The The End We'll be right back. Thank you. We'll be right back. We'll be right back. Thank you. And we'll begin our meeting with public comment for issues on the agenda. Is there anyone here to speak to items on the agenda? All right. If not, then we can move ahead to docket approval. Is there a motion to approve the docket? I move. Motion by Council Member Farmer, second by Vice Mayor Kaye. Is there any discussion on the motion? Yes, sir. All right. If not, then, oh, wait, there is. Councilman, Mr. Senate? Thank you, Mayor. I have a walk-on that needs to go on the docket for Thursday night. There's a copy of it in front of everybody at your seat. I move to place on the docket for the August 18th, 2016 Councilman, an ordinance directing the Lexington Fett Urban County Government Public Facilities Cooperation to take certain formal actions related to the issuance, authorizing, and approving of mortgage revenue refunding bonds. Courthouse Facilities Project, Series 2006. So moved. Second. Motion by Council Member Stenet and seconded by Council Member Farmer. Is there any discussion on the motion? All right. If not, then we can vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. And then, Mayor, after our presentation on the property taxes, I'll have several motions that will need to go on the DACA for Thursday night. All right. All right. Thank you, sir. Council Member Farmer. Thank you, Mayor. Mine is a motion to place ordinance number one for first reading on without a public hearing. So moved. Second. Motion by Council Member Farmer. Second by Council Member Massadi. Is there any discussion on the motion? All right. If not, then we can vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. Thank you. Council Member Bledsoe. Thank you, Mayor. I have moved to place on the August 18th docket without a public hearing an ordinance changing the zone from a single-family residential zone to a neighborhood business B1 zone, including the variance for the property located at 151 Pasadena Drive. So moved. Motion by Council Member Bledsoe. Second by Council Member Henson. Is there any discussion on the motion? All right. If not, we can vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. All right. All right, that allows us to vote on the original motion to approve the docket. Is there all in favor of the motion to approve the docket? Please indicate by saying aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. Next on our agenda is approving the summary. Is there a motion to approve the summary? I'll move. Motion by Council Member Farmer. Is there a second? Second. Seconded by Council Member Hensley. Is there any discussion? All right. Hearing none, we can vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. All right. Next is new business. Is there a motion to approve? And then I'll ask for discussion. Budget amendments. Did I miss something? Budget amendments. Yep, budget amendments. Sorry about that. Is there a motion to approve? So moved. Second. Motion by Council Member Farmer, second by Vice Mayor Kaye. Is there any discussion on the motion? Council Member Lamb. Thank you, Mayor. Journal number 97593, it has to do with special events, overtime budget. I would assume that would be Ms. Conrad or... There's somebody here who can speak to it. Mr. Reed. Thank you, Monica. It's on page five of the budget amendment summary. Did these overtime reimbursements occur due to expected special event coverage, or were they unexpected? They're generally planned special event coverage that we know that Thursday Night Live will be having, and then they are anticipating their reimbursement expenses. Oh, so their reimbursement expenses. Okay, that answers it, and thank you so much. You're welcome. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Council Member Lamb. Council Member Farmer. Thank you, Mayor. Mine is on Journal 97-516. It's on page 8. It's to reallocate funds from the Leastown Landscaping and Bell House improvements remaining in FY 2016 within the PFC Parks Project Fund. I'm just interested in those who are obviously left over. Where will those funds be appropriated to in that new fund? Hello. Hello. So it's $145,000. What are you going to do? That is correct. The Leastown funds were actually funded in fiscal year 2011. That is for the replacement of trees and signage at the entrance to Masterson Station. That was delayed due to the widening of Leastown Road. We put that out for bid twice, and we're now putting it out on a unit price contract, so that work should begin early fall. So you're just rolling the funds forward for the intended use? That is correct. Thank you very much. Same as Bell House. Thank you, ma'am. Thank you, mayor. All right. Thank you, Council Member Farmer. If there's no further discussion, we can vote on the motion. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. Allows us to move on to new business. Is there a motion to approve new business? Motion by Council Member Stenet, seconded by Council Member Scotchfield. Please sign on for discussion. Council Member Maloney. Thank you, Mayor. I have two. The first one I'd like to talk about is FF. I presume Charlie Lanter is there. Here I'd like to speak about FF, Charlie. Mayor, I just want to, what I'm concerned about is there was a lot of good news this summer, and I was really glad to hear about one of the top cities and all that, and we got the money for the town branch and the Tiger Grant, which I didn't think we could get. I congratulate you on this. One story out there really disturbed me, and that was the story about homeless for children. and all the years that I've been involved in Luskens and Bahamas, we've worked well with the Hope Center for Women and Men and the Salvation Army. But when it comes to kids, it really concerns me to read something like that, and I assume you have the answer, and I'm looking at this money, the priority list of what we do. Children, in my opinion, should be always at the top of every list for homeless. That's just my personal opinion. And I'm just concerned now, when I was in school younger, I knew where there was shelters for homeless people. I went to the West Ministry Home in Varsales, Cleveland Home. There was all those kind of schools there for kids. I don't hear that today for children. And I assume, are there homes out there for kids? And could you clear up that story that was out there? because you're talking 30,000 in Kentucky, 787 here in Lexington homeless children. And to me, that's a disturbance. And I just wanted to see if there's a way that we can make sure that children are always on top of our list, especially for homeless programs, and what are out there. What are we doing to make sure? Are we working with the schools, and what are we doing to help it out? Sure. To speak to the data in particular I think you were concerned about that was reported recently about Fayette County Schools. One reason you see a discrepancy in the homeless data that we've put out and the homeless data that Fayette County Schools has put out is there's a difference in the definition of homelessness between the two groups. We're required to follow the HUD definition. Fayette County Schools uses the Department of Education definition. Department of Education considers you homeless if you are couch surfing, like so you're living with a relative, but it's not your home. So within that 700, 800 number that Fayette County Schools is using, it includes a very large number of those are falling into that sort of second, we call it category two homeless, secondary types. It's not streets. It's not shelter. It's not living in a car. Not that they don't have students who are doing that, but the difference in the numbers, probably by four, three, four hundred, which represents the difference, are different definitions. So they wouldn't, and the challenge, and this is something that frustrates us as much as it does you, that means a lot of those children aren't eligible for federal services. They're not eligible for the HUD homeless assistance programs because they don't meet the HUD definition of homeless, which means they didn't stay in a shelter last night, they didn't sleep on the streets last night, or they didn't sleep in a car last night. So the gap lies in how do you serve those children and students who don't fit that definition. And that's something that we're working on. Unfortunately, that requires funding from sources other than the federal government, so that's something that we're going to have to prioritize with a lot of our local dollars. We are doing that as much as we are able in the federal continuum of care grant that is actually on the agenda today. The local scoring and ranking process for applications actually awards, I want to say, eight, maybe ten priority points for projects that serve priority populations of which children and youth are a priority population. so are veterans, and so are people experiencing chronic homelessness, so people who've been homeless for longer than a year. We are doing what we can to coordinate with Fayette County Schools and improve how, as a community, we're responding to that challenge. Their homeless coordinator is on our Homeless Prevention Board, and I'm actually meeting. She's coming to a committee meeting tomorrow where we'll be reviewing these project applications to rank them and prioritize them. So she'll be really there in the room while we have that conversation. and I appreciate you clearing that up and I know there's what you understand some of the cracks that fall through we know some of these kids don't have the luxury a lot of these kids have other family members to go to some of the children have their grandparents or aunts where do we have faith there will be some that don't have that luxury and that's what happens when you have the Cleveland home when I was down there and the minister down in Fussells we had places. Do we have that here in Lexington for children that fall through those cracks that have no one to go to? So for children who are unaccompanied, so they don't have a parent with them, if they're just on their own basically and they are homeless, they go to Arbor Youth Services here locally. They serve children ages six weeks to up to their 18th birthday. I was over there yesterday. They had several children staying there yesterday. So yes, to answer your question, for emergency shelter purposes. The challenge is long-term transitional housing for those children, transitional housing for youth age 18 to 24 who aren't eligible there. That's the gap. There's no, I don't say no, but there's very few options for that population, particularly those who age out of foster care. They turn 18, they're unable to stay with their foster family. They're essentially homeless by default. That's another challenging population that we're we're looking for housing opportunities for. I appreciate it. The story really disturbed me, but I'm glad you cleared up a lot of it. But to me, that should be our priority, is that the children who are homeless or any way that we can work with the family, and that should be top of the list. I know we've done a tremendous job with the veterans. We've done a tremendous job with the Hope Center for Women and Men, but there's something I've never heard really for children, and that's just something that I hope we don't leave out, and I assume all the council members up here have the same feeling I do. We've got to make sure that these kids have a place to stay and have a career, a chance, and opportunity. Now, my time's up, but I do have a question on another one on here. Do I have to wait, or do I just need to have? Go ahead. Okay, the next one I have is question B. And that's on the rent for Monica. If she could come up. I just want to first of all understand what this is. I think it's great. That's something that I'm glad we're doing. But it goes back to a couple weeks ago, and I don't have any, it has nothing to do with you, but I put in a committee that we see how much money we are spending that we should have got from the schools for our building inspection permits and all that. And from what I've heard, the numbers is amazing. The question I have to you is when I drive around these ballparks in the summer in the baseball field throughout these high schools, I don't see them being used. And I hear we have problems with kids in softballs and places that cannot find anywhere to play. Do we have a relationship where they get – we're giving – this is incredible. I think it's great. We're giving this out. We're giving all this. Do we have the luxury of getting the same what we give out that they give us for our park use for softball, baseball, soccer, any of those on those fields during the summer that we need to help? I hear this for many years now. Do we have a relationship that that's going to happen? We are certainly working with Fayette County Public Schools, not only on the Meadowbrook golf lease, but also with our extended school program or after school program. but at this time we don't have any agreements with field usage, whether that be baseball, softball, football. And see, that's the thing that I hope this council, and why I brought this up, is we are doing a lot of work for the schools to save a lot of money on these permits, which we're the only city in Kentucky. You've got these poor cities that are paying for the inspection. And then we turn around and give all these other great opportunities for these kids, and we cannot use any of their fields. I just hope, Mayor, I assume we have a new superintendent you've met, that we can tear these walls down, that we can use these fields and have these be used in basketball courts and all that. A lot of money that this city is giving out and we're not getting nothing back in return. And I think it's time we start trying to get something back and I hope the school board realize how important we are helping them. and we need also help for for the summer and all that so hopefully this is an eye opener for everybody thank you thank you council member maloney uh council member lamb thank you mayor uh commissioner oh wait a minute i'm sorry just a second council member brown okay all right we'll come back then council member lamb thank you uh commissioner ford i just wanted It's item aye, aye. I'm pretty sure. Is this as a result of the audit, the changes in the positions? Council Member Lamb, not directly related to the audit. These are employees, one long-term, the social worker senior, who assumed a lead social worker responsibility some time back, and this was in our attempt to balance by assignment her workload, reclassify it to a case management coordinator, and then also the administrative specialist. So not directly related to the audit, but we did, of course, take a look at all of our personnel structure while reviewing the audit. Okay. And I really thought they were relative to that because I was going to put a plug in for everybody to know that in our general government social services committee on November 1st, we're actually going to have an overview. I know that Commissioner Ford and the personnel and Division of Adult Intentant Services have been working to address all of the audit items. And I just wanted to make it known that we are going to have further discussion on that in that committee on November 1st. and just wanted to recognize that. So thank you. Thanks. Thank you, Mayor. That's all. Thank you. Council Member Sadi. Thank you, Mayor. I have a question on Item T. I don't know if John Sheet is available or maybe not. I see you are. Thank you. John Shee, this is letter number T on the abatement for the historic courthouse. You've got a total figure of, I guess, $374,000. Is that what you're anticipating in totality on this whole building? It seems like it's kind of low. Don't anticipate any additional charges. What you got before you is just a change order that would allow us to remove a concrete topping, which was placed on top of the original hardwood flooring, which would give us the ability to have it refinished once they start working on the inside. But in terms of the overall work, they're fairly close to finish up, So I think once they're done, they do this change order, you're probably looking at within about a week or two we should be out of there. This is surprisingly low. That's why I say that, because for a building that age to have this price tag. A clarification. What you see in here, it's in relation to the federal and state grants that we received for the initial cleaning. There's a second phase to it that's being handled by the development group over there that handles all the other items. Okay, so this is separate from the revenue abatement then. Okay, because I thought this was a pretty low number, and I thought that's a great number if it's that low. Well, so far, even with their bids, the number's been very, very good. And we've been lucky. The same contractor that's doing our work for us also got the other job, too, and I think it came below the initial estimates. Well, that's good news. We should be in good shape. Thank you. And I have one last question, Mayor. And Ann, I was just curious when the PSOC Center is going to be operational. Ronnie? We have a couple of milestones coming up here. One, September 1st, is the phone system that we've been waiting for, we're promised will be delivered. And then we're lighting the tower that was built out there on the 9th. So we hope very soon after that to start moving into it towards the end of September. Okay. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Council Member Sondy. Council Member Fred Brown. Thank you, Mayor. I'd like for Ms. Conrad Parks, I had a question on B. That's an automatic renewal for the Meadowbrook Golf Course. Yes, sir. I don't know if you've done any research or anybody remembers it, but in the early 2000s, that was supposed to have been in a package deal. We're supposed to have ownership of that Meadowbrook golf course. Are you aware of that? I am not aware of that, Council Member Brown. We have worked with our legal department as well as with the school system. It is terminable within 30 days by either party, but we can certainly... Well, I want to look into the ownership part because we did major land swaps in early 2000 with Tates Creek and the Fayette County system in that we gave them land for a band, for the high school band. We gave them land for the high school baseball property. We give them one of the softball fields right close to the school there. And then we had some Athens land out there. There was a park out there that we swapped some properties. And Meadowbrook was supposed to have been in this deal. And then when I see it's leased here, that means it wasn't in the deal. But maybe the law department has got something. It's been several years. But I think that was part of the deal, that we were going to buy that or it was in the swap. I mean, I don't know if there's any money involved or not, but I'd certainly like somebody to look into it. We will certainly do that and follow up with you. Okay. The other item for you is on ILM. To increase the contract with W.R. Cole and Associates in the amount of $10,350 for three additional windows. What size windows are those? I mean, that's... They are. Those bulletproof? No, sir. Unfortunately, they are not. But in the original quote, three windows were missed in that original quote, and so we had to do a change order to add them. The funds are budgeted. Well, you didn't answer my question. I don't know the size. Three windows for $10,000 is very excessive unless they're large. I didn't get that information in the packet. Sure. I'll be glad to get that information for you. I don't necessarily need it, but I just like for somebody to look at it and make sure $10,000 we're not taking advantage of. Okay. All right. Thank you on that. And then I've got for, let's see, Paulson S. Derek's not here. Just a quick question on that design. It's not my district, but it's the design on the Squires Road sidewalk project. Is that both sides of the street? Just the north side. The south side has sidewalks now. And the north side actually has sidewalks up to the end of this section. So we're actually connecting existing sidewalks. So we're just closing the gap on the north side of Richmond Road? No, on the north side of Squires Road. Oh, okay, okay. Yeah, the south side has sidewalks, and the north sidewalk has it up to this block. So we're just closing that gap. Okay, thank you. And then on V and X and 00 or OO, I think those are all. The question on V, I know we're buying a property, 135 and 137 Elam Park, and it says cost will not exceed $525,000. Is that an appraisal? I mean, that's a pretty expensive property there. There are three properties involved. I'm sorry, 134, 135. And so that will include demolition. That will include satisfying taxes, doing asbestos abatement. Typically, we'll use an appraised price and then some other past historical prices for those other ancillary things and try to operate off of that so we don't have to come back to you guys, stop the process, because we've reached an upset limit. Obviously, the goal is to stay below. Have these been appraised, these three properties? I believe they have been. And I believe we actually have MOUs for at least two of them. Okay. And then are we going to do the other work in-house? Will we be able to demolish in-house? No, we have a demolition contractor that does that. Okay. And then I've got about the same question on X. It looks like 1653 Gale Drive. Is that the same situation? Exactly. I guess that property is a little bit more valuable. It is, but it's not that valuable because we've bought a lot of properties out there already. We pretty much know what the price point is. But, again, that is reflective of a number of a not-to-exceed. That way, as we get into this and we get these properties down, that we don't have to stop in the middle of it and come back to the council. So we're basically establishing a budget for the project. That's all I have. I've got another question on some others, but my time's up. so I'll refer back. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Brown, thank you. Council Member Farmer. Thank you, Mayor. All these new business items and all these maps, what fun. All right, so item K, I'm just interested in Wilson Street. Was this part of another street? I mean, I've been there. I know where this is exactly. Was it part of something different earlier in Lexington's history? So this is a street that at one time or another was used and simply is no longer being used. It sits between Deweese and Elm. Did it ever connect across Elm? At once upon a time, the law is saying, based on their review of the Platt State, once upon a time it did connect. It's been several years since. Oh, yeah. It's not being used now. on. So it's a good item. I was just interested in it. Okay. Thank you, sir, very much. Next is item DD, which is the request for approval of resolution authorizing us to apply for low interest loans for sanitary projects through the Kentucky Infrastructure Authority. Mr. Martin, they are your best friends, and I want to celebrate that with you now. I mean, they have been very good to us. It's been a great working relationship with Kentucky infrastructure authority and that as quickly as we can get these things through the intended use plan that Vernon makes good use of things and gets it built. So yeah, it has been a good thing. And these are good projects you've got listed here for the Commons and Griffingate and things in the Expansion Area 3. Some big numbers there. So congratulations all the way across. Thank you. Glad for you to continue there. And then lastly, I think it's the last three items of business that begin with QQ. So we're moving a lot of money around here. Give me the sum total of all three of these or how you want to number them off. There's just a lot of work being done there, and I'm interested in it. Well, we are looking at a very favorable bond market right now. Yes, sir. And so these are all opportunities for us to save money. And by refinancing the bonds that are callable and are subject to being refinanced. The detention center is going to be over a 10% savings. We will save almost $400,000 a year in reduced debt service. The walked-on AOC for the courthouse is a little under 14% savings. That's $455,000. Our participation in that is about 10%, so we'll save about $45,000. And then we would also like to capitalize before the next Federal Reserve meeting. We would like to go ahead and issue our project bond for this year's capital improvements. Makes great sense. So we're trying to hit the market while it's low. Strikes me you didn't take five weeks off like we did. We've been working, yes, sir. Thank you very much. Actually, not all. I appreciate it. Thank you, Mayor. Yeah, go ahead. Same question, Mr. O'Meara, or just a little unexpanded. Is the QQ, is the $40 million, 085, is that in fiscal year 17's bond package that we've already got? That's everything that was approved in the 17 budget except the sports complex. Which is another $7 million, I believe. Yes, sir. So that's not in this. That is not. And the other two are actually refunding? Correct. what you're doing there? Because they're not real old ones. One of them isn't. One of them is 2006, I believe. Was the other one 2016? SS? Both of them are 2006. 2006? Yes, sir. Well, it's got down there an SS. It says Series 2016C. Is that a misprint? That'll be the new issue for the project. Oh, okay. Okay. Okay. I just tried to wrap it around. Okay. Thank you. All right. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Council Member Brown. Council Member Evans. Thank you, Mayor. I had a question on item 00. That's Charlie, if you could come up real quick. It looks like we were, we got in a bit of trouble. There were some training issues going on. Was it that they weren't trained or the training just wasn't recorded? and has that been rectified or how is it being rectified? It has all been rectified and all been resolved. When EPA showed up, we weren't aware that we were subject to air quality regulations. We're water quality. It became somewhat of a surprise to us that we were supposed to be doing certain things relative to the chlorine and the sulfur dioxide, which is utilized in both plants as part of the treatment process. And the best thing I can discern is that some of that institutional knowledge left somewhere in the early 2000s, because we found a lot of data then and then a gap that started after that. If you read the memo, they even talk about going back to records that were from 1992, and so I'm not surprised we weren't able to put our fingers on those. At the end of the day, as much as I hate the fact that we had a fine, And I think that EPA was very fair with us. If you also read the memo and see what I'm projecting on what it's going to cost us moving forward, they didn't ding us nearly as badly as they could have. And in the end, I think it became a mutual agreement that we recommend that we settle on this matter and move forward in a compliant way. Is that training something that's going to have to occur? How often will that have to occur, and is that going to be something that... It will have to occur annually. and also there will have to be supplemental training for every new employee that comes on that site and is exposed to that. That will impact your budget. Yes, it will. I presume that's going to be. Right. Well, I'm projecting it's $10,000 a year annually in the memo, and that's between both treatment plans. Okay. Thank you, Council Member Evans. Thank you, Charlie. That's all I've signed on to speak in discussion. So we can vote on new business. motion. Is there all in favor of the motion for new business? Please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. That takes us to continuing business and presentations. First, is there a motion for neighborhood development funds, NDFs? So moved. Second. Motion by Vice Mayor Kaye, second by Council Member Henson. Is there any discussion on the motion? All right. If not, we can vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. Next, I'll ask for the committee summary planning and public safety from June 14th. Council Member Massadi. Thank you, Mayor. I believe I already read this out on June 28th when we had the discussion in reference to the ZODA. So this has already been read out, and we have already had motions passed and forwarded and voted upon. So I'm not sure it's necessary that I need to reiterate the committee summary again, unless you feel it necessary. No, I don't. Okay. All right, that's fine, then. We've got it. Next is a presentation by Elizabeth McGee on the fiscal 2017 ad valorem options. I'm sorry? Yeah. I just wanted to, do you remember, Council Member Mazzotti, if that was just the motion on the Rexota or was it the entire? The entire, because I remember referencing Mr. Wells from EKU that did the survey. Okay. I went to length about that. Okay, all righty. Okay, just double checking. If we didn't, we'll get it next time. All right. Thanks. Elizabeth, go ahead. Okay. I'm here to discuss the ad valorem property tax information that we sent out to you over your break on August the 5th. You should have received a packet of our property tax booklet. In addition, we also sent out some information on the urban fund analysis that we've been doing. So this presentation will go over some of our legal requirements, give you a highlight of the calendar, the deadlines involved, and the options that we have done our preliminary calculations for you. So we'll start looking at that. We included in your information the calendar, which sets out the 45-day requirement to set property taxes. The state certified our property assessments on July the 20th, which gives us 45 calendar days to set a property tax rate and be in compliance with all of the existing KRS. For us, that means we must set property tax rates by September the 2nd. Based on that, the calendar that we provided you says that we'll be discussing rates today here at work session, and you'll give your tentative approval. They'll receive first reading at Thursday night's council meeting. We'll do any necessary advertisements for the public hearing on the 19th and the 22nd of this month. And second reading will be at your scheduled council meeting on Tuesday the 30th. And that will also be when we hold our public hearing. The taxing districts that we're going to talk about and we included information are the city's regular general fund property tax rate the urban services and the three services street lights, street cleaning and refuse collection and then our three special taxing districts soil and water conservation, ag extension and the health department Just a little overview of the assessments in the city. For FY 2017, our property value is at $24.8 billion. This is 4.1% more than last year. That 4.1% growth can be broken out into two components. 1.5% is related to new growth. 2.7% is related to reassessments. Our budget assumed a 2.25% growth rate, so this is a little bit higher than we had expected, which is always the way you would prefer to have that go. Because our assessments were higher, the library is entitled to additional allocation from us. We are required to provide them 5 cents for every $100 assessment. So based on the assessments that we received, their allocation from us will go up to $286,520, which is $14.9 million. It's also worthy to note, regardless of what we set our rates, they are entitled to their allocation. So the administration has prepared a couple of different options for you. We have keeping the rates the same, setting the compensating rate, which should give us approximately the same revenue as prior year for existing properties. Option three would be the plus 4% maximum rate. This is the highest rate we can set that doesn't have a potential for voter recall. It does require a public hearing. And then the fourth rate, or option four, is going above the 4% increase. This rate, if we were ever to select it, would be subject to voter recall. There's a separate procedure for that. Within 45 days, if a petition is generated with 10% of the voters of the last presidential election signing it, it could go back before the citizens to vote against or for the rate. So for the general fund, we've prepared three options for you. Keeping the existing rates, which is option one, the compensating rate, which is option two, or the maximum 4% rate, which would be option three. The table that you see here summarizes what all of those rates would be. For option one, they would stay the same. Option two, compensating, would go down slightly. but the personal T rate would increase. Personal T is anything like inventories, airplanes, PSC, personal property, things that aren't real estate. Option three would increase the real estate rate to .082 and also increase the personal T rate. At the bottom, you can see what the impact would be for fund balance. For our purposes, option one would give us an additional $178,000. Option two would lower fund balance by $19,000. And option three would provide us with an additional $783,000. For all three rates, the rate for the abandoned property is remaining the same. For Lexington, this will apply to approximately 117 parcels for this year. And then we've also shown what the impact of those rates would be for an average house of $165,000. Keeping the rates the same, the tax bill for just the general fund portion would be $132. Compensating would be $130.35. And the maximum rate would be $135.30. sense. The administration is recommending keeping the existing property tax rate for both real estate and personalty. Vice Mayor. Council Member Stenet. What we prefer to do, like we've done in the past, is to address each section as we go and not go through the whole presentation. Go ahead and make motions now, just on general services. So if there are questions, we could pause and have those questions answered before I make the motions. Okay, unless there's objection, we'll proceed that way. So that's for section one. Are you ready to make a motion? I am, unless somebody has questions for... Questions or comments on this first section? Yeah, if you could put page 100, that previous... There you go. No questions? Questions, comments? None. Council Member Stinnett. Okay, the first one is I move to set the General Services Fund ad valorem real property tax rate at option one. Second. I have a motion and a second. Is there any discussion on the motion? Seeing none, all those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? That motion carries. All right, number two, and Council Members, these motions are in front of you on your seat. I move to set the General Services Fund ad valorem personal property tax rate, including public service companies, non-commercial aircraft, and non-commercial watercraft at option one. Second. Motion and a second. Discussion on the motion? Seeing none, all in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? The motion carries. Number three, I move to maintain the prior year ad valorem tax rates for motor vehicles, tobacco and storage, agricultural products and storage, insurance companies, capital, and abandoned urban property. So moved. Second. Motion and a second. Any discussion? Seeing none. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? That motion carries. And then last part of General Services, I move to place an ordinance pertaining to these taxes on the docket for Thursday, August 18th, Council meeting. Aye. Motion and a second. Discussion on the motion? Seeing none, all in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? That motion carries. And that's all the general service. Thank you. Okay. We have the next section. Before you see the same setup for the urban services fund, for urban services, we provide you with one additional option, which is option four, the cost of service rate. Those are the rates based on our analysis of our 10-year projection of what it costs us to actually provide these services based on the existing forecasts. For urban fund, this is 90% of the revenue that the whole fund generates, and property owners are only charged for the services that they are actually receiving. Option one, prior rates, maintains the existing property tax rates. It would provide an additional $555,000. Option two, compensating, would lower all three service rates and the public service company rate, which is merely a sum of the three service rates. It would decrease revenue by $241,000. Option three, the maximum 4% increase, would increase all three service rates and the public service company rate. It would generate an additional $1.1 million. And option four, the cost of service rate, it would increase the rates for street lights and street cleaning. It would lower the rate for refuse collection. and again, that's based on the analysis that we provided with you at the beginning of the month, it would generate an additional $2.7 million in revenue. Options 1, 3, and 4 require a public hearing. Option 4 would be subject to voter recall because it goes above the 4% rate for streetlights and street cleaning. We prepared the same analysis based on that average $165,000 house on what these three rates would impact a property owner. Maintaining the existing rates would be $286.77. The compensating rate would be $280.34. The 4% maximum rate is $291.23. and the cost of service rate would be $303.60. Based on our analysis, the administration is recommending option one, maintaining the existing rates. You want to get a motion first and then go to discussion? All right, fine, that's fine. Council Member Massadi, that's fine. Thank you, Mayor. Elizabeth, can you tell us what kind of deficit we're running in the streetlights, because we deal with this every year. Let me flip to the page. For streetlights, based on the unaudited 2016 analysis, it's a $2.2 million deficit for one year. Yes. Our estimate for 2017 takes it to 2.3 for that year. Okay, thank you. Council Member Maloney. Council Member Maloney. My question is on streetlights. As we know, we've had this discussion for the last five, six years. if we were to choose option three on streetlights or option four, how much would that help into where our shortfall is every year on streetlights? How much does that put into it? Do you know? Based on our analysis, it would fund it within the year. You're blocking your face. It would not necessarily deal with the existing negative fund balance that already exists. But that rate is based on looking at a one-year snapshot. So it would fund what is required in that one year. Those services already are at a deficit fund balance. The refuse collection fund balance is helping to keep that boat up, if you will. So it wouldn't do anything looking backwards, but going forward, it would fund the service. And you're speaking to the cost of service rate option number four. Yes. I think he asked about it. Can you get it? I can't hear you. Thank you. Her comments were addressing option four, the cost of service, the .0329. That would fully fund a single year and going forward. Was that the question you asked? It was streetlights. I'm just asking streetlights. Yes, sir. I'm not asking. I know it's going to take a long time to catch up where we are, but how much of a dent we would put in where we have now instead of taking it out of general funds, which we do every year, to offset, how much would this help not tapping into the general funds? It would eliminate the $2.2, $2.3 million transfer that's coming out of the general fund to subsidize the streetlight program. So this would solve a lot of your problems with streetlights? It would solve this year's problem, yes, sir. But we would have to do this every year, increase it every year until when to catch up? Or this is going to be something we have to do like the library and the school board does every year, raise it up to the 5% because we have to keep going, going, going, or just something that is a time in life where it will catch up and if we can leave it there. Or you're just telling me we're going to have to raise it every year. I'm telling you we're predicting you will have to raise it every year. you're limited if you have a zero increase in property tax and the rates go up 5%, then you're going to have a deficit the next year because the electricity rates went up more than your property tax revenues went up. So in order to maintain, you would have to look forward to raising property tax rates to cover the operating and capital expenses that increase each year. So looking at the other ones, I know street cleaning were a little bit behind. Refugees were doing well there. I think we're in good shape there. The only one that we're really behind is street lights. And this will help a little bit next year. When the general fund comes, they will have money there that we won't have to take $2 million out of general funds and we can put it somewhere else. Those are true statements. the one thing I want to clarify is the streetlight property tax revenues are deficient to cover operating expenses as well as capital. So you need a subsidy to cover the rest of the operating expenses as well as any expansion of the streetlights. The street cleaning, your property taxes are covering the operating expenses. It does not generate enough revenue to replace the aging fleet. So you still don't have enough money for your capital outlay for street cleaning program. So just throwing this out there on the street cleaning, if we raise it up to option three, would that be, and I mean, I'm looking at four, just to give an example, for street lights to catch up with street lights. If we do street cleaning and raise it up to option three, would that help considerably for some of the problems we're having in street cleaning? It would help, but in order to cover your capital outlay, you would need to go to option four. Okay. Thank you. All right. Council Member Evans. Thank you, Mayor. And this is perhaps an obvious question, but if we are in the hole that we are in, why is the recommendation not an option that will get us out of the hole or closer to being out of the hole? Sorry, I mean, I just got to ask that question. I promised her that she could do the presentation, and I would help with the questions. As we've had multiple discussions about alternate funding for streetlights, we've talked about the common area streets as well as the neighborhood streets, looking at them as two distinct programs, saying that the subsidy from the general fund to help pay for those common area streets that everyone benefits from had a reliable and a defendable position. And so using that approach, we recommended the same funding this year with property tax for the neighborhoods and the general fund to help fund the cost for the common area streets. In your opinion, is that the most efficient way to do it, though? I mean, I'm still figuring this out. Because if you're being the numbers person, I would think we're looking at numbers as a whole. At least because this is not my forte, and I will admit that. But if we have to look at it from the total, I mean, how are we ever going to get out of that hole if we keep doing what we do? I mean, and I think maybe that's the bigger discussion we're not. I mean, that's the discussion we need to start having because we all get grumpy every time we see this. And this is my third time seeing it. But we have to do something different. And I think the discussion should probably shift to what is that different going to be as opposed to an option that we know is not going to sustain us i took i took that as commentary rather than a question may i mayor you may you know this is like coming back off summer vacation and having an algebra final on the first day um we don't have to we have separate motions for each one of these so we could we could pick different options for each one of them if we so desire correct can you roll down to the next slide please using your 165 000 so under option one people would pay 286 77 in the compensating rate they would still pay 280 34 in the maximum quote unquote rate you go from 286 to 291, and if you went in what I'm just going to call option four, the all-in option, you'd go from $286.77 per year to $303.60 per year for these functions for a house valued at $165,000. You picked that because? Historically, that's been our average. When I reviewed the PVA's website, that was the average sale price for 2015. All right. Roll back to the other one again, if you would, please. Okay. So, there's room for leadership here. There's room for us to make interesting decisions, or decision. And, you know, sometimes you make motions just to shake the tree and see where the boats are, see what's going to happen. And sometimes you just kind of roll out there and see what you can get done. For the amount of time and energy that we as a council have put into talking about streetlights, it is unbelievable to me that we can't make a decision here. But I still have something else I've got to delineate. So the 2.6, how much of that is just the streetlight part, the way that rolls down? Because you don't give us individual numbers there. You're just giving a total. Because refuse goes down, so it's contributing in the other direction. Streetlights has gone up most dramatically. So my assumption is that's most of the 2.6? Yes. I could get that for you. I have information based on the option one rates on what specifically would be generated by service. I don't have it carried out for all three, but we can get that for you. I thought that's what you said, 2.2. That's what? Tell me. Excuse me. But to clarify, option four is cost of service. Right. And so that should cover the subsidy, which is budgeted at $2.3 million for this coming year. Well, then, I think folks understand what cost of service is. And I think we're talking about at a maximum point for all four of these, $17 total difference for the affected taxpayer, and everyone is a taxpayer. for a home of $165,000 in this instance. And, you know, there may be no second for this. But I find public policy, sometimes we confound ourselves by not doing something. And I would prefer to try to do something today. So having couched it in that light and trying to say that this is not that, yes, this is a tax increase, and yes, it is more than people pay now. But, yes, they pay it anyway because we have to find it and fund it anyway. I would make a motion. What about? To set the streetlight category at the nuclear option, option 4, at .329, which is a cost of service option. So moved. Wow. Who was the brave second? Thank you. Jake, we're on the same team again here. What about that? Thank you for that second. we have a motion we have a second motion by councilman farmer second by councilman give is there any discussion on the motion motion discussion on the motion council member standing thank you mayor elizabeth you said you had the numbers for option one for street lights what does that 2.0210 generate street lights would generate 4.4 million 4.46 million dollars okay so 4.46 million so another way councilman reformer and i appreciate what you're trying to do i mean we've talked about this in my committee for years and it is about time we fix this so why not look at a different way why not abolish the property tax and don't raise property tax on anybody but get rid of it and funded 100% out of a general fund that has had $20-plus million fund balances the last three years. Did we look at that? So that means we'd have to find $4.4 million in next year's budget to break even. So why wouldn't we do that when we have surpluses consistently in fund balance? Well, what we would ask is that the council identify where to cut the current year budget by $4.46 million. Not necessarily. We have a fund balance. We know we'll all have here in November, and we can easily use that to balance the budget. So why wasn't that option looked at? Well, I would have to speak against it. I'm sure. Because I'd rather have 2.2 to do what we want with. If we raise this tax, we have free money, basically, that we'll spend somewhere else. Actually, I would approach it a different way. I look at it a different way. To be a structurally balanced budget, your revenues should cover your operating expenses, not going to your savings account to pay your utility bills. So by using fund balance, you're borrowing from your savings account to pay your current operating expenses. So that's why I would be opposed to that approach. And I would disagree with that because we set property tax rates after we balanced the budget fiscal year July 1. We don't have that luxury to go backwards. So the only option we have to get this started down the right path is to use fund balance one time. It's a one-time expense so that next year when we create a budget before July 1, we can incorporate the cost of streetlights in our budget. So I would disagree with that assessment. We have to use it one time. I can live with that. But it gets us on the right path, and it gets us on a path that everyone pays for streetlights because every single person in Fayette County uses streetlights. Whether they're on your street or not, you're driving places where they're at. So I would vote no against Councilman Farmer's motion. Thank you, Mayor. Vice Mayor Kaye, wait a minute. Has everybody signed up? Have you all signed up? You've signed up for this? Wait a minute. Let me ask a question. Have you all signed up to speak to this motion? I was originally signed up to speak to the class of this. I raised my hand. It's okay. Okay. Can you answer? All right. I'm going to. Councilman Farmer Kaye. I mean, Vice Mayor Kay, and then okay. Same response, actually. I was originally signed up to speak to this, but I want to speak to the amendment. Okay. So I think this is a policy question. and what we're getting, I think the recommendation from the administration is that we think about the streetlights in particular as a service that goes specifically to some people and that part of that service goes to everybody and so I don't think of it as a deficit that is made up by the general fund I think of it as we fund the streetlights primarily through property tax, and we also fund part of it with the general fund. It's not a deficit. It's not a hole to be made up. It's not a problem. We've had this discussion any number of times. So I would vote against the motion, and I would urge council members to think about this as not an ongoing problem, but as a decision that we've made about how to use the funds that we have to provide the services that we've said we'll provide. Some of it from property tax, some of it from general services. In my mind, not a problem. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Council Member Scotchfield. Thank you, Mayor. You know, I look at this, and every year, obviously, we've talked about streetlights. One of the things that we know for certain, not everybody in the city pays taxes for streetlights, correct? Correct. Okay. But everybody benefits from those streetlights, correct? Or, I mean, that's up to somebody's interpretation, I guess. But I would assume that if I'm looking for a restaurant and there's streetlights there, that's good. If somebody's looking for a nonprofit, that's great because we have streetlights. Those nonprofits don't pay taxes, correct? We have a lot of large organizations in the city that don't pay taxes, like the University of Kentucky, who enjoy a lot of assistance from streetlights. So we start out with not everybody pays the taxes for streetlights. And so the whole benefits from it. Number two, I come back to what I had mentioned to Council Member Stenet and Vice Mayor Kay just mentioned. How can we increase taxes when we didn't return the fund balance to the taxpayers? They paid that, and we had money left over. I just, I can't, you don't increase taxes when you didn't spend all your money the year before, especially if you're not going to return it to the taxpayers that paid the money. That's all I have to say. All right. Who else wants to speak? Councilmember Maloney? I just want to give a little history here. We brought this up about four years ago, three years ago, when I was on the administration side. And we brought a proposal to do a Band-Aid fix for at least eight years. And part of that was to raise the franchise fees. And we, the council, voted for an increase on the raised franchise fees. That money now on the franchise fees is about $6 or $7 million, close to whatever. We're using $2 of that million every year out of there to keep paying for it. As the year goes along, we're going to have to take a little bit more out of it. What I want to do is when the time comes that we're taking too much out of the franchise fees, And then we look at probably raising something or fixing this problem when the time is right. But right now, I can't sit here in good conscience when we already made taxpayers, or we don't like to call it taxpayers, but the franchise fee, we increased it for this reason, to help with the streetlights. And it is doing okay. We are still four or five years away from maxing out to that number. But we've got to fix this problem. And when that time comes, and this is why we're good to be talking about it now, and it's going to come, which doesn't take long for four years to come around. So I tell my colleagues that we don't need to raise the tax right now. We did this three years ago. Some of you on the council were there. And I don't think they want to raise it again after what the real reason was to raise it. and I brought this proposal with the administration to raise this tax to fix this problem temporarily. It is being fixed temporarily. So when the time comes, we will have to do something. But I don't think we have to do it now. So I will not support this motion. Who else? Councilman Fred Brown. Thank you, Mayor. I've got maybe a legal question here. This is the Urban Services Fund. Can we dissect this and pick and choose in this particular fund? Under Kentucky law, if you raise a tax for a specific purpose, you're not allowed to spend it on something else. And in this case, you have it segregated out where you're specifically charging for the streetlight as a segregated category. So you can't, in turn, if you're suggesting we have perhaps more money in the refuse collection account, because that was not raised under the pretext of paying for streetlights. You're not allowed to switch the categories that it's paid. So the motion is moot point then, isn't it? If we can't. I think his motion was to go ahead and increase the streetlight fee component all the way up to the maximum. Yeah. That would not impact any of the other segregated categories. Well, we can do that legally then. Oh, yes, sir. Yes, sir. Okay. Okay. That's where I'm talking about picking and choosing. So I think the, and I think it's been alluded to, I think it's very difficult, and I'm not going to support your motion, Mr. Farmer. but it's very difficult to raise anything when you've got a fund balance that we've had the last couple of years and until we get to that point that that fund balance is not going to cover us and we get then we need to maybe address this so I don't mean to kick the can down the road I just think it's not the appropriate time and I think the administration has already acknowledged that by giving us the option one. So that's what I'm supporting. Thank you. Who else wishes to speak? Council Member Hensley. Thank you, Mayor. I kind of like Council Member Farmer's motion because in the 12th district we pay more taxes than any other district in the county, and we need more fire, we need more police, and that only comes out of the general services fund. And so if we were to accept a deferment to spend that money on the general services fund, then we're never going to get that. So it's a priorities issue. So while I don't generally like the idea of raising a tax, this to me puts the cost center to where it is versus us bearing that in the 12th district. Thank you. All right. Anybody else? Nobody else? All right, then we can vote on the motion. All in favor of the motion, please indicate by saying aye. And voting electronically, it looks like. Opposed, no. Surprisingly, the no's have it. All right, the motion fails. Thank you for a good discussion. Yes, sir. Yep, all right. Next. Next. Ready? Yes, sir. Since we're making motions, Mayor, I'll go ahead and move to set the Urban Services Fund Refuge Collection. I have a low on real property tax rate at option one. Second. All right, motion by Council Member Stendent, seconded by Council Member Fred Brown. Is there any discussion on the motion? Any discussion on the motion? All right, hearing none, then we can vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. Thank you, Mayor. I move to set the Urban Services Fund Streetlights, Avalorum Real Property Tax, at Option 1. Motion by Council Member Stenet, seconded by Vice Mayor Kaye. Is there any discussion on the motion? Hearing none, we can vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. No. Motion carries. And number three, I move to set the Urban Services Fund Street Cleaning, Avalorum Real Property Tax Rate, at Option 1. Seconded by Court. Motion by Council Member Stenet, seconded by Council Member Henson. Is there any discussion? If not, we can vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. And then I move to set the Urban Service Fund Public Service Company's ad valorem tax rate at .1738. Second. Motion by Council Member Stenet, seconded by Council Member Fred Brown. Is there any discussion on the motion? If not, we can vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. And then last, I further move to place an ordinance pertaining to these taxes on the docket for the Thursday, August 18, 2016 council meeting. Motion by Council Member Stenett, second by Council Member Henson. Any discussion? All right, we can vote then. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Council Member Stenning. Okay. Lizzie. That brings us to our special tax districts. We have 30 tax districts, soil and water conservation, agricultural extension, and the health department. We'll deal with the easiest two first. Agricultural extension and the health department have requested to maintain their existing rates for this fiscal year. The extension would like a real property rate of .0035 and a personal property tax rate of .0038. Health Department is requesting a real property and a personal property tax rate of .028. Soil and water conservation currently has a tax rate of .000516. 516 that because of the limits of our existing billing software, we only bill the taxpayer at .0005. We've been doing that in an attempt to, year after year, increase their rates so that they can eventually get to .0006. The taxing district this year, they have not received an increase for the last two years. They did not request one last year, and they were not given one the year before. So they have decided their board has elected to request from you a tax rate of .0006 for this year. A little bit of background on this. You can see the existing rate of 516 and the rate that we bill. The way the state calculates compensating and the maximum 4% rate, they don't consider anything lower than .001. In the KRS, the definition of compensating, that is the lowest threshold. So due to that, according to the state, that is the lowest tax rate that they even acknowledge. For that reason, the 4% rate and compensating rate don't apply to them in the same way as they do to other districts. So the .006 rate doesn't trigger that threshold. So they are hoping that you will approve this .0006 rate so they can get to that next level, and that should sustain them. Any questions about them? All right. Thank you, Elizabeth. Bill? Oh, I thought you were coming up to the podium. You are coming up to the podium. All right. Well, Sally asked me to maybe clarify. The soil and water conservation is currently at 0005. This is all about decimals. Their adopted rate goes two more beyond that, which we cannot bill that far, nor does the state recognize. So they are asking for an increase from .0005 to .0006. The point that Elizabeth was making is because of only going out three decimal points at the state level, that tax increase does not trigger the 4% for voter recall as other taxes would. Is that clear as much? Okay. All right. Vice Mayor. Wait a minute. Is this? Maybe I'll sign up for this. All right. Council Member Lamb first. Thank you, Mayor. This isn't my first rodeo with this soil and conservation, and it has been an interesting one for a long time in my mind. So I know you provided us specific information about the total amounts on an average tax bill, but we don't have anything for this. I think that really puts it into perspective. Oh, you do have something in. We have applied these rates for all of the previous rates that you have approved, soil and water extension and health. I can tell you the difference from what the taxpayer is currently being billed at .005 and .006. The difference is approximately 16 cents. And so I guess my question is, what would be, and not that I'm advocating for this, but it's just an educational question, what would be the most, even though they just asked for .0006, what would be the most that they could be given? Would it be the .001 at the point that the state recognizes it? Our tax bill would reflect the .0006. Because that's what they requested. And that is what our software allows, that many decimal points. Will it recognize three decimal points? Yes. Okay. So I guess my question would be, if the soil and water conservation didn't ask for anything other than the .0006, does the council have any purview of doing anything other than what they ask? And I'll look at Mr. Barbary. Under the statute, they're supposed to submit a budget, and so if they're not able to fully fund, you're supposed to have some discourse about how they would make up that funding shortfall. And it's not real clear under the statute. There's no real winner on it, and you all ultimately get to approve whatever it ends up being. But the idea under the statute would be that if they can't balance their budget off of the revenue that comes in from the tax, if the tax is the way you all are going to fund it, that there might have to be some other discussion about how that might get funded. Now, I think in the past you all have simply said you're not going to fund them at that budget level if they've asked for more, and they've just made do with what you all are budgeting for. Okay. All right. Well, I guess I'll reserve my comments for later and let everybody else have their piece, and thank you. All right. Council Member Stennett. Mayor, I was going to make the motions, but I'll hold off and let the other folks ask their questions. Council Member Henson. Thank you, Mayor. Elizabeth, you said this would generate 16 cents. It's 16 cents difference for a $165,000 house. The 0006 would generate approximately $150,000. For the agency as a whole. For? For soil and water. Now, I know this is the current rate, right, .00516. But we can only bill at the .0005. Correct. But their goal is to get .26. Yes. So at this rate, how long will it take us? It's hard to say for certain because the amount they're able to increase depends on what the assessments actually are. I would ballpark it at least another four or five years, if not more. So, and someone may have already asked this question. Could we just go on and jump it up to .0006? That is what they are requesting, yes. And then we would bill at that rate? Yes. That would solve? This incremental rate that we've been going through. And would they generate more revenue than they need? That is a question they would have to answer. I believe that there is someone here to answer that part. Thanks. All right. My name is John James. I'm a supervisor on the board. In answer to your question a moment ago, I believe Jennifer said that our revenue would then be $145,000. That's roughly a $30,000 increase from previous years at the .0005 rate. How much of an increase? I'm sorry. $30,000. Okay. give or take a few hundred. And then as for the whether or not that's enough money, I mean, we could definitely find outlets for more because we're trying to be active in schools with education about conservation. We're trying to create a county cost share program within Fayette County for the landowners to do improvements on their farms that would in turn, you know, like one topic is to put rock in their driveways so that mud doesn't get out on the public road. So what's your current budget total? It was under $115,000. So this would generate $30,000? About $30,000 more, yes. So that would be like a third of your current budget increase. Yeah. Okay. All right. Thank you. You're welcome. Thank you, Elizabeth. Council Member Hensley. Okay. Thank you. Just a point of clarification in my mind. You said you used $165,000 because of the average price of a house sold last year. Correct. So it's not the median house value in Fayette County. That's just the median of the sales turned over last year. I believe in the past it has also been approximately an average house. I could not get any information on what that value was, but I could verify that it is the same as the average sale price. I just wanted to frame the conversation because, I mean, we're talking about the PVA doing a couple billion dollars in assessments on I believe $165,000 median house value for Fayette County is low, way low in my mind. Maybe I'm wrong. I'm not a realtor. We've got one here. And so I just wanted to throw that out there. That's the only comment I had. I mean, I think for the context of having this conversation, we should be talking about the median house values of Fayette County, not the median house values of property sold last year. So it's a different conversation. Councilmember Stenet. Thank you, Mayor. Now, I'll just say to follow up to that, it's actually David O'Neill sends that out. It's 168 for this past year. So it's the median property tax bill, not what they sold at, but just the property tax bill on which they pay taxes on. So I agree the market values probably are a lot higher than 165 or 168. I move to set the health ad valorem real property tax rate at .028 and health ad valorem personal property tax rate at .028. So move. Motion by Council Member Stennett, second by Council Member Henson. Is there any discussion on the motion? All right, if not. Can you put that other back out? What's the question, Jennifer? I just asked him to put that out. Oh, okay. All right. All right, if there's not, then we can vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. Okay, working our way down the list, I move to set the soil and water conservation ad valorem real property tax rate at .0006. Second. Motion by Council Member Stennett. Seconded by Vice Mayor Kaye. Is there any discussion on the motion? All right. If not, we can vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. No. All right. Let's show that electronically then. All right. Motion does carry. All right. Number three, I move to set the extension ad valorem property tax rate, I'm sorry, real property tax rate at .0035 and extension ad valorem personal property tax rate at .0038. Second. Motion by Council Member Stennett, second by Council Member Farmer. Is there any discussion? All right. If not, we can vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. I further move to place ordinances pertaining to these taxes on the docket for the Thursday, August 18, 2016 council meeting. Second. Motion by Council Member Stenet, seconded by Council Member Farmer. Is there any discussion on the motion? All right. If not, we can vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. And then last, I further move to schedule a public hearing related to the ad valorem tax rates for Tuesday, August the 30th, at 5 p.m., which is our next scheduled council meeting after this Thursday night. Second. Motion by Council Member Stennett. Second by Council Member Farmer. Is there any discussion on the motion? I have no question. All right. Council Member Henson. And this public hearing has already been advertised, correct? No, but it will. It's a regular council meeting anyway, so it's our normal scheduled monthly council meeting. It's already on our calendar. And it's for the... Tuesday the 30th. Yeah, with our calendar this year, we had to have another Thursday night, but we couldn't. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. If there's no further discussion, we can vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. All right, thank you, Council Member Stenet. Next on our agenda. Thank you, Elizabeth. Thank you, Bill. Next on our agenda is the presentation from Woodsongs. Council Member Farmer, you want to introduce? Yes, thank you, Mayor. Yes, sir. You know, it's easy to ask the question, who fills the house every time in downtown Lexington and who has some one and dones? people would say that's Coach Kapp. But I always say to you, it's Michael Jonathan, who has done more to bring people to downtown Lexington. At this point, to the Lyric, and before that, to the Kentucky, he's been one of the... He's done a great job in bringing people to downtown every Monday night and creating an event that is famous worldwide. And he wanted to give us a little update on that, and so we asked him to come and be with us. I'm sorry you're without accompaniment, but we're glad to have you, sir. Last time I did this, I had my banjo, and you made me promise not to do that again. I forgot that. Thank you very much. I have only good news, and I'm not asking for anything. And I'm going to make this as brief as I can, because I know that you all have some very important matters to discuss. But about four years ago, with the help of Mayor Gray and by the invitation of Councilman Farmer and also with the help of Ed Lane, it was suggested that Woodsong's move to the Lyric Theater which was struggling with the events and such at the time and would we help reinvigorate the image of the Lyric that part of downtown to just represent the whole public impression of what is a beautiful theater a wonderful safe neighborhood which has, oddly enough, plenty of parking. And all of that were the opposite impression of the Lyric at the time. Since then, we're ending our first four years here in December, and by the time December comes around, Wood Songs will have attracted about 40,000 people through the doors of the Lyric Theater. And this is my update for you. Wood Songs, Monday night, downtown, during dinner time, during rush hour traffic, hundreds of people line up to see essentially artists they don't know sing songs they've never heard before. It is the greatest expression of love, which is the driving force of every hometown. Love is the driving force of the arts. It's the driving force of everything worthwhile, and Wood Songs is an expression of that, and let me explain why. I get nothing, zero, for doing wood songs. Nothing. The 30-member crew are all volunteers. They do 44 productions a year for free. Congressman Brown was just there last Monday, and he saw it in action. They are a wonderful family of people that have been incredibly loyal. The head of our volunteer crew is Ms. Roz in that beautiful, colorful jacket. She represents the passion of our hometown, and she is the mother hen of this amazing volunteer crew. The TV directors, the audio engineers, the people who work the stage, the attendants, the folks that take care of the audience when they come in are all volunteers. The artists who come on the show are not paid a penny. They don't even get a travel stipend, and yet Judy Collins was just here for her sixth time. The most awarded woman in blues, Genova Magnus, the BB King Entertainer of the Year was there last night. That was her seventh time. They don't get anything. With Visit Lex and Mary Quinn Raymer and the Bluegrass Hospitality Association, our hometown offers all of these artists beautiful first-class hotel rooms for free. Every artist, every person in the band is welcomed to Lexington with a beautiful 21C to the Clarion. There's about eight hotels that participate in rotation. Not only that, but every Monday, a hometown restaurant, whether it's the Lexington Diner or any of the other, about 12 other restaurants that support the Wood Songs, bring dinners down, not just for the artists, but for the entire 30-member crew. And they do this for free. Here's the amazing part. Wood Songs airs on 514 radio stations. This is an international commercial to come visit Lexington on a live audience broadcast happening in Lexington, put on by Lexington people from Australia to Austin to Boston to Dublin, Ireland. Speaking of Dublin, Wood Songs went to Dublin to do a live broadcast from there, and 2,000 people showed up at the National Convention Center to see this Lexington, Kentucky broadcast that came to their hometown. It goes free to public radio. Working with KET, Woodsongs airs on 97 million homes across the United States for free. Woodsongs also airs on American Forces Radio Network. That puts Wood songs on the radio in 173 nations, plus every single military base in the world, U.S. naval ship in the world, Coast Guard vessels sailing in North America twice every weekend. And the show has been so successful on American Forces Radio that they have added the show. It's on the main channel, The Voice. They have added it to a second channel as well. So we're on the air on two radio stations from South Korea to Kuwait, from Brazil to Russia, wherever American Forces Radio airs. And this is a very beautiful, positive presentation of our hometown because it's put on with love. There is virtually no financial transactions going on short of a few members of the audience. Because most of the audience comes free. They're called Wood Song's Partners. Wood Song's does all of this on a weekly ticket income of just under $320 a week. And every week when they come in, just before the broadcast starts, they are welcomed to Lexington. About 30% of our audience is from outside of Fayette County. They're welcomed to Lexington in this beautiful historic theater by a recording by Mayor Gray, welcoming them to the Lyric Theater in our hometown of Lexington. So in the four years that we've been there, when we got there in 2011, the Lyric only had about 90 events scheduled. This past year, they had 450. The Lyric Theater has generated almost $12,000 just in ticket service fees alone from Woodsong's being there and bringing all these people in. Venues and things like the Lyric Theater do not invest in artists. They do not invest in concerts. The business model has changed. What they invest in is audiences. and Wood Songs has successfully attracted a massive audience and this audience comes from all over the United States to be part of our broadcast every week at this gorgeous theater. Another thing that we've done that I want you to know about is Wood Songs has started a program of education in schools all over North America. A team of teachers, college instructors, take select broadcasts of wood songs, and they write lesson plans to the shows for middle school, high school, and college level. This has become huge among teachers and especially homeschool families across the United States that have nothing. They get this for free. You want to introduce your kids to the banjo? We have Baila Fleck and Abigail Washburn. You want to introduce them to traditional American jazz? We have Preservation Hall Jazz Band. Bluegrass, we have J.D. Crow and Doyle Lawson. The best of the best come on wood songs, and this is offered to schools, all emanating from Lexington, and every single educational broadcast begins with a thank you and invitation to our hometown of Lexington. It is truly the crossroads of America's folk and bluegrass music. It is the gateway city to the beautiful Appalachians, and it is the home of great art and music and families, and that's how Wood Songs presents this magnificent hometown and especially this very historic theater that is staffed with incredibly caring, loving people that has made Wood Songs as a guest in their venue very welcome, but most of all, extremely successful. That's all I've got to say. Thank you. I'll answer anything you want. Thanks, Michael. Thank you. If nobody has any questions, I'll leave you to your popcorn. Councilmember James Brown. Thank you, Mayor. No, I just wanted to say thank you for Wood Songs and all that you do. I came out, I think it was the Monday before last, and I'm hard to impress. I was thoroughly impressed with the production, with the show, and really the volunteers is what impressed me most. You said it's about 30 volunteers. I got a tour of the facility. And, you know, to volunteer your time to come on a Monday and put on a production, I think it speaks more to service and the love for music and what wood songs brings to the community. And you said you don't get anything out of it. I beg to differ. I think you get the opportunity to stand in front of a crowd with your banjo and go bizarre. That can usually frighten them away, though. Now, I want to do explain, you know, I don't get anything for wood songs. I do make a really good living as a musician and artist, and what we're doing is to give you a sample of my latest album, which I recorded with a 61-piece symphony, to just simply show you that what I do to support my home and my wife and my baby twins that turned two years old this week is completely separate from Wood Song. I am also one of the volunteers that make it happen. No, but, yeah, I was thoroughly impressed by your showmanship and Ms. Roz's assistance in helping you put the show on. But I think that, you know, I appreciate Council Member Farmer and Council Member Ad Lane for bringing this forward. And I know Commissioner Ford was chair of the Lyric Board when Wood Songs first was introduced. And I think that the mutual benefit that Wood Songs gets in the Lyric gets from this partnership is just a benefit to the community and Lexington as a whole. So thank you for all you do. It's been a wonderful experience. We missed the Kentucky Theater, but since moving to the Lyric, what you created in that venue is a state-of-the-art home for national touring artists. A separate thing that I do for our hometown is another volunteer-run project called the Troubadour Concert Series. And it brings concerts to the Opera House. This year we've had everyone from Dwight Yoakam to Greg Allman. On my way here we confirmed that Chris Isaac is coming to Lexington as part of the Troubadour series. And the Lyric Theater is part of that venue. That's a strong income generator for the Lyric Theater. But also it's volunteer run, much like Woodson. Councilman Bledsoe. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you for your presentation. I was most interested in the Southland Drive project. Oh, was that included? Can I describe my thought on that? Love generates an audience. An audience has wallets, which is why maintaining an audience is the right business plan for the arts. That's how it works. We are sitting on a powder keg of positive tourism on Southland Drive because you have every single music store in Fayette County is there. You've got Good Foods Co-op. Once upon a time, you had Southland Drive, which was my idea to the south. I'm not taking credit for it. Well, yeah, I am. There was a beautiful thing that attracted like 500, 600, 800 people on a Tuesday night to Southland Drive. Now you have Willie's locally known out there. It is a music avenue. It's Lexington's version of Bardstown Avenue, but it's not being utilized. And I think you can attract some of the 59 million bluegrass fans that the United States Census buys and pays money for bluegrass music if you nickname Southland Avenue Bluegrass Avenue. And every single block you dedicate to some of these amazing bluegrass artists that worked here are from here. You've got J.D. Crowe. Ricky Skaggs lived here. Bela Fleck lived here. Bill Monroe worked here. Did you know Flatt and Scruggs had a radio show that they did every week on WVLK? This is the Beverly Hills theme song people. One of the heroes of the Grand Ole Opry, Stringbean, had a TV show on WLEX. You have all of these amazing artists with Lexington connections, and I guarantee you as a tourist attraction, if you do what I say on that proposal, you will attract tens of thousands of Bluegrass fans a year to stop in Lexington and come visit Southland Avenue, the restaurants, the music stores, everything that is there, if you turn it into Bluegrass Avenue. You don't have to change the legal name. You just nickname it that. And if you banner every single block, If you crowdfund statues like they did with Merle Watson in North Carolina, they made a little statue next to a park bench, and people come and take their pictures next to Merle's statue. And you're talking about tens of thousands of people a year sit on that bench. They did that with Mayberry in Mount Airy. Everybody wants to come and do that. And if you look at our hometown with excitement and power and passion and love, you can explode the tourism dollars here. And I think Woodsongs is just an example that it does happen and it can happen. And we are one of the most creative communities in North America. I know because I tour all over North America. This place, bar none, is one of the greatest. I think you're right. And I'll just make two observations. One, the mayor and the council so graciously have put $2 million in the budget for Southland sidewalks. Well, I didn't know that. Which is coming. So that's a great time. And then two, the Southland Association, we took there this morning. They meet monthly, and they love the idea. Is Phil Wyatt still on there? It's still there. And they meet at Good Foods Co-op on Tuesday mornings at 8 a.m., which is a little early. But they were very interested. So I would encourage maybe you to come to one of those meetings and have that conversation because the Southland Association is trying to raise money for the amenities like bunches, like marks. And the Corridors Commission, thank you to my friends in the Corridors Commission, provided a grant to work on new signage for entrance into Southland Drive. So that conversation that you bring is very appropriate and timely to this. Well, there's a lot of exciting possibilities. And remember, this massive international audience have wallets, and they will open those wallets if you can get them here to Lexington. I think it's great. I'll invite you. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Bledsoe. Michael, thank you so much. Thank you, Mayor. Yes, sir. Oh, Council Member Lamb, did you have something? I just wanted to say. Michael, sorry, one more. Michael. Michael, Michael, one more comment. I have two things to say to you. Thank you for being a member of our community, and thank you for continuing to be the volunteer and to show what our community represents and making a difference in so many different peoples' lives, and I appreciate that very much. I appreciate you saying so, and I will say that this volunteer crew, that this amazing woman with this brilliant smile, Mother Hens, that story has yet to be told on a national level. It is an amazing story. Wood Songs is the only all-volunteer-run, multi-formatted, fully syndicated international broadcast in history, And it happens at the Lyric Theater in our hometown every Monday night. Thank you, everybody. Thanks again, Michael, so much. All right. That allows us to move on to council reports. So the floor is available for council reports now. Council Member Gibbs. Before, let me make one comment before we start council reports. I just want to extend congratulations to Council Member Siobhan Akers. She's not here today. but to Siobhan and her husband, Jared Downing, and to now big brother, Hayden, on the birth of Emerson Drew Downing, who was born on the morning of August the 3rd. And we're all glad to hear mother and baby are doing well. All right. Council Member Gibbs. Thank you, Mayor. Charlie Einter's office has launched a campaign called Change for the Better, And I'd like Charlie to come up and say a few words about it if he doesn't mind. And Chris has got the cards to put up. They're already up. Thank you, Chris. Thank you, Council Member Gibbs. The number one call we get in our office, the number one email, the number one letter, the number one stop by and ask is what do we do about panhandling? And our office does not tackle the issue of legality. That would be a question for someone else. But what we did want to do is provide an answer for folks. The question we get is, should I give when someone asks? And our position as an office, and we've talked about this with our board, is that this giving cash to someone who asks on the street is not helpful. It can actually be harmful. A large percentage of those individuals are seeking funds to fuel their substance use or abuse. And the services that they're seeking are available. So we wanted to find a way to educate the public on that, and we developed this campaign. We have printed 10,000 cards using this change for the better concept. One side of the card explains to the giver, the driver, whoever, reasons why giving to a panhandler can be harmful, can actually undermine efforts to help that individual, and then suggest that they would be better served to make those donations to a charitable organization. On the reverse side of the card, there are basically a breakdown of shelter, meals, other forms of assistance, as well as the 211 contact hotline for resource referral. And the idea is that someone could keep these cards with them, pass them out of their car window or in a parking lot if they're asked for money, instead of giving cash, which can be quite harmful. We have had a lot of interest in these. We printed 10,000. I thought that would last six months. It's almost gone. Anyone who's interested in these cards, please contact our office, the Office of Homelessness. We'll mail them. We'll drop them by. We'd love to get them to churches, businesses, individuals. We've been very busy distributing these. They're very popular. I'd be glad to answer if there's any questions. No, thanks, Charlie. Anybody? I got a question. I'm glad you brought that up, and I appreciate you bringing this up, because I know that right now we can't do anything because it's in the Supreme Court, the place cannot enforce this. I heard there is an ordinance out there, but from law telling me that we cannot enforce it now because it's the Supreme Court ruling. And the problem I'm having with this is I've noticed there's a lot of them get together, a bunch of them, and then they go to this one person and give all the money to this one person. it's not like they are sitting there and trying for themselves. It seems like to me they're the same people. They all get together. And I'm just wondering, how do you enforce that? And I don't, I mean, I envy, I've been, I feel sorry for the people. I've given them money. The problem is now I've noticed that they are taking a group together and taking this money to one person. That's the problem I'm having with this. And I didn't know how we can enforce that and how you do something with that. I personally think there's more than just homeless there doing it. I think it's some kind of business operation. You're absolutely right. I mean, there are a number of reasons why it's harmful to give to panhandlers. Substance use is just one of those reasons. Not all of them are substance users, but maybe they're using it for, in some cases, legitimate purposes. But there are also a large percentage that are not homeless, but their sign says they're homeless. They're not veterans, but their science is their veterans. There's no way for you as the passerby to vet that, to know. It is, unfortunately, in some cases used for trafficking, human trafficking purposes, in which case it's the situation you were just describing, Council Member Melanie, where one person is basically being put out to work to collect money for someone else, maybe multiple people. So there are just any number of reasons that this is not a positive thing. can it be banned? I think the law department would tell you no that there's not been any successful efforts to do that and those that remain probably just haven't been challenged yet in some communities. There's a number of reasons not to do that. We're getting pulled in a lot of directions. We get a lot of calls from citizens about what are you going to do to stop this? We also get a lot of criticism from advocates saying why are you telling our people they can't panhandle? we get caught in the middle. And I don't think it's your control. I think it's the police control. I'm more concerned about safety, too. When people get out in the streets and they're out there, a couple of cars slamming on their brakes and all that, it becomes a safety issue. Now, to sit there and say we can't do nothing because it's a Supreme Court ruling, but when it comes to public safety use, I think we can do a little bit and tell them you can do this, but you can't do it in this location, which deals with a lot of traffic flow, which causes somebody could possibly get hurt. So I don't know what a police law can get involved with that part. Can law get involved? I know you can't enforce them to stop, but can you force them to say you're in a wrong location, this is a safety reason, you're backing traffic up, it becomes a safety reason? I think police does enforce the intersection issue. I mean, I think they are enforcing that. I think the question is when people are sort of around the intersection but not right in it. And I think, you know, I sent an email to counsel saying our current panhandling ordinance has been challenged by someone who got cited under it. So it's actually a criminal proceeding, but it's a challenge within that criminal proceeding. So Fayette County Attorney Larry Roberts' office is handling that. And it's actually pending in the Kentucky Supreme Court right now being briefed. So they're probably going to have oral argument on it in the next few minutes. Thank you. All right. My five minutes is up. I'm good. Thank you. All right. Thank you. Council Member James Brown. Thank you, Charlie. Thank you, Mayor. I would like to add. Well, I guess I'll start by saying welcome back to all the council members. I missed you guys. But I would add to Michael Jonathan's presentation, the Woodstones actually does a good job of making the program accessible to the neighbors. I think they allot 30 tickets that gets distributed out to the community, the East End community, for every show on Monday. So I think that's also something good that they do. I have a few announcements. Since tomorrow at 10 o'clock, we're going to have a plaque dedication for the Charles Young Center. It's, you know, the Charles Young Center has been put on the National Register of Historic Places. There's going to be a press conference and an unveiling tomorrow, so I'd invite any member of the public or any council members to come out. I think we actually have the privilege of having the mayor there tomorrow to do the unveiling. on Friday the 18th part of the Douglas Park Centennial celebration there's a Miss Lexington pageant in Douglas Park it's from 5 to 8 there's a lot of young people that are involved in this activity and excited and fortunately somebody's going to be crowned Miss West the end of Lexington so she'll begin her year of reigning as a beauty queen beauty pageant And then this weekend is the East End Family Reunion. It's also held at Charles Young Park. It starts on Friday night and carries on through the weekend. So we have a lot of events taking place in the 1st District, so I'd encourage everyone to come out if you're available. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Brown. Council Member Scotchfield. Thank you. I will be fairly short. I wanted to make a public thank you. Dow was very busy this weekend helping me and constituents in my area. I also want to thank Tracy Thurman and her staff, Sherrick Edmonds, John Day, and our Cannon Jones for getting trash picked up on a Saturday when it had been missed on a Friday. Thank you all. And Dow, also thank you for getting the stop sign put up from some hooligans that decided to move it. So thank you. All right. Council Member Lamb. Thank you, Mayor. I just wanted to recognize that Southeastern Cal Ripken baseball team, the 12U team, they made it all the way to the World Series in Maryland this year, and they had a great season, and we're all very, really proud of them, and I just want to make sure that we know that we throw out the accolades to them and know that we've got a great baseball league over at Veterans Park. Thank you. Council Member Fred Brown. Thank you, Mayor. I'd like to announce that Gainesway Trail has been completed, and we'll try to have maybe a dedication service for that in a couple of weeks. That's our trail that goes from Tate's Creek High School all the way over to Armstrong Mill Road. So it's brand new, and they just completed it. So I want to encourage the neighbors out there to use it, walk it, bicycle it. I think it's going to be really a good addition, and we hope to expand that even further on Armstrong Mill Road. And the other thing I'd like to put into General Services Committee, it probably doesn't go into this committee, but this committee probably will be able to work it because public safety is pretty full. But I'd like to put in committee to look at our radar trailers and speed spies that we have throughout Fayette County. And we don't have a whole lot of those, but I'd like a presentation. And it may be a joint presentation from police and traffic. I'm not sure yet. We'll get that together. But I'd like to put that in general services if I could. Okay. That's it. Thanks, Fred. Do you need to get a motion on that? I move that we put it in general services. Motion by Council Member Fred Brown. Is there a second? Second. Second by Council Member Evans. Any discussion? All right. If not, we can vote. All in favor, please say aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. Council Member Evans. Just very quick. Thank you, Mayor. I had my district, 6-wide district-wide meeting. August the 3rd, I wanted to thank all of the speakers that were representing the City of Lexington. We had everyone from code enforcement to traffic engineering. Charlie came and spoke about the panhandling issues and police, fire, everything. And it was very well attended, and we've been getting good responses on that. So, Mayor, I want to thank you for having such good staff, your commissioners that are allowing their directors and so forth. come out into the community and share information. So it was good. Plan on doing it again. And again, just wanted to give that personal thank you to all of those who were involved because it was really very informational and everyone stayed within their time limits, which was great. So thank you. Thank you, Council Member. Thank you, Council Member Evans. Council Member Lamb. It just dawned on me that I had failed to mention that we all are in our new council chamber today and i want to give accolades to stacy maynard our council administrator and everybody in building maintenance or whatever it's called now um and everybody that was involved in this look at this new carpet the new chairs i mean it's really it's really nice and i just wanted you all everybody that was involved to know how much we appreciate it this is the cleanest i've ever seen it and that's 30 years so all right councilmember massadi thank you mayor since we're giving out accolades in entrepreneur magazine on august 12th issue it stated that lexington was in the top 10 of the most and least expensive cities to start a business, and we are number eight. So if you had a thousand square foot rental, say an office space, at the end of the year when you figure your filing fees, your rent, your utilities, your startup costs, and your payroll, it comes to about $234,000, which is very inexpensive for a startup. So again, another accolade for Lexington as far as we keep on getting better, Mayor. Thank you. That's all. Thank you, Council Member Sada, Council Member Hanson. Thank you, Mayor. I wanted to send out thank yous to, I guess, all of our kids going back to school next week, or if they haven't, they will be going this week. But we have a lot of fantastic employees with LFUCG and a lot of community volunteers that give the kids a lot of really real opportunities throughout the summer. And I think it made summer more enjoyable for them and also gave them some opportunities and experience they wouldn't have otherwise had. So I just would like to thank Partners for Youth and our Lexington Police Department and Fire Department. And then we have Valley Park Activities Board, Cardinal Valley Elementary staff, lots and lots of people. I'm sure I'm going to forget somebody, so I better leave it at that. But I'm always just very, very amazed at the dedication that people invest in our children. So thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Council Member Henson. Council Member Bledsoe. Thank you, Mayor. Just real fast, I just want to give a quick shout-out to Commerce Lexington. You know, they were awarded the National Chamber of the Year in the large category, beating out some pretty serious competition, Jacksonville, Brooklyn, New York, and others. This is the third year they've been in the top one or two, and to come out on top I think is a pretty amazing testimony to Bob Quick's leadership and our team here in Lexington, and we should be very, very proud. So, thanks. All right. Looks like that's all signed up for council reports. Is there anything? All right. Mayor's report, is there a motion to approve the mayor's report? All right. We have a motion. We have a second. Is there any objection? All right. Then the mayor's report motion passes. Is there a public comment for issues not on the agenda? Anyone signed? nope, Michael Jonathan's already spoken. All right, so no one's signed on for motion to adjourn by Council Member Stenet. Is there, unless there's objection, we are adjourned. Thank you.