# Council Work Session - September 18, 2012 > Auto-transcribed civic record · September 18, 2012 - **Permalink**: https://meetings.lexingtonky.news/meeting/2697 - **Source video**: https://lfucg.granicus.com/player/clip/2697?view_id=14&redirect=true - **Date**: 2012-09-18 - **Last revised**: July 17, 2026 - **Length**: 13,158 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 Urban County Council met on September 18, 2012, at 3:00 p.m. in the Council Chambers on the 2nd Floor of the Government Center, with Mayor Jim Gray presiding. The council addressed 12 agenda items during the meeting, taking 11 votes and hearing 5 public comments from citizens on issues both related and unrelated to the agenda. Key actions included approving requested rezonings and docket items, neighborhood development funds, and new business matters. The council also received informational presentations on electronic monitoring from Sgt. Chris Toombs of the Division of Community Corrections and on UDAG funds from Irene Gooding, Director of the Division of Grants & Special Programs, along with budget amendments and reports from the mayor and council members. ## Attendance **Present:** - Mayor Jim Gray - Council Member Beard - Council Member Blues - Council Member Crosbie - Council Member Ellinger - Council Member Farmer - Council Member Gorton - Council Member Lawless - Council Member Myers - Council Member Stinnett - Council Member Stenning - Council Member Wallace - Council Member Hanson - Council Member Lane - Council Member Kaye - Council Member McKay - Council Member Crosby **Absent:** - Council Member Martin ## Votes and Decisions The meeting included eleven votes, ten of which passed unanimously and one that passed by roll call vote. **Unanimous Votes** The following motions passed unanimously: - Motion to approve docket of requested rezonings, moved by Ellinger and seconded by Gorton [timestamp: 0:09:49] - Motion to approve summary for work session, moved by Beard and seconded by Blues [timestamp: 0:09:49] - Motion to approve budget amendments, moved by Gorton and seconded by Farmer [timestamp: 0:10:20] - Motion to approve new business items, moved by Gordon and seconded by Ellinger [timestamp: 0:10:20] - Motion to approve NDF list, moved by Gordon and seconded by Ellinger [timestamp: 0:14:33] - Motion to suspend rules to allow CM Lane to speak again, moved by Lawless and seconded by Farmer [timestamp: 0:14:33] - Motion to approve Mayor's report, moved by Gorton and seconded by Myers [timestamp: 0:14:33] - Motion to transfer off-premises signage jurisdiction from public safety to planning and public works, moved by Lawless and seconded by Crosby [timestamp: 1:20:35] - Motion to remove October 1st disciplinary hearing from agenda, moved by Gordon and seconded by Gordon [timestamp: 1:24:02] - Motion to adjourn, moved by Stinnett and seconded by Crosbie [timestamp: 1:50:33] **Roll Call Vote** Resolution 0073-26, requesting legislative amendment to authorize civil fines for unlawful posting on public property, was moved by Myers and seconded by Ellinger. The resolution passed 13-1 [timestamp: 0:14:33]. **Votes in Favor:** Mayor Jim Gray, Council Member Beard, Council Member Blues, Council Member Crosbie, Council Member Ellinger, Council Member Farmer, Council Member Gorton, Council Member Lawless, Council Member Myers, Council Member Stinnett, Council Member Stenning, Council Member Wallace, and Council Member Hanson. **Votes Against:** Council Member Lane. ## Budget and Financial Actions The meeting included authorization for nine financial actions totaling approximately $237,347.20: **Grants and Programs** - **EcoArt Grant Program** (0914-12): $66,966 authorized for environmental art projects to be distributed among non-profit organizations, public and private schools, and individual artists. - **Financial Literacy Education** (0945-12): $36,000 authorized to execute an agreement with Apprisen for a financial literacy education program. **Design and Engineering Services** - **Northland Meadows Arlington Phase 5B Project** (0931-12): $24,966.20 authorized for a sole source purchase of design services agreement with ECSI, LLC. - **Tates Creek Road/Lansdowne Drive Traffic Signal Project** (0957-12): $2,600 authorized for Contract Modification No. 2 to the engineering services agreement with BTM Engineering, Inc. **State Funding** - **Traffic Signal Project** (0949-12): $100,000 in state funds from the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet accepted for the Tates Creek Road and Lansdowne Drive Traffic Signal Project. **Property and Easements** - **Drainage Easements** (0943-12): $6,815 authorized to accept permanent drainage easements from the owner of record at 631, 633, and 635 Cardinal Lane for a stormwater improvement project. **Planning and Policy Amendments** - **Solid Waste Area Designation Update** (0897-12): Authorization to approve the Area Designation Update for the 2013-2018 Solid Waste Five Year Plan. - **Solid Waste Management Plan** (0932-12): Authorization to approve the 2013-2018 Division of Waste Management Five Year Area Solid Waste Management Plan. **Community Development** - **Neighborhood Stabilization Program** (0954-12): Authorization to convey five properties purchased with Neighborhood Stabilization Program funds to Seedleaf, Inc. for community garden space. ## Public Comment Five speakers addressed the council during the public comment period, raising concerns about funding allocation and potential conflicts between proposed projects. **Senior Housing and Daycare Initiative** David Vinson urged the council to allocate funds from the special project pool to support a senior assisted housing and daycare initiative [timestamp: 0:07:08]. He emphasized the project's potential for long-term job creation and economic development in the neighborhood. **UDAG Fund Allocation** Council Member Ford proposed that residual UDAG funds be used to support community projects across all 12 council districts [timestamp: 1:02:28], advocating for broad-based investment to maximize city-wide impact. Council Member Myers encouraged the council to develop its own proposal for using UDAG funds rather than waiting for an administration-backed plan [timestamp: 1:16:48], emphasizing the importance of district representation. Council Member Kaye suggested evaluating different project proposals side-by-side to determine which would yield the greatest return and impact [timestamp: 1:18:56], advocating for a holistic budgeting approach. **Theater Competition Concerns** Council Member Farmer raised concerns about possible competition between the Kentucky Theater and proposed new downtown theaters [timestamp: 1:26:13]. Farmer called for more transparency on the intentions behind the RFPs related to these projects. ## Contested Items **Use of UDAG Funds** Council members were divided on how to allocate a $1.262 million UDAG balance. The debate centered on whether to distribute the funds across multiple districts or concentrate the entire amount on a single high-impact redevelopment project. Beyond the allocation strategy itself, council members expressed concerns about transparency and accountability in how the funds would be used. This split vote reflected differing priorities regarding equitable distribution of resources versus strategic concentration of investment. **Potential Competition Between Downtown Theaters** A heated discussion emerged regarding whether new downtown theaters would create unwanted competition with the existing Kentucky Theater. Council members raised concerns about the implications of introducing additional theater venues in the downtown area and questioned whether public funding should support projects that might undermine an established cultural institution. The discussion highlighted the need for greater transparency in the RFP (Request for Proposals) process and prompted broader questions about the appropriate role of public funding in supporting entertainment venues. ## Public Comment – Issues on Agenda [timestamp: 00:07:08] David Vinson addressed the board during the public comment period on agenda items. He spoke about the need for funding to support a senior assisted housing and daycare project located in his district. Vinson emphasized the project's potential benefits, highlighting its capacity to generate economic development and create jobs within the community. His remarks focused on securing financial support for this initiative. The outcome of this agenda item was informational, with no formal action taken during this portion of the meeting. ## Requested Rezonings/Docket Approval [timestamp: 00:09:49] No rezoning requests were presented during this agenda item. The docket was approved without discussion. ## Approval of Summary The council considered approval of the summary from the work session. Council Member Beard moved to approve the summary, and Council Member Blues seconded the motion [timestamp: 00:09:49]. The summary was approved unanimously. ## Budget Amendments During this agenda item, no budget amendments were presented for discussion. The council proceeded directly to new business without addressing any proposed changes to the budget. [timestamp: 00:10:20] ## New Business The council addressed several new business items during this agenda section, with discussion led by Gordon and Ellinger [timestamp: 0:10:20]. The items presented for approval included: - Solid waste management plans - EcoArt grants - Design services - Traffic signal project modifications All new business items presented received unanimous approval from the council. No concerns or objections were raised during the discussion of these matters. ## Neighborhood Development Funds - September 18, 2012 [timestamp: 0:14:33] The council considered and approved the Neighborhood Development Funds (NDF) list during this agenda item. Gordon and Ellinger were the key speakers presenting and discussing the allocation. The NDF allocation directed funds to local organizations for a variety of community projects. The approved funding supported initiatives including: * Free ultrasound services * School events * Sports equipment The council voted to approve the NDF list as presented, moving forward with the distribution of these neighborhood development resources to the designated organizations and their respective projects. ## Electronic Monitoring; Presented by: Sgt. Chris Toombs, Division of Community Corrections [timestamp: 0:15:04] Sergeant Chris Toombs from the Division of Community Corrections presented the electronic monitoring program to the board. The presentation outlined the program's application to low-risk offenders and detailed its operational components, including GPS tracking capabilities and the establishment of exclusion zones for monitored individuals. **Key Presenters:** - Sergeant Chris Toombs, Division of Community Corrections - Bureau Manager Edie Dabney **Program Overview:** Sergeant Toombs explained the electronic monitoring program's use as an alternative supervision method for qualifying offenders. The presentation covered GPS tracking technology and how exclusion zones function as part of the monitoring framework. **Cost-Effectiveness:** A central focus of the presentation was the program's cost-effectiveness compared to incarceration. Sergeant Toombs highlighted the financial advantages of electronic monitoring as a community corrections tool, demonstrating how the program provides supervision and public safety measures at reduced expense relative to institutional confinement. **Outcome:** This agenda item was presented for informational purposes. No formal action or decision was required from the board regarding the electronic monitoring program. ## UDAG Funds; Presented by: Irene Gooding, Director, Division of Grants & Special Programs [timestamp: 0:42:26] Irene Gooding, Director of the Division of Grants & Special Programs, presented information on the UDAG (Urban Development Action Grant) fund balance to the board. **Fund Status** Gooding reported that the UDAG fund currently holds a balance of $1.262 million. **Presentation Content** The presentation covered: - The history of the UDAG program - Eligible uses of UDAG funds - The administration's plans for reinvestment **Administration's Intent** Gooding explained that the administration intends to reinvest the UDAG funds in urban redevelopment projects. A key component of this strategy is leveraging private investment alongside the public funds to maximize the impact of the available resources. **Outcome** This agenda item was presented for informational purposes. No formal action or vote was recorded as part of this presentation. ## Council Reports Council Member Lawless moved to transfer jurisdiction over off-premises signage from the public safety department to planning and public works. [timestamp: 1:20:05] Council Member McKay reported on new murals created by Herakut, an artist or artistic collective. Council Member Gordon made two announcements: first, regarding a scheduled workshop on the UK Master Plan, and second, concerning a change to the disciplinary hearing schedule. The item was approved. ## Mayor's Report No mayor's report was presented at this meeting. [timestamp: 1:24:02] ## Public Comment - Issues Not on Agenda [timestamp: 1:02:28] During this agenda item, several council members raised concerns about matters not formally listed on the meeting agenda. **Key Issues Discussed:** Council members Ford, Myers, Kaye, and Farmer addressed the following topics: - **UDAG Funds**: Concerns were raised regarding the use of UDAG (Urban Development Action Grant) funds and how they are being allocated. - **Downtown Theater Development**: The potential impact of new downtown theaters on the existing Kentucky Theater was discussed, with members expressing concerns about how this development might affect the established venue. - **Fund Allocation Transparency**: Council members emphasized the need for greater transparency in how funds are being distributed and allocated. **Outcome:** This agenda item was informational in nature, with no formal action taken. The discussion served to raise awareness among council members and the public about these concerns related to downtown development, existing cultural institutions, and fiscal accountability. ## Adjournment The meeting was adjourned at approximately 1:50:33 following a motion by Council Member Stinnett and a second by Council Member Crosbie. The motion to adjourn was approved. --- ## Decisions - **Motion** — passed (0-0): approve the Summary. Blues seconded the motion. The motion passed without dissent - **Motion** — passed (0-0): approve the New Business Items. Ellinger seconded the motion. The motion passed without dissent - **Motion** — passed (0-0): approve the NDF list. Ellinger Seconded the motion. The motion passed without dissent - **Motion** — passed (0-0): move Off‐Premise Signage from the Public Safety Committee into the Planning and Public Works Committee. Crosbie seconded the motion. The motion passed without dissent - **Motion** — passed (0-0): remove the October 1st, 2012 3:00pm Special Meeting from the calendar. Ellinger seconded the motion. The motion passed without dissent - **Motion** — passed (0-0): enter into closed session pursuant to KRS 61.8101 (f). Beard seconded the motion. The motion passed 13‐1. (Stinnett voted no) - **Motion** — passed (0-0): return from closed session. Gorton seconded the motion. The motion passed without dissent - **Motion** — passed (0-0): adjourn. Crosbie seconded the motion. The motion passed without dissent. Lexington-Fayette Urban County Government Work Session Agenda September 25, 2012 --- ## Full transcript Music Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I'm sorry. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. So it looks like we do have a quorum. Council Member Stenet's on his way. We've got a big quorum now coming. I didn't mean, no. We have a quorum arriving. Mayor, I believe that has been said a powerful, powerful. Well, I mean that, of course. We know that. All right. I'll call the meeting to order. This is the meeting of the Council's work session. And first on our agenda, well, actually, first on our agenda, I'd like to make an announcement that many of you know, Many of the council members and many of our employees, of course, especially those in public safety and our police department, we're acquainted with, we're friends with Sergeant Michael Sarge Sharp, extraordinary member of our public safety community, our police department. Sarge passed away on Sunday, September the 16th. And I wanted to announce that the visitation will be Thursday from 4 to 9, and Friday morning from 9 to 11 a.m., and the service will be Friday at 11 o'clock. And the location, Hillary, if you'll please get us the location of the service, please. Emanuel Baptist. It's at Emanuel Baptist, right. And the visitation is at Kerr Brothers or Emanuel Baptist? All right. We'll come back with that. All right. First on our public agenda is public comment. and this is for issues that are on the agenda. And David Vinson, David, is signed up to speak on issues that are on the agenda today. And, Dave, I know you know the protocol, the name, location, and three long minutes. Thank you, sir. My name is Dave Vinson, and I reside at 3663 Niagara Drive here in Lexington. Thank you, Mayor, Council Members. My understanding is there will be a discussion today of a pool of funding. I really don't even know what that means, but I understand that the funding is available for special projects and this sort of thing. I know that we've done a great deal of work on the Acceptacon property and trying to repurpose that property. Currently, Councilman Myers and Representative Westrom are both working, along with the mayor, to broker some type of repurpose for that property. Here there will be a meeting on that tomorrow. What I would like to suggest and ask for you all to give consideration, too, is the fact that if there is some money in this pool that it could possibly be put over, and I don't know what that amount would be. That would have to be discussed by you all. But if there was some money to put over to the side for the project that Councilman Myers, I think it's senior assisted housing and also something to do with daycare and early learning, there is a group of people who would like to put that there, and that would also be good economic development. It would provide long-term jobs. jobs and really provide a huge solution to our neighborhood's problems. And, you know, that's the kind of consideration that we would like to see from you. And also Representative Westrom has told me that if you all can get together with a plan and possibly give some funding, that if you can bring that plan to the state, that the The state would also be very interested in trying to help resolve the issue in our neighborhood and in our city and also help to provide jobs at the same time. With that, Mayor, I turn it back to you. Thank you, Mr. Vincent. Thanks, David. Thanks very much. Thank you, sir. All right. Second on our agenda is docket approval or any rezoning requests. I don't see any, and we don't have a council meeting this week. So we can move on to item number three. Is there an approval of the summary for work session? Motion. It's a motion by Council Member Beard, second by Council Member Blues. Is there any discussion on the motion? Any discussion on the motion? All right, then hearing none, we can take a vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. All opposed, no. Motion carries. Thank you. Next on our agenda are budget amendments, and there are no budget amendments this week, so we can move on to new business. Is there a motion to approve? Motion by Vice Mayor Gordon, second by Council Member Ellinger. Is there any discussion on the motion? Council Member Stenning. Thank you, Mayor. I have questions on new business items A and D. This is our waste management five-year plan that we submit, I assume, to the state. And this is a rather lengthy document. And I think it's prudent that this council understands what exactly that says in terms of operating our soil. Come on up, Steve. Can you tell me what the deadline is in submitting this document to the state? It's actually October 1st. We've got a waiver to go just a few days over. okay um i think there's a huge there's a couple of issues that this council may want to consider i think in that plan it dictates um who has to have city services and who has to pay for them um that everyone entering into our service area has to be on city garbage is that correct no that's what it was previously so is that no longer in there because in the last one we submitted 07 um it said this policy of this government was to anyone coming into our service area brand new would have to be on city. They wouldn't have that option. Oh, I understand what you're saying, yeah. Yeah, that's been in effect for a number of years. Yes. Right. And I think that's an issue. For about the last 20 years or so. Right. And I wish the Waste Management Task Force would have been given a copy of this so we could kind of review it before this whole body sees it. But I think it needs some additional review to make sure this is what the policy we want to set for our waste management collection system, especially since we're looking as a task force of changing the fee structure. Would you have an objection to letting the committee look at this plan before submitting it to the state? Certainly not. This was presented to the council office the 1st of August. Right, which we were on break until August 15th. And we're going to be making a presentation to the Environmental Quality Committee next week. On this plan? Yes. Well, I'll save my motions for then. Okay. Assuming you go through that plan in 15 minutes and we can adequately understand it, And I know Council Member Blues, who chairs it, will give us adequate time to fully discuss. But this is an important plan, and this will have a long-term impact on our vision for 20 or payage, what is it, trash free by 2020. So there's a lot of opportunity in this plan that affects our community that we may need to be aware of. So I'm glad to hear there's a presentation. I'll hold all my comments until then. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Council Member Stennett. Thanks, Steve. Council Member Crosby. Thank you, Mayor Gray. I have a question on I for Mr. Paulson. I just, and I'll ask as he's coming up, I just want to make sure that with this, this is the Tates Creek sidewalk and getting the signals in compliance, correct? Yes, it is. And they're not going to come back and say, because we have several intersections, and I notice this is just for the one that we have to spend an additional $2,600 at these other intersections, or is this it? As far as I know, this is it. and this is because of this one intersection, they're trying to improve the signalization there kind of to help with that. It's got a mast arm and, for lack of a term, the string, and they're trying to just cut it down to the one. We've actually saved some money on this with our traffic. Yeah, I understand. I just want to make sure that we're not looking into having to do it at the other ones now. Again, as far as I know, this is the only one that they're planning on doing. That's all I wanted to discuss. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Crosby. Anyone else? All right, then. We have a motion. We have a second. We can take a vote. All in favor of the motion, please indicate by saying aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. All right, next on our agenda is continuing business and presentations. Is there a motion on NDS? Move approval. Thank you. Motion by Vice Mayor Gordon, second by Council Member Ellinger. on the NDF. Is there any discussion? All right. Hearing none, then we can take a vote. All in favor, please say aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. Next on our agenda is a presentation on electronic monitoring by Sergeant Toombs, Division of Community Corrections. Clay, are Are you going to introduce Clay? Okay. Go right on. You might want to introduce folks, Clay. That might help. If that's, unless it's already, you all have already got that set. Thank you. Bureau Manager Edie Dabney is over that program. I can't hear you. Are we on? Okay. Are we on now? Yep. Bureau Manager Edie Dabney is over the program that Sergeant Chris Toombs is going to be giving a presentation about today on electronic monitoring. Thank you, sir. Sergeant Timms has been with us for six years and has been with electronic monitoring for about three and a half years. He recently promoted to sergeant and is back in the main facility, but he's very knowledgeable and well-versed in electronic monitoring, and so he's going to give you the presentation now. Thanks, Edie. Thank you, Major Daphne. Thank you all. I'm going to go ahead and get started. I've got about an eight-minute presentation, then I'll open up the floor for any questions that you may have. The mission statement of electronic monitoring program, I want to paraphrase here, is basically to allow offenders outside of the facility to reduce population, and those offenders are going to be your low-risk offenders who pose a minimal risk to the community. One thing that I personally like about electronic monitoring is that it gives offenders responsibility a little bit at a time, instead of being completely institutionalized within the facility and then getting out to complete freedom, they get out of the jail and on the electronic monitoring program and given responsibility a little bit at a time. So I think it is something that I believe in. It's something that does help reduce recidivism. Some of the general electronic monitoring rules is that they are required to phase drug and alcohol tests unless the judge would stipulate otherwise. They are required to stay inside their residence at all times unless the judge would require otherwise. Sometimes the judge may stipulate that they can go to school, go to work, and things like that. They must adhere to an approved schedule, again, set by the judge, and obviously they must abide by local, state, and federal laws. If they get any new charges, that's an automatic trip back to the facility and off the electronic monitoring program. Our best technology is our global positioning satellite, or GPS technology. Its uses are for high-risk offenders, and it's important to note that those high-risk offenders are used by the judges as a condition of their bond. For flight risk, people with failure to appear and things like that. And then also to restrict movement. We had one gentleman that was on the program for quite some time at a family court for a custody issue. Now, the GPS is a one-piece unit. I did bring a unit with me if I can pass it around here in a minute. It's really durable. It's completely waterproof. We have excellent web-based monitoring that we can use. It's called OmniLink. We can set inclusion zones in which people have to be inside that zone. If they leave that zone around their home, we would get an alert. We can set exclusion zones, which would be a zone where a person cannot go, like if they had an EPO, DVO, or they had a victim. We can set different schedules for the different zones, and then it works on a dual cellular and GPS signal. Here's a couple of screenshots from our OmniLink web-based software. Top left, I moved the mouse over one point, and it shows the latitude and longitude, the rate of speed, and that's obviously a satellite picture. To the right of that, I have another satellite picture of somebody traveling inbound on Vercels Road. And at the bottom, I just have a screenshot of a map of somebody traveling down Vercels Road. Here is what our screen would look like. This is a full screen. On the left, you would see the offender information. On the right, you'll see some points, and you'll see that those points are numbered. Those are actually sequential. At 8 a.m. in the morning, you might see .1 at their residence. They travel through town and go to work, and it might be .45. You'll also notice that the purple point, that means that that person has been at that point for one hour. That means that's the most updated point. The orange points are between one hour and 24 hours, and then anything over 24 hours would be a red dot. So the different colors signify how updated that point would be. This is a GPS bird's eye view. Some of you all may recognize this. This is the Long Johns and Takes Creek Center. We can actually zoom in and see the actual business, residents, hospital, things like that. The only issue I have with this is I may have chose KFC over Long Johns, but that's just me. This is a GPS speeding report. We can actually run a speeding report. Now, obviously, being from the Division of Community Corrections, I'm not qualified to go pull somebody over and arrest them. But what this could help with is if somebody was to abscond from custody, we could call Lexington Police or KSP and let them know the direction of travel, the rate of travel, and it actually could help apprehend that person. This is a still shot of an inclusion zone. It's a 300-foot circle around a person's residence. If they were to leave that at any time, we would receive notification and act accordingly. And with inclusion zones, it wouldn't be just a residence. We can actually set it up to be the whole county, the whole state, parts of the U.S. Whatever the judge asks, we can actually draw a zone and make that happen for the judge. So this is just a screenshot of Fayette County. This is an exclusion zone, like I mentioned earlier. This is a zone where a person cannot go. This particular participant's victim worked at UK Hospital. So we set up a large zone around UK Hospital's campus to make sure that that participant, that offender, did not go into that zone. That helps to protect that victim. Obviously, it's not a complete solution, but it can give somebody notification. This is how we monitor people. You might have heard of passive versus active. Passive is a little bit slower response time, and active is a little bit quicker, a three-minute report time. Again, it works both through GPS. If we don't get a GPS signal, we can actually monitor them through cellular signal, through cellular triangulation, and be able to tell where somebody's at even indoors. Next, we've got information quickly available on our web-based software, age, sex, race, date, vehicle information. Again, all that is very important where if somebody did abscond or violate in any way, we can get on the phone with Lexington Police or KSP and pass that information on quickly to help apprehend that suspect as quick as possible. We get notifications in many different ways, fax, pager, e-mail. One of the greatest ways right now is that I actually have an app on my iPhone. Say I'm out to eat with friends and I get an alert that Jimmy was late getting home. Well, I can look it up, call Jimmy, and say, Jimmy, why aren't you home? So this is a great tool, and it's really nice that the technology has kept up, and it really helps our on-call officers, which are on call 24 hours a day, seven days a week. We always have somebody on call to respond to alerts appropriately. We do have landline and cellular radio frequency units. This is a little bit older technology. It is used for lower-risk offenders. Again, it's waterproof as well. It's typically used for people that have to be inside the home only that cannot move around per the judge. Now, the electronic monitoring process, we have a correctional referral. And for that to happen, somebody has to be a low-risk offender, no felonies, no violent charges within the last five years, no EPOs or DPOs or anything like that. Then the jail would send a recommendation to the judge, and ultimately it would be that offender's judge that would allow them out on the ankle bracelet. We have a judicial referral, which is if somebody bonds out, it would be a condition of their bond. And then we have a judicial sentence, and that would be if the judge sentences a participant for EM instead of jail. That's most typically seen for your four days for a DUI, a low-risk offender. Now, the greatest thing about electronic monitoring is that John Q. Public does not have to pay for it. The participants have to pay for it. So I've included a list of pricing information here, just so you all are aware. But that's one of the things that is great is that it doesn't require taxpayer money to pay for the actual bracelet and monitoring. That's all I have as far as presentation. I'll open up the floor for any questions that you may have. Thanks, Chris. Thanks, Sergeant. Any questions from Council members? No? Oh, okay. I'm sorry. All right. Council Member Lane. Thank you, Mayor. If you have power outage, do these monitors have backup power support so that they don't lose their functionality? With the radio frequency units, they have about a 72-hour backup battery. So typically those are just used for people that are on for three or four days, so that really wouldn't affect them. With our GPS, they do have to charge every single day. and what we would do is if there was a power outage, have them come down to the office and charge. So obviously they would have to charge every day, and we would accommodate them and let them come to the office to charge so that we don't have a situation where they're not being monitored. But we always ensure that they are monitored through charging, and they can receive write-ups and things like that for it, and we'd have them come to the office. Okay, and the other question is on your aerial photo. So are those live time photos you're able to get? You can do live time. It would be a manual. When I went over passive versus active, there is a one-hour report time for passive and a three-minute report time for active. But you can go in manually in the software and zoom in and see where somebody is currently. So you can do that manually and get their current in real time. Okay. Thank you very much. You're welcome. That's a very impressive system. Thank you. Council Member Wallace. Thank you, Mayor. My handout here is some of it I can't read. On the slide about murder, rape, domestic violence, sexual assaults, I guess it's slide four. The first part of it I can't see. That one. Oh, because it's red, it doesn't show up on our... Okay, sorry about that. Okay, so high risk, that would be a... wouldn't be a passive, but an active... The judge does stipulate that, and every... The judge in pretrial does stipulate that, and again, that would be a pretrial offender, somebody that has not yet been sentenced or found guilty in the court of law. And obviously with the law system, it would be innocent until proven guilty. So sometimes these people do bond out, and even with serious charges like murder, rape, domestic violence, things like that, the judge would feel that it's necessary to have that person wear an ankle bracelet to help, for lack of better terms, keep them honest while they are out. So we do see that quite often. We have 42 people on the program right now, and 39 of them are pretrial, if that gives you any indication as to our pretrial numbers. So they are people that during their pretrial hearing they bonded out and were put on the court? Yes, they're awaiting trial. They haven't yet been guilty. With that act of, first of all, let me say I think that using these monitors to get low-risk offenders instead of housing them in our jail at a very large cost is an excellent idea. Yeah. My concern was the, you know, domestic violence, sexual assaults. Sure. Unfortunately, we don't have control over that. Right. The judge refers it to us. That would be all pre-trial, as well as the last one, sex offenders, that too would be pre-trial? Yes, ma'am. Yes, ma'am. And how quickly, you said it's immediate, but... With the active, it's a three-minute report time. So if they were to cut it off, we would know within three minutes and then act accordingly. We would look up their information, start making phone calls. If we can't get a hold of them or we suspect they have cut it off, we would call pretrial immediately, and then they would call the judge to get a warrant for them for absconding from custody. And in those cases, would they most likely not be able to? I mean, it sounds like in those cases, if they cut it off or if they went outside their zone, you'd have to call a judge. Depending on the seriousness of it, obviously pretrial would be our first point of contact because we're monitoring them for pretrial. but then pre-trial would let the judge know and if it was a serious enough case where we think they were hurting other people or if it was a murder or something serious, we would notify Lexington Police. And we've done that multiple times when people have absconded. We would get them involved because obviously we're not qualified to go chase somebody down like a fugitive but we would let Lexington Police know what was going on in that case. I mean, because, you know, the risk of, especially, well, in those situations, situations, a lot can happen in five or ten minutes. Very true. So, okay, thank you very much. All right, you're welcome. Thank you. Councilman Lawless. Vice Mayor Gordon. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Thank you, Sergeant Toombs, for your presentation. I just had one question, and it might be for you or for the Commissioner. In our public safety link, we discussed at length the use of the electronic monitoring and discussing and having conversations with the judges here in Fayette County to increase that, because they're the ones who have to say you have to be on a monitor, correct? Right, that's correct. So I wondered if there's been any progress in the discussions with the judicial community to increase the use of these. And maybe it's Edie. Welcome. We have had success in having the judges use the program more. With it being a newer program, they wanted to get acclimated and get a little more comfortable with it. But we are now seeing judges start to order people to electronic monitoring that didn't in the past. So it's a slow process, but they are taking note of it and using it a little more than they did. Will you be able to maybe in six months give us some sort of a data report, a comparison on pre-discussions with the judicial folks and post so that we can see how much more they're using it? Absolutely. We do a monthly report, so I'd be happy to give that to you. Okay, I think that might be helpful, particularly since we've discussed it, I think, more than one year in different public safety links. Commissioner, did you want to add something? No, she's the manager of the program. I wanted to give her the opportunity to come up and address it, and that's exactly the situation. We've got support from local prosecutors. They have talked to judges. It's just, again, it's a slow culture change. But it is changing. Okay, good. Thank you. I'm encouraged by that. Thank you. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Council Member Myers. Thank you, Mayor. The first question I was going to ask, the Vice Mayor just asked. I'm on that council link as well. The next question I had, though, is if I'm wearing a bracelet and I impact the safety zone around the employment, the place of employment for someone that I'm not supposed to get into, What triggers when I do that? What happens? Well, we have a cell phone and a pager that we carry on us at all times, you know, day and night. We would first get a page, and being that it's a more serious exclusion zone alert, we would get a page and a call. That would help wake us up if, you know, it was at night. But assume it's during the day, we would get a page and a cell phone call and get what was called an exclusion zone. And immediately we would get on the phone and start to see what was going on. If they were just passing through a main artery or if it was an actual alert, then obviously we would call Lexington Police and let them know what was going on. And then we would try to notify the victim as well because we do sometimes get information about the victims from victim advocacy through the circuit court. So we do, obviously we can't prevent everything, but we do try to help solve the problems as much as possible. Okay. So when you said that you have a pager and everything, are you tied to each? Are you like a parole officer so that you have a certain group of people? There is a certain caseload. That's correct. Okay. I guess you sort of answered if the victim is at work at that time and they're in that exclusion zone and I get in that zone, what is the protocol for whether or not that person is called and how immediately does that happen? Every situation is different. Sometimes we get a false alert, like if a zone happens to clip a little bit of New Circle Road and the offender travels through New Circle, we would get an alert, and it would go away very quickly. But if we look into the alert and we see that it is a true alert, obviously we would notify Lexington Police immediately. We would try to notify the victim immediately what was going on to try to respond accordingly. So the phone calls would be almost immediately. We'd get on the computer and get on it immediately. We wouldn't let something like that wait. Okay, and then we've had a couple cases maybe in and around Lexington where people have separated from their band while they're out. Has that involved any of the models that we use? Unfortunately, we have had people remove their bracelets and abscond. Our success rate right now is 93%, so obviously more succeed than don't succeed. But unfortunately, we do have those pretrial offenders that do cut or remove their ankle bracelet and abscond. I can't tell you in the last few months how many we've had, but like I said, our success rate is 93%. So it's, for the most part, very successful, and I think it does work. But we do have those few bad apples, per se, that do remove their bracelet or take them off and abscond. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Council Member Myers. Council Member Hanson. Thank you, Mayor. Having that high success rate, will that help to convince the judges to place more folks on the electronic monitoring? I believe so. I do. I would think that would be certainly in our favor. I think our numbers speak for themselves. It's been a pretty successful program, and I think the judges do have confidence, not only our equipment but our staff, to handle these situations appropriately. Because you actually have inmates that take off from time to time, correct? I don't know those numbers. I'm sure there's human error here and there. Well, most of my questions were related around I know we were wanting to get more support from the judges and if the electronic monitoring numbers have increased since, you know, I was out there several months ago, and I know you were working hard, and I was very impressed with what you guys do and the confidence you have. but I didn't know if it was declining or increasing. I will tell you this. I started working with electronic monitoring in 2009. We had about eight people on the program. I've seen it as high as 70. So the numbers have increased dramatically during my time with electronic monitoring. It has grown. Right now we do pretrial adult probation people at our sentence. We do monitor people for Division of Youth Services and drug courts. So other agencies have come in and said, we trust you, we want you to monitor our people. Instead of sending them to jail, let's do an ankle bracelet. So we have not only grown in people that are on the bracelet, but also the agencies that we monitor them for. And funding-wise, it's very beneficial to do the program. Yes, ma'am. Because it's much more costly to keep them incarcerated than to keep them on the electronic monitoring. They actually pay. Yes, ma'am. Yeah, it costs the taxpayer about $70. I don't know the exact figure, but it's about $70 a day per person in jail. We house 1,280 inmates, so if you do the math, that's a lot of money each day. But with a bracelet, it saves a lot of money, plus they have to pay for it. Correct. I have a question, if not about the trustees. I know that I thought that that number had the amount that the judges are approving for trustees is decreasing. Yes, it has. Is that correct? It has. We used to send them out 40 to 50 people out for community service, and now we're sending anywhere between 5 to 8. And you haven't seen that improve at all? It has remained right around 5 to 8. We have a different procedure in place now where we get approval from the judges before we let them out, and the judges have decided not to let as many out as we used to. Can we put them on electronic monitoring? We need them. We can do that. Thank you. You're welcome. Thank you, Council Member Henson. Council Member Beard. Thank you, Mayor. You kind of sped by this GPS speeding report. Tell me a little bit about that. This is just a report of their location and the rate of speed. I don't have my glasses on today. You'll have to forgive me. But I believe this one, they're traveling from Danville, Kentucky, into downtown Lexington to our office. So it shows the direction of travel, which would be south to north, and the rate of speed. And like I mentioned earlier, this would be important to, if somebody was absconding or they went out in the middle of the night when they weren't supposed to, and they were going down 75, I can contact the appropriate authorities and let them know what was going on, the kind of vehicle they were in, the license plate number, and obviously the speed and the direction of travel. I guess it's where they live. I see it in Danville. I see three Lancasters. Do we do that? What it is is that a lot of our pretrial offenders violate in Fayette County. Well, they all violate in Fayette County, so they have charges in circuit court in Fayette County. But they may live elsewhere. They could be just traveling through and have a charge here. So we do monitor people outside of Fayette County. The good thing about GPS is we can monitor them all over the world, in any state, any country, or anything like that. We haven't done it outside of Kentucky yet, but we have been outside of Fayette County because they do have a circuit charge here. And the judge requests that they're on the program, so we just monitor them while they're outside of the county, and they still have to adhere to the same rules? It looks like a lot to me. And, you know, we pride ourselves on having guests in the Fayette County, but I'm not sure these qualify. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Council Member Beard, Council Member Blues. Thank you, Mayor. As you say, on the whole, this is an extraordinarily effective program, and it does save taxpayers a good deal of money. But with reference to the very recent high-profile case in which an individual on the verge of conviction broke away and fled and is still at large and so forth. Has that led to any policy changes with reference to the use of the electronic monitoring devices? I wasn't a part of that, so I can't really speak on it. I don't know if Major Dabney will have any details or not. That individual wasn't, he was in court, so he was in between, he, if you will, fell between the cracks. He was in the court system, so he should have been monitored differently. Our staff wasn't monitoring him because he wasn't out and about in the community. He actually had a court appearance, and so at that point the bailiffs and the sheriff's office is in the courthouse, if that answers that question. Well, it does help. I understand that that wasn't your responsibility, but I guess this was a judicial decision? Correct. Because that person was out on bond. He was out on bond, and the charges that he had, we would not have recommended him from community corrections to be on electronic monitoring once he was sentenced. Now, we don't recommend any way until they get sentenced. Everybody before sentencing is pretrial, so he was recommended by the pretrial office, and the judge approved it. I see. so the next time we have a judge come up, we can ask him or her that question. Thank you very much. Thank you, Council Member Blues. Sergeant, thank you very much, sir. Thank you all very much for your time. Thank you, sir. Good presentation. Thank you. Next on our agenda is the presentation on UDAG funds, and that's Irene Gooding, Division of Grants and Special Programs. Irene, thank you. UDAG is a very old HUD program from the 70s and 80s. The purpose of the program was to provide for economic development activities that aid economic recovery and may assist industrial commercial housing projects where there is private investment. In UDAG projects, HUD would basically provide gap financing to make a project that was otherwise infeasible feasible, and the return here is that the project would provide jobs for low-income people and also the projects, if they were successful, would provide some stream of revenue to their local governments. Oh, I'm sorry. I should have... There. These were the eligible activities. We could do construction, land acquisition, infrastructure, affixed capital equipment, parking facilities, professional fees, and hard costs. And in our city, we had four of these projects, Festival Marketplace, Toner Street, Victorian Square, Lexington Dry Goods. Toner Street was a housing project. Lexington Dry Goods was a commercial project, as were Festival Marketplace and Victorian Square. We did not get a revenue stream at all from Lexington Dry Goods Project. and Toner Street had very minimal funds coming back to us. Most of those houses actually went to foreclosure, so we did not actually get any money from those. The revenue streams that we got were from Festival Marketplace and Victorian Square. Those have provided us with some funds, which we called UDAG repayments. and UDAG repayments can be used for any eligible UDAG or CDBG-eligible activity. We don't have to have a national objective. We don't have environmental requirements on the use of these funds, and we don't have to apply the federal prevailing wage rates. So none of those federal cross-cutting requirements we have to have on these projects. are recently completed projects for a long time. And we've had funds from these projects since the 90s. So some of these go back a ways. Several years ago, we provided loans for small businesses in the community under an economic development project. We haven't done this for some time, but we used to do it. We provided some money to Habitat for Humanity for a water line that they had to have to make one of their projects work. Provided some money for the Affordable Housing Trust Fund economic study. On Ann Street, we paid for the acquisition, relocation, demolition of those houses for Ann Street, which is the boulevard from Equestrian View down to Midland Avenue. Did some restoration at the Cadentown Rosenwald School. Did exterior painting on Bell House. And did some improvements at Gratz Park. And then we have some projects that basically are not closed out. One of the major things that we have done with these funds is grant match for the Home Investment Partnerships Program. In fact, we have spent over the years approximately $2.7 million on grant match for this federal program. 898 Georgetown Street, which you know is Rain Garden Way. We paid for the demolition and the infrastructure for the Housing Authority's HOPE VI project. we spent $2.2 million on downtown sidewalk design and we had funds available for the 3rd Street Corridor Development Plan and that's the one that included Charles Young Center and at this point we have a fund balance of $1,262,100 this figure does come from the Division of Accounting and the recommendations. The administration's priority is to reinvest these funds into an urban redevelopment project that will leverage significant private investment, and it should also be the last money investment to make the project a success. This would be in keeping with the original purpose of UDAG funds, which was to make infeasible projects feasible, and also they were the last money invested. Do you have any questions? All right. The floor is available for comments from Council members. Council Member Lane. Thanks for your report. I was interested to know if we have other money that's owed to be paid back and whether this fund will be self-perpetuating or when we spend the $1.2 million remaining, we'll be out of money, period. This will be it. We have no expectation of receiving any other payments. There might be a Toner Street townhouse out there with a second mortgage still on it, but I wouldn't count on it. Okay. That's my question. Thank you. Council Member Stenet. Thank you, Mayor. Irene, where is this money kept in our budget and accounted for? It's in Fund 3300. It is treated as a grant, so it's in projects. But it's under your budgeting, right? Yes. Okay. You said accounting gave you the number of fund balance of $1.262 million. Mm-hmm. Back on May 29th at our council meeting, you said it was $1.732 million back then, and that's a pretty big difference, half a million dollars. Have we spent money from that in the last three months? The only money we have spent was on our restoration of Charles Young Center. I don't remember an amount. I do remember saying that we had received our balloon payment from Victorian Square, which was slightly over a million dollars. Right. So. And I'm not saying that's wrong to spend it. If we spend it, okay, I just want to know what the difference is. The only funds we would have spent would have been on Charles Young Center, which was about $100,000. Commissioner, I'm sorry, you were jumping up. I was just going to say in our unaudited financials, we gave this number to Irene, and that is an unaudited number. but that is the fund balance for the UDAG funds. And the largest piece of that was $1,022,891.31 to be exact from the Victorian Square repayment. That's the majority of those dollars of the fund balance. So the balance of $732,000 that we talked about back then, we don't know where that was on PeopleSoft? I don't recall. I've looked at the last few days, I've looked at the expenses from 2009, 10, 11, and 12, and there aren't a lot of recent. The streetscape design was done some time ago, and most of these projects are at least a year or so old. So I don't know where I would have gotten $1.7 million if I... Yeah, I mean... Accounting says we have $1.2 million, so... That's a pretty big difference. In terms of recommendations from the administration, what input are you all taking from citizens, and what is that process going to be used to take input on what to spend this money with? Because obviously we have a great deal of need, and probably plenty of people would like to have some assistance. What process were you all used to? We have never used a process for these funds. This has always been a recommendation from the administration. To the council? Yes, to the council. With council input, I'm sure, because you saw the breadth of the projects. So you could see that we were at one time answering a lot of needs. Yeah, I mean, we've done a lot of good work with this man since I've been on council. I know we received at least three checks since I've been on council, dating back to 2004. So we've done a lot of good things with this. and I look forward to the discussion about how to move forward. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Council Member Senate. Council Member Beard. Thank you, Mayor. When you grant this money to a recipient who's doing a project, who makes the decision to give him that money? It would be a council decision. For the most part, if you look at the projects that we've done, they have been our own infrastructure projects, and these projects have been carried out by our own divisions. The one exception to that would be Habitat, but I do remember there was a specific council resolution that authorized $45,000 for Habitat for Humanity. So that came from council. It wasn't even a recommendation from our office. It came from a council member. So if you will look at the rest of these projects, these are all our projects. The tower project, as you mentioned. Oh, okay. These, I wasn't around when any of these were done. These were all done in the 80s. I was not here. These were projects. We submitted applications to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. They were, how they were decided, I don't really know. These applications went to HUD and they were approved by HUD. And the Toner Street, Toner Street townhouses was a project that, I'm not sure who actually, I think Barlow built the units. but at this point I honestly couldn't tell you what the structure of that project was. The other projects, like Festival Marketplace, Victorian Square, obviously I think the web companies were involved in both of those projects. Do you get some type of individual guarantees from the developer? Are you talking about the original four projects? Yeah. Yes, and in fact, that guarantee was what gave you money back on Festival Marketplace. Because as you know, several years ago that project went south. They had not made payments to us, and the Commissioner of Insurance took them to court. We were a defendant in that case, and that's how we received money back from what we call the Kentucky Central case. I don't exactly remember what that project cost, but it was well up into the millions. Right. Our investment wasn't quite that much, but what they were supposed to do, and I have this information upstairs, and if you're really interested in it, I'll send it to you because it's on a one-page sheet about what the terms were. For example, one of them had a few years they could operate without paying interest, and then they would pay interest only for a few years. And then it was structured in such. And we actually, as I understand it, weren't really allowed to dictate the terms of that structure. I believe that HUD Washington really dictated those terms. and they were very close to those projects in these days and we didn't really get to make a lot of those decisions. I know when it was sold, it got $650,000 on a $9 million project or whatever it was. But our fund, we didn't have that much. Our UDAG funds were only a couple of million in each project. So we probably, we didn't have that much. Kentucky Central was the one that actually gave it up on that one. I understand. Thank you, Irene. What's that? Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Councilman B. Councilman Match. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Ms. Gooding. I think when we were talking about the 1.7, that number came because in that meeting on the Thursday night, you said there was $777,000 and some change. and then after that you said there was a check for a million, a little more than a million. Ah, okay. The 700, if I gave you that figure, it would have come from the PeopleSoft, whatever I was showing on the PeopleSoft budget. It might have included encumbered funds. And one of the projects that I've mentioned this afternoon, the Georgetown project, actually has some funds encumbered to it that I found out this afternoon that we can release the encumbrance to. So that would be a little bit more money. So do you know how much that is? I don't think it's quite $100,000. Okay. And then also the downtown streetscape project also still has encumbrances to the design engineer, and I'm not sure that we owe them money. still or not. So we may have that. Okay. Commissioner, when you get a chance, could you go back through that and sharpen your pencil on that and see if there's any other funding that can be added back to this? Thank you. Ms. Gooding, you said there wasn't a process for determining how this money is spent. Do you know if the, and I know that we have a recommendation maybe from the administration on it should be the last money used and for a project that otherwise wouldn't go without the money. Has any of this 1.2 or whatever's left been promised to anybody yet? Not that I'm aware of. Okay. Is there a time frame on when this money needs to be spent? No. Okay. And then you said we don't have to go back to the federal government, right? No. These are repayments to the government that we do not owe back to HUD. In fact, we don't even owe a report back to HUD. Okay. One last question. On the four projects, if you can go back to that screen, the Festival Marketplace, Toner Street, those four projects. Yes. You say we didn't get any return on two of those projects, right? Lexington Dry Goods Project. We received no return on Lexington Dry Goods Project and very little on Toner Street. Okay. When you were talking about guarantees, when those projects were initiated, was there a guarantee that we would get money back from all four or just some of them? I know for sure there was a guarantee on Festival Marketplace in Victorian Square. Lexington Dry Goods Project was done before I was employed here, and it seemed to have been closed before I got here. And I really don't have information on the Lexington Dry Goods Project. But I do know that we had no expectation of receiving any funds. Okay. Thank you. And for Toner, we were the second mortgage on all of those townhouses. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Council Member Myers. Council Member Ford. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Irene, for your report. I guess I just have a question in regards to the recommendation. Irene, talk to me again briefly. You mentioned it in regards to the eligible activities as they apply to the final balance of funds. Just so as long as there's not necessarily. I'm asking a question. Is there necessarily a geographic boundary countywide in which these funds can be used, or is it just a matter that funds wherever the project is located, they adhere to the eligible activities that you have listed on your slide? That's the way I understand. We do not have to meet a national objective. A national objective would be a low-income benefit. Do not have to meet that national objective. Otherwise, it needs to be either a CDBG or UDAG-eligible project. And all of the examples of projects that you have here are examples of those. Grants Park is not a low-income area. So it does not have to – we're basically winding this grant program down. It dates back to the 70s and 80s you mentioned. We've had repayments that have trickled in over the years. We have a residual balance, and we have some decisions to make on how best this government can use these funds. Forgive me for being redundant. I'm really trying to zero down on this. It does not have to meet a national objective. Right. Thank you, Irene. I appreciate the report. I would float the idea to Councilman, to the Mayor, to the Administration. Our neighborhoods all across the 12 districts, and with the three at-large members who recognize this as well, our neighborhoods and communities have been very patient. They've been very understanding through the economic recession that we've had, and we all know that the general fund dollar is a little thin, and we're working to get that back up. Is it possible, and forgive me for venturing here, is it possible that the balance of these funds could be used to go towards neighborhood and community projects spread across the 12 council districts? I know that's a policy question that the administration and the council would have to address. My concern is how do we best leverage the residual balance of these funds, three-decade program, to have an impact in our neighborhoods and communities? I think the question is whether or not 1.2 million located in one or two projects will generate some benefit that we will see or whether or not we kind of try our best to spread and leverage these funds out to help us in our city parks, to help some other projects that might benefit the district. Do we have that leverage? I guess I'm not going to ask your opinion on that, Irene. I know it's an administration and council decision, understanding grant funds, but do we have that leverage and that freedom to take that policy consideration in regards to this? We don't have to go to Washington, D.C. to get these answers, right? No, it would be your decision. Thank you, Irene. Council, I, Mayor, I throw that out as an opportunity. I'll speak just last point. I definitely wasn't on council. We all know that we have a small pot of funds of NDF, neighborhood development funds, that we try our very best to be supportive of community initiatives. My understanding is that a few years past, the council, each council district had a large investment of funds that it was able to make some larger scale improvements. An example I think that applies here is the improvements made at Douglas Park over the last few years, neighborhood development bond funds, and I think some council discretionary monies also went there. So I think we should all be a part of the conversation of how we expand and invest these last few funds. Thanks, Irene. Thanks, Mayor. Thanks, Councilman Ford. Councilman Farmer. Thank you, Mayor. I guess the purpose of the presentation is to bring forward the idea that these funds are available, and if the administration has a priority, use for them is what I get from all this. And so I'm kind of wrestling around here with I'd like to see almost a T account of what's going on with the funds here, what's coming, what's going, what's here. Because we've been presented with just a sum number here, and it's floating in the middle of this one slide, and I'd just like to see the background on that. I agree with Council Member Ford's idea that there are different ways to leverage, and each of us, there may be 15 different ways to leverage, but we need to have the discussion. So besides wanting to see more background on what's there, what's been expended, and what still may be yet to come, Kind of the other half of the mystery here is the last bullet point. I don't understand the term last money invested. Is this the last money we're going to invest? Will we be investing more money before this to make what? I mean, there's no stated project here. I guess that's where I'm going to. I think I'll let Jane speak. but the way I look at this is the way I look at any responsible business decision. I think you would, everybody up here, we know we have limited resources. We know we have scarce resources. So in my view, we should be measuring what real opportunities, high probability opportunities we have versus hypothetical, and what does leverage mean? You know, in today's world, I think leverage means economic leverage, jobs. How are we going to create jobs? How are we going to create opportunities for people? How are we going to leverage our city? So I think what we're going to see is we're going to see a competition, perhaps, you know, ideas. That's good. That's a democratic process. I expect that the administration, I hope that we will soon have a proposal or plural. I expect that perhaps council members will. That's the way it works. And the way that we examine these things is responsibly. How are you going to create the highest and best use for the limited resources that we have? That's one of these. Now, Jane, you may have a different point of view. No, actually, I would concur with the mayor's thoughts. And last, quote, last money invested is looking at a pro forma of a project. And, you know, they're able to pull together resources and that, you know, they need a portion to make the project feasible. But, again, we're leveraging. The goal would be to leverage private investment. That's been the history. That's been the history in the large projects, the original UDAG projects. I might just clarify, Mayor, if I could, a point earlier. And I know Irene was speaking about there are no additional, we're not expecting additional funds back. I think it was your question, Council Member Lane. But we are looking, too, in our proposals at what the return on capital might be. So we may be looking for projects that have that return on capital. Yes, sir. So that's one of our criteria that we're looking at as well. It should be a criteria, right? Yes. And I think that's an important piece. And the economic leverage and the jobs that might be created. And whatever neighborhood benefits, for example. Yes, sir. The goal of today's presentation is to say these UDAG funds are available. The administration has or is entertaining urban redevelopment projects that would leverage significant private investment. So you want the council to know that because at some point in the not too distant future, you're going to, I guess, would this come as a budget amendment? How would this be presented to us to take action on? Because it's not been presented, I don't believe, to take action on today. It would end up in a blue sheet with the budget amendment. But I think more importantly, technically, that that's what would happen. But what we would be looking at is bringing a project forward, and this could be a piece of it in total. But I think it's unfair until we have that project pulled together and we do have a return on investment in there and all those particulars that we bring you a total package to present to you, and we're not there yet on any projects. So this is to set the stage in some respect. Yes, sir. To provide us with the background of what these funds have been used for previously, what's here now, and maybe to lay some groundwork for what might come forward in terms of recommendations more specifically from the administration rather than just the framework for the recommendations, I guess. Yes, just kind of wanted to set in place the criteria that we think is important moving forward. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Yes, sir. Council Member, Council Member Stammer, have you already spoken on this? Okay. All right. Well, good deal. Then you're up again. Thank you, Mayor. And I appreciate Council Member Farmer's question, but I asked for the presentation not to put the administration on the spot or say you have to come up with a grand plan, But I think it's important that Council understands we have actually, Council Member Ford, utilized this money in a very similar way back in 2007. We divided it up amongst the 12 districts, actually 15. And as Council Member Farmer said, I'm sure all 15 would like it, including the 16th, the mayor, to have a piece of this money to utilize however way they want to utilize it. So that is a good idea. You know, there's so many projects in our community that we've heard about or anticipated happening, one being right next door, the Kentucky Theater. You know, I'm sure they could utilize this money to save the theater because if they don't come up with the money to do the digital filming, you won't have a theater coming next spring. So I'm sure that's a good option for this money to save a historic theater. So there's a lot of opportunity out there, and I look forward to the debate. One thing I'm still troubled with is the amount. We've had two people stand up to that microphone and tell us there's leftover money in the streetscape, two different people in the last three months, that there's leftover money, about $700,000 in streetscape from the UDAG. So, Commissioner, I want to reemphasize what Council Member Myers asked. Can we have a better accounting of what the real number is? Because I don't think the 1.2 is reflective of all the things that we could possibly come up with left over from other projects. The 1.2 is a good number when you look at fund balance that's unassigned, if you will. So I will get with Irene and we'll go through not only that unencumbered balance, but maybe projects that are in process that are complete and maybe there's funds remaining. That's the difference, I believe. Okay, and that's fine. It may very well be, but let's clean up the street escape funds. I think those projects are over with, and if we don't owe anybody, let's put the money to good use and get something else going. I understand. Thank you. And how soon do you think you can get that back to us? Probably in here. Two. A couple weeks. Two weeks. A couple weeks. Fair enough. Thank you. Councilman Lawless has not spoken to this issue, so Councilman Lawless. Thank you. Just briefly, I want to say that there are still a couple of things in the streetscape that have not been finished or completed. So that information I'm looking forward to also, and people are working very hard to get that. Thank you. Council Member Beard. Thank you, Mayor. Irene, just a clarification. And when you sent this project to HUD and they endorse it, and then they make a credit judgment, I would assume, I would hope. And we had nothing to do with that credit. So when the project goes south, we're the ones that eat the loss. Is that correct? I think that's probably fair. I know that I talked to someone who was here at the time working on these projects, And, for example, HUD would determine what kind of rents needed to be charged and details like that. And I know that this person felt maybe that wasn't very realistic. So HUD was primarily responsible for making those major decisions on how the project would be structured. It gives you a warm feeling about the bureaucrats, doesn't it? Thank you. Council Member Myers. Thank you, Mayor. I guess, Commissioner, when you start to look at those numbers, can you go back and perhaps look at that tape and see that $770,000 and start with that, and then the one point, whatever it was for the check, and then whatever else that Ms. Gooding talked about today that might be. encumbered that can be released. And I would say I actually like what Councilmember Ford was saying, and what I think would be unfair is if we don't take a look at the opportunity to use this funding across the entire city. And I just had a constituent come up here earlier and speak, and we've got a situation in our district that we're trying to find a solution to, and this would be a solution. And as Councilman Dennis said, we've done this in the past since we've been on the council. And I would hope that the council, maybe through the leadership of the vice mayor, would begin the process for council starting to articulate what it would like to see happen with this pot of money, rather than just wait for the administration to bring something to us that's already packaged and ready to go, and then we sort of have to vote that down. And I know the mayor is not too far removed from being one of us, and so I know you can appreciate having been on this side of the bench and wanting to look at utilizing that to represent your district and do something maybe globally across the entire city and county. So that's what I look forward to. So, Vice Mayor, I hope that you'll take that by the horns and lead us under your leadership to put together a proposal of our own on how we might utilize that money, how we see fit. So thank you very much. Thank you, Ms. Gooding. Thank you, Mayor. Council Member Lane. I hate to say this, but I do remember a little bit about the Lexington Dry Goods Project. And I believe in that situation the building was converted to a restaurant on the first floor and apartments above. And the restaurant went out of business, and it was the primary source of revenue, so the whole building went into default. So then that got reconverted to an office building with a restaurant, and that's been successful. I think I've seen you down there at the Portofino's occasion. I know, too. But I believe the idea of the UDAG funds is the last money in. That is generally going to be the high-risk money that's needed to give the whole additional financing to get a project over the hump. I would encourage trying to have these funds as be a mortgage, and we would get a payback on it. because if we did that, then we could, as this money came back in, we could recycle it and put it into another project at a future date, whereas if we just give the money away and don't ask for any kind of future repayment, then it's gone from the use of the government forever, and it would be nice if we could have this rotating recycling financial fund. That's all I've got. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Council Member Laines. Council Member Kaye. Thank you, Mayor. As an at-large council member, as everybody knows, I don't have a specific district, and so perhaps I felt that it would be useful to weigh in on the broader perspective and the use of these funds. At the very least, I would be interested in seeing a comparison of projects. If some council members think it would be best to allocate these funds across the districts, I would be interested in seeing what those proposals would look like, what the impact might be, how they investments, is there going to be any return on those funds, in comparison to a particular project or maybe a couple of projects that would take the entire set of funds and have potentially a greater impact. So kind of a theme of mine when thinking about budget, I hate to think about things in isolation. I like to see them in comparison to what else we might do with the money. So just a thought at this early stage. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Council Member Kaye. All right, that's everyone who got signed up to speak or comment on the UDAG presentation. We can move on to council reports now. Floor is available for council reports. Council Member Lawless. Yes. First of all, I'd like to make a motion to move the off-premises signage from public safety to planning and public works. That has to do with things such as the rental signs, et cetera. It was originally in public safety because it was under building inspection, but it's going to be transferred to planning. Second. Motion by Council Member Lawless, second by Council Member Crosby. Is there any discussion on the motion? Any discussion on the motion? All right. Hearing none, we can take a vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. um also um for people in and around the third district there are um the university of kentucky is doing a series of um neighborhood meetings meeting with um different entities that surround the UK area which is almost all considered the third district so if you want more information about that you can contact my office at the lawless at Lexington ky.gov and you can also if you're in the third district and want updates from my office you can ask to be put on the email update list so you'll get these things when they come in. Thank you very much. Thank you. Councillor Lawless. Councillor McKay. Thank you, Mayor. I just want to let people know that if you haven't seen them yet, that the new murals that were painted over the last week by this team of artists, Herakut, are a wonder to behold. They're spectacular. They're a great addition to our community, and they were done in a way that included many people in the community. It was really a combination of world-class artists coming in and many people in the community getting together for not a whole lot of money and producing some really great art. Unfortunately, I was out of town most of last week, so I did not see them in process, but I got to go to a celebration Saturday night that included the artists. I got to meet them. We had a proclamation from the mayor for the two local artists who had brought them and for them, and it was just a wonderful event and a great celebration of the energy, enthusiasm, and creativity in our community. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Council Member Kaye. Council Member Gordon. Thank you, Mayor. Just a couple of things. It's council members on September 27th at 4 o'clock. We're going to have a workshop before the council meeting about the UK master plan. And so I would encourage you to pack your brown bag dinner and come along. And then I wanted to ask Law, if you know any more about whether we will have the police disciplinary hearing on October 1st, if there's any change or update in that. Two minutes before I came down here, I received the waiver from the officer's attorney, so that hearing will not take place on October 1st. Okay, so if that was done by motion, I move to take the October 1st, 3 p.m. special meeting for disciplinary hearing off the agenda. Motion and a second. Is there any discussion on the motion? Hearing none, we can take a vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. Thank you, Keith. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you. Council Member Crosby. Thank you, Mayor. Vice Mayor Gordon, what kind of meeting did you say on the 27th? It's a council workshop for the U.K. Master Plan. So I want to make sure I understood what type of meeting it was. And then I just want to thank the Division of Parks and Recreation. As many of you all know, at the end of this month, we will have the fright nights at Jacobson Park starting, and they've worked really hard to be accommodating to the neighbors. As you can imagine, there's lots of noise and lots of activity at Jacobson Park during this time. So I thank them for trying to redirect some of the sound and do some things with the fencing to help make it a little bit more enjoyable for the neighbors. And I would encourage everybody to go out and get spooked. Thanks. Thank you, Council Member Crosby. Council Member Farmer. Thank you, Mayor. Just three items. First, I wanted to invite everyone to the Christ the King Oktoberfest this weekend. It will be on Friday from 4 until 11, and on Saturday from 1 until 11. I have plenty of good Mets, Brats, Red Hots, and Hot Dogs, things that add up maybe too fast on me sometimes. Secondarily, on Sunday, I had taken a little ride with my mom, and we had sought out Raven Run. I wanted to see the nature sanctuary, which I thought from the way that the sidewalk is laid out, it just looked like it was a lot further from the car. But I was able to talk Mom into it, and we walked down and went up to the sanctuary, looked it over. It's a wonderful place, and took our time walking back. But the parking lot was full with license plates from as far away as Minnesota. So it is a wonderful opportunity to enjoy nature at its finest in the 12th District. And so I just encourage all to go and see. Then lastly, I was approached by a couple of constituents who are helping Vice Mayor Yates with her fundraising efforts on behalf of the Kentucky Theater. And after some of the press clippings about the requests for proposals for other movie places in downtown, there was kind of a question asked of me as a representative. You know, is this in competition with the Kentucky Theater, or will this hurt the Kentucky Theater, or will this hurt people wanting to give to the Kentucky Theater? So I'm just wanting to float that out to the council because I think there's a little bit of a conversation in the community that some of this appears on the surface to be a little bit of cross purposes because the Kentucky Theater is a beloved institution in the center of downtown. The idea of having more theaters in downtown on the surface of it is not a problem. But I just wonder if there's more we want to hear about it at this level. at this level? Do we want to hear from what's the genesis for the RFPs and or do we want a little bit of a presentation from former Vice Mayor Yates and her group about what they're trying to raise funds for and do and give them a little bit of a lilt here in public? And I'm just throwing that out for Earl's consumption. I have no motion on that, but I just think there is a little bit of a feedback loop there of if we're raising money for the Kentucky and they're trying to build other theaters, what's really going on here? And I can understand some of the potential misinformation there. So that's just for consumption. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Council Member Farmer. Jeff, do you want to comment on it? I will say I'm getting ready to write my check, Council Member Farmer, to Isabel, so I'll be happy to come down to Farmer's Jewelry for you as well. My name is on one of the seats over there right now from last time. So we want to, same thing, we're all encouraged. I'm ready to roll up again. We're all ready. We all want to do it. So I'm happy to provide additional information briefly just to answer your question so that you have something to respond to your constituents about. The intention has always been to build upon the presence of the Kentucky in terms of building a theater district. And so any proposal that comes forward, and I should say that we're at the very early stages of this. I mean, we requested qualifications, but the qualifications is really to start the conversation, And there's miles to go on this and many chances for you to weigh in. But always the intention was that this was a different product than what the Kentucky offered. The Kentucky offers art house theater. They offer music. They have a market niche and a very important one. And this was never seen as competition for that. This will be the vision here is something that's going to appeal more to the 14-year-old in the crowd. You know, so lots more explosions at the cinema than at the Kentucky, much fewer foreign films. So I think, you know, that symbiosis has real opportunity. Obviously, there's a lot to figure out here, and the Kentucky is definitely part of the consideration of those conversations. So that's the brief answer, and I happen to provide any additional info that you might have. Thank you, sir. Good. Great. Councilmember Lawless. Since you brought that up, Councilmember Farmer and the Kentucky Theater is in the 3rd District and actually helped raise funds when it was renovated years ago. And if I ever win the lottery, I'm going to pay for that pipe organ. So that's one of my projects, if I win the lottery. I hear you have to play, but my understanding is my information and my understanding is very limited, but it does seem that the Kentucky Theater is a real anchor to our downtown and is a very different niche than what people now downtown in the U.K. have to go out to Hamburg or whatever to see those kinds of films. So I, too, am anxiously awaiting more information, and I've had several questions from constituents about it. So thank you, and I appreciate you bringing that up, Council Member Farmer, and I have a check going too. So thank you. You're welcome. We may ought to call Isabel down here right now. With the basket. She'll be here. Does anybody else have no other council members or am I missing something? No other council members signed up for council reports? Okay, then we can move on to the mayor's report. There is no mayor's report this week. Next is public comment for issues not on the agenda. Mr. Mundy, you got anybody? Okey-dokey. All right, then we do have a motion. Sorry, sorry, we have a closed session. We have a vice mayor Gordon. Thank you, Mayor. I move that we go into closed session pursuant to KRS 61.810.1F for a discussion that may lead to the appointment, discipline, or dismissal of an employee. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. guitar solo guitar solo guitar solo guitar solo Thank you. guitar solo guitar solo guitar solo Thank you. Thank you. guitar solo Thank you. Thank you. The End I'm sorry. Thank you. guitar solo guitar solo Thank you. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion to adjourn. Motion to adjourn by Council Member Blues. Second. Second by? No, we don't. That was not. No, this was for the before. Is there a place on the agenda to speak for public comment? It's gone. He already did it. I did it. Oh, you did it before he went? Yes. Motion and a second. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. We are adjourned. Crazy I'm crazy for feeling so lonely I'm crazy Crazy for feeling so lonely I knew you'd love me as long as you wanted. And then someday you'd leave me for somebody new. I love you.