That's higher than the 10% that is the norm. So we're already starting out. We've already got plateaus. We don't have to go get Toyota. We don't have to go get Ford's just added 1,800 jobs in Louisville. and they're getting ready to add more. And Louisville, University of Louisville, is doing a world-class job in applied manufacturing. This is all of the kinds of things. GE is already doing a lot of work with the University of Louisville. So is Ford. Here, UK is doing the same thing with Toyota. Now think about the fact that if we put those two applied manufacturing together, and this is how you do manufacturing a different way, how you do things a different way. how many different types of industries can we bring, that's what Germany did. That's what they do. They do it better than anybody in the European Union. There's no reason we can't do it better as a result, and that's what this is all about. Now, does that mean we won't end up with something that will help agriculture? Sure, we will. But we're going to focus on that area. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Councilman McKay. Councilman Blues. Thank you, Mayor. Mr. Host, you may have answered this question already in your response to Councilmember Kay, but I just wondered whether, looking ahead, you foresee the possibility, the need, the advisability of a literal connector between Louisville and Luxembourg. You mean like light rail? Or heavy rail, for that matter. I will tell you, I just came back from San Francisco area, and I've been spending a lot of time out there on business. And I fully understand that need. And if you really want to dream, if you really want to dream, to be able to have that connector in some way between these two areas, think how great that would be in terms of being able to really connect the areas, connect the education, connect all the various things. Now, is that something that we're going to come out with this study with? No. But is that something that could happen if we really dream and have vision about what can really happen as a result of all this cooperation between two cities? Heck, yeah. Why not? Why couldn't we do that? So that's something that I thought about and talked to my wife about the other night. Wouldn't it be something? You know, probably won't be in my lifetime, but part of this would be that if we connect these two cities, if these two councils really work together and have joint committees that work together and dream together about how you match the two universities, how we match the two communities. I'll bet you, how many here know that Louisville has the fifth top-ranked zoo in the United States? Anybody here know that? I suspect you didn't, because I bet you nobody's ever been to that zoo. Conversely, how many people in Louisville have ever been to the horse park? Think about that. Now, I say that because that's the kind of thing that we've got to develop, is that relationship between these places. And that's what I've learned since I've been doing what I've been doing the last six years. Louisville's a great city. This is my city. they're both in Kentucky and this is my state and this is our state let's make it better I'm glad to hear you say that I think we do have to think long here in some ways and you're right intense imagination precedes reality and that's something we have to do for the first time you've got two entrepreneurs that are running these cities you've got an entrepreneur in Lexington, you've got an entrepreneur in Louisville and I'm an entrepreneur. So if you think about the opportunity we've got of thinking out of the box, that's what we've got to do. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Well, thinking along those lines, Dr. Blues, I was just remembering that Henry Clay built the first railroad in 1832, so the 200th anniversary would be 2032. So, you know, Chairman Host has something to hope for there. I don't have anybody else signed up for a comment or question. Anybody else? Going, going, going. Well, Jim Host, thank you so very much. One summary statement. Our first board meeting with the announcement of the two mayors, the announcement of this, what I think will be a world-class board, will be made in Frankfurt, which is where we're holding our meetings, on November 21st at the Kentucky History Center at 2 o'clock. And I would encourage all of those of you who can come to offer support, to offer support of this very first public forum that we're going to have of these top CEOs and two university presidents, the two mayors, and outlining this initiative publicly, I would strongly encourage you, if you can, to come. There will be plenty of room in the crowd for those of you who would like to come. Thank you. Thank you, sir. That was November 21st, right? November 21st, 2 o'clock, Kentucky History Center. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Be there early. We know your reputation. Yes, sir. All right. Thanks again. All right. Next on our agenda, Council Reports. The floor is available for Council Reports, and signed up first is Council Member Lane. Thank you, Mayor. In my general government committee report on October 25th, I advised counsel that the committee had approved a draft ordinance establishing policies and procedures pertaining to the use and management of real estate properties owned or controlled by the Irvin County government. But I did not make a motion to put it on the docket at that time because there were some exhibits that were being finalized by the legal department. and those documents have been finalized and a copy of the ordinance and the exhibits was delivered to council members yesterday. So I would like to make a motion, just a second, to put it on the docket for our meeting, our next council meeting. But I wanted to say that there probably will be some questions and discussion about the ordinance and the exhibits and I would hope that we could bring it up at our next council meeting or our next work session. But that would allow the general services to move forward with this project. And because we want to advise tenants and give them as much lead time as possible, time is somewhat of the essence. So that being said, I moved to place on the docket for the November 3, 2011, council meeting an ordinance approving the Department of General Services policies and procedures for usage of all facility space owned by the Lexington Fayette and Urban County Government. Motion by Council Member Lane. Second by Council Member Henson. All right. Is there any discussion? Hearing none, we can take a vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. All those no, motion carries. Thank you, Mr. Lane. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Do you have anything else? No, sir. All right. That's it. Thank you. Council Member Blues. Thank you, Mayor. I have a motion and also an announcement. The motion is to place on the docket for Thursday, November 3, a resolution authorizing and directing the mayor on behalf of the urban county government to execute a release of easement and a partial release of detention easement releasing a sanitary sewer easement and a portion of a detention easement on property located at 1758 Hatter Lane. So moved. Motion back. Council Member Blue, seconded by Council Member Lane. Is there any discussion on the motion? All right. Hearing none, we can take a vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. All opposed, no. Motion carries. Thank you, Mayor. and the announcement is that tomorrow night at 6.30 p.m. in the community center at Marlboro Park, Council Member Ford and I and our legislative aides, Georgetta Gill and Tiffany Tatum, will meet with the residents of five neighborhoods who, as of last Thursday night, moved out of the second district and into the first. It's an opportunity for us to say goodbye and hello and for those folks to get to know their new council members. So the residents of Green Acres neighborhood, Brookfield Chase, of Glynburn, of Radcliffe, Marlboro, and of Joyland's Shandon Park Precinct are all invited and encouraged to attend again at 6.30 tomorrow night in the community center at Marlboro Park. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Councilman Blues. Vice Mayor Gordon. Thank you, Mayor. Just three items, one of which I've already spoken about, and that is the joint resolution by our council and the Louisville Council. I expect to come forward within, I'm hopeful, the next week. And Jim King, the president of the Louisville Council, and I have talked about future partnerships and conversations, and I would welcome your all's ideas for that in ways that we can be working together more. The second thing is just to remind council members of the confirmation hearing this Thursday, November 3rd at 5 o'clock on the fifth floor for the Commissioner of General Services who is being proposed by the administration. and you should have received the financial disclosure form and the resume today of that person, and you may have actually received it yesterday. And then finally, I have sent council members an email about this just to put kind of an emphasis over it or under it. As you saw in my email, the citizen advocate office will be moving. At the request of the CAO, there's some, well, I guess the word is shuffling of offices. with the PIO staff diminished to two and the desire of the CAO to move to the first floor. We've been working together with Mr. Baradaran to move the citizen advocate office, and I understand right now everything's out of it. Is that correct? On the first floor, because it was actually two offices, And Mr. Baradaran and the CAO have identified a fourth floor office and are working to help bring it up to standard and to add some security measures to it. It will be accessible to anyone. And so that move will probably be complete maybe with the painting and everything next week. Is that correct? Okay. Very good. We've identified a temporary person who is going through HR to work on a temporary basis as our citizen advocate until the permanent citizen advocate is hired. So, thank you. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Council Member Henson. Thank you, Mayor. Last week I think we were a little busy and I didn't get to make my announcement or give my council a report. But I wanted to thank everyone that participated in the Cardinal Valley Fright Night event. And many of the legislative aides volunteered. And it was just a lot of fun and very, very well organized. I enjoyed it completely. And you've received my emails about the Salvation Army celebrity bell ringing. and Council Member Blues and Council Member Myers are fighting each other over who's going to win. Very, very competitive. There are a few slots available, but not very good ones. But we have Mary Jo Porter later in the evening available. Cruiser has signed on with us, Mayor John Perino, and the mayor, you haven't signed up yet. Thanks for pointing that out. I was trying to wave my hand. I'll sign up, Peggy. I know you will, and I appreciate it. And I just wanted to point out that this is one thing that Salvation Army, they are so very important to our community. because Christmas, everybody really sees their kettles and the work that they do, but they do work year-round for folks that don't have a place to live, for families and women, and it is a very costly job that they do to provide those services. So they're just so very much appreciated, and I wanted to bring up why we are doing this in reality. They do a lot of things at Christmas time. Also, their annual breakfast is tomorrow morning at 7.30. And they will be roasting... Luther Deaton. Who? Luther Deaton. Yes, Luther Deaton. And that's always fun. I was warning, I had spoke to Jeff Reed about community corrections, and he said that we'd be getting an update. And I wanted to ask if that will include an update on hiring the new director and where that is in the process. Do you want to come forward, Mr. Green? Thank you. Yes. When I was speaking with you the other day about community corrections, and you said we'd have an update coming forward fairly soon, And I just wanted to make sure that would that include or ask would that include? We're prepared to discuss that, and we've been talking about getting an advertisement for the new position out. We haven't done it yet. And again, your committee and the mayor's new task force is looking at those issues related to the jail and governance of the jail and specific roles and specific activities that are done that we've discussed. and I think we'll be in a better position to move more quickly once we have some resolve on those issues. But we are taking steps, and I think a lot depends on how quickly we move as to when those issues of governance are fixed, are resolved would be a better word. I appreciate it. I hate to keep bringing this up, but I just felt like that I would like an update certainly on hiring the new director. We haven't taken any steps yet. We are talking about starting to take steps, and the first steps would be the advertising process. Okay. Thank you, sir. And one last thing is I also picked up four new precincts with the redistricting, and there is a neighborhood meeting that I believe Council Member Martin and I will share. It's possibly in two different districts. And they have a meeting next Tuesday, 7 o'clock, Garden Springs Neighborhood Association. And that is at the Lutheran Church on Gardens Prince Drive. And I look forward to meeting them and working with you, Council Member Martin. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Henson. Council Member Farmer. Thank you, Mayor. Mine actually goes back to new business. There was a question I meant to ask on Item D about the authorization to enter into a short-term telecommunications franchise agreement. And I guess starting... Commissioner Graham is coming to the podium. So this is just to tide us over until we have a completely negotiated new telecommunications franchise. That's correct. It just gets us to a point where we can really get into negotiations. Well, and that's kind of the point. I think we should make sure that we do a really great job in negotiations. And I think one of the things that harmed us in the past and in the header letter on this is to negotiate longer-term franchises. At one time, we labored under a 20-year contract. And I think that's just way too long given the way that telecommunications is changing. And I would just, there must be some sort of industry standard that we want to comply with and or exceed because I think there's opportunity for us to do better within this negotiation and in this contract, especially on a shorter turn. I just would like to have other conversations with you as we go on about it, because I just think it's very important. We've had, I don't know if everybody has had, but I've had e-mails about the new owner and what the new owner will do and how it's all going to kind of play out, and I just want to make sure that we do the best we can. We will be consulting with you all on all those things. Perfect. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Mayor, if I might actually ask a follow-up. Commissioner, because the Council had asked that the contracts, the franchise contracts, they were coming up for renewal, that they would come and make a presentation. And so this is actually not the first renewal, but the second extension of this contract. Is that correct? And I believe from talking with David Barber, this one expires in September. We are still, we have a franchise, I think, on the telecommunication that's going to expire in September. We did some extensions last. Right. We had some on, I think it's electric and gas, that we got a short-term extension because we're currently in franchise negotiations with them. But we're waiting on a utility audit that we're conducting. So those, once we get the utility audit done, we'll resume the negotiations with them. Are they actually going to come talk to us? The idea was that they come and talk to us about what they've been doing because we're the ones who vote on the contract. The utilities actually come talk? Yeah, absolutely. I think as part of the resumed negotiations that we were going to talk to him about that once we get the utility audit done. So I don't know that we have a commitment on that because they haven't been in those meetings, but we can find out for you and let you know. I'm going to require it before I vote for him. So there's your commitment. Okay. Thank you, Mayor. Take that in, too. And then, Vice Mayor, I would just say I would look forward to the joint resolution for the BEAM situation. and if we have the opportunity to have a joint meeting with the Louisville Council, I would suggest either Wadi or Paytona, either one. Excellent. Thank you, sir. Good suggestion. Council Member Ford. Thank you, Mayor. Just a few announcements. I want to announce to the Council that the Charles Young Center Redevelopment Task Force has completed its work after 14 meetings and eight months of work, we will be delivering to each of the Council members a formal copy of that report that outlines our recommendations. You'll have that in the next few days. And it's also my understanding is that we'll have the opportunity to present formally to the work session on November 29th. So, again, I thank many of the members of the public, the citizens who have come out. I want to thank again Council Member Kane, Council Member Henson, and Mr. Glenn Brown from the administration mayor. Glenn was a very active and dedicated member of that work. And I'd also like to thank John Sheed and his staff of General Services and Security. We had our final three meetings at the center without incident, and we're very thankful for their work there. changing subjects. I would like to thank Parks and Recreation and the families who have participated again in youth football and cheerleading. I understand that they are nearing the end of their regular season and going into the playoffs and tournament games. So again, I want to thank all the volunteer coaches and supervisors at our various parks across the city for helping these young folks ages 7 through 12 to have something fun to do. You guys know how special football is to me. But it starts there. And then lastly, I would like to thank Councilmember Tom Blues for his leadership in allowing me to meet and begin to introduce myself to his constituents and our constituents. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Councilman Ford. Councilman Kay. Thank you, Mayor. I just want to take the opportunity publicly to give a shout-out to Parks and Rec, to Lori Houlihan from the mayor's staff and anybody else who was involved in helping with the thriller reenactment, entertainment, and parade on Sunday night. It was a wonderful event. If I can put it this way, it was very spirited. Just two chuckles, that's all I get for that? Okay. A very large crowd, comparable in the space to the crowd that comes down for the Fourth of July. So this is an event unique to Lexington. It's put together with a huge amount of volunteer effort. So for all those who participated and came down, thank you so much. Thank you, Mayor. Yes, sir. Thank you, Council Member K. Big underlining and ditto to what you had to say about the thriller. It was awesome. Okay, Council Member Martin. Thank you, Mayor. And as Council Member Henson indicated, we have the Garden Springs Neighborhood Association will be holding a meeting on November 8th at the Gethsemane Lutheran Church. I always get that tongue twisted. At 7 p.m. on Garden Springs Drive. And they'll be unveiling their new website. And we'll be welcoming their new council representative as well. And so Council Member Henson and I will be sharing Garden Springs. And I told them not to, that they didn't lose a councilman. They're gaining a second one. And so we look forward to that as well. And with redistricting, we also welcome residents of Rabbit Run, Clemens Heights, Indian Hills, and Plantation to the 10th District. And I look forward to meeting with folks from those neighborhoods in the near future. And, Mayor, I just want to follow up the conversation earlier. It really takes some courage to quote Mark Twain in front of Dr. Blues being a lifetime Mark Twain scholar. So I commend you on your courage. Thank you, Mayor. I probably got it wrong. I think it was 20 years. Did I say 10? Yes. Oh, shucks. Council Member McCord. Thank you, Mayor. Just a motion to approve the NDF requests. Second. Motion by Council Member McCord, second by Council Member Farmer to approve the NDF. Is there any discussion? Okay. Hearing none, we can take a vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. All opposed, no. Motion carries. Great. Anything else, Council Member Court? Okay. All right. I don't show anyone else as signing on for a council report. So next is a mayor's report. Second. A motion by Council Member Stennett to approve, second by Council Member Blues. Is there any discussion? Any discussion? All right. You can take a vote then. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. All opposed, no. Motion carries. Thank you. Next on our agenda is public comment. I don't have anyone signed up for public comment. Mr. Mundy, is nobody? Okay. All right, sir. Don't have anyone signed up for public comment. So if there is no other business, then I'll ask for a motion to adjourn. Motion by Vice Mayor Gordon, seconded by Council Member Martin. All in favor, please say aye. Opposed, no. We are adjourned. Thank you.