Music Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. Okay. I think that we've got one, two, three, four, five, six people here, and we can go ahead and get started. First item on our agenda is the approval of the May 3rd committee summary. Is there a motion, please? Not all at once. Motion to approve. Thank you. Second? Thank you. Okay, there's a motion and a second to approve the committee summary. Is there any discussion? All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? All right, thank you so much. Now the next item that we have today is an update of the Substance Abuse and Violence Intervention Program. And I believe that Ms. Baker and, let's see here, I've got my notes. Larry Johnson. Yes, Ms. Baker and Mr. Johnson are going to have a presentation. Thank you so much. All right. Thank you, Council Member Lamb, for inviting us and committee members for hearing this update about SAVI. We just wanted to update you because next month we will be one year old. So we've done a lot in this past year, and we wanted to share it with you. We're just going to start out with our objectives of the office. We want to increase programming and opportunities that reduce drug-related violence by teens and young adults. And after I finish talking about substance abuse initiatives that are going on, Larry Johnson will speak to the violence intervention initiatives. decrease the stigma that inhibits recovery and advocate for increased access to effective substance abuse services and bring about systems change, which is a big one that will take a lot of time, but we plan to be on board for the long haul. So even before SAVI was established, the council and the government were already directing resources toward substance abuse services in the city through the ESR process. And this year, we funded Chrysalis House at $87,500 to provide residential substance abuse treatment to pregnant and parenting women. And the Hope Center received $561,000 to provide substance abuse services to the detention center, the women's and men's programs, and mobile outreach programs. So even before SAVI was officially in office, LFUCG was already dedicating resources toward this initiative. So what I want to spend just a few minutes doing is talking about some of the activities that have been taking place for the past 11 months that we have been a part of and just going to highlight a portion of these activities today. So the first thing I want to talk with you about is the substance abuse treatment locator and I know at this point many of you have heard me talk about this or seen the billboards or heard the ads. before SAVI was created, we knew that folks were having trouble finding substance abuse treatment services. They would get onto Google and punch in substance abuse treatment Lexington, and all that would come up would be a bunch of ads. And that's not what people needed to find services. So we thought this was going to be a long-term goal. And then we met Open Lexington through Eric Schwartz here at the city. And they were very sympathetic to our cause and worked very hard with Savvy and Voices of Hope to put together this locator that helps folks find substance abuse treatment services in Lexington or anywhere in Kentucky. So we are very thrilled to have this resource that we can offer to not only Lexingtonians but Kentuckians across the state. GetHelpLex.org is the site. It includes programs across the state. at this point we have about 160 programs loaded in. And what makes this different from a traditional directory is you go through and you answer questions. This would be the first page that we have loaded here. Are you looking for residential or substance abuse treatment? Let's say yes. We click that. It will then ask you if you're male or female. Let's say you clicked you're female. Are you pregnant? Not pregnant. 18 or over or under? Do you have insurance? Do you not have insurance? So instead of getting a list of 200 treatment opportunities where 150 may not apply to you, the ones that apply to the answers that you supplied are the ones that pop up. And so we've had over 2,700 hits since the program launched in March, so we're very happy about that. We've been promoting it anywhere we can because having the locator doesn't help unless people know that it exists. So we've been working very hard to get that out there and have been very supported by the council and Commissioner Ford in getting that done and also the administration. So very happy about that. another initiative that we have that i wish we didn't have to have we learned very early on with the overdose deaths that were happening in the city that a number of loved ones who were were mourning the loss of folks who had died from overdose were doing it on their own and they were unaware of any other parents or loved ones who had lost someone due to overdose. So with the help of some parents who had lost children to overdose, we put together a life after loss support group. And it meets every other Tuesday at Broadway Christian Church. They have donated the space. And we meet there every other Tuesday. We've advertised this with funeral homes. We get calls from people saying, I don't know anybody. Can we come? And of course, it's open to anyone. So, like I said, it's unfortunate that we have to have this group, but with over 130 overdoses in Fayette County last year, and at this point, I'm sorry, in March of this year, we'd already had 40. So we're on track to having a very high number again this year. I'm very proud of the of the work that we have done there. So in September of last year, after being approved by this council and also the Board of Health, the Lexington Fayette County Health Department started a needle exchange program. And I'm happy to report that since the inception of the program, they've taken in over 12,000 dirty needles that are no longer in our garbage cans or on the street or disposed of in an unsafe way. And as of April, we are now able to be a part of the needle exchange project. Before Dr. Leach passed away, he wanted to address the missing piece of the needle exchange program. And that was happening when someone would come into the program and say, I don't want to do this anymore. What other options are there for me? And people who were there exchanging the needles couldn't provide responses to those questions. So Dr. Leach really wanted to add a referral component, someone who could be there and address the treatment needs that came up while folks were there exchanging needles. And through discussions with Commissioner Ford and the administration and approval by this council and approval through an MOU at the health department, we are there every Friday from 1.30 to 4 to answer any questions that folks might have who come in and are ready to try something new. So we're very grateful to be a part of that process because, if you'll remember, one of our goals is access to treatment. So whether that's through helping write a grant and we get 50 people in at one time addressing their substance abuse treatment needs, or if that's one person, access for life-saving treatment. And we do look at it as life-saving treatment. As I mentioned, we had 137 overdose deaths last year in our county alone. so we look at every treatment opportunity as a life-saving opportunity so very happy to be a part of this and very grateful that the council approved this mou to to let it happen okay so one of the last issues i wanted to talk about with the substance abuse initiatives that we've been working on has to do with access as well. Before then-jailer, now Commissioner Ballard, left for the Department of Corrections, we worked to bring in money from the Department of Corrections to provide substance abuse treatment services at the detention center. So as of July 1, we will have a six-month program at our jail for 20 men at a time to receive long-term treatment in hopes that the issues that brought them there will be addressed in jail, and when they get out of jail, the cycle will be broken. So we were very happy to be a part of that process with Jailer Ballard and ready for that to kick off July. It won't be July 1st. It'll be approved July 1st. But at the time it takes someone to get on board, we will be ready to go and help them in any way that we can. So we're very happy to be a part of increasing access for that group of people. So I can take any substance abuse questions now or at the end. How would you like to do this? We can do that now. Okay. All right. Thanks. Thanks, Amy. That's a great presentation. Council Member Henson. Thank you, Chair. Amy, thank you for your work. I think the work that's being done is valuable to our community, and we know what the increase has been in drug abuse. I was curious what I found is families that have a family member, child, whatever, that's an addict, and a lot of times they don't know what to do. And so I saw in here the support for those that have lost a person, but is there any educational components that help families while they're going through this and and i've also found that maybe they know their child's an addict a lot of times they enable that to continue by giving them money or whatever and then if they have passed away there's an overdose and pass away, they're like shocked. I mean, not to take away their pain, but is there anything in place that would help? There actually is. There's a group called Parents of Addicted Loved Ones. They meet in Scott County, and we are looking at potentially opening a chapter of that group here in Lexington. because, as you know, addiction is a family disease. The addict doesn't exist in a vacuum alone. Everyone in the family is touched by addiction, and for those who still have someone in the family that's using, the family is often devastated by the use. It affects the entire family. I would also suggest that anyone who has a loved one that's still using, that they go to an Al-Anon meeting, which is a meeting for folks who have someone who is still using substances. So you absolutely are correct in that those who still have a loved one who is using, they absolutely need support services. And I refer people often to parents of addicted loved ones because they absolutely need support. You're welcome. Sure. Council Member Bledsoe. Bledsoe. Thank you, Chair. Thank you for your presentation. Back on the website, you said there were 2,700 hits. What was the time frame on that? We launched in March. So it was March to June 1st? Yeah. So here's my question. We obviously don't take personal information, but are we doing any analysis on what they're searching for? Well, if you log on to our site, you're searching for substance abuse treatment. That's what the site is for. But as far as narrowing down to what's been clicked, whether it's outpatient or residential or medication-assisted therapies, we have not started doing that yet. One thing that I need to reiterate is the work that Open Lexington did for us in putting this website together for us. And I can't say enough about them because they did it for free. We thought this was going to be a long-term goal, that we were going to have to ask for money to do, and it would be on down the road, maybe in a five-year plan kind of way, but they did it all for free, and they're still doing it. If we call and say, you know, we need for this to happen to make the locator better, they get on it immediately, or they say, we can't do it for two weeks, but we can do it then, so I can't say enough about them, and another group that was involved and still involved is Voices of Hope, so it really is a partnership between the three of us. But we absolutely want to track more items to help us gauge what is needed in the community because we know more treatment is needed. That would help us identify exactly what kind of treatment is needed. And that's where I was going because I think it would be a great tool to find out where the trends are. Are we meeting needs? Where are our gaps? What are people searching for they're not getting access to? It would help us have that better analysis and it might be something, you know, the Martin School does projects like that for projects for school work. And it might be an idea to have some of them come in, help us an internship, or help us a project base to get some good analytical tools without us paying. So I'm grateful for them, obviously, for doing this for free, but that's a lot of work to do analysis. So just my two thoughts there. Thank you for sharing that. We'll definitely look into it. Thank you. Thank you. Councilmember Scutchfield. Thank you, Chair. What you are doing is so needed for our community. I know I speak for myself, and probably everybody in this room knows somebody that's been impacted by addiction or substance abuse. I mean, I have family members that have hit rock bottom and needed family and outside resources to get back up. So everything you're doing, especially now that we're seeing a lot of recreational drugs that are so easy to access. One of the things I did want to ask about the Fayette County Detention Center program, I think that's so needed. Yes, definitely. When I was prosecuting, we'd have the same people over and over again, and they didn't get better. They just kept coming back. Sure. How are you, are they going to have to opt into that, or is that going to be something? Sure. Well, one thing that's great about our jail is they offer AA, they offer a four-month treatment program that's funded through ESR that's staffed by the Hope Center. And now they're going to offer the six-month program. So what they will do is assess people to see if they need to go into the four-month program or the six-month program. Unfortunately, with only 20 beds, we know that not everybody who needs the treatment is going to be able to get it. So not only will they opt in, but no doubt there will be a waiting list to get into the program. Before I was here, I was with the Department of Corrections and their substance abuse treatment office. And we maintained a waiting list of hundreds of people who were already in jail or prison just trying to get into the program. So there will be 20 beds, and we're grateful for the 20 beds, but it's not nearly enough. So, yeah, folks will sign up and apply to be in the program, and maybe one day we'll get more beds. But we're certainly grateful to the Department of Corrections for making those funds available. And that was a part of Senate Bill 192 that made more treatment funding available to the state. Great. And I guess in that answer, you confirmed they have to want to be in the program. Right. Absolutely. Okay. Perfect. Thank you. You bet. Council Member James Brown. Thank you, Chair. And thank you, Amy, for your presentation and the work that you do. And just to follow up on Council Member Scotchfield's comments about the jail substance abuse program, did you say it was just 20 men? Is it a men's program? Yes, it's a 20-bed male program. We applied for the funding that was available through DOC. And right now they had enough female beds, but they didn't have enough male beds, so that's what we applied for. So DOC really needed more beds for males, and that's why we applied for those. Okay. And roughly about, what's the amount of funding that's coming from the state for that program? It's $9 per inmate per day, so it's about $66,000 a year. So that $9 is on top of what we get per inmate per day to house the inmates. And this is an ongoing program? It doesn't have a sunset or a time frame? When I was with DOC, the programs lasted indefinitely. Of course, everything depends on what is available through the budget at the state level. But Senate Bill 192, which I referenced earlier, had an initial allocation of $10 million. And from everything I have heard, which of course could change, that amount will double in the upcoming budget year. So I don't look for the programs to disappear anytime soon. Okay. And I don't want to get down to the nitty-gritty of the program, but is there tools in place or a system of measurement to keep track of the inmates? Yes. The Department of Corrections partners with the Center on Drug and Alcohol Research at the University of Kentucky to do a follow-up outcome study with those who have been through the program to check outcomes after one year. Okay. All right. And then I have another question about the NETO exchange. You said since the program has been instituted, it's 12,000 needles have been, clean needles have been, is that a one-for-one for every one needle? It's basically a one-for-one. There's just a slight difference between what's been taken in and what's gone out. The intent of the legislation that passed with Senate Bill 192 was for as close to a one-to-one exchange as you can possibly get. to make it a true needle exchange site. So it's within 100. So when the needles come in, you get 21 needles per. And I don't do the needle exchange part of the program, but it's basically a one-for-one exchange. Okay, okay. All right, I appreciate the presentation and the work you do. Thank you, Chair. All right, Council Member Maloney. Thank you for the presentation. I was watching TV the other day where, what is it, every 20 minutes someone dies in this country overdose. 129 people a day. And there was an episode where they have a child who's 13 years old teaching how to take shots to give to their stuffed animals because she has a brother that has a hearing addiction. And when he has that addiction, that shot saves their lives. So you know how you've got defibrillator for that now. People have heart attacks. They have them all over the place. Has anybody ever looked at putting where we have a high population of where heroin overdose is? Right. Sure. And the drug is set aside for people to train. I know the health department has it. Every health facility has it. But like a school. Sure. I hope we never have a problem at school. Or, for instance, we have a lot of down here at the courthouse. The other night we had a judge trying to get into the courthouse on a Saturday. Couldn't get in because homeless people were just piled up trying to get in there. And she had to wait a while. And a lot of them were on heroin addiction. I'm just wondering if you have places like that where we can have people, medical or anyone like that. So the antidote to reverse overdose is called naloxone. And I hate to refer back to Senate Bill 192 again, but it did make it much more available to everyone in the community. So Voices of Hope, which I referred to earlier, Stop Heroin Legs, have both taken on naloxone training and distribution since Senate Bill 192 passed. Our police officers will begin carrying naloxone very soon. I don't know the exact date. We'd have to check with Chief Barnard on that. Our first responders carry it. It would be nice to have it everywhere that folks could potentially overdose. And while you mentioned that the homeless population had used heroin, I would like to reiterate that it's used with every population, with every income level. No one is immune to these overdoses that are happening. But the goal would be to get naloxone everywhere that we could get it. And I know that there are initiatives in place to make that more available. And it's sad that the young girl had to learn how to administer that on a stuffed animal. But the reality is we have parents across this country and in our city who are using naloxone while their children are home and in their custody. And so teaching a child how to administer naloxone is not completely unheard of, just like you saw it on the news. I know we give out the needles. We try to have them trying not to pass HIV and all that. But to me, I just know the heart thing is all over. It's saving people's lives every day. And this, to me, is an epidemic. Yeah, absolutely. This is the worst case in the history of our lifetime. And I don't know. And the thing is, we can save somebody's life. And hopefully we can put these around so people can be prepared. Because I don't see any win, win, win yet. I mean, you all are doing a tremendous job, but it's just not. When I went to Ireland, that was their biggest problem was heroin overdose and homeless. It's the same problem. It's not just here in America. It's everywhere. Sure. Absolutely. I just try to figure out a way we can probably save people's lives, but I don't know if they have to do it themselves to fix it. When we go back to our objectives, one of the first things that we talked about today, we have to look at systems change. We have to look at changing how we do business because, and when I say we, I mean the collective we, everyone involved in substance abuse services, because it is an epidemic like we haven't seen before, and it's toxic. And I've been doing this for almost 20 years, and folks have died from overdoses since I've been doing this work, not at the rate of 129 people in this country a day. So things are going to have to be done differently. Well, thank you for this presentation. I know that you're going to segue into Mr. Johnson. I am. I was going to talk about one of the last things that we've wanted to address was the hiring of Larry Johnson to address the violence intervention portion of this office. So I would like to turn the presentation over to him now, and he will address the violence intervention portion. Good afternoon. I'm not sure how coordinated I'll be with this clicker, but we'll try it. We'll do the best we can. One, I want to mention that, and which one is the top one? Let's try it. There we go. Got it. One, I want to mention that the violence intervention efforts in Lexington did not begin with hiring me, did not begin with the SAVI office. It began several years ago in 2011-2012 when the mayor appointed then Councilman Chris Ford, appointed him over a public safety and youth development commission. And over 53 people representing various different agencies, various different sectors, including the public sector, the private sector, government, and education, they kind of all met together for several months to come up with a list of concerns that they felt was about violence and would reduce violence. If you look on your screen, you'll see several of those that were represented. That isn't comprehensive. It's just as a sample of some of those groups that came. That group had actually three committees. Two of them are committees that we drew recommendations from to support the work of the Savvy Violence Intervention Committee. One was the Public Safety Committee, and the Public Safety Committee said that we had to address violence and intimidation, social pressures, and parental guidance. Then there was a Youth Development Committee that was a lot more specific. They wanted to make sure that on an ongoing basis we were hearing the community's voice. And so we did that through public forums, through surveys, Partners for Youth paid for a youth development survey, and by doing some research. We also looked at that group recommended that we have a platform very similar to Get Help Lex. where young people can come or where families can come, citizens can come, and find out what was going on in the city, especially what type of programs and resources were available. Another was to increase capacity of existing programs. We didn't want to start a lot of new things without finding out what was going on first and then filling in the gap. And to build collaboration and strengthen connections, as we said, Partners for Youth has been heavily involved over the last few years in addressing violence prevention, building programs, building a directory of summer programs, after school programs. So that piece of the work has been going on through Partners for Youth. The Savvy Violence Initiative, we work to strengthen local violence prevention and intervention efforts, targeting teens and young adults. We've basically set our age from 12 or 13 to about 29 years old. And the type of violence we're addressing is that which is associated with the use and trade of illegal drugs. Our strategies include advocating for system change that places kids and young adults on a cradle-to-career pipeline versus the school-to-prison pipeline. We don't exactly do programs. What we do is we work to identify, coordinate, and promote promising prevention and intervention efforts. We advocate to support local efforts, grant writing, grant support, conducting trainings and presentations, providing technical assistance, and hosting collaboration meetings and groups. As you'll see on the next screen, we also are responsible now for the It Takes a Village, the biannual It Takes a Village conferences that take place in Lexington. A current violence intervention initiative core areas of engagement are social and emotional well-being, parent and child relationships, targeted learning opportunities, job readiness and employment opportunities, and one that I found was particularly lacking and needed was peer and personal networks. I'd like to talk about each one of them and just give you a couple of examples, so I won't address all of them unless you want me to address a particular piece of that. But research has told us that young people who are experienced in high level of ACEs, adverse childhood experiences, let me name some of those, living in poverty, being raised and growing up in high-risk communities, being part of a single-family home, dealing with the death of a loved one or friend without any type of counseling. Experiencing high levels. They are experiencing high levels of post-traumatic stress disorders. In fact, a report from the Center of Disease Control says that they're experiencing higher levels of PTSD than soldiers who are coming back from Afghanistan. We know that it affects brain development, so we have to be concerned about addressing trauma. So we are promoting the use of formal and informal trauma assessments and advocating for increased trauma-informed care. We are also promoting the development of community public health strategies with the potential to reduce those adverse childhood experiences. In the area of parent-child relationships, we are advocating for programs that promote and empower absentee parents to become involved in the lives of their children. We at first was looking at fatherhood absence, but as we began to talk to several in the community, we're finding that there's a lot of grandparents who are raising children, and motherhood absence is as significant as childhood absence. So we've been working with some of the local program and program leaders to address motherhood absence, as well as with the Lexington Leadership Foundation, David Cozart and several of them, to increase programming that addresses fatherhood absence. One of the ways we've been doing that has been working with kids who are in foster care and how we can increase, in fact it's a national effort as well, increase fatherhood engagement, especially with kids who are in out-of-home care. We are promoting the implementation of a family dinner program. A family dinner program is a program that Versailles has used, and we're working with the Lexington Drug Free Lex to implement that in Lexington. What it does is it asks families, and we're going to target a number of families, and ask them to have dinner with their children because we know that one of the ways that we get parents and children talking is when they sit down at a meal. And too often, children are not eating with their parents anymore. everybody's eating, everybody's busy, everybody's sporadic, and so it provides some guidelines for that and measurements for how many families are engaged. We figure if we can get parents back involved with the daily activities and lives and interests of their children, they can have more of an influence on their behaviors. In the area of targeted learning opportunities, We learned that there's a lot of model programs that we implement that are working, but when they're disaggregated for gender, we're finding that they're actually working more for females than for males. And, of course, if we look at our prison population and who's going to detention, there's a whole lot more males than females. So we are looking at how we can advocate for what we call social-emotional learning techniques in schools and social-emotional learning opportunities. That's hands-on, practical, peer interaction kind of learning programs. And so we're promoting those. We're also promoting divergent learning opportunity. opportunity. Divergent learning opportunity provides or increases critical thinking skills. I often tell people when I go to programs and talk about this, if I gave you a fork and say in five minutes tell me how many ways you could use this fork. It causes you to have to think. It causes you to take time and look beyond just it being a tool for eating with. and they can come up, I've had people come up with 20 or 30 uses of a fork in five minutes and we want to encourage our children to do critical thinking and use critical thinking skills. In the area of, I think I went back too far, in the area of job readiness and employment opportunities, We are very, very concerned, one, about the high number of ex-offenders that we know are going to be reentering the population. Reducing the prison population is a national focus. It's a state focus. And what we're finding is that when ex-offenders come out, there's not as many opportunities for housing, opportunities for employment because of some barriers. to employment, and then they don't have as much access to resources. Many of them can't even get an education because they're felons so they can't get a student loan. What tends to happen is, if I can't get housing, if I can't get a job, I can't even go to school to better myself, they re-offend within one and a half to two months. What we also have learned from some of the research is that the level of their violence increases with each offense. And many of them end up committing violent activities. So one way that we know we can reduce the violence, especially violent deaths, is to identify how we can successfully reintegrate through changing policies, increasing opportunities, and increasing resources for ex-offenders. We've been working too with Sky Family Programs 4-H to establish a youth business incubator. How can we take those youth that are middle school and high school youth and funnel them into some programs that teaches them life skills, teaches them business skills, and provides opportunity for them to create a product, market that product, and establish their own businesses? And then we're in conversation with the fatherhood program to see how we could link fathers and children together so that you have two generations who are going into their own businesses. And hopefully that will continue down through more generations. We're looking at year-round readiness and apprentice opportunities as well. So in the area of peer and personal networks, and this will be, I think, my last, Laura and I had the opportunity a few years ago to talk to some ex-gangbangers, and it was very, very, very informative. We didn't just survey those who was in school. We went through our surveys. There were surveys happening in detention, but we had an opportunity to personally interview ex-gangbangers. One of the things that they told us is that kids who are 12 years old, because of fatherhood absence and other things, motherhood absence, they're in the same peer group with 23-year-olds. And those peer groups are usually negative peers. They're their role models. They want the car. They want the house. They want the jewelry. They want the clothes. So when you have a 12-year-old and a 23-year-old peer who appears influencing the younger, You have a whole lot of kids that start off very early in age getting involved in delinquent, criminal, and even violent behavior. So one of the things that's very important to us is to reintroduce traditional peer groups. Elementary school students should have elementary school peers, middle school, and vice versa. So we're creating opportunities and encouraging opportunities for more appropriate peer group activities. One of those is through the social-emotional learning programs, which places kids in groups. We also want to support the recruitment and program adoption of positive adult mentors for young men. We're always talking about mentors for kids, but we have some teenagers and we have some young adults who need mentors, especially those who are ex-offenders. We had an experience in our office just yesterday where we had a 30-year-old who was an ex-offender, ex-ganger, who was coming out. He's trying to do the right thing, feeling that he's completely by himself. And we was able to connect him to a 44-year-old ex-banker who has had 16 years of success. 16 years of success. He has a job. He survived. He survived all the peer pressure. He survived it all. And now he's mentoring the 30-year-old. So a lot of work we have on our plate. This time I offer you the opportunity to ask any questions. On your screen, you see where we got some of our information and how we determined what some of our goals were. I'm not going to go through those. If you have any questions about those, I'll be glad to answer them. Thank you. Thank you so much. This has been a really good report and update. And it's not only just, we have to remember, it's not only just for us. It's also for people that are watching this in the community so that we can educate them about the programs, too. So I really appreciate the time and effort you all put into this presentation. Council Member James Brown. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Larry, for the presentation. Thank you. I think it would be valuable to me and maybe other council members if you could share maybe a list of some of your partners and then some of the programs that you work with that you promote and implement some of these initiatives. I think, you know, sometimes we take phone calls and hear concerns, and instead of having to funnel everything directly to you, maybe we can help shuffle people to some of these resources that are out there. But I know it's probably a pretty big spreadsheet. I'd love to answer that question. It depends on which area and which one of those focus areas you're talking about, but I have a list of partners for each one, and I'll be glad to share some information with you. In fact, we're in the process of beginning to form our database, if I can use that terminology, so that after we kind of monitor Get Help Lex's locator, we can develop a locator that will help people to find resources for that as well. But is there a particular area? Well, I wasn't talking about today. Maybe an e-mail form or a spreadsheet. I'd be glad to do that. Now, it takes a village conference that you had last year. You might have said it and I missed it, but do you have one scheduled for this year, 2016? It is every two years, so we don't have one scheduled yet. What we are doing now is there are other little things that are happening, and we're trying to work to support what groups like Molding Generational Divas is doing with young ladies and some other things. So we're looking at how we can support groups that are existing. But as far as it takes a village conference, it's an every two-year thing. And we don't have ones that we're planning to do until next year. We've had some conversation about this year, but we haven't begun any planning. And it's not in concrete that we were going to do a 2016 conference. Okay. All right. Well, I appreciate you and the work you're doing and look forward to working with you going forward. Thank you. Council Member Bledsoe. Thank you, Chair. Thank you so much. You have a very tall mountain to climb. And, I mean, your background research is a great start. Thank you. I'll toss you, have you ever heard of Train Up Foundation, Tony Dungy? Train Up. Train Up. It's T-R-A-I-N-U-P Foundation. I know someone who's been through this program, and it is for the emotional and, hold on, emotional and moral intelligence. And they said that has, which is very similar to what you're talking about, non-academic approach, but that has a far better influence of long-term gain when you do that. So that's just another resource you might look at is providing some help. Thank you. I promise you I'll look into that. You're welcome. Thank you, Chair. All right. Is there any further questions or comments? No? There being none, I appreciate again your all's update today. And I know that we always appreciate Commissioner Ford's efforts in working with you all and making sure that you're continuing to move in a positive direction. And thank you for everything you're doing for our community. Thank you. Thanks. All right. Next we have on our agenda is the Council Rules and Procedures Legislative Review. Vice Mayor Kaye. i'll recognize you thank you chair and thanks for the opportunity to address the committee in your packet on excuse me on page 25 there is a memo that was i believe sent out to all council members i'm just going to go through it briefly to remind people of what you've already heard and kind of new information so the first section really talks about what would change if this were to be adopted, and some of it is simply mechanical, and some of it is a little more than that. The format for the work session and docket would have to be modified, but that's just a matter of adding a language in the appropriate place. With the mayor's report format, the suggestion has been that right now we get a mayor's report that has mostly appointments. this would separate the mayor's report into two parts, one of which would be the legislative review or consent agenda, whatever we come to label it. The minutes format would also have to change somewhat. The question of how this would actually be handled, we had a lot of conversation about this. The thought right now is that there would be someone identified in the chief administrative officer's office who would have the responsibility at the very end of the usual process of sorting out the items, either to go onto the docket as normal or to be placed on the consent agenda. That would be the major change. We did a little bit of research on essentially what time would be added and what time would be saved. So if you look at the chart at the bottom on time estimates, One of the dockets, we actually timed what it would take to identify the legislative review items and how much time would be saved by not reading those items twice in the usual council meetings. the other dockets that are identified there the other four we estimated given however many items that were on the on the on that particular docket roughly what it would take to review those items and roughly the time saved so if you look at the at the bottom on on time save reading it's Average is about 10 minutes, give or take, per meeting. And if you do the rough math, which I've done, if you save 10 minutes at every council meeting, and there are roughly 20 meetings a year, and there are roughly 30 people, I'm being conservative, who are sitting here while those items are being read, it's about 100 hours annually that are spent listening or not listening to those items. And it would take roughly 10 hours of one person's time over the year to review those items, make the sort, and put them in the appropriate place on the agenda. We've talked about the impact before. I just want to remind people that it does not take any prerogative away from council. It just places that prerogative of questioning in a different place. And if a council member has a question about anything that is slated for the legislative review docket, that can be moved to be placed on the regular agenda and heard and given two readings as usual. So I don't think this is a major change. I don't think it takes away anything from the transparency of government. I don't think it takes anything from the prerogatives of the council. So it saves some of us roughly 10 hours of meeting, and there's a fair number of people who are here because either you're on council or you're in the administration or you're interested in particular items on the docket. So that's essentially the information that we have. I guess the one thing I did not say is that the format for Legistar would have to be updated, but the people who provide that support will do that at no cost. So there's no cost that would be incurred from making this change. So that's my overview. I'd be happy to take questions, comments, whatever. Thank you. Okay, and I thought that perhaps following up Vice Mayor Kay's discussion or presentation of this, I would like to go ahead and ask that we hear from the council clerk, because this is going to involve, and speak to my colleagues here, this is going to impact three areas of government. And it's going to impact the council clerk, it's going to impact the chief administrative officer's office, and it's also going to impact our council administrator. So I have asked to ask the council clerk if she wouldn't mind to share with us a little bit more so that we all understand exactly how things are going to have to be changed. And we kind of talked about this. So if you don't mind, Martha, please. Were you interested in just going through the process to start? Yes. Because I created a visual aid if it pleases the council. That would be great. Sharon Jones will be handing it out because it's a little hard to see up there. And someone has stolen the clicker. Hold on just one second. So I thought what we could look at, I think maybe some portions of this that Council may not be aware of It's the behind-the-scenes process that has to occur for an item to go from a proposed legislative item to go to an item on the docket to where you pass it and it becomes legislation and has a possible contract associated with it, an MOA, a deed. So what I did was just simply put together a four-page screenshot of what we see because it will show you what has to change. So this is the first screen of our Legislative Management System. It's the first page. I just want to point out a couple things because this usually starts out blank, but this is complete. This comes from the Division of Grants and Special Programs, and their files are usually excellently done, so I thought it would be a great example to use. As you can see in the middle portion, all of this text that has to be filled in. It just has the summary, what project you're working on, where the money's coming from, the fiscal impact, the annual impact. You'll also see at the top these two portions. Each file is given a type of status, so this one is a resolution and it's approved, but through the legislative management process, that gets changed a couple times through the different stages that it goes through. So on the next page, and you guys know how fast I talk, so this will be brief. This is just another tab that kind of shows you the other part of what an individual would add to the file. In addition to adding all of the information, they're going to attach blue sheet memo and agreement, all of the supporting documentation that someone reviewing the file would want to know before it gets to you. They need to make sure they've included every single aspect of whatever agreement deed is being authorized by council. So, next page. This just shows a little bit of the detail. This is more of the work that our office does after it's passed. There's an enactment number. There's a contract number. There's a portion in the middle for notes, but as you can see, Irene has entered references. It comes from her division. It has her name. Is everybody seeing that? Okay. And the final page, and these are all different tabs in the system. So the final page will just show you our approval tracking sequence. Each division has a very unique sequence for a specific item depending on what that item is going to be, whether it's for a different project or a grant. and what the individual basically does is upload the sequence. As you can see, I believe there are 10 to 12 people in each sequence, and they're going to hit the start button. And what it does electronically is it sends an email to the very first person on the list, and this one is Irene, and that says, Irene, you have an item waiting for you, and it needs to be approved. And Irene's going to open up this file, look at this item, review it for all the pertinent information, and approve or not approve. And so this is a very, very short, brief explanation of the process that we go through, but it was very difficult to explain it to you without a visual. Now, I just did that very quickly, but the process behind the scenes is a lot bulkier than that. So to get to this, each person on the list, as you can see, there's people from budgeting and law and the CAO's office. They each have to go into the file and look for their specific information. So to get to this point, the approval process, it looks like it took about four days. And then before that, it varies between divisions on how much time it'll take to get the contracts, get them signed, get them uploaded, get the blue sheet memo, get all the accounting correct. Make sure that it's fiscally correct between fiscal year impact and annual impact. So I hope this gave a really short, Council Member Liam, I hope this is what you're looking for, this gave a really short sort of sum up of the process. And that doesn't even include what goes into doing the work session agenda or even before that when people are reviewing the files. This is sort of the focus from our office. Because after it goes through all this, it can go on the docket. So our process is more of a back-end process. Before us, it's in the CEO's office. It's with our council administrator. But this is just kind of a black-and-white Legistar run-through. Do you have any questions? Well, I was going to ask Martha, if you don't mind to share with us, at what point, given the fact of this, what's going to have to be changed on here in order to, if this council were to choose to go with that consent agenda, what on here and in Legistar would have to be changed, and we'll go from there. Sure. After discussing with Legistar and showing them our proposal, and like Vice Mayor Kay said, it's free of charge, it's included in our package, we're going to have to change the status and the type of the file. The status and the type of the file are really important because when we process our dockets and our agendas and work session agenda, they're given a certain status, so they go to a certain place in our reports. When we create all of these reports, we already know that this file is a resolution, this file is an ordinance, so it needs to go in a specific place. Well, we're going to introduce a different type of files with a different type of status. So we'll have to do some reprogramming and we'll work with Legistar. Legistar couldn't give us a time frame on that because they're not sure. So we'll have to get, we'll have to sort of reprogram the type and the status. And then from discussing with the council administrator and the CAO's office, pretty much like I said on Vice Markay's report, a different person will have to be included in this approval tracking sequence that will search just to make sure that the item is either resolution and ordinance or it's consent agenda. And I'm not sure the type of time that would go into the process that would include with that. Okay, and one more thing, if you all will allow me this before we start asking questions so you all have part of the information. The time that it's going to take for the council clerk's office to implement changes to Legistar with the assistance of Municode slash Legistar, I think it's the case that we have up to 10 hours a year in our maintenance agreement. so if it exceeds that 10 hours in order to make these changes, is it feasible that there could be some cost with this if it exceeded 10 hours? I would have to refer to our maintenance agreement and get back with you. According to Legistar, they said there would be no cost associated with any changes that we need in ongoing training and implementation, but I will make sure I check into that and get back to the committee. Okay. Now I'll recognize, I think, too, just so my colleagues know, I believe that we need to hear from the CAO's office, and I would also like to hear from our council administrator regarding this process. Now, you all tell me whether you all want to ask questions in between here, or do you want to wait until you hear everything? Hear everything first, and is that okay? Okay, cool. All right. Thank you, Council Clerk Martha. Ms. CAO Hamilton, if you would talk about the process and how it's going to affect your office, please. First, when Vice Mayor Kay asked me about this, I told him that we would be glad, naturally, to do anything that the council decided and that we will implement this and implement it well. Here's the way I feel about what it will do to us. is that you can talk, I see all these things all the time, but when I'm putting them on a consent calendar and saying to you, these are just fine, no questions to be asked, I've got to know that. I mean, I have got to have asked all those questions prior to doing that because now I'm sort of telling you unequivocally that I've gone through this very, very carefully, which I don't go over each one of these. So it is going to take more time as far as we're concerned. And that's not to say that we'll be glad to do that, be glad to do that if that's what the council wishes. I can't put all that responsibility. Who does our legislature right now? And she took Wes's, or whoever was in the mayor, I guess it was Wes. She took Wes's job doing legislature. I can't put all of that on Shannon. So consequently, in order to do this and do it correctly until Shannon gets a real good feel of it, that's going to involve Shannon, it's going to involve Jennifer, and it's going to involve Glenda. And because we just would need to be able to tell you that when we're putting something on that consent calendar, that we have checked that change order. We know for sure that all these facts are correct and everything we put on it. So, yes, it will take us more time. And I don't think that probably at first that we can accomplish this as quickly as Nathan did. However, that, as I said, I want to start out with what we said before. If this is the wish of the council, that this is a better way to do this, we will implement it gladly. Thanks, CAO Hamilton. And lastly, because, as I understand the way that it's being proposed and has been proposed many times before, that this eventually will come to the Council's work session agenda, which falls into the hands of the Council Administrator as the person that actually ends up putting that together and disseminating it to us. so i wanted to find out from the council administrator uh if she's been able to because well i know more about this process than probably most of you so i have to not interject my personal stuff into it but council administrator if you would like to speak to this please thank you um i think the biggest impact that it would have on the work session packet is where everything goes ultimately so when i pull that packet i pull all these files that martha just went through this list, and she used a good example. Not all of them are perfect like that, so they take a little longer to get through. But it would just be determining where they end up on the packet. Make sure they flow through the approval sequence to the right place so that they end up in the right spot on the packet. And depending on how long the CAO review would take, then we may ultimately have to look at changing some of these deadlines for our commissioners and divisions to get things entered because we are on a certain time limit to get the work session packet out. But, you know, we'll make it work if the council chooses to do that. But there just may be some deadline changes we'll have to implement. And then eventually, just so Ray knows, then eventually it goes all back to the council clerk's office. And Martha, I hate to ask you to come back to the podium, but because as of right now, every ordinance and resolution if there's a contractor deed or change order, they are all numbered and they are kept by permanent record in the Council Clerk's Office. So how would this impact having to figure out another way of numbering system identification for things that go through the consent agenda? Because as it is proposed, there are deeds and change orders. and just so anyway so if you wouldn't mind to speak to that please sure the way that we index all of our contracts and deeds now is they're all given an individual number whether it be a deed number or a contract number but they're also given a resolution or an ordinance number as a reference so if you're looking up a contract or a deed for resolution 5 2012 but you don't know the deed number which is what normally happens we have multiple ways to reference it in our system, and we would simply create another reference system, whether it be consent agenda item 1 or put the date. We're not really sure how that would, the exact nomenclature that we would use, but we would create another naming system within Legistar and within our on-base document management system. Okay. Alright. So I think that hopefully that's painted the picture and answered several questions and of course it makes me think of more questions but I'll let you guys do the questions now and so Council Member Maloney. I don't have any questions I just have a comment. I do not, I told a couple weeks ago why I did not support it. I just felt like this was giving the mayor more power that he needs or he or she needs and they were like I said before there was some mayors that I wouldn't want to have this kind of power. But the Second thing, the reason why, after hearing what I just heard here, how much time being added, I didn't get elected just to satisfy my needs, to get more hires, to have more freedom as a council person and put more burden on the staff. And that's the last thing that I would ever do to this staff or anybody because they're doing a tremendous job for what they have right now. And I don't want to ever sacrifice you all to give me an extra so many hours a year to enjoy my life. I enjoy being here and watching how you all work. And I got elected to do that. And I would vote totally no on this issue. Council Member Bledsoe. Thank you, Chair. I do just have a couple questions. So on, and Martha, this may be you, or Sally, this might be you. So on this sheet, who is the last, on this particular example that you provided, the last sign-off looks to be Todd before Stacy, right? So is that because he's in charge of RFPs and this happens to be a grant RFP, or is he usually the last person to sign off on? So you're asking why specifically Todd is the last person? I guess I'm just curious, you know, who is the last person that says yes? you're the last person that says yes before it goes on the docket, or you're the first person that says yes to go through the process? I believe it varies for each file, and this is an old one, too. Go ahead. I believe, I'm kind of speaking out of turn here, but I believe in that particular instance, because Irene Gooding reports to Sally Hamilton, that it initially goes to her. There could be other examples. You know, if a different division, then Sally would be that final approver at the bottom. I think that particular instance is just why you're seeing. That was the first thing that caught my eye as well. That's why she comes back again on number seven. That's right. That's correct. And so your concern is that you decide really, or your office kind of decides, yes, this is good or not. And right now, you rely, and this is totally fine, you rely on us to be that file on checks and balances. And the concern is that in doing this, you feel like the balance of pressure goes back to you to make that call faster. Yes, that's exactly. I look at, you know, in that particular instance, there may be seven approvers before me, you know, and I'm relying on the fact that they have all looked at this. But there's just that one thing that now I'm telling you, I've got one more. You all ask a lot of questions a lot of times that we don't think about. Or it may be something that we thought was a no-brainer that turns out to be something else, you know, that there are a lot of questions. And now I feel like that it would be my responsibility on those consent items things to really now start to look and think about it, not just look down a list of approvers. Okay. And that's my, you know, I was initially all for this, and I want to be for it. I really want to be for it really badly. And yet that concern is the one concern that I have. it puts a lot of pressure on your staff to make that call. And my concern, honestly, is that it takes one bad example for that to be blown up and gone right back to the system we have now. And that's where I see the big concern. It may be something small or it could be something larger. And that's my hesitancy right now. Thank you, Chair. Thank you. Council Administrator Stacy was, I didn't know if you wanted to respond to this I was just going to comment on her question about the order of the approval sequence I'm always the last approver on every file because then I know it's work session agenda ready Todd's always right before me, I don't know why and I think usually it's HR or law, the last four or five are always the same and it's just so that it goes to purchasing and budgeting and law and grants and HR so they all see it. I think the ones at the top usually switch depending on the division that initiates the request. Thanks. Thank you. Council Member Gibbs. Thank you, Chair. I support this change. I'm opposed to wasting time, and I think we waste a lot of time in this body. Council Member Maloney's observation is it's a burden for the staff. It's a burden for some of the staff, and if they need more help to do this, I'd be happy to try to arrange that. But it might increase the burden on some of the staff, but it releases the burden on a lot of people. I mean, poor Jeff Young suffered through these meetings all the time, and a whole bunch of other people, you know, 10 hours a year or more. I mean, if we total that up, that's a whole lot. I also think a lot of our meetings are kind of embarrassing. We have all these no-brainers that Martha's reading into the record at record speed, which I appreciate. But I think people watching it are just wondering, what are these guys up to? When it comes to if something looks like, maybe it doesn't look like a no-brainer to one of us, we have the right to move to take it off the consent agenda. So we're not stuck with these things. I do have a question for Council Member Maloney, if you don't mind. In the last time we discussed this, and also today, you said this might give the mayor more power, like if we had an evil mayor, how would that work? Could you give me a scenario of where they would put something on a consent agenda? Because, again, we always have the option to take it off the consent agenda. So they can't just ram this through. So if you could explain the scenario to me, I'd be really appreciative. Thank you. Well, from what I understand, some of the contracts and all that were going to the mayor's council report, his report. And instead of going through there, we can ask these questions. when it goes to the mayor's council, his report, a lot of times we just look at that and just let it slide. When it comes to the agenda on Tuesday, we read about it, we understand it. When it goes on the docket Thursday, we know what we're voting on. But when you don't see all that information and you're voting on money being spread through here, I just feel like it gives you the mayor more power to override, to see what we vote on. And I just don't feel it. And this is the fourth time, not the second, third. This is the fourth time I've sat through this, and all the arguments have been the same. They always say the mayor gets a little bit more power with this than anything. In 2002, in 2008, and then I wasn't here in 2012, and now we're back at it again. It's the same argument. I just feel like it continues to go on and on. I just don't want to keep doing a broken record. Council Member Yibbs? Yeah. You finished with all cut. Well, I'm still a bit confused because we still have access to all the information. And if we want to take something off the consent agenda, we can. And I'll do my due diligence every week and go through those things. And if I think there's something that doesn't belong on the consent agenda or if I have questions about it, I'll move to have it taken off the consent agenda. I mean, if you're fine with it, I'm fine with it. I'm just telling you why I'm against it. In my opinion, you have yours. I'm against it. Okay. I'm going to go ahead and I want to recognize Council Member Fred Brown. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. This might be for a law question. Has this got any charter ramifications? I know our charter goes to a certain amount of detail, but I don't know that our rules and procedures that this would change anything charter-related. No, we have actually taken a look at that, and this process, if approved, is okay with the charter. Okay. Does anybody know the history of these procedures that we're doing here? Has this been ever since we have become a merged government? Have we been using this system? I think when I was on before, I think this was a system, but I don't know when it started. Well, I can tell you I've been here for 21 years, and so we've switched from a paper system to an electronic system, But generally, the system is still the same. We haven't done any major change to it in the 21 years that I've been here other than to go electronic. Okay. Well, I'm not going to support it. I don't think it's a worthy effort in the fact that I don't know that it's a broken system. And if it's not broke, I don't think we need to fix it. All right. Is there anyone else? Because I would like to speak as well, but I don't have a vice chair to hand it off to, so I'm just going to run with it. So I do have a question because clearly I really fully understand this above everybody else here. I really feel like I get it, and I have sat through every single time this has been discussed, and this is the fifth time it has been discussed before a council and administration. And the one thing I wanted to find out from Glenda, in identifying something that has been approved via a consent agenda, if it is a change order that was previously approved by a resolution or ordinance, and now it's being approved via a consent agenda. I'm wondering if that would still need to continue through its path being approved. And legally, I don't know the answer to that. Do you know the answer to that? Something I just thought of a few minutes ago. Catch you on the spot. I think we're still okay. You know, the state statute says that the council acts through its ordinances and resolutions, and so at the time of the original change order, that would have been the only way to approve that. But if we change the process to say, now the council isn't going to act, if the council does nothing, then the authority falls to the mayor, I think we're okay. that the difficulty that we'll have is for the CAO's office, the council clerk's office, and the law department is trying to tie all of those things together to make sure that we can still locate them, that everything flows, so that when we get open records requests, when we get requests from you all, that we're able to find all of the documents. Okay, thank you. And on that note, I think that leading back to the transparency to the public, I think that that's when the public knows now, those that care, that they know that a resolution and a contract or a resolution and a deed, they're connected. So I think that that could cause some, it'll be a learning curve for the public for them to understand that there will be things that will have a contractor deed number, but they won't have an ordinance or resolution associated with that. I was going to ask, also, back in 2013 when this was brought forward, I'm just educating my colleagues on the committee, and some of you were on that council at the time, actually one of you, two of you. And it looks like a similar draft of resolution was brought forward, changing the rules and procedures. and the current draft that we have before us has 11 bullet points that would be under consideration for a consent agenda. And I just want to make sure that everybody understands that what was produced as a resolution and failed by a 5-9 vote in 2013 only had seven of these bullet points. There were four that all had to do with the contracts, and they are item on our draft in front of us today. They're items B, C, G, and K. Those items were not entertained for the motion back in 2013 that actually failed before the council. So obviously I am completely for moving forward in a good and transparent if I feel like that it is going to make a difference. I feel like if it is only going to make a difference between 8 to 12 minutes at a council meeting, a savings of that much time, I have a hard time supporting it. knowing how much time it is going to put on the front end and the amount of responsibility to identify what items need to be placed on consent versus a legislative item. I have a lot of concern with that, and I guess that's what I will say at this point. And Council Member Bledsoe. Thank you, Chair. You may be able to answer this or maybe someone else. I'm just curious. I know Louisville is set up differently than us, but they have a consent agenda, do they? Don't they? They do. They do. And their process is completely different than ours. Their process actually starts out where a council member actually supports a legislative item, and it comes to the council and gets first reading, and then it goes back out to its appropriate committee, and then the committees do actually the homework and song and dance as to whether it needs to go to a consent or whether it comes back before the full council for further vetting. And at that point, that's when their consent agenda is created and then it moves forward. And so does that help? I'm going to really throw a wrench in the discussion, but I'm just curious. That seems to be a council-led initiative over against an administrative or administration's CAO office decision. Is that something we could have considered or could consider? I'm not sure I'm advocating for it. I'm just tossing out the idea. but there might be other ways of doing a consent agenda that don't compromise the administration that still might yield us a good result. Just food for thought. I don't know if the vice mayor wants to speak to it, but I will speak after he speaks if he so chooses. Go ahead. Thank you. I think that's probably worth looking at. What I gather from the comments right now, there are sufficient questions that I'm not interested in pushing this forward. I am interested in the notion. And so it may be that there's a way to do it where council members take on more responsibility and things don't get quite so far before the administration gets to look at them. I also want to just clarify one thing about the proposal that's before us today. It is the language, I believe this is correct, it's the language of the original motion that I brought forward that got amended in committee before it got to council. So it got out of committee last time, as amended, and then the council at that time voted it down. a lot of these questions were not raised at that time for whatever reason but I think I get it I think with minor exception myself and a couple other people I think people feel that there's too much potential burden for the administration in this particular way of proceeding and not enough to be gained so I'm okay with leaving it where it is thank you And if I can follow up, and I appreciate that, but also, I mean, I understand the concept of the consent agenda. I totally, totally get that, and I do know that there is some savings in that. I think that if this committee wanted to suggest about looking into reformatting, I think to answer Council Member Bledsoe's question and my expertise, we would have to redo our whole rules and procedures as far as the administrative review process, i.e. blue sheet, i.e. Legistar now. we would have to amend that entire process and change up in order for us to implement something like Louisville's doing. It's so funny, when we started implementing Legistar back in early 2010-11, when we were talking to vendors about this and our structure, our structure is different. I mean, we merged back in 1974, back when there were no other governments in Kentucky that were merged, and there were very few out in the United States. So we actually, when we put, and I say we, I wasn't involved in 1974, but when the process for the rules and procedures were put in place, there wasn't anything to go by hardly. So ours is an unusual process where the administration and the divisions and departments actually bring forward things to us, whereas in Louisville, it takes a council member to sponsor something before it goes through. So if the Vice Mayor would like to further look into maybe reviewing the entire process, I think that's the way that I would need to go into this to look about coming out with a different process. So hopefully that... Thank you, Chair. Well, for reasons I've already given, I think that the present system really is broken. But I'm not going to bang on that anymore. If there is enough interest in this committee or elsewhere in looking at the entire system so that we might be able to change the things that really don't work very well in terms of public perception, in terms of the use of our time, I'm all for that. That was my only intention in bringing it forward. And if I can add one other thing, I want to thank a significant number of people in the administration and in my office and other places, your office, who spent time working on this so that we have a pretty good, I think, clear picture of the implications of it and what the tradeoffs are. So thank you, Chair. All right, thank you. Is there any further discussion on this matter? No? Okay. And I appreciate all the information from the administration from all the different areas, the homework that you all did and the discussions, and I really appreciate that as well. So I guess the next item, well, the next part of the agenda would be to go over the referrals and if we want to go through those, the Parks Foundation, Council Member Scutchfield. If you can keep that at this time. Okay. All righty. And I know that Council Member Evans is not here today, but we expect that this should be brought forward at the July meeting. And the ESR process, Council Member Bledsoe? We're ready for July. Ready for July. All right. Okay. We're still pending information about the Veterans Affairs. Mr. Councilman Fred Brown, the security cameras. Thank you, Chair. I'm not sure I have to. Jeff, I haven't gotten any information on that. We had talked about gathering some information on that. What's y'all's position or where you at on that? We're still not enamored with the idea, of course, but we are accumulating additional information. We would be in a position to do a test at some point. Would you, July or August? August. August. If you give me July or August. Let's do August. Okay. And give us an idea. We still had, we've got, I think just about every council member has parks in their district, you know, have a park in their district. And I think we had talked or alluded to the fact that what we could do, what type. So a presentation would be in order, whether we resolve it or whatever, but to have some good discussion from the parks area and back and forth and discussion from the council members and our concerns. If I could mention, we had also discussed the parks ambassador program program and increased security in the parks using overtime police officers, which we are in the process, have implemented, if that can be part of the broader conversation. We want to look at the costs associated with this and what some other, I don't know that we've gotten some other information from other cities. I think we were gathering that. We do. Let's try for August then. Okay. Okay, and Council Member Fred Brown, just for clarification, we don't have an August meeting for this because it's a short month, so can we shoot for September? Yeah, that'll be fine. All righty. All right. Thank you. And the Council Rules and Procedures, is there a, Vice Mayor Kay, I know you're not a member of the committee, but do you want it to stay in the committee with a possibility of looking up to anything else, or? I would say if there is a member of the committee who would like to continue the conversation and take responsibility, I'd be happy to have them do that. But I don't need to. Okay. Thank you. All righty. Well, I mean, and maybe we can just leave it in here and we can further discuss and see and we'll go from there. Okay. Okay. The autonomous cars, it's pending a review. minority recruitment and retention, Council Member James Brown? Do you think that could be ready? I was going to say August, but since you said we don't have a meeting in August, and my birthday is in September, I'm not doing anything, am I? Oh. No, I'm just joking. No, I'm just joking. Yeah, I think we can have something ready by September. All righty, that's great. Okay. And now I'll entertain a motion to remove the item of SAVI from Council Member Henson. I made a motion. Second by Council Member Fred Brown to remove the SAVI presentation. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? All right. Thank you. The Bluegrass Add Development or Bluegrass Add Update, I believe, Councilmember Maloney, I believe we're looking at September maybe? I thought we were going to have law come in on the 1st in July. In July? To make the presentation what we can do and what we can't do with Bluegrass Ad. And then I think in September or October, I think Bluegrass Ad, we're trying to get them to come and present their... Right, right. But I still think we're on board for July. Do we have a meeting in July, don't we? Yes, yes. I think you have it now. I'm going to take a few minutes to tell you the list of what they can do and what they can't do. Okay. So the contractual options for workforce, it would be possibly for July then. Okay. And then the update on the Bluegrass ad in September. Okay. HR management audit, I think we were looking at September for that. Is that good? Okay. Neighborhood match grants, Council Member Scotchfield stepped out. Not sure about that one. The Adult and Tenant Services update, I think that we'll look at that for later this year. Question on that, Chair. Yes, sir. The Adult and Tenant Services audit, is that the audit that was performed by the Internal Audit Group? Yes, sir. What are you looking for? Are you looking for a presentation from the Internal Audit Board or an additional, or where are you coming from? Well, where I'm coming from is an update from the Social Services Department and Adult Services, Adult and Tenant Services, as to what they're actually doing and how they're approaching the issues and everything. So that would be Commissioner Ford getting that stuff together. Okay. Yes, sir. Okay, fine. Thank you. And then the Fair Labor Standards Act changes to the exemptions. I think we'll look at that later this year. I think we've got that ready to go. So I think that's everything. So is there a motion to adjourn? All right. Thank you. All in favor, say yes. Yes. Thanks. You feel my heart with laughter Take away and make it better