Music The End Thank you. The End ¶¶ The End The End Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, we're about to start the Planning and Public Works Safety Committee. I'll need a motion for the May 10, 2016 committee summary. Move approval. Is there a second? Second. Any discussion? All those in favor? Any opposed? Thank you. Next we have Dr. Evans here from the Community Corrections. He's from Eastern Kentucky University. and he may want to introduce his team. And I also want to acknowledge Rodney Ballard, who is now our Commissioner of the Department of Corrections, for being here today. Welcome. Council Member Evans, I'll go ahead and let you introduce Dr. Wells from EKU and take this forward since you put this in committee. Thank you. Yes, thank you, Chair. I will just do a brief introduction of Dr. Wells, and he can introduce his team. But as the committee recalls, this was an issue that came out of last year's, I guess, link as a non-budgetary issue, was the turnover at the corrections facility. So a little bit about Dr. Wells to give you his full glory and rightful accolades, I guess. He's a full professor in the School of Justice Studies in the College of Justice and Safety at Eastern Kentucky University. At the beginning of his career, Dr. Wells was a correctional officer at a super maximum security prison in Lucasville, Ohio, and later a criminal justice planner for an architectural and engineering firm that specialized in designing correctional and other justice-related facilities. Dr. Wells has been a university professor since 1989 and has been at EKU since 1995. And he has brought some of the students that took this challenge on that was actually already ongoing. So I was very relieved when I found out this study was going on because that meant less work for me. And he will introduce them, and they will speak about some of their findings, and hopefully it will be used as a tool for the next director at the facility and help the overall attitude, overall feeling of the employees and the public in general. So, Dr. Wells, I will turn it over to you, and thank you for being here. Thank you, Council Member Evans. I'd first like to recognize everyone that was part of our research team. The first six authors you see on the PowerPoint up there and on your report are graduate-level criminal justice students in the School of Justice Studies at EKU. We have Joseph Ellis. Joe, go ahead and stand up. He was the project chair of our research study. Kendall Granger, she was largely responsible for doing a content analysis of all the open-ended responses. and Mr. Ryan Phillips, who was our quantitative team leader. The last three authors you see on the report are myself, Dr. Kevin Miner, who is a colleague of mine at Eastern Kentucky University, and Dr. Eric Lambert, who is a professor and chair in the Department of Legal Studies at the University of Mississippi. Given that I suspect the three of us have studied and published most of the academic research on the work environment of correctional staff, I asked for their assistance in helping me develop this questionnaire about this time last year. Although Dr. Miner and Dr. Lambert did not have an active role in the administration of this study, I asked both of them to look at the results and to give us their own objective and unbiased evaluation. Dr. Miner was able to join us today. I want to extend our sincerest gratitude to the administration and staff of the Fayette County Division of Community Corrections. They graciously opened their facility up to us and allowed us to conduct our research and engage in real-world learning. We were treated with the utmost respect and professionalism by everyone we encountered. We also want to especially thank former Director of the Division of Community Corrections, now Kentucky Commissioner of Corrections, Rodney Ballard. for his willingness to allow us to administer this survey. Based upon all my experiences of a researcher, it's my belief that Commissioner Ballard is probably the most progressive correctional administrator I've ever encountered in the United States, especially when it comes to research, taking advantage of technology, inmate health care, et cetera. He is way up there at the top of his profession. I also want to thank Public Safety Commissioner Ronnie Bastin for his willingness to allow us to administer this study as well. In this study, we did ask some questions that have never been asked before of correctional staff, and to my knowledge, have never been asked of staff in any criminal justice organization in the United States. Why is that? It's because up until now, no correctional administration has been willing to allow such questions to be asked of their staff. Given that this type of study has never been conducted before, the results from our study cannot be compared to some norm, some standard, or to other data from other facilities. However, the fact that we were able to get a 94% response rate among the staff by itself speaks volumes as to the professionalism and high standards of everyone that participated in our study at the jail. It's our expectation and hope that the current jail leadership, as well as the Lexington County government officials, the citizens of this city and county, including the media, will focus on using the results of our study in a positive light and improving the work environment of the jail. We also want to thank Eastern Kentucky University, the School of Justice Studies, and the Criminal Justice Graduate Program for their financial support of this research project. We did it at no expense to the taxpayers of this city and county. Granted that it took our research team over four hours to do a presentation for the jail that we thought was highlighting the key findings, and I've been told that I only have 15 minutes to do the same, I think it best that I make the following brief statement that best summarizes the current state of the correctional facility we studied this past spring semester. To do so, I'm going to briefly say a little bit about my background and my experiences, not to brag, but just to make a point about what I think the essence of this report contains. My career in corrections spans over 35 years. As Councilmember Evans mentioned, I started out as a correctional officer in a super maximum security prison, probably one of the worst facilities in the country, the site of the longest prison riot in US history that resulted in the fatalities of both staff and inmates. After that, I had the opportunity to study the living environments and work environments of staff and inmates in probably over 100 facilities throughout the country as both a researcher working for an architectural and engineering firm, designing what we thought were the best facilities in the country, and more recently, over the last 20 years since I've been at EKU as an academician that's been able to take advantage of dozens and dozens of both funded and unfunded studies that I suspect have allowed me to interview or survey over 20,000 inmates and staff about their work environment or their living environment. So I just want to say, based upon my experiences as a researcher, and I have no objective data to back this up, And I want to emphasize that, that I would rate the Lexington Fayette Division of Community Corrections not as a problem facility, but as a facility in what I would regard as the top 5 to 10 percent of those facilities that I've encountered when it comes to inmate and staff physical safety, sexual safety, security, design, engineering, efficiency, management, leadership, professionalism, training, medical care, programming, reentry initiatives, the use of technology, and with respect to transparency, probably the top 1%. That's not to say that the jail here does not have its share of problems. As we will see momentarily, the jail has scored moderate to good on the vast majority of measures in our study. One last thing before I proceed, our present study was a descriptive one. It simply describes the work environment at the facility. It does not explain or tell you why certain measures are high or low. This study in its current state will not tell you, for example, how to reduce turnover. To do that, we have to get into cause and effect relationships, do some explanatory research, do more sophisticated analyses, something I will bring up again at the end of our presentation. our study had three goals or purposes number one to describe and measure the context of the work environment among sworn staff at the lexington fayette division of community corrections two to provide specific and potentially actionable findings to the client host agency and possible generalizable contributions to the field and three to teach our criminal justice graduate students how to do quantitative and qualitative analyses by utilizing them in a real-world application where they practice peeragogy, what I refer to as peer-to-peer learning. As a result of the report that you have in your hands, goals one and three have been met. Goal two will be ongoing for some time since the data in this study are very rich and will probably keep myself, Dr. Miner, Dr. Lambert, and others probably busy the rest of our academic careers. I want to say a little bit about the correctional work environment. Staff that work at correctional facilities are the heart and soul of that facility. They're not only a valuable resource, they are an expensive one. Since between 70 and 80 percent of a typical correctional facility's operating budget is for staff, it's important to protect this valuable resource. In addition to the significant effects that staff have on the operation of correctional institutions, the work environment of these institutions also has significant effects on the staff. Past studies have reported that positive work environment variables are linked with sought-after desired outcomes, such as increased job involvement, job satisfaction, organizational commitment, job performance, life satisfaction, organizational innovation, compliance with organizational rules, support for the rehabilitation of inmates, and organizational citizenship behaviors. Additionally, negative work environment variables have been found to result in detrimental outcomes, such as increased job stress, absenteeism, substance abuse, turnover intent, actual turnover, burnout, all sorts of health and medical problems, and even premature death. There is a need for far greater research in this area. The correctional environment is complex, consisting of many dimensions, of which many have not yet been explored or studied in full. It's critical that additional research be conducted on how different aspects of the work environment affect correctional staff. This current study attempts to fill that gap where additional research is needed. We developed what we refer to as the Work Environment Questionnaire, the WEQ. It has 23 different measures or scales that measure the correctional work environment. All of these measures or scales have been used in previous studies, some of them in disciplines other than corrections, but they have all demonstrated their validity and reliability. Do keep in mind that these measures, like all measures that examine perceptions, feelings, attitudes, are imperfect measures. They do not measure actual incidents or frequencies, things that have actually been reported or things that have actually occurred. They measure perceptions. Here's another slide containing the other half of the items we measured. All of these measures are clearly defined in your report and in your handout I put in the beginning of your report. I've also given examples of what a high score on each of these scales or measures means. Although in a minute we will look at a graphic summarizing the average scores and all the scales we measured in our study, I encourage all of you to take a detailed look at the report where we also reported frequencies, percentages, results of statistical tests, as well as report other statistical graphics. For example, if you take a detailed look at the report, you will see that most of the scale distributions, How people responded to these scores, these scales, are skewed, suggesting that only a minority of staff at the facility perceive that certain measures of the work environment are problematic. Most staff report moderate to favorable scores on most of these measures. Figure 49 on page 169 presents a ranking of scales averages in descending order. For these scales where a higher score is preferable, an average of 3.5 or greater is needed in order to have a favorable perception of that scale. Ambivalent perceptions, those in the middle, require an average between 2.5 and 3.49. Less favorable perceptions require an average of 2.5 or less. So here is a ranking of those scale averages in descending order. This is also, you also see these in your handout as well, the definitions of these in your handout. Notice that the staff generally displayed moderate to favorable perceptions, okay, defined as an average score of 3.5 or higher on the vast majority of these work environment measures. This holds true for both individual and organizational whistleblowing propensity, that is, willingness to report wrongdoing, organizational citizenship, instrumental communication, personal efficacy, positive affectivity, normative organizational commitment, and interactional justice. Staff expressed greater ambivalence, that is, they reported averages of between 2.5 and 3.49, on measures of group cohesion, job satisfaction, continuance and effective organizational commitment, supervisor support, management and workplace trust, fairness, employee ratios, trust, and negative affectivity. Additionally, as a group, staff generally displayed moderate to favorable views of alternative employment prospects and considerable ambivalence regarding turnover intention. This suggests that at least a fair number of staff view alternative employment possibilities in a relatively favorable light while having some intention of leaving their jobs. Dr. Wells, I hate to interrupt you. We have a 15-minute rule here. If there's a council member that would like to defer and give Dr. Wells some more time to finish up, about another five minutes, would that be? Yes, ma'am. I actually timed my presentation when I began talking. It's 14 minutes. Oh, well, your timer is better than mine here then. So go ahead. Is there a motion? Do I have a second? All those in favor? Any opposed? Thank you. Go ahead, sir. Thank you very much, Chair. so um i want to bring your attention that on a few scales where higher scores are problematic you can simply subtract the average score from that maximum score of 5.0 so the score can be so that the scale can be compared to the other scales where higher scores are favorable what we did here on this slide we actually categorized all the different scales as to whether or not they belong in the favorable category, ambivalent category, or less favorable. I do want to point out that staff displayed less favorable perceptions, where they scored below a 2.5 on measures of management cynicism, fear of reprisal, role conflict, organizational cooperation, and public perception. overall in our opinion these findings should be seen as presenting encouraging news for facility administrators and city county officials because most scales on which relatively negative staff perceptions were uncovered by the research for example management cynicism fear of reprisal road conflict organizational cooperation public perception these are all amenable to change through improvement initiatives. Moreover, scales upon which relatively favorable staff perceptions were uncovered, such as whistleblowing propensity, organizational citizenship, instrumental communication, personal efficacy, positive affectivity, organizational commitment, and interactional justice, can sometimes be utilized as strengths or assets in efforts to constructively address these ambivalent or less favorable scale scores. To illustrate, for example, the relatively favorable levels of instrumental communication where the staff scored pretty high, and personal efficacy, they also scored pretty high on that. These can be drawn upon as part of initiatives to improve perceptions of management cynicism or perceived role conflicts. Or a more incremental approach might involve drawing upon staff perceptions of interactional justice to improve trust, which in turn could then be used to address fear of reprisal. There's all sorts of creative options that can be explored in addressing these problem areas. So we hope the Division of Community Corrections and the city-county government will take advantage of the results of this study. For example, the data results from this study and our questionnaire, the WEQ, can be used as a pre-post measure of interventions, such as academy training or in-service training, or identifying operational needs, such as how to design better staff training or decrease staff turnover, improve reporting, improve investigative mechanisms, or exploring staff perceptions before and after mission changes or informing strategic planning, program development, and staffing needs. So assuming the Lexington-Fayette Division of Community Corrections and or the Lexington-Fayette County Government would like to examine in more detail these data to develop or improve any safety-related strategies, interventions, training programs, etc., in regard to some of the measures our study addressed, we welcome the opportunity. We have the skills, expertise, and experience to go beyond the descriptive results you have in our study and to develop more complex multivariate, what statisticians refer to as multivariate correlational models or path-causal models that allow you to get at cause-and-effect relationships that would allow us to actually determine what are the most important predictors of some of these work environment variables to be determined. We could actually do a follow-up study where we could tell you, based upon the data we have, what the most important predictors of turnover intention are. That concludes our presentation. Thank you very much for allowing us the opportunity to do this study and report our results. I'd like the committee to feel free to ask any members of our research team any questions you may have. Thank you very much. Thank you, Dr. Wells. Are there any council members that have any questions for Dr. Wells? Council Member Lamb. Thank you. Thank you for this presentation. Just wondering if there were any statistics or any data or anything that you had to compare this to from years back. No, not really. And the main reason for that is that many of the measures we utilize in this study have never, ever been measured in a correctional facility. And again, Director Ballard at the time allowed us to do this study. I wasn't sure he would allow us to do it. I mean, not many jail administrators in this country are going to let you come in their facility and allow you to ask their staff about whistleblowing, propensity, reporting, wrongdoing, things of that nature. So, sorry, but no, there's really no standards, no norms to compare a lot of our data with. Okay. And I don't know, is there any plan on administrative-wise, and I look back at our public safety commissioner and whoever our new director will be, is there any plans to take this information and put it into play and to try to start making other improvements? There certainly is. I'll just say for me, I'm still at the absorption stage. I've read the entire study twice. I sat through the four-hour presentation, and then I've had subsequent conversations with Dr. Wells and Dr. Miner, And I'm still trying to wrap my head around some of the far-reaching concepts that go with some of the variables that were measured. But that's exactly what we plan to do. Once we have the new director on board, we felt like it was important to have that person leading the charge to look at development of strategies to provide some interventions for these areas. We want them certainly to be on board with what the plan is and start moving forward. We also want to continue the relationship with Dr. Wells and Dr. Miner and EKU to do some further research, some causal research, to try to understand what causes this variable to be high or low. Those are important pieces. We're going to do some benchmark research to look out and see what others in the field may be doing to address some of these variables. It's really an exciting piece of work, and I look at it as a baseline, something we've never had before. We've all had impressions that we thought this might cause this or whatever. Now we have something that we can point to that's research-based that will give us a really good springboard to move forward. So I really want to applaud the work of the EKU team, Dr. Wells, Dr. Minor, and the students, the entire group of students that helped. But the person I want to throw a lot of accolades to is Commissioner Rodney Ballard, because Rodney approached me with this, and he said, what do you think? And I said, well, I can tell you what most people in the country are going to think. They're going to think you're crazy because if things come out bad in this, it's their job. And typically that's the way people look at it across the country. And he said, but we need to know. And I said, I agree. You have to, in order to move forward, you have to ask the tough questions and be willing to accept what the answers are if you're going to be able to work out of a situation that's undesirable. So he had the courage to do it, was willing to put his job online. and I applaud him for that because he's the only one so far that's allowed this kind of thing to happen. Now we can move forward and hopefully this will provide some information that will help other correctional facilities throughout the country. And the one last comment I will have is that I appreciate having this information and I appreciate the fact that you all want to move forward with it. I do think that as far as my colleagues here go, that there's a certain level of accountability that we can actually ask you all to report back to us in an conceivable amount of time. We don't want to put the pressure on to expect you all to be moving mountains in a nanosecond, but I do think that we should do that from this body and to be able to find out how it's going a year to 15 months down the road. We'd be happy to come back and do a report and talk about what we've done to that point where we see things state-of-the-art and where we'd like for them to be going. Sure, sure. Well, and it's always good to have the support from the top down. So, all right. Thank you. Thank you, Commissioner. Thank you for your support. Thanks. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Council Member. Council Member Stendham. Thank you, Chair. Commissioner, I was going to ask the question that Council Member Lamb asked is, what are you going to do with this report? and I appreciate you willing to take a pause and digest it further. If I might add to that report, and I know this is going to make some people in the room uncomfortable, but one issue that since I've been on council has always been the leadership, questioned by staff, by employees, and some of this data explains that. And whether it's perceived or real, the end result is it's something's there that we need to change culture-wise. And I guess when I say leadership, upper in the ranks. And if you look out in the room, you know, I don't see any women in leadership. I don't see any minorities. And nothing against the individuals here. They've worked their way up, and they've been promoted just like anyone else. But that's got to change. We can't go forward as a community unless that changes. And I think page 167, I'll read this just so the public doesn't have a copy. It says, overall, the data suggests that female staff feel alienated and marginalized and that they do not trust their fellow employees, including management, and that they are not treated fairly by their superiors. And then it goes on in here to talk about the fear of retaliation, and that's men and women now. Now I'm jumping to everyone feels a sense of retaliation that if they do report, that's got to change too. Those are the two biggest things that I've heard 13 years around this council, that those are issues that I think we can improve. But while we – I appreciate the work you did, Mr. Wells, and this is a good benchmark. But we've got to improve on those two areas going forward. And I hope you feel the same way. We'll take a look at that on a serious – I do. In terms of diversity at the upper level, I can tell you we have some rising stars at the captain rank that comprise, I think, three or four of the five certified jail managers in the state of Kentucky. or there's a couple of captains, female captains, so they're at that developmental stage where they're really going to be able to contribute to the organization in the future, I think. Well, good. Well, thank you again. And, Director Ballard, thank you for coming back and your willingness to do this. This was a hard thing to do, but you know what? We can only improve from here, and it's well worth it, in my opinion. So thank you all. Thank you, Council Member Henson. Thank you, Chair, and thank you for the research. Thanks to my colleague, Council Member Evans. Just to echo a few comments of when I first came on the council, for many years I worked in employment. And for information purposes on every council docket, at the back of our docket is people that have left the Lays-Stand-Fayette Urban County government for one reason or another. Many, many times multiple people are from community corrections. So I began immediately questioning that. What is going on? And I almost came to the conclusion it's just the nature of the beast. It's just a horrible, horrible job. So that's why I think that this research is so valuable. I appreciate former Director Ballard and now Commissioner of Corrections, is that correct, for allowing this to occur. So we've gone many, many years with suspicion about what is going on and just assuming things and hearing things from corrections officers. But I do believe that under the leadership of Commissioner Bastin, who we can credit with running a very fine Lexington Police Department with diversity and everything, that I do believe in him and that he will work with the corrections staff to make it the best it could be. Maybe not the Lexington Police Department, but because it's a different animal, but corrections make it the best corrections model for our country. But thank you, and thank you everyone who worked on this. Thank you. Council Member Maloney. Thank you, Chair. I just need to ask a couple questions. First of all, looking at what Council Member Stenet said about the problems we've had over the years, I mean, it's been going over and over. I always thought if you had a strong HR department, a lot of this problem wouldn't exist. I mean, to me, some of them would exist, but how does that work? I mean, I know how, I think it's a little bit different than what I read, than the HR department that we have here. I think the jail and police and fire have their own HR person. Did you all look into that on how? Is there going to be an improvement there? Because it seems when you read these kind of things, they've got to go somewhere to talk to people. And the only ones that I usually know, when we have that problem, we usually send it to HR to try to fix these problems out. Our study only focused on the sworn staff at the facility. And again, the purpose of our study wasn't to look at turnover intention or anything like that. It was to look at the work environment in total. And it just so happened that turnover intention happened to be one of the things we measured. That's not to say that we could do a turnover study. Dr. Miner, myself, and Dr. Lambert have probably done most of the turnover research of correctional facilities. in the country, and one of the things we would definitely look at would be HR, you know, and benefits and health care and pay. Many of the measures in this study we would also look at. Dr. Minor, you want to add anything to that? I just think that if you were to do a full study like this, it would be essential to take a look at exit interviews. The best research that's done uses a combination of quantitative data with qualitative data. They complement each other. So I think if you were going to fully look at a study like this, you would want to actually do exit interviews with people who left. That can be difficult to pull off, but if it's done properly, you learn a lot of good information. I just reviewed a study that was done in a state for a journal, actually, and it was very informative what they learned about some things that they might be able to change with management relations and so forth. So I think you want a multifaceted study. You want to come at turnover from different angles, both quantitative and qualitative information. It's important to have. Can I ask Commissioner, I want to ask a question, what they just answered there. Can you explain how HR is different than the regular? If you have a complaint like this, Do they have to go through collective bargaining, or can they go to the HR just to listen to write these things down? How does that work compared to where? You're talking about a workplace complaint, how it would work? Well, there could be a grievance. I mean, that process is set up in collective bargaining agreements. Certainly, the administration is going to be very interested in resolving any issues that involve fairness or anything like that. So my door is always open with that, and I get some of those calls. In terms of satisfaction, one of the things that was noted that kind of stuck out with me here that maybe you all can help me with, and this is going to be a goal of mine, is people didn't feel like society and the community valued what they did. And, I mean, we all need to know that what we do is of value, and it adds value to the community. And so I want to just take an opportunity right now to thank the folks here who serve in our Division of Community Corrections for what they do and to reiterate to you, I've done this before, but what you do adds value to the quality of life of Lexington. I really appreciate it. It takes special people to do the work they're doing. And they make you know it. We can do that. We're going to start talking about the public safety team a lot more so that people get to understand that public safety is more than police and fire. They're very important, but it's more than that. So we need to make sure that all of our employees feel like what they're doing is of value, and we need to recognize that and be cheerleaders for them. I want to echo the same, what you just said. Does the HR report to John Maxwell, or does the HR stay under your department over there? Well, we work hand-in-hand. If a grievance comes up, there's a stage that it does go to HR. So in other words, John, that group will oversee DHR. And, you know, we all work with the union presidents and try to do the best we can to resolve things at the lowest level we possibly can. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member. Looks like Council Member Akers, you have not spoken yet, so you go before Council Member Lamb. Thank you, Chair. I want to thank you all for this report as well. It has a plethora of information and data that we can all study for some time and digest. And I want to thank Council Member Stinnett for recognizing the disparity between female staff and highlighting that because it jumped out at me as well. And I wanted to ask on page 166 of the report, in the overall, I guess it's the summary section, it looks like maybe there's something missing in the first paragraph, the last sentence, to your level. I think there should be a level there, had the most significant differences, while a certain shift maybe had the fewest with three. And I just wondered, I could probably just read above and add on that. Most of our analyses focused on doing just simple descriptive statistics. We did look at some relationships between the scales and demographics, male, female, shift, tier, which tier you came in on with respect to pay and benefits and such. So we did find some, in fact, I think we found most of the significant differences we found on our scales which pertain to female staff as well as between the different tiers, tiers one, two, and three. That's pay scale, basically, correct? No, no. Actually, I can't remember what page it is in the report. We actually define the different tiers. How long did they work there? Length of influence. Yes. Yes. But that came out during the course of our study. A now retired major, Capello, suggested that, oh, you may want to look at tier level. We suspect there may be some differences between staff. And really, I mean, that's a good point. A staff member at the jail could be working next to somebody who's been there six months longer than they have, and they can retire perhaps years earlier because of the different tier levels. So that is an issue that probably needs to be looked at. And some of the recommendations, I guess this goes to someone that may be our commissioner. Some of the recommendations by staff or concerns and some of the qualitative comments of the report, Or are we, I know that it is new, so are we planning to look at some of that and like the lie detector test, for instance, on hiring? Is that required? Is it a state requirement? Is it a federal requirement? Is there anything that we could have the power to control? It's not a requirement. That's something we choose to do. I would venture to say that some of the higher scales when you get to the whistleblowing and integrity type issues, there's a strong feeling of people that they want to hold people accountable within the agency. I suspect that we're getting a lot of the right people in the door. We're just not getting enough of the right people in the door, enough people, period. For instance, last police class, there were six people who had worked at community corrections that were graduating in the class. So we're getting good people at community corrections, and I think that's reflected in the importance to them that we hold people accountable and there's a high level of integrity. But we need to increase the, just get more word out and get more people involved in applying, more of the right people. And I agree with you, too. I know that the police department has taken great strides lately with public relations and has done a marvelous job with that. The fire department has done that pretty well for a long time. So I think that the corrections department could use some of that as well. I know I can do it in my council newsletter and maybe do a council comment since it's in my district. But to highlight the staff there and try to increase the public support and appreciation for it, because it is a tough job and not many people want to do it. So I think that we should thank them more often. And lastly, there was some comments about contraband and we need a body scanner and that sort of thing. Is that something you all are considering? Is the price unrealistic? Well, that's something that we'll talk with the new director about when they get in. I think there's a story coming out on Thursday about contraband in jail statewide that was done, and we participated with that. We do go to pretty extreme measures to try to keep contraband out of our detention facility. Can't always do it. Sure, sure. But we really, we're doing what we can do, including random sweeps with narcotic dogs and things that don't happen in a lot of other places. All right, great. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Thank you. Council Member Scotchfield. Thank you, Chair. A question. I know that I've seen advertisements for the public safety symposium increasing, trying to increase minority women applicants. Is corrections participating in this as well? Right now, police and fire are doing one each. They're doing them. They're being advertised. We're at the drawing board with corrections right now. We've spent a bunch of hours trying to re-engineer the process. Our process was too long. There's a lot of things that are cumbersome with it. And we're trying to break that down right now and working with HR to do some of that. We're hopeful that we're going to make some improvements. My goal and directive to folks is we have to have 30 of those 50 vacancies filled by this time next year consistently. It'll cut down on overtime expenditure. It's going to cut down on folks having to work double shifts and all the things that I think could help lead to a higher attrition rate. So we're going to tackle that one and put everything we've got on it. We're seeing some positive signs, I think, but it's a little bit early to declare any kind of victory. But we're going to work really hard on that. And I know it's difficult. I spent several years as a criminal justice chair at a technical school here in town. People want to go into policing. They want to go into fire. Corrections is not the first thing they think of. Ural's job, I know, is difficult. Capillo was one of my instructors, and he would let them know this is not the easiest job in the world. But I think we do have to get into those colleges, universities around here and change impressions. Maybe not that it's not hard, but that it's a worthwhile job doing, and that takes time. But I hope that we're reaching out and trying to develop some relationships with some of those colleges and universities locally known. We are, and we have internal focus groups with employees to find out what attracted them to the profession and what causes them to want to stay. And one of the things I heard the other day in a focus group was, you know, I feel like I make a difference every day I come to work. And those are the kinds of messages that don't get told about corrections, unfortunately. They add value to our community. I really believe that. But we don't get the story out. It's not always what you see. So we've got to find a way to get the message out. Thank you for that. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Lamb. Commissioner, I know that there is collective bargaining out in the community corrections, but I'm not clear as to what the levels. I know like in police and fire there are different levels. So can you explain what positions are within? Are they included? Yes, please. Officers and sergeants are under the FOP, under leadership of Steve Parker. lieutenants captains are under uh sean hubbard who's here with us today so there's two separate bargaining units that represent employees the majors at community corrections are appointed positions serve at the pleasure of the director so there's some flexibility and you know and choosing your team uh to lead the agency so so are the majors is it similar like to the police I swear that it's depending on the director? I may have to turn around and get some confirmation. I'm assuming that folks who are promoted to major from the captain rank still are represented by the captain's bargaining unit. Is that correct? Okay. All of this was being implemented about the time I was retiring, and so it's all new. So, all right. Well, thank you very much. Thanks. Thank you, Chair. Thank you. Council Member Senate. Thank you, Chair. I want to circle back to that exit interview. Commissioner Ballard, if I'm not mistaken, you started doing that exit interview process. I don't think we'd ever done before, and I think you started doing some. Did you keep those? Are we still doing it? Yes, sir, I did. One of the things I did when the employees came in to make them feel more relaxed, I didn't take any notes. Because one of the fears they had was we would write notes and then use them against them for reemployment. So it really was just a chat. I would come in and encourage them to tell me what was on their mind and work that way. we did it it was useful uh we had some positive things come out of it okay so it wasn't a formal last process that was suggested earlier that we go through each time somebody leaves and well it'd be a little different if dr minors did because he's neutral when i was doing it they would fear that what was going in their personnel file so these men could do it for these young guys and i think it would be fine yeah makes sense thank you thank you chair thank you council member Henson. Thank you, Chair. I have one question about, and I know this has come up before when I visited the detention center with Director Ballard at that time, but maybe perhaps the design of the jail may play a factor because of, I know when it was originally built and designed, And I think that was 20 years ago, if I'm not mistaken. Then it was like supposed to be the state-of-the-art design for corrections facilities. But what I've found is that, and what I've heard, is that it might play a role in the satisfaction of the corrections officer, job satisfaction, because of their confinement. And so is that something possibly that could be looked at? I can take a stab at that since I worked for an architectural and engineering firm that designed correctional facilities. But the facility in this county is a direct supervision facility that has lots of advantages, provided staff are properly trained and equipped to do the job. Granted, they have to have the necessary support mechanisms in place. They have to feel safe. The biggest thing is that they have to be trained in interpersonal communication skills. They have to be comfortable working in that environment. They're there to prevent problems from occurring. Most correctional facilities that do not have that type of design, staff can only react to problems after they've occurred. The facility here in this county is designed to allow staff to be aware of problems before they actually occur and to react, if necessary, accordingly. Granted, I mean, direct supervision is a complicated concept. A lot goes with it. You just can't design a facility and expect staff to be able to manage it. In my consulting, I've been in county facilities where they designed a direct supervision facility and didn't give the staff the proper training and the inmates are running the housing unit. The staff member, the deputy or whoever's got one hand on the exit door and one hand on the walkie talkie and he or she's scared to death. So a lot has to go with it. An educated workforce, staff who have some college credits or are working on a college degree or have a college degree, makes a huge difference in how well a direct supervision facility is run. I think one of the biggest concerns that I'd heard, though, was that they didn't have a lot of interaction with coworkers. And I think that's important in a job. You know, a lot of people may like their job, but they love their job a lot more if they can interact with coworkers. So I was just thinking about that confinement, and maybe that would be something to consider down the road. Well, I suspect some of the jail leadership can address that question better than I can. But, you know, some staff may prefer to get, you know, revolved, you know, around that unit, work a unit six months and go somewhere else and work. Other staff may be perfectly fine just working that one housing unit and being very comfortable doing that. Yeah. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Thank you. And thank you, Dr. Wells and for your colleagues for presenting us with this survey today. Thank you, Commissioner and Commissioner Ballard. for having such an open-door policy, and thank you to Councilmember Evans, because I think this was something that the Council has had a lot of questions about, especially employee turnover and corrections for quite some time, and I appreciate you bringing this forward. So we'll move on to the next item on our agenda, which is the rural recreational ZODA. And basically the reason why we're having this issue put in this committee is based upon the Planning Commission recommendations. But before we go any further, I want to let you all know in the audience and those watching at home what we can do here as this committee and as the council. So bear with me. I've got a few issues that I want to bring forward. This situation is a bit unusual because it is to my best interpretation what could happen based on council rules and ordinance how we proceed. It was referred to the Planning Commission for review by the council and was not initiated by us. there was no time limit imposed upon the Planning Commission for the review. Because it is a text amendment and not a zone change, the Planning Commission's report to the Council also did not impose any time limits under the Council which we have to act. At the Committee meeting, according to the Council Rules, Section 2-205, the Committee reports to the full Council with or without a recommendation of matter referred to the Committee. So I think that the committee can make whatever motion it desires by a majority vote of this committee. Changes to the Planning Commission recommendation would be reported out as the committee's recommendation to the full council. The ordinance and the statute only allow for the full council to actually take action on a text amendment. I believe that if the committee recommends something different than the Planning Commission and the Council votes to place it on the docket, then the Council would likely receive only the recommendation of the committee unless a Council member was to request that the recommendation of the Planning Commission be included. The situation is somewhat different than a zone change, and it does not require a public hearing unless the Council desires to schedule one, and the text amendment can be adopted by a majority of the Council, unlike overriding the recommendation of the Planning Commission in a zone change situation, which requires a majority of the entire legislative body. If anyone has any questions before we proceed, I have Tracy Jones here from the Law Department. If they'd like to ask any questions, if not, I'll go into the presentation. Does any of the Council members have any questions? If not, I'll ask Jim Duncan, if you wouldn't mind coming forward and start with the presentation. Council members, we also have about, it looks like about eight citizens from the public that would like to speak on this as well. So, Mr. Duncan, I'll let you proceed. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you all for having us here today. We are here to talk about a proposal that has been several years in the making. This is to amend the Zoning Ordinance for Recreation and Tourism Uses. We have shorthanded that title to call this the RecZota, Recreation Zoting Ordinance Text Amendment. So you'll hear us refer to the RecZota, but that's the proposal that you have before you. We're also aware that this is an extremely complicated issue. It's taken four years, over four years, just to get us to this point. There's been a lot of community interest and community passion on a variety of sides about this issue. and the staff recognizes this, and so we understand that this has taken a while to get here, but it certainly is an issue that needed to be fleshed out. But the overriding theme all along has been to define and better regulate how we use our rural and natural lands to accommodate recreational uses. today that Tracy Wade and I will review with you what we have done in the past regarding this proposal. I will give you a brief history about the meetings that have been held and who was working on this, and then Tracy will talk about existing conditions and then what you have before you. In February of 2012, then-Vice Mayor Gordon organized a work group to study the need and develop recommendations for recreational tourism. This work group consisted of 15 members of government and other leaders across the community. They met for 20 times between March and December of 2012 and reported out their recommendations to the Council in May of 2013. The Council referred the results of the work group to the Planning Commission in order for the Planning Commission to develop the specific text, the ZODA, for this legislation. The staff drafted the legislation in July and August of 2013, and then we reviewed that with the chair of the work group, Don Robinson, and Vice Mayor Gorton. Following that, we presented the recommendations to the Planning Commission in October of 2013. The Planning Commission then spent the next year reviewing those recommendations, making their own modifications and changes to that, and then held the first of three public hearings on this issue in October of 2014. They followed that with another hearing in March of 2015, and then in June of 2015, the Planning Commission voted 6 to 5 to advance the recommendations to you, the recommendations that are before you now. The last time we spoke about this out loud was in November of 2015 when you invited us to make a presentation and introduce the Planning Commission's version of this legislation to you at a council workshop. So that brings us up to date, Madam Chair, members of the committee. At this point, Tracy will take us through what the work group did and what the Planning Commission did and where we are now. Thank you, Jim. The matrix that you see on the overhead today is a direct product of the workgroup that was formed in 2012. They began evaluating really two general tourism categories, agritourism and ecotourism. And as they dove into those particular larger categories, they realized they really wanted to look at individual uses. So the work group developed a list of individual uses and then went zone by zone and decided what they were going to recommend to the council and the planning commission in terms of how to regulate those particular uses. So the matrix was compiled by the work group and presented to the council in May of 2013. With that work, it became clear as the work group progressed and then as the Planning Commission started to review this particular text amendment, that the agricultural zones really were going to be the location in our county where agritourism and ecotourism fell, where it fit logically into the landscape. that then presented some additional discussion through the planning commission so the the year that the planning commission spent looking at the text amendment they took the matrix that staff developed the particular language and then they spent time tweaking the language to what they felt fit best into our community. When they looked at the agricultural zones, just in terms of a little background, the Rural Land Management Plan is what was adopted in 1999. It provided guidance to both the work group and the planning commission in terms of what uses would be appropriate in the rural service area. The Rural Land Management Plan does break down into six land use categories, but the two that sort of rose to the top and were of most concern to the work group and the planning commission were the core agricultural and rural land, the car carl category, and that encompasses a majority of our rural service area. As you can see on the overhead, the rural land management plan map, a majority of that dark army green is what's recommended for our agricultural rural zone. The other land use that sort of rose to the top in terms of consideration in light of the ZODA is the natural areas land use. In terms of zoning and land use, natural areas land use correlates directly with our agricultural natural areas zone, the AN zone. So looking at the land area recommended by the Rural Land Management Plan and subsequent comprehensive plans, that area is located along both the Kentucky River and Boone Creek in the southeast portion of Fayette County. The staff would note, and I believe we brought this up in November, that although these land use categories are recommended by these plans, almost all of the rural service areas currently zoned AR, there are a few locations of residential zoning and business zoning, but there is no AN zoning currently in Fayette County at all. In terms of the current regulations for our recreation and tourism uses, and again specifically in the ag zones because that is where the focus began to come with the Planning Commission, the recreation uses and tourism uses are currently regulated in the AR zone, because that's the zone that exists, as either accessory or conditional uses. In the accessory uses, you have what is considered an ag tourism use in a temporary roadside stand that's permitted. You also have wineries, which are permitted as a principal use, and they're not listed here by state law. But we also have as accessory uses non-commercial recreation uses, which would have to be associated with another permitted use. And those are your typical fields or swimming pools and tennis courts. In terms of the conditional uses that are currently regulated in the AR zone, there are four generally recreation type uses. The first is horse tracks, horse race tracks. Second, the small farm winery accessory uses like wine tasting or selling of wine is considered a conditional use. historic house museums and then the last and broadest is the commercial and non-commercial outdoor recreation facilities so the number of outdoor recreation facilities we have today have generally been permitted by the board of adjustment through that last that fourth bullet in terms of a land use category the ordinance does explain a little deeper what is meant by that it outlines a number of uses from some that would be considered really not and not big not as big of issues like a fishing lake or a riding stable and goes all the way to a zoological garden which would be considered a zoo and other more intense uses so it is a broad range of uses that's included in the current regulations and there is some discretion because it uses language like or or including such as. So there is some broader interpretation by the Board of Adjustment to consider similar uses to those listed in the ordinance. In terms of the proposed text amendment, the work group and the Planning Commission have worked on for a number of years. When the staff began drafting the text in July of 2013, there was a lot of emphasis put on the definitions and how important those were to the Board of Adjustment in terms of making their decisions, knowing what was meant by a particular use or category of uses, and how that use would be regulated in the zoning ordinance. So not only the emphasis for Article I changes, but the trickle-down is how those uses then fall into the individual zoning categories, and the regulations that were presented and we reviewed for so long actually affect three articles of the zoning ordinance, 8, 11, and 23. We explained to the council in November, though, a lot of the urban uses did not receive much attention from the planning commission, from the work group, from the public, and so we considered those really minor modifications in the urban zones, but the focus remained on the agritourism and ecotourism uses, which fell mostly within the AR and AN zones. Since November, the staff prepared a comparison table of the AN and the AR zones, and that should have been part of your packet on page 35. This is an opportunity for the council to compare what is existing in the zoning regulations today compared to what is proposed or what was brought forward by the Planning Commission to the council. And it is a table format. Generally, the first half of the table lists uses that are already in the ordinance, and there are very few changes. The bottom half of the table uses generally 26 through 48 were new uses that have not been listed in the zoning ordinance but might have been otherwise included in that commercial, non-commercial, general category. There were two primary areas of concern or discussion that remained at the end of the Planning Commission's, I guess, deliberations. The first is a shift that occurred during the Planning Commission's consideration between October and June, October when they held their first public hearing and considered public comments, and then June when they made a final recommendation to the council, and that shift occurred in terms of the AN zone. Six uses were shifted from the agricultural natural conditional use list to a principal use category. And then the second area of really ongoing discussion is that the staff voiced some preference that additional conditional use opportunities be available in the AR zone. Those, in our opinion, remain the ongoing discussion issues. In terms of the proposed AN zone changes, the Planning Commission thought that these six uses listed on the screen were generally compatible or consistent with the stated intent of the agricultural natural zone. And so they moved those uses from a conditional use status to a principal use status, knowing that we don't have any land that is currently zoned AN. So none of those uses would be permitted the day any regulations were adopted. There would still need to be a zone change approved by the Planning Commission and the Council. Those six uses are listed here. The educational classes, hiking and biking trails, equine trails, tree canopy tours, canoeing and kayaking launch sites, and nature preserves. And those would be in addition to the existing principal uses in the AN zone, which are agriculture and single-family residential. The last kind of ongoing discussion item is that the staff did have some preferences that were not incorporated. And to be honest, that happens quite a bit. So it's not an unusual thing that the staff's recommendations aren't taken completely and factored in. and especially on a complicated issue such as this, the staff did recommend that a number, six listed here, of uses remain conditional uses in the AR zone. In one case, the use would be moving from now a conditional use to being prohibited, the campgrounds. Those other uses aren't specifically listed today, but might generally be considered under the commercial, non-commercial, outdoor recreation category and go to the board for further consideration. In the AEN zone, the staff suggested listing rock climbing as an option for a conditional use. in the text of the AR and AN zones the staff suggested providing the Board of Adjustments some special provisions which we felt were filing requirements or approval findings that were necessary sort of criteria for the Board to consider when they deliberated on a conditional use and the best examples I could give you would be the Board would need to see an operations plan for a particular use before they move forward or perhaps a traffic analysis so that they had a better understanding of the impact that land use might have on the property and the adjoining properties. And then the last suggestion the staff had put on the table was prohibiting zoological gardens in general in the agricultural zones. In terms of the next steps for the council, I think we've already discussed it. those, so we don't need to reiterate that, but we are available to answer questions either about the next steps or about the text in particular. I know we've focused a lot on where the discussion or debate focused, and there is a lot more to the text amendment, but we're here to help decipher and hopefully break down those pieces so it's not so complicated. Thank you, Tracy. In the interest of time, we've got 50 minutes, and so if the council would hold off on some of their questions. What I'd like to do is I think I'd like to hear from the public because I think if the public may bring some information to the council, the council has questions about if you could limit your time for three minutes each. And I'm going to go ahead and call several names so you can be ready because, again, we've got 50 minutes to try to get through this topic. We first have Susan Speckert, then Dick Murphy, Price Bell, Jim Griggs, then Nick Nicholson, if you would state your name, address, and if there's any organization you're affiliated with. Thank you. Thank you, Chair Mazzotti, Council Members. Susan Speckert on behalf of the Fayette Alliance. My address is 3675 Bowman Mill Road in Lexington, and as I said, I'm the new Executive Director of the Fayette Alliance. I appreciate the opportunity to speak with you today, and first of all, really want to commend everyone who was involved in the drafting of this piece of legislation. It's been a long process, but the scope and the purpose of it required the kind of careful analysis that was put into it. The Fayette Alliance has and continues to support the general intent of the REC-ZOTA. We support expanding recreation and tourism opportunities in our community, including in our rural areas, so long as the intent in each area remains unchanged. With respect to our rural areas, the work group had to carefully balance the needs of agriculture and protection of our natural resources on the one hand with new public access and recreation opportunities on the other. This is no easy task. As you know, our rural landscape is more than just a stunning, beautiful landscape. It's also a critical economic engine in three primary ways. First, we have working farms. Our rural areas support a $2.4 billion agricultural industry that provides one in nine jobs in Fayette County. This industry contributes over $66 million in state income and sales tax, as well as $7 million in occupational license taxes in Fayette County. Second, our rural areas attract visitors and tourism. Our rural areas anchor a tourism and travel industry that contributed over $2 billion in expenditures and supported over 15,000 jobs in 2015 alone. Third, our rural areas attract investments and businesses to Lexington and Fayette County. Our rural landscape helps attract and keep businesses here. As you know, Lexington consistently ranks high on quality of life indicators, and our unique rural landscape and agricultural industries are a major part of what makes Lexington a great place to visit, work, live, and raise a family. While we want to create new ways for people to enjoy the countryside, we all have a stake in ensuring that we do this in a way that doesn't disrupt agriculture or destroy our natural resources. Failure to strike the right balance threatens the very landscape visitors and locals wish to experience. We literally cannot afford to do that. The Fayette Alliance supports the reczota as passed by the Planning Commission, except we believe the six uses that were added as principal uses should be changed back to be conditional uses. Ms. Speckert, I've got your time's up. I'm sorry, I've got to move this. mr murphy thank you very much mr murphy and then price bell jim griggs and mr nicholson thank you madam chairman i'm dick murphy i represent boone creek properties and the clays ferry neighborhood association i think mr carey will yield me his time if i need some more time i'm going to try not to but we want to tell you about the six uses in a.m that the planning commission voted to make principal uses instead of conditional uses there are the educational classes hiking biking trails tree canopy tours nature preserves canoeing and kayaking launch sites i want to tell you a couple facts which led to this number one there is no property in fayette county now zoned ar a an that means that anybody who wants to do one of these uses has to apply for zone change has to pay for thirty four fifty thousand dollars worth of studies of environmental specialists water specialists tree specialists to review those under the guidelines in this ordinance the other fact is an a n zone changes a down zoning there are fewer uses allowed in the a n zone than they are in the ar zone so every a n parcel is going to appear before you because every parcel needs his own change to do a tree canopy tour a hiking trail or whatever we want to avoid a situation what I call the gotcha situation where a property owner comes in applies for his own change to do a hiking trail gets the zone change granted but gets the conditional use turned down that's the worst possible world because not only did they not get their hiking trail approved they got down zoned and they have fewer uses today than they did when they started the process. The Planning Commission felt that since every property was coming before you, you could decide in the zone change decision, which is discretionary with you, when somebody comes up and the only reason they want a zone change is to get a tree canopy tour or a hiking trail, you have enough information to make that decision. You can approve the zone change if you feel that the hiking trail is appropriate. If you don't, you can vote it down. There is no use in going through another level of approval at that point since you are going to have to decide every AN zone change as it comes up to you. We feel very strongly about this. We want to avoid the gotcha situation. And people need some incentive to ask for an AN zone. If there's no incentive, no person is ever going to come before you and ask for that AN zone situation. The issue is who can make that decision. We feel you are clearly capable of making that decision. You make much harder decisions every day you meet up here. We feel you're able to decide whether those particular uses are allowed because you can vote on them, yes or no. Thank you very much. Appreciate it. Thank you, Mr. Murphy. Price bow, please. Good afternoon. My name is Price Bell and I speak on behalf of myself and my family. First and foremost, I want to thank you all for your volunteerism and committing your time to this council and to your passion for our community. Last fall, I watched with fear and curiosity as the Luke Bryant concert unfolded at the winery on the south end of town. That concert occurred because of the accessory use to the principal use of the wine making. Light music at a winery became a huge concert and a major life safety concern for those on the south end of town. Streets being turned into parking lots for basically from the middle afternoon until early the following morning. So I just ask that you consider that slippery slope that exists within the accessory uses. And as you work through this incredibly important ZODA, please consider empowering the AN zone so that the land that is not critical to farming, like the AR zone, can be governed by a separate zone. In addition, please consider making those principal uses conditional uses so that we do not risk another Luke Bryan concert in part of our community that cannot be handled. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Bell. Mr. Jim Griggs, please. And then Mr. Nick Nicholson after that. Hello, my name is Jim Griggs. I live at 600 McCall's Mill Road in Lexington. I was a member of the Board of Adjustment until a year ago. I rotated off after 12 years. I'm opposed to these principal permitted uses in the AN zone. I'm not sure what Mr. Murphy means about a gotcha situation, because someone can change from an AR zone to an AN zone without specifying any recreational uses. and if they're principal permitted uses, there will be no control over them once the zone change is granted. Having an important disruptive commercial use as a principal permitted use keeps us from being able to control it at all at any level. The code enforcement inspects conditional uses on an annual basis. It keeps conditional uses from morphing into something else. The elephant in the room is the zip line that's been built out on Old Richmond Road. There was originally a fishing camp conditional use permit allowed there, 60 members, private, members only. It morphed into, there were, in the Board of Adjustment hearings, there was evidence of retreats, bed and breakfast kind of situation, weddings. They morphed that private Boone Creek fishing camp into a much larger operation. And you're going to have a hard time controlling these things if they're not conditional uses where they're inspected. I hope you won't allow commercial uses to be recreational commercial uses, non-agricultural uses in the AN zone as a principal permitted use. There'll just be no control. Thank you, Mr. Griggs. Mr. Nicholson. And then Mr. Carey. And then Dr. Martin. Good afternoon. Nick Nicholson. I'm here with Stocking and Ogden. We represent a lot of the farms that are in the AR zone. I promise I don't have that much to say. This is just because this Zota process has been going on for so long. But the key point I just want to make very quickly is we're asking you not to basically overload the AR zone with too many uses. If you go back to the very intent of the AR zone, it's only two sentences, so it's a very easy read. but it stresses that a limited amount of conditional uses should go in the AR zone. We do not, as Mr. Bell kind of put it, that we do not want to basically allow a situation to occur next to the key farms that are really the core agricultural and rural landscape of Fayette County to basically have their factory floors interfered with with too many heavy commercial recreational type uses. I'm very glad that Price brought up the Luke Bryan concert, so I don't have to be the only one that kind of mentions that gorilla that was in this room. We represent a farm that had a Breeders' Cup mare that was in full that was 300 feet away from the stage of the Luke Bryan concert. Now imagine trying to call an insurance adjuster and try to explain what just happened to a multimillion-dollar foal because there was a country concert next door to you. Some people just wouldn't really understand how that could possibly happen. And we saw the headlines for, you know, basically days afterwards about how much traffic occurred. And that was because you let something in as a principal use in the AR zone without really fully understanding what the impact could be. And so very briefly, I just wanted to point that out, that when you allow certain uses right next to kind of the core agricultural land, it can have a lasting impact that we don't foresee when we're trying to make these rules. And that's why the intent of the AR zone is so brief, and it keeps it very clear. We want a limited amount of the conditional uses. These are agricultural zone. Keep the AR zone agricultural. Thank you all. Thank you, sir. Mr. Carey? Mr. Murphy, I'm going to let Dr. Charles Martin speak because you've already spoken and then I'll have you finish up. You're going to go instead? Go ahead then. Thank you. Thank you all very much for the time you spent hearing this very delicate and unfortunately controversial issue. I'd like to point out that our zip line is closed and we have not operated. We're in full compliance with the City of Lexington, and we have always operated the Boone Creek Anglers Club and Boone Creek Outdoors in compliance with our permit. I also represent the Clays Ferry Neighborhood Association, and I'd like to point out the difference between the impacts of the interstate and the opportunities of the Kentucky River to my neighborhood from the greater rural area. The AN zone has existed since the early 90s and has had the exact same uses as the AR, and it was intended to promote ecotourism and recreational uses. No land has ever applied to become AN, and that's the reason the uses are the same. Why would you go to a more restrictive zone intended to protect sensitive areas, to agree to a higher level of standards in terms of buffer zones, water quality, runoff, density, usage, for no additional use or benefit. This inaccurate or unreasonable zone overlay in a historically commercial area has held back my neighborhood. There are a multitude of properties that we're very excited about, community hiking trails, fishing access, canoeing and kayaking, bed and breakfasts, which are a use that's not even been discussed. All those are opportunities for the AN area in what I think is the most overlooked and ill-zoned area of our county. And it's also one of the biggest opportunities for us to grow ecotourism to central Kentucky. It's historically the first commercial area west of the Appalachian Mountains. There's a story there that is related to the beginning of the horse business and the beginning of whiskey. And all that would contribute to the tourism opportunities that could promote growth in that area in a positive way. As Mr. Murphy has already pointed out, any zone change would come before this council. And any uses or any results of uses would be subject to the council's restrictions. So there's more oversight at the council level than at any other. And what's more important is that that landowner would be guaranteed to use that use. Right now in the AEN, traditional agriculture is a principal use. Well, that's horribly destructive down there. Cattle, farming, the erosion that happens, the invasive species. This whole thing started with me because I wanted to take better care of land down there that's inappropriate for traditional agriculture. And this was a way to have less impact even than hiking trails. But there's other opportunities that we're missing as well. Please make these use as principle. Thank you, Mr. Carey. Dr. Martin. And then I'll turn this over to Council Member Lamb since you brought this out of committee. Thank you. I'm Charles Martin. I live on Grimes Mill Road in Lexington. Thank you for the opportunity. I handed her a copy of a bill that passed the state legislature with some definitions of zip lines and canopy tours that the state has adopted and that we might want to recommend incorporating. You may have already seen it. I just want to suggest that we have no commercial uses added to agricultural zones if they're not agriculturally related. No uses should be added unless there are conditional uses that require a conditional use permit so the surrounding neighbors have some insight. The intent of the ag zone was to preserve land for a signatory industry. That's horses, but now it's also cattle and row crops, wineries as well. Commercial non-ag uses certainly have detrimental effects on the ag base if not carefully managed. And my property, I think, is a good example of what can happen there. There's no way to distinguish between the multiple ag zones on my property. It is separate but contiguous tracks acquired over 30 years. There's no map showing where the lines could be for the AR or the AN or the AB because it all qualifies. I've got different soil types. There are natural areas on the creek. There are fields with row crops. There are areas for cattle. And there are some areas that are developed with paddocks, waterers, and barns for horses. And I'm on a county line, which makes me a buffer zone. So there's no way to determine which I would ask for in the zone change. But another important point, I think, is that there's no limit as to how many uses one might have on a single piece of property, regardless of the size, be it 10 acres or 100 acres. As written, I might commercialize my entire farm by gerrymandering the zones. I could have canopy tours and canoe launches, pettings, hiking trails, bicycle trails, and ag classes. And then I could make the AEN and use a 50-square-foot gift shop and recreational outfitting equipment, a youth camp, and a zoological garden. Our farm is in the center of hundreds of acres of conservation and PDR easements, which could make real farming difficult. So as proposed, my own 650 acres could overnight really become a commercial venture with no resemblance to agriculture. Be careful, please, not to add uses to any zone that hurt the intent of the zone. And don't add any uses, please, that are not conditional uses. Thank you, Dr. Martin. We're at a disadvantage. I think only about four or five of us got your information. So if you want to give it to the clerk, and perhaps we can look at it later. And now I'll turn this over to Council Member Lamb. You were the one who introduced the topic. I actually took it off the table. So if you want to go ahead and have any questions for the staff or any of the other petitioners, go right ahead. All right. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. I do appreciate all the work that has gone in from everybody in the community. You know, this is how we work, I think. We sit down at the table. We talk about all the issues. Then we come together, and then we try to make a decision. So I do have some questions, and I'm trying to decide on which direction to go. So I want my colleagues to understand that what's before us today is the recommendation from the Planning Commission, but also separately is the staff alternative text for the conditional uses in the AR zone. And I don't know. I've done some homework this weekend and tried to make sure I fully understand that. And so my questions are going to first be on the AR zone conditional uses by the staff alternative techs. And I don't know who of the planning staff would want to answer these questions, but first I want to understand I know that the work group met, you said, 20 times, and the work group submitted to not have any of these conditional uses in the AR zone. And then you said the Planning Commission had three public hearings saying that they didn't, and they voted not to, they rejected to have these conditional uses in the AR zone. Do we know what the vote was of the Planning Commission at the work sessions? We tried to get that information this morning and wasn't able to come up with that. Council Member Land, there's not really a record in that per se of the work session. So as far as the record of how they voted to whether to include these in, there's not a record of that. It was a discussion presented to the Planning Commission, and then they decided whether to include them or not. And in this case, they decided not to include them. Okay. I think that's a discussion for another day about whether there's records of work sessions of Planning Commissions, but we don't have time for that today. But that is definitely going to have to be a discussion of another day because that has to change, I think. But anyway, I think that the fact that the planning staff is bringing something to us that has already been turned down by the work group and the planning commission, I think we have to give that strong consideration and understanding before we vote on that issue. And as it relates to the AN zone, I understand that there are six conditions, there are six uses that need to be switched or that is recommended by the staff to be switched from principal to conditional. And I just want to make a statement that if something is conditional, that you're not limiting that use from being created on that property. If it's principal, you have no say. But if it's conditional, it still can be in place on that property. so I see the benefit of conditional because that way we make sure we look over the entire property and we make sure that we're safe and how we're moving forward and we're following our rural land management plan and all of the recommendations from all the work that the work group has done as well as the majority of the planning commission. Having said that, did you all just recently put something in place with the Board of Adjustment as far as some more restrictions? I don't think we've gotten that recently, but you were talking about the special provisions, about the filing requirements and approval findings. The Planning Commission held a hearing last week about environmentally sensitive areas. and having the Board of Adjustment receive more information for a piece of property if a conditional use is applied for, if it also falls within an environmentally sensitive area, which would be like in a flood plain, 15% slopes. So the Planning Commission did hold a public hearing on that, and they recommended approval. So council will see that in short order. Okay. So there's a lot to consider in this, but I think at the end of the day, I look forward to hearing if anybody else has comments around the dais here. But at this point, I'll be prepared to make a motion before the meeting time expires. Thank you, Council Member Land. Vice Mayor Kay. Thank you, Chair. Jim, a question for you, if I can. the issue of when something is permitted use as opposed to a conditional use. Excuse me. When someone comes forward for a zone change, do they have to indicate exactly what they will do within that zone? When they get the zone change. At the time of a zone change, a development plan is also presented. So that gives a strong indication of how the property is going to actually be used. in an urban zone change, we sometimes run our finger down the list of permitted uses and ask the Planning Commission to restrict those. So there's some options at that time to narrow the focus of how the land is going to be used. And certainly the development plan gives us a strong indication of how they're going to use the property. Okay. And if a zone change is granted and they then don't develop it according to that development plan, Can someone come in and develop that land in another way? Well, the property can be developed according to the development plan, and if they choose not to or someone else develops it, then they can use somebody else's development plan. But if they change the development plan that has been approved by the Planning Commission for that site as part of the zone change, then a new development plan would be presented to the Planning Commission for approval. Okay, so it must come back to the Planning Commission but not to Council. That's right. Thank you. Well, let me kind of back up half a step and say that I think everybody understands that there's been a long and involved effort in getting to the place we are today. And that what we're left with, I think, is a disagreement about whether these uses should be permitted or conditional. The Planning Commission voted 6 to 5 to keep them as permitted uses, overturning the work of the task force and the recommendation of the planning staff. Given that, and given I think that this is what I think we're here to talk about today, I'm going to make a motion to amend the proposal that has come to us from the Planning Commission to return the six uses which they have as permitted uses to conditional uses. So that would change hiking and bicycle trails, equine trails, tree canopy tours, canoeing and kayaking, launch sites, nature preserves, and educational classes to make them conditional uses rather than permitted uses. So move. Is there a motion? Do I have a second? Second. Is there a motion and a second discussion on the motion? I mean, there are other people signed up to speak. Thank you, Chair. There are several people who signed up for questions, I think, before we were ready for motions. So I can speak to the motion, but I have questions before I was ready to do that. Why don't we go ahead and take care of the questions first, if you don't mind, Vice Mayor? And then maybe those questions can be answered, then we can go ahead and vote on the motion. Well, I guess I'm interested in having the discussion focus on that question. And so I don't see that that would prevent anybody from asking questions or making comments. Council Member Bledsoe, do you have a question on the motion then? All right. Go ahead, Council Member. Council Member Senator, do you have a question on the motion? I do. All right. Go ahead. A couple questions going back to this whole notion of going before Board of Adjustments is somehow more protective and better than this body right here. Basically, it's what's been said today from the public. And I take offense to that because I've sat through a lot of zone changes. I sat through zone changes where we've put so many conditions on them that when it goes to the Planning Commission, they end up not doing a development, and it goes away. So I think this body is perfectly capable of making any decision on the AN zone and conditions that do protect what our signature is in the rural landscape. But let me ask this question. It was alluded to earlier, and I think, Jim, you can answer this question. Conditional use. If it goes before Board of Adjustments and they grant a use, who is monitoring if that use, and how often do they monitor if they're meeting that conditional use? If the use is ongoing, then it is monitored annually. By who? It's the zoning enforcement section of the Division of Planning that does those inspections, the same people that inspect zoning issues within the urban area or the rural area. If it's an issue that can be resolved, for instance, the construction of a church, then the monitoring ceases. But if it's a use like something like this, that would be annual. And you all keep a log of annual, and that's in perpetuity. That's forever. That's right. And it's only once a year? Yes. And complaints, where do they go back before Board of Adjustments if someone feels someone's in violation? They would work through our zoning enforcement, and if it appeared to be a violation that could not be addressed through the enforcement process, then that would go back to the Board of Adjustment. Okay, so given the motion that was made, if Council decides to make everything conditional use, we'll have a zone change. And once that zone change is passed, for any type of use, they would have to submit to the Planning Commission and the BOA or just the BOA to get that use and then back to the Planning Commission? How would that process work? In certain cases, the Planning Commission can act as the Board of Adjustment. So when they sought the zone change, they would also ask the Planning Commission for the conditional use at the same time. Okay, and that's what I thought. So, I mean, basically, you know, not everything will go to the BOA. That's right. And so if it doesn't go to the BOA, do you still annually monitor it? Yes. Oh, yes. It's still treated the same way. It's just it's meant to be a concession to the applicant so they don't have to make that extra step. Right. Okay. Very good. Thank you, sir. Thank you, Chair. Thank you. Council Member Bledsoe. Thank you, Chair. Mr. Duncan, I think I need to ask you a few questions. I want to talk more about the accessory uses. It seems like when we have principal uses, we also have automatic accessory uses that come with those. I did not see any, and I could have missed it, accessory uses for the new principal uses if they're passed under the AN zone. Did I miss any, or they don't exist? Tracy would have the details on that. if you have your final report it has the the full text attached and it might take a minute to navigate but 8-14 is the page where the an zone begins the first column um tracy can you tell us what page that's on please 8-14. I'm not sure if it's numbered differently. Okay. The first column shows the intent of the zone and then the principal uses. 8-3C is where accessory uses start. There are a number of accessory uses that are already listed in the AN zone. Some of the new ones would be farm tours, hay rides, petting zoos, and those are indicated with either both a box and then the dashed line underneath. So are those automatic or do you do they ever get approval first? In the way these are listed they would be automatic. If you have a permitted principal use or conditional use. Once the board or planning commission approves a conditional use it is now deemed permitted. If you have a permitted principal use then you are allowed to have accessory uses. Regardless. Regardless. That's what I want to make sure I understand the clarity between those two things. So they exist either way. Okay. Thank you, Chair. Council Member Hanson, is this on the motion? Go ahead. Thank you, Chair. Tracy. Yes, ma'am. The principle and this controversy over principle conditional pertains only to recreational in the agriculture zone, correct? I mean, it's like we're not talking about other uses because recreation would be out of the norm, I would think, in an agricultural area. Correct. So there was not a controversy in the highway service business zone where other recreation uses are listed, like go-karting. There was no discussion about that at the planning commission. And this was what the work group, who had put a great amount of time into it, came up with. What would be conditional, not principal, right? the the text you have before you is what the planning commission right they they voted for a principal use some and they but the work group that worked all those hours recommended conditional uses is that correct that's correct okay and and that was made up of a great number of people. And I guess, you know, my thinking is that conditional, although I'm all about recreation, you know, I love horseback riding. There was a day I would do zip lining and so forth. Not anymore. But I think it has to be on a case-by-case basis to protect our farms. Not, you know, I don't buy, I've said this before, I don't buy the fact that it'll disrupt the horses because we have horses by the airport. You know, if the planes don't disrupt them, you know. But still, in order to preserve our farmland, our identity, I'll support the motion. So thank you. Thank you, Council Member Henson. Council Member Eggers, is your motion? Thank you. I wanted to ask, I guess, Jim. Hi. Do we have any zones that do not have any principal uses? No. All of our zones have at least two principal uses, I would say. Right. I mean, that's what I thought, too. So that's what seems illogical to me, that we would even create a zone that has no principal uses. What would be the benefit of having that zone? Why create the zone without a principal use? Well, it would still have the principal use of agriculture and a single-family residence, so that would not go away. But the difference in the AN, I mean, then why do we have an AN versus an AR if it still has the same principal uses as AR? Why would anyone, why do we have a different designation of AN? Well, we've offered that, of course, as it has been pointed out. No one has taken advantage to change the zone of their property to AEN. But that was developed in the Rural Land Management Plan back in the late 90s as a way of acknowledging that the land that's identified as AEN is different than the core agricultural land. And so, therefore, it's environmentally sensitive and it would need special protections beyond what you would ordinarily think of for rural land. Right. And typically, I mean, my understanding is that AN would not really be suited for normal farming and the like with the Palisades and other areas that are cliffs and such and near the river and that sort of thing. In the packet, and I'm not sure, maybe Tracy, I'm not sure, page 10 for us, but it talks about no retail sale of merchandise. So I just wonder if, was this something recommended by the Planning Commission? Is this recommended by staff? Where does this come in? Let me find that page. I understand we don't want a large box store without naming one in particular in the rural areas. However, if we had a small kayaking outfitter, why couldn't they sell T-shirts and boats and water-safe cameras and the like? I'm sorry, which page are you referring to? It's 10 in our packet, or 10 in the presentation, 26 in our packet. Okay, the slide. Yes. So it says, it's talking about the commercial and non-commercial outdoor facilities that could not have outdoor lighting, loudspeakers, restaurants, food service. Those are current regulations in the AR zone, and those restrictions are meant to protect the character and, I guess, quality of the agricultural area. So no lighting because of the effects on agriculture. Retail and restaurant uses obviously draw additional people. So that could be accessory uses because we have them now, right? We have restaurants. We have hayrides. hayrides, we have corn mazes. How were those allowed, I guess? Good question. Actually, no, the retail sale, merchandise, and restaurants are not permitted as part of this outdoor recreation use. There is an example in Fayette County of the corn maze, and they do offer for sale things, And they have told our staff, and we're still trying to work with them, that that's because the state gave them permission to operate as an agritourism operation. And our division told them that that didn't exclude them from local land use regulations, and they believe it does. So we have additional work to do. there's a possibility that this text amendment with the allowance of a farm gift shop would permit what they're doing. So we don't want to jump to the conclusion of saying, no, you can't do that, and now next year you can. So there was some leeway given while the text amendment was in process. Sure. Okay. I think that that's just important. And I hear people and appreciate the slippery slope argument and that we don't want more Luke Bryan concerts. I don't think anyone here wants that. But it happened, and it was legal to happen. And so I don't know that even if we approve what the Planning Commission recommended, that we can always prevent every potential bad thing that could happen in a zone. And also, I just think that there should be some kind of principal uses. When we're talking about hiking and canoeing and equine trails, biking trails, I don't think that we're going to have 25,000 people blocking the streets to come out and hike or go canoeing in summer months. So I don't think that the sky will fall if it's approved. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Lamb. Thank you. Tracy, I just wanted to clarify something that Council Member Akers was asking. Now, it was my understanding on this comparison table of the AR and AN zones that there are actually eight principle, proposed principle uses in the AN zone, but we're only saying that we're changing six of them. I think that's another excellent question. The Planning Commission considered in depth and the work group did as well. There's been a change in the state law that our zoning ordinance doesn't reflect that permits what we are calling equine related uses and it by definition would allow a riding stable as a principal use. It also, the agriculture definition in KRS 100 allows small farm wineries as a principal use so those are listed in both the AR and the AN as principal uses, where today our regulations don't allow the riding stables. They list them as a conditional use. But horse shows is another example. We require those generally to get a conditional use permit, but state law allows up to 70 participants at a property as a principal use. Okay. I just wanted to make sure, because there's just been a lot of information that we've got in front of us today, and I just want to make sure that we're all on board and that there's no misconceptions, and for the public's purpose, too, that not all of the principal uses are being taken away, just six out of the eight, if by this motion. And for the record, the agricultural use is a general thing. It includes the wineries. It includes the equine-related items, and single-family residential would remain, too. Okay. All right. All right. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, and we'll go back to you, Vice Mayor Kay. Thank you. I guess I just want to reiterate a few points or maybe emphasize a few points. The original intention was to allow for more activity in the rural areas, but always with the understanding that the rural area is what defines this community. This is what makes us special. And we have legislated many different ways to make sure that we protect that rural land. This is one more effort to do the same thing. What we're asking, and what I'm asking with this amendment, is that we allow a second level of safeguard for the rural area. People can come forward, and they can come to the Planning Commission and get a zone change to the AR, the AN. but if they have a specific and they will have to make a specific proposal at that time about the use and then they will have to go to the BOA and make the case that this use is in fact going to protect the rural area. They will also be subject to an annual review to be sure that there's no creep in what they're doing and we've seen some other examples of conditional uses granted by this community, by the usual system, where people have then gone to the edge and over the edge of the use of that particular conditional use. In that case, we have a way to rein them in. So I would urge my colleagues to support the amendment to provide this extra level of safety for our rural lands. Thank you, Chair. Thank you. I'll go ahead and repeat the motion. The motion is to amend the proposal from the Planning Commission to change the six uses to conditional uses rather than permitted uses in the rural recreational ZODA. There's a motion and a second. We're ready for a vote. We've had discussion. All those in favor? No. Those opposed? I think we're short one. Kevin voted for it. He spoke against it. You only have nine here today. Motion passes. And then I'll defer to Council Member Lamb, who has brought this forward, if you'd like to make the motion to approve as amended. You just made the motion, so. That's the amendment to the motion. Now we have to place the amended proposal, I believe. Oh, to report it out? If we want to move it forward onto the docket. Oh, okay. Okay. I get it. I get it. Well, I make a motion that we report it out to the full council. Second. Second. Motion and a second. Any discussion? All those in favor? No. No. I think we need to vote electronically. I'm serious about this. Motion carries. I'll take a motion to adjourn. Thank you all. Okay.