Well, I think of all the worries that people seem to find, and how they're in a hurry to complicate their minds by chasing after money and dreams that can't come true. I'm glad that we are different, we've better things to do. May others plan their future, I'm busy loving you. One, two, three, four. And use my simple plan. You'll be my loving woman. I'll be your loving man. We'll take the most from living. Have pleasure while we can. Two, three, four. Sha-la-la-la-la-la, live for today Sha-la-la-la-la-la, live for today And don't worry about tomorrow, hey Sha-la-la-la-la, live for today Baby, I need to feel you inside of me I got to feel you deep inside of me Baby, please come close to me I got to have your love, please Please, please, please Give me some love. Give me some love. Give me some love. Give me some love. Baby, give me some love. Give me some love. I've got to have all your lovin'. Give me some love. I need all your lovin'. Give me some love. I need all your lovin'. La, la, la, la, la. Sha, la, la, la, la, la. Live for today. Sha-la-la-la-la-la. Live for today. And don't worry about tomorrow. Hey, hey, hey. Sha-la-la-la-la-la. Live for today. Sha-la-la-la-la-la. Live for today. We can never know about the days to come But we think about them anyway And I wonder guitar solo Thank you. Thank you. guitar solo Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. guitar solo Thank you. guitar solo guitar solo Thank you. Thank you. No discussion. Point is to it. There's many new council members on the committee, and so I wanted to give a little background information regarding the safe parks position that is an agenda item prior to our presentation. But in June of 2013, so we're going on two years now, Vice Mayor Gordon appointed a Neighborhood Parks Task Force. One of the recommendations from this task force was a position for safe parks. And as you'll see from the presentation, they'll go into more detail about what this position would entail. But the task force was to develop strategies to make Lexington's neighborhood parks safe while improving the quality of life, health for citizens, ensuring a plan is in place by the Division of Parks and Recreation when programming is removed from these parks. So if you remember, throughout, some of our parks have become less safe, I should say. Not that they're unsafe completely, but they were showing signs of problems in the area. So there had been some shootings and some murders in our parks. But even set aside from that, I think before it becomes to escalate to that, our park would show signs of negative activity in the parks. So that was the reason for the task force. And we have at least one task force member present. I served along with Council Member Ford, now Commissioner Ford, and Lieutenant, now Darter E. Wright, was a big help. And then, of course, all of the park staff participated along with law. but we felt that it was important because I can remember back when my children were young in the parks and the parks had like park directors that would come and generate activities for the kids and hand out balls or open up you know unlock equipment and things like that and get the kids involved in activities at the park. So we moved away from that and what I have found too is that as we build bigger complexes such as Cardinal Run or where they have, I think, Shilato Park would generate, they're not neighborhood parks, but they're parks where a lot of activity, ball and softball, baseball, football, all of these huge leagues play. So it left a void in our neighborhood parks. So I don't know if there's anything else that I wanted to say other than that, but I just felt that this is something that needed to be addressed, and how could we address it? So it would be through volunteers in the area, and the more activity that are in our parks, the less likely for them to become a haven for unwanted activities. And it also opens our neighborhood kids up, many times low-income areas, to experience different things in life. So I could go on and on and on, I guess, but I will. So, Chris, are you the main presenter? Chris, yeah, myself and Brian Rogers as well. So, Chris Cooperrider with Parks and Rec is here, along with Brian Rogers and Reed Small, who all played big parts in this, along with my aide, Hillary, who did a tremendous amount of work. But thank you, Chris, for this presentation. Thank you, Councilmember Henson. Thank you, Council Members, and congratulations, Council Member Lamb, on your newly elected position, which I'm sure you'll do a great job. As Council Member Henson was saying, Vice Mayor Linda Gordon appointed Neighborhood Parks on May 20, 2013, so this effort has been ongoing for some time, took some time. And I'd like to take this moment and thank actually Councilmember Henson for chairing the committee. She did a fantastic job. And as she mentioned, we did include other council representation, including Councilmember Ford, Councilmember George Myers, and also Council aide Tyler Scott, who was instrumental in this task force. In addition to those members on the task force, we had Commissioner Jeffrey, Laura Hatfield from the Partners for Youth, and Sergeant Daudery, who's now Lieutenant Daudery. and he was instrumental in a piece of this that I'll discuss here shortly. And also Captain Ron Watson from the Sheriff's Department, who was not appointed to the committee but was involved in our conversations and recommendations where people or individuals from the Department of Law and also from our Division of Risk Management, as well as what Council Member Henson already said, other members within our Division of Parks and Recreation. The task force did meet seven times over a course of about eight months and had our report out to council on April 22nd of 2014. The goals of the neighborhood task force are to develop strategies to make Lexington neighborhood parks safe. We wanted to create a family-friendly environment and to do that we're looking to improve the quality of life for the quality of life and health for the citizens, especially the neighborhoods surrounding the park, and to create a plan to address, as Council Member Henson mentioned, when a park faces a decline in being family-friendly. And oftentimes that's a perception. There are some activities, but we're really dealing with perceptions as much as actual facts. But what the thought is, is to look for voids, whether in infrastructure or in possible new programming needs. the task force has developed three recommendations to help create family-friendly parks and those recommendations include developing a parks barring policy to review infrastructure and develop needs assessment for opportunity parks and then to develop a programming model to increase neighborhood buy-in and have more park activities which was termed by council member chris ford as safe well We were talking about safe parks when we were looking for an acronym, and he suggested strategies for accessible and family-engaged park. I like safe parks, but that's what it's meant to be. I want to give you an update on a couple of the items that were suggested. The parks barring policy was presented before council for recommendation on implementation. Prior to presenting it before council last April, the Division of Police reviewed it, along with their own law department, task force members, CAO's office, our Parks Advisory Board, and the Fayette County Attorney's Office. And all entities were very supportive of the Parks Barring Policy. So we decided to move forward on implementation. Currently, well, we had to design or develop language for the sign, and it was reviewed by the Department of Law, and we have them purchased, and we're currently in the process of sign installation, which is a big part of the barring policy. In addition to that, we developed the Notice of Barring Letters. They've been drafted and reviewed by law, and I'm currently working with the Division of Police on the process of implementation and training between their officers and our own people. So we're well underway. It's a process. It still will take a little bit more time to get through. final implementation. As Council Member Henson mentioned, we came up with the term Opportunity Park. That's a park that we would look to the respective district council member along with the Division of Parks and Recreation to define and it's where there might be a perception of a decline in family friendly. Opportunity parks infrastructure is reviewed and efforts are made to develop a needs assessment so improvements or replacements of amenities can be made. As part of the task force pilot project, Wolf Run was designated as an opportunity park. We have already made some improvements at Wolf Run, which include there's a building structure at the park, and in the structure there was an individual room that the baseball league used for a storage site, and we have rehabilitated that room, and now it's a programming site. It can handle about 20 or 30 people. So we have an area during inclement weather or indoor needs where people can get out of the park, and we can have programs. In addition to that, in our FY 2016 budget, we've requested for new ball field fencing, again, to improve the looks of the park. People don't want to go to a rundown park. They want to go to a park that looks nice, that's inviting, that's family-friendly. In addition to the ball field fencing, we're also looking for additional funds for the restroom building. There's some more improvements we want to do, some storage we want to add, and to heat the restrooms and make them better for year-round use. A big component that we're here to talk about today with Opportunity Parks is the programming piece, as I mentioned earlier, Safe Parks. And we have Deputy Director Brian Rogers here to speak more about the Safe Parks programming piece and the pilot that we did. Brian? Thank you, Chris. Hello, everyone. So with the programming piece, we were really trying to create a new service delivery model by identifying third-party service providers and hooking them up with neighborhood leaders to identify the needs of that individual park and then see if those third-party providers could provide programming in the park, working under the theory that a busy park is a safe park. So the pilot program that we began had three different elements. First, we worked with a fitness program for new mothers, and that process really helped us work through the logistics of the process, gaining record checks on anybody that would be working with the youth, alleviating any insurance concerns for the third-party provider, working on a pricing structure with regional input, and then also the qualifications and checking references on that third-party provider. And so that was very helpful to work with that program, and we appreciate her efforts. Secondly, we worked with Green Acres Park, which actually did have existing leadership in that neighborhood. And so we worked with that leadership in order to define the needs of that park. We surveyed the community. We took a look at their facilities, saw what we could do, what the constraints might be. And then we tried to work with that neighborhood leadership group, the Neighborhood Association, to match those parameters with a third-party provider. And that's been an ongoing relationship. Lastly, at Wolf Run, there was no existing neighborhood leadership. There was no active neighborhood association. So thank God for Hillary Angelucci and Mr. Reed Small out of my office, who sustained a monumental effort to create the Wolf Run Park Activities Board. And that effort is continuing and ongoing. So we created a board from scratch, and we've had to identify programming and once again survey that community and see their needs. And as Chris mentioned, we did some facility improvements in order to facilitate programming, and we're very proud of that relationship, and that is ongoing. We've actually started programming in the park, and we hope to continue that overall. But the biggest lesson that we've learned is just how time-consuming and detail-oriented establishing these relationships and maintaining these relationships is. and we in the enterprise section of Parks and Recreation just cannot sustain that effort or expand the effort without additional help. So the recommendation of the task force was to create a Safe Parks Program supervisor position, which the division supports that recommendation, and we'd like you all to take that recommendation seriously. That concludes our presentation. Thank you very much. We are now open for questions. Thank you, Mr. Cooperrider and Mr. Rogers. And now I will ask the council if they have any questions and I'll call on Mr. Maloney, Councilmember Maloney. Thank you for this presentation. Peggy, I want to commend you for and the group for putting this together because this has been needed for a long time, especially with Duncan Park is another example where we really have to help out and that's what has happened over there. My question to you guys, have you all put this in your budget for the supervisor to be funded? We did, yes sir. Okay. And the other question I had, I met with you all in a couple of these meetings, have we started a relationship with the University of Kentucky because they were really interested in getting on board on doing something like it. Have you all been able to tap into that source yet to work with them? We have definitely started to lay the grounds for that relationship. There hasn't borne fruit yet, but we would like this position to work very closely with volunteer efforts, and we feel like the university has already helped us a great deal in that area, and so we'd like to expand that relationship. Yes, we haven't forgotten. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. All right. Council Member Bledsoe. Thank you, Chair. I'm very excited about a lot of what you're talking about, mostly because I think it goes along with that strategic plan for parks in general, making sure that our ball field parks are excellent ball field parks and making sure that our neighborhood parks fit the neighborhood that they're engendered to. Meaning not every kid in certain neighborhoods need ballparks. They might need softball fields. They might need just green space for kickball or for Frisbee golf. And so I'm encouraging not just to improve what we already have in some of those places that need run down. I mean, my son plays at Wolf Run, so I get it. But we go there to play baseball and then we leave. you know, I'd be more interested in figuring out a way to help that neighborhood, particularly bringing some sports or bringing facilities that match the neighborhood, I guess. And I'm very interested and supportive of the third-person policy of letting our nonprofits do some work and who are already actively engaged and bringing what they do after school already to certain parks to help enhance that. So that position will do that, essentially. Yes, ma'am. We'll work with all those people. That's great. Thanks. Thank you. We're excited, too. Councilmember Evans, please. Thank you, Chair. I agree with the comments that have already been made, but I guess being a new council person, I think I need to backtrack and just kind of try and figure out, I mean, it seems that these were kind of common sense kind of issues. I mean, was there no one assigned to in parks to look at the different parks and see what the issues were. I mean, I'm kind of curious why it took a task force to look at this. I mean, I would just assume that that's a part of the duties of Parks and Recreation to look at what facilities need to be, you know, get creative. So if you could give more of the background on what was going on in the department, that maybe that was something that could not be addressed or was not being addressed. It's a very good question. And you're right in that we have maintained a relationship for 50 years with the various neighborhood associations. Some of them actually own neighborhood buildings, which you might be aware, that sit in the parks. And the neighborhood associations are actually in charge of programming those buildings or renting those buildings out. and in our office we just maintain the relationship, connect them with the public, and then review their financial statements every year. The relationship was very superficial. And so at the staffing level that we have, and if you'll recall, you know, in 2008, 2009, we were tough times and the division took a bit of a hit. And so we were only able and really still are only able to continue that superficial relationship. relationship but there are neighborhood associations that we have better relationships with than others and we try to work very closely when they reach out to us we we try to work with them as best we can but this position would give us the opportunity to reach out to them and say we have these things available these third service third party service providers are out there and would like to program in your park and can make those connections and that was something that we never had the time to do before. Does that help? Okay. Council Member Stinnett. Thank you, and again, congratulations on being chair. Brian, having worked or ran a couple parks in our history, and as you know, and worked on some of these issues, tell me, how does this incorporate going back to our model that we had 20 years ago and having summertime activities at parks like box hockey and ping pong, having those two park people there. I know the partnership with UK, that's where we wanted to explore and have students come over for credit and have those programs back in our parks. I know Councilman Wiginton, when he was here, he and I pushed to have those reactivated. I know Councilman Maloney is really interested in this as well. How can we get back to those activity levels and getting those summer youth counselors back in all of our parks like we used to have? Is that looked at with this program or is that something totally separate? No, they are intertwined. And I'll tell you this, if Council Member Stanton, you've been around a long time, so you know that five years ago, five or six years ago, we did try to reestablish the park program. And we did put directors back out in the parks. And guess what? The kids didn't come. They didn't come. So the, you know, the 70s and 80s, what the parents will allow their kids to do has changed, right? So they're not really going to say go to the park and play without any supervision. So we put the supervision there, and they still didn't come out and play. So what I think is key in this program is that we work with those neighborhood leaders, and we identify the needs, and we identify the parameters first, and we know what the community wants to do. So, for example, at Green Acres Park, we did all these surveys, and getting the kids active was one of the things that they wanted to do. So we brought in this Urban Ninja Project, and we had the help of the Neighborhood Association to advertise that out to that community. And that was something that that park director program missed. And so I don't think that, one, it was advertised well enough, or two, it was explained well enough so that the parents would feel comfortable sending their kids to the park unsupervised or knowing that there would be a park director there. So we hear that all the time. Everybody says, when I was a kid, you guys had box hockey and ping pong. But, you know, the other part that we heard was, you know, and they would take us to the movies and they would drive us to other parks. And you can't transport kids like that anymore. So a lot of the things that we were doing back in the 70s and 80s, we wouldn't be allowed to do today. So I think the key to the Safe Parks program is that we work with the community so that then the community is able to convince their own neighbors that, hey, this is a great program. Come out and do it, which is what that was missing. Yeah, I think advertising was the key link that we missed about five years ago. And I think anything we do is going to have to be advertised and even have the directors go out into the community and knock on doors and tell people the schools could help too. I know they weren't involved as much five years ago, but I think we need to look at that. On the Safer Parks program piece, are we also talking about security in parks? I know we had one part-time individual who used to help us on security during some of the baseball leagues and football leagues. Does it include a security piece of having a security guard that can go to different parks in time we need, or are we going to still use the same system we've always used with a part-time individual? We have an existing security piece. It's Parks Patrol, and we look at it across the board. What this does is develop the Parks Barring Policy, and it gives a tool for the police officers where most of the activity we experience is misdemeanors in nature, so it has to be directly observed, whereas with the barring policy, if we have a repeat offender or the offense is severe enough and we bar an individual and a park patrol officer would walk up on the scene, then they can have a resolution quicker than waiting around and spending time watching out for the activity. So the piece, we already have some funding in our budget for park patrol program, and what this does is gives another tool to those officers to use. How many officers do we have now? It's we go by a budget and that we only have the one coordinator position But then what we do is we actually engage Division of police and they come to us whether working straight time or overtime and give us additional support So you are able to meet the flexibility and needs of individual parks I know yes, we've had a couple that I've worked with we've had that that response. So we still have that available Yes, and the budget still there. Yes and adequate. Yes. Okay. Very good. Thank you Councilmember Henson Sure. I'd be glad to. Recognize Council Member Brown. Fred Brown. Thank you, Chair. This is a new position that we're asking for. Does it have a job description other than what the task force has said there, or is it too early to get into that, I guess? No. What we requested in our budget was for a program supervisor, which has a pretty generic description to it that could pretty much apply to anything. but I'm not familiar enough yet with the new HR levels to tell you which one, but it used to be a 110. Who would that person report to? To the enterprise deputy director, myself. Okay. Of the parks. Do you happen to, off the top of your head, have a total number of parks that you're dealing with here and a listing of them and what districts there? We have that list. There's approximately 11 of them, and seven of them have buildings. Is that right? Seven of them have these neighborhood buildings in the parks that the Neighborhood Associations Program, so that would be where our focus would start. You're talking about 11 parks? There's more than 11 parks in the whole community. Oh, gosh, yeah, there's almost 100 parks. Yeah, what's 11 represent? Those represent the parks that have these neighborhood buildings, which is our primary. Are those the only ones that you're targeting right now? So those would be the ones. We've only done the pilot program, which has ended, which targeted the two parks and the one program. But we figured we could handle 12 altogether at any one time. And we would work with the recommendation would come from your office to promote a park as an opportunity park or not even promote it. Just ask us if we could apply this program to that particular parks have swimming pools, tennis courts. Sure. Yeah. So if that park is one of the ones that you're working with, then that would be something that would be involved on what the neighborhood people would like to have. Plus, are they on the capital improvement program and that type of thing? Because when you go into one of these parks and you're going to try to get the neighborhood involved and you're going to try to bring them together, obviously you might have some things that need to have some capital money into them so that you can round it out and make sure it's a viable park. That was another lesson that we learned during the, that's a great point, you know, during the pilot was that you're not going to go over to Green Acres Neighborhood Association and only talk about third-party service providers. You know, they inevitably want other things. And so, yes, it has been a great opportunity for us to work with those associations to try to make capital improvements. And as Chris said, Wolf Run is a great example where we've already done some facility improvements and we're looking for money in the budget to do more. Green Acres has asked for several park improvements and we're trying to work actively with them to do more. But those are things that we would do for any neighborhood association that called and requested improvements to the park. But through this program, it became a greater focus. So you're probably not hitting every council district? No, but we are willing to. The pilot did not. But if we got the position, we would be willing to. You all would be open to expanding that. You could still handle that? Yes, sir. Good, because I think every council member here probably has parks in their particular council district. I know I have several, but some of them are, you know, you'd have this same relationship and working relationship with some neighborhoods that are really involved. There's other parks that a lot of people could care less, really. So it's up to us to kind of generate that enthusiasm and progression on that. So we'll see how it goes from there. Thank you. That's great. Thank you. Council Member Henson. Thank you, Chair. I really appreciate all the conversation that's taken place because I feel like this is extremely important to our community, to our parks, particularly our neighborhood parks. And each of you have said things, comments that I felt were very important. Our entire park system is extremely important. Our Cardinal Run is important. And our neighborhood parks are important. our Jacobson Park and so forth. So I just feel like that there is a strong void in our neighborhood parks, and we want to attract people from the community, help them feel comfortable, and bring their children there. And I know, Councilmember Evan, you had mentioned about police possibly or the reaction from parks, I guess, is what you had mentioned. And I go back to 2008 when I was a new council member and I had a park where there was a gang-related shooting. And it was actually the park I grew up in. So that was very scary for the people that live in close proximity, and I didn't want that park to become a haven for that type of activity. So we began programming there, and it has become a very, very strong park and positive. To my knowledge, there's been no further incidents, but they worked very, very hard. And there's a park activity board there that organizes activities for the neighborhood children, And it is based upon the need of the community. So then in 2012, 2013, I began to see these other parks having similar issues to what we had in 08. And when I contacted parks at that time, they were saying it's a police issue. But then the more and more I thought about it, I became adamant that it's not a police issue. It's not just a police issue. They're a quick fix. They will go in, do anything I ask them to do. But we need more for these parks. So that is why we established this task force. try to get in there and dig and see what we could possibly do to prevent this so that every person in our community has an opportunity to go to the park, take their children, play on the playground, or just kick the ball around or whatever they might want to do and feel safe and protected. So I just wanted to add that, but I do appreciate everyone's comments. I think University of Kentucky utilizing their help. But again, I think this position is probably essential to the success of our neighborhood parks. So thank you, Chair. I want to make sure, though, is there any motion, since we believe that the position is in the budget, I know that that was a hang-up in the prior. So is there any other motion that should be brought forward by the Council for this, other than just informational purposes? Councilmember Henson? Personally, Councilmember Maloney wants to speak, but in answer to your question, I would just say that we need to support this position in the budget and see that it stays there. And then I think then Parks could take the reins and see that this happens. Thank you. All right. Councilmember Maloney? I mean, after seeing the task force and what the recommendation and hearing all the concerns with the council, I feel that there should be a motion made that we do have as broken as this. And because this happened 20 years ago, we were able to have this and it fell apart. So this way here, having something like this, make sure that it keeps going and it's being supported. so I don't know if you want to make a motion that you put it together you make the motion you're good at it I want you to get the credit for it you did a good job so why don't you make the motion so I would entertain a motion then in that case I would motion to have council approval for including the safe parks position in the 2016 budget So moved. Second. Is there a second? I'm sorry, who seconded that, please? Okay, thank you, Ms. Cutchfield. All right. Is there any discussion on the motion? All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Thanks. All right. Mr. Rogers and Mr. Cooper-Rider, thank you all so much for your presentation today and for everyone else's involvement as well. Thank you. Thanks. Thank you. Chair, I wanted to recognize someone real quickly that participated in the pilot program, and that is our new council member, James Brown. His father, Louis Brown, is in the back, and I believe that might be Mr. Commodore with him. And they participated in the Green Acres pilot project. and thank them for their work because I think we're all in this together. So thank you. All right. Thank you. We always appreciate it when the community gets involved, and we really appreciate it. It makes our government a stronger body. Thank you. All right. As we move forward on the agenda, the reorganization of the security to Department of Public Safety. Since Vice Mayor Kay is here today, I didn't know if you wanted to be the one to introduce. I'd just be happy to turn it right over to Jim Sheed. This was presented at the request of the administration. Thank you, sir. Thank you. For majority of the council members, if you recall, during the past 24 months, per council's direction, we've been intensifying our efforts in regard to increase level of services through our security section. We've looked at this as a phase approach. First phase obviously was to take a very closer look at our resources, how they've been utilized and finding areas where we can gain some efficiencies. Which we've done that in regard to additional training. We've also been able to incorporate new policies, procedures, standard operating procedures and so forth in handling of visitors coming, as well as any other building-specific security questions and concerns. Phase two was trying to incorporate some additional safeguards and security in regard to the building, and that we've accomplished through installation of additional cameras and surveillance areas, as well as additional doors, expansion of our electronic access system, and so forth. And we've had quite a bit of success with that. The third one was we kind of got together and take a look and see where we've been, where we are, and where we need to be. We've had discussions during the past 24 months, off and on, with police as well as the public safety commissioner's office. After some discussions and internal discussions and discussions with other departments and so forth, it became evident that maybe transferring off the security section and moving it under the Department of Public Safety might be the best next step in terms of trying to meet the councils and obviously other customers' demand for these type of services. So we have a very short presentation. Just want to give everybody an overall view of where we are, what we're proposing, and be glad to answer any questions that you all might have. Why are we asking for this? It's fairly obvious, as I mentioned. We feel like, considering the public safety department, their core mission, the expertise that they have in-house, the resources obviously that are geared toward public safety and security will lend itself perfectly to take over this group. And we feel like number one, obviously, as I mentioned, is the core mission. Number two is they have so many resources that probably can be shared with a new group, the added group, in terms of expansion of the knowledge and trainings, and if you've got issues in terms of shortage of staffing, they probably will have more success handling any of the last-minute emergencies and so forth. And also, I believe, trying to refocus the security sections group in more of a security. As most of you are aware right now, we do many, many different things through our security sections, and we feel that this will really move the whole section up to the next level. They're going to be able to do things that we, the Department of General Services, really do not have the resources or the know-how or the expertise to do so. So that's in a nutshell what we think going to be the efficiencies and improvements that would be gained through this process. This is the current organizational structure. As you see, security section that's highlighted in yellow is currently under my group, and we deal with many different issues on a daily basis, and I believe the guys have done a wonderful job meeting what our expectations are. Again, I just want to emphasize this is by no means a bad reflection on security. If they're doing or not doing their job, they're doing a wonderful job. It's just, as I said, we feel like with a level of demand and specific requests, this move would answer some of those questions. We'll be proposing with discussions with Commissioner Baston with public safety. This is where public safety office feels that this group would fit in. And you will see there are two yellow boxes. Number one is the Administrative Officer AO, which originally was vacant due to retirement. Most of the responsibilities for that specific position got consolidated among two or three other security officers. We felt like at this point it was prudent for us to take a look and see what we need to do with every vacant position to improve our quality of services. Originally, we only had one supervisor or management level. There were no redundancies available to us. So we decided it would be a good time to go ahead and maybe try to create an overall general manager over that group that kind of look at everything holistically while he let the security supervisor handle the day-to-day operation of the security. And so as I said, this is what the requested cross-departmental reorg would end up having security under the commissioner's office. Just want to give you all the numbers. The whole section is comprised of 16 full-time employees. The AO position is currently vacant. We, halfway through evaluating potential applicants, we decided to stop, and we felt like at this point, if this real goes through, it would be fair for the public safety to interview and decide who would be a perfect match and fit for that position. The rest of the positions are currently filled. We also have two part-time security guard positions that, depending on time to time, we have vacancies. I would say the vacancy level on both of those are probably about less than 40%. percent. Really don't have that many opportunities in terms of attracting qualified applicants for those positions since they're primarily part-time. I want to give you an idea about the size of the budget. The current fiscal year, the ratified budget for the entire section is at $825,000. Majority of that obviously would be your personnel costs, benefits and so forth. And operational cost in it is, we keep it very minimal. We do zero-based budgets, so everything we ask for the budget, it's based on exact items that we identified during the budget prices. So that's, in a nutshell, that's what you've got with the security section group. As I mentioned, it was going to be a brief one, so I'd be glad to answer any questions that you might have. Thank you, John G. Are there any questions of the council? Council Member Brown. That's Council Member Fred Brown. I've written at the top of my notes to say Council Member Fred Brown, and so I have to get acclimated to that. Thank you. I was just teasing with you. The question there is, the screen before you had $825,000 as a ratified budget in the current year we're in, What is the proposed budget for 16? The proposed budget probably it's a continuation budget. We did not anticipate, at least for the first year, if the transition. So that budget of $825,000 had that AO off position in there? Yes, yes. The personnel budget we do not create. Right. That is obviously. I understand. But that is a position that's on that group, yes. but the age twenty five you're talking about and covers all the personnel plus operating expenses correct do these security officers that you regard to we have now i'd should be aware of it but do they carry uh... guns or they got a little okay now we we were they limited on the security level there as far as the police if they need to that's that's correct okay we still rely on on police is we run into any kind of issues we feel like we need their assistance So if they were in the public, Commissioner of Public Safety, has he been, I mean, have you all talked to the commissioner? Yes, sir. We've had quite a few discussions. As a matter of fact, it started with Commissioner Mason and then also continued with Commissioner Baston about the pros and cons associated with each and what would be their approach into the transition of the group if that happens. And what would be, as a matter of fact, a proposed FI 216 budget was put together with full participation of the commissioner to make sure that what's being proposed, if the reorg moves forward, then this is not a shock to him. He knows exactly what's in the budget, what is it for, any specific items, line items, and so forth. CAO Sally Hamilton, can you just address it? basically I'm sure you've looked at it and and just maybe for the public record you could give us do you approve of it or I mean is it yes sir I think it's I think it's a correct move I think it will function not that it doesn't function well but I think it's more appropriate under the Commissioner of Public Safety and we have discussed that in detail with Commissioner Bastin and I think he agrees with us thank you great thank you Council Member Evans. Yes, thank you, Chair. I'm in agreement with this. I think it makes perfect sense, but I did kind of want to follow up on what Council Member Fred Brown I think was going to on kind of the more specifics on the additional training and I'm curious equipment that they would be getting and if that's also in the budget proposal. That is, the uniforms and any equipment that currently are using, any replacement equipment, is included as part of the proposed FY216. As I mentioned, we've reviewed that with the Commissioner of Public Works Office in more than one occasion, making sure, based on what their short-term goal is, that we're not going to short fund them in trying to do these transitions. So at this point, they're very comfortable, barring any major changes to the ultimate budget. He seems to be very comfortable with what's being proposed. And their role is still going to be more of an observe and report? I think it would be, but I anticipate, well, I think, and I can't speak for Commissioner Bastin. I believe, like everything else, the first year is going to be a transition year where they're going to take a look and look at some short-term changes, as well as looking at long-term what direction to fill like the core mission of the security going to be. Obviously, they're not going to be, per nature, they're going to be public safety officers, but I believe their role, the primary role, is going to be brought up a little bit higher than what they are right now. Councilmember Brown's whispering in my ear, I guess, to maybe expand upon what maybe the future goal might be. That was very well said. We're not looking to make any drastic changes. We're going to try to, for as smooth a transition as we possibly can, we recognize we have some good folks that are employed in this area. So we're going to look at it and see, and with any other operation that we have, we're going to look for continuous improvement, what we're doing that we shouldn't be doing, what we're not doing that we should be doing, and those kinds of things to improve the operation. And I would certainly entertain any suggestions or ideas that you might have, because you may have had some conversations that would give you some appropriate input as we move through this process. Okay. Councilmember Maloney. I do support this. I'm sorry, Chief. I mean, Commissioner now. I get straight one of these days. I've been everywhere with you for years. Like light-duty police officers that you have, can they sometimes fill some of these positions that we have? And these guys we got are doing a great job. And I know the security is the main thing concerned everybody, especially when you see in other cities where problems were people coming in with guns and all those kind of – but are we looking at possibly merging that you work with light officers that I have? We haven't had any conversations about that specifically, but we'll look at everything and see what the most appropriate, most efficient way to staff and meet the staffing needs that we have and security needs for the government and try to find resources within when that's appropriate and go from there. The other thing that concerns me, and I don't, is the metal detector that we have down here for the mayor's office. And I know it's hard to get in that mayor's office Because you've got to go through that and you've got to go through security and all that. It's just real easy to get through this council chamber. All you've got to do is just check in, sign your name, come on up there, and without going through any metal protectors or going through anything. I don't even know if that's something that you guys are looking at from looking at other courthouses and other places we have that. Is that something that you ask for ideas? I'm just trying to throw that radar out there just to give you a concern that I have about what I've seen in other cities and what's going on. This is easy to get into. And the other problem I have is when we pay the bills, and I've noticed we get a lot of problems with people coming up here. Our rated customers causing a lot of problems. And, John, I think you all are going to fix some of that problem. I mean, I'm hoping that has already been done or is that going to be done where you've got people with a lot of money transpired? Yes, we've incorporated a few items and we're in the process of installing a window at the revenue that would really improve it per their requirement and their request. So that should be taken care of fairly shortly. And the reason, because I know that we're looking at the LexServe bill and possibly RFPL may come back in-house. If it comes back in-house, then we're looking at more money possibly coming generated through this, the windows here and all that. So hopefully, and that's why I think this is a good fit, Chief, new, I mean, Commissioner. I think it would be a great fit for all this to happen because you've got a lot of tools out there with people on light duty that might be able to come on board and help out on these problems. because I'm just concerned what people, how easy does it get in and out of this chamber without being able to have to. Your point's well taken, and one of the things we will be doing once the transfer happens is looking at the entire security plan for not only this building but others, and we'll make changes as we see that they need to be made, but we'll certainly take into account what your concern was. But I do, these guys you have here are doing a great job, and I just didn't know for the first way that they need help to protect this chamber a little bit better. Yes, Commissioner. Commissioner? I just, yeah, Commissioner. Can I make an observation here? This is a good move because of Ronnie's expertise and the relationship, obviously, that he has with police. We've had a long give and take with council about security. And in the past, and I know several members here are new, but it's been about what level of security we have and the cost versus what you get on different levels of security. Like on the council floor, we've offered to install similar doors and locks similar to what's in the mayor's office and what's there. And the council has chosen not to go that direction because cost involved and open access. And we have taken steps to, you know, cut down on the number of people who have access to the floor and those type of things. I think Commissioner Bastin is in a better position to assess those needs and costs versus what you get going forward than we've been able to do. And I think these are issues that need to be revisited with a new council because these have been debated in the past. and not gridlock has occurred, but we haven't been able to go some of the directions we've wanted to go, and you perhaps, the council, hasn't been satisfied with the total security level that they had. So, again, I think this is a good move forward. Oh, I think it's a great move. Being on the fifth floor, I don't have any. I'm more concerned what comes through this door. And that, to me, I think it's real easy to get in here. And I'm not saying that wood like he's going to keep knocking on wood, but it just takes one little something to go through here, and you could have a lot of serious problems. And the whole issue is complicated by concealed carry law that is very permissive that allows people to carry weapons into a building like this. And how do we best provide security with, you know, the knowledge that people have a right to do that legally? So, and again, I think he is better equipped to deal with it than we are moving forward. All right. Thank you. Councilmember Henson. Thank you, Chair. I just wanted to briefly say that I think this is a good move. We probably should have done this years ago. Excellent idea. And you have my support on it. Thank you. for the presentation. Thank you, John Shee. Is there any further discussion of the council or questions? I will entertain a motion to forward this reorganization of security to the Department of Public Safety. Council Member Scutchfield? Second. And Council Member Scutchfield made a motion and Council Member Bledsoe seconded the motion. Is there any discussion on the motion? There being no discussion, all in favor, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? All right, that motion passes. And I will again defer to Vice Mayor Kay if he'd like to, since these two presentations, since you're here, I didn't want to look you over, you know, with all due respect, sir. Thank you. This is similarly at the request of the administration, and CIO Velocente, I believe, will present this information. or CAO Hamilton, I don't know which. CIO of Ellicente. Good afternoon. Congratulations to the new leadership and welcome to the new council member, Brown. This is a real great opportunity for me, and I'll tell you why. I've been here for about a year, and so we're doing my reorg and transition in sort of phases. So I will talk about those phases. But before I do that, it's also really an opportunity for me to kind of do a little bit of level setting. I've stood in front of this podium, in front of this council a number of times now and talked about very specific issues. You know, either the telephone issue or other issues or the lease issue. But this is really an opportunity for me to kind of present at a very, very high level sort of the trends that are going on in IT, in state and local government, and I'll address that with one slide. I'll talk about the current organization, the proposed organization, and then focus on what the organization will do. One of the strongest organizations in the United States is called the National Association of State CIOs. It's an organization I've been a member for a long, long time. I've actually been its leadership and led the organization for a number of years. So I very seriously look at what their top ten priorities are. So what I've done here is really put down their top five priorities. Not only that, but there are a number of organizations that work with local governments, counties, and cities. And when I took a look at what they proposed, their top five, frankly, they're almost the same. So let me go through them very quickly because you'll see these themes repeated sort of over and over again as I come up and talk or as others talk about IT. Cybersecurity is today's number one priority for all the states, all of local governments. And, you know, with everything on the front pages that you have seen, the banks, the targets, et cetera, with breaches, that probably will continue to stay number one for a long, long time. I don't know about you, but I just got a very, very recent email from the Hilton Hotel. I have one of their cards. I use it as a loyalty card, and they asked me to change my password. And I think you're going to see that from many, many organizations. Number two, cloud services. Cloud services are one of those things that has been talked about now for a long, long time. So before I go on to the next item, I'll give you just a five-second definition. Cloud services are not new services. It's provisioning telecommunications capabilities, communication capabilities in a new way, not new technology. Three, consolidations and optimizations. What does that mean? That means most organizations at the state level and also local level want to unify what it is that they've had in their environment. So consolidations, less servers is probably better than more servers. You can virtualize a lot of them in today's environment. What that means is you want to simplify what you're managing and optimize. In other words, make it perform better, get better performance. The fourth one is broadband and wireless connectivity. Broadband is something that I think is not new to the city. You've heard the mayor announce it. We've talked about it. I've been here giving you short updates about what we're doing as a city. That will continue to be one of the top five priorities for all governments. The ability for its citizens and its governments to communicate better is really, really very important. And last but by no means least, budget and cost control. That will always be the issue. How can we do things more efficiently? How can we do them better, faster, and not use as much of the resources that we already have? So those are the priorities for the states and local government. All right, current organizational structure. I'm out here hanging all by myself. We created that office last year. Because you remember when I was hired, there really was not a CIO position. So I'm out there. I've, by the way, assumed a lot of power. But I think that's been done before in history. So the point is that we now want to take the organization that still is reporting to the chief administrative officer and move that over. By the way, DES, which is the organization that stands for the Division of Enterprise Solutions, was created in 2008, primarily when we were implementing the PeopleSoft, and it was there to support. But as you look forward and as we look ahead, there will be other needs to support enterprise solutions. So the big arrow. We want to take the two organizations that now report to the chief administrative officer and move it over to the office of the CIO. And it is best that we do that in the budget cycle. So that should occur in July. So we want to create the Department of Information Technology, move enterprise solutions, and move computer services. That really unites the separate organizations for the first time in a long time. Align the structure then to reflect requested services. Prioritize the investments and upgrade ongoing infrastructure. So what do I mean by all of that? Align the structure. When computer services was first formed, it was really formed to support applications and to write applications. You know, we don't do that very much anymore. We purchase a lot of our applications, and as we purchase those applications, the support structure is changing for them. In some of those applications, we actually put it into the cloud. So someone else is supporting it and we make sure that the traffic, that the service level agreements and all that are in compliance. Also to identify continued efficiencies and cost savings for delivering services. As I said earlier, we want to focus on cybersecurity. That is by the way, still at the top of our list. I want to make a very short reminder, but House Bill 5, which passed at the state level, now requires all state and local governments to report any breaches of any private information within 72 hours. So if it's not under investigation, we have to do that. Consequently, one of the initiatives that we have taken on for the last year, and this was with the council's support, was to invest in equipment, into people, and how to do the cybersecurity in a much better fashion. Opportunities for cloud computing. We will continue to look for those opportunities where we can get a system that will support what both the citizens need and our own people will need in the departments and to do that in a faster and more efficient way. Monitor service level agreements. You've got to remember now, we may not be the primary service level. We are now going to be a service level agreement that we have to monitor when somebody else is providing that service. Align employees and skill sets. So let me just talk about that for a couple of minutes. Unemployment for IT folks in this area is probably about 1.5%. That means we have a very, very hard time recruiting. We're actually quite lucky when we can. Sometimes we bring on a person that is a contractor, and they like the environment, they enjoy the environment, and sometimes we can convince them to become an employee. That is one of the paths that we're following. But you've got to remember that no IT organization will ever be staffed 100%. What we ended up doing, and by the way, I've managed many organizations, to as much as a third of my staff were contract employees at one time. So right now, we have contract employees. I would say that's probably at about the 15% level, but we've got to figure out whether that is appropriate or not. There are some skill sets which are very difficult to recruit, and we will rely on those for contract employees. So we want to balance what our employees can do and then contract a workforce. That's very important long-term. And then invest in citizen and customer-facing services. And transparency, which is a big issue for government. And why do I say that? For instance, for things like the leaf collection, when people could click on a map and see that that's a citizen service. There are folks in the business and consultants who will tell you that if you look at future government, one-third of city services will have to come as a self-service. And by the way, that's what many citizens want. They don't want to stand in line. They don't want to go to a building. They want to do it at 10 o'clock at night or at midnight, if that is convenient. So we have to balance what we do to support our departments and our organization and what we do for the citizens. Questions? Thank you, Chief Information Officer Balacinti. I will recognize Councilmember Bledsoe Thank you, Chair I just want to commend what you're doing and I think the most important thing we can do as a government is be very customer service oriented and be a very responsive government to citizens I did a training on the apps for my district and I had people come with their iPads going this is great, how do I do this? How do I send in 311? So I think it's wonderful what we're doing to try to be very, again, just customer focused So thank you, I think it's a great move Council member Fred Brown. Yeah, question CAO that's responsible at this time and obviously you're involved in this and supportive of it. It probably wouldn't have got this far. I've taught her everything I know and I now am ready to turn the reins over to her and I do support this. I think it's important to note that we're both on the internal audit board, and we're having difficulty getting an IT person that's, you know, it's mandatory. We have to have it to be able to do some of this audit work internally. And then I know you're probably having a problem of getting applicants that would qualify. And I don't know where we're at on that through HR or what we are. And the state, and when Aldona and I both worked there before, the state has been 80% contractor in IT for years because their personnel system just could not accommodate the salaries that they'd had. Question to Aldona. In this particular move to transfer some of this organization, is there any additional staff? No, there's no additional staff. So it doesn't really have a big impact on the budget? No, it has no impact on the budget. Really what the opportunity is, first of all, let's put it together. Obviously, we're already deploying different applications. We've got to take a look at what is our support structure. Is it still appropriate? Do we have to shift some people, assess skills? We have to do that. What is your approach on trying to get the salaries up to where you can hire some IT people? Because they're going to demand higher salaries. And I don't know how, you know, HR, how we deal with that right now. Well, you know, we just went through a salary study. We just went through. And so I will tell you that probably at the entry level, we will do better. Okay. As they have come up a bit. I think at the more experienced level is where we're going to have our issues. But in some of those cases, at that level, at those experienced levels, it's very specific expertise that you may not need all year. You may only need them for a short time. You may need them for six months, et cetera. I support this reorganization because I think it needs to be put in where it's at, and this is the modern day, and I think a lot of communities are already doing this, but we need to get up to speed on this. So I thank you for presentation. Vice Mayor Kaye, please. Thank you, Chair. I'm not a member of the committee, but I appreciate the opportunity to speak. I just had one. I'm supportive. I think this is the right move. But what I'm not clear about is create a Department of Information Technology. Will that be a department with no head? How does all that work? Well, right now it's the office of the CIO that's created. it will be at the Department of Information Technology with the head as the CIO. The name of the department, the Department of Information Technology, rather than DES and Computer Services, which are two separate organizations. Okay, so basically you'll, I mean, it doesn't seem parallel with most of the other organizations, and I'm just trying to understand. It will be a department. Correct. You will be the head of the department. Correct. But your title does not change. No, it does not change. Great. Because actually the CIO is a commissioner-level title. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Are there any other questions of the committee? No? I would entertain a motion to forward the creation of the Department of Information Technology and reorganization of Computer Services and Enterprise Solutions to the office of the CIO. I would entertain a motion. Second. Council Member Fred Brown made a motion. Council Member Henson seconded the motion. Is there any discussion on the motion? There being none. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Thank you. then that will be moved moved forward to the full council now items under items referred to the committee is the next on the agenda and since I think we have a few more minutes before we probably need to leave the chamber so they can get set up for the budget address there are some items on the referral list that need to be addressed and if we can just go for go through them if y'all would bear with me on item number one since council member Ford a former council member Ford was on this item is there a council member that would like to be the chair a sponsor of this okay thank you council member Henson all right And I believe I spoke with Councilmember Scutchfield earlier about the part that was the parks, the aquatics program design. Is there any changes in that? All right. Thank you. Thank you. And then on the Parks Foundation, Councilmember Scutchfield. I will talk to Commissioner Reed. I know that they were intending to switch over a position to a grants position, and I don't know the current status. And we can just, Commissioner Reed, we can just, I'll talk to you and we'll get an update so that you can present. And that's what I, so we'll get an update as soon as we have that filled. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And I'm thinking there is a motion necessary to remove a safe parks position off of the item list. So moved. Excellent. All right. Council Member Henson, seconded by Council Member Akers. Is there any discussion of the motion? There being none. All in favor? Aye. Any opposed? Thank you. Now, a review of the ethics ordinance. That was also maintained by former Councilmember Ford. Would there be a volunteer of someone? I'll take that on. All right. Thank you, Councilmember Evans. And also, just on another note, I will work with Councilmember Evans, chair of that subcommittee, in order to fill the vacancy created by former Councilmember Ford on that before the next meeting, hopefully. So, all right. And the next item is the Bluegrass International Center, and I know that they are working on the ordinances for that creation, and we'll bring that back as soon as it is in more final form. And Council Member Henson, should we just look forward to the EMS fees in May at the May agenda? All right. And Council Member Akers, any update on, do you want to bring that back forward in May also? Yes. That's ready for May. All right. Thank you. And then the Masterson, Councilmember Acres, the Masterson Station Park Master Plan update. When do you expect us? I need to wait on the mayor's budget and then work with Commissioner Reed on that. Okay. Maybe June, July. Okay. Sure. No problem. Thanks. Thank you. All right. Could I ask a question of Councilmember Akers? On that, I guess you have to say yes. Can I? Mother, may I? Of course. On this Masterson Station Parkmaster update plan, did the Planning Commission approve that and then you put it into committee? Well, it's not part of the Planning Commission. It was actually conducted by the Parks Department in 1992, I believe. Okay. So it's just a master plan for the park. I thought all those master plan updates came through the Planning Commission, but that doesn't. That's different? Okay. So it just needs updating. Yeah, thank you. 92. Thank you. You're very welcome. Is there a motion to remove item number 11 for the reorg? So moved. A motion by Council Member Gibbs, second by Council Member Bledsoe to remove. Is there any discussion of the motion? there being no discussion all in favor say aye any opposed thank you and number 12 is there a motion to remove it from the item list council motion by council member Gibbs seconded by councilmember Henson is there any discussion on the motion no no no all in favor of the motion say I get tongue-tied any opposed Thank you. I believe that is everything for For today. All right, thank you It's a great tour.