That's what she wants, cause she's hot and so, she's hot and cold, she's got it all, hot and loving every night. Can't you see her standing there? See how she looks, see how she cares Thank you. Thank you. The End Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. The End The End The End Thank you. The End The End THE END The End just a little bit behind schedule. I'll call the meeting to order. And we will begin with a roll call. Madam Clerk, please call the roll. Mr. Sinnott. Ms. Bledsoe. Mr. Fred Brown. Here. Mr. James Brown. Here. Ms. Evans. Here. Mr. Farmer? Yes, ma'am. Mr. Gibbs? Here. Ms. Henson? Here. Vice Mayor Kay? Here. Ms. Lamb? Here. Mr. Maloney? Ms. Massadi? Here. Ms. Plowman? Here. Ms. Scutchfield? Here. And Mr. Smith? Here. Thank you, Madam Clerk. We are so honored tonight to have Father Norman Fisher, pastor of St. Peter Claver Catholic Church, here with us tonight. He is always inspiring. He is a guest of Council Member Smith. Father Norman, thank you for joining us. Good evening. Good evening, Mayor, Vice Mayor, and all the Councilmen and women. Shall we bow our heads for this moment of prayer and moment of stillness to realize the significant roles we represent before the Almighty. Loving Father, I say thank you on behalf of all who are gathered here this evening. Thank you for your many and abundant blessings. Thank you for life itself, for the measure of health. We need to fulfill our callings for sustenance and friendship. Thank you for the ability to be involved in useful work and for the honor of bearing appropriate responsibilities. Thank you for the gift of freedom in our country. A freedom to believe that is so sacred and uniquely held that we can choose to use that freedom to embrace you or not to be embraced by you. Thank you for loving us even so from your boundless and gracious nature. in the sacred scriptures you have said that citizens ought to obey the governing authorities since you have established those very authorities to promote peace and order and justice therefore I pray for our mayor vice mayor for all the various levels of city officials and in particular for this assembled council I'm asking that you would graciously grant them wisdom to govern amid the conflicting interests and issues of our times a sense of welfare and true needs of our people, a keen thirst for justice and rightness, confidence in what is good and fitting, the humility to work together in harmony even when there is honest disagreement and personal peace in their lives and joy in their task. I pray for the agenda set before them this evening. Please give an assurance of what would please you and what would benefit those who live and work in and around our beloved city of Lexington, Kentucky. Let your hand be upon us and lead and bless our city, especially our nation. It is in your most blessed name, I pray. Amen. Father Norman, thank you so much for joining us. I want to call on, I want to recognize Council Member Bledsoe for a motion. Thank you, Mayor. I'd like to make a motion to allow the mayor to make a presentation at this time. So moved. Second. We have a motion. We have a second. Motion by Council Member Bledsoe, second by Council Member Henson. Is there any objection? All right, then we will have a presentation. Council Member Bledsoe, if you'll join me. And Chief Barnard, you're already right there. But you're going to join us too. And I want to invite Amaya Ketching and her parents, Catherine and Britton to join me also at the podium. And brother and friend, brother Ken and Kristen, right? Kirsten. Kirsten, right, I got it. We are tonight in the presence of an inspiring and remarkable young woman and her family. Amaya Ketching. As many of us know, back on June the 13th, Amaya and her friends were enjoying a birthday sleepover at a friend's house. While they were asleep, an assailant fired several shots at the house where they were sleeping, and tragically, one of the bullets struck Amaya. We all know this was a senseless act of violence, and it's changed Amaya's life and her family. Her parents, Catherine and Britton, her brother, Ken. But with the help of their friends, co-workers, family, neighbors, and our whole community, Amaya and her family are rising to a new future. While Amaya was in the hospital, I along with Chief Barnard, we got the chance to visit with her a couple of times. And the smile that you all see right now, look at that. And that infectious smile greeted us both times. In fact, I asked her, I said, and the chief asked her, said, well, now, what can we get for you today? And she said, please order some chicken wings, which we did. But as Chief Barnard has said, Amaya is an inspiring, intelligent, confident, and talented young lady who is looking forward instead of backward. This is the kind of spirit that inspires all of us. So today, we want to honor Amaya with a very special award that we reserve for very special citizens. The Spirit of Lexington Award. And it reads to Amaya Ketchum, in recognition of an outstanding girl who has inspired our entire community with her unwavering optimism and her determination to overcome every obstacle with her spirit, her inspiring spirit, I, Jim Graves, Mayor of Lexington, do hereby recognize Amaya Ketching with this Spirit of Lexington Award and thank her for lighting up our whole city with her smile. Thank you. Okay, now I want to invite Council Member Bledsoe for some remarks. Thank you, Mayor. I think you said it right. You are a brave, inspiring young girl. As a mom of young kids, I think about how exceptional you're going to be as an example to so many others. And I'm really excited by that. I can see the tenacity on your face. On behalf of council, I tried to figure out what we could do to support you and to give you something to do every day. That would be exciting. I reached out to the YMCA, and they graciously agreed to provide a scholarship for my and her family so you can continue to swim and play ball all through the winter and the spring and summer without limitations. So I give you that scholarship on their behalf, and I hope all the kids at the YMCA get to watch you, and they're inspired to be the best version of themselves. Congratulations. Now we would love to get a picture with all of you all, with everybody. Y'all will all come up here in the council. Oh, Maya's going to speak. All right. You're going to speak. All right, great. Mike went to check. Does it actually work? Okay. It's working. You're mad. Oh, thanks for stuff. And I don't know. Thanks. I don't know. What? Thanks. Y'all know what I mean. Oh, that's awesome. That's awesome. Thank you so much. Okay, there we go, Kenny. Thanks. Thank you. One, two, three. One, two, three. Okay, now I'm going to get a couple from up here. Here we go. One, two, three. One, two, three. Thank you all. Thank you. All right, Madam Clerk, whenever you're ready, will you please give us a second reading of ordinances. Ordinance number one, an ordinance change in the zone from a single family residential R1E zone to a planned neighborhood residential R3 zone for a 13.84 net, 70.76 gross acres for property located at 1975 Russell K Road, Alcorn Springs Development, LLC, Council District 1. Item two, an ordinance admitting certain of the budget, selecting a federal government to reflect current requirements for municipal expenditures and appropriating and reappropriating funds. Schedule number two. Item three, an ordinance of admitting certain budget to the Lexington Fayette Urban County Government to provide funds for purchase orders and prepaid expenses rolling from fiscal year 2017 into fiscal year 2018 and reappropriating funds. Schedule number three. Item four, an ordinance of admitting sections four, fourteen, and four, twenty-one of the Lexington Fayette Urban County Code of Ordinances to increase the boarding fee for dogs, cats, livestock, or fowl held by the Lexington Fayette County Animal Control Officer or the Lexington Fayette County Animal Shelter from $8 per day to $10. per day. All right. Thank you, Madam Clerk. Is there a motion? So moved. To approve. Motion by Council Member Farmer, second by Council Member Plowman. Is there any discussion? All right. If not, then, Madam Clerk, please call the roll. Mr. Stenet. Yes, ma'am. Ms. Bledsoe? Yes, ma'am. Mr. Fred Brown? Yes. Mr. James Brown? Yes. Ms. Evans? Yes. Mr. Farmer? Yes. Mr. Gibbs? Yes. Ms. Henson? Yes. Vice Mayor Kay? Yes. Ms. Lamb? Yes, ma'am. Mr. Maloney? Yes, ma'am. Ms. Massadi? Yes. Ms. Plowman? Yes. Ms. Scutchfield? Yes. And Mr. Smith? Did you get the last one? He nodded at me. All right, okay. All right, the vote reflects passage of the motion. Allows us to move on to resolutions. No, no, no. Sorry, sorry. I've moved too fast. Ordinances for first reading. Thank you. Item 6, an ordinance demanding the authorized strength by abolishing one classified civil service position of administrative officer, grade 523E, in creating one classified civil service position of project program manager, grade 527E, and reclassifying the incumbent in the Division of Facilities and Fleet Management, effective at the beginning of the next pay period, following passage of Council, item 7. An ordinance demanding the authorized strength by abolishing one classified civil service position of municipal engineer, senior, grade 525E, in the Division of Engineering, effective upon passage of Council. And ordinance number 8, an ordinance demanding section 23.5 of the Code of Ordinances, creating 30 positions of police officer grade 311N in the Division of Police and creating 12 positions of firefighter grade 311N in the Division of Fire and Emergency Services effective July 1, 2017. All right. Thank you, Madam Clerk. Are there any motions to suspend? I'll move to suspend the rules and give these all a second reading. Mayor? Motion by Council Member Farmer, second by Council Member Hanson to suspend all and give a second read. Is there any discussion on the motion? All right. All in favor? Please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. Madam Clerk. There's going to be a slight delay. I need to fix something. What did she say? There'll be a slight delay. Oh, okay. All right, I apologize for that. Item 5, an ordinance changing the zone from a neighborhood business B1 zone to a downtown center business B2B zone for 0.61 net, 0.73 gross acre, and from a high-density apartment R4 zone to a downtown center business B2B zone for 1.97 net, 2.53 gross acres, for property located at 101.52 East High Street, of portion of each in 238, 240, 242, 244, 250, and 252 Rhodes Avenue, Calvary Baptist Church, Council District 3. Item 6, an ordinance demanding the authorized strength by abolishing one classified civil service position of Administrative Officer, Grade 523E, and creating one classified civil service position of Project Program Manager, Grade 527E, and reclassifying the incumbent in the Division of Facilities and Fleet Management, effective at the beginning of the next pay period, following passage of Council. Item 7, an ordinance demanding the authorized strength by abolishing one classified civil service position of Municipal Engineer Senior, Grade 525E, in the Division of Engineering, effective upon Passage Council. And finally, Item 8, an ordinance demanding Section 235 of the Code of Ordinances, creating 30 positions of Police Officer, Grade 311N, in the Division of Police, and creating 12 positions of Firefighter, Grade 311N, in the Division of Fire and Emergency Services, effective July 1, 2017. Who was the motion by? Where did I get to? Motion by Council Member Scotchfield, second by Council Member Lamb. Is there any discussion on the motion? All right, if not, then... Was that first reading? Call the roll. All right, thank you, Madam Clerk. Please call the roll. Mr. Stenet. So sorry. No, no. Ms. Blitzo? Yes. Mr. Fred Brown? Yes. Mr. James Brown? Yes. Ms. Evans? Yes. Mr. Farmer? Yes, ma'am. Mr. Gibbs? Yes. Ms. Henson? Yes. Vice Mayor Kay? Yes. Ms. Lamb? Yes, ma'am. Mr. Maloney? Yes, ma'am. Ms. Massadi? Yes. Ms. Plowman? Yes. Ms. Gutchfield? Yes. And Mr. Smith? Yes. Thank you, Madam Clerk. The vote reflects passage of the motion. It allows us to move on to resolutions for a second reading. Resolution number one, a resolution approving the Fayette County Sheriff's Settlement 2016 taxes for taxes collected as of April 15, 2017 and granting the Sheriff acquitus. this. Is there a motion to approve? Second. Motion by Councilmember Hansen, second by Councilmember Farmer. Is there any discussion on the motion? All right. If not, Madam Clerk, please call the roll. Mr. Senate, Ms. Bledsoe. Yes. Mr. Fred Brown. Yes. Mr. James Brown. Yes. Ms. Evans. Yes. Mr. Farmer. Yes, ma'am. Mr. Gibbs? Yes. Ms. Henson? Yes. Vice Mayor Kay? Yes. Ms. Lamb? Yes, ma'am. Mr. Maloney? Yes, ma'am. Ms. Massadi? Yes. Is it working? Ms. Plowman? Yes. Ms. Scotchfield? Yes. And Mr. Smith? Yes. All right. Thank you, Madam Clerk. The vote reflects passage. There it is. There it is. The vote reflects passage of the motion. All right, whenever you're ready, first reading of resolutions is next. Item 2, a resolution accepting the bids of Fleet Pride Incorporated, Koi Auto Parts and Batteries and Bulbs, establishing price contracts for truck and auto batteries for the Division of Facilities and Fleet Management. Item 3, a resolution accepting the bid of LM Asphalt Partners doing business as ATS Construction in the amount of $234,512.19 for the Legacy Hope Center Trail for the Division of Engineering and Authorize the Mayor on behalf of the Urban County Government Taxi Unit Agreement with ATS Construction. related to the bid. Item 4, a resolution accepting the bid of Dark Co. Transmission Sales and Service Incorporated, Nandino Industrial Electric Incorporated, Duke's A&W Enterprise LLC, Pyrotech E3 LLC, Clark Power Services Incorporated, Diesel Power Systems, Fleet Pride Incorporated, Glenn Ford, Glenn Freedom Dodge, Napa Auto Parts, Peterbilt of Louisville Incorporated, Advanced Storage Company Incorporated, DBA Car Quest Auto Parts, Lexington Auto Spring Company, Worldwide Equipment Incorporated, Paul Miller Ford, Trek Pro LLC, and Martins Peterbilt of Central Kentucky, establishing price contracts for automotive and truck parts, having due for the Division of Facilities and Fleet Management. Item 5, a resolution accepting the bid of LM Asphalt Partners Limited in doing business as ATS construction in the amount of $210,599.94 for the Brighton Rail Trail Phase 4 for the Division of Engineering and authorize the mayor on behalf of the American Government to exceed an agreement with ATS construction related to the bid. Item 6, a resolution accepting the bid of Midwest Mole incorporating the amount of $1,521,760 for the WH-7 wet weather storage road bore for the Division of Water Quality and authorize the mayor on behalf of the American Government to exceed an agreement and any other necessary documents with Midwest Mole Incorporated related to the bid. Item 7, a resolution accepting the bid of Judy Construction Company and establishing a price contract for town branch door replacement for the Division of Water Quality. Item 8, a resolution ratifying the probationary classified civil service appointments of Judy Higgins, Revenue Supervisor, Grade 520E, 2314.88, biweekly in the Division of Revenue, Sean Gatewood, Public Service Supervisor, Grade 514 and $19 hourly in the Division of Water Quality, both effective July 10, 2017. Ronald King, Telecommunicator Supervisor, Grade 520E $22,065.84 bi-weekly in Division of Emergency Management 9-1-1, effective July 24, 2017 and Disa Ray Noon, Public Service Worker Senior, Grade 519N, 14.852 hourly in Division of Parks and Recreation, effective July 10, 2017, ratifying the permanent civil service appointments of John Angel, Equipment Operator Senior, Grade 512N, 60.091 hourly, effective June 19, 2017 Rodney White, Vehicle and Equipment Mechanic, Grade 512N 17.776 hourly, effective June 5th, 2017, both in the Division of Streets and Roads, Cameron Noonan, Staff Assistant Senior, Grade 510N, 42.790 Hourly, Division of Accounting, effective July 9th, 2017, John Saylor, Program Manager Senior, Grade 524E, 2711.54 Bi-Weekly, effective May 6th, 2016, Heather Wilson, City Arborist, Grade 521E, 2182.72 Bi-Weekly, effective February 15th, 2017, and Scott Tyree, Arborist Technician, Grade 515N, 80.446 Hourly, effective January 4th, 2017, all in the Division of Environmental Services, and ratifying the permanent sworn appointments of Adrian Robinson, Community Corrections Sergeant, Grade 112N, 23.937 hourly in the Division of Community Corrections, effective July 3rd, 2017. Item 9, a resolution authorizing the Division of Human Resources to make a conditional offer to the following probationary civil service appointment. Lee has an engineering technician senior, Grade 516N, 21.608 hourly in the Division of Water Quality, effective upon passage of council and authorizing the Division of Human Resources to make a conditional offer to the following unclassified civil service appointments. Elizabeth Christian Wilson, Family Court Services Specialist, Grade 516N, 24.03 and hourly in the Office of Circuit Judges. Patrick Greg Haley, Deputy Coroner, Grade 515 and 22.114, hourly in the Office of the Coroner, both effective July 24, 2017. Teresa Owen, Project Engineering Coordinator, Grade 525E, 2401.52 by weekly in the Division of Water Quality, effective August 7, 2017. And Dennis McHatton, Skilled Trades Worker, Part-Time, Grade 515 and 20.517 hourly in the Division of Community Corrections, effective July 24, 2017. Item 10, a resolution authorized by the Mayor on behalf of the Every County Government Taxi Unit Agreement, awarded pursuant to RFP No. 15-2017 with Blue Stem Communications for Mass Marketing Services related to stormwater and water quality education at a cost not to exceed $210,000. Item 11. A resolution authorizes the Mayor on behalf of the Urban County Government to exceed change order No. 5 to the contract with Bluegrass Contracting Corporation for the Idle Hour Park Improvements Project, decreasing the contract price by the sum of $47,035 from $791,431.35 to $744,396.35. Item 12. A resolution authorizes the Mayor on behalf of the Urban County Government to exceed the master equipment and products agreement with Siemens Healthcare Diagnostics Incorporated for the provision of direct testing equipment and reagents for the Division of Community Corrections and a total cost not to exceed $227,293.87. Item 13, a resolution authorized and direct the mayor on behalf of the Irving County Government to execute change order number one to the contract with NTT Data Incorporated award to pursue it to RFP number 59-2015 for configuration and deployment of cloud-based Lex Hall citizen request management system increasing contract price from $760,000 from $810,716.72 to $870,762. Item 14, a resolution authorized to direct the mayor on behalf of the urban county government to exceed a multi-year true lease schedule with Dell Financial Services LLC pursuant to master lease agreement number 670-5564 for the lease of desktop computers for the urban county government at an estimated cost not to exceed $89,836.19. Item 15, a resolution authorized to direct the mayor on behalf of the urban county government to exceed an agreement with the University of Kentucky Osher Lifelong Learning Institute for use of classroom space in the senior center. Item 16, a resolution authorized and direct the mayor on behalf of the government to execute an amendment to the agreement with Accela Incorporated related to the right-of-way online permitting module and the citizen's view module to permit the registration, application, and online data transmittable required for online permitting at a cost not to exceed $61,250 with maintenance and support costs subject to sufficient appropriation of funds in future fiscal years and authorizing the commissioner of planning, preservation, and development or his designee to execute any necessary documents related to the implementation, configuration, and maintenance of these modules. Item 17, a resolution authorized and directed the mayor on behalf of the urban county government to accept a grant from the United States Department of Homeland Security, which grant funds are in the amount of $252,210 federal funds under the 2016 Assistance to Firefighters Grant Program are for the Community Paramedic Pilot Program, and the acceptance of which obligates the urban county government with the expenditure of $29,596 as a local match, and authorized the mayor to transfer unencumbered funds within the grant budget. Item 18, a resolution authorized the mayor on behalf of the urban county government to exceed the purchase of a service agreement with the Lexington History Museum Incorporated for the maintenance of its collection and the provision of educational programs for the benefit of the public at a cost that exceeds $60,000. Item 19, a resolution authorized and direct the mayor on behalf of the Urban County Government to execute an agreement with the University of Kentucky to permit the attachment of banners to the light pole zone by the Urban County Government on South Limestone Street from the Avenue of Champions to Maxwell Street at no cost to the Urban County Government. Item 20, a resolution authorized and direct the mayor on behalf of the Urban County Government to execute an amendment to the agreement with the Lifestand Habitat for Humanity extending the period of performance through July 1, 2019 for the operation of the First Time Home Buyers Program. Item 21, a resolution authorized the mayor on behalf of the Lexington Fayette or McKinney Government to exceed a contract with Kroger Limited Partnership 1, Louisville Division, to supply the influenza vaccine and administer vaccinations to eligible Lexington Fayette or McKinney Government employees at a cost of $28 per employee during the 2017-2018 flu season. Item 22, a resolution change in the property address. Numbers of 1673 Alexandria Drive to 1685 Alexandria Drive, 4701 Aetham Spoonsboro Road to 4861 Aetham Spoonsboro Road, 2933 Candlelight Way Unit A to 2933 Candlelight Way, 2933 Candlelight Way Unit B to 2937 Candlelight Way, 112 Cobblestone Court to 114 Cobblestone Court, 131 to 135 West Main Street to 135 West Main Street, 3925 Military Pike to 3941 Military Pike. can change the street names and property address, numbers of 280 Fox Harbor Drive to 250 Harrison, 550 West Reynolds Road, 23157 Keyshire Way, 2361 Parris Pike to 425 Rogers Road, 3445 Richmond Road to 3401 Yorkshire Medical Park, all affected 30 days from passage. Item 23, a resolution authorized and directed the mayor on behalf of the county government to execute a memorandum of agreement with Kentucky Community and Technical College System for college courses associated with the police academy, and it costs not to exceed $73,800. A resolution authorized by the Mayor on behalf of the Urban County Government to execute purchase of service agreements for fiscal year 2018 with Commerce Lexington, $457,000. Downtown Lexington Corporation, $40,000. Downtown Development Authority, $323,467. World Trade Center, Kentucky, $55,000. Score, $5,000. Lyric Theater, $150,000. LexArts, $489,050. And the Urban League of Lexington, Fayette County, $90,000. And the total cost not to exceed $1,609,517. Item 25, a resolution authorized and direct the Mayor on behalf of the County Government to execute an agreement with Windstream Communications for installation of seven new circuits at the Public Safety Operations Center at a cost not to exceed $21,000. Item 26, a resolution authorized and direct the Mayor on behalf of the County Government to execute and submit a grant application to the Kentucky Department of Military Affairs, Division of Emergency Management, and to provide any additional information requesting the connection with this grant application, which grant funds are in the amount of $668,550 federal funds and are for the continuation of the Chemical Stockpile Emergency Preparedness Program for fiscal year 2018. Item 27, a resolution authorizing to direct the mayor on behalf of the U.S. County Government to execute change order number 1, final to the agreement with Adams Contracting LLC for the West Loudoun Avenue sidewalk project, decreasing the contract price for the sum of $46,097.87 from $328,980 to $282,882.13. item 28 a resolution authorizing direct the mayor on behalf of the county government to execute and submit a grant application to the United States Department of Health and Human Services and to provide any additional information requested in connection with this grant application which grant funds are in the amount of $2 million federal funds under the first responders comprehensive addiction and recovery act program item 29 a resolution authorizing direct the mayor on behalf of the county government to execute an easement agreement with the YNC of Central Kentucky for the acquisition of permanent temporary construction easements across a portion of the property located at 381 West Loudoun Avenue relating to the construction and maintenance of the Hope Center and Lexi Trail Systems at no cost to the urban county government and authorize the mayor or does it need to execute any documents required for the acquisition. Item 30, a resolution authorized and direct the mayor on behalf of the urban county government to execute an agreement with Habitat for Humanity Restore for the operation of the Welcome Home Furniture Vouchers Project at a cost to exceed $4,000. Item 31, a resolution authorized and direct the mayor on behalf of the urban county government to accept a donation from the Citizens Police Academy Alumni Association of Police Equipment for Use at the Division of Police at no cost to the urban county government. Item 32, a resolution authorized and direct the mayor on behalf of the American County Government to exceed third amendment to agreement with Corizon LLC for provision of health services at the detention center to add additional staffing and the CPI increase mandated in the agreement and additional costs not to exceed $266,798.16 per fiscal year 2018 for a total cost for base services not to exceed $3,644,354.45 for fiscal year 2018. Item 33, a resolution authorizes the mayor on behalf of the American Government Taxi to the 3rd Amendment to the Price Contract No. 276-2011 for inmate telephone services with Securus Technologies Incorporated to include SecureView Tablet Solution for the Division of Community Corrections at no cost to the government. Item 34, a resolution authorizes the mayor on behalf of the American Government Taxi to contract West Company Clear Services, a division of Thompson Reuters, for background and investigation at a cost not to exceed $5,436. Item 35, a resolution authorizes the Mayor on behalf of the Urban County Government to execute a partial release of the easement, releasing a utility easement on the property located at 2250 Innovation Drive. Item 36, a resolution authorizes and direct the Mayor on behalf of the Urban County Government to execute and submit a grant application to the Kentucky State Police Vehicle Enforcement Division to provide any additional information requested in connection with this grant application and to accept this grant. the application is approved, which grant funds are in the amount of $60,000 federal funds and are for the continued operation of the Motor Carrier Safety Assistance Program for fiscal year 2018, the acceptance of which obligates the urban county government for the expenditure of $10,588.24 as a local match and authorizes the mayor to transfer unencumbered funds within the grant budget. Item 37, a resolution authorized to direct the mayor on behalf of the urban county government, text to submit a grant application to the National Recreation and Parks Association in partnership with Disney and to provide any additional information requested and connected with this grant application, which grant funds are in the amount of $24,020 and are far the replacement of playground equipment for Valley Park. Item 38, a resolution authorized to direct the Mayor on behalf of the Urban County Government to exceed and submit a grant application to the AARP Community Challenge and to provide any additional information requested in connection with this grant application, which grant funds are in the amount of $10,000 and are for the purchase and installation of benches along the walking trail at Idle Hour Park. Item 39, a resolution authorized to direct the Mayor on behalf of the Urban County Government to exceed a partial release of easement releasing utility easements on the property located at 1447 Antique Drive. Item 40, a resolution authorized and direct the mayor on behalf of the room county government to exceed the purchase of services agreement with the Roots and Heritage Festival Incorporated for the 2017 Roots and Heritage Festival at a cost not to exceed $35,415 plus additional in-kind services estimated cost of $63,000. Item 41, a resolution authorized the mayor on behalf of the room county government to exceed an agreement within the Blue Cross Blue Shield for administrative services and stop loss insurance coverage relating to the health insurance plans offered by the room county government for a one-year term beginning January 1, 2018 with an annual option to renew through December 31, 2020. Item 42, a resolution authorized the mayor on behalf of the county government to execute an agreement awarding a Class B Education Incentive Grant to Health First Bluegrass Incorporated for stormwater quality projects that it costs not to exceed $2,500. Item 43, a resolution authorized the mayor on behalf of the county government to cancel the adopt-a-spot program agreement with Boy Scout Treatment No. 103, Resolution No. 31-2017, and execute an adopt-a-spot program agreement with Ambassador Christ's Ministry for participation in the adopt-a-spot roadway cleanup program under the Kentucky Pride Grant for fiscal year 2017 that it costs not to exceed $300. Item 44, a resolution authorized and direct the Mayor on behalf of the American Government to execute and submit a grant application to the National Complete Streets Coalition to provide any additional information requested in connection with this grant application, which grant funds are in the amount of $29,500 and are for participation in the Safe Streets Academy. Item 45, a resolution authorized by the Mayor and the Hathorby County Government to execute change order number one final to the agreement with Free Contracting Incorporated for the Marquee Avenue Sanitary Sewer Replacement Project, increasing the contract price with a sum of $8,800 from $464,575.04 to $473,375.04. item 46 of resolution authorized and direct the mayor on behalf of the urban county government to execute change order number 2 to the agreement with the grw engineers incorporated for design of polo club boulevard increasing the contract price for the sum of $38,420 from $224,720 to $263,148 item 47 of resolution authorized the mayor on behalf of the urban county government to execute change order number 2 to the contract with tri-state roofing and sheet metal company for the black and Williams center roof replacement and repairs project increasing the contract price for the sum of $29,800 from $225,249 to $255,049 and adding 42 calendar days to the construction schedule. Item 48, a resolution authorized and direct the mayor on behalf of the urban county government to exceed a renewal agreement with Everbridge Incorporated for the Emergency Management Alert and Notification System at a cost not to exceed $90,693.38. Item 49, a resolution authorized and direct the mayor on behalf of the urban county government to exceed contract amendments with Lansdowne Mayor of the Neighborhood Association and Masterson Station Neighborhood Association for extension of the period of performance to December 31, 2017 at no cost to the urban county government. Item 50, a resolution authorized the mayor on behalf of the urban county government to execute agreements with Cardin Springs Elementary PTA Incorporated, $500, Athens-Charlesburg Elementary School PTA, $800, Edith J. Hayes Middle School PTSA, $750, Food Chain, $2,000, and East End Family Reunion Coalition Incorporated, $500 for the Office of the Urban County Council. A resolution amending and restating Resolution No. 167-91 and Resolution No. 319-2015 to adopt a revised minority, women, and disadvantaged business enterprise 10% minimum goal and to restate a certified veteran-owned small business and certified service disabled veteran-owned business minimum 3% goal for government contracts. Item 52. A resolution adopting a policy to govern the temporary placement of employees in positions currently occupied by other employees due to a pending job vacancy for a period not to exceed 90 days, authorizing departing employees to train incoming employees, provide transitional assistance and aid with the continuity of operations within the government, subject to the availability of sufficient funding and authorize the Director of Human Resources on behalf of the urban county government to develop and implement procedures consistent with this policy. All right. Thank you, Madam Clerk. If I'm not mistaken, we can do second readings on all of them, but I have some down here that have asked for specific ones. Vice Mayor Kaye? Thank you, Mayor. Yes, I move to give a second reading to all, so move. We've got a motion. We've got Vice Mayor Kaye, seconded by Council Member Scotchfield. Is there any discussion? All right. If not, we can vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. I think it carried, though. Sorry about that, Richard. All right. Madam Clerk, I think you can give a second read. The poor guys who are waiting. The original friends who are waiting to speak. They thought we were getting to the end. We're getting close, y'all. We're getting close. Okay. related to the bid. Item 4, Resolution Accepting the Bids of Dartco Transmission Sales and Service Incorporated, Nandino Industrial Electric Incorporated, Dukes A&W Enterprise LLC, Pyrotech E3 LLC, Clark Power Services Incorporated, Deuce of Power Systems, Fleet Pride Incorporated, Glenn Ford, Glenn Freedom Dodge, Napa Auto Parts, Peterbilt of Louisville Incorporated, Advanced Stores Company Incorporated, DBA CarQuest Auto Parts, Lexington Auto Spring Company, Worldwide Equipment Incorporated, Paul Miller Ford, Trek Pro LLC, and Martins Peterbilt of Central Kentucky, establishing price contracts for automotive and truck parts heavy duty for the Division of Facilities and Fleet Management. Item 5, a resolution accepting the bid of LM Asphalt Partners Limited, DBA ATS construction in the amount of $210,599.94 for the Brighton Rail Trail Phase 4 for the Division of Engineering and authorizing the mayor on behalf of the Urban County Government, texting an agreement with ATS construction related to the bid. Item 6, a resolution accepting the bid of Midwest Mole, incorporated in the amount of $1,521,760 for the W-8-7 wet weather storage road bore for the Division of Water Quality and authorize the mayor on behalf of the Irvin County Government to exceed an agreement and any other necessary documents with Midwest Mole, incorporated related to the bid. Item 7, a resolution accepting the bid of Judy Construction Company's option price contract for town branch door replacement for the Division of Water Quality. Item 8, a resolution ratifying the probationary classified civil service appointments of Judy Higgins, Revenue Supervisor, Grade 520E23, 14.88, biweekly in the Division of Revenue, Sean Gatewood, Public Service Supervisor, Grade 514N, $19 hourly in the Division of Water Quality, both effective July 10, 2017. Ronald King, Telecommunicator Supervisor, Grade 520E, $2,065.84, biweekly in the Division of Emergency Management, 911, effective July 24, 2017. And Dees Ray Noon, Public Service Worker Senior, Grade 509N, 14.852, hourly in the Division of Parks and Recreation, effective July 10, 2017, ratifying the permanent civil service appointments of John Angel, equipment operator senior grade 512 and 60.091 hourly, effective June 19, 2017 of Rodney White Vehicle and Equipment Mechanic, grade 512 and 70.776 hourly, effective June 5, 2017, both in the Division of Streets and Roads. Cameron Noonan, staff assistant senior, grade 510 and 40.790 hourly in the Division of Accounting, effective July 9, 2017. John Saylor, program manager senior, grade 524E, 2711.54 biweekly, effective May 16, 2016. Heather Wilson City Arbor is grade 521E 2182.72 biweekly effective February 15, 2017 is Scott Tyree Arborist Technician grade 515N 80.446 hourly effective January 4, 2017 all in the Division of Environmental Services and ratifying the permanent sworn appointment of Adrian Robinson Community Corrections Sergeant grade 112N 23.937 hourly in the Division of Community Corrections effective July 3, 2017 Item 9, a resolution authorized in Division of Human Resources to make a conditional offer to the following probationary civil service appointment. Lee Hudson, Engineering Technician, Senior, Grade 516 and 21.608, Hourly, in Division of Water Quality, effective upon passage of council and authorized in Division of Human Resources to make a conditional offer to the following unclassified civil service appointments. Elizabeth Kirsten Wilson, Family Court Services Specialist, Grade 516 N, 24.038 hourly, in the Office of Circuit Judge Patrick. Greg Haley, Deputy Coroner, Grade 515 N, 22.114 hourly, in the Office of the Coroner, both effective July 24, 2017. Teresa Owen, Project Engineering Coordinator, Grade 525 E, 2401.52 biweekly, in the Division of Water Quality, effective August 7, 2017. And Dennis McHatton, Skilled Trades Worker, part-time, Grade 515 N, 20.517 hourly, in the Division of Community Corrections, effective July 24, 2017. Item 10, a resolution authorized by the Mayor on behalf of the Urban County Government. Taxi in an agreement awarded pursuant to RFP No. 15-2017 with BlueStem Communication for Mass Marketing Services Related to Stormwater and Water Quality Education at the cost not to exceed $210,000. Item 11. A resolution authorizes the Mayor on behalf of the Urban County Government Taxi Change Order No. 5 to the contract with Bluegrass Contract Incorporation for the Idle Hour Park Improvements Project, decreasing the contract price by the sum of $47,035 from $791,431.35 to $744,396.35. Item 12. A resolution authorizes the Mayor on behalf of the Urban County Government Taxi and master equipment and products agreement with Siemens Healthcare Diagnostics Incorporated for the provision of drug testing, equipment, and reagents for the Division of Community Corrections. And it told cost not to exceed $227,293.87. Item 13, a resolution authorized directly to the mayor and behalf of the government to execute change order number one to the contract with NTT Data Incorporated under order pursuant to RFP number 59-2015 for configuration and deployment of a cloud-based Lexall citizen request management system, increasing the contract price by the sum of $60,000 from $810,716.72 to $870,716.72. Item 14, a resolution authorized directly to the mayor on behalf of the Urban County Government to execute a multi-year true lease schedule with Dell Financial Services LLC pursuant to master lease agreement number 6705564 for the lease of desktop computers for the Urban County Government at an estimated cost not to exceed $89,836.19. Item 15, a resolution authorized directly to the mayor on behalf of the Urban County Government to execute an agreement with the University of Kentucky Osher Lifelong Learning Institute for use of classroom space in the senior center. Item 16, a resolution authorized and direct the mayor on behalf of the American government to execute an amendment to the agreement with Accela Incorporated related to the right-of-way online permitting module and the citizens' view module to permit the registration, application, and online data transmittal required for online permitting at a cost not to exceed $1,250 with maintenance and support costs subject to sufficient appropriation of funds in future fiscal years and authorizing the commissioner of planning, preservation, and development or his designee to execute any necessary documents related to the implementation, configuration, and maintenance of these modules. Item 17, a resolution authorized and directed the mayor. We have the urban county government to accept a grant from the United States Department of Homeland Security, which grant funds are in the amount of $252,210 federal funds under the 2016 Assistance to Firefighters Grant Program are for the Community Paramedic Pilot Program, and the acceptance of which obligates the urban county government for the expenditure of $25,000. I know it's tempting. It's so close to the conclusion of things, but let's get our volume down just a little bit. Our visitors are wondering, what in the world is going on here? Go ahead, Madam Clerk. $29,596 as a local match and authorizing the mayor to transfer unrecognized funds within the grant budget. Item 18, a resolution authorizing the mayor on behalf of the urban county government to exceed a purchase of service agreement with the Lexington History Museum Incorporated for the maintenance of its collection and the provision of educational programs for the benefit of the public. It costs not to exceed $60,000. Item 19, a resolution authorizing and directing the mayor on behalf of the urban county government to exceed an agreement with the University of Kentucky to permit the attachment of banners to the light poles owned by the urban county government on South Limestone Street from the Avenue of Champtons to Maxwell Street At no cost to the Urban County Government, item 20, a resolution authorized to direct the mayor on behalf of the Urban County Government to exceed an amendment to the agreement with Lexington Habitat for Humanity, extending the period of performance through July 31, 2019 for the operation of the first-time homebuyers program. Item 21, a resolution authorized the mayor on behalf of the Lexington and Fayette Urban County Government to exceed a contract with Kroger Limited Partnership 1, limited Louisville Division to supply the influenza vaccine and administer vaccinations to eligible Lexington and Fayette Urban County Government employees at a cost of $28 per employee during the 2017-2018 flu season. Item 22, a resolution change to the property address numbers of 1673 Alexandria Drive to 1685 Alexandria Drive, 4701 8th and Spoonsboro Road to 4861 8th and Spoonsboro Road, 2933 Candlelight Way, Unit A to 2933 Candlelight Way, 2933 Candlelight Way, Unit B to 2937 Candlelight Way, 112 Cobblestone Court to 114 Cobblestone Court, 131 to 135 West Main Street to 135 West Main Street, 3925 Military Pack to 3941 Military Pack, and change to the street names of property address numbers of 280 Fox Harbor Drive to 250 Harrison. 550 Wesson Reynolds Road to 3157 Keesha Highway, 2361 Parrish Pike to 425 Rogers Road, 3445 Richmond Road to 3401 Yorkshire Medical Park all effective 30 days from passage. Item 23, a resolution authorizing and direct the mayor and behalf of the urban county government to execute a memorandum of agreement with Kentucky Community and Technical College System for college courses associated with the police academy and a cost not to exceed $73,800. Item 24, a resolution authorizing the mayor and behalf of the urban county government to execute purchase of service agreements for first day year 2018 with Commerce Lexington, $457,000 Downtown Lexington Corporation, $40,000 Downtown Development Authority, $323,467 World Trade Center, Kentucky, $55,000 SCORE, $5,000 Lyric Theater, $150,000 LexArts, $489,050 And the Urban League of Lexington, Fayette County, $90,000 At a total cost net to exceed $1,609,517 Item 25 A resolution authorized and direct the mayor on behalf of the Urban County Government to exiting an agreement with Windstream Communications for installation of seven new circuits at the Public Safety Operations Center around the cost that to exceed $21,000. Item 26, a resolution, authorize and direct the mayor on behalf of the County Government to execute and submit a grant application to the Kentucky Department of Military Affairs Division of Emergency Management and to provide any additional information or requests in connection with this grant application which grant funds are in the amount of $668,550 federal funds and are for the continuation of the Chemical Stockpile Emergency Preparedness Program for fiscal year 2018. Item 27, a resolution, authorize and direct the mayor on behalf of the County Government to execute change over number one final to the agreement with Adams Contracting LLC for the West Loudon Avenue sidewalk project, decreasing the contract price by the sum of $46,097.87 from $328,980 to $282,882.13. Item 28, a resolution authorized to direct the Mayor and have the Irving County Government to execute and submit a grant application to the United States Department of Health and Human Services and to provide any additional information requesting a connection with this grant application, which funds are in the amount of $2 million federal funds under the First Responders Comprehensive Addiction and Recovery Act program. Item 29, a resolution authorizes and direct the mayor on behalf of the Urban County Government to execute an easement agreement with the YMCA of Central Kentucky for the acquisition of permanent and temporary construction easements across a portion of the property located at 381 West Loudoun Avenue relating to the construction and maintenance of the Hope Center and Legacy Trail Systems at no cost to the Urban County Government and authorize the mayor or his designate to execute any documents required for the acquisition. Item 30, a resolution authorizing direct the mayor on behalf of the urban county government to exceed an agreement with Habitat for Humanity Restore for the operation of the Welcome Home Furniture Vouchers Project at a cost of not to exceed $4,000. Item 31, a resolution authorizing direct the mayor on behalf of the urban county government to accept a donation from the Citizen Police Academy Alumni Association of Police Equipment for use at the Division of Police at no cost to the urban county government. Item 32, a resolution authorized and direct the mayor on behalf of the urban county government to execute a third amendment to agreement with Corizon LLC for provision of health services at the detention center to add additional staffing and the CPI increase mandated in the agreement at an additional cost not to exceed $266,798.16 for fiscal year 2018 for total costs for base services not to exceed $3,644,354.45 for fiscal year 2018. Item 33, a resolution authorized and direct the mayor on behalf of the urban county government to exceed a third amendment to the prize contract number 276-2011 for inmate telephone services with Securus Technologies Incorporated to include SecureView Tablet Solution for the Division of Community Corrections at no cost to the government. Item 34, a resolution authorized the mayor on behalf of the Urban County Government to exceed a contract with West Company Clear Services, a division of Thompson Mariners for background and investigation at a cost not to exceed $5,436. Item 35, a resolution authorized the mayor on behalf of the Urban County Government to exceed a partial release of easement, releasing a utility easement on the property located at 2250 Innovation Drive. Item 36, a resolution authorizes and direct the mayor on behalf of the Irvin County Government to execute and submit a grant application to the Kentucky State Police Vehicle Enforcement Division to provide any additional information requested in connection with this grant application and to accept this grant. If the application is approved, which grant funds are in the amount of $60,000 federal funds and are for the continued operation of the Motor Carrier Safety Assistance Program for fiscal year 2018, the acceptance of which obligates the Irvin County Government for the expenditure of $10,588.24 as a local match and authorizes the mayor to transfer unencumbered funds within the grant budget. Item 37, a resolution authorized to direct the mayor on behalf of the Aram County Government to exceed and submit a grant application to the National Recreation and Parks Association in partnership with Disney and to provide any additional information requested in connection with this grant application, which grant funds are in the amount of $24,020 and are for the replacement of playground equipment for Valley Park. Item 38, a resolution authorized to direct the mayor on behalf of the Aram County Government to exceed and submit a grant application to the AARP Community Challenge and to provide any additional information requested in connection with this grant application, which grant funds are in the amount of $10,000 and are for the purchase and installation of benches along the walking trail at Idle Hour Park. Item 39, a resolution authorizing the mayor on behalf of the Urban County Government to execute a partial release of easement, releasing utility easements on the property located at 1447 Antique Drive. Item 40, a resolution authorizing the mayor on behalf of the Urban County Government to execute the purchase of service agreements with Roots and Heritage Festival Incorporated for the 2017 Roots and Heritage Festival. It costs not to exceed $35,415 plus additional in-kind services, estimated cost of $63,000. Item 41, a resolution authorizes the mayor on behalf of the urban county government to exceed an agreement with Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield for administrative services and stop loss insurance coverage related to the health insurance plans offered by the urban county government for a one-year term beginning January 1, 2018, with an annual option to renew through December 31, 2020. Item 42, a resolution authorizes the mayor on behalf of the urban county government to exceed an agreement awarding a Class B education incentive grant to health versus bluegrass incorporated for stormwater quality projects that would cost not to exceed $2,500. Item 43, a resolution authorizes the mayor on behalf of the urban county government to cancel the Adopt-A-Spot Program Agreement with Boy Scout Treatment No. 103, Resolution No. 31-2017, and execute an Adopt-A-Spot Program Agreement with Ambassador Christ's Ministry for participation in the Adopt-A-Spot Roadway Clean-Up Program under the Kentucky Pride Grant for fiscal year 2017 at the cost not to exceed $300. Item 44, a resolution authorized and directed the mayor on behalf of the urban county government to execute and submit a grant application to the National Complete Streets Coalition and to provide any additional information requested in connection with this grant application, which grant funds are in the amount of $29,500, and for participation in the Safe Streets Academy. Item 45, a resolution authorized by the Mayor on behalf of the Urban County Government to execute change order number one final to the agreement with free contracting incorporated for the Marquee Avenue Sanitary Sewer Replacement Project, increasing the contract price for the sum of $8,800 from $464,575.04 to $473,375.04. Item 46, a resolution authorized by the Mayor on behalf of the Urban County Government to execute change order number two to the agreement with GRW Engineers Incorporated for design of Polo Club Boulevard, increasing the contract price by the sum of $38,420 from $224,728 to $263,148. Item 47, a resolution authorized the mayor on behalf of the room County Government to execute in order number two to the contract with Tri-State Roofing and Sheet Metal Company for the Black and Williams Center Roof Replacement and Repairs Project, increasing the contract price by the sum of $29,800 from $225,249 to $255,049 in adding 42 calendar days to the construction schedule. Item 48, a resolution authorized the mayor on behalf of the room County Government to execute a renewal agreement with Ever Ridge Incorporated for the emergency management alert and notification system at a cost to exceed $90,693.38. Item 49, a resolution authorized directly to the mayor on behalf of the urban county government to execute contract amendments with Lansdowne, Mayor of the Neighborhood Association and Masterson Station Neighborhood Association for extension of the period of performance to December 31, 2017 at no cost to the urban county government. Item 50, a resolution authorized the mayor on behalf of the urban county government to execute agreements with Garden Springs Elementary, PTA Incorporated, 500, Athens-Chattlesburg Elementary School, PTA 800, ETH, J. Hayes Middle School, PTSA, $750. The Food Chain, $2,000. And the East End Family Reunion Coalition, Inc., $500. For the opposite of the Urban County Council, on the cost note to exceed the sum stated. Item 51, a resolution amending and restating resolutions number 167-91 and resolution number 319-2015 to adopt a revised minority women and disadvantaged business enterprise 10% minimum goal and to restate a certified veteran-owned small business and certified service-disabled veteran-owned business minimum 3% goal for government contracts. Item 52, a resolution adopting a policy to govern the temporary placement of employees in positions currently occupied by other employees due to a pending job vacancy for a period not to exceed 90 days, authorizing departing employees to train incoming employees, provide transitional assistance, and aid with the continuity of operations within the government subject to the availability of sufficient funding and authorizing the Director of Human Resources on behalf of the urban county government to develop and implement procedures consistent with this policy. Thank you, Madam Clerk. Yes, nice job. Motion to approve by Council Member Farmer. Did I hear a second? Council Member Stennett. We've got a second. Is there any discussion? All right. If not, then, Madam Clerk, please call the roll. Mr. Stennett. Ms. Bledsoe. Yes. Mr. Fred Brown. Yes. Mr. James Brown. Yes. Ms. Evans. Mr. Farmer. Yes on all. No on number 19. Mr. Gibbs? Yes. Ms. Henson? Yes. Vice Mayor Kay? Yes. Ms. Lamb? Yes, ma'am. Mr. Maloney? Yes, ma'am. Ms. Massadi? Yes. Ms. Plowman? Yes. Ms. Sketchfield? Yes. And Mr. Smith? Yes. Thank you, Madam Clerk. The vote reflects passage of the motion. It allows us to move on to communications from the Mayor. Is there a motion? Vice Mayor Kay? Thank you, Mayor. At this point, I'd like to make a motion to separate number 8 from the rest of the communications to be voted on separately. So move. Motion by Vice Mayor Kay, seconded by Council Member Henson. It's a motion to separate. Do I need a motion to approve? I'll take a motion to... Motion by Council Member Plowman to approve. Does that work, Keith? We've got a motion to separate, number eight. Is that sufficient for the motion to approve all? Separate. To separate. We need to vote on that. All right. Is there any discussion on the motion to separate? All right. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carried. I move approval of the rest. All right. Motion to approve the remainder. Is there a second? Second. All right. Motion to second. Is there any discussion? All right. Then let's vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. All right. So now we'll separate on number eight. Do you want to make a motion, Professor Mayor? Yes, I move approval on number eight. Motion to approve number eight by Vice Mayor Kay. Second by Council Member Massadi. All right. Is there any discussion? All right. Can't get in. Okay. I thought we were going to, you're separating eight, but I wanted to separate each person in eight. Perfectly appropriate if you prefer. So to separate, I'll make that motion to take each one individually. Each of the nominees individually. That's the whole idea of separation. Correct. All right, we've got a motion. Is there a second? Council Member Brown? Second. Council Member Massadi? All right, we've got a second. Is there any discussion? All right, all in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. All right, so we'll go with now a motion on, do you want to do the first one? Yeah. I move approval for the reappointment of Ms. Carolyn Plumlee. So moved. Second. Motion by Vice Mayor Kaye, second by Council Member Plumlee. Is there any discussion? All right. All in favor, please say aye and vote electronically if you want to do it that way. Can we do it that way? All right. Opposed, no. No. I'm sorry. Can we get a... Yeah, let's get a... All right. Let's vote electronically then. All in favor, please indicate by saying aye and voting electronically. Opposed, no. All right. Motion carries. All right. Vice Mayor. I move approval of the nomination of Mr. William Wilson. So move. Motion by Vice Mayor Kay, seconded by Council Member Massadi. Is there any discussion on the motion? All right. Hearing none, we can vote. Can we get us a new register there? All right. All in favor, say aye and vote electronically. All right. Motion carries. Can I move approval of the appointment of Mr. Headley-Bell? Second. Motion by Vice Mayor Kay, second by Council Member Massadi. Is there any discussion? All right. We've got a cleared register. All in favor, please indicate by saying aye and voting electronically. All right. Motion carries. Vice Mayor. Finally, I move approval of the nomination of Mr. Larry Forrester to fill an unexpired term to the Planning Commission. So move. Second. Motion by Vice Mayor Kaye, seconded by Council Member Henson. As soon as we clear the register, I'll ask for a vote. All right. Please indicate voting electronically. All right. Motion carries. Mayor, may I have the privilege of stating why I voted no? Yes, sir. Since I may have been the only one. I was concerned about representation. The individuals that's been recommended are above reproach. But we've got six council members that are coming out of the six nominations. not nominations, but six people on the Planning Commission that are coming out of the 12th Council District. We've got four that are coming out of the 5th Council District, and then one out of the 7th. And I just really feel that the representation there of our whole community is not on the Planning Commission. And that's the reason I voted no for this 12th District and 5th District nominations. The people are good people, but I wanted to state that. Yes, sir. Thank you, Council Member. Council Member Stendon? Yeah, I just want to add a couple things to that, Mayor, just so you're aware and everyone watching. The other big issue is there's currently no one under the age of 50 on the Planning Commission. Our average age in this community is 34 years old. There's no one, if we want to attract millennials, there's no one on there to represent them. But tonight, with Larry Forrester, who's 35, I hope he doesn't mind me saying that, but we have our first person under age 50 on the planning commission. That's a big deal. The other thing, I think we need more women because women are 51% or more in this community. And that planning commission is going to be so important in the next five years. So whatever we have to do, Mayor, to work with you, to make sure we have a planning commission that represents downtown, the whole city, everywhere, is very important to me and I know a few other people here on council because the decisions we make, as you know, our boundary is choking us. And so how we put emphasis on infill and getting those projects done and commercial development, especially for jobs, that's going to be the key. And I hope we have plenty of commission members that understand that. Thank you, Mayor. Council Member Scotchfield? That's the reason that we've placed this issue into committee because we do want to look at how the decisions are made and how the distribution around the city is. So, I mean, we'll be looking at all of the things that Council Member Brown and Stenet brought up. All, of course, worthwhile. Thank you all. All right, Council Member Plowman. Thank you, Mayor. Also, I was going to mention, I don't think I heard you say this, Council Member Brown, but we do have one of the folks on the commission from District 2. District 2. Lives in Griffingate. He moved. Mr. Owens. I was just saying, I thought we had a commission member from District 2. Not sure. Okay, we'll check into that. However, I will also tell you that my vote would not take on the past. I had three of them that just didn't, it wouldn't take it on the monitor. So, if we could correct that. All right. Thank you, Mayor. Did you get that, Clerk? She said three of her votes did not register. All right. All right. The next is for information-only communications, and that takes us to announcements. Are there any announcements? All right. If not, then... Well, no, we've got to do public comment. One more. Just public comment. Sorry. Public comment. No. We caught ourselves. We caught ourselves. Yeah, now, who all... Whoa, whoa, whoa. Whoa, whoa, whoa. Robin, who is this? Robin Code and then, yes sir, just a second. Hi, my name is Robin and I'm here with the Take Back Cheapside Coalition. And I'm just curious if you all have made any progress on finding potential new locations for both the Breckenridge and the Morgan statues. And I also wanted to thank you, Councilman Maloney, for having brought it up in the earlier meeting. Well, this is ordinarily used for public comment and not for inquiries necessarily, but I will say that we are doing our due diligence. We're listening to many voices in the community, and we're examining the alternatives and the process. Cool. Thank you so much, Robin. Well, with that, I will just leave you with if there's anything we can do to help further that, please get in touch with any of the coalition members or the organizations. Thank you very much. No, I know. I know. I've been in these meetings before. Not here, but I'm saying on the other side. We're with Main Street Baptist Church, located at 582 West Main Street. Main Street has been there for 155 years. It's on property that slaves purchased from Mary Todd Lincoln's family. In fact, Abraham Lincoln was the one who has signed the papers for that. We supposedly have that in our safe and everything. And so we have no plans of moving. I hope you understand that. We have no plans of moving. And we're not against the town branch park. Not against it at all. What we're asking for is that you would work with us because if you take the parking lot away in the back, you take the viaduct away, we don't know where we're going to park. We now have Main Street Baptist Church and we have Main Street Baptist Church Chapel. They're on both sides of the viaduct. Okay? And so all of a sudden, everything's going away from there. A lot of times we would pull in from the back, go into the buildings, and there's just limited parking that we have. And so all we're asking for is if there are some discussions, that we be included in those discussions and realize what it does. I was thinking if we had a funeral. Where do the people park? Where do we line up for the processional? all of those things are issues and especially as you increase the size of the civic center, moving it over expanding it out, you're taking that away my understanding is you're trying to take down the bidoc at the beginning of 2018, if that starts to happen that's going to impact us, and just asking for some consideration there. Okay? Ultimately, we believe that the Lord is going to keep us. He's kept us for 155 years, and he's not going to let his church be destroyed by man. Because we believe that. We trust in that. That's our hope. And so, but if you would just be so kind as to discuss things with us, and Mary, you did that. I've got the clip. I learned last night how to take a little clip from YouTube where you say Main Street Baptist, when we did the press conference, you said Main Street Baptist Church is here. They're our neighbors and we want to work with them. And all we're asking for is that you work with us. Okay. And you know, you'll probably get some calls from some of our members because it's not just one district's problem because our members don't just live right in that district. They live all over Lexington and I'm from Georgetown. So that makes, but I've been there, you know, I'm going to turn 64. I've been there all of my life, all of my life. I've been at Main Street Baptist Church. And so, uh, just, uh, we're sending up prayers and like I said God will not let his church fail and we ask that you work with us. Thank you. Mr. Covington and friends and everybody here you have our assurances that that's exactly what we're going to do but you're all making the point. We know that's a good thing too and visiting with us and reminding us. Thank you all so much. I think it's all we have tonight. There's a motion to adjourn. Is there a second? Thank you so much. We are adjourned. you Thank you. You Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. You ¶¶ Thank you. I'm sorry. Thank you. The I love you. Thank you. Thank you. The End The End The End ¶¶ All right, if we can go ahead and get our seats. It's 1.03. We'll call the General Government and Social Services Committee on July 11, 2017 to order. And the first item on the agenda today is the approval of the June 6th committee summary. Is there any discussion or is there a motion to approve, please? All right. Motion by Council Member Henson. Is there a second? Council Member Angela Evans seconded the motion. Is there any discussion on the motion? There being none. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Thank you very much. We'll say those are approved. And we will go ahead and move to our next item, which is the review of the ethics ordinance. I'll recognize Council Member Evans, who has been leading the work of the subcommittee of the review of the ethics ordinance. So, Council Member Evans, please. Thank you, Chair. This has been a long time coming. If you all remember, I'll just kind of go through the PowerPoint briefly and give some little anecdotal thoughts here and there. But it's pretty similar to what had been reported out before, but we did want to have the full input from the Ethics Commission themselves, and we have gotten that, and quite frankly, they didn't have too much more to add. So I will note where they did have some concerns. but the first part is just the review that this was July 5th of 2016 I think is when we reported out and what our original call was that's the first slide do I need to come up okay thanks and we will be talking about this and we'll talk about council members but of course keep in mind that all of this applies to any elected officials, so the mayor, the PVA, the sheriff, anyone that's elected along with other officers of the urban county government, which more than likely would be the commissioners, but I guess the examples that we might use will be in the context of council members, but just know that it applies to all the elected officials and officers. We did add a declaration, clarify a declaration, which we just simply got from the Charter, and we did think that it was helpful for the public and everyone to understand what the real purpose was of the Ethics Act itself. and we did talk about the qualifying adult language that we simply we approved and agreed that should be included and that had been included in let's see to include life partners in financial statements and that they would also be subject to nepotism prohibition and is referenced throughout the act but this has also been included in our health care plan so we just thought to be consistent with the Ethics Act and other rules that the qualifying adult language should also be added. And this is where it starts to get interesting. The financial interest, we actually included a definition, which we thought would be helpful for everyone. And this was taken from Louisville. they had a definition that was also the recommendation of the Ethics Commission to, one, have a definition, and then was suggested to use this one as well. I will add, after having some time to think about it and reflecting on it later on, it's a little clumsily worded. I mean, if you all have questions on it about it, we can certainly discuss it. I think maybe from better clarification that we could opt to have the sentence stop after line three, after officer, and delete the portion of which does not arise from until the end. I think they try to do a lot more in that definition, which we clarify later on, but I don't think it hurts it to leave it in there. But, again, having come back to it after some time, it was a little clumsy. But the point being that we actually added the financial interest definition. We also added the private interest, which is something that would be very new to all of us. and the private interest would mean employment, board membership, or participation in management operations of any entity by an officer or family member of an officer. Now, the impact of that would be that, one, we would want those interests to be reflected on the financial statements, or at least before anyone would vote, talking about council members or anyone serving on the Ethics Commission or the Planning Commission, those where you actually have to vote on things, that that would be divulged prior to any votes. We thought this was important to add because it does clarify the phrase that we all love so much, the appearance of impropriety, because we know that we all serve on different boards and so forth, and we all are connected in different ways to a lot of different agencies. but again it's just more of a transparency issue that the public will know that there is some relationship but again we clarify that just because you have a private interest doesn't necessarily preclude you from voting but we'll get to that in a minute but again just clarifying and making it more transparent about the relationships that we have with agencies or entities that might come before council or other officers of the city. Again, the conflict of interest. This is where, you know, obviously the Ethics Commission has a lot of complaints that come through. But what we did do, again, is clarify what a conflict of interest is not. So this was our attempt to say, basically, if you don't have a financial gain to any greater extent than anyone else in that group would receive, then it's not a conflict of interest. So, Council Member Farmer, I always like to use you as the example because it's kind of an anomaly, not an anomaly, but a different kind of profession that you have. So the example that we would bounce around is, let's say an example would be, I know we have an ordinance that impacts all of the jewelers. We want a sign that is greater and bigger, that they get some different rule for jewelry signs. Just because Council Member Farmer is a jeweler, if he doesn't receive any greater benefit than any other jeweler in Lexington, just because he's a part of that group, that would not be a conflict of interest for him, just because it simply impacts a group that he's also a member of. So to kind of clarify that, which perhaps I made as clear as mud, but to kind of clarify those situations that just because you might receive a benefit, but as long as your benefit isn't any greater than anyone else in that group, then it is not a conflict of interest. The Ethics Commission was concerned about the term member in the last line because there is a legal definition to that term as it relates to business. So the thought was maybe we could change that to an individual to substitute that, because that was a concern that they did have. A lot of them are attorneys on the Ethics Commission, so they were reading it very differently through that lens. But I think that would be an acceptable substitution for the term individual. if we were to vote for this definition. And continuing with conflicts of interest, we also wanted to address when, again, when we're talking about council members, a lot of us sit on different boards, non-profit boards. So there were some council members that said, look, I just decided to get off the boards to not give that appearance of any impropriety or any special treatment. And that was, I think, historically a question that I remember being on when I was on the Ethics Commission. That question had come through as well. So it's really for clarification for the officers and the public, but really something that I know previous council members have had questions and concerns about. So this was to clarify that, again, just because you're a member of a nonprofit organization, it doesn't mean that you will be indirect. You will have a direct conflict of interest as long as you, one, report it, put it on your financial statement, or disclose it prior to voting. So it's kind of the same concept. As long as you divulge that you have a relationship with that organization, then you're in the clear. You know, we, of course, want it to be revealed as soon as possible, which would be on the financial interest statement. But if you do it before, though, that would be acceptable, too. But again, it's just another way to clear up that appearance of impropriety and give comfort to officers that do want to serve and have served on so many boards diligently just to eliminate that concern for the public. The official misconduct definition was added, and that was at the suggestion of the Ethics Commission, and you have the definition right there. But again, this is still restricted to someone acting in their official capacity in their office. in their role as a council member as pva as you know coroner whatever um so there are some set explanations and we did add intentions um you know the mindset of what would be of the of the person at the time so you you see intentionally recklessly knowingly performs with intent to obtain or knowingly accept. So we did want to make clear that there would be a true mentality. It's not just a, oh, oops, I did something, and there was no real ill intent behind it. So that is new, and again, that was on the suggestion of the Ethics Commission. And these would be the penalties that, again, obviously would be new as well. And these also are focused around the intent of the individual. So we did highlight the words that I think you should pay attention to, the unintentional violations. And if someone voluntarily corrects it, there's certainly a penalty for that. but of course it would be much lighter than than someone doing something intentionally uh intentionally or the result of a good faith misinterpretation that would result in a reprimand and item c for the intentional violations which is obviously knowing that the commission would then have four options to choose from if they decided that that uh individual had acted intentionally But the impact and purpose of this is to give the public and the commission clear disciplinary actions that can be taken. And again, to let those elected officials and officers of the city know what potential penalties could be based on their behavior. next we were charged to discuss the makeup of the of the commission and we had decided to eliminate and replace with broader categories there was a lot of discussion on this It is in your draft, if you want to go to it, page 14 and 15. I think this does change a lot. It does give the administration, any administration, sole responsibility or discretion of seeking candidates, which will potentially have a faster appointment, which is a concern for the commission, that a lot of times there would be vacancies on the commission. But it does eliminate what I think is the initial intent of the citizen's involvement. Right now, for those of you that don't know, we have organizations that nominate names and present them to the mayor. this would eliminate that and it would just be the sole discretion of the administration to find and select those those individuals now I got through that much faster than I thought so I will kind of expound on on this one and this was something that was not a unanimous vote and again I think going back to We spent a lot of time on this because, again, it was the concern of commission members and those organizations, some of which are older age and just perhaps not gaining membership, but that was a concern. It was pointed out that organizations don't necessarily have to appoint someone from within their membership. It's that organization simply has the duty to find and nominate someone. So I personally thought that was perhaps something that was a misunderstanding. But changing it to this way would eliminate that entire process. because right now, again, for those of you who don't know, each time they nominate an individual, these organizations have to present their bylaws and additional information about that organization to show that they are still in existence. But I think there are some other options that could be discussed. We could eliminate the group that was, I guess, of the largest concern currently, or maybe replace that group with another organization that's similar in its purpose or a group that represents a demographic that historically has been disenfranchised, like I think a few of them do. But that's pretty much the presentation. If there are questions, I'll certainly take them. Thank you, Council Member Evans. So this opens up the floor for discussions. I recognize Council Member. Farmer, please. Thank you for this work. I look forward to it. And it seems very well done. I had not followed it that closely. So you contemplate a couple of changes. You're really kind of cleaning up the ordinance from maybe its original writing. Is that how you would characterize it? Well, some of it's cleanup language. Like some of the strike there is cleanup language. But no, I think we have changed it significantly with the explaining what a financial interest is and the private interest and having to report that. So I will say that that's a significant change from what we've done. But timely and part of what it should have had in it anyway, don't you think? I guess I have another type of question because I don't see how I'm going to ask you how this, in its change form or even its current form, whatever, you know, we began the year, we inaugurated a council member who's not here today. How would this, in its changed form, or would it have contemplated any of those circumstances or any of those background things? I don't believe it would because of what any officer, so whether council member or otherwise, does in their private life. That was a discussion because we've had, quite honestly, a few different situations. Yes, ma'am. Yes, ma'am. So we did discuss that, but we did believe it was more appropriate to focus on how someone actually uses their official capacity. So it is still narrowly tailored to that, and no, it would not address someone's private life. Very good. Thank you very much. Thank you, Chair. Council Member Henson. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Council Member Evans, for your work on this. I appreciate it. And thankful that we have an attorney on the council to help with these types of things. I guess I... I just wanted some clarity. clarification, okay, the conflict of interest or the private interest, is that this is just the definition or can you give me an example, and this is on page nine, of the private interest means. So I guess if we, many of us do, serve on different boards, I know I serve on Employment Solutions, Council Member Stenet serves on like big brothers, big sisters. So, and I just feel like to avoid a conflict of interest, if the agency that I serve as a board member or currently the chair, if they were to seek government monies, tax dollars, then I would recuse myself from that vote. So is that, hasn't that always been the case? Always the case. I'll let someone from the law department talk about that. I've only been here for two and a half years. I can't tell you what always is. But yes, but actually what we tried to do was eliminate, or to really say that just because you serve on that board, that's a private interest, but just because you have a private interest does not mean that is a conflict of interest. Okay. So that's what on page 11, page 11, parence 6, tries to explain, right there, that it's because you serve on a nonprofit that might come before. Again, we'll use counsel as the example. But if it's disclosed, then it will not be a conflict of interest. I don't think it asks those type of questions on our financial statement, so is that being revised as well? That would have to be revised, yes. Okay. Because right now it's strictly financial interest, but yes, we would be expanding it to include your private interest. Okay. Thank you. I appreciate the work. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Council Member Henson. Council Member Fred Brown. Thank you, Chair. Looking at this document here, it's easier for me to read the actual draft on page 16. It starts on page 16 because it shows in red the additions and deletions of the present Ethics Act. So I will refer to that on my questioning. Over on page 29, it talks about the Ethics Commission created, and there's some new language in there about the nine members. What was your overall discussion? Because basically you're deleting where these members are coming from and basically leaving it more up to the mayor to appoint these. so they may be pointed groups may get involved they may not it's pretty much like our planning commission uh it may be more political is what i'm thinking so what was your also take on that or or did you talk about it well i can do you want to speak to this council member evans i mean i'll speak to it as well if you want yes because i think that's where paths diverge um so i i think it's good to have certainly more people who are on the subcommittee talk about it. Yes, that is what, and I will tell you, I did not vote for this, but the majority of the subcommittee voted for it. Yes, that's exactly what it does. Let me interrupt just a minute. Could you name who was on the subcommittee, please, so I know how the votes went. You really want me to name them, Council? Well, I mean, what's on the subcommittee? Councilmember Fred Brown, it's actually in the packet as to who was on there. And it was, I think, very evenly distributed. It was Councilmember Evans, Councilmember Bledsoe, myself, Councilmember Maloney, and Councilmember Scotchfield. Okay, thank you. Just a group of five. Yes, sir, it was. Thank you. I'll let Councilmember Maloney speak, and then I can come back. Sure, sure. I just want to follow up on the committees on the nine. Most of them live in the 5th and 12th District. That's what I'm worried about. I'm concerned. Okay. And I'm going to add to the explanation on that, Council Member Brown, because obviously I had years of experience with dealing with the appointments for the Ethics Act, and I know that I'm really conflicted with this change as well because I realize the value of making sure that we are pulling the correct people onto this so that it is spread across the community from all the different areas. However, it was very, very difficult, and I mean that it was strenuous, to be able to get members from these organizations to get them to nominate three people. And, I mean, it was nearly impossible. So we met that time and time and time again. So I think that this is a work in progress. I'm not saying that I love the way that what we come up with, but I think it's something that we can work off of and work with. I don't think it's the best solution, but I just want people to understand that the way that it has been set up in the past, It was nearly impossible to get people to be appointed. I can see it's a major change is the reason I brought it up. Sure. And just the word there, you probably could have put out of there one member from a list, not less than three names. You could probably struck three names and just let that group nominate one person, and you would have solved that problem. I don't know if you talked about it or not. I think we did. but we did get stuck on the problems that the boards were having. I don't disagree with you, Council Member Brown. Having worked with licensure boards for six years, I mean, the governor's office would have the same issues about getting people to serve. So, I mean, I think there are ways we can help these organizations. Like you said, perhaps reducing the number, And again, explaining that they don't necessarily have to come from their own membership. They can come. It's just they have the duty to nominate someone, which I'm not so sure was always clear. But, yeah, I have concerns about eliminating the organizations and the citizen involvement. I guess this ethics ordinance is probably 20 years old, somewhere in that. And I remember I was on the council when we first adopted it. And, you know, there was a lot of work and a lot of thought into it, and it was just a sign of the times that we needed to have some transparency and that in government. This particular area, though, I think was thought of a lot. And I can't support this language here because I think it takes away from having representation throughout the community with these bodies that should be involved, and I think it gives a little bit too much power to the mayor on appointment. So I'll say that. That's one topic that, and I've got some time here. I want to address the conflicts of interest. Well, actually, I believe you have ran out of time. However, obviously, you can speak twice on the subject, so if you wouldn't mind, if I could come back, go ahead and recognize Vice Mayor Kaye, and then I'll come back to you, That's okay, sir? Yes, sir. Thank you. Vice Mayor Kaye. Thank you, Chair, and thank you to the subcommittee. I know this was a lot of hard work. These kinds of pieces of legislation are very complex, and every word makes a difference, so I appreciate the hard work. I wanted to first ask a question on this last conversation about the appointment process. is it the case the council these would go on the mayor's report the council would have to approve of members who are appointed to the ethics commission I see heads nodding yes so there's still a little control and I understand the concern for citizen involvement but the practicalities are that whether it's one person or three getting an organization to actually submit to do the work and submit candidate has proved to be pretty burdensome. It doesn't work very well. So this does not preclude those organizations from putting people forward. It just tries to simplify the process. And I think so long as Council has the approval process and the final say that I can support it. Secondly, I want to follow up on Council Member Farmer's comments about activities outside of one's official responsibilities. I think there was some expectation, perhaps inappropriate, that this work would also speak to the question of removal from office. And since it has not, what I will do is place into this committee that question. So this is the question of what grounds, if any, we would like to establish for removing someone from office. Before you do that, perhaps the law department might speak on that because that was a conversation that we had. And I'm not convinced we have the authority to do that pursuant to Kentucky Revised Statutes. We had that discussion. I haven't been involved in those discussions, but it's definitely something we would have to look at. It periodically comes up, so it is questionable, but there's nothing wrong with looking at it if that's what you would like to do. I believe that conversation would be useful, and we can get all the information to this committee and to the public, because there's, again, I think a concern that for certain kinds of misconduct, we have no opportunity to act on that to, I want to be careful how I say this, but basically to protect the integrity of this body. So I would like to see it get a little more specific information, and I think this committee is the appropriate place to do it. I don't usually use my prerogative as vice mayor to place something in committee, but I do have that prerogative. But I'll hold for the comment. Council Member Evans. I believe it was our understanding, and I'm not your legal department by any stretch of the imagination, but we had that discussion, and it was our understanding that we do not have the authority to do that. Louisville has the authority to do that, but we do not, because we are under a different KRS chapter. So we don't have the authority to remove anyone from office. That may be true, but KRS is also amendable, and I would like to see this body consider what we might do or not be able to do under existing regulation and or move to amend so that we have the authority. So, again, for what it's worth, I'd like to have a more extensive discussion. So, thank you, Chair. Thank you. I appreciate that. Council Member Farmer has signed up, and then I'll recognize Council Member Fred Brown again to finish his comments. I didn't mean to come back again, but the Vice Mayor has kind of helped focus this a little bit, and I don't mind to have more discussion. I don't mind to flesh it out. I just don't think we should place ourselves in a situation, potentially, where this ordinance or the work of this ordinance would take place faster than someone's judicial representation might. I don't think that we should act before, if someone is involved in a court proceeding, I don't think we should act before that court proceeding is done. It's just my personal point of view on it, because I think that could be prejudicial to whatever's going on there. I do understand your point about protecting the body. I think we're all of one mind there. I just think we might want to be careful about when and how that takes place in relation to the outside situation. It's just my thought. Thank you. Council Member Fred Brown, please. Yes, the other areas of concern was the official misconduct and the penalties arising by that. That was expanded, it looks like, looking at the draft. And it seems like it gives an awful lot of power to the Ethics Commission. Let me ask this question first, maybe from law. Is this open records, the meetings for the ethics? Any of that closed, or is it all open? I really wish Glinda were here. She handles all this ethics stuff and has been involved in all of these discussions about ethics. Part of what the Ethics Commission does is confidential. Part is not. It depends on what they're doing and how it is submitted to them and how the person submitting it makes an election, as I recall. And I'll confirm on that, too, because obviously there are certain issues that are discussed in closed session, and there are certain issues that, you know, so, but they do have minutes and those that are over. in our public record. Certainly any official, I'll call it discipline, is going to be open. I don't, and I'm not familiar with the amendments you're doing, but for example, in our bar association, there are private reprimands that may not be open. I don't know that this is providing for something like that, but generally anything else, a reprimand, the other things would be open. Well, I think my concern always is that once you, any of us or anybody on any of the committees, once your name gets out there that the Ethics Commission is looking at a particular issue, if that's open, then it's just the media is there and you can't get that back. it's to some degree maybe a blot on your reputation or your credibility or whatever and I've seen it happen too many times where it gets played out in the media not that the media is telling anything wrong they're just probably quoting what is in that committee but when you're looking at these penalties and you're looking at this conflict of interest it just opens up a can of worms to me about service from the community, not only elected, but people out there that are putting themselves out to work on these committees and commissions. And I just have a concern there about maybe the Ethics Commission having too much control, too much power on what they could do to a particular person. And then you've got to get into the legal end of it, because if I'm accused of any of this right here, I'm going to lawyer up. And I don't know how that's related to this Ethics Commission either. So I just put those out for... And certainly you have Council members who can address that. But as I recall, the initial part of the Ethics Commission investigation, et cetera, is not open. But that's all confidential. I certainly think, and people do bring attorneys to these hearings. I'm going to put hearings in quotes because I'm not that familiar with the hearings that the Ethics Commission does. So initially, but also I don't think there's anything that would prevent someone from going to the press if they made a complaint on something like this, but you all may be more familiar with that than I am. And I'll speak to that also. So if there is a complaint that has been filed, which would be what you're talking about through an investigation, because there are two things, advisory opinions and complaints. Those are the purview of the Ethics Commission. And when a complaint is filed, there is an investigation and there is a process that takes place. And obviously when things are discussed at that level of the complaint, it is in closed session, because that is not an open process. during the investigation. And I know, Angela, Council Member Evans was on the Ethics Commission as well, but I understand your concerns. I don't think that if you actually heard about the process that takes place that you would have as many concerns as you've expressed today. I think there is a very significant level of confidentiality that goes with that, as it should be. So I know I think Council Member Evans wants to speak to this as well. I will speak in my role as general counsel to several different licensing boards because there would be complaints that would come through from the public, and those were deemed not subject or not available to anyone making an open records request because it was pending. There are exceptions to the Open Records Act, and if an issue is still pending or under investigation, that's a valid exception that can be used to not give that information to someone making that request. So even if there was an issue out there or a complaint going on, I think the Open Records Act could be used to keep that from being distributed to someone, because that was an exception that I always used when people wanted to know about a case that was going on. Well, it's pending. It's still under investigation, so I can't provide you with that complaint. So, Council Member Fred Brown, do you have any other? Okay. Alrighty. I appreciate it. I'd like to take this opportunity, not seeing anyone else signed up to speak, because I have some concerns. I don't have the concerns that others have expressed about the misconduct or the conflict of interest. I think that is important that that language be added. I do have concerns with the way that the Commission, the members, are created. I do think that we probably need to see about that. But there are some, especially specifically one organization that's listed on here that actually I think they just have one or two members still left. So you also have to deal with issues like that where the organizations are so thin that they don't have enough people to represent. I know we have in the past gone through, the prior councils have gone through and changed the name of the organization. to better represent or try to get members to be nominated. So the other thing is under the page 31 of the actual Ethics Act, where you see that there is a lot of redacted struck through on item 9, subsection 9 and 10, that's where we had to get all the information from these organizations, and it was such a cumbersome process. So I appreciate and believe that that information should be no longer required. So I guess I would ask my colleagues what you all would like to see happen today, if you want to move forward or if you want to have an opportunity to think about this and maybe even get some input from the Ethics Commission themselves. I know that they weren't able to be here today, so I will ask my colleagues what your preference is for this item on the agenda. Don't speak up all at once either. Vice Mayor Kaye. Thank you, Chair. I would defer to the presenter, but I'd be willing to make a motion to move this on to the docket for council approval. You're asking me. You're not formally. I'm asking you. I was contemplating it based on the conversation that we've had. I think the membership makeup is perhaps the biggest concern. So I would move to accept the recommendations with the exception of the membership makeup and perhaps have more conversation about that because I feel like that's the concern. So that's what I was leaning towards, not officially making motions. But I hear concern about the membership makeup, and I do. So that would mean leaving it in committee, I presume. Or moving to amend today. Well, I guess there are several ways to skin the cat. Moving to accept all the recommendations with the exception of the membership recommendation. That would be my motion. and leave the membership as is. All right. There's a motion to accept all changes with the exception of excluding Section 25-20, which is the creation of the Ethics Commission, and that motion was seconded by Council Member Henson. Is there a discussion on the motion? Yes, ma'am. Okay, Vice Mayor. I just want clarification, if I can. If that moves forward, what essentially we're doing is approving all of the changes except that change, not having further discussion about whether the membership ought to be, whether that section ought to be changed or not. I would see that as an amendment and not a motion. I just want to be clear. Well, I'd like to move as much forward as I can. And I think the commission's still operating in their membership as it is. I mean, we just nominated or approved a membership, you know, a new commissioner not too long ago. So I feel like the other things need to be changed and addressed, and there seems to be some kind of consensus. So I wouldn't want the membership to hold us up. And we can, someone else can pick that up at a later date. But I'd like to move as much forward as we possibly can, because there are also some just cleanup language that's been included as well. Okay. I guess what I'm stuck on is that what we are looking at was a recommendation from the subcommittee. Is that correct? And that's what you have brought forward? Well, that's what was reported out a while ago, yes. but I think we've had more discussion because nothing has changed since the previous report out nothing has changed this is the same presentation that was given okay but now we've had further discussion about membership and that seems to be a concern well there's some other concerns as well but again I just like to move as much forward of this as the majority can agree on. Okay, then only one further question. Does that mean that the subcommittee would continue its work and come back with a recommendation to? I think the subcommittee completed its work a long time ago. We were actually just waiting to get a final word from the ethics commission, but I believe when it was previously reported out, the subcommittee was dissolved and our duties were done, unless you all want to create a new one based on the membership. Okay, so then I go back. Basically, so functionally, if we were to approve your motion, we are moving to approve the report of the subcommittee except for the section on membership, and there's no further discussion by the subcommittee and there's no further discussion at this time of that question. Is that correct? Okay. Thank you. Okay. And Vice Mayor, I would say, I know Council Member Farmer wants to speak, but I will say that if this does move forward with the exception of 2520 on the membership, I personally would like to see that further vetted, now whether that's through another subcommittee. But I think we need to have the administration involved because this impacts them as well, their work. And they did speak to us at the subcommittee. And so I think that it is important to understand all of the parts of this. So I would suggest that if this does move forward today, with the exception of 2520, that we actually discuss the membership section along with your concern that you had after that. And I think that we have the purview to do that. So I just wanted to say that. Council Member Farmer. So if the motion is successful, this would report out during the committee meeting in August. Would that be correct? That is correct. So there would be plenty of time for any other discussion or background work to go on or amendment to happen at that time? Yes, sir. So there's no rush to the post for this afternoon or this evening? Oh, no, definitely not. Thank you. Council Member James Brown. Thank you, Chair. I guess my question was, and I don't want to rehash what several have already said, but the subcommittee's recommendation was this change to the nomination of the ethics committee. This was already vetted through the subcommittee, and this is what their recommendation was. Was there another option that was on the table as far as nominations? This is it. And this change is because there's a challenge with filling the ethics commission. So if we move this forward without making this change, we strengthen the ordinance, but we still have the same challenge with filling the commission. Okay, I was just wanting to understand some clarity on that. And then I have some of the same concerns that Council Member Brown had brought up and would like some clarity on what proceedings are public and what is closed. I think some clarification on that when it comes back in August would be helpful. Thank you. I'll go ahead and recognize Council Member Scotchfield, and then I'll speak after that. Council Member Scotchfield. Thank you, Chair. and especially I'm not a member of this committee anymore. One of the issues that I have with us going through the ordinance, and I mean I've made this, I felt like we kind of looked at it piecemeal and added things in rather than trying to streamline the whole thing. I had said several times I would have preferred to start over and have a new, look for a new ordinance. maybe include some of the things that we thought were important, but rewrite it. I feel like we've added a lot of language to it, but I don't think we've necessarily clarified it. And I think, you know, we did vote out what you have in front of you. I would prefer, if this committee decides to move it forward, is to move it forward as it was reported out of the committee and then offer solutions as we move forward in August. because otherwise why would we have a committee bring it forward unless we're going to offer amendments now because the amendment is to exclude something which doesn't make sense so that's again I can't vote you all are at your your discretion on how how you go from here but those are my thoughts on it I think we've done too much piecemeal, and we'd be doing that again. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Council Member Scutchfield. I will say that that was one of the problems with the, when the new committee structure came out, two of the members on the subcommittee had actually been not, they weren't on this, the General Government Social Services Committee any longer, So we were either going to report out or we were going to have to restructure the subcommittee also, just FYI. So Vice Mayor Kaye. Thank you, Chair. I'm going to try and not complicate things, but I believe I would agree with Council Member Scutchfield. At this point, it makes more sense to me if we're going to move something forward, that we move forward what has come from the subcommittee. and that if there is further amendments to be made, that they may be made when they come forward before Council at work session. So I would move to amend the motion to include the section on membership as reported out by the subcommittee. So in effect, we'd be moving forward the whole report as submitted. Is there a second to Vice Mayor Kaye's motion, please? Second. All right. There's a motion to amend the existing motion on the floor to add back in Section 25-20 of the Ethics Act. Motion made by Vice Mayor Kaye, seconded by Council Member James Brown. Is there any discussion on that motion? All right. Yeah, the motion to amend. Is there any discussion on the motion to amend? If not, can we do an electronic vote just to make it easy? Please vote. All those in favor of the motion to amend? All right. Okay, that motion to amend failed. Now we're back to the original motion that was made by Council Member Evans, seconded by Henson, Council Member Henson, to approve the report out with the exception of Sections 25-20. Is there any discussion on that motion again? There being none, then if we can have an electronic vote as well. And all those in favor, please say aye or vote electronically. All right. That motion reflects approval of 6 to 4. So I guess we will go forward. I would ask Council Member Evans to not request to have this. Well, we can add another item into the committee later on, so never mind. Scratch that thought. So, all right. So that seems like that puts that item in committee to rest. And so we go on to item number three. and this item was placed into committee by Council Member Maloney and I'll ask Council Member Maloney to introduce this. Thank you. I brought this up because I've been a big fan of evaluations and I think the administration knows that I've asked that we see where we are in evaluation because when I came back under the administration, there were there was places departments that were not doing any evaluation at all and there were some doing some evaluation and then the reason I was told that there were no evaluation because they weren't getting raises and that not a good reason why because performance evaluation has more than just raises if your job is being produced how you can improve your job and that's why we have evaluations everywhere I've been. The state For example, we didn't give anybody raises for eight years, and we still did evaluations every year. And when I came back, I asked that we get back on the evaluation, and that's when I was CAO. And now that I come back, counsel, I've asked where we are on the evaluation because we were not doing it. Am I correct? I don't think it might have been one department that I remember doing evaluation. But now I'm hoping that we have every department now back on track and to follow up how that's coming along. Well, I appreciate the opportunity to speak with you all today and thank you for inviting me. I'm going to talk a little bit about our current process and even some ideas for a new process as well. And to your point, we do actually, we receive a considerable number of evaluations from all kinds of divisions just for the reason that you specified, because we think it's important that people have their progress and their performance evaluated and have the opportunity to sit down with the supervisor, discuss how they're doing, some opportunities for improvement, and have those conversations. So I'll tell you a little bit about how the current process is. We've been doing the same process for quite some time, so it really hasn't changed a lot, but just so everyone's familiar with it, it's outlined in our employee handbook in Chapter 13. All employees receive a handbook during new employee orientation. It's also available on the intranet so they can see the information about that process. In addition, we distribute a two-week checklist to all new employees, and part of that checklist is covering important topics, including performance evaluations with a new employee. And another effect of our current process is if an employer receives less than a 2, that's a 2.0, on their overall score for their evaluation. They do not receive the annual increase, but anyone with a 2 or above does. I'll talk about that in just a second. We have four forms that are used. Two are basically identical. There's an exempt form and a non-exempt form. The only difference for probationary forms is they really don't have as much of the detail for position responsibilities. It focuses more on the general competencies and their success with those or items that need improvement. There's a ratings worksheet. Our scores are on a rating scale of 1 to 5, 1 being the lowest score, 5 being the highest. Those are averaged and can even be weighted for the competencies depending on the need for the division. There is an area for development plans whereby the supervisor can talk about some things that the employee can do to develop throughout their career here. The employee can also make comments, and then there's a place for everyone to sign. Our performance management system is driven to some extent by ordinance, and chapter 2148 covers civil service performance management, 2231 is unclassified, and 2347 is for fire and emergency services. We have just a summary here for you, but you'll see that all of them are very similar in that each of them states that the director establishes a criterion for the supervisor's use. It covers all civil service employees, unclassified civil service employees, and even sworn employees. They're to be used for determining things like salary increases, disciplinary action. It could even be used for seniority in case you have a tiebreaker for layoffs. For civil service employees, we use those for permanent appointments in that we ask that a PMD form comes with the request for permanent appointment. And for those to be delivered, supervisors need to sit down and discuss those with their employees. We always tell folks in training, you know, nothing on a performance development plan should be a surprise to anyone. Everyone should have the opportunity to sit down and discuss those with their supervisors. The employees do have an opportunity to appeal their performance management form. If they have a question about it, they follow the grievance procedure in order to do that. And then for the merit pool application, employees get within grade salary increases based on their score, like I mentioned earlier. Employees with a score of 2.0 or above are eligible for the standard increase. If they have below a 2.0, they are not eligible. Some things to note about our current process. We do, again, think it's very important to provide feedback to employees regarding their performance or development needs. We think that our current system is adequate. It's a little bit dated. It could be improved by providing training or increasing accountability for completing those. We could even develop a new and more modern system. It would either need to be included within PeopleSoft or integrate with PeopleSoft, we believe. We have had some discussions about the new PeopleSoft upgrade and think that there might be some improvements we can make there in using it a little bit more for performance management. In order to do that, we would need to decide some basic requirements of the system, whether or not to link pay to performance. We would need staff to retool the existing system, create workflow, accountability, develop training programs, deliver the training, and provide system support for management and staff. Some desired components would be really a kind of top-down view of the process where LFUCG would have strategic priorities for department commissioners. They would then bring that down to their departments and divisions and identify strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats, work with their division directors, set smart objectives, and then cascade those down through their divisions. Directors would work with management, management with supervisors, and then supervisors would have kind of a line of sight for goals throughout their division, monitor staff progress for those goals. Again, changing those goals, they can fluctuate throughout the year, so making sure they're a little more fluid than just one-time delivery. They can use coaching and counseling forms throughout the year to kind of build on an end-of-year performance development form. and then of course we would still recommend that those forms came to human resources for inclusion in the personnel file any questions thank you Miss Walters I appreciate that now I'll open up for for discussion or questions councilmember Maloney I appreciate the presentation and I'm glad that we're doing this because see we do when we do a lot of reclassification moving people around in the apartments and all that I like to see that their references I mean their evaluations are being taken to the new supervisors before they hire somebody to know what kind of goals they had now they reach their goals and all that because not knocking but before I came on there were people that would get just moving them just to get them out of the department because they were being a headache and I just don't want to see that anymore and that's one thing that I have a problem that's why I asked for evaluation if they're being a headache you fix that problem and that's why I'm glad I'm hoping this is what we're doing here because there were a lot of folks that were being moved around there were problems and there were problems going in those other departments and now we don't need that. What we need is and I'm glad to see this and have we made it mandatory that every department now is going to be doing evaluations and when are they doing like the state we always had them do quarterly and then one report would do first of the year and then at the half of the year you have if they're on track and all that and then the final report would do at the end of the year. They have twice a year they bring everything finalized. What did you all, one year, twice a year, what? While we don't make those mandatory, they are highly recommended just because of the importance of feedback and even the documentation, and we ask for those to be completed annually. So they're not mandatory? Departments don't have to do evaluation? We ask that they do, but we don't have a checklist to make sure we get every one for every employee. To me, I think, and I'm not trying to. I understand. It seems like to me if we've got one department doing a heck of a job keeping everybody, and then you've got one department not doing anything, not doing evaluations or nothing, it just defeats the whole purpose. Because all you're going to do is, I'm just hoping that you all are going to have evaluation. Because to me, that is mandatory. anywhere I've ever worked state my non-profit, everywhere and any place I've ever been my boss, supervisors have always and I'm just hoping that we are setting, if you're going to be a supervisor the reason why you're getting asked to pay is because you have to be over these folks and you make sure that your department is being run right. I just hope that we're not that you have a system that shows that every department is doing what they're supposed to be doing I think that's something we could certainly move toward. Thank you. Thank you. Vice Mayor Kay. Thank you, Chair, and thank you for the presentation. Thank you. I guess my question is on page, what's 51 of our packet, current process, tell us what that is, and then it can be improved by either improving the current system or developing a completely new and modern system. I guess I have two questions about that. One is just off the top of your head, which way is the better way to go absent all other considerations like time and money? And then what's the difference in time and money for between one and two, between modifying what we've got and developing a new system? Well, I think to Council Member Maloney's point, the increasing accountability portion with our current system, and I think that would be important if that's the direction we want to take, if we want everyone to complete forms and make sure we monitor those. There are all kinds of systems out there, and it would be something we'd probably have to even RFP if we wanted a separate system. I think that probably somewhere in the middle could work just by some of the things that I've seen with PeopleSoft and working with the integration of the upgrade portion of it. It seems like it might have some capability that we don't use in the current version we use, and we may be able to do some build-out of job descriptions, but tasks and things that we could then measure performance in that system. So as far as the amount of time or the amount of money, it's really hard to gauge. It would depend on what we decided we needed to put into a new system and what we wanted out of it. Okay, so what are the likely next steps, if any, given this report? Well, I think it depends on the feedback. We have been, it's been our feedback before to continue with the process that we have, that it's adequate, that we could promote it more and get more people to participate potentially. and still be able to provide that service to our employees and give feedback to our employees. You know, the opposite end of that scale would be a complete revamp from top to bottom, which would be considerable. So it really just depends on the direction that the administration would like to take. Okay. Okay. So is it fair to say that from your perspective, the system presently is not perfect, but it works fairly well, could be tweaked? And I'll let you answer that, and then I'll add a comment. I do agree with that, yes. Okay. When I look at number two, developing a completely new modern system, I see a lot of time and money. and I don't want to overstate this, but there's no perfect system. Right. And anybody who's dealt with workforce and workforce development and evaluation understands that there's always a human element in it, no matter what you do, that there's always places where it works and doesn't work, and I would be reluctant to ask the administration to invest a huge amount of time and effort in a completely revamping. Thank you. Comment. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Council Member Evans. Thank you, Chair. I guess I'm a little confused and maybe have to start back at square one, because what I recall Council Member Maloney's concern being is that just evaluations weren't being done across the board. Is that, what's the position, is that changing? start with that. I don't know how we got from just trying to improve or make sure everyone's being evaluated to creating a whole new system. I guess some of the thought might be that people might not use our current system because they don't like it or don't feel that it meets the needs of their departments or divisions. I guess that could be one reason for it. If there was a way that made it easier, maybe not as cumbersome with 18 different things to fill out and comments to make on each. How do people get an option of whether or not to evaluate their employees, or is that the concern that it hasn't been a requirement? My understanding is that's the concern. And so if the direction is we need to take more focus, then we would need to dedicate some resources in our division to that process. So systems aside, how is that being addressed? Because if it's done on paper, I mean, again, coming from the state perspective, I presumed everyone used the same evaluation because I got evaluated to the same general kinds of questions. So it had to be done and whether or not it went into a file and never looked at again. The fact is it was there should it need to be used. So I guess I'm perplexed that there's perhaps an option that it's not something that's in someone's job description to do evaluations or make sure evaluations are done. So is that perhaps where we need to go? I think, to your point, part of the difficulty is the tracking mechanism. Because it is on paper and we get them anywhere from the beginning of May to the end of July sometimes. whereas if we used a system that was electronic we'd be able to identify people in the system who should not only receive evaluations but also who should give those and we would be able to track that and then identify folks who maybe weren't complying with that okay I'll stop because that's really concerning I don't understand why it is not in someone's job description to make sure the evaluations are completed. And what level of employee is that? And is that something that needs to be in writing? Is that a policy that needs to be changed? Or is that something? Well, I think that we could make a focus to communicate that to the division directors. And, you know, that way it's a smaller scale. Instead of HR being the gatekeeper for all performance evaluations, that divisions individually can make sure that theirs are completed. Okay. All right. Thank you. Council Member Maloney? I want to follow up on Council Member Evans. So I'm getting the impression that some divisions say you can do it and some divisions say you don't have to evaluate, or is that my... I don't believe that that's the case. I don't believe that some divisions are told they have to or they don't have to. We tell everyone they should. We just don't double-check to see every employee has an evaluation that comes to human resources. And as a supervisor, defined supervisor, every title, I mean the definition of a supervisor, it says you have to evaluate or are you saying that the supervisor does not have that language in there that every supervisor needs to evaluate? I think without looking at individual job descriptions, it should be understood that So if you've never been to Market 301, what you're going to find is about 30 different artists, makers, and or local boutiques in Lexington. We have so many talented artists and makers here in the city. I just really felt, I felt that it was important to give them a place to showcase their goods so that Lexington can really keep that shop local focus. I hope when somebody comes to Market 301 for the first time that they leave with a, just a knowing of how important it really is to shop local, that the people that they see here tonight really are people of our community. Obviously, we want them to leave with all kinds of fun new local goodies, but just knowing that importance of shopping local and how that comes back to their community. So we're here at Mulberry and Lime on Limestone in Lexington, Kentucky. They were Wixology Candle Company's first retailer here in Lexington, and we're super excited to be carried in their beautiful store. Wixology was launched in October of 2016, so we've been in business just a little over our seven months. Wixology is a candle company. all of our candles are bourbon cocktail scented and they're hand poured here in Lexington in reusable bourbon glasses. So once you've burned your candle, you actually have a glass to keep. And they all feature the cocktail recipe on the side of the glass. My husband and I love bourbon and we love making cocktails at home. And we really wanted to create a product that kind of spread our love of bourbon from Central Kentucky kind of to everyone. And so we had an idea to pour a candle in a bourbon glass. And then that kind of led to, well, let's have all the scents be bourbon cocktail scented. We just started to come up with ideas for cocktail recipes that would be good in a candle scent. And it kind of just grew from there. So for us not currently having a brick-and-mortar store, we really depend on places like Market 301 to be able to have that face-to-face interaction with our customers. We really enjoy getting to talk with them, allowing them to smell all of our scents and experience our product face to face with us. It's a place where people can come and meet friends and have drinks. And that really just goes with our product because we want your candle to smell amazing in your home. We want it to look great in your home. We also want you to use that glass to make a cocktail and to enjoy with friends and kind of celebrate. And Market 301 kind of brings all that together for us. Markets like Market 301 really give us a chance to have customers experience our product in person. And I feel that the markets have even given rise to a lot of the boutiques now realizing that people do want a handmade, locally crafted product. And now we're experiencing the boutiques wanting to offer a lot of what the markets have to offer. So it's really helped our company a lot. We have just gotten so much encouragement and excitement around our products since we launched in October, more than we ever even expected. But the Lexington community has just been so supportive, and they have so much pride in the fact that this product is made right here in Lexington and by a Lexington couple. So that's been a great thing about launching Wixology in Lexington. So Phoenix Forward is just an opportunity for people to gather in Phoenix Park and of all different backgrounds or different places from across the county and the city to enjoy some time outside this summer. It's an underutilized park and so we wanted to find some ways that could attract people down here. You know part of our initiative with the Phoenix Forward Project is to revitalize Phoenix Park and increase our partnership with the Lexington Public Library. It's really a way to incorporate not only the library in the park but it's a way to allow our downtown residents, our folks who work downtown, passers-by through the park to be able to get more use of the space. So we are looking at Phoenix forward we presented this to the Knight Foundation as part of the Knight Cities Challenge as a way to bring more energy and livelihood into these spaces and like Monica said we really want these to be great public spaces that everybody can enjoy be that through the dog park or the family programming or the adult programming after hours which is really kind of geared towards the young professional community. We really wanted to make these spaces more functional and inviting for everybody. The public spaces downtown are really what helps knit the city together and so it's important that we pay attention to those and help activate those and actively manage them both as resources for the people, the workers, the community, the visitors and everyone that's passing through our downtown and so it really a project like this just gives us an opportunity to test out new ways to do that and helps us kind of link together our other partners like the library, the other surrounding businesses, the farmers markets on Saturday a block away. For June and July of this summer, Tuesdays through Thursdays and on Saturdays there's going to be a variety of different events both in the park and in the library and so on Tuesdays and Wednesdays there'll be different activities for after work in the park. There will be a beer garden and programming from 4 to 8 for our young professionals. On Thursdays, there will be more of a family atmosphere with inflatables, face painting to kind of coordinate with Thursday Night Live. And on Saturdays, the Downtown Public Library will be working to program in the park and offer activities for kids and petting zoos and lots of fun activities. As part of Phoenix Forward, Central Library has created a discovery and play lab on the Central Library's second floor. That space is open daily. It will have weekly rotating activities. It has areas designed for babies and toddlers, areas designed to do different STEAM and artistic programming with children, and then also some gross motor skills. So the hope is that children and families can come downtown, be it for a farmer's market or a library program or whatever activities that appeal to them, and be able to learn and stay downtown a little bit longer and experience all the great things that Lexington has to offer. So all of these programs will be going on weekly throughout June and July. The biggest thing is to check out facebook.com slash phoenixforward. We'll have daily updates there with weather and current list of programming. At Twilight in the Triangle you can find local vendors, music. We'll have sidewalk sales. We'll also have food and drink vendors. and then extended hours from our brick and mortar stores who have been here for years. Our goal is to bring the community together, have a safe, fun place for families to come with their kids. I hope to see the people who have been coming to our Triangle for years for shopping and for eating to come back and have a good time. And I'm also looking forward to meeting the new shoppers who have never been here before. We would like to expand our awareness of our shops and let people know about the 24 different fantastic locally owned businesses that we have in the area. If you don't support local, we won't be here long. The Bardo Art Gallery has been open for about two years. We're actually going into our third year. We have paintings, and we also have cell prints. We have sculptures and gift items. And the art that we have, we actually have the artists who have been juried into Woodland Art Fair, St. James, and Kentucky Craft. And that's how I contact most of the artists here. And we're also part of the Lex Hop. So what we do for that, for the gallery hop, is we change out our art and feature a new artist every other month. I owned a previous business in this location, and once the economy sank, you know, a lot of small businesses went under. And I sold art in that business as well. It was a boutique. I sold clothing, art, and jewelry. And so we had to close because of the downturn in the economy. And then after the uptick and things started doing better, then it seems like a lot of the artists just kind of started coming out of the woodwork. They were more available. And so knowing that, I was able to start my dream of owning an art gallery. I started my business, as I mentioned, in 2015 when I decided to get back in the small business sector. And the way I got into art is I've had the good fortune of getting to travel fairly extensively in Europe. My husband and I lived in France for six months, and so I've been able to see some of the best art in the world. So I think that that really helped pique my interest in art, and it also has helped me in selecting really nice art for the gallery. And in saying that, I don't mean to say that we have really, really expensive art here. we have small treasures up to significant pieces of art. And one of the biggest thrills that I had was when my grandnephew, who is a college student, came in here and bought his first piece of art for his apartment. When you talk about owning a business, location, location is everything. And that was part of why we became involved in this area. But, you know, we get a lot of drive-by traffic. We get a lot of foot traffic. We have a real high walkability index. But, you know, the twilight market, that has allowed us to have just a whole lot more activity going on in this area that expands it into the evening hours. You know, we get a lot more people down here. We do end up having a band, you know, a DJ, sometimes a band. And just the whole energy in the area is more like a festival or it's just a lot more festive. We get a lot more vendors. We have arts and crafts vendors out and artisans. So it's just a really fun way for people to get more exposure to our local businesses. If somebody comes in here and they buy a piece of art, and then the artist goes out and spends that money, their money, like at a food market, a farmer's market, then that is like a synergistic effect and it's giving back to the community. Have you ever been walking around downtown and tried to find your way around and wish there was something that could lead you in the right direction? Well, now there is. Installation has started on new wayfinding signs designed to make Lexington a more walkable and pedestrian-friendly city. More than 50 signs will be installed at 25 major intersections throughout the downtown core during the first phase of the Walklex program. During the second phase, at least 64 additional signs will go up at 32 intersections near the University of Kentucky and Transylvania. All the signs are expected to be installed within four to six weeks. The signs will give pedestrians directions to major landmarks or districts, and they will indicate how long it will take to walk there, such as Rupp Arena is a four-minute walk from a certain location. The Walk Lex program will also be key to helping visitors navigate the city. The idea began in 2013 as a pilot project under Leadership Lexington, a leadership training program. For more information about the Walk Lex signs, please visit downtownlex.com. We'll be right back. cyclists must adhere to. My name is Howard Florence. I'm a police officer downtown in Lexington. I've been with the department for 22 years. When you're on a bike downtown, we do encourage that you use the streets. The bicycle lanes are well marked. The streets are well paved. There's some hazards associated with that, as would be anywhere you're on the street. Watch for parked cars pulling out. Watch for people exiting their cars. Watch for the doors opening up kind of thing. Watch for pedestrians. They may step out between cars in your path. Make sure you signal your intentions to the motorist if you're changing lanes or making turns. And one of the most important things is to make sure that you stop for the red lights. Especially downtown, the cars are going to trip the lights. You're not going to have to wait very long. It's a safety issue and it is the state law that as a cyclist on the road, you're bound by the same laws that govern vehicles. So stopping for the red lights is highly encouraged. When you're riding in the street downtown, always make sure that you're going with traffic. You don't want to ride against traffic. Stay to the right as much as you can. If you find yourself riding on the sidewalk, obviously that creates a whole other set of hazards for you and for pedestrians. Pedestrians always have the right of way. So if you find yourself on the sidewalk, some things to look out for, don't get too close to the buildings. People could be stepping out or opening a door on you. And just the simple fact that pedestrians move so much slower than anybody that would be on a bicycle, you're always going to catch up to them. So if you're catching up to a pedestrian walking, their back's to you. They're not going to know you're there. So if you have a bell on your bike, just give that little friendly ring or just give a kind greeting just so that they know that you're there. and then make sure you still give them enough space because when they react to you, it still may startle them and you may not know how they're going to react. They may step into your path. So I just want to emphasize pedestrians, they always have the right of way. And also watch for cars that are maybe pulling in and out of the parking garages. They're not really expecting a bicycle to be coming down maybe because, like I said, you're going to be moving a lot faster than a pedestrian would be. So just make sure you're watching. Watch out for that. Bikelexington.com is a very good resource. It has links to the state laws for bicycling as well as the city ordinances. tonight I feel wonderful because I see the light in your eyes and the wonder of it all is that you just don't realize how much I love you It's time to go home now And I've got an aching head So I give her the car keys She helps me to bear And then I tell her As I turn out the light I say, my darling You are wonderful tonight Oh my darling, you are wonderful tonight I'm not alone. I have a single thing to do I've come for a new What was going on I know and knew That I was gone Stages keep on changing Stages rearranging I couldn't even get you on the phone Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. I'm sorry. Thank you. The End Thank you. The End The End The End The End Thank you. Good afternoon, good afternoon everybody. We've got a full house today. Greetings. I'll call the meeting to order. And we have a lot of folks here from out at the center. There we go. And so before we get to public comment, because we don't want to keep you all waiting, We know you want to get right back out there. Jane and Barbara, who's going to speak? There's a very quick request to speak, and you all, please come right up to the podium. Good afternoon, Mayor and Council members. we're very appreciative that you would take the time to see us today I know this is a very busy schedule for you today what with the work session and then a council meeting that's a lot on anybody's plate for one day's work I'm going to try and keep it brief when I was growing up my mother always told me the two most important sentences in the world were, first, I'm sorry, and second, thank you. And that's why we're here today, for the second reason, to say thank you. We would like to present this letter to the Council, expressing our appreciation for the new Center. I'm not going to read the letter. You're busy, and you can read it on your leisure. But there are a few brief comments I'd like to make about the letter and about the new center. The center opened in the fall, and it's been a beehive of activity ever since. People are constantly going in and out of the center. And they come for a variety of reasons. Some like the exercise class. Some like art, music. the ceramics class. Ollie teaches classes out of the new center as well. Various people come for various reasons. And that new center allows Lexington senior citizens new opportunities and new experiences, which never would have been possible at the old facility. It was just too small. we'd outgrown it. We appreciate it greatly. Another reason they come to the center, quite honestly, is the staff. They are an exceptional group of people. I would like to recognize each and every staff member, but to be honest, I'm not getting any younger, and my memory isn't getting any better. But anyway, I would not want to forget somebody. They are a group of exceptional people. So, on behalf of the Lexington Senior Center's participants, Council, thank you. Thank you for a beautiful facility, and thank you for an excellent staff. Thank you, Barb. Thank you so much. So many were involved in it, and you all just came routinely to the council meeting, council chambers, and wouldn't let it go. That just proves if you want something really, really, really bad and you work really, really hard for it, then we'll get out of the way. Thank you all so much. Sally, Sally Hamilton, thank you for your leadership of the project. My goodness gracious. Yes. And like Barb, like you said, all that wonderful staff. All right, now we will move on to public comment for issues on the agenda. And I'll open the floor for public comment for issues on the agenda. Do we have anybody signed on the agenda? I'm going to call on Council Member Stennett for a motion here in just a minute. Wait just a second. We do have two signed on to speak to, or one signed on to speak to an issue on the agenda, the golf course study, and that's James Robertson. Mr. Robertson. I'll make my time brief. I just want to make a brief comment about the golf courses. And, you know, as a citizen of Lexington my entire life, I've golfed the courses my whole life, and golf is my passion. I've seen them go into a decline, and I know this has been something that's happened in the past. We've looked at this issue in the past, and unfortunately things didn't get resolved. But anyone who's familiar with the economics of basic economics would understand that oversupply and under demand creates for a very hostile situation for businesses and particularly golf courses. We've seen local golf courses close, and I think that there should be some other actions taken. And I would impress upon the council that perhaps they look at some other options other than what perhaps Mr. Keegan is suggesting. And I would like to see some further review of this and perhaps some more comprehensive business solutions that have the taxpayers in mind. So with that, I yield and I thank you all. Thank you, sir. Thanks, Mr. Robertson. All right, I'll recognize Council Member Stenick. Thank you, Mayor. I move to, under continuing business and presentations, item number C, to move to the top of our agenda and to allow for 20-minute presentation. So moved. Second. Motion by Council Member Stennett, seconded by Council Member Scutchfield. Is there any discussion on the motion? All right. Hearing none, we can vote. All in favor, please say aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. All right. I'll now introduce Commissioner Jeff Reed, who will introduce our guests. Hello. As part of the introduction, let me preface my comments by saying that we have a very good golf operation here in Lexington. It has good people in it. They provide a good service. Golf all over the country is struggling, and we need to take a strong look at our operation as other municipalities are all over the country. In 2012, the Council was discussing golf and our golf operation and the size of the gap between the revenues we collect and our expenditures. The Council determined that we should develop a plan, parks and golf, to address that gap. we came back to you a few months ago and provided you an update of where we were. And while making progress on that gap between revenues collected and operating expenditures, I didn't feel like it was significant enough. I felt like we needed to do better, and I felt like we needed to look at our operations more critically. The Mayor stresses continuous improvement in all our programs, and I know that's what the Council desires as well. So besides what I've been involved in and doing in dealing with the golf operation, I decided to bring an outside consultant in who is an expert in golf operations to take a look at what we're doing here, talk about what we're doing well, and what we can do better. To the help of Scott Shapiro, Monica Conrad, Michael Johnson, I selected J.J. Keegan. This was my initiative, and Mr. Keegan is based outside of Denver. He's been here three times. I want to stress that beyond his findings, the process itself has been extremely healthy for this operation. Mr. Keegan's been here three times, spent a number of days here, played all of our courses, interviewed a number of our employees. Just as importantly, he's interviewed people that are interested in golf or involved in the private sector golf. He's talked to a number of council members and has reached some conclusions and recommendations that I think are appropriate to share with you now as we go forward. Mr. Keegan has some slides that will give his own biography and where he is, but I wanted to give that as context and background. So I'd like Mr. Keegan to come up and start his 20-minute presentation. Mayor. Excuse me. Before we start this, do we need to approve the docket so our clerk can get it ready for 5 o'clock since we have a rushed schedule tonight? I just didn't want to put that in jeopardy. All right, let's do that. Mr. Keegan, if you'll hold just a minute. I'm sorry, Mayor. Thank you. I'll ask for a motion to approve the docket. Motion by Council Member Sadi, second by Council Member Plowman. Is there any discussion on the motion? Hearing none, we can vote all in favor. Please say aye. Wait, wait. Got a question? Okay, Jake. Council Member Diets. I move to place number five under ordinance as a first reading on the doc for the July 11, 2017 council meeting without public hearing. So moved. Motion by Council Member Gibbs. Second by Council Member Farmer. Is there any discussion? All right. We can vote. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. Is that all in discussion? All right. So let's vote on the docket. Approval now. All in favor, please say aye. Opposed, no. Motion carried. All right. All right, Mr. Keegan. Thank you, sir. Lexington. What a great city. When I arrived in April, it was the first time I've been here. It was the last of the 100 cities in the country that I was to visit. Shame on me. You have a beautiful town and a fabulous community. One of those assets... One of those assets are your golf courses. They're really, really good. I apologize, I hope this isn't counting against my minutes. Thank you. Your golf courses are great assets of the community. And what we're here to talk to you today about is that my name is JJ Keegan, and I'm a golf strategist. Mario Andretti has an expression that if you like your work, you need no hobbies. Of the 203 countries, I've been in 49. Of the 34,000 golf courses, I've visited over 4,000 of them. And this has led me to write five books that are used by 15 universities as a way of creating value for golfers on a foundation that optimizes the financial performance of your golf courses. I'm here because decisions are to be made. Here's what we hope to achieve today in 20 minutes. What is the strategic vision and the financial goals for the golf courses? Are you looking for them to be profitable? Profitable to the extent that they cash flow capital reserves? Is it acceptable that they lose money, and if so, how much? Depending on how you define that objective, it becomes, should some of the courses close between December 1 and February 15? Should citizens be able to get double discounts? Should a veteran who pays $7 have a loyalty card be only able to pay $2 when the cost of producing the round of golf is $36? Help me out. I must have missed the business class where it costs $36 and you make two as a good, sound business model. What's the appropriate age for seniors? What do we do to get better course conditions? Is the golf shop overstaffed? Can we save money there? And some of you are considering what about using a privatization of the golf courses? Depending on what you decide, there is low-hanging fruit that we will identify in 20 minutes where you can save $600,000. But for you to make a decision on those eight items, you need to know the facts. So we're going to talk about what is the role of government? Should it be in the business of providing golf courses? What was the research process we used? And through our seven-step process, what did we find? You have three viable alternatives. and what are the hurdles in getting them implemented? Well, from the lack of vision, from the lack of defining a goal, everybody knows what the goal of an NFL football team is. Win the Super Bowl. The goal of baseball teams is to win the World Series. What's the goal of the golf courses here? To provide an intangible asset that is funded, or should it be self-sustaining? And it's from that lack of vision that has been defined that it's created a dysfunctional management culture and as a result, entitled customers. And it's produced this financial result. Over the last 10 years, $9.2 million has been lost. So the role of government, obviously, please fire, water, utilities, is essential. Government also provides parks, library, ball fields, senior citizen centers. and that golf is discretionary. To provide citizens for that which private enterprise would not undertake, the question you have to ask yourself, should you be in the golf business? Because I am glad I'm standing here and not sitting where you are, because you all will say the golf courses should be fiscally responsible, but the staff is going, we need more resources to make our golf courses competitive. the public, the taxpayers are saying, let me see if I understand this. You're providing $850,000 today for a recreational amenity for the wealthy. They have twice the income of the average citizen. And the golfers are going, we are the wealthiest and we pay the most in terms of consumption and sales taxes. Our kids are out of school. And we still pay property taxes that fund the schools. So finding a balance between all of these conflicting interests is really a challenge. So what is your vision? Should golf be held to a financial standard? Is golf a recreational asset that has an intangible value that should be subsidized? Because until you answer that question, that the resources that are going to be needed, the policies and procedures and the rates that are going to be set are all based on a single question, what is your vision for the golf courses? Here's what I know. You can get positive cash flows or realistic objective if you brand property, set rates correctly and you allocate your expenses appropriately. There exists over $600,000 in terms of green fees, inventory, expenses, golf shop staffing. We're going to recommend the increase of the maintenance staff to create better course conditions that will attract play. Conversely, we're recommending a sizable reduction in your golf shop staff. There's $600,000 in low-hanging fruit. We can take this from $850,000 to $200,000 easily. But what was the research process, and how did we come to that conclusion? Well, we use a seven-step process. We look at the age, the income, ethnicity, the demographics. Would you put a Maserati or a Bentley dealership in a low-income neighborhood and hope to be successful? The answer is no. A golf course, your average golfer makes $96,000. We look at the weather. How many days do you have to actually make money? Are you using technology in the cell phone or with online internet reservations? And how do your financial statements compare to the majority? Facilities. Every year you need to spend a half a million dollars in capital improvements. What are your operations? And what did your customers say? We've sampled 1,500 of them. So when we looked at the marketplace, I've uniquely run 44 variables on the 15,204 courses and you can see that within 10 miles of the golf courses, Lakeside has the greatest potential to be successful and that Kearney has the least. Now think about it, where's Kearney located? It's in a rural area, there's not a lot of homes and so the success of Kearney is based on Pete Dye, PB Dye, bringing golfers from beyond a 10 mile radius. And to James Robertson's point, if we look at the golfers per 18. The national average is 2,200. You only have 1,728 golfers within 10 miles of Picadome, 1,627 within Kearney Hill, but only 2,300 at Lakeside. We have and we know how much do the residents spend on golf per 18 holes, and what you see for the likely course are the revenue potential of each one of your golf courses. So in conclusion, in terms of the markets, yes, supply does exceed demand. But we believe if you brand your courses platinum gold, silver, platinum at Kearney Hill, gold at Picadome, silver at Lakeside, there's an opportunity. If golf is an intangible asset, there's no better property than Meadowbrook. It's the entry door to the game. If it were I and I privately owned it and it wasn't under lease, I'd make it a nine-hole golf course. I'd build a driving range and put in miniature golf. I'd make it a community recreation center. It's in the right part of the town to do that. The values of golf are indisputable. But Lakeside, you're looking at a $1.3 million investment in irrigation. Randstellar is doing a study of parks and rec. Should that golf course be closed to save $1.3 million and put in parks and rec? Because if you and I own the golf courses, financially, repurposing Tate's Creek makes the most sense. It has the least upside potential based on the demographics. So when we looked at the weather, I was shocked. In Denver, we have 214 days. In Minneapolis, Minnesota, they have 204 playable days a year. You only have 214. You're located in a place where golf between 45 and 90 degrees with less than two-tenths of an inch of rain determines the number of playable days. So you don't have a lot of days for golf here. And so if we look at, when I say, should you consider closing some of the golf courses? Look at January, February, and December. You've got a lot of seasonal labor. Do you need it? The number of playable days supports closing the golf courses. Because if we look at the total number of rounds capacity, you have capacity for over 250,000 rounds and you're only doing slightly under 100,000. You're at 36% of capacity. So because you have a surprising limited golf dominated by extremely warm humid summers and rain throughout the year, the average golf course in America is at 52% of capacity. It's our recommendation only one course should remain open between December 1 and February 14. I suggest Piccadoma. It's centrally located. It is a jewel. It is a historic, fabulous golf course with a McKenzie bunker on 13, the Donald Ross green on nine. I teasingly say, if you want to save a quarter of a million dollars, I'll sign a lease for a dollar, and I'll put a quarter of a million into it by April. It's that good a golf course. It's got that kind of potential if properly marketed. So we looked at technology. You have 30,000 golfers in the marketplace. You have limited online reservations. You only have 780 names in the database. I'm tempted to ask how many of you have the Starbucks app on your phone, or how many of you have the United app? or Marriott or Starwood or Hilton. We're tied to loyalty programs. You have no idea who your customers are. 20% of your customers generate 60% of the revenue. We don't know who they are. We don't know how to communicate with them. We don't have an email address. The software that's being used is great for parks and recs. It's not good for golf. And so for $400 a month, you could put in Club Profit Systems or T-Snap. you could start doing email marketing and starting to market the courses in the brand on the platinum, gold, and silver. When we looked at the financial metrics and the revenue research we did, just to familiarize yourself, your loss was $853,000. You can see the losses at each of the golf courses. $3,600,000 spent for $2,787,000 in revenue. But every time rate increases are talked about, there's a rule of thumb. If we were to take the rack rate up $1 across the board, it only has a net effective benefit of $0.60 by the time you filter it for seniors, veterans, nine-hole, and leagues. And only 27% of your play is playing rack rate. Seniors are 26%. Loyalty card holders are 24%. Veterans are 3.6%. There's a rule of thumb. The average golf course in America has $45 green fee card prime time. They yield effectively 60% of that or $27. Look at what you're yielding. At Lakeside, $19. Pick it up, $20. You're yielding about 30% less than you should on a competitive basis. And you might say, well, Kearney, wow, we're over at 100%. That's great. Kearney is a really good golf course. It's held the senior PGA Tour events. That's not a $45 course. That's a $55 or $60 course if it's properly maintained. So you're underachieving on Kearney also, in my opinion. So the options abound in terms of loyalty sales. You sell $56,000 worth of cards, yet they redeem it for $124,000 more. Seniors and veterans, the discounts provided are costing $285,000. And so if we looked at these and we addressed them, that's where we get the possible increase in the revenues. But the senior age, 50. We all qualify. Social Security, 66. Start at 62. Look at your competitors from Cherry Blossom to Griffin Gate at 60. Danny McQueen's courses, the University Club. or 55. Your average golfer is 45 years of age. The vast majority of them qualify for a senior age just based on the function of their age. Is that right? We're recommending that you increase the senior age to 60. And looking at the expenses, look at the golf shop weekly hours for 52 weeks a year, 510 man hours at Piccadone, 370 at Lakeside. I just did a national survey. The average number of golf shop hours, prime time during the summer is 260 hours. If we look at the excess labor that you've got at your golf courses, you could say $473,000 if you just adjusted your labor to national standards for 52 weeks a year at $260. But as you can see in the footnotes, Mecklenburg County, they're down to 115 hours during the week in the November, December, January, and February season. Fringe benefits is part of the culprit. The whole question of privatization. Two weeks ago, I was in New Braunfels, Texas. Last week, I was in Baltimore. Three weeks ago, I was in Albuquerque. The fringe benefits were 54%. New Braunfels at 47%. You can see that your fringe benefits at 31 to 35 percent. If you bring in a management company, they're going to pay 22 percent fringe benefits, and so you're overpaying on fringe benefits by $146,000. But what's the management company going to cost you? I called as part of this engagement and got some preliminary from the leaders in the industry. There are about $150,000 to $175,000 will be the fee they charge you plus all the expenses. So to bring in privatization just based on the savings and fringe benefits, it's going to be a push. But if the culture doesn't change in two years, it may be an option. If we look at maintenance departments understaffed, everything you've bought in your life, the Starbucks you get in the morning, you consciously go, value equals the experience minus price. Did I get what I paid for? And when the answer is yes, what do you do? You do it over and over again. Well, the value and the experience of your golf courses, I could show you on my cell phone right now, you've got water in your bunkers on 4, 13, 17. I had to take a rake to scrape the ball out of the bunker today. $450,000 is needed on the bunker renovation at Picadome. I was there at 7 because I love the golf course. I love the golf course. It's really good. So we need to put in more labor to enhance the quality of the golf courses. Because I was at Cherry Blossom yesterday afternoon. I played Canewood yesterday afternoon. I arrived at 2 o'clock. I went to Kearney last night at 8 to measure the depth of the rough that needs to be cut. If we maintain these courses, they will come. there's lots of details on this slide but let's just you don't even account for golf shop operations versus maintenance salaries out aggregated for the first time we created departmental budgets they staff hasn't even seen budgets in 15 years the senior age is at 50 we talked about the golf shop you only carry title list in the survey we did a 1500 customers they said to me where's the sirrickson where's the callaway where's the nike they're going to commercial stores to buy because you're a titleist only shop so the budget should be set by the golf course staff that goes to parks that goes to the commissioner that goes to you mr mayor and approved we're making suggestions and rate increases from a current rate to suggested rates and it's a shock thirty five to forty four dollars is the suggested rate at Lakeside or Piccadone from thirty seven to forty five fair market value when we looked at your facilities you're losing eight hundred and sixty five thousand a year but you know what you're actually losing a million three a year because you should be having an escrow five hundred and sixty four thousand dollars for irrigation for green for bunkers for tea for driving ranges you need to set aside five hundred and sixty four thousand dollars a year positive cash flow to be able to make the golf course sustainable so from five sixty four to a million to eight hundred sixty five thousand we've got a delta here of a million four mr keegan let me ask yes i have the unpopular role of being the timekeeper, I just want to give you a heads up that you've got a minute and 15 seconds in a 20-minute session, okay? Perfect. Because what we looked at here in terms of operations is we fair market value the prices and that we have made some suggestions on the pricing in terms of the golf professionals or brand ambassadors. And that what we talked about was a management company and that the likely management fee. Well, we surveyed your customers and you can see that the heart of your customers of where they've come from and their interest level in golf is being very avid. The gender was 80% male, 45.8 years of age as a respondent. Their income was $94,000. This is who is using your facilities. 94% were Caucasian. They think you should provide a mid-tier experience and subsidize what they're doing, though 59% believe the core should have positive cash flow. And if you can't do that internally, they do agree with you that you should bring in a management company as they play 7.8 different golf courses in time and no barriers. Money is not the issue. What's important to them is course conditioning, pace of play, and price. You can see how they like Kearney, and they're not big fans of your other golf courses. But look at what they say in terms of the best price in the area or the best value in the area. And so the customer believes that there are changes necessary. So whether you like these suggestions, you've got three choices. Management company, a two-year trial with the existing staff, or you can continue to subsidize losses. Here's your opportunity. If you listen to the words of the critic, he reveals that the friends hide from you. No statute was ever erected to honor the critic. So to build a path of success, here's our suggestions. Define the financial goal for the facilities. Authorize the golf courses to close from December 1 to the 15th. Eliminate the ability to use a $5 loyalty card with senior or veteran rates. Set the senior age at 60. Implement the new green fees January 18th. Approve maintenance staff increases of 20% with a decrease of 30% of your golf shop staff. And if in two years you're not breaking even, privatize. Are there any questions? All right. A lot of information. I'll ask for council members comments or questions. Council member Massadi. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you so much for the presentation. First of all, I am not a golfer, so this is unique to me. The thing that struck me was that you made the analogy that if you were to increase the maintenance by, I guess, hundreds of thousands of dollars, more people would come. But what about all the other golf courses they had to choose from in the area? area. There's several in the central Kentucky region. So do you think that's going to have an effect if you maintain these golf courses to a higher standard? They're going to play here instead of playing at those other courses? Councilman I played all the other golf courses. I visited them. The quality of the conditioning. A municipality is like a buoy in a lake and you set the standard in terms of your pricing and your conditioning and that they may respond in time. I'm a little nervous about going from 50 to 60 on senior ages, it could cause a short-term loss in play of those within that age gap. But the density of your population suggests that if you were to improve the conditions of the courses rather than buying the passes to go to the golf club, a bluegrass, or the university club, or paying on occasion, if you look at those slides closely, that the university club and Griffin Gate were rated the lowest on price and value. I believe that if you maintain the courses correctly, you will bring in the play based on the density of the population to make it work. Fair enough. Thank you. Councilmember Lamb. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Mr. Keegan, for this presentation. We met earlier in this year, and I appreciate that. I appreciate the presentation regarding the golf operations. And my question is actually for Commissioner Reid. I know Commissioner Reid and I briefly discussed this with the best way for us to proceed, and I didn't know if you would like to speak to the way we would want to proceed, because I plan on making a motion to refer this into the General Government Social Services Committee so that we can further vet this. I don't know that we would want to vet that today in this work session, but just to give you a heads-up from the colleagues. But Commissioner Reed, your thoughts, please. I was pleased with the overall direction that was suggested as far as moving in a two-year plan to see what we can do to make this operation more financially efficient. I think we have to get our house in order internally. We have to look at the significant issues that just stand out rate-wise and address that, and we need to work together moving forward. We need to keep you informed of what's going on and the steps we're taking. You know, we talk about golf, we talk about our concerns, and then we wait a year or two and talk about them again. We have to stay on this and address it with the Parks Master Plan coming along, and there's going to be demands for new activities and new initiatives. We have to be particularly efficient and effective with golf. I think a lot of information was given here today. I give my information normally a little bit differently, but I think it is a worthwhile exercise. A lot of what Mr. Keegan says we're going to have to absorb, check the numbers, but I think it's very important that you receive an assessment from somebody totally separate and is looking at it singularly from the financial perspective. And a lot more goes into these decisions than just that. But it is an important ingredient, and I want a year, I would like a year, to be able to report back to you what we've done, the progress we've made, with a minimum of changes in service to the public. There's all kinds of rumors going on. Nobody's talked to me directly. about any golf courses being closed. There's a whole lot of people talking about Meadowbrook being closed. Meadowbrook shouldn't be closed now. We shouldn't close any courses at this point. We need to do better with what we've got and do better internally and look at the rates. That's where I am. All right. Thank you, Commissioner. I really appreciate that. And I realize there are other people signed up to speak, but I would like to go ahead and make a motion that we continue these discussions as per what Commissioner Reed just spoke about and have discussions a year out. So I make a motion that we refer this issue about our golf courses into the General Government Social Services Committee for further discussion. I so move. Motion by Council Member Lamb. Seconded by Council Member Plowman. Is there any discussion? All right. If not, then we can vote. All in favor, please say aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. Thank you, Mayor. Council Member Plowman. Council Member Plowman's indicator doesn't work. My request to speak is not working. My request to speak is not working. I, too, just wanted to comment on it's a lot of valuable information that we got from the study. And I think moving forward, I agree with Commissioner Reid that we ought to pause, look at some of these options, put them in place, and see where we end up in time. It's great information. One question I had for Commissioner Reid, had we ever conducted a survey like this in the past, and were the results similar to what we have been shared today? I'm not aware of any sense. I've been around. I don't know what was done 20 years ago. Okay, I didn't know if we'd ever done that. We have not done that. And I think one difficulty we've had is we've relied on our golf people to fix golf. And they have to be a key player in addressing the program. And we're getting great involvement from our pros now as a result of this process. and some of the suggestions. They've got other ideas that we haven't been hearing before, but we're making changes. We're getting good ideas. I'm very optimistic that we can make some substantial improvement in what's already a good operation. Thank you, Commissioner. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you, Councilman Plumman. Councilman Fred Brown. Thank you, Mayor. I think it was a real good presentation. I agree with a lot of the information in there, and I think this is a much-needed consulting report that we needed to go forward. I really think we're talking more than just golf, though, and I think that will come out in the committee. I think we're talking about green space. We're talking about neighborhood involvement and property values. we're talking about you know parts of the community and I can address it because I happen to have one of the golf courses in my district so I think I'm a little bit more aware if you don't have one in your district you may not be as aware around the population and the people you've talked to so in my particular district which is Tate's Creek it's a jewel in our district and it's kind of the heart of my council district So, you know, that input, and I'm certainly making it now, and I'll make it later in the committee, but I think that input needs to come in from the people that live in those areas and live in proximity to golf courses. So it's really more than golf and how much green space and what we want to do with some of the properties there. And keep in mind we've got a population increase that can only add to, I think, maybe the golf population. And I think it's tapered off to some degree. And Commissioner, Jeff, I think we're going in the right direction here, but I think there's some things in this right here can probably be done in the next month or two, some items that are suggested there. So I want to step up the timetable a little bit, But I don't know how the committee process, because you could beat us some things as we go along, and whether we have to make the decision or it's administratively made. You know, in the past, we've always attacked the revenue side. And what we've been doing is reducing golf fees. And they've gone up and down since I've been on the council even prior. So that's one area. but I don't think we ever addressed a lot of the expenditure areas or closing it for two or three months and what the ramifications are there. So I would hope that we could be kind of a continuous process, and I don't know how it would involve the committee structure. So I'll throw that out as maybe something that maybe we can get off and get started on it and do it a lot even between the end and the next six months. I agree, and we have been doing that, and we've started that process before Mr. Keegan got here, and then we got additional information that really validated some of the steps we're taking. We're in the process of hiring a new director of golf. We're in the process of hiring a new deputy director of Enterprise, which oversees golf. I think we'll have some vacancies in our golf pro ranks, and I think we're in a position to evaluate those positions, see which ones we want to keep, which ones we don't. We're driven in golf by seasonal and temporary and part-time type of people. We've got to take a hard look at that and some of the suggestions. Again, I want to digest the hours and some of the findings, but I agree with the underlying conclusions based on my observations that we can move forward with making some adjustments in pro shops on manpower hours and manpower that I think will start to make a significant difference. Yeah, I think that's a good approach. And one other thing is that I picked out on the recommendations is that we have been in the business of having golf inventory, selling clubs and shirts and caps. I mean, some of that you would automatically, but we've been in the business of competing with Walmart and the golf shops around and online and the major competitors. And I think one of the recommendations is to pull out of and not have any inventory of these golf courses related to clubs and high-end items because we shouldn't be in competition. That was just one of the things that I can speak to that. I think we have to be selective and careful how we attempt to back out of that business because we do have a number of people that come to the courses in need of material balls, things they've forgotten, but we do need to take a careful look at the quality of what we have and if we are impacting competitors on a local level. All right. Thank you, Councilman Brown. Councilman Maloney. Thank you. I appreciate your presentation, and I think you've hit on a lot of issues that's happening throughout the country. And as I probably wanted a few council members up here to play a lot of golf, I do want to commend our golf department. We have great golf courses. I played the other day in one of the counties and then paid 55 bucks to play that golf course, and I played with three regulars that played here in Lutton. And a compliment came out of that conversation because every sand trap we hit in, there weren't no sand. And they said they couldn't wait to get back to Lutton because the golf courses were a lot better than out in the counties. So it does, if you have good golf courses, they will come and play. You're right on that. And to pay that little extra and all that, I understand it. I agree with the commissioner that we need to take this, and I think he's doing the right thing, what he wants to do here. I think we need to be careful what we do, and with the new golf director coming on and looking at the fees and all that, we can't really look at the fees now because we've already budgeted for next year. We've already had the cards paid for, but we have time if we decide to make changes, and I'm glad you brought this to our attention. And also, Tickle Death, you like Picket-Own, because that's my pride and joy. I love that golf course. That's where I grew up. And to hear how – I personally wanted to fuse – it's my number one golf course. It always will be, not just because I helped get it. It's because that's where I grew up, and it always meant – but hearing from you from being outside to show how beautiful that golf course is, And to me, I hope somehow we can market Kearney. Kearney is beautiful. Most of our people come to Cincinnati and come here to play this golf course. Because I've played many times on Kearney, and everybody compliments how cheap it is to play a Pete Dye golf course. Because I've played a lot of Pete Dye golf courses, and they run anywhere from $95 to $275. When you tell them what our price is, that's the reason why we have a lot of people here. But I think it's an eye-opener, and I want to commend you, and I think the commissioner is, I think, on track. But I do want to tell everybody that our golf courses are real good, and you've seen them, and I think we can improve, and I think we will improve. And I think you're giving us some good eye-openers, and I thank you again for helping us out. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Maloney. Council Member Evans. Thank you, Mayor. I do thank you for this presentation. It was very educational, and I'm not a golfer, but I think that goes to, I think, the comment that I'm about to say, that we are concerned about revenue, and these were your words, not mine. This is a sport of rich white men. I'm not interested in supporting something that's just for a very small group of people, especially when it has the means to play elsewhere. So that being said, I think we need to start focusing on bringing more people into the sport. I mean, the slide that you had about how many women play versus men, maybe that's where our revenue can come from and what's in the racial makeup of who's playing. I think that needs to be certainly looked at, and I don't know when and how, But we do have a population with disposable income that crosses all kinds of gender and racial barriers. And looking at that number is pretty alarming. And understanding it's been a sport traditionally for white men, but this is the 21st century. So I think that's something that we truly need to look at because there is income out there. And we need to start figuring out how to do better, introducing our youth to this sport if this is something we decide should be continued for the city. We're experiencing all kinds of different sports that are going out of style or whatever. But if this is something we decide, we're going to have to focus on youth and making sure that they are engaged. And if we're a city where young people like to stay, then I think we might need to get them more involved in this sport, if that's a population that is going to be here, along with the retirees. We have plenty of new living facilities for them. But that's just my concern, is that we're excluding several different demographics that could help, at least in the revenue department, if not the next two months, certainly within the years to come, and how do we focus on them as opposed to our traditional players, because we can't sustain it with just who's playing right now. So I don't know if you have a comment towards that or suggestions. Commissioner Evans, that's a great question. Time, cost, and difficulty are the historical barriers of attracting people to the game. This is such a nationwide issue that the PGA of America has focused on girls in school program, PGA Junior League. and I'm pleased to report that between the ages of 6 and 18, more youth are playing today across America than they are here when I grew up playing the game. So there is a growth coming in 20 or 30 years. So for programming in terms of the opportunities the PGA is offering that the pros can, is the solution to the problem. It's a long-term solution. the short-term solution unfortunately is with the current constituents of increasing the rates to fair market value of those rates. The loyalty card and the discounts, the multiple discounts, are something that should be implemented January 1 of 18 and it would have a significant impact of a couple hundred thousand dollars on your revenue for next year that could be then reinvested in programming for youth. All right. Thank you, Council Member Evans. Council Member Scotchfield. I have two things. Council Member Evans, I will say one of the things for youth, you know, when I was in high school, elementary school, golf was never taught in school, nothing along those lines. I know that my children's elementary school has bought golf nets so that they can play in trying to teach them all different types of games. And my daughter just did her high school phys ed course this summer, and one of the things that they did is they went out and played golf. I mean, driving range, but golf nonetheless. So, I mean, I think there are major pushes to, I guess, get more people playing, but it's a matter of whether people can afford it and whether they have time. You know, and also, as Council Member Fred Brown had stated, I also have one of the golf courses in my district, and one of the biggest concerns that anybody has expressed to me is green space. They pride their green space in the area, and the biggest fear would be losing that as a green space. One of the things that I do know for Lakeside is it has to be green space. Even if they were to get rid of the golf course itself because of the way that land was given, it couldn't be developed, which I think is something that does relieve residents because, as everybody probably on council knows, we also have another golf course in my district that's up in the air and has a lot of people concerned. People like green space, and the golf course is a golf course or the golf course as an expanded park. green space is key in these communities because as council member brown said that's why we moved to certain areas is because we enjoyed that green space so i want us to make sure that we keep that in mind as we move forward to thank you thank you council member scotchfield council member stennett thank you mayor and mr keegan thank you for your uh passionate presentation and and the information that you gave us first did you look at the management system and the hierarchy system of our golf operations at all yes and are we satisfied with the way it looks are you are there suggestions we can change that because we have a deputy we have a golf manager and then we have i don't know underneath there but several different course operators etc 68 67 on your golf staff 31 on your maintenance staff they should be more in balance to the hierarchical structure of having a director of golf a deputy director reporting to the director is consistent with other cities across the country i will say that uh michael johnson is a tremendous asset in his oversight of the golf operation and the way he's been able to create the leadership amongst the pros and the superintendents in the last month and a half is really uh to be commended so there should be more maintenance staff is that you said yeah i when you look at the hours commissioner stennett that you are overstaffed by probably 30 in the golf shop operations the golf shop should close one and a half hours before last night at 8 15 there were four working at kearney you need one in the golf shop one in f and b one in maintenance to put the carts away because the golf course conditioning is suffering which is causing the issue of attracting