# Committee of the Whole - May 6, 2008 > Auto-transcribed civic record · Committee · May 6, 2008 - **Permalink**: https://meetings.lexingtonky.news/meeting/487 - **Source video**: https://lfucg.granicus.com/player/clip/487?view_id=14&redirect=true - **Date**: 2008-05-06 - **Body**: Committee - **Last revised**: March 1, 2026 - **Length**: 8,338 words > ⚠️ **Auto-generated content.** Audio from the official Granicus video was auto-transcribed by OpenAI Whisper-1. Structured facts were extracted with GPT-4o; the narrative summary was written by Anthropic Claude Sonnet. Speaker labels and verbatim wording may contain errors. See [methodology](https://meetings.lexingtonky.news/about/methodology) or [report a correction](mailto:editor@lexingtonky.news). --- ## Meeting Overview The Debt and Capital Projects Committee met on May 6, 2008, with the Vice Mayor presiding over the session. The committee focused on a single agenda item regarding the Mayor's FY 2008-09 Budget Request, which was presented for informational purposes. During the meeting, the committee took one vote and heard no public comments. The session served as an informational briefing on the upcoming fiscal year's budget proposal as it relates to debt and capital project considerations. ## Attendance The following Council Members were present at the committee meeting: • Councilman Gordon • Council Member Stennett • Council Member Lane • Council Member Blevins • Council Member Beard • Council Member McCord • Council Member Blues • Council Member Stephens No Council Members were recorded as absent or arriving late to the meeting. All attending members were present for the duration of the committee session. *Note: Council Member Gordon appears to be listed twice in the attendance record, which may indicate a data entry duplication.* ## Votes and Decisions The committee took one formal action during this meeting. **Motion to Adjourn** - **Outcome**: Passed by voice vote - **Vote Type**: Voice vote - **Vote Count**: Not recorded for voice vote The meeting concluded with a motion to adjourn, which was approved through a voice vote. No specific vote counts were recorded as is typical for procedural motions decided by voice vote, and no individual member votes were documented. ## Contested Items The committee meeting featured one significant area of contention regarding project delays and financial management practices. **Project Delays and Financial Management** A heated discussion emerged among council members concerning ongoing project delays and questions about the city's financial management of bond sales and budget allocations. The disagreement centered on concerns about the current approach to financial oversight and reporting mechanisms. Council members raised pointed questions about accountability measures and expressed dissatisfaction with the level of financial transparency being provided. The discussion highlighted tensions between different perspectives on how bond proceeds should be managed and how project timelines should be monitored and reported to the public. The debate focused particularly on the need for enhanced financial reporting standards and stronger accountability frameworks to prevent future delays and ensure proper stewardship of public funds. Multiple council members participated in the discussion, though the specific individuals involved and their particular positions were not detailed in the available materials. The outcome of this contentious discussion was not clearly resolved during the meeting, with calls for improved financial reporting and accountability measures being the primary result of the heated exchange. The matter appears to require further consideration and potential policy adjustments to address the concerns raised by council members. *Note: Specific transcript timestamps are not available for this meeting content.* ## Mayor's FY 2008-09 Budget Request The Committee received a presentation on the Mayor's budget request for fiscal year 2008-09, which included discussions of general obligation bonds and capital projects. The presentation served as an informational briefing for Council members to review the proposed budget allocations and spending priorities. Multiple Council members participated in the discussion, raising various questions and concerns about the budget proposal. Key participants included: • Councilman Gordon • Council Member Stennett • Council Member Lane • Council Member Blevins • Council Member Beard • Council Member McCord • Council Member Blues • Commissioner Coe During the discussion, Council members raised specific concerns about project delays and financial management practices within the proposed budget. These questions appeared to focus on the implementation timeline for capital projects and how funds would be managed throughout the fiscal year. The budget request encompassed both operational expenses and capital improvements, with particular attention given to general obligation bond funding for infrastructure and development projects. Council members sought clarification on various aspects of the financial plan to better understand the scope and impact of the proposed spending. This agenda item was informational in nature, allowing Council members to review the Mayor's budget proposal and ask questions before formal consideration. No formal action was taken during this presentation, as the purpose was to provide Council members with detailed information about the FY 2008-09 budget request and allow for preliminary discussion of the proposed allocations and priorities. The discussion provided Council members with the opportunity to identify areas requiring further review or clarification before the budget moves through the formal approval process. --- ## Decisions - **Motion** — passed (0-0): Motion to adjourn --- ## Full transcript gave you handouts, and I just assume that we'll work specifically from those handouts. The 2008 projects, of course, we have not sold bonds on yet. We'll be packaging those with the 2007 so that we'll have a fairly large bond issue later this year or early next year. I guess probably the best thing to do at this point is ask if there are questions about, first of all, the 2008 projects. These are projects that were approved last year. Yes, ma'am. Councilman Gordon. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Thank you very much for this information. I have a couple of questions, one of which is if we go to the, I guess just in simple terms, my question is which of these projects have been delayed even more? The ones that were for fiscal year 07-08, have any of them been delayed beyond what we originally intended because of the economic picture? And if so, which ones? Because some of them I thought we would have already bonded. Well actually, we've done a reimbursement resolution on every single one of them. So I've been holding all the bonds. So it's not anything to do about the spending. I've been holding the bonds waiting for our audit. Okay. So nothing's behind schedule? I wouldn't go that far. That's what I want to know, is what's behind schedule and what's on schedule? Actually I kind of anticipated this question, so I have another handout. Okay. And then while you're getting that handout, I just had a comment. For many years we would receive a matrix where we could look 30 years out, and on that it would show, for instance, 2000 to 2020, such and such bonds. So we could see every bond package in relation to every other, and when we retired them and when we didn't. And I wonder if you could, kind of like a spreadsheet, do you, okay, well, I don't have a copy. Do you have it on a timeline? This is 2008 through 2013. But not our whole bonding picture? It is every bond with its debt service for that timeframe. If you'd like, I did not bring copies of this one, but I'd be happy to have some made. And if you want us to go beyond 2013, certainly we could do that too. What is very helpful for me, and I don't know if other council members find this helpful, but every year we used to get a piece of paper, legal size. I'm just going to put this in real elementary terms. And on the left hand was a list of our bonds, for instance, EOC. And going across the top was every year for the next 30 years, so that we could look at this one piece of paper and see what years we had what debt. Does that make sense? Oh, absolutely. And this one only goes to 2013, because that was about the most you can get on this size of paper. We can go out more years. I'd be happy to get that for you. If you'd like what I have, which is through 2013, I can get someone to come make copies. I'm pretty interested in our entire picture, because we've got stuff out there many years already in terms of debt service. This gets us to the point when our debt service actually starts dropping off. So, I mean, this is a crucial time period between 12 and 13. 11, 12, and 13, I think, are very crucial. So does it show the end of every bond that we have? It does show when each bond drops off. In relation to every other one. Yes, ma'am. I'll tell you what. Let me let you take a look at this and see if it's what you want. And if you'd like this, we'll run it out more years. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. Council Member Stennett. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Commissioner, on the list you gave us, is there a way to get what the payments will be for this going forward, the debt service payments? They are on this piece of paper. The one you just handed? Yes, sir. Okay. Lillian, if you're watching, could you come down and make copies for me, please? Maybe somebody back here could make them. And just a quick question. You may or may not know this. We have $33 million worth of bonded or bonds to sell in the FY07 and FY08 combined together. Of that, how much of that has already been spent? And of that, we'll have to reimburse those funds. Because in other words, obviously we're paying that money from somewhere. Right. I assume it's our cash flow. Right. How accurate have we been, given the situation with STARS, in tracking this money through our cash flow balance? We watch our cash flow balance daily. How much of that $33 million are we going to have to reimburse? Right now, what I have expensed to date, but this is maybe two weeks old, was about $11 million of the $33 million. If you look at the very last page of the handout with the highlighting. Highlighting. Okay. All right. I see it. So when we reimburse that $11 million, is that to cash in our cash flow? Yes. And what accounts is that coming out? And what will that go back into? Well, it's across government. We don't manage cash by fund. We manage cash at a higher level than fund. And then do the paperwork to distribute the interest among the funds. So I assume that $11 million has been taken into effect when the mayor proposes a 0-9 budget, that that money will come back into the budget? Well, it's — How do you encumber that, in other words, going forward? It's a cash flow issue and not a budget issue. Right. Going forward, we will sell bonds and replenish the $11 million. Okay. So there's another $11 million in cash flow out there that could be used for an emergency or in other situations? Is that what you're saying? No. No. No. This $11 million is gone out of our checking account. Right. Basically. But we've just loaned the money to ourselves. So then when we sell the bond, we put the $11 million back in to make us whole. Well, I guess — We're doing a cash float here. Right. And that's what I'm getting to, though. We have $11 million-plus in our checking account to pay for whatever emergency that technically is not budgeted for line items. Yes. Yes. We are floating some money in our accounts. We're not operating — No. Everything — no, we budget everything that we expect to get. There's no money that we anticipate receiving that's not in the proposed budget. Okay. Okay. So we don't have $11 million extra in our checking account? No. So then how do we pay this? If we had budgeted everything, what other budgets did you take? It all is just — it's an in and out of — I'm sorry. I'm not doing a very good job of explaining this. I don't know how — Council Member Lane, you might be able to help me with this. Well, I was just going to say, I believe what you're working with is the float. For example, the real estate taxes are collected earlier in the year, and yet their expenditures are at the end of the fiscal year. We have extra cash that's in the fund that's already been allocated to be spent, but we haven't spent it yet, and we use that as float money to, you know, lend against the bonds that are coming in. Well, it's just like our personnel budget. We may budget, you know, $100 million, but we don't need $100 million July 1. So what we — what we do in cash management is look at when we expect the expenditures to occur and ensure that we have enough cash to be able to support those expenditures. Here's my problem. Here's what I'm getting to. Okay. In 08 budget, this Council approved these bonds to be bonded. They haven't been bonded yet. That's right. Yet a number of those bonds include a debt payment in 08, correct? They all incurred — the 08 projects did not incur a debt payment until 09. So we didn't have a debt payment at all in 08 for the trail money, the infill money? No. No debt payment? Not for PDR? Not a penny. Well, I know we did from 07. Yes, sir. We did. But we haven't bonded anything from, you know, two budgets ago. You're right. So where are all those debt payments that we were supposed to have made? How are we accounting for those? We're accounting for those by budgeting for them going forward. Right. But there was money savings in 07 or 08 from bonds. We had planned on issuing, but we did not, correct? Because I know we wouldn't wait until 09 to bond a 07 project like we're doing now. If the market looked good, we might wait. But I'm saying when we worked on the 07 budget, we included a debt service for those projects in our budget for 08. In 08, yes, sir. Right. So where — and we haven't bonded those, so we haven't paid debt yet. So where is that money? That money is still budgeted. Right. So we used — if you remember, we brought a budget amendment to you to use part of the money that was sitting there for debt service to do the reappropriations because we didn't have any carry forward from the prior year. So we brought a budget amendment to counsel to use the debt service that most of the debt or a lot of the debt service that had been appropriated for 08 to be used to do reappropriations. The rest of the money in that debt service would be available to go into fund balance at the end of the fiscal year. Which brings me to my third point. We're projecting zero fund balance moving forward for 09. That's right. Okay. So there has to be a pot of money somewhere that we anticipated budgeting that we haven't spent. Otherwise, we spend it incorrectly because it should have been spent on debt payments. And that's what I'm looking for. Well — That's why I wanted to say — Just like any other project that we might have held on. Okay. We're holding up a bunch of personnel decisions. We have not filled positions that you authorized in the 2008 budget. Money is going to be available in those counts on June 30th and will go into fund balance. The problem is that we're not anticipating our revenue to make budget either. So we're going to need whatever we can get out of savings and expenditures to offset what we're not going to get in revenue. I understand. And that gets to your next presentation, which is Thursday night, I believe, on the revenue projection. Yes, sir. Which is about a $5 million difference from 08 and 09. Right. So you're saying, you know, there's a $5 million cushion we're going to save by not doing these things. Is that what you're telling us? By not bonding some of these and not hiring those personnel? Right. Putting a fire class on hold. Putting a police on hold. Well, the savings in 08 that we're projecting by curtailing expenditures, and among them being this payment of debt, is that's when we say that we think that we can manage our way through 08, we mean that we think that we're going to have enough savings and expenditures to offset what we're not going to get in revenue, which is why we're projecting a zero fund balance, a zero carry forward. Now, it's not going to be to the dollar. No. I mean, so, I mean, there's going to be something there. But we felt like at the time that we had to make a budget to the council, that it was so close that we didn't want to budget any carry forward in expectation of maybe having some money and then it not coming through. Now, I'm hoping by Thursday to be able to have April revenue for you, which would at that point then give us another month under our belts to see what our revenue picture is doing. Because, you know, as I've been presenting to budget finance every month, it's really tight and we're behind budget. April will be a great month for us to make a determination about how much behind budget we think we're going to be, because April is a big month for some of the license and taxes. Yeah. I just think it's very difficult to do the 0-9 budget and knowing there were things we all felt wholeheartedly were in support of in 0-8 that we may still want to do. And that's what I'm trying to get the numbers from you all, exactly how much savings you're anticipating by not doing certain things in the 0-8 budget. That's what I asked for. Okay. I know we don't have it. I'm not. You don't have it today. No, but I can answer it. That's what I want to know. I want to know what things did you all recommend putting on hold in 0-8 and how much generating or cost savings that generates going into 0-9. So we don't have as big a deficit to make up. We're not projecting that you're going to have any deficit to make up because we are saving expenditure money. So we're hoping at the end of 0-8, our plan is to break even. Now, given that clearly we hope there's some money to carry forward, but if you're talking about did we not – I'm trying to think of – the specific cost-saving measures have been mostly in the area of personnel by having a personnel freeze. So in other words, the positions we authorized, how many of those are we going to save money on by not filling those right now? I don't have that number in front of me. That's what I'm looking for. Okay. And any of the debt payments that we're not going to bond this year or next year, how much do we save on any of those things? Okay. So we know there may be something we want to do, such as the 12 firefighters, the 25 police officers. There's things out there that you all have recommended put on hold that we have a choice to make here. Do we fund them now and worry about 0-9 as well? So those are some of the questions we have, and that's where I'm getting to. Okay. I'm sorry. That's fine. No. I understand it's complicated. And it's going to be very difficult to do, too, because it's – but we will get something to you. If you can do that, because, you know, we played a shell game, it seems like, not before your time on council, but – or in the government, but it seems like we're moving pots of money around in order to balance budgets from past fiscal years. And that's just a game that is a dangerous game, because it's hitting us in the tail right now. Right. This year it's hurting us. And in 0-10, it's going to get even worse, because there's no debt payments in the 0-9 budget for things that we plan to possibly bond in 0-9. But there are debt payments for the 0-8 bonds. Yeah, for this fiscal year. I'm talking about when we're working on 0-9 fiscal year. But that's typical. I mean, we always do a year ahead. I understand. But we haven't even bonded 0-7 yet. You're right. So, I mean, it's getting into a situation where we need to start doing what we say we're going to do in budgets and stop pushing it forward like we have. But that's the end of my comments. Thank you, Vice Chair. Excuse me. Council Member Gordon. Well, I think Council Member Stennett's questions go back to my question to you, and that is, what has been delayed? Okay. That we didn't ---- Okay. I'm sorry. I'm ---- since this was a capital meeting, I assumed your question was about capital projects, not ---- he's talking about the operating budget, and I assumed your question was about capital, which is why I handed this out and then wanted to discuss this with you. If it ---- if your question is about capital, if it is ---- My question is about what did we not pay a debt service on that we first intended in fiscal year 08 and, therefore, delayed the project? We have not delayed any project due to not having debt service. Now, there are some projects on this list that we might want to talk about whether we want to move forward with or not, but none of them ---- I'll step back from that. There are a couple pieces of equipment that we held up on to wait to see what the budget was going to look like. But other than that, in the capital budget, we haven't asked any division directors to hold back because of the situation that we're in financially. So every project that we intended to bond and move forward is moving forward? I didn't. I don't think that's what I said. Okay. I'm saying that they ---- no one has been asked to delay because of budget conditions. Some of these projects, for example, I mean, the $2 million infill and redevelopment, no money has been spent there, but you know that. You're getting ready to have before you the land bank program. So from my perspective, you know, it's authorized to move forward, but if you looked at a piece of paper and it showed that nothing had been spent, you might jump to the conclusion that for some reason we have delayed that. But there's been no conscious decision to delay spending the $2 million that was there for infill and redevelopment. It's just been slow to formulate the program and get it in front of you and ensure that we are doing the right thing with that money. Thank you. With the liberty of the Chair, it can be taken for perhaps context. I am interpreting, Commissioner Koh, my translation of the question from Councilmember Stennett and Councilmember Gorton has to do with maybe connecting the dots between the financial piece and the project execution piece of the roles that we see in the administration. So I, for example, myself am thinking, I believe we had Raven Run, the visitor center, in last year's funded projects. That's right. Expected to be bonded. Expected to perhaps then have some debt service on those bonds. Next year. And in next year. And my understanding that the project is, has been slow to get started. So this is also a way for us, this represents a way for us as councilmembers to examine or see the extent to which the projects we have supported and funded are actually being executed. Is that a fair statement? Is that a fair statement? And that's what this gives you. This gives you, the one with the highlights gives you an update on the progress. There's a status, it's a status report on every capital item that you budgeted in 08. Okay. Okay. And, and what I have done, and let me, let me point out, I've met with the mayor about these projects. I have not met with the commissioners or division directors yet to pass along to them the information that I'm getting ready to say. So this is all very preliminary. But the highlighted projects in this handout are projects that we feel like we need a little more information about before we make a decision whether to move forward with that particular project or not. Either there, we felt like there was insufficient justification of the status of the project to actually support the need, or it was just, if it was a really high priority and you put it in the budget last year and you haven't spent any money, you know, from our perspective, just meeting this morning, it was we need a little more information about those that are highlighted in yellow, other than the $2 million on the land bank. And one of the things that I spoke with the mayor about this morning is, do we want to offer up to council, and certainly your decision, do we want to continue to possibly authorize $2 million in that project, but only sell a million dollars worth of bonds, because it has been slow to come on, and how fast do we think we're actually going to spend the money? Is there some savings to be realized by deferring part of the bond on that $2 million? And, you know, I'm sure that Harold Tate can bring you up to speed with where we are on this, but that's just one of the items that I highlighted, and for that reason. Council Member Blues. When you say, Commissioner, that you need more information on these highlighted projects before moving forward with them, now these are projects that council has already authorized. That's right. So, from whom do you need the more information? From the division directors, and then I would bring the information to you. This is not a decision that the administration would make on our own. What I'm proposing to you is that there are a few 08 projects that we really need to scrub right now and make a decision on whether we're going to bond these projects or not, but that will be your decision. The bond authorization will come to you, and it will either be for, let's use the land bank, $2 million or $1 million, based on the feedback that I get from you about how you want to proceed with that program. But these are decisions we've already made. You did make a $2 million decision on that, yes, sir. I'm just saying that you do have an opportunity to revisit those decisions, given where we are in the revenue situation. When we made these decisions last year, the administration along with the council, we had no idea that our revenue was going to take the dip that it has taken. We might have looked at some of these projects differently last year had we had the information before us now that we have about our revenue. And that's all I'm suggesting. So I understand. In other words, you're inviting us to reconsider our previous decisions. Yes, sir. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member McCord. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Just something specific, and I see Jerry and Bob there, but I think it might shed light on some of the other things in here. But as it relates to the Parks Trails Project and so forth, we've, I know, gone over in the last year kind of an exhaustive way how best to use that money and so forth, and it's showing that we've got a million-plus in RFP design approval and so forth. So can you tell me kind of where things are with that? Well, I think, I mean, you, I think you've been a participant in the fact that it took us a while, really, to decide how we were going to proceed with this program. The status report, I mean, shows over a million dollars tied up in design, which is really remarkable progress, given that this time last year we didn't know what this program was going to look like. So I would say that that program is one that's on target. And clearly, the money's not going to be spent by June 30th, but we wouldn't have wanted to rush into a decision about how to spend the money. I think that everybody has had a lot of input in how we're going to do this. So I would call that program on target. I think something for the viewers to know and for us as council members to know, and I guess the problem, again, this doesn't, it doesn't, it kind of bypasses you and goes a little bit deeper. But, you know, in circumstances like this where you've identified where we need to go and there seems to be a slow drug-out process, I think where council members get very frustrated is when you have a trail project, for example, that costs X, but because of the bureaucracies of government or because we need to do this or we have some internal policy that council members don't know about, that it slows potentially the spending of this, but it also slows the production of it. And it bleeds into a new year. And here we sit at $3.00 and something cents a gallon in gas. And asphalt prices are actually tied to gas prices. And so what happens is, is that that $2 million doesn't go nearly as far because we've kind of sat around and done certain things and not gotten certain things done. So I think, one, I wanted to bring light to the fact for council members that this was a, when we put this into the budget, one of the things we wanted to do was identify where we could spend it, where we could use it and get it done, preferably within the year. We got the design work out. We've got things like that. But I think going forward, what really is frustrating is recognizing that when we're trying to allocate money for something and then it doesn't get done in the time frame that council is trying to get it done, then costs go up and then it costs more money to do. And it becomes extremely frustrating, not only for us, but for constituents. And I haven't seen anything since I've been on council in three years come in under budget without some sort of change order, without some sort of, hey, we need more. And that's the part, I think, that's really frustrating. And I agree with Council Member Gordon that if we can kind of get a bird's eye view of what's going on, I think we can plan better. But I think the administration and I think all of government needs to understand that over the next two years, there will be more heat from this body than probably ever before in government to get things done. And as I've said so many times, we cannot keep doing it the same way. It cannot be done because we're not doing a good job. And I appreciate you standing up here and trying to navigate yourself through that. But I just want you to understand where the frustration lies for us when you allocate money and you feel like, hey, we've got this done and we're putting that out to constituents that, hey, this is going to get built or we know this is going to happen and then it doesn't. Ultimately we are the ones that have to explain that. So I appreciate your help in sorting through that. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I would just comment that certainly it's your role to hold us accountable and we welcome that. I would offer to the Council that we do some kind of quarterly reporting around these projects, much like, I mean, and I would hope even with better information than you have here. In defense of the division directors, I only gave them a few days to turn this around. So I think we need some kind of regular reporting mechanism, particularly on the capital projects as we move forward. And we'll be bringing something like that to you. Thank you. Council Member Lange. My first thought is it must be very frustrating not to have 100 percent of your financial reports available to work from. You're right. And we're in sort of a difficult time where our income stream is lower and our expenses are going up. I just thought of a summary of what Council Member Stenitz said. Maybe I could just restate it. Essentially, we're estimating that the income for the urban county government for the fiscal year ending on June 30th is going to be about $4.something million under what we had originally forecast. That's right. And we have spent all that money in our allocations. I think the question that Council would like to see maybe restated is if you could show us in like a little report where, you know, we've saved money. Like we didn't add these employees. These people weren't hired on schedule because we couldn't find replacements. Or we didn't have the debt service incurred because we elected to delay the bonding until the last minute or whatever. And show what efficiencies you've been able to come in savings. I think that's what the Council would really like to see. And I don't think it has to be too complicated. Just be a little summary report. And it's probably based on the calculations you've already got is how you're going to save the money to get into budget. I will make an attempt at it for you to review it at our Thursday meeting if that's okay. But clearly, I can't make the 72 hours with that. But I will get it to you as much in advance as I possibly can. But it is something that I'll have to generate. And I think also we realize that these are estimates and not actually hard numbers because, you know, you're looking at through the balance of the year and we don't know exactly what the income is going to be. Now, do you have a date when the April receipts, revenues will be coming? I know they're in, but you're still calculating? We actually run the program the fourth working day. So I think that's tomorrow. And that's why we're hoping to have that for you. And it's still, the big receipts are still on the mainframe. So we have to run a mainframe application and get it over into PeopleSoft before we can actually generate any reports. So they're expecting to do that tomorrow. Unless something goes terribly wrong, we'll have that information for you when I'm here on Thursday. Okay. Thank you very much. Any other councilmembers? Councilmember Blevins. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I just want to confirm my understanding more than anything. If I heard you correctly, all the capital projects that were approved, I'll say in 07 and 08, have been eligible to move forward if they wanted to or were able to? I said, with the exception of a couple pieces of equipment that I think a commissioner asked that we hold on them, just so they could get a better handle. But by and large, they were available to go. Cash or funding was not the issue. It was some other aspect. For example, the trail planning is a good example. We had to go through the planning cycle to do that. But cash was available. You might want to, for the viewing audience, touch on why you haven't sold the bonds if you haven't already earlier today. Because I think people might not understand that. It looks really good from an ordinary citizen's standpoint. You know, interest rates are incredibly low. Why in the world aren't we selling these bonds? Why don't you give a quick explanation why we haven't sold them? Well, actually, I was, I think it's been pretty well noted in the newspapers and everywhere about the problems we've had with our financial accounting. And there's just absolutely no good reason to go to market with our financial system not where it needs to be. We don't yet have an audit in hand for FY07. That's something that bondholders will expect to see. And so we've been waiting until we could get our house in order on the financial reporting side. So there really was no decision. We just could not go to market with the situation that we were in. Well, in addition, having the cash on hand, it looks like our expenditure rate wasn't high enough to justify selling them yet anyway. That's true. So having cash on hand makes sense to go ahead and do it that way until we absolutely have to sell the bonds. So this seems like a wise decision to me. In addition, I want to confirm my other understanding for this fiscal year. We did plan to sell bonds, and we had debt payments scheduled in the budget this year. But since we haven't sold them, that's part of the savings that we're going to apply against the revenue shortfall. Part of it is part of the savings. We used part of it for reappropriations. Correct. You did say that. I forgot that. I'm sorry. And then moving forward into next budget, into the one we're currently reviewing, are there debt payments, new debt payments in that budget? There are new debt payments for the FY07, FY08, and FY07 and FY08. So the ones that we had anticipated selling this year are now planned for in the next budget. That's right. And if you don't sell... Okay. Let me stop there. And then when you give your report that Councilmember Lane has asked for, I think one of the things that Mr. Stennett was looking for, if I can put words in his mouth, is the savings we've anticipated this budget cycle to get us to break even, as you've talked about. Do you anticipate those going into the next fiscal year, and were those accounted for in the mayor's proposed budget? So for example, unfunded positions that we didn't fill for some reason, unfunded but unfilled positions, will they continue past July 1, and if so, was that accounted for in your budget? The unfilled positions are accounted for. Any vacant position with our January 5th payroll is not funded in the L9 budget with a few very minor exceptions, and we did make a major exception for corrections because there's a significant turnover there that we had to account for. So that savings is captured as savings going forward into the mayor's recommended budget for FY09. Right. So barring, you need to cross your Ts, as you said, and come back to us Thursday, but what you're telling me, I think, is that don't count on any additional savings that aren't already built into the mayor's proposed budget. You know, quite frankly, I hope there are some that, I mean, I hope we end the year with a few million dollars, and we may. But what I would suggest to you is that this L9 budget is so tight, I mean, especially on the personnel side. When you consider that we had 222 vacancies on the books January 5th, we didn't fund those with a few exceptions. We're expecting 170 retirements, 50 normal attrition, and only 50 add-backs. I mean, that's significant to this government. And if there's any extra money at the end of this year rolling into next year, we need to look very carefully at that personnel situation. Because this isn't just non-sworn, this is sworn, too. So we have some significant personnel issues built into the L9 budget. At what point, I'm going to switch subjects on you, at what point do you think your cash flow is going to cease to be able to float these projects, and you're going to be forced to sell the bonds? We're very close. Very close to that now. We need to go in the next few months, and I'm working with a financial advisor to do that. We're putting the package together. Okay. And are you on your new schedule as far as getting the audit completed? We're anticipating that getting done pretty soon. End of May. End of May? And as far as in a situation where you're now confident enough to use it to sell bonds? Yes, we are. So end of May, we will be in a position to start selling bonds, should we decide to do so. Should we decide to. Yes, sir, we will be. All right. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Any other Councilmembers have questions or comments? Yeah. Councilmember Beard, and then Councilmember Stanton. I guess Councilmember Blevins' comments struck a nerve with me. What if we reach a point where we have to expend monies that we don't have, and we don't have time to get the bonds into the marketplace? Do we have the capacity to borrow funds? Yes, sir. We've already been in touch with them. Okay. I wasn't sure that we could even do that. Yes, sir. Yes, sir. We have a stopgap in place. A bridge type of a situation. Yes, sir. Okay. That's all I have. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Stanton. First of all, thank you for being up here and doing such a good job today. Thank you for the opportunity, Councilmember Stanton. You're more than welcome. Anytime. I have a quick question, just to clarify, Councilmember Blevins, about the personnel that we, you know, the 222, that some of those vacancies January 5th include positions, besides police and fire, other positions in government that we authorized in the 08 budget. Absolutely. So, I guess, and part of my frustration, you don't have to respond to this, is though, if they were so critical, and we had to have them in the 08 budget, and now all of a sudden, hey, here it is, May of 08, we don't longer need those. So, that's the dilemma we face going into these budget lengths. Here we are hearing people say, oh, we've got to have this new position, we've got to have this, and yet we don't fill them for almost a whole year. It's like, you know, are they really critical or not? What are we, what we're hearing, is it really true? Well, I think that we have been handed a wonderful opportunity to right-size government. But where is that right size? Quite frankly, where we are right now, with many of the vacancies that we have in parks, we're going to start hearing that maybe the grass is not getting mowed, or some trash hasn't been picked up. We're going to start hearing those kinds of things as we move into the next year, if we don't come up with money to fill back some of the really critical positions. To imagine this government down another 400 positions is, or down 400 positions at the end of next year is, that's significant. That's where I'm looking for long-term. Where do we have too many positions, and where can we put the ones we really need? The grass being mowed is a call we're all going to start getting. We've already got it on New Circle Road, on different roads, Hayes Boulevard, etc. So where are our real critical needs? You all have that list of vacant positions that are critical? Well, actually the mayor is personally approving all new hires, so he is making the determination about those that are most critical. Clearly, we've been filling corrections positions. Those are critical. Using my divisions as an example, if I lost a senior accountant right now, or a division director in accounting, if we didn't replace it, we wouldn't get a clean audit next year. It would be that simple. So I consider that one critical. And I have lots of other positions that support the rest of government that we would be in some financial problems if we didn't hire some people. But part of the problem that we have here is, in a lot of programs, we don't really know what that program costs. Because we account, in large part, at the division level. Now, some of the divisions are broken up into sections and can actually give you some costs about particular programs. But we don't do a good job across government about costing programs, so that we might be able to say, you know, if we don't cut the grass anymore, it would save us this much money. Now, Jerry probably has that number. But I'm just using that as an example of, there are lots of things like that that we don't know the amount of money that it takes to really do just that particular program and what it might, how it's going to shake out. So we're going to be walking a tight wire, really, for the next year on what's critical and what's not. And I'm assuming that some of that is going to be a function of our level of tolerance for things not being done that usually that we've been expecting to get done. Well, then, I think it's safe to say in closing that any savings we find in this 2009 proposed budget, we're better off just sitting on those rather than trying to go out and reappropriate them now at this point, wait until January 1 to see what shape we're in. So. Absolutely. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Beard. Again, something triggered a question. The 170 retirees you mentioned. Yes, sir. Are going to be, obviously, long-term employees. Yes, sir. Probably higher-grade employees than the average. And if they're not replaced in the short haul, are we not going to have to hire them back or someone like them back to get the job done? And you mentioned a couple of positions in accounting, for instance, that your back would be against the wall if you didn't have. And have you factored that number in your calculations at all? Well, part of the problem that we have is while we projected and we built this budget on 170 retirements, we really have no idea how many retirements there are going to be, where they are, who they are, and even, you know, what's their payout going to be when they leave, and is it a critical position that has to be refilled? That truly is something that we are just going to have to deal with on a case-by-case basis. The way we came to the 170 is that we do know how many employees have at least 22 years of service with LFUCG, and from that, we extrapolated this 170 number because with 22 years, there's the possibility that an employee could have bought five, which means they're at their 27 years, and the window closing January 1 affects a great number of people. So with that 22-year employee number is how we came back around to the 170. That 170 is not every eligible retiree. Not every employee who has 22 years of service. Because at one point, I was hearing 180 from you all. There are more than the 170, but we knew that there were some people who will not retire. I mean, some people have already told us even though they're eligible, they do not plan to retire. You'll be very busy between July 1st and the 1st of November, I think. It's going to be a good show for the Division of Human Resources. Yeah, I would think. Thank you. I'm sure Councilmember Blevins. I just wanted to add that the State legislature is going to dramatically affect us, could affect us this year if they're reconvened by the governor, because there are a number of things having to do with the retirement cycle that could force a lot of these employees to have to retire. For example, there's changes I know being considered to the lump sum payout. The way that works when you retire, you can either take a lump sum up front or something like an annuity for your entire life. Those calculations matter to each individual employee, and depending on what the State legislature does, we may see more retirements or less. So pay close attention to what they're doing up in Frankfort. Absolutely. Any other comments or questions for Councilmembers? For Commissioner Coe? Does anybody have any questions about the 09 projects? Because we haven't really talked about the 09 projects at all. Go ahead. I mean, I gave you a handout, and I think the Mayor addressed many of these projects in his budget address. Where are they? I'm sorry. Which handout? It says 2009 Mayor's Recommended Budget Capital Projects. I don't have it. Does anybody have it? Or I can't find it. Do you have it? Yes. Yes, it does. It's not titled. It's not titled. She means the Capital Improvement Plan handout. Okay. It's a spreadsheet. Okay. It's a spreadsheet that has Capital Improvement Plan at the top. I don't have one. Okay. So, Kena, why don't you take us through it? Okay. The summary, I guess. Okay. Because it's pretty lengthy, right? It is. It is very lengthy. I think most everything on here is pretty self-explanatory. I would ask, though, if you turn to page 2, General Services, Parks and Recreation in particular, we use the same process for every division, but this one, because their needs are so varied and the way their request was put together, after they did their request, Commissioner Cole sat down with Jerry and maybe some other folks in parks, I'm not really sure, and said, you know, clearly we can't do all of this, but it was right of them to identify the needs. What are the highest priorities? So, really, as we were making decisions about what to fund in Parks and Recreation, we were working from almost an adjusted list of highest priorities. So I tried to put those in blocks so that they would make some kind of sense to you about what they had requested and what we did in that particular area. So, other than that, I think they're mostly self-explanatory. Lots of the things like copy machine leases and things like that, we've funded with cash, so they're taken care of. They're just not in this package that is the bond package. I have a question. Okay. Dr. Stephens and Council Member Gordon. What is Parks Parity? That's a program that the mayor recommended to the council, and you funded last year, that there are some parks that have been a little more ignored than others, and it's an effort on the part of the Department of Parks and Recreation to bring all the playground equipment and that kind of thing up to a particular standard. Thanks. Thank you. Council Member Gordon. Thank you, Vice Mayor. I have a question on two that's a parks question, and I was curious about the second line from the bottom, what parks we have on septic tanks. Is this a Jacobson? Jacobson is on a septic tank. So the bathroom would be hooked to the sewer. So that's all for Jacobson. And then is the, let's see, on parks the same page. Is the installation and repair, that $70,000 right above the dark box, is that for the Jacobson? What is that for? Is that to move the Jacobson dog park, or what is that? That would be to expand the paddocks at the dog parks that are existing, make them larger. This would be to kick in some money to share with the friends of the dog park. But where is it? Where would it be spent? Do you know? I can't tell you, Linda, specifically. My guess is. Because the friends of the dog park are currently putting money in for the Wellington, and the Cold Stream is finished, and the Masterson is, you know, they're raising money for the second piece of Masterson. So the only thing I could think would be that plan to move the Jacobson to a different area that takes the rain better. That's been talked about. Can you find that out for me, please? I will. I'll tell you at 3 o'clock. Okay. Thank you. You might note that the mayor didn't recommend funding of that particular project. Okay. Dr. Stevens. And can we assume that everything on this capital improvement plan is bonded, except for the few things that you've had notes for cash in the right-hand column? That's right. Okay. Thanks. And so under operating capital, is that the usual procedure to fund? We do equipment and vehicle notes generally on the operating capital. You'll see most of those are pieces of equipment for streets and roads, computers, those kinds of things. We've normally done those on either a three-, five-, or seven-year note. And that's what we would recommend that we continue to do. Right. Okay. Thank you. Commissioner Cowley, any other any further comments? No. I don't have any. Council members? Okay. Just as a point of information, the we have scheduled a Committee of the Whole meeting this afternoon at 5 o'clock, and that's mainly to address administrative issues internally to the council, just the council's budget. Shouldn't take too long, I don't imagine. And then the additional meetings of the Committee of the Whole related to the budget will be on the sheets that I think everybody has. If you've got any questions about it, Jerry has copies of this. Okay. Absent any other comments or questions, do I hear a motion to adjourn? Motion to second. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed? No. We are adjourned.