# Council Public Safety Committee - March 6, 2012 > Auto-transcribed civic record · March 6, 2012 - **Permalink**: https://meetings.lexingtonky.news/meeting/2426 - **Source video**: https://lfucg.granicus.com/player/clip/2426?view_id=14&redirect=true - **Date**: 2012-03-06 - **Last revised**: July 17, 2026 - **Length**: 13,773 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 Public Safety Committee met on March 6, 2012, at 1:00 p.m., with Diane Lawless presiding. The committee addressed four agenda items during the meeting, taking six votes and hearing four public comments. The committee approved three items: the Approval of Summary, the Brake Ordinance, and the TaxiCab Ordinance. One item—an Update on Items Referred to Committee—was deferred to a future meeting. ## Attendance The following individuals were present at the meeting on March 6, 2012: * Diane Lawless * Doug Martin * Chuck Ellinger * Chris Ford * Julian Beard * Bill Farmer * Kevin Stinnett * K.C. Crosbie * Jay McChord * Peggy Henson No absences or late arrivals were recorded. ## Votes and Decisions **Ordinance 0130-26: Engine Brake Ordinance** [timestamp: 00:20:14] Motion by Bill Farmer, seconded by Kevin Stinnett. This ordinance prohibits the use of engine brakes on non-limited-access highways unless they create a noise disturbance. The motion passed by voice vote. Implementation includes signage to inform truck drivers, with an effective date of July 1, 2012. **Ordinance 0131-26: Taxi Cab Ordinance – 24-Hour Service Requirement** [timestamp: 01:18:56] Motion by Julian Beard, seconded by Chris Ford. This amendment requires taxi cab companies to provide 24-hour, 365-day service. The electronic vote resulted in 6 ayes and 3 nays. Voting in favor were Diane Lawless, Doug Martin, Chuck Ellinger, Chris Ford, K.C. Crosbie, and Jay McChord. Voting against were Bill Farmer, Kevin Stinnett, and Peggy Henson. The motion passed. **Ordinance 0131-26: Minimum Fleet Size Reduction** [timestamp: 01:04:11] Motion by Bill Farmer, seconded by K.C. Crosbie. This amendment reduces the minimum fleet size requirement for taxi cab companies from 25 to 10 vehicles. The electronic vote resulted in 5 ayes and 4 nays. Voting in favor were Diane Lawless, Doug Martin, Chuck Ellinger, Chris Ford, and Jay McChord. Voting against were Julian Beard, Bill Farmer, Kevin Stinnett, and Peggy Henson. The motion passed. **Ordinance 0131-26: Fleet Increase Motion** [timestamp: 01:37:20] Motion by Diane Lawless, seconded by Julian Beard. This motion would have allowed current taxi cab companies to increase their fleet one vehicle at a time. The motion was withdrawn following a legal opinion that it would constitute special legislation. **Ordinance 0131-26: Final Passage** [timestamp: 01:40:02] Motion by Bill Farmer, seconded by Chuck Ellinger. Final passage of the revised Taxi Cab Ordinance as amended. The motion passed. **Motion to Remove Agenda Item** [timestamp: 01:45:21] Motion by K.C. Crosbie, seconded by Chuck Ellinger. This motion sought to remove "Community Corrections Best System of Management" from the agenda. The motion was withdrawn to allow input from Council Members Myers and Kay. ## Public Comment Four speakers addressed the council during the public comment period. **Engine Brake Ordinance** Dr. Blues presented an engine brake ordinance at [timestamp: 00:03:03], noting community complaints about noise from trucks using jake brakes in residential areas. Dr. Blues emphasized the need for signage and public education to address the issue. Officer Cook spoke at [timestamp: 00:11:06] regarding truck safety and compliance. Officer Cook explained that engine brakes are safe when properly maintained and that most noise complaints stem from inadequate mufflers or straight pipes rather than the brakes themselves. Officer Cook stated that enforcement of brake regulations is possible and that safety exceptions exist for certain circumstances. **Taxi Fleet Operations** Mr. McGinnis addressed the council at [timestamp: 01:27:28] regarding the growth of taxi fleets. Mr. McGinnis requested that the council allow existing taxi companies to grow their fleets one cab at a time, arguing that the current 25-cab minimum requirement creates a barrier to entry. Mr. McGinnis stated that he has been unfairly restricted under the existing policy. Mr. Browder spoke at [timestamp: 00:46:04] about taxi service and visitor safety. Mr. Browder stressed the importance of maintaining 24-hour taxi service for airport visitors and cited personal experiences of being stranded at the airport without available cabs. ## Contested Items The March 6, 2012 meeting included three significant areas of disagreement: **Minimum Fleet Size for Taxi Companies** A proposal to reduce the minimum fleet size requirement from 25 to 10 vehicles resulted in a split vote. The debate centered on multiple concerns: public safety implications, economic fairness among operators, and the regulatory burden on taxi companies. Participants disagreed about whether lowering the threshold would improve market access for smaller operators or create unacceptable risks and competitive disadvantages. **24-Hour Service Requirement** Intense discussion occurred regarding whether taxi companies should be mandated to provide 24-hour, 365-day service. Arguments on both sides focused on three main issues: public safety needs, the economic viability of such requirements for operators, and fairness considerations for small businesses. The debate reflected tension between ensuring comprehensive public transportation access and the practical constraints facing taxi companies of varying sizes. **Allowing Incremental Fleet Growth** A motion was introduced to permit existing companies to expand their fleets one vehicle at a time. This proposal was withdrawn following legal advice that indicated such an arrangement would constitute special legislation. The procedural dispute highlighted concerns about the legal framework governing fleet expansion policies and the distinction between general regulatory changes and provisions that would apply selectively to specific operators. ## Approval of Summary The committee reviewed the meeting summary from the February 7, 2012, session. Andrea James led the discussion on this agenda item. The summary covered motions related to the Noise Ordinance Task Force and amendments to the draft noise ordinance that had been discussed at the previous meeting. The committee approved the summary. ## Brake Ordinance The committee discussed and approved the Engine Brake Ordinance during this meeting. [timestamp: 00:03:03] **Key Speakers** The discussion involved Dr. Blues, Rick Curtis, and Officer Cook. **Content and Provisions** The ordinance prohibits the use of engine brakes on non-limited-access highways when they create a noise disturbance. The ordinance also includes provisions for signage and enforcement mechanisms to support compliance. **Outcome** The Engine Brake Ordinance was approved by the committee. ## TaxiCab Ordinance The committee addressed the TaxiCab Ordinance during this agenda item, which involved debate and amendments to the existing regulations [timestamp: 00:21:22]. **Key Changes and Amendments** The ordinance underwent several modifications during discussion. A significant change reduced the minimum fleet size requirement from 25 vehicles to 10 vehicles. The ordinance also included a requirement that taxi services operate 24 hours per day, 365 days per year. **Speakers and Discussion** The following individuals participated in the debate: Mr. Browder, Mr. McGinnis, Diane Lawless, Julian Beard, and Bill Farmer. The committee engaged in multiple rounds of amendments as they refined the ordinance language. **Outcome** The committee approved the TaxiCab Ordinance unanimously after completing the amendments. The final version reflected the reduced fleet size threshold and the continuous service requirements. ## Update on Items Referred to Committee [timestamp: 01:40:45] The committee reviewed several items that had been previously referred for further consideration. Key speakers in this discussion included Doug Martin, Bill Farmer, and K.C. Crosbie. The committee addressed the following referred items: - **Noise ordinance** — reviewed as part of the referred items - **Public safety disability claims** — discussed during the update - **Paramedic Training Emergency Medical Advisory Board report** — presented for committee consideration - **Quarry ordinance** — included in the items under review Some of the referred items were deferred or removed from the agenda pending the receipt of additional information needed for full consideration. **Outcome:** The committee deferred action on the items under review, indicating that further information or clarification is required before these matters can be fully addressed. --- ## Decisions - **Ordinance 0130-26** — passed: Approval of the Engine Brake Ordinance prohibiting use of engine brakes on non-limited-access highways unless they create a noise disturbance. - **Ordinance 0131-26** — passed (6-3): Amendment to the Taxi Cab Ordinance to require 24-hour, 365-day service. - **Ordinance 0131-26** — passed (5-4): Amendment to reduce the minimum fleet size for taxi cab companies from 25 to 10 vehicles. - **Ordinance 0131-26** — withdrawn: Motion to allow current taxi cab companies to increase their fleet one vehicle at a time. - **Ordinance 0131-26** — passed: Final passage of the revised Taxi Cab Ordinance as amended. - **Motion** — withdrawn: Motion to remove 'Community Corrections Best System of Management' from the agenda. --- ## Full transcript Music Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Those opposed? Motion carries. Next thing on the agenda is the break ordinance, and I understand that we have some commentary from Dr. Blues to introduce this. Dr. Blues. Thank you, Mr. Vice Chair. and thank you for this opportunity to bring the engine brake ordinance forward. As I indicated in the email I sent late last week, the noise ordinance task force in its final report brought two ordinances, two draft ordinances for consideration. One was the noise ordinance, which the committee discussed last month, and the other is the engine brake ordinance, which is in the packet. We brought the engine brake ordinance forward because we, as a task force, had received significant numbers of complaints from Lexingtonians who live in the vicinity of roadways where trucks are coming off the New Circle Road or such corridors as Highway 27 or off I-75 and slowing their vehicles not with their regular brakes but with the so-called jake brakes or engine brakes that make considerable noises. In my district, for example, I get the complaints from residents of Griffin Gate about the trucks as they come off the interstate, and also from the Leastown Road residents regarding the trucks that come off the New Circle Road. So we brought that ordinance forward to prohibit the use of such breaks on all but limited access highways in Fayette County. And we have here today David Barbary, who was a task force's attorney, Rick Curtis, from the Office of the Commissioner of Public Safety, who also served on the task force. and Officer Cook, Division of Police, can also speak to this matter. And so I would welcome the discussion and hope there will be a motion in due course to move the proposed ordinance forward to the full council. Thank you, Dr. Bluse. At this time, I'm going to turn the gavel over to Council Member Lawless, who is the chair of the committee and who has joined us. Council Member Laws. Thank you. Are there any questions? Council Member Farmer? Oh, you were... Mr. Barbary, thank you. I apologize for not remembering what the numbers were, Council Member Blues. I think part of the discussion when we talked about this, which was probably now several years ago possibly, I think this was going to have some signages posted so that people would be aware of it if it gets adopted so the truck drivers would actually know that this was in force. And I don't recall what all that involved as far as how much that was going to cost and which division was going to take the initiative on that if this got adopted. But I think that would be the one thing that you all would need to consider is normally if you have one of these on the books, there would be some signage posted in some of these areas so that the truck drivers would know that this was on the books? I think you're absolutely right. This would involve some expense for installation of signage, and that is why the ordinance's effective date, if it is passed, is for July of this year to at least give the time to prepare and install those signs. also to educate that segment of the driving public that would be directly affected by the new regulation. Madam Chair, if there's no objection, I think that Mr. Curtis could probably provide some additional information on this proposed ordinance. Thank you. This was actually, like Councilman Blues actually alluded to, this was brought up during the task force, which obviously went on for a number of years. And there were people who actually came and spoke to it, constituents from in and around the Richmond Road, Manowar area, Leastown Road area, people adjacent to I-75. That was a horrendous problem for them because it went on sometimes to the wee hours of the morning when trucks were going to and from and cutting through, and they were using their braking system or their hydraulic air brake system, and he used it as a backup to slow the vehicles down as opposed to just using their foot brake itself. Officer Cook, I brought him with me because he basically is our recognized person on the police department that knows about the commercial vehicle. He runs a commercial vehicle program for the police department as far as the citation and the grant process that we have and knows infinitely more than I ever will about braking systems on trucks or ever want to know as far as trucks go. One point that he did bring to me, that on the signages, the city of Pennsylvania had to deal with the signs themselves. where the state of Pennsylvania passed a law against the use of these kind of brakes with heavy trucks, and they basically posted no Jake Brake use within certain areas, and we're finding out that that's a copyrighted term that can't be posted on any public sign because it's an infringement upon a national copyright. So with that in mind, we couldn't say no Jake Brake use, but we could say no air brake use or no brakes to use to slow the vehicle down. There's other terminology, obviously, that we can use. But it is a source of concern for many people, and we've heard numerous complaints about it. If I can just add, all of the illustrations of signs that I have seen in the several states where municipalities have prohibited the use of those brakes in certain areas, they all refer not to Jake brakes but to engine brakes. Engine brakes, yes. So that's the typical signage. And that is the commonly used term that's known. throughout the country. Yes. Thank you very much. Thank you. Council Member Martin. Rick, I have a couple questions for you. So is this a field of expertise for you about trucks, or do we have someone that might be able to talk to us about the mechanical issues? That's why I brought Officer Cook with me. Absolutely. Absolutely. he was already getting up as soon as you said expertise i have none he does welcome thank you uh basically what semi trucks do they have air brakes okay um the ones we're talking about that use the engine retarders or the jake brake switch have uh have air brakes each axle has two brakes one for each side of the axle if you have a semi-tractor trailer with five axle it has 10 brakes, 10 air brakes. Each one of those brakes have to work. They have to be within a certain tolerance, and that's what we inspect when we stop the trucks. Now, one of the biggest things about the jake braking and the little switch they throw is that's designed to cut off the cylinders when they're at their maximum. That slows the truck down without using the foot brake, which in turn activates the air brakes. They do that because if truck brakes get too hot going down a long hill, then they can glaze over and not be as effective. So a lot of them try to use that when they're going down a steep hill. Now some of them use it when they're going around man-of-war because they tend to get up to 45, 55 miles an hour later at night because there's not that much traffic and all of a sudden the light changes. Well then in order to stop with that load on that truck, they have to do something other than just use those 10 brakes or they're going to slide right on through or lock them down and damage their brake lining. So So they hit that jake brake, which in turn, engine retards that compression in that engine and slows them down. So that's what you have. Now, most of the noise that comes from that is because of inadequate silencers or mufflers on those trucks. If a brake retarder is used correctly, you'll never hear it activated. Because even a normal car, you use a brake retarder or an engine brake every day when you drive your car. because when you let your foot off the gas, it slows that engine down automatically. So you're using that, and that's what a trucker does when he hits that switch. But it's putting that pressure, that compression is holding it down and saying, and that's what does that. But most of that noise coming out of those mufflers is because some of them have straight pipes, which is illegal. Some of them, they're just old trucks. They don't want to spend the money on the maintenance. So that's where a lot of the noise comes from. A lot of CISIs use the noise ordinance. I've used inadequate silencers on them before when I catch them at night doing that because it's an inadequate muffler. So that's under state law. So how will trucks operate in compliance if this new law passes? They will have to use their foot brake, which is their air brakes. That's what they would have to use. And are there times when those are inadequate because you mentioned? Sometimes they would be inadequate. if they have to stop quickly sometimes. So it's safer if they engage this Jake break on times where they have to stop quickly? Yes. So are we asking trucks not to be safe? No, I think what you're asking them is to be aware. You post the signage, you make them aware of it, you do some type of media, something that you can get on a short commercial or something on some of these radio waves. If you post it coming in the main arteries of the city, Most of them will see that. If you post it, like especially from Bursell's Road at Manoworth Airport and then over there at, you know, US-27 Nicholasville Road, the major arteries post those signs where they can see them, and they will know it will educate them. And I think then that will make them say, hey, I need to drive a little bit slower and be a little bit more careful because I'm not going to be able to use that jake brake to help myself out. So you don't think you're asking them to do anything unsafe. You're just asking them, hey, now you know that instead of going that extra five miles an hour over the limit like you might normally do, you better go five under. And that's one of the reasons we didn't prohibit it. We're only doing it if it's a noise, if it rises to a level of noise disturbance. If it's muffled in the manner that he described earlier, I'm going to assume it shouldn't be written up in that case. But it's the instances where it's not muffled that it would be a concern where it would be a noise violation. So is this ordinance clear that it's about? You can still do it. It's not prohibited. And if it needs to be cleared by putting properly muffled or language like that in there, that's fine, too. But the intent when we drafted it was not to prohibit it from taking place. That's not what this says, though. This says it is illegal. No, it's illegal if it creates a noise disturbance. And then you define what a noise disturbance is. Which may result in a noise disorder. Otherwise, we would have done it as a ban. But because of the issues that he brought out, we didn't ban it from taking place. and this is something my guys once we get the ordinance up we can print it out i can get my guys doing truck inspections to hand them out all day long because we stop the trucks i just want to make sure that it's possible to comply that good laws are ones where it's actually possible to comply yes like i said if they've got the adequate muffler silencer on that truck you'll never hear that jake break when it comes on good deal thank you thank you chair Council Member Henson. Officer Cook. Yes, ma'am. I'm sorry. My question mainly was about safety and if a truck found itself in a situation where it needed to stop quickly, And say they were going around a man of war or New Circle at speed or just below speed and needed to stop quickly, they could use the brake. They could use the brake, yes, ma'am. And really and truly, you know, you have the NORS ordinance listed in that and the way that works. And basically, we're going to have to be there to see it to enforce it. So if he sees a car that pulls out in front of him, he's got to use it. He uses it and makes a little noise. If we're not around, we're not going to write the citation anyway. So if he avoids an accident by using the air brakes or engine brakes, whatever, and it is hurt, is there any leeway to say, well, you were trying to avoid an accident if you've seen that? There's leeway in enforcement, yes, ma'am. Same way on I-75 where we have restricted lanes for trucks. We catch them in the left lane a lot, and they'll say, well, I had to move over because the car pushed me over. You know, we evaluate that and decide at that time whether or not a citation should be issued. Okay. Thank you. You're welcome. Council Member Beard. Thank you, Chair. A couple of questions. One involves signage. Who's responsible for the signage? We were talking about it taking some period of time. We're talking about state and federal highways generally. Do we have to write the check, or who gets to write the check? Rick, you get to write the check? Yeah. Basically, we do propagate signs through traffic engineering, but it would be something we would have to work with District 7 to see, once the law was passed, to see if we could do a concurrent type thing for the state roads as well as the local roads as well. That's what we've always done in the past. Okay. That was the first question. The other is more of a comment, and that is that I get a lot of complaints from people, trucks coming off of U.S. 27 going north, and they attempt to stay away from Fayette Mall, especially at certain times, Christmastime being quite typical. And so they utilize Manowar, which is 100%, essentially 100%, if anything's 100%, residential. And for those residents, it's been an occurrence, especially coming immediately off of U.S. 27 in that area. I guess they get the first brunt of that compression breaking and don't like it. So they themselves are going to think this is the greatest thing that we've ever done as far as legislation is concerned. And I would agree. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Thank you. Council Member Farmer. Chair, unless there are other questions or comments, I would make a motion to approve this as submitted. Motion to approve by Council Member Farmer, seconded by Council Member Stinnett. Is there any discussion? Council Member Farmer, are you? Okay. I'll just ignore it. There are no questions. May we vote? All in favor? Aye. Opposed? It passes. Hooray. Thank you. Thank you, Dr. Blues, and to the committee for all the hard work on this. I know you all put in a lot of... Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you, members of the committee. Appreciate your support. Thank you. Next on the agenda, we have the Taxi Cab Ordinance. And I believe Mr. Browder from the Convention and Visitors Bureau is here. and so he can... Is it okay if... Do you need to get back quickly? Okay. Mr. Curtis? What's before you today is essentially the same thing that you've looked at in the past. There's not a lot of changes to it specifically. There are some definite necessity items that are within the ordinance that need to be done for the safety of the general public, and that's always been our concern, obviously, is the safety of the general public and the passengers themselves. I would request specifically that it be passed again. Can you not hear me? That it be passed again and that it go to the full council for a vote. But there are just things that we need to do in public safety as far as inspection processes, control issues, and that sort of thing that just need to go through. One of the issues that came up last time was the inspections. cab companies objected to having to pay an independent certified mechanic for inspections. And it's been clear that we do not have the resources to do those inspections. And so I asked for a list, which is at the back of the packet. This is the list. And my understanding is, and these are the inspections for 2011, they were not random. The cab companies were bringing them in knowing they were being inspected. Is that correct? Yes, they actually ask, they call the cab companies, the detectives do, and ask for specific numbers to be brought to them to be inspected. And the numbers are randomly picked, but I mean it's just. But the cab companies know that cab's coming in. They do know ahead of time that it's coming in. And so United had 16, 17 that were brought in for inspection. I believe, and 11 of those failed the inspection? Yes, my understanding, yes. And then there's a section under that that has a list of cab numbers that were, it says broken, broken, out of country? Did that mean out of county? I'd say it's supposed to be county, not country, yes. Okay. Or out permanently. Were those other numbers that were requested to be brought in and weren't brought in for those reasons? At times there are numbers that they request where they are mechanically unable to get there, and they don't bring them in for inspection. All they need to do is tell the detectives at that time. And then another cab company had six come in. All of them failed, and one of them was taken out of service permanently. Lex Taxi, and that's the gentleman that has one cab in his fleet, right? Yes. And his passed, and Discount had two that came in and had a 50-50, one pass. One each, yes. Okay. And I think this is extremely eye-opening as to the necessity of having an independent outside mechanic inspect these cabs for the safety of our community and the cab drivers driving them. Well, I agree, and I don't want to put any additional expense on the companies, but at the same time, for the sake of public safety, I think that the inspection process that you see is indicative of what may very well be the problem. And our biggest problem is we don't have the personnel to do a totality of companies to inspect them all, but instilling a dual inspection or twice-a-year inspection by someone who is basically not part of each company. And it would be a very objective type of inspection. And it's just that we would say what we want done as far as the inspections go. If they pass, they pass. If they fail, they fail. So that would be maybe $75 or $100 per cap twice a year. That's what we've been told, yes. And a lot of these companies lease the cabs to the cab drivers for around $400 or more a month. I don't know exactly, but it's close to that per month, yes. Councilmember Farmer, is your name still on there? I'm ready to proceed. Okay. There's been some good work done in the rewrite of this ordinance. There are still a couple of areas I think that some of us may disagree on or may want to try to change back out of this potential draft. And I'd like to bring light to a couple of those. And I know that there's also a couple of instances where we've had good discussion with members of the taxi community who want to add a couple of things to this that we've talked about previously. But first, I'd like to talk about the one on page 16 of the packet, that is Section 17, that we've gone through, or at least in this draft, we've gone through to strike out and shall offer 24-hour service, which, you know, I think one of the important distinctions that Lexington has a hard time making is whether it's a town or a city. And in my estimation, if you're going to be a city, you'd have to offer, in my opinion, 24-hour service, because if you don't have 24-hour service or you don't mandate it, you may indeed get to a point where you are at the airport or you are somewhere and cannot get a cab. So with that rather brief background, I would like to make a motion to remove the strikethrough and leave in and shall offer 24-hour service. Second. So you're making a motion to amend Section 16? 17. 17. I am. And it was seconded by Council Member Ford? if it would, if I could speak to that. I believe you should relinquish the chair to do so. I've been at the airport when a late flight came in. And so I'm assuming you've relinquished the chair to your vice to make this commentary? Yes. Very good. Is that? That would be parliamentally correct. Yes, ma'am. and there were no cabs there, and we couldn't get a cab. Another woman and I, one particular time, stood out there for a very long time. She finally called her husband in Danville, who came and got her, and took me home too. So I think that there are cab companies that may have 24-hour service, And that's their prerogative, but to require it of everybody means that, for instance, LexTaxi that has only one cab, I think it's prohibited. So that's my concern with that. Council Member Stinnett. I'm sorry. I relinquished the chair back to Council Member Lawless. I didn't realize I had it. You did. I chucked at it. Here, I'll just throw this. I chucked at it. He's in the meeting if you want. He's closer, though. He's in the meeting. Maybe next month. Let me mention my name next time. Thank you. Council Member Stinnett. I don't have a, it was on another issue, so I'll wait after this discussion. Thank you. Okay. Is there any other discussion on this requirement? Council Member Beard. It essentially, by requiring 24-hour service, essentially knocks the small operator out of business. I see no reason at all in my... So we're going to have the larger cab companies. This is an opportunity for them to get more business because they're not going to be competing with somebody that has to park it and go to bed and go to sleep so that they can be on the street again the next morning. Or if they choose, they can sleep during the daytime and be out at the airport at night. But to dictate that we have to have 24-hour service is just another way of attempting to control in favor of the large operators. And I'm very strongly against that. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Henson. Thank you, Chair. is seven days a week also included rick or is that um was that removed no it's not included because it always said just 24 hours a day and it was basically understood that it would be seven days a week 365 days a year but that in itself is a good point that um that the cab companies have brought up to me what their what their biggest fear is is that if you allow smaller companies to come in and I can understand that they would only operate on the weekends, that they wouldn't operate throughout the week and they would only operate during the peak times on the weekend nights. And to be honest with you, for the people that have basically given over themselves for years to this community, it's unfair for them to give somebody else an advantage just for three days a week where their drivers and their cars are not being utilized throughout the week as the others are. So I like the idea of a seven day a week that it has to be available now it doesn't if it's entirely up to you all obviously if you don't want it to be a 24 operation 24 hour operation but i think that they should be made to operate at least during business hours if if in fact that they're not going to be 24 hours a day because that way it would mandate that they have to be uh they have to be available throughout the week during the times when people come into airports and that that sort of thing to be available, and also, too, I mean, they could work on the weekends as well, but still that would prohibit from them just working special events weekends and only those days. I think it needs to be the 24-7 personally because I was thinking if we have visitors in our town and they're looking for a taxi, and they may call several companies to find one that has someone working. So I just think it's ridiculous to have a cab company that is not operating 24-7. So I'm not in favor of this. I'm in favor of the amendment, and I would prefer that it be 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Council Member Martin's next. Is it okay? Well, I mean, and so pharmacies. People need pharmacies. Some people decide that they're going to only be open 16 hours a day. a few decide, and they may decide amongst themselves, that the pharmacy will be open 24 hours a day. But we're going to jump right in there and demand that all of them be open 24 hours a day. Makes no sense to me. Grocery stores, they work the same way. The economic aspect of all of this is that it's a stacked deck. And if we want to be party to a stacked deck, go at it. I'm not going to be party to it. Thank you. Council Member Martin. Thank you, Chair. And I think you brought up a good point. And the thing that I have some concern about is, number one, will we have everybody sort of fighting over each other for the peak times and be underserved in the other times? But also there is a special trust that someone has when they get into a cab in a strange town that they are going to be, you know, that the company is closely watched by the community and that by being allowed to operate under a license granted by the government, that they are of high quality, of safety and dependability in finance. And my concern is that we're going to have folks come in from out of town or from our own town who may have unsafe experiences. we'll just leave it like that, with a solo operator. It's hard to verify that a solo operator is going to provide a safe and dependable atmosphere and experience for the elderly, for women, for kids, for anybody who gets into a cab in a strange town. So I want to make sure that we have a high-quality and safe cab service, because by giving these folks a license, we're sort of putting our stamp of approval, whether that's the way it is or not. And so I like the idea of having the 24 service. It creates a minimum threshold that this is going to be a company of substance. So thank you, Chair. Council Member Ford. And the question I have is, and I definitely understand the point that Councilmember Beard is making in regards to the economics and the competitive nature of the business. But I would like to share with me how is that the intent of striking that through? Is it the intent to provide a fairer marketplace, or is it the intent of this revision as it relates to this reference to provide a safer experience for our riders? That really wasn't our request to have that done. Okay. It was actually done at the request of Councilman Lawrence. Well, can an argument be made that that revision not requiring a 24-hour service can have a positive impact on public safety? Can that argument be made? Or is it just an argument in regards to the economic competitive nature of the business? It was struck because, just like Council Member Beard said, that was in there because the current taxi cabs, one of which is not located, is an out-of-town conglomerate. that it, like you say, I mean, a taxi cab being required to be 24-7, we do have one permitted taxi cab company that has one vehicle. and if a cab company, these larger cab companies, if they have the cabs and want to do 24 hours a day, just like a grocery store may want to do 24 hours a day or a drugstore, then it's to their advantage to do so. But there's nothing in this ordinance about a sole operator. We do have one who has been in business for years, and obviously he can't drive 24 hours a day, seven days a week. If we lower the threshold to 10, then having the 24-hour, they may want to do that. But there are also cab companies in other communities, such as Louisville, that have a kind of concierge service where they only, you know, they have deals with other businesses or whatever. So, I mean, it's a whatever business model, but to require a 24-hour 7, I think one thing that, you know, if you require that and the taxi cab driver is driving 16 or 18 hours a day because of this requirement, requirement, he obviously, he or she obviously, is not going to be alert and driving like someone who's had rest. So, I mean, I think that's up to the discretion of the cab company. Certainly, they're going to want to make the most money they can. So if they have 50 or 60 cabs on the road, they're probably going to want to have 24-hour service. As far as peak hours go, that's when there are fewer cabs on the road because it takes longer in traffic to get from one place to the other. So they don't make as much money. And so if we don't require it of a drug store, certainly there are people that need medication in the middle of the night. You know, again, we're regulating this business like we do no other. Council Member Deard? Yeah, just a point on order. He's already spoken twice on this issue, on this motion. So in order to speed this process on, we're going to Council Rules. No offense. Sorry, Council Member Beer, but we can't be friendly more having a debate and then not friendly other times. So just to keep back, Council Rules. Point well taken. Thank you. Which is what? Not twice. Just twice. Yeah. On this motion, he can speak again. Council Member Farmer, have you spoken twice on this motion? He made the motion. He made the motion. I'm just going to call the question. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Without discussion, we've called the question. Can we vote electronically? We're voting on to call the question. Can we vote electronically? All in favor? Okay. That passes. So we will now vote. Could we vote electronically on if you could restate the motion? I think it's well done in the heading. Remove the strikethrough for 24-hour service, page 16, section 17. Okay. All in favor of striking through and requiring the 24-hour service, that's the motion. That is not coming up. For some reason it won't let me vote. I vote no, but it passes 7 to 2 to keep the 24-hour service. Thank you. Are there any other, Council Member Farmer, I believe you said that you had other issues. Unless you want to defer to someone else, I was going to take up another area of the ordinance. Okay. You're on there to speak. I was going to then turn to page 8 of the packet, which is Section 3, where this is kind of the heart of some of the differences among us voting on this, is the strikethrough that takes this from the current 25-cab minimum to a minimum of 10. I think we've had a lot of input from the community that does this, and they have talked, I think, very passionately about the need to have enough to do the job. And, you know, really there's just been a couple areas of contention about this whole rewrite, the one we've already dispensed with and this one. And I would just like to air this out in terms of having a discussion and a vote, So I would make a motion to remove the 10-cab minimum and take out the strike so it remains at a 25-cab minimum. So moved. Second. And seconded by Council Member Crosby. Oh, Stenet, I'm sorry. At this time, I'd like to ask Mr. Browder to speak. Mr. Browder is the Executive Director of the Convention and Visitors Bureau. Thank you. Thank you for having me. Basically, the Convention and Visitors Bureau, I drafted a letter and sent to Councilman Lawless, basically saying that we were in favor of any ordinance that would improve the safety of our visitors. Lexington has a bit of a challenge in that our airport area isn't quite large enough to drive as much convention business as we would like and it's constantly working to improve that and growing. But it also is a little difficult when people come to town and get stuck at the airport. As two people on my staff, the same thing happened to Ms. Lawless where they were stuck out there with late flights coming in. And, you know, as it relates to the 24-hour ordinance, it unfortunately must not be enforced because we couldn't get taxis for them. We had to drive out there and go get them. So, unfortunately, I'm sure if it's happened to people on my staff that's happened to a councilman lawless, then it's probably happening to others. And that is a really, really poor reflection on us as a city as it relates to visitors. It is a safety issue with people who are out there who are unfortunately going to be reliant on catching rides from strangers in some cases to get either to their hotel or otherwise. So that is our number one complaint that we do have. And respectfully, the cab companies, I think, do a wonderful job trying to make sure that they have a safe, clean environment and well-trained individuals at the organization. So I really applaud them for those efforts. but there are a few of those little areas that I think we need to pay attention to. And not being able to get a taxi extremely early in the morning against early flights is a challenge sometimes, but late at night is more concerning when individuals get stuck out at the airport. So any help that you can give us in that particular arena certainly would appreciate it. I don't want to profess that I have the solution to the 24 versus the 10 cab issue, but that's not my forte. But I do need some help with the safety in that particular area. Thank you very much. Thank you. Council Member Beard. Thank you, Chair. I think probably one of the problems that I have, which I've voiced before, but are we saying that the 25 cabs get evenly distributed across all 24 hours, or are we saying that you can qualify by having one cab operate from 2.30 until 7.30 in the morning and still qualify to have 25 cabs? The math doesn't really work. You know, the red eye that flies in from Los Angeles every night and gets here at 3 o'clock in the morning obviously is something that we don't have to deal with. The airport shuts down essentially at 11.30 or 12 o'clock at night, so that issue, as far as what happens in the middle of the night, doesn't fly with me. No pun intended. But there's an imbalance here. You get to have 25 cabs even if you only utilize one of them at a time. And it allows you then to shut out all the other players who can't afford to have 25 cabs. It still makes no sense to me how we can possibly get in the middle of something like this and dictate this. Bars shut down at 2.30 in the morning. It used to shut down at 1 o'clock. There isn't a lot of bar traffic at 4 o'clock in the morning, So obviously, again, there aren't going to be a proportional number of cabs as we might think or dictate for the early a.m. hours. If an operator wishes to operate at that period of time, it's a gap there that he may do so. I mean, that's kind of the way free enterprise works, and we're bucking free enterprise big time here, folks. I'm sorry I'm so vehement, but that's my prerogative. It's my first time on this issue. Thank you. uh council member martin you were on there and then you withdrew to speak or i'm still there okay council member martin thank you uh i think this goes back to my earlier comment about about having a a um sort of uh when we issue licenses that we have companies that are dependable and that are going to be there. I'm flying out at 4 a.m. tomorrow morning, and when I get back, it will be 11 p.m. later in the week. And so I'm going to test our responsiveness through the airport to see how we're doing. But I think it is a concern that we make sure we have companies that are substantial and that have adequate resources to meet the needs of our citizens. And so I realize that there's a lot of ways to draw the math in this. But I think that we need to have some sort of minimum threshold for the size of the company. And I'm personally just more comfortable with 25 than I am with 10. Thank you, Chair. Councilmember Stennett. Thank you, Chair. I would just go back to a year ago when we started this whole debate. And one of the reasons why I made the motion to bring it back into committee is where is the public outcry to change it from 10 to 25? Where is the big need in our community for us to take three years and to change it from 10 to 25? As was established, 25 is still an arbitrary number. We don't know whether or not that's a great number, why we had it there originally. We came up with 10 the second time around because it was more reasonable what other cities were doing. I'm not sure either number really improved safety in our community. Either way, whether we make it 25 or make it 10, I'm not necessarily sure either way on that side of the debate whether one improves the safety or another. I do think 24-7 service improves safety, leaving people out at airports, leaving people when they need cabs. And the question of why regulate this industry when we don't others, well, we regulate plenty of other industries and tell them what to do. We tell you when you can stop selling alcohol that you have to do it. We tell you when you can open your doors to sell alcohol. I can give you numerous examples of when government tells different businesses. I agree with the sentiment of Council Member Beard. I hate any more government regulation than necessary. I agree with that. But I'm trying to figure out how this system is broken, what we've been operating. I appreciate Mr. Curtis's housekeeping and the safety changes. I think we've done that. I don't think changing the 24-hour and the 25 cabs helps us at this point. So I'd be more in agreement to keep them in there. Thank you, Chair. Council Member Henson. Thank you, Chair. Rick, I have a question about if you have a company with 10 taxis as opposed to 25. I've always been in favor of reducing this. I think if we could help out the smaller business owners, I think we should. But if I have 10 taxis, I'm going to be putting more mileage on those taxis. Yes, I would say so. Would that affect, I mean, could we base the inspections upon the amount of mileage on a taxi rather than? Well, the problem with that is we just don't have the personnel to monitor the mileage itself. And that would be the crux of that problem, is how would we monitor the mileage? It's just we would have to rely on a report from the company as to what the mileage was on each one. And it would be somewhat of a nightmare to try and monitor, because then they would be coming in piecemeal one or two at a time, as opposed to if we set dates for each company to have it done within a two-week period. Okay. Because I was trying to, you know, I was thinking, well, really, I don't know how many, if you have 25, how many, some of them may run longer hours, work more, others may work less. I think you're exactly right there. I mean, there's a lot of people that most, a lot of their cabs are owner-operated, but they still have to rent the logo, per se. and the use of the company permit and the insurance the company provides. There's a lot of things that the company does for the stipend that they pay to be out there under the umbrella of the company, and some of them do run extremely long hours. They really do. They have to just to make a living. Well, you know, and as far as the feasibility of 10 cabs versus 25, I think that would be up to the owner of the company. If they want to invest in 10 taxis and not make any money, that is their choice. I don't think that we should regulate that. We'll regulate whatever you all pass, obviously. But, I mean, if we have five companies or we have 25, if we have four or just two, then we'll do whatever needs to be done as far as public safety goes. Thank you, sir. Thank you. I would like to relinquish the chair to the co-chair, Council Member Martin. Council Member Lawless. Thank you. To say that a larger company is going to be more reliable and safer, I think that the inspections where 65% of one company's cabs failed, 100% of another one of the large companies that were brought in, knowing they were coming in to be inspected, failed. And one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten of the ten other cabs of the company that had 17 and 11 failed had 10 that they didn't even bring in. So obviously just because they're large doesn't mean they're safe or dependable. So that argument makes no sense to me. And, yes, we do say with bars what time you have to close, but we don't tell people they have to be open or how many bars they have. We do food service inspections, But I think the most critical piece of this is one, I think, locally owned small business is economic development and is good for the economy. It's good for competition, generally provides more selection safety, and they know if their cabs are in good shape and responsive, they're going to make it. There aren't the only other industry that is regulated that requires the number that they have to operate is the number of beds in a hospital, and the state regulates that. But clearly the statistics on these inspections are frightening and certainly gives no credence to the argument that a large established company is going to be safer because they failed the inspections and they knew they were coming in to be inspected. So that being said, I think it's, again, an opportunity for small business owners, and to start a company with 10 cabs will cost about $300,000. So it's not a small investment they're making. So thank you. Council Member Martin, do you want to? So relinquished. Council Member Farmer, have you? Thank you, Madam Chair. I just, for purposes of clarity, I wanted to, since there's no verbiage that has appeared in the motion on the floor, my motion is to remove the new verbiage, 10, parentheses, and replace it with the current verbiage in the ordinance, 25, in parentheses. And then since we've talked about the inspections a couple times, I know there's someone here from one of the, Mr. Babbage is here to make comment, I think, to those inspections. Sir, if you would. Thank you, Madam Chair and members. I'm Bob Babbage, Babbage co-founder, and I'm representing Yellow Cab again. Yellow Cab made its investment on the level of 25 cabs and 24-hour service, and so we certainly favor those steps that you're taking. A thousand calls a day to yell a cab, a thousand. Last Friday night between 6 and midnight there were 700. But on an ordinary day, there's one every minute or two. Pretty big number of folks. the complaint level is about one or two persons a day that's one tenth of one percent to one fifth of one percent on my math people council member martin ask for drivers they ask for driver cells drivers give them their cells for me for my family my firm we often pre-arrange a ride because we have enough riders enough drivers and enough availability to do that for people who come in And if you missed, someone missed a pickup at the airport, we certainly didn't intend that. Nobody who has a cab in Lexington would have intended that. I flew in from Lansing, Michigan, or Detroit, actually, last Thursday night after a quick run up there. There were four cabs waiting. So all the anecdotal stuff, all the stories are interesting, but not exactly on point. about those inspections. Every one of those inspections redone the next day passed. They passed the next day. So they weren't missing a back seat or an axle or a steering wheel. My own personal vehicle or other vehicles might have an item to address, and I think the government has done that very faithfully, and so does Yellow Cab. We favor the outside inspections. We in no way would suggest that you not do the outside inspections, The outside inspections are serious for us and serious for everybody. Those two drivers were out of the country, not out of the county. So that is correct. And so their cabs taken out of service by the company and by the driver failed inspection because they couldn't be inspected, just so you know the context and perspective. So we're very committed to working with you. We've made suggestions. We trust the judgment of the commissioner to make some of those suggestions in practice or other administrative regulations or other processes of government, as do you. He will do the right thing. A couple of our suggestions not included could be enacted by him or his office. So with that, I conclude our remarks and ask you to keep the level of 25 and the 24-hour service for a city of 300,000 and often larger for basketball, football. Brad Paisley or what have you. Councilmember Farmer? Unless there's other commentary, I would call the question. Second. Second. Okay. Can we vote on the call to question? All in favor? Aye. Opposed? Okay. And the motion, would you repeat the motion? I will go with the verbiage that has been up on our screen. removing the new verbiage of 10 cabs from replacing with 25 cabs current ordinance verbiage, page 8, section 3. And can we vote electronically, please? Okay. Is everybody there? It passes 5 to 4. Are there any other motions? Council Member Farmer? I would just... You're just a motion machine tonight, aren't you? Thank you. I believe that this ordinance is ready for us to pass, and I believe that I'll make a motion to attend to my comments. I will say that during the discussion, and not part of these changes, as alluded to by Mr. Babbage and his client, was the potential for some verbiage about, I think, was it background checks and drug testing? Am I correct? I don't want to cloud the issue today, but I think we have legislation that's ready to pass. We may want to look at these other things and add to it later. Okay. Part of the ordinance that exists now and will continue to exist is that the Commissioner of Public Safety can set up administrative rules and regulations. And because that's an administrative process of hiring, we can add that to the administrative rules and not make it part of the ordinance. Thank you, sir. Then, Madam Chair, I would move passage of the rewritten taxicab ordinance as amended. Okay. Okay, we have a motion to pass as amended, seconded by Council Member Ellinger. And I think at this point we have, are there any Council Members that want to speak to this? Okay, Council Member Henson. Mr. Curtis. I just have one quick question. The 24-hour service, does that mean 365 days a year, or should that be included in this ordinance? because what if they decided they weren't going to operate on Sundays? That's a good question. I don't have an answer for it. It's always been understood that it was 365 days a year, 24 hours a day, but it's not written into the law itself. You're right. So I would move to amend the ordinance to state specifically 24 hours a day 365 days a year. It's all moved. Okay, so you're offering up we have a motion on the floor to accept as amended, but I want to amend it again. Is that correct? I want to amend it now. Okay, so you're offering that? I just want to make sure that it is clear that the service is to be provided 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, or 360. Is there a second to that? Second by Council Member Ford. Any comment? Council Member Beard. Unless we stipulate at some point what 365 days a year, 24 hours a day, does that mean that they can get by with that by having one cab on the road? Or do we want to get in there and proportion that to suit us, seeing as how we're in the cab business now? but it means nothing to say 365 days if you've got one token cab out there that can't handle the traffic and the business just to enable the 25 cab rule to work so we need to get into it We either need to get out of the business or we need to get into it all the way up to our necks, in my opinion. Councilmember Henson. It was my understanding that the company with the one taxi was grandfathered in. Is that not correct? That is correct. I'm here right now. Oh, I'm sorry. That's okay. And this would not apply to this company, correct? Why wouldn't it? because prior to the ordinance that we have right now, he was already in existence and was grandfathered in, so he doesn't apply. Yes. Which is really something that I wanted to address before you did the final vote. I'm sorry, you haven't been recognized to speak. Can you answer that, Ms. Hill? In response to Council Member Henson's question, the only part of the ordinance which doesn't apply to the taxi cab that was grandfathered in is that he doesn't have to have the 25 taxis. He only has to have the one. But everything else in the ordinance, the 24-hour service, the inspections and all of that, does apply to that company. How can he operate 24 hours a day? I can't. That's not a legal issue. I mean, I understand your point, but. Mr. Curtis just pointed out that this is that you have to be available by dispatch, not that you have to be actually operating. I don't know if that really is a distinction or not, but I wanted to relay to you what he just said. But I can't answer how he can operate the 24 hours, but in terms of the grandfathering, it only applies to the number of cabs he's required to have. I guess my concern would be is that if a company decided they weren't going to provide services on Sunday, but the rest of the week they provide it 24 hours a day. How can we address that? Well, if you're adding in this 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, they're operating seven days a week, 24 hours a day. And that would put this guy out of business, right? I'll have to defer to Mr. McGinnis on that. Okay, thank you. Okay. Okay. And there's no time requirement. It takes 30 minutes to get... Excuse me. We have a motion and a second. Are there any other comments? Council Member Ellinger. Thank you, Chair. I see Mr. McGinnis up here and would like to comment here, and I'd like to hear his input, if we don't mind. Thank you for recognizing me. I really appreciate that. And I want to thank everybody here for putting a lot of effort into this and considering when I look at each of you, I don't just see you. I see the thousands of people that you represent, and I appreciate that. I appreciate the diversity of this council. I think something that's really important that's been missed here that you've kind of forgotten about, I think, or really maybe hadn't been addressed for a couple of years, is that I'm the only business, I think, in this entire city that has not been allowed to grow their business. You have stopped me, except in 2010 when the World Equestrian Games came. You allowed me to grow my business, and I went up to 10. And then you did something that was equally as harmful. You made me take them all off the road. So I am the only business, I think probably in the history of this city, that you have really crippled me. And I ask you, no matter what you do here today on this vote, is send a resolution or request the law department to write a resolution that will allow all existing taxi companies to increase their fleet one at a time. That will take the blockade off me. It will allow me to grow my business. And who knows where it will go. It may go up to 10. It may go up to 20. It may go up to 50. But at least I'll be able to go from 1 to 2 to 3 like a normal business. No one in the world would say you have to jump from 1 cab to 25 cabs. The cab that I have right now cost me $24,000. It's the nicest cab on the road. And I've been in business for, well, I've been driving a cab since 2001, but I've been in business for 10 years myself under Lex Taxi. So I basically am just asking you to get out of my way and let me grow. And a resolution, or if you request a resolution to be sent to the law department so it will be drafted by the law department, they'll do it. They'll draft it like you say, and then you can pass that, and then I'll be able to grow my business. And I do appreciate your time. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. McGinnis. Are there any other comments? Yes. I would like to point out to the committee that several years ago, Mr. McGinnis sued me and the former commissioner of law and the director of litigation over the issue of 1CAB versus 25, and he did lose that case in Fayette Circuit Court. So our ordinance is valid that it's either he has the one he's grandfathered into or he has to meet the minimum requirements of the ordinance. I don't think it's really pertinent that he sued. Clearly the ordinance as written keeps him from doing that. That's not the question. So asking the law department to do a resolution one at a time is not valid. It is valid to ask for the counsel to change the legislation that would allow him to do that. Under the current legislation, he cannot, and I think it's ridiculous. But thank you, Ms. George. May I respond to that? But he has to meet the minimum requirement of the ordinance. As the ordinance is written. You are correct. Thank you. Councilmember Martin. Thank you. Ms. George, why don't you stick around a second. Okay. Is this a state law thing that was the subject of the suit, or was it this ordinance that was the subject of the suit? It was based on the ordinance, the 1 versus the 25, because several administrations ago, the whole issue of us allowing Mr. McGinnis to increase his fleet one taxi at a time came up, and it was the opinion of the law department that that was special legislation because it would apply only to one person. Mr. McGinnis then sued us over that and then lost in Fat Circuit Court. Okay, and so it's in our law department's opinion, what? That Mr. McGinnis is grandfathered in for the one taxi cab, and if he wants to increase his fleet, he has to increase it to what the minimum number is in the ordinance. Okay, so if we set it at five, he would have to increase it to five. Then he can do five. Okay. But he can't do one at a time to get to the minimum number. Okay, thank you. Thank you, Chair. Following up on her, if I may, following up on her lawsuit thing, the circuit court upheld what the law department agreed, that it would have been special legislation to allow just me to grow, because that's the law. You can't just write a law for one person. You can say, oh, Will McGinnis can do this. You can't. That's why you have to say all existing taxi companies can do it. The resolution that was written before did not say that, did not address that. Had it, then it wouldn't have been an issue. The circuit court couldn't have said anything. It wouldn't have been special legislation. But the law department would not, under David Holmes, would not issue that kind of language. Wouldn't do it. But if it comes from the Council that says all existing taxi companies can increase their fleet one at a time, that is not considered special legislation. That does not just affect one person. That affects the whole industry. Okay. Thank you. Are there any other comments? Council Member Stennett. Call the question. Okay. Can we? There's a motion to call the question. This is on the amendment, by the way. The amendment. and Peggy's amendment to require 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. All in favor of calling the question? Council Member Ford was the second. All in favor? Opposed? No. No. Okay, so it passes 7 to 2, I suppose. Okay, now we will vote on that motion. We're voting electronically. and that passes 6-3. I'd like to hand over the chair to the co-chair, Council Member Martin. It's a good thing I came today. It sure is. The chair recognizes Council Member Lawless. I would like to make a motion to add to the draft that all current cab companies may add to their fleets one at a time. Second. Second by, oh, I'm sorry, Council Member Martin. Beard. So we have a motion on the floor made by Council Member Lawless, second by Council Member Beard. Council Member Lawless, would you mind restating your motion? That all current cab companies, all permitted cab companies in Fayette County, be allowed to add to their fleet one cab at a time. We have a motion and a second. Do we have any discussion? Council Member Stenet. Thank you, Chair. I'd like to hear from our Department of Law and get their take and see if we can legally do this in this ordinance. No. Even if you say all, it still only affects the one company. Every other company meets the minimum requirements of the 25. So saying all doesn't make a difference. We're still going to come back and say it's special legislation and we can't do it. Because the other two companies or three already meet 25? So they can already add one if they want to. Right. They can do whatever they want to. That's the point. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. Any other discussion? Yeah. So, so. Or Prosby. I'm sorry. I thought you called me. So is it the opinion of law that we cannot do this because we would be making an exception for one company instead of all companies. Is that the opinion? Yes. I just want to make sure I understood correctly. Thank you. Is there any other discussion on the motion? I would like to, if I could. Council Member Beard. What about the companies that are, there are companies now that are less than 25, are there not? You have to have a license for a minimum of 25 based on the ordinance. We do not regulate how many you actually have out on the street. But all of the other companies have licenses for a minimum of 25 cabs. From that, if you only want to have one in service, five in service, that's the prerogative of the company. But everyone does show proof that they have 25 cabs in their belief. I'm just going by this addendum memorandum. We have a Mr. Taxi. Do they have 25? Everyone does. Discount tab has 25? Mm-hmm. I would like to dig into this a little bit further. I just don't possibly believe that they all have 25 cabs or better. May I? Yes. Thank you. Mr. McGinnis, I apologize. The council has some sort of procedural rules. If you don't mind taking a seat. And when we finish with our deliberation, I'll give an opportunity for folks to come speak on this. I realize how serious this is for your business. And just sort of let us get through our discussion, and I will free up some time at the end of the discussion to have you and anybody else who might be interested. Mr. Beard. Yeah. That's fine, but I could have recognized him myself. I'd like, Rick, I'd like to know how each company, you may have this data. Yeah, we keep the data on every latest. Discount cab has 25 cabs or better? Yes, they do. They were initially, when they applied, in the application process the way that it works, they apply, they have to write down each vehicle that they have. Each one of those vehicles is inspected by the detectives to ensure that they are in compliance with the logo scheme that they have proposed. They send that certification to us that there is 25 cars that are viable, that have been permitted, that are listed on the permit itself, and then we issue an overall cab permit. So on the inception of the application, yes, they did have 25 cabs. Okay, and at that point then, as they go out of service for whatever reason, we don't care whether they're down to 23 and now they're down to 21 or that. As far as no, because the application process is what you start out with. In other words, Mr. McGinnis can then go rent 24 more cabs for 24 hours, and he's in business, and then he turns his car back in. Feasibly the way the law is written, yes. Well, I'll put my hat on the other direction. That's ridiculous too, isn't it? That's all I need, Rick. Thank you. Councilman Ford. Thank you, Mr. Martin. I think a lot of good work has been done on the ordinance, and I applaud the chair, councilwoman Lawless, and everybody, and Rick Curtis. And I think that the legislation, as it has presented itself today, has us making some progress. I look at it in regards to an issue of capacity, and I do empathize with the petitioner that's come forward and wanting to grow his business in regards to increasing. And I don't think, from where I stand, it's our intent necessarily to prohibit his business. I don't know personally, I'm certain we have the information on how many cab companies we have in Lexington. Now let's say we have five cab companies that meet, just for comparison's sake, we have five cab companies that meet the threshold. They have a fleet of at least 25, and they can respond via dispatch 24 hours a day. I think our role, again, should be to ensure the safe transport of those that call a taxi cab company and need that service. And so if we have five taxi cabs and four of them choose to go to New Orleans with the cats at the Final Four and never come back, Now, we need to be ensured that that remaining taxi cab company can service the needs adequately of the 300,000 people here in Fayette County. That's just kind of how I look at it in regards to capacity. And so I empathize with the gentleman here today, but I think we need to focus more so what's important and to the greater benefit of the residents. We serve the 300,000 residents and those visitors that come here, and we hope that will visit us often. Thanks, Ms. Lawless. Thank you, Mr. Fort. Unless there's an objection on the council, I'm going to allow Mr. McGinnis to address this for three minutes. Is that – Mr. McGinnis, I appreciate it. Thank you. I appreciate it. The 25 is a barrier to entry. Once you're in, you're in. Okay? So a motion from you all, and I think that's something they should do. Ask the law department to draft a resolution that will say all existing cab companies can increase their fleet one at a time, no matter how many cabs they have in their fleet right now, no matter how subject to anything else. Let them bounce it around in the law department. And if the law department then says they can't do it, then I can always take it to court if I want to. But let the law department bounce it around. It would not be considered special legislation if it was written in the language that all existing cab companies can increase their fleet one at a time. The 25 is just a barrier to entry. What are you saying? Are you saying that, okay, all companies now can increase their fleet one at a time except for one? He has to increase this at 24? I mean, you have to have a – in fact, the ordinances void any language that deals with growth. It's non-existent. It doesn't exist anywhere in there. It doesn't say anything about it. Maybe a resolution needs to be put in there dealing with the growth of companies. But the reason it was kicked out of the circuit court last time is because there was not a resolution written that had that kind of language in it. It was only written in a special legislation way to address just me. There was no other language that was written the other way. So if it comes with you, you may not even vote it to the law department, but I ask you to at least do that. At least vote it to the law department. Ask the law department for the first time in 10 years to draft a resolution that will allow all existing cab companies to increase their fleet one at a time. If the law department bounces around there and says they can't do it, then I can always take it to the courts. Thanks. Council Member Lawless. It's my understanding that if a cab company starts with 25 and for some reason they lose some of their cabs and drop down to 20, they then can add one at a time until they get to 25 again. Is that correct? No. What I have here is our Secretary brought down the actual permits themselves for the taxi cabs. At the beginning of the calendar year when they apply for a licensed operated taxi cab company, they have to have 25 operational vehicles. In answer to your question, that's not something that we monitor numbers-wise of vehicles. We do specifically say, and here it is in writing, that they have to have a minimum of 25 cabs to operate a taxi cab business in this county, with the exception of one company, which is allowed because he was grandfathered by the state. And they all have them as of the 1st of January of this year, at least 25. It's reasonable to expect that if they start with 25, something could happen that throughout the year they could fall below that. It's possible, yes. And they would then be allowed to add cabs one at a time until they got back up to 25. Well, yes, that is feasible, but obviously it's advantageous for them to keep as many cars as they can on the road. They're going to make more money. So that legislation saying any existing cab companies could add one at a time would apply to, say, a cab company that started with 25 and then lost six. That's all I have to say. Okay. At this time, I'm going to turn the chair of the gavel over to Councilmember Farmer, as you are, I guess, the mover on this, for the purpose of making a comment. Councilmember Martin. Thank you. I can't support this at this time because the legal department tells us this is special legislation. I trust and respect their judgment in this. But also it seems to me that by this sort of language we're basically destroying any minimum level requirement we have and that the purpose of the motion is to, in fact, get around the previous motion, which is that we have a minimum of 25 which passed by this body. So I'm not going to support this motion at this time. I think that it is sort of contrary to a requirement that we have cabs with a minimum level of service and fortitude in their operations. And I think allowing introducing language that's going to confuse things that folks are allowed to add one at a time would lead to a sort of further erosion of that rule that we just passed. So I will take back the chair. Yes. Council Member Beard. Relinquished. Well, let's carry that one step further. Does that mean then that they can shed the number throughout the year and get down to 1, 2, 3, 4, 10? And we can't do a thing about that either. Our intent is to have service for the population and their guests. and this kind of cuts the legs out from under that because they're only checked once a year, January 1st. They've got 364 days to do anything they want to with it. They may decide that they want those cabs in another market somewhere, and they pull them out, and we're damaged because of it. gets a little squirrely. This whole concept kind of gets a little squirrely, to tell you the truth. But we may need to just go back and start all over again as to what our intention is rather than a whole string of amendments, some of which contradict the amendment before or after it, and get the thing right for a change. It seems like we've had problems with this over the years. Thank you. Council Member Farmer. Well, I see that our chair had her hand up, and I would not deprive her of the opportunity to speak, but I'm ready to call the question unless she has something pertinent. Council Member Lawless. We currently have three cab companies that were permitted at 25 and one that was permitted at 1. So my motion would not change that threshold for any new companies. It would just allow any cab company to add cabs one at a time if they fell below the threshold or didn't have. So that's my motion, and that's what I have. I would hope that you would support this because it isn't changing the threshold of the number of cabs you have to have to start a company. It's allowing currently permitted cab companies to add to their fleet one at a time if they fall below the threshold or want to build their business or whatever. Thank you. Council Member Crosby. Thank you, Chair. Council Member Lawless, I appreciate your motion because I do believe that there's something. I wish there was a way we could look into this. I'm not comfortable voting for your motion, even though I would like to be able to support it because of the information that we've received from law. I don't know if there is an alternative to where they could look into something and come up with more of a formal opinion than what the exchange we've had here. But I certainly don't mean – I don't think that if we do not pass this motion that it's something that we can't consider pursuing. I think some really good points have been made. But personally, I'm just not very comfortable, given the opinion and the information that I have in front of me today, to vote on this. Thank you. In order to move this forward so we at least get the outside inspections of every cab twice a year on the books, then I'll withdraw my motion so we can at least have an outside mechanic. Is the second withdrawn as well? You seconded? Yes, I did. Because I think that's critical for our public safety, and it's a sad state of affairs. The motion and the second have been withdrawn, and I will relinquish, Chair, back to Councilmember Lawless. Is there a motion? We had a motion on the floor. I can't remember now who made the motion. Councilmember Farmer made a motion to move it forward, and Councilmember Stenet seconded as amended. And Councilmember Crosby has a question. Well, by going to an outside mechanic, will we still be able to get the same type of information that you provided us with on the inspections as far as – so this is something that can be reviewed periodically to where if we do decide in six months or a year that something needs to be done, that that information would be made available to Council? My understanding is that information Mr. Curtis would receive from them. Is that correct? Okay, thank you. Keep that on file. Are there any other questions? Comments? Okay. Council Member Ford. Thank you, Chairwoman. I'm going to support the motion, but I will recognize that I think we've had a very healthy debate. some of the issues that Councilman Beard brought up. I think that we all can appreciate in regards to, again, capacity, making sure that we are able to track what we actually have on the books now, 25 and plus. So I do appreciate you, though, Chair, for allowing us to bring this, to get some legislation on the books to get out there and improve the safety, but maybe we can continue to study this further. Thank you. Thank you. Any other comments, questions? All in favor of the motion to approve the ordinance as amended, please vote electronically. And that passes unanimously. Thank you. Next on the agenda is update on items referred to the committee. which the noise ordinance is still in play Councilmember Martin, public safety disability claims. Do you want to keep that? Chair, Lexington has approximately 38 percent of its annual retirements in public safety with disability, whereas the rest of the state is at 8 percent. I'm quite disappointed that it's taken maybe 14 months to bring this before this committee, and I hope we can hear it sometime soon. Okay. The Paramedic Training Emergency Medical Advisory Board, that was put in by Council Member Gorton and myself, and that committee has done its work and has a report ready. So we'll get that. Is that correct, Council Member Farmer? That was what I placed my name up for, yes. We have completed our work, and a final report has been delivered to you and to staff. And I think in impaneling that, the vice mayor was wanting us to come back as quickly as possible to make our report part of the conversation as it would relate to our upcoming budget deliberations. But our work is complete. Thank you. Okay. And thank you for all your hard work on that and all the people that served on that committee. So we'll try to get that on the next meeting, which will be in April. I mean, May. Sorry, we don't have a meeting in April. Community Corrections Best System of Management. That was Council Member Myers and Kay. That seems to be, at this point, moot. So I'm going to strike it, and they can bring it back up. Quarry ordinance, that was referred by the link. and signage that was brought up by the link, but I think it was Council Member Myers that was interested in that, so I'll check with him. The nuisance abatement process, these are all links. So I think as chair, I'm going to try to get more information about what council members are. You want to take a motion for the one you struck? Yeah. I'm just going through them. So, if it suits the council, I'm going to try to get to the root of these that were put in here by the link. Off-premises signage, I'd like to keep that in there. and given the rearranging of things, it might be more appropriate in a different committee, but we'll come back to that. Chronic nuisance ordinance, May. fleet management services and I think that was also one of the links and then we passed the break ordinance and we passed the taxi cab ordinance so I'd like to see if somebody would like to make a motion to remove the community corrections best systems of management from the agenda I'll make some motion Second Okay, Councilmember Crosby, seconded by Councilmember Ellinger All in favor, please say aye Sure Comment, I'm sorry Yeah, I would, in deference to Council Member Myers and Council Member Kay, we might wait a month to take this off and let them comment on it. That's just my thought. I'm not aware of what we've done to fix our problems with the jail. I understand that we're going to have a candidate to run the jail, but I'm not sure what we have done and that everything's fixed. So I guess I'd like to maybe have their input on that before we take it off. Okay. That's fine with me. Are you okay with withdrawing your motion? Okay. Would someone like to make a motion that we get the root of all these that were put in here by the public safety links? before we, I'd like to investigate. Okay, well, I'll leave them in, and I'll try to find out and come back with more information. And then I would like to put taxicab ordinance back in there for investigating whether or not we can legally allow people to add to their fleet. So I will ask at the committee of the whole for that to be put in. Any other questions or comments? Councilmember Crosby. Thank you, Chair. Did you say that you were going to, all the public safety link ones, that you were going to refer and ask the administration where they stand on it? or could we suggest that? Because they should have gotten the same. These came directly from the link committee meetings, and certainly in a year they've been working on this stuff. So maybe they could give us an update as to where they stand, as to whether or not these are things that need to stay in committee or if they're things that are being handled that we may have voted on outside of committee. That is an excellent, excellent point. Thank you. Thank you. Move to adjourn. Who made the motion to adjourn? Council Member Farmer, seconded by Council Member Ellinger. All in favor? Thank you.