# Budget and Finance and Economic Development Committee on 2024-01-30 1:00 PM - January 30, 2024 > Auto-transcribed civic record · January 30, 2024 - **Permalink**: https://meetings.lexingtonky.news/meeting/6030 - **Source video**: https://lfucg.granicus.com/player/clip/6030?view_id=14&redirect=true - **Date**: 2024-01-30 - **Last revised**: January 30, 2024 - **Length**: 12,781 words - **Speakers**: Chair > ⚠️ **Auto-generated content.** Audio from the official Granicus video was auto-transcribed with OpenAI's open-source Whisper large-v3-turbo model, run locally by The Lexington Times. Structured facts were extracted with GPT-4o; the narrative summary was written by Anthropic Claude. Verbatim wording may contain errors. See [methodology](https://meetings.lexingtonky.news/about/methodology) or [report a correction](mailto:editor@lexingtonky.news). --- ## Meeting Overview The Budget, Finance & Economic Development Committee convened on January 30, 2024, at 1:31 PM, with J. Brown presiding as the meeting officer. The committee addressed four agenda items during the session, focusing primarily on financial updates and strategic development initiatives. The meeting began with the approval of the November 28, 2023, committee summary, which was successfully approved by the committee. The remaining three agenda items were informational presentations that provided updates on the city's financial position and future development plans. These included a Quarter 2 Financial Update for January 2024, an Annual Comprehensive Financial Review, and a presentation on Technology Ecosystem Development. The committee conducted two formal votes during the meeting, with no public comments recorded during the session. The informational nature of most agenda items suggests the meeting served primarily as a briefing session to keep committee members informed about the city's financial status and ongoing development initiatives rather than requiring significant decision-making actions. ## Attendance All members were present for the meeting on January 30, 2024. **Present:** • J. Brown • C. Ellinger • D. Wu • H. LeGris • L. Sheehan • P. Worley • F. Brown • W. Baxter • J. Reynolds • K. Plomin **Absent:** None **Late:** None The meeting achieved full attendance with all 10 members participating. ## Votes and Decisions The committee took two formal votes during the January 30, 2024 meeting. **Approval of November 28, 2023, Committee Summary** [timestamp: 00:30] - Motion by: Reynolds - Second by: Plomin - Vote type: Voice vote - Outcome: Passed The first motion addressed the approval of the committee summary from the November 28, 2023 meeting. Reynolds made the motion to approve the summary, which was seconded by Plomin. The motion passed by voice vote with no opposition recorded. **Adjournment** [timestamp: 120:00] - Motion by: Plomin - Second by: Ellinger - Vote type: Voice vote - Outcome: Passed At the conclusion of the meeting, Plomin moved to adjourn, with Ellinger providing the second. This procedural motion also passed by voice vote. Both votes were conducted as voice votes rather than formal roll call votes, so individual member positions were not recorded. No conditions or amendments were attached to either motion, and both passed without recorded opposition or abstentions. ## Approval of November 28, 2023, Committee Summary [timestamp: 00:30] The committee reviewed the summary of their November 28, 2023 meeting for approval. J. Brown led the discussion of this agenda item. The committee examined the previously distributed meeting summary, which documented the proceedings and decisions from the November 28, 2023 session. No specific concerns or corrections were raised during the review process. Following the review, the committee approved the November 28, 2023 meeting summary without amendments. ## Quarter 2 Financial Update – January 2024 [timestamp: 01:00] Commissioner Hensley, Director Holbrook, and Director Lueker presented the financial update for the second quarter of 2024 during this informational agenda item. The presentation covered the organization's financial performance through the second quarter, including detailed analysis of revenue and expenses. The directors discussed budget performance metrics and provided updates on fund transfers that occurred during the reporting period. Key areas of focus included: • Revenue collection and performance against projections • Expense tracking and budget adherence • Fund transfer activities and their impact on overall financial position • Comparative analysis of current quarter performance The three speakers collaborated to provide a comprehensive overview of the financial status, with each director contributing their expertise to different aspects of the financial report. The presentation was structured to give board members and the public a clear understanding of the organization's fiscal health during the second quarter of 2024. This was an informational presentation with no action items or decisions required from the board. The update served to keep stakeholders informed about the organization's financial position and performance during the reporting period. ## Annual Comprehensive Financial Review [timestamp: 60:00] Gina Jones presented the results of the FY23 audit to the meeting participants during this informational agenda item. The presentation focused on the annual comprehensive financial review, with Jones highlighting that the audit resulted in a clean opinion. This clean opinion indicates that the financial statements present fairly, in all material respects, the financial position and results of operations in accordance with generally accepted accounting principles. Jones discussed the financial statements as part of her presentation, providing an overview of the organization's financial position for fiscal year 2023. The presentation also covered required communications that are part of the standard audit process, ensuring transparency and compliance with auditing standards. The agenda item was structured as a presentation format, allowing Jones to deliver the audit findings and financial review results to the attendees. As an informational item, no formal action was required from the participants, and the presentation served to inform stakeholders about the financial health and audit results for the completed fiscal year. The clean audit opinion represents a positive outcome for the organization's financial management and reporting practices, indicating that the financial statements are free from material misstatement and provide a reliable representation of the entity's financial condition. ## Technology Ecosystem Development [timestamp: 90:00] Nick Such presented on the development of Lexington's technology ecosystem, providing an overview of the community's tech sector history, current challenges, and future growth opportunities. Such discussed the evolution of technology jobs in Lexington, examining how the local tech landscape has developed over time. The presentation covered the current state of the technology ecosystem, identifying both strengths and areas where improvement is needed to foster continued growth. Key aspects of the discussion included: • Historical development of Lexington's technology sector • Current challenges facing tech job creation and retention • Opportunities for expanding the local technology ecosystem • Strategies for attracting and supporting technology companies The presentation was informational in nature, aimed at providing meeting participants with a comprehensive understanding of where Lexington stands in terms of technology development and what potential exists for future expansion of tech employment opportunities. Such's analysis covered both the obstacles that may be hindering tech sector growth and the promising avenues available for strengthening Lexington's position as a technology hub. The discussion provided context for understanding how technology ecosystem development fits into broader economic development goals for the community. This agenda item served as an educational briefing, giving attendees insight into the current technology landscape and the factors that could influence future tech job growth in Lexington. --- ## Decisions - **Motion** — passed (0-0): Approval of November 28, 2023, Committee Summary - **Motion** — passed (0-0): Adjournment --- ## Full transcript Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. We'll be right back. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. this meeting to order for the Budget, Finance, and Economic Development Committee for January 30th, 2024 at 1.31 p.m. The first item that we have on the agenda is the approval of the November 28th, 2023 Committee Summary. I'd entertain a motion to approve. Motion approved. Second. All right, a motion was made and seconded to approve the Committee Summary for November 28th. Are there any questions or corrections? Hearing none, all those in favor, please say aye are there any that oppose hearing none that motion passes next item on the agenda is the quarter two financial update january 2024 so we have commissioner hensley director holbrook and director lucre commissioner i'll turn it over to you to get us started all righty hello everybody glad to see we all made it back thank you so much for the extension of time to get back from the the mayor's address. I appreciate it. So we are going to be looking at today the second quarter financial update. This is financials through December. And there's actually a new slide in this presentation today, and we're going to go through why that's in there. But I just want to make sure that everybody remembers that these reports are put together in order to help the mayor and to help council know where we are financially at any given point in the year. They're a snapshot. They're a point in time. And so when we present to you all, what we're trying to give you is the information we think you're going to need to be able to make the decisions that we have to make going forward. So when we look at our adopted budgeted revenue versus expenses, we all know that this doesn't happen. Take the whole budget, divide by 12, and it's the same every month. We have a lot of seasonality. In addition, in this month's financials, you're going to see that we've deviated from that chart a little bit. These financial statements show you a picture of the general fund for a period of time. This does not show a picture of any of the other funds of government. So when you're looking at that, you have to kind of keep in mind that the actions that we take all day every day are also impacting other funds. I'd like to bring that specifically to your attention on this item because for the second quarter when you all made your fund balance decisions, part of the decisions that you made were to transfer a large portion of money off the general fund and over to the homelessness fund and the capital fund. And those were for those big projects that we're going to be working on. So when we put together this slide, we try and show you how our current year revenues versus our current year expenses and transfers are looking. How are we doing on an inflow-outflow basis? When we make the decision to do large transfers to another fund, for example, a capital fund or homelessness fund, that large transfer amount that you see that's $56 million represents money that's coming off of the general fund and over to another pot for use of government operations. And that is not something that's necessarily seen in this presentation. So as we're going through this presentation, I just want you all to keep in mind, because you'll see it through the remainder of the year, that that transfer line item represents those large fund balance decisions that are saved in other funds that the government has for future expenditures. It still is going to impact our financials. We still want to make sure you have up-to-date information. We're transparent. But just keep in mind, it only represents the one fund of the government that we're looking at at any point in time, which is the general fund. So, but for those transfers off to another fund, which again, we still have the cash, we would have revenues exceeding our expenses and transfers of 17, almost $17 million. So we would be in good shape for this year. If you wanted to take into account that those transfers may have also been expensed, The reason it's showing the 38, they're almost $39 million deficit is because that fund balance would have come in not as a current year revenue, but as a beginning balance brought in. I think it's really important to try and grasp it. I know it's a lot to kind of understand and we don't typically look at it that way, but our typical fund balance assignments are usually retained within the general fund. We don't always transfer them off. So any other year when you all do your fund balance assignments, you may have assigned them to a parks project, or you may have assigned them to streets and roads. That would stay within the general fund. So it's just the fact that we moved them to the capital fund or the other, the homelessness funds that make this look kind of strange. So it's going to look that way again the remainder of the year because those are real. Those are real transfers that we've made. But just keep in mind, as you're evaluating the information, we did the large capital construction reserve. We added funding for Dunbar Community Center and the additional Valley Park assignment. We did additional affordable housing, additional OP sustainable solutions. All of those things exist off of the general fund. So really we're just trying to make sure that you guys have the information you need to be able to make your decisions. And then the next set of slides that we're going to show you are how we're doing versus how we thought we would be doing at this point. How are we doing to budget? For that, I'm going to ask Director Holbrook to come up and talk to us about our revenues. Commissioner, before you leave, we have a question. Councilmember Ellinger. Thank you, Chair. On that transfer, how restrictive is that fund? That capital fund? So when you all assigned it at fund balance, you called it a capital reserve. And so that's the assignment that we gave it as well. And so if you all wanted to make a different decision with that, you could. But that was the assignment that was made at the time, and that's what we have it recorded as. Right. But that is money that if we wanted to, we could go and make some changes to that. It's not like when we have a ready day fund where there are the restrictions on that or economic downturns and that kind of thing. Right. So the large capital construction reserve, I think, is the one that you may be talking about. That's not one that we have assigned anywhere other than just a placeholder for these large projects that we have coming. So if you all want to make a different decision, you could do that. That's what I thought. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Commissioner. All right. Thank you, Councilmembers. Just looking at our top revenue source for the first half of the year, and this gets to some of the seasonality that the Commissioner talked about, you can see the first half of the year is, on the whole, typically we collect less than what we do in the second half, and we see a lot of variation month to month. And a lot of that has to do with the fact that the deadline for the first month is on the last day of the month, and the rest of them is the middle of the month. So you can see some changes in there. One of the things I think to note is that while we're tracking pretty well to prior year, and on the whole we're above budget, things are a lot tighter than we've seen in the prior fiscal year. A lot of that has to do with the fact that we adopted a more optimistic revenue forecast, and so you're not going to see as large of a variance to budget. But you can see on the whole, with a couple of exceptions, namely December and August, we've outperformed prior year in most months with payroll withholdings. Looking to net profits, net profits has been an area we've been monitoring. We haven't seen collections come in as strong as prior year yet. Last year, we collected over $70 million in net profits, which was the most we've ever collected. Some of that we're going to have to wait to see if we see the same level of collections come in in March, April, and May, which is when we have our tax filing season. Right now we've underperformed budget in several of our months, and then we've underperformed prior year as well. So this is one we're watching. I think on the whole, just the way it's trending, we're on track to eventually hit our budget even though we're underperforming right now, but we're not looking like we're going to outperform like we did in prior years. You can see just month to month how that performance is coming in both to budget and actual. Looking on the whole, one of the bright spots that we've had, especially to budget, is our insurance premium tax. We've seen growth there. It's been a pretty significant and pretty regular grower just over the past several years and that's something we've seen continue this year. So that's providing a little bit of cushion to offset the net profit decrease that we've seen compared to budget in the prior year. Franchise fees, again, that's reflective of what we collect from Kentucky Utilities, Columbia Gas, and Kentucky American Water. And so, as those collections have been less, as people have used less energy, used less water, just as the weather really sort of dictates, we don't see those collections come in as strong to budget. Property tax, even though it's showing negative to budget, a lot of that has to do with the budget for the Commission under property taxes, and so once that budget catches up, we should be back on track. The only other area I want to point out is services to budget, and we've had a couple items that have really been performing strong there. One continues to be our EMS fees, and then the other is golf course collections. That's something that we saw be strong through the first half of the year and hope to see that continue in the spring. Unless there are any questions about items to budget, we can move on to actuals. Looking at actuals year over year, you can see some, again, like we've seen in prior months, you can see this performance really in some ways be exaggerated. Our growth over prior year in payroll has been strong. It's just because we do have that more optimistic revenue forecast budgeted, that's something we're not seeing as much of that growth carry over to budget. Net profits, this is really where you see how much of a drop off there's been in what we've collected over prior year. And then the other categories really just follow what we've seen to budget as well. Unless there are any questions to actuals, we're outperforming about 3.3% on the whole, which is good. the individual categories, we do see a lot of variance. We do have a question. Councilmember Fred Brown. Thank you, Chair. I didn't know whether to wait until the end. I've got several questions. If they're for Director Holbrook, feel free to go ahead and ask. Well, I might as well, since you're on the schedule there, let me ask the question on the revenues, I think that's the one you've got compared to the 23? Yes, sir. Net profits there. What's the downturn on that? Different time of collection? No, it's not really a different time of collection. One thing that we saw in fiscal year 23 that really bolstered our performance and we saw continue through the remainder of the year was very strong estimated payment activity in December. and in this year we just put it plainly we saw that just really fall off compared with prior year not the big month for net profits anyway we'll typically see december estimated payments come in pretty strong especially 23 the level was uh much higher than we'd seen on the estimates yes okay okay and looking at that down i'm looking at uh let's see investment income uh looks like we had quite a bit of increase on that. What was that attributed to? Bonds not being serviced yet? So there are a couple things there. One of those is just interest. Interest collections have been stronger. I mean, we see that in a higher interest rate environment, especially when you look to prior year and interest rates have been increasing. The other one is the adjustment cost to market, which is something that has been a drag on that line for the past year or so. It's basically if we were to sell bonds right now, what the impact would be. So that was negative in the past fiscal year. This year it's flipped. It's positive. Have we sold any bonds yet for the fiscal year 24? On the bonds that we own as far as. Bonds that went through the budget. We budgeted so much bond revenue. Our bond issues has not gone out yet. It goes out in March. So that enables us to keep some of that money in savings and or, well, I don't know that that would have a. Well, so for those projects, those will have spending authorization just that gets passed as part of the budget. And those would be in their own segregated funds, not in general fund. Are we going to have any type of summary, and I'll turn it to the Chair, about what we do with those bonds in March? Are we still on the same mindset that we were when we set the bonds into the budget? I mean, because we bonded 30-some million, is that what we bonded, Commissioner? I think our bond was about $38 million in the prior year. We have had positive cash flow, enough that we've been able to fund the projects that were going to come in. We also know that a significant portion of our bond was vehicle purchase, and we're not going to actually recognize the receipt of those for a good year to two years. Okay. So we have held off on going out for that bond until we absolutely needed the cash, which will probably be March, April sometime. So what you're telling me, I hope, is that you're not going to need the complete $38 million in that bonding group in March? I think we will need the complete $38 million, but thus far we've been able to cash flow the projects that we have already authorized. chair uh we need to look at that a little bit in march pretty serious because of our cash flow and because of our capital monies that we have you know we've got a we have an opportunity to reduce our bond debt in the future and i think anytime we can do that we always got to look at that i've got a couple of other other questions well let's see director west going back to, well this might be commissioners though, back to page seven. I wanted to look at one thing before I get off here. Page seven had the quarter performance review with axles. Down there across, one more page down. Yeah, okay. All the way to the right on that first, On that right section there, it's got expenses for each month, July, September, October, November, and December. I noticed December was $83.97 million, and that was a lot larger than the expenditures in the other months. What took place in December there? That's actually the expenditures and transfers line. Oh, transfers in there? Right. That's the transfers we just talked about. Okay. on the last thing. Looks like that our revenue is $233 million through six months. And that, does that equate with pretty much a six month number? Are we looking at $467 million for the year? Not necessarily because remember our two largest revenue sources and we can go and see the, we can see the graphs here. We anticipate our third quarter is always our largest performer in payroll withholdings and fourth quarter follows pretty closely so we'll expect the second half of the year in payroll to outperform the first and then also in net profits are big you essentially collect 50% of that revenue line in March through May okay all right thank you chair thank you councilmember director you those are those are all the notes I have and if anyone no one has If you have any more questions, I'll pass it to Director Luker. Okay, thank you. Good afternoon. So this chart here shows our FY24 personnel budget to actuals. It also shows how we compare to FY23. So you'll see on the blue line we've got some spikes. Those spikes in September and March are, because we have three payrolls that month that we're paying, paying. There's a spike in January. In January, we have what is known to our employees as the sick check, as well as we have higher payouts in January. And then June, we have end of year closeout and all of that. So that's why that spiked high. I'm pretty proud of this graph personally, because you can see we are very close to budget on our personnel this year. We're right at or above or right below budget each month. And you can see we are spending more than what we have spent in the prior fiscal year. So this chart really shows a lot in our personnel spend. I think it's very useful and it's very helpful in explaining what's been going on over the last couple of years. Now we have the operating chart, which I'm not as proud of here, but this is showing the same thing with operating. However, it's painting a different picture. You can see that we are under spending in our operating just about every month. There's only one month where we have been at or near budget. And so I will remind directors of that when we give the budget instructions for the FY25 budget, if any of them are listening right now, remember this chart please. But you can see we're not really spending a ton more month over month than we were in FY23 according to this. So this just points out we have a little bit to do with our operating budget. The detail behind our total variance here, you can see our personnel budgets within 3.5%. A lot of that is within our full-time salaries. In January, early January, right when you all came back from your winter break, there was a reallocation budget amendment that came forward that reallocated $2.7 million of savings for projects that were needed to be done right now or some overtime that needed a little additional funds. So that's not reflected here, but next month you'll see a different picture with that $2.7 million being moved around into different categories. The operating, you can see we've got a $14.5 million variance. We have a lot of open POs. Money is encumbered to be spent. It is not spent yet. People are waiting on either receiving their goods or for services to be completed. We also have some additional fuel and vehicle repair charges that the inventories are being booked. They were booked last week. And so we'll see that get caught up as well on the next report once we close January. You'll see the insurance. We've got a little bit in partner agencies, which is a timing of payments to agencies. I think some people shut down over Christmas and didn't send us their statements to get paid. So we've got a couple of agencies there, but that will get spent. And then the commissioner went into detail on the transfer line already, so I'll spare you all that again. And then you can see year over year, we are spending more in every category. You can see we're almost 12% more in our personnel line, while we're only 2% more in our operating line. And so you can just see we are spending more, even though we are still spending under budget in our categories for the fiscal year. Are there any questions? Yes, ma'am, we do. Council Member Savigny? Thank you. Could you just explain, then, we don't, when we encumber, we're just encumbering. So we're not really expensing an encumbrance until we receive the goods. And are we expecting to receive that amount of goods? like when we do the budget piece on operating expense, are we expecting to receive the whole thing before the end of the fiscal year? On some items, yes. Over the last couple of years, we've had a lot of items that are harder to get and are taking longer. I know police has had an encumbrance on for ammunition for almost two years that they've yet to receive. So it kind of varies. Some of them, yes, we will get, and some of them with supply issues we may not get before the end of the fiscal year. But we have an open purchase order, and so we will roll that forward. And so at the end of the year, when we kind of finalize a budget, are we moving those expenses generally over into the new fiscal year as kind of a carryover? Or are we trying to accrue those on like June 30th? So there will be a budget amendment. So we'll have the list of purchase orders that need to roll forward that we're still waiting on things. And there will be a budget amendment that will move that budget from 24 to 25 that you all will approve early in July. Thank you. And I had one more question on the investment income side. Typically, so when we did the transfer over into the capital fund, I guess I would call it, does all the investment income just roll to the operating fund, or does the money roll to the fund that it's supposed to? Like, so if we have $75 million in the capital fund, for instance. So I believe that because each fund is going to have its own set of accounts that go with it, And so if you have money that's parked in a capital fund, then the investment income will accrue to that fund. That's great. That's what I wanted to hear. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Council Member. Next is Council Member Fred Brown. Thank you, Chair. On this flow chart here, I'm curious about the $2.7 million that you've already transferred. I don't know if we normally do that, have done that in the past. and I think you said 2.7, you reallocated as a result of payroll expense not being as high as it was budgeted. Have we done that in the past? So typically this time of year we're looking for money to reallocate for salt or for our snow removal contracts, but we've been fortunate enough where we haven't had to do that yet this fiscal year. We typically do a reallocation as part of the budget, it, but there were some projects and needs that were more immediate that needed to be done, so we decided to go ahead and do that while we had funding available and get some of these things taken care of. So instead of, because in the past we just had fund balance that we maybe make some adjustments to fund balance, but in this case you're not even touching fund balance, is that correct? I mean, if the money wasn't spent it would drop to fund balance, but no, we did not impact The fund balance of the general fund. And let me ask you about the debt service of $35 million. Is that for three? Is that really for nine months? That's for six months. Well, the debt service is not $70 million, if I recall it from the budget. The debt service budget is spread based on when the payments are due. So that is one fortunate thing. We have a schedule of all of our debt service payments, so we can spread that budget correctly. So it's not just half of what our debt service is. I believe it's 50-something million. Okay, because I think our debt service was 40-some million for the whole year. I think it's 51. Was it 51? So you've already spent 35, so are you telling me for the next six months we're just looking at 16 million of debt service? Yes. So the next statement's going to look a lot better the next quarter. Essentially, yes. Okay, because it looked like it was a high number, and I know it relates to when you pay it as far as the cash flow on that, But anyway, that is really not a six-month figure budgetary-wise. Correct. Is that correct? Okay. Yeah, you can't take it and double it. Okay. All right. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member. Are there any other questions? All right. I'm not seeing any. So thank you, Director. Thank you, Commissioner and Director Holbrook for the second quarter, quarter two financial update. All right, committee members, the ARPA update information is in your packet. That's for information only. We'll move to the next item on the agenda, and that's the annual comprehensive financial review. We have Jenna Jones and Jennifer French from Strothman & Company who are here to present the results of the FY23 audit and provide an overview of the annual comprehensive financial report. So thank you for being here, and thank you for your service to the city. Good afternoon, Council Members. Jennifer French wasn't able to make it today, so I'm Gina Jones. I'm the engagement partner on the audit, and so I appreciate you allowing me to come today to present. I'm going to go over just a short summary of the audit and go over the ACFER and then some additional required communications as part of the audit. So, basically, during our audit, we started around September and worked through November of this year, and currently we are working on finishing the audit procedures for the single audit, which is the audit of the federal awards programs, and we'll be finishing that up hopefully in the next couple weeks. We issued a financial statement opinion on the June 30, 2023 financials. It was a modified opinion, a clean opinion, which is the highest level that an organization can receive. As I said, we're still working on the single audit, and we will issue two reports as part of that audit. One is a report on the compliance in accordance with government auditing standards. And then also another report related to the compliance requirements of the OMB uniform guidance, which is the guidance for each of the federal award programs, and a report on the internal control related to that compliance. Our audit opinion, this is on pages 13 to 15 in the ACFER, the big bound document that you have. And it basically says, based on our audit and the reports of the other auditors, because we have the component units in the financials, they are presented fairly in all material respects for the year into June 30, 2023. basically you all operate under the general fund so I'm not going to go over the government-wide financial statement numbers because those actually include accruals and fixed assets and those are not applicable in the general funds so total revenues for the fiscal year into June 30, 2023, were $481 million compared to $433 million in 2022. Total expenditures were $427.3 million compared to $394.7 million in 2022. And then there were other items, sources and uses of funds of 7.9 million. So the net change in the general fund for the fiscal year was 46.4 million compared to 44.8 million in 2022. One other thing that we always like to look at in the ACFIR is on page 35, and that is the breakdown of the fund balances for the general fund. So you have the non-spendable, which is basically inventories and prepays of $2.2 million, and then the restricted funds related to public safety and the energy improvement of approximately $2 million. And then there is committed fund balance. Part of that is committed for the general government, which is $10.6 million. And the rest is for economic stabilization. Sorry about that. $38.59 million. And then the remainder is the assigned general government of $42.7 million, and then the rest, capital projects, of $75.9 million. And then the unassigned, which does not have any restrictions to it, of $24.24 million. If you were to go through and read this entire report, the one thing that I would point out that would be the best thing for you to read is the MD&A, which is Management's Discussion and its Analysis, and that starts on page 16, right after our independent audit opinion. And this basically highlights a lot of the things that happened during the fiscal year, comparing it to 2022, and then anything that's going to be upcoming for the government. And this is a lot easier to read than actually looking at the financial statements. So, I just wanted to highlight that. And then the next part of my presentation is really just to talk about some required communications as part of our audit. You have the scope of the audit, what our responsibilities are as the auditors and what management's responsibilities are for the financials, and then some independence matters. And I'm not going to go through each of these slides because there's a lot of information in here, but you have it in front of you. But basically, you know, the scope of our audit is just to look at the results of the financial statements and the supplementary information for the fiscal year into June 30, 2023. And our responsibility as the audit firm is for forming and expressing an opinion on these financial statements that have been prepared by management. And then the scope of the audit is just, the audit is performed in accordance with gas, which is generally, auditing standards generally accepted in the United States and also government government auditing standards issued by the Comptroller General of the United States. We are required to communicate certain items to you as part of the audit, and that's what I'm doing now. Independence, if we had any independence issues, we would have to communicate those to the council, and I'm happy to report we don't have any independence issues as our firm in in relation to LFUCG. Additional reporting, as I mentioned before, there is a report, two separate reports as related to the single audit. When we look at all of the federal dollars that is spent by the organization, and if If there's any compliance issues that we find, we would have to report that to this body. And as of now, we're currently going through our testing, but currently the programs that we've looked at, we've not found any issues with compliance. But when we finalize that, we will issue that report and communicate those findings to you. Any significant accounting policies, we are supposed to communicate those to you as well, and those are all disclosed in Note 1 in the ACFER, starting on pages 50 to 62. There is one new accounting standard that was implemented and adopted during the fiscal year, and that was GASB 96, which is the subscription-based information technology arrangements. So it's very similar to the LEAS standard that we talked about last year during this meeting. It's anything related to IT-type contracts, and those are required to record an asset and a related liability on the statement of net position. If there were any unusual policies or methods that management was using, we would communicate those to you, and we did not note any. if there were any alternative accounting treatments used we would have to report that to you as well and we don't have any matters to report in that area if there were any uncorrected misstatements in regards to any of the professional standards we would have to communicate those to you and we're happy to report there were not any uncorrected misstatements found during the audit We are required to report to you many of the accounting estimates and management judgments that are made as part of the audit. And here is a list of those. I'm not going to go through those. There are certain sensitive disclosures in the financial statements, and I've highlighted those in the next section below. It's related to long-term debt. It's in Note 3D. and then also the leases and the sabitas, which is those subscription-based information technology arrangements, and that's in note six, and then the pension and the OPEB disclosures, which is in note nine. And then there are some additional governmental accounting standard board accounting standards coming up in the next year or two. those are GASB number 100 related to accounting changes and errors and corrections. And then in 2025, we have GASB 101 related to some updates to compensated absence disclosures. And the last thing before I end my presentation is to let you know that effective November 1 of 2023, Stroessman and Company merged with LBMC so we are now LBMC but because we started this audit before that happened we're issuing our report under Stroessman and Company for this year and this is just a slide about the organization our headquarters our main offices in Nashville Tennessee we are number one in Tennessee and number three in the southeast and we're among the top 40 in the United States and we have over 850 professionals in our firm and close to 170 of those are audit professionals. And that's all I have unless somebody has specific questions about the annual comprehensive financial report. Thank you for going through that report with us and we do have some folks signed up for questions so uh first is that council member fred brown okay thank you chair um i'm looking through the report here and on page uh i believe it's page 80 general obligation bonds and notes is there another schedule that gives the total of all those that's our total debt for the general fund i think but i i think you usually have a schedule in the back maybe in the statistical section you you know what i'm talking about yeah give me just one second if you go back a few pages um starting on page 75. 75 yeah on 75 you were you were talking about page 80. yes okay talking about your debt sure okay so on page 75 you'll see all the bonds listed for the governmental activities and then also for the business type activities broken down by the bond issue and then we're looking at debt about 362 million is that our total debt of the urban county government 362 million let me go to another page because it's total bonds notes and loans payable i just wanted to emphasize on on that we do have a pretty good sizable debt for the government here. It's on page 75. I see it now. Okay. Let me ask you this. The ARPA funds that we've got in this past fiscal year, and I noticed you have some footnotes in here related to that. Did you all discuss that or in the maybe the financial notes as to if we're doing everything proper there or was there any control problems or anything? Yeah, so that, so not in the notes, but that's part of what we do for the single audit that I said we were still working on because those are all federal dollars. Federal funds. Yes. Yes. And you haven't issued that yet? No. We're in the process of finishing our testing on the programs that we selected. So we're not expected to have any surprises? As of right now, what we've looked at, we've not found any compliance issues with those dollars. but if we do, we'll be meeting with management on that and then that will, any findings that we have, if we have any, would be reported in that single audit report. You know, there's quite a few notes to financial statements here. If, and you know, it's a big audit report and of course I have some experience on being able to read it and look through it. What would you advise this council here as far as what is the significant notes to the financial statements that we ought to be really paying attention to as we go through our budget process? Well, so in my PowerPoint presentation where I talked about the financial statements disclosures that are sensitive to the financials, that would be the long-term debt self-insurance program which is in note four the contingent liabilities and commitments in note five and the leases and the sabitas which are the new standards note six and then in note nine those related to the pension and the opeb liabilities and i assume commissioner that you're on top of those particular notes and and then and then the council i mean when we look at our whole financial system and our financial outlook, those are important things that we need to pay attention to. And, you know, having said that, I think we've done a good job, the city has, and you didn't mention that we had a real good audit report, but looking at it here financially, we had a real good financial report for this past fiscal year. Anytime you can set aside a lot of dollars there into the fund balance, I mean, that's got to be a plus there. I think the only other thing I had, I've got 42 seconds, the detail of capital projects was $75,967,143. Is there a summary of that number? And I think it's on the balance sheet. You know, when you talk about the fund balance, you know what I'm talking about? There's unassigned about $29 million. Yes. That's $75 million. Yep, we categorize that a little bit differently than Strothman does, just for year-all's purposes, but the good portion of that is that capital balance reserve. It also includes any of those large capital projects, and we can send you a full list. Okay, good, good. I appreciate it. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Auditor Brown, I mean, Council Member Brown. All right, next up, we have Council Member Cimigny. Thank you, Chair. I appreciate the audit report. I had the same question about the capital side, and I think I asked you before, but that $75 million-ish does not include the amount that we've allocated in October. Is that correct? It does include it. It does. Okay. So it does include it. So that's one of the reasons why it's so big. Okay. And then typically semantics wise, because I don't necessarily think when this class came in, I think you guys might have done the audit prior to us showing up in January. Last year you might have done it at the end of December. I think it did in January last year. Oh, did? Okay. It was your very first one. You guys were... Okay, very new at it. Yeah. It was your first meeting. Yeah, my question is, does this body typically approve the audit and then it becomes, like what's the, because typically when I've been on a board, you approve the audit. If there's adjusting journal entries, the adjusting journal entries then get made at that point. And I'm just kind of curious what the process is. Sure. So the audit is their opinion. opinion, and so the most that we would do would be accept their opinion unless you don't accept their opinion, which I'm not really sure why we would do that. But then whatever subsequent journal entries that would need to be made, those would be in the correspondence that the audit team would have with accounting, and we would make sure that those are entered before we start fresh the next year. Okay. Yeah, that's what I just wanted to try to understand how that typically works. So that's all I have, Chair. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Savigny. Are there any other questions? All right, I'm not seeing none. Thank you, Ms. Jones. Thank you for giving us a clean bill of health financially. And I think this audit report is just a testament to the good and hard work that Commissioner Hensley and her team are doing for us in the finance department. So thank you. Chair, if I could. Yes, sir. uh one last note there i think we need to commend the accounting department and the commissioner in front of your packet here or your is the uh is it still called the kaffir after it's a achievement award that this government has done 30 some years 31 years this will be our third i think we need to you know acknowledge that publicly that our accounting department and financial department has strived to make this audit report a national thing and we get national recognition for it and we don't often see director cooper here but she's with us today and i do want to just give some acknowledgement to her and her accounting team. They are outstanding, an outstanding group of professionals. Very good. Very good. I could not be more proud. Yeah, and I concur. So thank you, Council Member Brown, for doing that. Okay, so thank you for that. So we'll move to the next item on the agenda, and it's a technology ecosystem development. Council Member Sevigny is actually the lead on this. We have Nick Such from Awesome Inc. here to present, but I'm going to turn it over to Councilmember Sevigny to tell a little bit more about this presentation. Yeah, thank you, Chair. Yeah, back maybe less than, maybe six months ago or something, about halfway through my first term, I've worked with the folks at Awesome Inc. for a long, like I've had some experience with them for a long time. And there's a group over there called TAB, which those of us that are a little bit older remember TAB as a beverage, but they have a thing. There's an organization called TAB, and honestly, they have so much passion about bringing a, having Lexington be a stronger tech ecosystem that I talked to Councilmember Brown about it, James Brown. And we decided that we needed to put it in committee. So the result of that is what you're going to see today. And this is really to kind of whet your appetite as to where we could go. And there's going to be some, there'll be follow up on this. It won't drop. But I appreciate you being here, Nick. And he's a great District 10 constituent as well. So thank you again, Nick. Thank you Councilmember Savigny for the opportunity to be here, Councilmember Brown as well. I also want to thank a few other folks who are joining me here in the audience today. So we have Andy and Cheryl from Commerce Lexington who have played no small part in getting TAB started and a lot of work with our technology community over the years. Also Owen Cropper, a distinguished computer science alum from the University of Kentucky who is also one of the board members for TAB and an alumnus of IBM, which you'll hear a little bit about here in the presentation. So the Technology Association of the Bluegrass is what I'm here today to represent. I own two small technology companies here in Lexington, Awesome Inc. and Apex Software. And we are member organizations of TAB, the Technology Association of the Bluegrass, which is a newly formed nonprofit organization that exists to grow the technology industry and workforce here in Lexington. Our board and committee members include representatives from UK, BCTC, Fayette County Public Schools, Commerce Lexington, Alltech, Covetris, Rubicon, Oracle, and a handful of other tech educators and employers. So our goal for a pretty well-rounded group as part of the Technology Association. My goals here today is to start a conversation. And to do that, I want to share a bit of the history of the technology industry in Lexington. I want to take a look at some of our current challenges and opportunities. And, of course, I want to begin to ask for some support from the LFUCG in making our city an even better place to live and to work. So while Lexington might today not be known, you know, our top line billing, you know, bourbon and horses and basketball and health care. Today, we may not identify as a technology-first city. However, looking back a little bit into our history, we really seem to be on that pathway in 1956, which is when IBM opened here. And it was a very different Lexington at the time. very agrarian, solid professional services and education opportunities here, but a very different Lexington at that time. And I'd venture to say that without IBM locating here in 1956, there certainly would be no Lexmark, which grew out of IBM itself, likely no Toyota or Lockheed Martin or many of our other great employers here. I might even take a leap to say that our thriving health care industry would be a bit different because it was also in 1956 that plans for the expansion of the University of Kentucky Medical Center, the Chandler Hospital, began to coalesce with this new large employer in town. And relating a little bit to our city government, It was two years after IBM's arrival that Lexington began planning for the future and that growth by creating the nation's first urban growth boundary. So what a pivotal time in Lexington in the mid-1950s. Now to fast forward a little bit and look at what was the effect of this first major tech employer coming to Lexington, By 1985, IBM had 6,000 workers here in Lexington. That was second only to what continues to be our top employer in the city, the University of Kentucky, which had about 7,500 employees at the time. So IBM was certainly the cause and quite likely the catalyst for many of the tech employers from the 1950s, the 1980s, and beyond. Several great companies on here. I hope you all are familiar with Volta. If not, you can ask Council Members to be more about that. But many great companies that have had significant impacts in terms of employment here in our community as well as impact on their customers and those who receive their services all around the world. Now, Lexington was not the only city to land a major IBM investment in the 1950s or 1960s. Today's major tech hubs like Austin and Boulder had a similar IBM investment actually after Lexington and quite possibly as a result of the success IBM did have here. Yet, when we look at one measure of that continued success, the location quotient, LQ, which is a relative concentration of one type of workers in a particular population, what we see today is that Lexington falls far behind what were some of our peer cities at the time. And these were cities that continued to invest in that tech ecosystem following that initial IBM investment. A little example here in Lexington, and something I found particularly surprising, from 2010 to 2020, when most cities were seeing significant growth in their technology employment, Lexington not only failed to grow, but actually we lost thousands of tech jobs from 2010 to 2020. And that's part of where we ended up with our less than average for a U.S. city of our size concentration of those tech jobs. One thing I do want to make clear is I'm not here suggesting that we try to become Austin or Boulder. Those cities have their own set of challenges, but I do want us to become a better Lexington by raising our LQ even from that .68 to a 1.0, which looks like adding about 3,000 technology jobs here. So that's what we're looking to do, but I want to talk a little bit about why this is an interesting opportunity for our city. So tech jobs are highly desirable jobs. These are desirable for individuals and for communities. Technology jobs like software developer or cyber security analyst are consistently ranked among the most desirable jobs when those surveys are run. Tech jobs pay very well. They don't require advanced degrees to get started. They They don't require a lot of land usage, and they're a great way for diverse candidates to launch high-growth careers. I got to watch the Mayor's State of the City address today, and I heard that we, Lexington, accomplished a very important feat. We're actually above our employment level from pre-pandemic, which is certainly no small achievement. However, one of the things that you'll hear in March as we talk about the Regional Economic Development Plan and hear from economist Ted Abernathy, working with our friends at Commerce Lexington, is while we do have a pretty solid number of jobs here in Lexington, our wage mix is a little off. We have a few too many low-wage jobs and not enough high-wage jobs. And technology jobs, growing that is one way that we can fix and improve our mix here. So we formed TAB, this tech association of the Bluegrass, this nonprofit organization, as a way to follow in the footsteps of several peer and aspirational cities that have found ways to strengthen their tech ecosystems. that you're not seeing New York or San Francisco on here. So there are lots of opportunities well beyond those stereotypical tech hubs. One that stands out a lot to me is Chattanooga and in forming a technology association as a glue for their community, they got to capitalize on an early investment in their fiber internet infrastructure, and they really got that ROI out of that building on events and education and growth in employment. Another city I want to point out, because this might be a travel destination for many of you later this year, is Salt Lake City, and this is where this year's Commerce Lexington Leadership Visit will be heading. Salt Lake City has seen a pretty significant growth in tech talent coming to the city, young workers locating there, and I think there's some opportunities to learn from what they've done in Salt Lake and apply that to here in Lexington. And this is one look in particular comparing growth in the number of high tech jobs and growth in wages for different cities. And again, looking at Chattanooga there at the top and Lexington at the bottom of this particular list, I definitely think there are some opportunities for us to grow those technology jobs and in a similar way see our average wages grow. So some good news for Lexington, we're not starting from scratch. So while our tech job numbers may be low, we do have a lot of the raw materials here in place that successful tech cities have had. So on the left side, you can see a few of our wins. One of the things that stood out to me, it was the 2022 budget address from the mayor. She highlighted that more than 1000 new businesses were now operating in Lexington between the beginning of the pandemic and in 2022. I thought about that for a minute and I don't think these were surprise healthcare companies opening up or unknown bourbon distilleries or a host of new manufacturers. Likely these were tech companies whose workers were freed from heading into their coastal offices and they got a chance to choose to live where they wanted to live and where they wanted to live was not San Francisco or Boulder or Austin, but right here in Lexington. So we're already doing a lot of things right. A few things that TAB has already learned through our conversations with other tech communities, as well as TECHNA, which is the Association for Tech Associations, is that there's some very actionable next steps that our community can take. building off of our history, our existing assets, and some of the opportunities that we have. But one of the reasons I come to you today is that several of these opportunities, these initiatives, are things that require us moving beyond a small group of volunteer individuals and raising some catalytic funding to really get this off the ground. And in thinking about what would happen if we didn't do this, we don't do something to invest in this sector and improve our industrial diversity. A few of the threats that we have on the horizon, one is definitely AI and automation. Many of the jobs that we have here in Lexington right now are at risk, especially due to automation in the coming decades. One I think of because it's a major tech employer is Amazon. And while there are lots of opportunities for tech roles in the future at a company like that, some of the lower wage and lower skill jobs that we currently have here in Lexington are threatened by that increase in automation. I got to hear a little bit more and dive in and gain some awareness of how the city budget works. So I enjoyed those presentations earlier. I know that $5 million in annual payroll tax revenue is but a drop in the bucket, but did want to take a look and understand what the impact of just 3,000 jobs, even at an average wage would impact. And I think what really matters a lot more than that number is that ripple effect of what those jobs bring in terms of added spending and support of other things in our community. And so as far as some current progress, the three main initiatives that we're working on right now are employment, education, and engagement. And so we've got a set of initiatives that the volunteer board and committees already have underway. And it's been exciting to see a few of these things getting off the ground. And yeah, as far as next steps, things that we could do with LFUCG support would really be leaning in on some of those opportunities to attract employers here, to grow some of those with an existing local presence, and especially to continue to invest in our talent pipelines and building our community. So I think the biggest thing I want to leave you with today is our opportunity to grow technology, jobs and training and things here in Lexington is really at this interesting pivotal point. Once again, maybe this is the next 1956. And I think tech has really helped give us the Lexington we have today. And I'd love to work with you to help bring us to the future. Thank you. Thank you, Nick, for the presentation. You got a lot of folks signed up for questions. So we'll start with Council Member Reynolds, Jennifer Reynolds. Thank you, Chair. And thank you, Mr. Such, for the presentation and helping us open our minds to this. I think we do have ways that we could grow. Uh, specifically, I guess I would really like to know more about, um, what you think we're missing in order to be able to be more like some of these other cities or attract the, the high tech. I know the, the mayor really cares a lot about, um, tech and we talk a lot about it and, you know, we have cold stream and we want to expand in that area. What are we missing? Yeah, I think one of the biggest pieces is the glue. We do have a lot of those ingredients, we just don't do a great job of mixing them together. A great example is there's a disconnect between a lot of our education and what employers are looking for. There's also, it kind of goes both ways, there's a disconnect in awareness of the job opportunities here for those students that our universities work so hard to attract in. And that's some of the work that we've started to do on a very small scale. and would love to see that continue. Especially on the education side, there's some really cool opportunities with Fayette County Public Schools and the new, I think it's The Hill is the official name. So they're from the new building downtown, the Old Herald Leader Building, and doing some of that workforce development and focusing on cybersecurity as an example. But it really takes our community coming together and not leaving FCPS on its own islands to really influence the existing employers we have here and to attract others. And it really takes a partnership. So that linkage is what we're missing. So you feel like we're missing the connection maybe between we have Commerce Lex, between the universities, between Fayette County Public School, what we're doing in the city so that they can work together to inform students and residents about what offerings we have available here so that they can stay here. Is that right? Yes, and so it's kind of a critical mass thing. The more students we can get, they come to Lexington for UK, they stay here, they grow that community. The more of those companies invest in Lexington as a place for those employees. So very much connecting the silos is what I see as the biggest need is. Okay, thank you. I think that's really helpful. And what, in my opinion, we need to focus on is, You know, if we're not reaching our goal, why? And then try to make strides in that area. So thank you very much. Thank you, Chair. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member. Next, we have Council Member Baxter. Thank you, Chair. Thank you for this presentation and for Council Member Signe for putting it into committee. I think it's a really important conversation that we're having. I'm looking at this slide, different tech ecosystems, different cities that you focused on. I'm just going to talk while you find it. Yes. Okay. So specifically Cincinnati stood out to me and the term strengthened talent pipeline. Yes. So as you were looking at other cities, do you feel like Cincinnati, for example, has a really good glue? You were just saying that with Councilman Reynolds' question. What have they done to strengthen their talent pipeline? Yeah. So one of the biggest things is that the universities there have worked very closely with some key local employers. One of the things I've found Cincinnati doing a really good job of is tech apprenticeships. Yes, and a couple of employers there through some of the tech community coordination. I know Kroger as well as Belcan, which has an office here as well, but it's headquartered there in Cincinnati, have done a really good job with apprenticeships. So moving beyond that opportunity to learn, but also to learn while on the job, They've had a chance to grow employment. I know I get most of my groceries now through Kroker's app and someone has to build that. And so for UC students and others there, they've done a really good job with that. Tech apprenticeships is something we don't really see at all here. So I see that as one really big opportunity, but it really is keeping that conversation going. Belcan has a program there with Cincinnati Public Schools, so all the way down to the K-12 level where they are doing internships and other experiential learning opportunities. So yeah, I think that whole talent pipeline, K-12 post-secondary, all the way up to employers. Yeah, no, that's great information. Thank you. It gives us something to strive for. So I'm kind of going to take the overall city growth angle. I'm going to take that look. So as we see that that IBM came in and our population doubled. And as tech jobs have left the city, our population is now experiencing decline. Could just be coincidence, but I'm going with it. I am interested in your other slide that had all of the five-year tech growth and tech wage, that chart in those communities has their overall population grown at the same rate as their tech jobs that is a that's a great question unfortunately i don't know the answer that so that's just something that i want everybody to consider that if we are serious about bringing tech back that we have to really be cognizant of where these people are going to live and while we are putting an increased focus on regionalism, which is very important, there's still a part of our population who would still like to live where they work. So I think it's a direct correlation and I'm excited to see how Lexington grows and how tech will play a part in that. So thank you. I look forward to working with you guys more on this initiative. I appreciate it. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Council Member. Next is Vice Mayor Wu. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Nick, for that presentation. It's a lot of really great information. Can you speak a little bit about ag tech? Because that's definitely been a fairly recent focus of the city. Certainly. I've got a couple of appendix slides that I think are here on the end and can speak about that a little bit. So all tech is one of our partners on here. And I know, you know, a big piece of ag tech. as well as Covetris, a veterinary technology company. And I think one of the things that's really interesting about technology is we can look at the technology industry. And so companies that primarily rely on their software, that's how you receive their service. That's not Alltech. But there's a big component of technology workers, so people who work in IT administration, software development, cybersecurity who work for ag tech companies like Alltech. And so that's why you'll see them on here. UK is now one of the largest tech employers in our city. So as the largest employer, it makes sense. But they employ lots of software engineers as well. So I think that's one of the really interesting things about tech is it really crosses a lot of industries, and ag tech is one of those. One of the things I wanted to highlight in here, can get into Bureau of Labor Statistics, SOC, and NAICS codes to kind of identify all this. CompTIA, which is the Computer Technology Industry Association, has really good classification. What do we mean when we say tech jobs? Are ag tech jobs, are biotech jobs what we're talking about? Typically not. When I say tech, I'm talking about high technology or jobs like those that are listed in here. So I think there's an opportunity to work together, but it is a distinctly different thing. Thank you for that. On the page that talked about tech councils from Delaware and Nashville and Louisville, how crucial do you think it is to have something like a tech council that is city driven and kind of putting it forward like that? Is that the glue that you're talking about or is it more organizations like yours? Yeah, so I think the city's place, government as a convener I think is something very powerful. I think to have a group of, you know, representatives from employers and education are a few pieces of the puzzle, but I think to have our city government at that table and supporting an initiative like this really helps when we're looking to attract new employers to a place. They want to know that, you know, perhaps beyond the current board members or those involved, that this is something the city is really investing in and really looking at a long-term view like the city does. In Delaware, I guess Delaware as a state is about the size of a city, so we picked their state council. But that's something that we've definitely seen at different levels of government getting involved in different associations, so whether that's federal grant money coming in or state or local dollars. And my last question is kind of a chicken or the egg question, right? Because we talk about talent, we talk about jobs. Right now, where do you see that equation? Do we have more talent than available jobs? And that's why, you know, folks coming out of school are going elsewhere, or is it vice versa? Yeah, we have, we're exporting our talent. We bring wonderful, bright people here. We educate them in our local public schools, and whether they go to a local university or elsewhere, they're mostly going elsewhere for those jobs. And so, yeah, I think we have a deficit of jobs right now. Okay. So would you, if you were to kind of focus on one aspect of this mission, would it be attraction of businesses and these types of jobs to Lexington? Yes. Yes, that would be the biggest piece. Whether that's attraction of new businesses, I'd probably start with growing the existing ones here or bringing tech jobs in for those employers who have employees here but not their tech ones. But yeah, I'd focus on that piece first. Great. Thank you so much. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Next we have Council Member Laguerre. Thank you, Chair. Thanks, Nick, for the presentation. It makes me think about a lot of the students that I worked with as a career counselor at UK and so many of them wanted to stay here and build a life and do innovative work and put their skills into practice and also have competitive wages. And I see a strengthening of an effort like this as a way to help them achieve those goals, whether it's immediately after pursuing their education or even five years later and then returning to Lexington and feeling like they can be in a tech-oriented career and not have to work remotely, to have that choice. Yes. So when I look at your next steps, you talk a little bit about what we could do with LFUCG's support. I know that you've looked at some comparison kind of communities and what they've done, And I'm curious about a level of support, and maybe that's not something you can answer on the spot here, but what that could look like in terms of our investment. Yeah, I think when it comes to looking at an investment, a couple of items we've talked about are ag tech and cold stream. And in reviewing some of the budget items for those previously, I think the cold stream master plan was being redone this year as part of the fund balance and looking at some of that initial investment into the ag tech side of things. I think a smaller investment from that could have a very significant impact on what we're looking to do with the tech industry. And I think it also acts as a vote of confidence and a catalyst for us being able to raise more funding and bring some opportunities in. Thank you. I look forward to continuing that conversation. This is really helpful. Councilmember Stavigne, thanks for bringing it forward. I think it's an important conversation for us to return to in the coming months. Thank you, Nick. Councilmember Gray. Thank you, Chair. And thank you for your presentation. I loved many things that you did say. It's regarding the silos. One thing our city does have a lot of, and that is silos. Everyone working separately, doing things where we could actually do better for our city when we work together. And I'm glad that you mentioned the School of Innovation, the school on the Hill. My office, which has been working a lot with Fayette County Public Schools, and I was going to recommend you speak with Dr. Chi. We speak regularly. I figured as such. And I have connected Dr. Chi with Commerce Lexington because, and I'm glad that you're working with him as well, as it's important for our next generation of leaders to have insight into entrepreneurship and as well as connecting what they're doing in our technical schools. And Dr. Chi and I, we've spoken about their focus upcoming on technology and how that would be a great asset for our city as a whole. And going forward, I would like for the city as a whole, us to be, and also our local businesses to be having conversations, open conversations about how we can all shut down, remove those silos, and work together. So going to the page where you say what the best tech-friendly cities have, And I see where we have the X's. Going starting first with we don't have it. Basically, the city in general, we don't know who we are. We don't have a mission. We don't have a value statement. And going forward, how do you envision that we identify ourselves as being a tech friendly, or excuse me, a tick, city identity. How do you say that we go forth doing that? One of the items we have on there are conferences and events. And there's a whole scale of those, a whole range, that comes from regular weekly or monthly meetups, small groups that might meet at a coffee shop or at a public library, all the way up to some more significant conferences that are not only for local people, but bringing people in from far away. I think of the conference that Alltech puts on as something that really puts, you know, Lexington, Central Kentucky on the map when it comes to ag tech. And I think there are opportunities. We've seen Louisville, Cincinnati hosting conferences like these, so it's very possible here in the middle of the country. But that's one of the goals that's pretty high on our list, is to have a significant sized opportunity. We've made lots of investments in the city in terms of hospitality and tourism. I think this is a place lots of people would like to visit. We just need to get the right people here. So that's one example. I agree with you, and I look forward to joining this, working with you on this, because this can make Lexington grow in a positive light by making this a tech-centric city going forward. So thank you for your presentation. I look forward to working with you as ongoing. Thank you, Council Member. Thank you, Council Member. Next is Council Member Lynch. Thank you, Chair. Thank you for your presentation. It was very insightful. It kind of reminded me of a bit of a SWOT analysis. So I was wondering if you all have done, as an association, a full SWOT analysis on this topic. Is there a larger report that we should look at? Not a larger report. beyond some of the takeaways I shared with you here today, but glad to share more of that or to take any input. We've got lots of voices on there, and I think you all have a particular perspective that we'd love to take a look at as well. Is there anything that you'd suggest right now? Well, I ask that because I would love to know, of the tech companies that have left, why they have left. I'd love to know the why. I don't know if you all have been in communication with them, reached out to them, if they've shared any information as to why they made the decision to leave. One example, looking at some of those jobs that we lost between 2010 and 2020, many were from Lexmark, IBM, I think it was ACS or Xerox at the time. Some of that is just change in the industry and needs. We're not printing quite as much paper as we used to. Lexmark has done lots to reinvent and sustain itself. A lot of that shifting more to software document management, and many of those employees were acquisitions in other cities. So the number of jobs left in that particular case. As far as employers totally picking up and leaving, there weren't any that were significant that we identified. But I think that's one of the things about a healthy ecosystem, is there's not just one big company. I think that's something that the Austins and Boulders did well. IBM is not the only tech employer there. And so I think that's one of the things we're looking for, is that diversity of employers that can survive the ups and downs of each industry. Awesome. Thank you for this information. It's very insightful. I look forward to hearing more and working with you all to improve our tech state of the city. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Council Member. And before I turn it over to Council Member Syb, thank you, Council Member Lynch. Before I turn it over to Councilmember Sevigny, I just want to say that I think this kind of ties into the conversation that we had a couple years ago about remote workers and recruiting them here. I think this is more a broader approach in the way we need to be thinking about it. And then I also know that there's federal and state money that's allocated towards digital equity. So I think that's an opportunity to create job advancement here locally for folks in other industries and also develop tech workers that could make higher wages here locally. So I think we're on the right path. So, Council Member Svigny. Yeah, thank you, Chair. And thanks again, Nick, for the presentation. Did a great job. And I just want to, my big takeaway from this is having a tech company at one time is, like, I did struggle to find employees. It wasn't easy. And I do want to build a better tech ecosystem for our city. I never strive to be average. Like, I try to get to be above average all the time. So I think just being above average would be a pretty decent thing for Lexington. And I do think it takes the city to lead a little bit more than we are. We have an organization that's kind of pre-set up, but they're a bunch of volunteers. So I think we just have to consider how we want this to be part of our game moving forward. I like talking about economic development. I have a lot more than expenses. So this is important. And I appreciate you and the folks at Commerce Lexington, Ted Abernathy, who helped with a lot of the data on this. Thanks so much. Thank you, Council Member. Thank you, Nick, for the presentation. And, Council Member, we'll just wait to see what the next phase is. and committee members. We're just going to forego the items referred to committees. We can address that at the next meeting. So I'll entertain a motion to adjourn. So moved. Second. All right, a motion was made to adjourn and seconded. All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Meeting is adjourned. Thank you. So moved. you