essentially 1.3. Well, I'm sorry, 1.46. And so we've increased it some, but I don't know about it in past years. Okay. I mean, obviously we have some time here to kind of flesh this out. I don't mean to put you on the spot today at all. I know you're still new and you're still getting your feet wet, so to speak. But we just want to make sure, as this body, our only role at this point in your operation is approving your budget. And we want to make sure that every dollar you're collecting from the property taxpayers here in the county is going towards increasing service, not changing the service to match the dollars, but actually providing a better and more service for our taxpayers. So we just want to make sure that's the only reason I'm asking you this, because that is a correlation of fair revenue versus daily trips. I understand, sir. Thank you. Dr. Stephens, then Mr. Lyon. I don't think you'll be able to answer this question, maybe, but perhaps we can do a little searching around and get the answer. Okay. Our population here in Fayette County, in the urban service area, is probably about 265,000 people within the urban service boundary. And I'm curious, how many people, how many of those people live within a half mile of a bus stop? That's a very good question, sir. I'll see if I can't find a way to answer that question. As I mentioned, the comprehensive operational analysis that we did four years ago probably has some of that information in there, and I'll look at that. And I know that when we do this again, that will be part of the criteria that they look at, so we can see where our riders are and where we put stops and that sort of information. Right. Well, of course, we're trying to get everybody out of their car and either on their feet or a bike or in the bus. Yes, sir. And if you have to walk more than a half a mile, it occurs to me that you'll be losing your... One of the things that we're actually looking at, you know, every day I think of new ideas for ways to get people out of the car. And, you know, we are trying to look at businesses, for example, that have large parking lots that aren't used Monday through Friday, for example. Some of the churches, Lexington Mall areas, things like that, where people could park their cars that drive in from the neighborhood, you know, which would be a short trip in and park there and catch the bus in front of those lots and things like that. So we've done some outreach and hopefully we'll get some results from that. There are plenty of parking spaces at Lexington Mall, I can tell you that. Yes, sir. Thanks. Mr. Lane. I was just going to add that I would find it very helpful if you could take some of the historical data from previous years and do a dashboard report sort of showing trends over the years. And I would also suggest, since there's a question about ridership data, to maybe look at UK, which I believe was working on some kind of a flat fee, and they probably had a lot of riders for students around campus, versus people paying, you know, a buck a ride to ride around the county. I think those data would be helpful to look at, too. But I concur with Councilmember Stennett that we're interested, you know, in trying to get the most bang for the taxpayer's money, and our budget overview is about all we have to look at. But having these data sort of trending, you can sort of get a trend line of how things are going. Yes, sir, we'll do that. We'll look at the, go back five years, would that be sufficient to see what the ridership would be? I think five years would be terrific, that'd be very good. We'll see if we can do that and show you what we predict. One of the issues that we deal with, and that's one of the reasons that I've decided to bring these 16-year-olds this summer to count passengers, is that we don't have a registering fare box right now that actually is a way to match revenues with people getting on and off the bus and those sorts of things. So we use a formula based upon the amount of revenue that we collect every day, so I'm not sure how accurate passenger counting actually is. I mean, it's a common practice in the industry for systems that don't have the registering fare boxes. So hopefully with these passenger counts, I'll be able to get a better idea of how accurate we are with using the formula. Thank you, and good luck and welcome here to the Center for Contacted. Thank you, sir. Thank you. Councilmember Gordon. Thank you, Madam Chair. I have one question, and I want to thank you for your time previously when we have met. Have you completed, I read somewhere where you're actually posting the schedules at the stops, the bus schedules. Have you completed that or started it or where is that? The plan right now is for August service change to have that done. What we plan on doing is at every shelter having a system map there as well as the full times for the entire route and then at every bus stop, pole if you will, which signifies the stop, having an abbreviated version of that so that a person can see which routes come by that location and the time point for where you are so you could know what time to expect that bus to come by. But we haven't done that, I guess in a long time. I'm not familiar if we've ever done that, but that's a new project that we're trying to get accomplished by the August time frame. I think that's a terrific idea because people can actually see right away whether they're at the right place or where they need to go. Yes, ma'am. Okay, I appreciate it. Thanks. Any other comments or questions? Thank you all very much. Thank you. Next on the agenda are council reports and I don't know whether my monitor is functioning or not. Why don't y'all just... Is it? Okay, I don't see it. Mr. Stennett, I'm told that you have announced that you have a council report. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Yes, sir. In response to our last presentation, I'll make a motion to go ahead and put the LEXTRAM budget on our docket for the next council meeting for first reading. So moved. There's a motion and a second. Is there any comment? All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Sir. Mr. McCord. Thank you, Mayor. A couple of things. First move to approve the NDFs for this week. Second. There's a motion and a second to approve the NDFs. Is there any comment? All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. Motion carries. Secondly, I wanted to announce the retirement of a real tireless servant in our community, Jan Bercotto, who's been the director of the YMCA for a very long time and has done just an outstanding job. Her retirement party is June 3rd from 6 o'clock to 8 o'clock at Sal's Restaurant. I just want to make that announcement and publicly thank her for all the good things that she has done in YMCA under her leadership. Third announcement is Pula Palooza at Southland Pool. This will be held Saturday, May 24th, coming up from noon until 4 o'clock. It's free admission. Come out to Southland Pool, which is a gym in the 10th District. We're both, Council Member Flevens and I, grew up playing in that pool. Fourth, I want to, in our budget that's coming up, there's a million dollars for trails. It's interesting because we've all talked trails across this body and around this community, but I had the good fortune yesterday to go to Louisville and spend a day with Van Jones, who is the gentleman that is spearhead of the 21st Century Parks Program in Louisville. Basically, this program has raised $60 million public and private over the last couple of years, has acquired thousands of acres to basically build a series of parks in Louisville in the last undeveloped area. It's an absolutely incredible project, and the monies that they're attracting and the excitement they're attracting is unbelievable. But, again, it goes back to the commitment of that community to start putting monies towards trails. Mayor Abramson has put a vision out there of connecting 100 miles worth of trails, basically connecting all of the parks across Louisville and what they're doing. Some of the things that we're doing in this town are along those lines. But, in the budget, I know we're looking for cuts and things like that. Of course, you look at a million dollars for trails and, well, we could use it here or there, whatever. But I want to quote a stat to you that I think is really important and I think that the audience needs to see because we haven't become a trails community yet. But as gas starts to creep up, I think things are going to start to change dramatically. We've got some folks in the audience from the home builder side, and I really want to aim this at folks in our community that build our community. The National Home Builders Association every year does a study about what amenities do folks want to live by, what are the top amenities that they want their home to be sitting by. And for 30 years, the number one amenity was golf courses. We want our house to sit on right beside a golf course. It adds value to our home. It's exactly the best thing I want. In September of 2006, the New York Times published the National Home Builders Survey. And for the first time in 30 years, it changed. And it changed to access to recreational trails. And so this body, as we start to work through the issues of do we keep trails money in the budget and what are we doing with trails and so forth, this is absolutely critical to green infrastructure, to getting our people healthier, but also to our economy. And I think that we just haven't quite gotten there yet as a city. We don't quite understand how it all fits together. But that was a very substantial eye-opener that I received yesterday from Dan Jones. And I'm looking forward to our city moving forward on that. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Thank you, Mr. McCord. Any other council reports? Okay. Hearing none. We have a mayor's report. Is there a motion to approve the mayor's report? Motion second. Any conversation? All in favor, please say aye. All opposed, no. Motion passes. We have a Council Member Gordon. I don't believe anyone moved approval of the neighborhood development funds. Did they? We did that already. They covered that. It breezed right past me. That's right. We did it. We got it done. Anything? Next on our agenda, finally on the agenda, public comment. And I have one, Mr. Justin Morgan. And then Mr. Lewis Cobb. Good afternoon, everyone, Vice Mayor, members of the Council. My name is Justin Morgan. I'm here with regard to just... Just one second. You need to give us your address, if you don't mind, please, just for the record. And we can start the clock on you again. Let's start it back up at three minutes, because I stopped you. You are aware that we do have a three-minute... I wasn't aware of that, Judge, but maybe that's in everybody's benefit. Well, I saw all those boards, and I thought that might be why I needed to alert you to that. Okay. Justin Morgan, 271 West Short Street, Suite 300, Lexington, 40507. It's regarding bid number 772008, which I believe had a first reading on May the 8th and is set for a second reading this Thursday. And I represent, along with... I'm appearing actually for Jerry Anderson, an attorney here in Lexington, who represents A1 Winchester Towing, which was the low bid submitted for that bid number. And for whatever reason, the Commissioner, Mr. Markham, issued a recommendation on May 5th, Monday, before the first reading. Suggesting that the higher bid of the two be accepted or put forth. Mr. Winchester and A1 Winchester Towing never received notice of that until May 12th. And Mr. Anderson, by letter May 14, 2008, put Mayor Newberry on notice of an appeal and requested a hearing with Commissioner Markham. And one thing I'll... I'll just put these up there if I may come around, please. I'm sorry, I'm new at this. But some of the reasons that the low bid was not accepted were the lack of a fence around the property, lack of adequate signage. And since these photographs were taken, there have been extensive work in addition to the expense of these improvements. There have been more expenditures that Mr. Winchester is out pending that. And the reason we're here today is to ask respectfully that the matter be removed from second hearing docket Thursday until we can pursue our appeal with the Commissioner. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Morgan. There seems to be, there's some questions related to protocol here. And I see Commissioner Logan asked you. There's some questions from council members about the appropriateness of the objection, purchasing as it relates to purchasing issues or purchasing protocol. I knew there was a reason Mr. Anderson asked me to come today. Well, we try to keep smiling, Justin. I think that any review of this by purchasing or whoever is responsible for considering the review is the appropriate party to consider this right now and not the council. And so, I mean, I would, I think it needs to run its course before he proceeds any further with any council consideration of this request. OK. Commissioner, Councilmember Gordon, and then Councilmember Blevins. Well, I just have a comment. I agree with you, Mr. Morgan. Council members do not get involved in bid process unless they actually sit on the committee. And we purposely do that to keep it from being political. So I have to say, I agree with Commissioner Askew, Logan Askew, that if you have a concern, it needs to go back to purchasing. Councilmember Blevins. Commissioner Askew, could you describe the appeals process just so that the public is educated? And then I have a follow up. I cannot tell you what that appeal process is right now. But I can get that to you. Is Brian? I don't think Brian's not here. Well, here's the problem. I generally agree with what you said a few minutes ago, except that he's quite right. We're about to award this contract on Thursday night. So there's a timing issue. If they have a legit appeal that's already been made, then we need to hear that before we vote on Thursday night. So can I ask that you take on the assignment to ensure that they've been treated fairly and so forth and to give us a report on that particular item? Before you vote Thursday night. Before we vote Thursday night. That way we'll know. Glad to. Thank you. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Morgan. Yes, sir. Mr. Cobb. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Peace and love to the Council and the Mayor in his absence. It's supposed to be three minutes. I'm already two, baby. Start me over. I need all three of my minutes, baby. Okay. This is a very special day. A very serious day. There's an election going on. But something more serious than an election is going on. My brothers are dying around about me and I just want the Council to listen to a few of these names. Jamal Covington. Dominique Faulkner. Tony Wright. Tony Sullivan. Benny Burton. Dave Morton. The actress Worthing, better known as TD. Franco Boggs. Taman Thompson. I happen to have a picture of him on my shirt. Leon. Leron Client. Tony Lavers. Tony Sanders. Todd R. Sires. Two brothers on Appian Way got gunned down from Louisville. Mr. Ed Prentisson was an innocent bystander that got shot by the American Legion. I need the Council and the City of Lexington to listen to me. There's an epidemic going on. We're losing people before they even get started. I hope that we can change this. I feel some of the responsibility because if I could have reached some of those guys, we would have been shining and I would have told them how beautiful life is. All of us have a life to live, and we have to help others to enjoy our life. I'm at the point now, I don't care what color a person is, whatever their sexual orientation is, whatever they believe in, if I can help them, I'm going to help them. So I'm asking y'all to help me. Let me shine y'all's shoes. Let me give these brothers jobs. Let me help them pay their child support. Let me help them pay their fines. We can all humble ourselves. We can shine shoes, wash cars, wash trash cans, go back to the old American way, the pursuit of happiness. We all want happiness. Lexington has been a state where we haven't all been able to enjoy that happiness. A lot of these brothers just want that happiness. Help us to pursue that happiness by hard work, by respecting the Council. I thank you, Vice Mayor, for giving me this time. I thank you so much for listening to me. We got to save these people. I'm asking y'all to help me. Humble yourself. Let me shine your shoes. Your shoes is dirty anyway. I don't mind doing it. We got to teach the young people to work and respect all nationalities. Please. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Cobb. Any further business before the Council? Hearing none, do I hear a motion for adjournment? Second. Motion and a second. All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no. We are adjourned.