# General Government and Planning Committee - September 10, 2024 > Auto-transcribed civic record · September 10, 2024 - **Permalink**: https://meetings.lexingtonky.news/meeting/6213 - **Source video**: https://lfucg.granicus.com/player/clip/6213?view_id=14&redirect=true - **Date**: 2024-09-10 - **Last revised**: September 10, 2024 - **Length**: 15,213 words - **Speakers**: Chair, Clerk > ⚠️ **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 General Government & Planning Committee met on September 10, 2024, at 1:00 PM with P. Worley presiding. The committee addressed five agenda items during the session, including one approval item and four informational presentations. The committee took two votes during the meeting and heard no public comments. The meeting began with the approval of the August 29, 2024 Committee Summary, which was successfully approved by the committee. The remaining four agenda items were informational in nature, covering a diverse range of topics affecting Lexington-Fayette County. Committee members received updates on parental leave policies, rural short-term rental regulations, and two community-focused initiatives. The informational presentations included a parental leave update, a discussion on rural short-term rentals, an assessment of historic preservation efforts for Lexington's African American hamlets, and information about the "Bring Back the Bluegrass" initiative. These presentations provided committee members with important updates on ongoing policy matters and community programs without requiring formal action at this time. ## Attendance The following members were present at the meeting on September 10, 2024: • P. Worley • K. Plomin • D. Wu • J. Brown • C. Ellinger • S. Lynch • H. LeGris • L. Sheehan • W. Baxter • J. Reynolds • Monarrez • Gray • F. Brown • Sevigny No members were reported as absent or late for this meeting. All fourteen members were in attendance. ## Votes and Decisions The committee took two votes during the September 10, 2024 meeting, both passing by voice vote. **Approval of August 29, 2024 Committee Summary** [timestamp: 00:30] - Motion by: Baxter - Second by: Sheehan - Outcome: Passed by voice vote - The committee approved the summary from their previous meeting on August 29, 2024. **Move Proposed Ordinance on Paid Parental Leave to Full Council** [timestamp: 45:00] - Motion by: Baxter - Second by: Not recorded - Outcome: Passed by voice vote - The committee voted to advance the proposed ordinance regarding paid parental leave to the full council for consideration. Both votes were conducted by voice vote rather than roll call, so individual member votes were not recorded. No opposition or abstentions were noted for either motion. ## Contested Items Two significant issues generated substantial debate during the September 10, 2024 meeting, reflecting broader community tensions around policy implementation and land use regulations. ### Parental Leave Policy A heated discussion emerged regarding proposed changes to the existing parental leave policy. The central disagreement focused on whether to introduce greater flexibility in how employees could utilize their parental leave benefits. Specifically, the debate centered on two key provisions: allowing intermittent use of parental leave rather than requiring continuous time off, and extending the overall time frame within which employees could use their allocated leave. The discussion revealed differing perspectives on work-life balance, administrative complexity, and fiscal implications. While the specific participants in the debate were not identified in the available materials, the nature of the discussion was characterized as particularly intense, suggesting strong opinions on multiple sides of the issue. ### Rural Short-Term Rentals Community opposition surfaced regarding regulations governing short-term rentals in rural areas, particularly those located within agricultural zones. The controversy centered on concerns about the potential impact these rental properties might have on the character and function of agricultural communities. The discussion involved detailed examination of existing regulations and consideration of additional restrictions or oversight measures. Community input played a significant role in shaping the debate, with residents expressing concerns about how short-term rental operations might affect agricultural operations, rural infrastructure, and the traditional character of farming communities. The debate highlighted the tension between property rights and community preservation, as well as the challenges of balancing economic opportunities with maintaining the integrity of agricultural zones. The discussion required careful consideration of zoning regulations, community standards, and the practical implications of various regulatory approaches. Both contested items remained unresolved at the conclusion of the meeting, indicating the complexity of the issues and the need for additional deliberation and community input before final decisions could be reached. ## Approval of August 29, 2024 Committee Summary [timestamp: 00:30] The committee reviewed the summary of their August 29, 2024 meeting for approval. P. Worley led the discussion of this agenda item. The committee examined the written summary of the previous meeting's proceedings and discussions. Following their review, the committee voted to approve the August 29, 2024 committee summary as presented. The approval was completed without recorded objections or requests for amendments to the summary document. ## Parental Leave Update [timestamp: 02:00] Council member W. Baxter and Miss George presented updates and potential changes to the municipality's Paid Parental Leave policy during this informational session. The presentation focused on proposed modifications to expand the current parental leave benefits, with particular emphasis on extending coverage to include foster care and adoption situations. This represents a potential broadening of the existing policy beyond traditional birth-related leave. The speakers outlined the framework for these policy adjustments, though specific details about the duration of extended leave, eligibility requirements, or implementation timeline were not detailed in the available information. The discussion appeared to center on ensuring equitable treatment for all forms of family expansion, recognizing that adoptive and foster parents face similar adjustment periods and bonding needs as biological parents. This agenda item was designated as informational, meaning no formal action or voting took place during the meeting. The presentation served to update council members and the public on the ongoing policy review process and potential future changes to employee benefits. The parental leave policy update reflects broader trends in municipal governance toward more inclusive family support policies that recognize diverse pathways to parenthood and family formation. ## Rural Short-Term Rentals [timestamp: 60:00] The committee engaged in discussions regarding recommendations for managing short-term rentals within agricultural zones. The agenda item focused on potential regulatory frameworks to address the growing presence of short-term rental properties in rural areas. Key speakers during this discussion included J. Brown and Miss Sutton, who presented various approaches to regulating these properties. The conversation centered on two primary regulatory mechanisms: the implementation of conditional use permits for short-term rental operations and the establishment of occupancy limits for such properties. The discussion examined how conditional use permits could provide a structured approval process for property owners seeking to operate short-term rentals in agricultural zones. This approach would allow for case-by-case review of proposed rental operations, taking into account factors such as property size, location, and potential impacts on surrounding agricultural activities. Occupancy limits were also considered as a means to control the scale and intensity of short-term rental operations. These limits would help ensure that rental activities remain compatible with the rural character of agricultural zones while preventing overcrowding that could strain local infrastructure or create conflicts with neighboring agricultural uses. The agenda item was designated as informational, indicating that the committee was gathering information and exploring options rather than making final decisions on policy implementation. The discussion provided an opportunity for committee members to examine different regulatory approaches and consider their potential effectiveness in balancing property owner rights with community interests in maintaining the agricultural character of rural zones. No formal action was taken during this discussion, as the item served to inform committee members about available options for addressing short-term rental issues in agricultural areas. ## Assessment and Historic Preservation of Lexington's African American Hamlets [timestamp: 120:00] The committee received a presentation on ongoing efforts to preserve and celebrate the history of African American hamlets throughout Fayette County. Miss Brown served as the key speaker for this agenda item. The presentation provided an update on current initiatives focused on documenting and preserving the historical significance of these communities within Lexington's broader historical narrative. The discussion centered on assessment efforts to identify and catalog important sites, structures, and cultural landmarks associated with these historically significant African American settlements. This agenda item was informational in nature, with Miss Brown delivering updates on the preservation work rather than seeking committee action or approval. The presentation aimed to keep committee members informed about the progress of these important historical preservation efforts within the county. The focus on African American hamlets represents part of broader efforts to ensure comprehensive historical documentation and preservation of all communities that have contributed to Fayette County's development and cultural heritage. These hamlets represent significant aspects of local history that require dedicated attention to preserve their stories and physical remnants for future generations. No specific action items or decisions emerged from this presentation, as it served primarily to update the committee on the current status of assessment and preservation activities related to these historically important communities. ## Bring Back the Bluegrass [timestamp: 150:00] Chris Cooperrider provided an update to the committee on the "Bring Back the Bluegrass" naturalization initiative currently underway in local parks. The presentation focused on ongoing efforts to restore native bluegrass ecosystems and the community involvement supporting these environmental restoration projects. Cooperrider outlined the current status of naturalization efforts across multiple park locations, detailing both the progress made and challenges encountered in reestablishing native plant communities. The presentation highlighted the significant role of volunteer participation in advancing these restoration goals. The discussion included an overview of future plans for expanding the bluegrass restoration program. Cooperrider addressed the committee's questions about the timeline for upcoming phases of the project and the resources needed to sustain the initiative's momentum. The presentation served as an informational update, with no formal action required from the committee. The naturalization efforts represent an ongoing commitment to environmental stewardship and habitat restoration within the community's park system, with volunteer engagement playing a crucial role in the program's implementation and success. --- ## Decisions - **Motion** — passed (0-0): Approval of August 29, 2024 Committee Summary - **Motion** — passed (0-0): Move the proposed ordinance on Paid Parental Leave to full council --- ## Full transcript Music Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. ¶¶ ¶¶ ¶¶ Good afternoon. We'll call the September 10th General Government Planning Committee meeting to order. First item on our agenda is approval of the August 29th committee summary. Chair, would entertain a motion? Second. Motion to second. Is there any discussion? All those in favor, please say aye. Any opposed? Thank you. That motion carries. Next item on our agenda is the update on the parental leave policy. Councilmember Baxter has been the lead on this ma'am Thank You chair colleagues I think it's always important when we pass a new policy to do a periodic review and look for any potential changes or or improvements that we can make to the policy so and working with Miss George we have a few suggestions to bring to you today so take it away thank you thank you Good afternoon, everyone. Good to be back. So to begin, I would like to provide you all with a little background about our paid parental leave policy. As you all know, the council passed this ordinance in November of 2022 and made it retroactive to July 1st of 2022. And some of the benefits of adding paid parental leave is number one, child growth and development. It's very important for parents to be able to bond with their newborn during the first initial weeks of birth. mental health and economic family economic security. Depending on when you have your newborn, you may not have enough leave time to take off and so you're guaranteed to have these four weeks of time and you don't have to use your own vacation, sick, or holiday time. And then finally, retention and recruitment. We have received several comments from new employees saying that having paid parental leave is one of the reasons since that they decided to come and work for the urban county government. In order to be eligible for paid parental leave, you have to be a full time or part time employee who has worked here for the previous 12 months and has worked a total of 1,250 hours. Paid parental leave runs concurrently with FML and in order to apply for paid parental leave you do complete the FML paperwork. And then upon approval to receive the PPL, it has to be taken consecutively within six months of birth, adoption, or placement of a child. And if it's for birth or adoption, you have four weeks, and if it's a foster child, it's two weeks. Here is the breakdown of our utilization of paid parental leave since the ordinance passed. We've received 215 requests. For 2022, we processed 56, 2023, 111, and as of the date we submitted this presentation for 2024, it was 51. We approved 202 of those requests and we denied 13 of those and we've listed the reasons why we did the denials. Also we've provided for you all a breakdown of the utilization across all of the departments and divisions of the government. And so as you can see there, each department and the number of requests that were approved for 22, 23, and 24. And since you have those, I won't stand here and read all those numbers if that's okay. The cost breakdown for, to date for our PPL, we have spent total $2,077,468 for the 215 PPL leave requests that we have granted. And it's broken down, you can see, by general police and fire. Some of the challenges that we've had with PPL. Number one, we have an issue with time code reporting. PPL runs concurrently with FML and so when you're reporting your time you have to put both of those codes into PeopleSoft and sometimes that doesn't happen. And so we do have a training with our payroll coordinators next week to talk about leave codes and how to report PPL, FML and other time reporting codes correctly. Another issue we have is with usage. Because employees have six months to use it, a lot of times they don't give their supervisors enough notification of when they're going to use it. Also around this time what we see is if babies are born over the summer, we see parents delaying the usage of the PPL into the holidays. And so they want to take off and use it in November and December as opposed to when their child is born. And then there have been some unique situations where we've had parents who've adopted their stepchildren and wanted to take PPL. And then we've listed the other things as well. So our recommendations, if we could make some changes to the ordinance, here would be our recommendations. Number one, we would like to offer four weeks of PPL for birth, adoption, and placement. Currently, for birth and adoption, you get four weeks, and for foster placement, you get two. And so we would like to give everyone four weeks across the board. Also, and it doesn't say it up there clearly, but one of the other things we would like to do, and it is in the draft of our ordinance, is for adoption. Right now, you can't use the PPL until the adoption is finalized, and that's after six months. And so we would like to allow adoptive parents to be able to immediately use the PPL as opposed to having to wait the six months. And then finally, to give the HR director, with the approval of the CAO, the ability to make exceptions in unique circumstances. And the reason that we put this in here is we recently had a firefighter who was in a training class, and he had a baby that was born, and he wouldn't be finished with the class before his PPL expired. And so he wasn't able to use the time because the six months was going to expire before he finished the class and there wasn't the ability for us to make an exception to that. And so that's why we would like to put that in the ordinance with you all's approval. And then that's it. So if you all have any questions, I could entertain those at this time. Thank you, Ms. George. Council members, do we have any questions or comments for Ms. George? I see Council Member Sheehan. Thank you, Director. I do appreciate that we have implemented this policy. I'm glad to see it being used. I think there are models even within Kentucky of having extended time beyond four weeks. So I personally would like to see us continue to evaluate that to see if we would be able to offer that for families. Four weeks is not that long when you have a newborn. But I have a question in particular about the intermittent, because right now it has to be continuous time, correct? It is. Could you talk to me a little bit about what the challenges are for allowing intermittent leave for when you're using your paid parental? Yeah, so you have the four weeks, and to do that intermittently over a six-month period can stretch it out for a long period of time, because intermittent would mean you could use an hour at a time. And the idea is that you're supposed to be bonding with your child. And so since that's the idea and the reason for the ordinance, that's why we wanted it to be continuous. us. Okay. I could see some situations where you have two parents that might, you know, kind of interchange for maybe like one person as a week and the other parent does a week. So I would like to revisit that and maybe have a conversation with you outside of this meeting to kind of explore that a little bit because I could see some situations where that would be helpful for families. But I'll stop there. Thank you. Thank you. Vice Mayor Wu. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Ms. George. Question about our policies as they may be compared to either other city governments or even state government. Where are we in terms of best practice may not be the right word, but how do we compare to other comparable institutions? So I do have a chart. And so So the city of Louisville did a whole comprehensive study about PPL and they do have the highest number of weeks and that is 12. The state of Kentucky has not passed their legislation allowing PPL. The University of Louisville has six weeks, the University of Kentucky has two weeks, and then Northern Kentucky has six. Okay, and you said so currently state employees don't have PPL at all? No, they do not. Okay. I think I'm always looking to provide as much leave as we can, especially compared to other comparable institutions. So I wouldn't mind exploring the idea of going over four as well. Okay. So thank you, thank you, Chair. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Councilmember Sevigny. Thank you, Chair, for recognizing me. Thanks for the presentation and I'm glad that we offer something like this. My remarks are probably similar to Councilmember Sheehan's. Like I do see and I've just experienced a child and a grandchild experience where they kind of tag teamed their parental leave. And even someone took off time without pay. And then my son, like, kicked in. So I just think this, I do think the six-month thing might be a little bit of a challenge. And then I also think it's maybe a week or two at a time. Like, I think there could be a minimum, like, at a time, not like a day or an hour. But I could see it being broken up to, like, the first week of birth is, you know, a big stress. and then kind of breaking up some some weeks um but it's i do agree that the bonding time is important but i also think um i also think attracting good talent is important and i know people do make decisions on younger people where they want to work based on how they feel like they will be treated and supported in this with having kids so thank you very much that's all i have thanks chair council member lynch thank you chair my question is regarding the six months of consecutive use of the ppl is i know you said that's because of wanting the need for the binding of the parent and the child is there any administrative benefits on the other side i'm just trying to get why why six months of consecutive use? It's four weeks of consecutive use and you have six months- Six months, okay. To use it. Okay. Do you know why we did six months? I think it's one of the . Is that why we do the six months? No, so it wasn't just . So I'm not 100% sure of the second part about why it's six months, but we'll see if we can find that answer for you and I can send an email to the council. Okay, I was just wondering if that was decided because administratively it's easier to track on the staff side or? No, it can't be that because in all actuality we would like for it to be utilized in a shorter amount of time. So I know that wasn't it, but I'll see if I can find that answer and then I can send an email to you all about that. Okay, thank you. Thank you, Chair. Council Member Brown. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Director, for your presentation and everybody's work on this policy. In regards to the flexibility of the HR Director, is it just flexibility in the approval period, or is it flexibility in the consecutive use and the term that it needs to be used in? Do you have, for some reason, if somebody needed two weeks immediately and some circumstance came up and they can't do the other two weeks consecutively and they could stretch it out maybe two months, are you asking for flexibility to be able to approve that type of use? Yes, because if we were asking for flexibility to extend, make an exception to extend the deadline, There could also be a situation where we would need flexibility to break up the consecutive use. But that would also, it's not just my decision, I'd have to get approval from the CAO to do that. But it would allow us to make exceptions to the ordinance, yes. Okay. Well, I'm comfortable with that. I know you can't plan for every situation that may come up. And if you have the flexibility to work with the CAO to grant approval, then I see where there's some value in that. So, thanks. Thank you, Chair. Thank you. Council Member Baxter. Thank you, Chair, and thank you again for your presentation. I think the biggest thing that Director George and I went back and forth on is whether or not we wanted to include something in the amended ordinance regarding the length of time, the usage, and whether or not we felt like someone should be required to take leave immediately or if we would allow them to postpone to a future date. So I kind of wanted to feel you guys out and see what you were thinking on that because I do see the benefit and the intent behind the ordinance to begin with was the bonding of the child and, you know, the parent at birth, not months down the line. So does anyone really have any feelings on that one way or another? Councilmember Reynolds. I think the question is what type of benefit are we providing the employees? Are we providing them with four weeks off because they had a child, whether they adopted a child or had a child biologically? And if so, then I kind of feel like they should be able to use it in the way that they choose. we might i'm okay with you know putting a limit on that saying six months or however many months but if they choose to use it two months later they choose to use it the first month the child is with them if they choose to use it three months later whatever our parameters are and our limit i think they should be allowed to do that there's a lot of different circumstances And I know that parents often tag team, and they might tag team two weeks and then two weeks or two weeks instead of four weeks at a time. And so I think as long as it's the same benefit for everyone, that they should be able to use it how they choose. Council Member James Brown. Thank you Chair and thank you Councilmember Reynolds for kind of your clarification or the way you think about it, it kind of gave me some insight. I can see where it can be challenging if it was hard for us to plan in regards to staffing for folks taking these leaves further out and how that could be a challenge. I would think the default would be to have the leave at the time of the event. And leaving you the flexibility and the CAO the flexibility to look at different circumstances and make a decision based off of what is presented to you. But yeah, but I do see where it could turn into some staffing challenges. Well, I can tell you in my conversations with Council Member Baxter, one of the things that we recommended was that it be used within the first 90 days as opposed to you having six months. Just cutting that time in half would be our recommendation. Yeah, I'd have to think about it a little more, but that's my initial thought, so thank you. Thank you, Chair. Council Member Ellinger. Thank you, Chair. Mine had to kind of go with staffing challenges too. It looks like over 80% of it's coming from public safety. And have we had any issues with that on staffing when we already are short staffed at times? Well, they fixed that with the backfill for the overtime. And so that's how they're able to make those accommodations for that. I understand, but it's still, I guess if we look at, if we're trying to extend the time from four weeks or going forward, I think we need to talk to public safety. I don't see anybody from public safety here, though. Is the commissioner here? No. I didn't see. No. I mean, those numbers are going to, if we have it at four weeks and you just think if we increased it to eight weeks, that number could double. So instead of $2 million, we'd be at $4 million. Knowing that our public safety where the costs are higher is where we have our higher utilization. And I understand that there is some appetite for wanting to increase that, but if we do that, the public safety numbers will really go up. Yeah, I was kind of amazed. I think it was 82% was from public safety. Okay, thank you. Thank you, Chair. Council Member Gray. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Director George, for your presentation. And thank you, Council Member Baxter, for bringing this up today. In reference to what you, Council Member Baxter, had just mentioned, I thought I would give my input as well. I believe that we don't know what's going on in other people's families. People have certain situations that we are unaware of, and I don't want to put a cuff or basically put a straitjacket on people and how they can make their decisions best for their families, However, which meaning I'm open for them to be able to pay their leave within, I was going to say a year. But maybe someone who's childless has no idea. Hello. So that was my only issue. I want to make sure that we have enough employees here to do the job and run our city. However, I do want to encourage us to embrace our families as they are. And as they are. So, yes, ma'am. Thank you, sir. Thank you. And, Council Member Baxter and Vice Mayor Wu, before I come back to you, if you'd let me ask just a quick question. Because I think, Council Member Baxter, you probably have taken action item the next time you speak. But, Ms. George, thanks for this. I think while generally I support a lot of flexibility in this, in the discussion of when within the six months and how long to take the time, obviously there's a little bit of a factor from the employer's standpoint of being able to plan for that. And so are you seeing or are you hearing from the department's particular difficulties as we talk through this discussion? And I think this is something, obviously, since there's not necessarily a proposal ahead of us, that we might revisit another day too. But I'd just like to know, before this discussion, what's coming to your desk of what those issues might be? Only situations where notification is kind of last minute, like hey, starting Monday, I want to use my four weeks of PPL and it's the week before. and then those situations where you have several people wanting to take off and use their ppl during the holidays are the issues that we see the most so i think i think those are two obviously you've got staffing issues if everybody takes off at the same time and then um uh and i should rephrase that my wife would get me not taking off taking their their due leave but then again the the notice to the employer and to the division to be able to staff that on my only other question you know in the in the private sector you don't see a lot of parental leave being offered to fathers but when you do you see a hesitancy to take that leave because of stigma or whatever. What experience are we having here at the government sector with that? We don't have that problem. Okay. That's good. Everybody uses it. All right, thank you. Those are my questions. Vice Mayor Wu. Thank you, Chair. And I appreciate your question, Chair, on that, and I'm happy to hear that we don't have that issue because I think that's something that a lot of us do think about. Do you all require a certain amount of notice for PPL? We do not. Once you receive your approval that you are entitled to the 160 hours, then it's up to you to notify your supervisor when you want to use it. And that is a good thought to provide in the policy that you have to schedule it so many weeks. in advance. I think that might be a possible solution because I think in these kind of situations in a very rare instances would you be surprised by you know like I think you can plan fairly ahead in terms of when your child's coming or for I'm getting a head shake over there but yeah so that might be a possible thought as well. The one thing I was thinking about in terms of the flexibility of how you can break that four weeks within the six months. Is I understand that we do have provisions for exceptions and people can kind of make their case to you all and you can look at particular exceptions and then perhaps make those exceptions. I think there are probably situations where parents and employees don't feel like they can make a request out. Like they're looking at the policy and they're saying, man, I wish I could do it this way. But the policy says this, and I probably don't feel comfortable making that kind of request. So to me, if we can build in that kind of flexibility in the allowance of the policy itself, then we kind of can mitigate that. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Thank you. Council Member Baxter. Thank you, Chair. Colleagues, I think this is what I'm going to do. I think I'm going to make a motion to move the presented ordinance out of committee, and then in the interim, Director George and I will work together to potentially bring an amendment when we report it out. So with that being said, I will move to report out the amended ordinance as presented to the full council. Thank you. We have a motion to second. Is there any discussion on the motion? Council Member Ellinger. Thank you, Chair. I guess when the interim, when you're looking at, could you look at, I think, what's been raised about given a time frame, maybe two weeks or something notice just so they can kind of schedule for the people. The two items that I'm considering are advance notice and the length of time to utilize. Thank you. Comment on that. Council Member Reynolds. Just about the advance notice, I kind of think that's a little impossible. My kid came almost a month early. And so when we say we have to give two weeks and then my child comes at a different time than I planned and then it's not the two weeks I thought it would be, but I need the two weeks off. I don't know how you handle that. But I just know kids come at all times and when you adopt it's the same way. So I'm just concerned about that. Thank you. Thank you. I think my comment would be there. To me, the issue would be more if someone is delaying the leave than providing some advance notice, I think, would be worth looking into. My son also is six weeks early, and obviously that was way much notice we could give on that. But I think if someone intends to delay their leave, then it may be beneficial to try to blend some form of reasonable notice in there. Any other comments or questions on the motion? Hearing none, all those in favor, please say aye. Any opposed? That motion carries. Thank you, Ms. George. Thank you. The next item on our agenda is a continued review and update on regulations regarding short-term rentals outside of the urban services boundary in our rural parts of our community. Council Member James Brown, would you like to lead us in? Thank you, Chair. Yeah, I do. And what you have in the packet is a summary of the recommendations that were shared when this was originally brought to us from the Rural Land Management Board and Ms. Sutton is going to go through those with us. And then we also included the original language that came to us in regards to the ordinance. So I think the intent was to try to move this forward to the Planning Commission so we can have a public hearing, get some input from committee members. Today, I'm hesitating because my thoughts on that have changed somewhat just because Councilmember Plowman's not here today. And I think her being the representative of the 12th district, which is what we're talking about, I think it's important to have her voice as part of the conversation. So I think we talk about it today after the presentation and then make a decision. But I'm inclined not to move it forward just so we can have the council member's voice to this policy. member of she and you got anything to add all right we're ready chair thank you and i appreciate that uh also and we'll see the committee's preference when we get because there is an action item in the in the packet but i agree uh councilmember plowman uh representing the majority of that area but also being the vice chair of this committee um would prefer if she had an opportunity to weigh in on the on the subject matter uh miss sutton please Please. Good afternoon, everyone. I'm just going to recap the presentation that Director Overman gave to this committee back in May. So these are going to be the recommendations from the Rural Land Management Board for short term rentals in the agriculture zone. So again, just a quick recap of the background. Councilmember Brown and Councilmember Sheehan had asked the Rural Land Management Board to review the issue and bring recommendations to the council. A lot of folks worked on this, and then again, you guys saw this originally in May. So the recommendations, the areas for which the RLMB has made recommendations include the Agricultural Rural Zone, the Ag Natural Zone, and the Ag Buffer Zone. And you can see the map here. So the first recommendation from the Rural Land Management Board was that all short-term rentals in the Ag Zone should be required to obtain a conditional use permit from the BOA. The BOA should also require that the short-term rental units in the RSA provide a certification that the property's septic tank can handle the intended use for this short-term rental. And then the BOA should also require that there are adequate fire safety measures in place as well. And so the second recommendation is that the BOA should consider the number of short-term rentals within a one-mile radius of the property, and then no more than one STR should be within that one-mile radius. The third recommendation is that adjacent property owners should be notified for the conditional use permit application. The fourth recommendation is only hosted short-term rentals should be permitted in the agricultural zones, and that is specifically due to the challenges of farming and other agricultural operations. The fifth recommendation is that only one STR should be allowed on each property and no newly constructed short-term rentals would be allowed either. recommendation number six is that a property owner with an existing farm employee dwelling unit may apply to the BOA for a conditional use permit to convert no more than one of those units per property for short-term rental the seventh recommendation is that the maximum occupancy should be limited to two individuals per bedroom due to the dependence on septic tanks and there being no city provided residential water. The eighth recommendation is that the short-term rentals in the RSA should be required to have on-site parking as well as lit entrances that can be visible from the roadway, and that is due to various safety reasons. recommendation number nine is that any special events would need to only include the participants that are staying in the short-term rental and then recommendation number 10 is only 14 property owners they have registered their existing short-term rental by the january 11th deadline all other short-term rentals that have come after that for the ag zones would be subject to the new requirements that the RLMB has recommended. So next steps as Councilmember Brown mentioned that Council would initiate this ZODA and then if approved it would move on to the Planning Commission for them to then do their work and then upon approval from the Planning Commission it would come to Council for a final review and adoption. And then I will pass questions over to Director Overman. Council members, do we have any questions for either Ms. Sutton or I believe she's trying to punt to Ms. Overman? Yes, we have Margaret Graves here who chaired the committee and Tracy Jones as well who was the attorney for the committee. So depending on your questions, one of us will answer and be happy to do so. Thank you. Right, none of the committee members are jumping in. Council Member Savigny. Thank you for recognizing me. And I was on the Rural Land Management Board and I appreciate the work that was done and I've witnessed quite a bit of it. I just had a quick question and it's probably more to law on the 14 that are, what's the status of the ones that are actually that we say are approved because I didn't think we actually had a methodology for them to apply to get approved because their zone wasn't included. But I may be wrong. I'm not sure I understand your question. Are you asking about ones that are approved? Because they were grandfathered in, but they really weren't included, I thought, in the grandfather clause of the original ordinance. It's my understanding, but I may be incorrect on this. This may be more of a question that evolved out of the original adoption on the short term rental ordinance, and there were some that they were aware of. And so I think if they provided information, then they were identified and included. But I may not be 100% correct on that. But I think there was a limited number of those that they knew were in existence. And so when all the other ones became grandfathered in, those were considered and dealt with in the same way, is my best understanding of how that occurred. But I think it was actually done through the process that was identifying originally the short-term rentals that were existing. Okay, yeah, and I probably will want to dig into that just a wee bit more just to, offline, just to kind of figure that out because I don't know that we could make a recommendation for them to be grandfathered in if they weren't actually legally grandfathered in. Does that make sense? Yeah, it does, and I think we can get more information on that as moving forward. Thank you. That's all, Chair. Just to follow up on that question while you're there, so I guess in the first ordinance, those that were in operation but maybe not be in operation according to those regulations that we passed, then we formally grandfather. But in a general sense, if there's someone operating now and then we pass some sort of regulation that would either otherwise restrict them or prohibit them, though they would be a legal non-conforming use, correct? Because they were in effect before the passage of the ordinance. I think that's the way that they have been treated through planning and through revenue when they give their information. But again, we probably need to provide more specifics to you on how many of those there were and exactly how they were evaluated. And potentially taking into account like we did with the inside the boundary, maybe just going ahead and formalizing a policy on that. Right. I think that, and Tracy can probably answer more specifically how planning looked at it than I'm doing right now. Thank you. Ms. Wade, if you could clarify. Yes. So in the ordinance that was adopted last summer, there is a section that addresses zones where we did not adopt regulations at that time. And so it indicates that in a zone, sorry, any short-term rental operating in a principal dwelling prior to July 11th that is located in a zone that would hereafter prohibit short-term rentals, so we prohibited them in all of the ag zones, they are allowed to continue operation as a non-conforming use pursuant to Article 4 of the zoning ordinance. and they shall continue to operate in accordance with the definition of a dwelling unit. So they can continue to rent the short-term rental if they had been and posting it on Airbnb as long as they're renting it for a week at a time. They cannot do this shorter than a week. So we evidently had 14 that met that particular kind of very narrow definition, But I know we have a much larger number that are interested in pursuing. Thank you. Councilman Savigny, did you have anything else? Councilmember Lagritte. Thank you, Chair. I have just a couple of clarifying questions about definitions. I've gotten some inquiries from residents about hosted versus unhosted and kind of that decision-making process. But first, I want to clarify just how hosted is defined in this case. So my understanding from reading section 111 definitions on page 31 of the actual ordinance is that if there were, say for example, two houses or two dwelling units, separate units on one property, and one had already been constructed, for example, in the past for farm employees, that if someone who were the host were to be living in a separate dwelling and then that farm employee dwelling were rented out as a short-term rental, that would count as hosted. Is that accurate? I just want to understand. I think that is accurate for what's in this proposal, And I think I can explain the thinking on that is obviously there's a lot of recommendations for hosted in this ag zone. And part of that was because of the difference in what takes place on a lot of those properties in terms of livestock cropping and other things. And so if there's someone who is living there, even if it's in a different unit, I think that's why it's defined that way. so that there would still be someone on the property who could provide assistance, be clear on where boundaries are, be clear on where you might be safe or not safe with certain livestock and that kind of thing. And so it's defined that way to allow for that because that also occurs in the Ag Zone probably more than in the Urban Zone. Okay. So if, for example, someone only had one housing structure on their property, then for example, it to be posted or hosted otherwise they would need to be living in that house while the people were visiting for their short-term rental i think that's accurate yes or they would you know if they don't have any other avenue to be on site then they would be there which is somewhat similar to bed and breakfast to be honest but is a little different so but there was that were that would be what that means. Okay. And then if someone owned a property in an agricultural zone and say they built an additional house on that property, would they be allowed to do that if they weren't planning to use it as a short-term rental or not? Like I don't. Like would they be allowed to build an additional residence and then use it as a short-term rental? Or not. Or say someone builds an ADU or they build a housing unit above their garage that already exists on the property, and then they have another house. And while they own the property, that's how it's used. They have guest quarters or something like that. They're not using it as a short-term rental. Then say they went to go and like sell their property and it had two different dwelling units on it Would the new property owner be allowed to use one of those dwelling units as a short-term rental or Or would it this you know when we're thinking about construction would it have to be prior to this adoption date? Does that make sense? Well Whether or not you can build an additional what type of residence in the Ag Zone is a little bit different depending on the size of your property and depending on what you're building. There's a whole other provision for tenant houses or what we used to call, now they're called farm dwelling units. But it's going to depend on the size first and then second, what's already there. But I think if you look at that section on page 31, it's talking about what's hosted. It does allow for an ADU. And so I don't know. It's hard to say because I don't know exactly what might occur or what might be allowed under other zoning ordinances in terms of structures that will be on the property. But I don't think you're going to be able to just build other residences and then turn around and use them for ADUs. or I mean for short-term rentals on these types of properties. Okay. Yeah, that's slightly different from what I was asking, but thank you for that information. That's fine, Chair. Thank you. Council Member Baxter. Thank you, Chair. Tracy, my question is kind of a follow-up to Council Member Legrees. So I guess my big hang-up is this number five recommendation about that no newly constructed short-term rentals could be permitted. And am I understanding you correctly that it depends on the size of the property on whether or not, or that limits the amount of farm-employed dwelling units that the property can hold? That's correct. Okay, so I guess I have issue with passing ordinances that we can't enforce, one, but that there's workarounds. So I could see real quick that somebody would be like, I'm just building a farm employed dwelling unit that I'm allowed to make and then flip around and apply. So I don't know. Is that right? I'm correct in saying that there's only, they're limited. A farm owner is limited. to the amount of employed dwelling units on the property one that's my first question well there i think what this this recommendation was getting at is that on each property there's going to be one short-term rental and so you know going forward you might have i don't know Depending on the size of your farm, if it allows it under other zoning ordinances, you might have eight tenant houses, but that doesn't mean you're going to have eight short-term rentals on your property. And you're not going to necessarily be able to build additional short-term rentals for that purpose. You may be able to build an additional tenant house, but there's affidavits and things that are required with that in order to get the permits to construct those that would prohibit you from doing this. So it was in an effort to preclude a situation where someone has the land and they just build a number of residences and have a little encampment of short-term rentals on their property. And where another property that's smaller would not be able to do that either. So this just kind of limits it to the one per property. Perfect. And then I have a question regarding the recommendations themselves, like the voting that took place. Can you tell me if items, item four, which is only hosted short term rentals and item five, only one per property, can you tell me if those were unanimous decisions? I don't recall, but Mr. Graves or Ms. Over might be able to. One? There's one objection? Wasn't there? They were adopted as a whole and there may have been one dissenting vote. So you're saying all the recommendations were voted on one time? All the recommendations were voted on as a whole group, like as a one through however many of them there were. And if I'm correct, and I'd like to go back and look, but I think there might have been at most one objection. Okay, do you recall if either of those two items were discussed more than any other? They were definitely the question as to whether or not we should require that all STRs be hosted or unhosted or allow for unhosted was discussed at length. And then the other recommendation that you- One per property? Yes, that was also discussed at length. And the concern was that we really wanted to keep the primary use agriculture and introduce or open the floodgates essentially to a whole number of SDRs on any given property. So that was the thinking behind that recommendation. Thank you. That's very helpful. Thank you, Chair. Council Member Ellinger. Thank you, Chair. I want to kind of follow up on four and five also in that when you look at requiring it to be hosted and it's an agricultural zone and it says in here the reason was that for agricultural operations, But not every property in there is going to be a horse farm or going to be agriculture. I know a constituent that's contacted me that lives on Berea Road, and Berea Road has houses in the subdivision on it, and that's in the role they've had as septic, but it's right by the horse park. So I'm trying to understand how that one fits into this. I think the challenge is that the AR zone includes a number of different types of properties. So you have large farms, you have small farms, then you have places like Berea Road that are still zoned AR. But it's more of a somewhat of a residential area. The concern was is that by introducing STRs in areas that are predominantly AR and predominantly agriculture, we wanted to limit the number of STRs in that area. So the AR zone applies to a very broad range of types of properties, and we didn't have the ability to distinguish between within the AR zone different types of properties. And I guess that's kind of where I think we need to try to give some of the people that have one like Brea Road, I think we're being too overbearing on that one and have some kind of exceptions that we could fall into that because that would be perfect if you're at the horse park and you literally can walk from that, but you can only have one within a whole mile around, and if they're not hosted, they can't do it either. I think our concern was that the exception could destroy the overall area. And so we decided to, I mean, there was a lot of debate. There were people in the rural area who thought that there should be no SDRs at all. Then there were people on the committee who thought that there should be unlimited SDRs in the rural area or more than what we recommended. And so we sort of struck the middle ground. And I think trying to come up with an exception, our concern was, is the exception going to destroy the intent of the rural area? And I guess that would be where we give the Board of Adjustment that opportunity to look at it and make it. Right. And often it really depends on what is around it. You know, is there an active agricultural farm next to a one-acre parcel that wants to have an SDR? and what is the risk to the occupant of that STR in terms of their trespassing on the adjacent farm, or what is the risk from a fire safety perspective. So we were trying to come up with recommendations that made sense using a broad brush without the ability to narrow in on specific properties. Right. Okay. And thank you. And in committee means, we don't take public comment, But I think when we do send it to the Planning Commission, there will be an opportunity there to have public comment to try to work on maybe some exceptions or how we can have the Board of Adjustment look at this. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Council Member. And just some general comments based on the questions that have been asked and my own thoughts as well. I do think obviously we need to be very specific about whatever our grandfathering language is to be fair to those good operators that are out there and have spent the time and money and have paid their business license and all that, just like we did inside the boundary. I think also Councilman Rellinger raises a good point that I think the Chair makes clear how difficult it would have been for the Rural Land Management Board to come up with all of these regulations. that's why we'll need the planning commission because they were trying to paint with a broad brush but i think even if it is an ar zone but has primary uses that are more residential or commercial in nature should potentially see different regulations and different opportunities because those properties are inherently different and and then also the the issue about hosted versus non-hosted you know generally i think some of that in protecting your own property is a business decision and protecting your neighbor's property could be a board of adjustment consideration given the neighboring properties i think she makes a great point if there's an active horse farm next to a next to a property that's different than several vacant properties around one another at a given time so i think those are all things that i don't think we have to necessarily answer here but have time to take back up if we don't move this item today but i think we do want the record to reflect that we'd like the planning commission to at least consider and make some recommendation on those issues. Council Member James Brown. Thank you, Chair, and I appreciate all the sentiment and points that you just made. I just wanted to clarify the way that the information is presented in the packet today is it looks like an amendment to the current policy. What we suggested and recommended to law just to keep them separate is to create a new section that actually refers to this policy in the zone. So it may be some duplicate language speaking in generality about short-term rentals, but be more specific about short-term rentals in our rural zone. So it would be pretty much, I think what you would be presented with the next time is a subsection that conveys all these points made, but it won't be an amendment to the policy as it exists now since we actually have that policy going back to the Planning Commission. It makes it less confusing. It's confusing enough, but it makes it less confusing to be altering existing language. And I guess, Chair, if there's no will to move it today and to wait and keep it on the agenda and wait until Councilmember Plowman gets back, then I think that may be the steps that we take unless somebody feels so inclined to make a motion. My preference would be to follow the will of the sponsor of the item unless the committee sees entirely differently and I'm not seeing anybody looking. Council Member Allenger. Thank you, Chair. The ones that are in the rural area that are grandfathered in, Tracy, one of the Tracys? Probably Tracy Wade. Tracy Wade may be able to better answer whatever your question is going to be. At this point, are those already, since they have a business license, they're already out and are STRs presently, right? Can you repeat the question? The ones that went ahead and filed that are in the rural service area, I think it was 11 or 14 of those, they're already active and they are going forward, right, as grandfathered in? Yes, they followed the same grandfathering timeline, so from July to January. They have been active prior to July and have continued this year. I didn't think this would have any impact on that. No. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Thank you. And then if seeing no other items or action from the committee, we'll move forward. Again, I think we'll have many opportunities to say this again, but to thank the folks at the Rural Land Management Board for their hard work on this. I think it's getting us moving in the right direction. And Council Member Brown and Sheehan for all your work on it, and of course our planning staff. The next item on the agenda is an assessment and historic preservation of Lexington's African American hamlets. And Ms. Sutton, this is Council Member Plowman's item, but she's obviously not available and I assume she still wanted us to move forward with the presentation today. Thank you. Please proceed. Well, good afternoon. Here representing a sense of place, I currently chair the committee as the equity and implementation officer. So a sense of place, remembering and celebrating the history of Fayette County's rural black hamlets. So just a brief introduction. Today we're just going to do an overall update on how we've been collecting information and defining this initiative. and the progress that we're making on the project itself. So we're exploring the history of Lexington Bay County, exploring the historical context and geographic locations of the historic black hamlets. A lot of really good information can be found on almost all of the hamlets, actually all of the hamlets in the 2006 Rural Settlement Study. We're talking about the rural hamlets and investigating the establishment and development of the historic rural black hamlet communities in the Fayette County region and their significance and impact. So we're discussing the cultural, social, and economic importance of these rural black hamlets, honoring the heritage and culture by creating a dedicated space in the community to highlight their significance. And so here are our steering committee members. We'll be adding Council Member Brown to this committee moving forward as we make transitions at the beginning of the year. So currently, Council Member Plowman is our Council Representative, Ms. Yvonne Giles, Dr. Seals, Mandy Higgins, who's the Executive Director of the Lexington History Museum, um Reverend Leticia Leticia Priestley who represents Gentown Dina Tatum who represents Fort Springs Alvin Calvin Graves who represents Maddox Town and his is also a local historian Reverend Leon Slatter who represents Caden Town and Joanna Green who also represents Caden Town who has a farm there and she's here today so timeline of key events um when we talk about the hamlets, a lot of us think that they were started after emancipation. We have two in our Fayette County rural area that were started prior to emancipation, and that would be Fort Springs and Coaltown. Those are the oldest hamlets in Fayette County and Athens, excuse me. And then in 1865, the emancipation of enslaved African Americans in Kentucky following the Civil War. Then you have the late 1880s through the late 1930s, where one of our anchor hamlets, which would be Cadentown, was developed. And then in 2022, this committee was established when Councilmember Plowman added this item to committee. So the history of Lexington's Black Hamlets, each hamlet was anchored by schools, cemeteries, churches, and economies. So they had grocery stores or lodge halls or other farming, agricultural farming businesses. So according to the rural settlement study, some of the spaces that still have these structures on them are the most vulnerable spaces in our county, vulnerable historic spaces in our county. So we have the opportunity to really highlight and celebrate the heritage and the contribution and significance of the African American community in Lexington, Kentucky with 705 Canaan Lane that the city owns. So some of the economic activities that occurred there were agricultural, there were farming, livestock raising, crop production, primary economic activities that supported the rural black hamlets, providing food, income, and sustenance, education and religious institutions. So just about every hamlet had a school and a church. Sometimes the school doubled as the church. Sometimes there were more than one church. And they alternated Sundays if they would go to the Methodist church or to the Baptist church. And these are some of the histories and how the community cooperated with each other that's very fascinating and should be highlighted. Domestic services. Many of the residents found employment as domestic workers. They were cooks, maids, caretakers, and in surrounding white households and farms. Skilled trades. And so we know historically about some of the history, like with Manowar, who Mr. Harbit trained, but was also a resident of Maddox Town. And so that connection to skilled trades work in crafts and trades and blacksmithing and carpentry and masonry and textile production were essential to economic activities within the hamlets. And then there was small-scale commerce. So local stores, we talk about, if you've heard some of the oral history, if you've come out to the Juneteenth celebration, you hear about the Jot'em Down store, which is still there on Russell K. Road. So local stores, shops, markets provided goods and services to the Hamlet residents, fostering a vibrant community-based economy. So this is just a quote. The rural black hamlets of Lexington and Fayette County were vibrant communities that fostered a deep sense of belonging, resilience, and cultural identity amidst the challenges of systemic racism and economic marginalization. We have a really prime opportunity with the Cadentown property. This is a picture of the Cadentown Rosenwald School, which is the only still-standing, as-seen, Rosenwald School in Fayette County. It is listed on the list of endangered historic places. This school was constructed over 100 years ago when Fayette County's black residents couldn't attend white schools because of segregation. And it operated as a school until 1943. One of the members on our committee went to the school and taught at the school, Dr. Alvin Seals. This wooden one-story building is tucked away in what was once a rural neighborhood off Otah's Road and sits behind the former Cadentown Baptist Church. It's easy to drive by it if you've gone past there, but it holds a really deep historical significance. There's also a cemetery that's back there behind the school that we've determined in our work on this committee that there's over 170 individuals interred there. So this property at 705 Caden Lane will become a dedicated cultural heritage hub that houses the history and legacy of all the hamlets in Fayette County. So some of our updates, there are several components to complete the first phases of this initiative to dedicate a permanent space in Caden Town to house the history of the heritage of Lexington and Fayette County's rural black hamlets because not all the hamlets are now in the county or in rural areas so cadentown jones town and um there's one more that's not in bracktown that's not in um rural areas anymore so um but the the others are so these are the components of the project so the school there are necessary repairs to the wooden siding envelope windows paint and hbac the church needs ADA accessible pathway from the school to the church and ADA accessible bathrooms for public use. The cemetery needs to be cleaned up and sites identified. And then there's the exhibit design, the cultural heritage exhibit design with artifacts, oral histories, photos, etc. from Hamlet communities. To date, Councilmember Plowman started out this initiative with the goal of raising $500,000. To date, we have raised $539,808. We recently participated in Lexington Black Philanthropy Week. So those numbers aren't included in there, in this number, but will be added. $257,657 are unrestricted funds which can be used toward the capital, the construction and repair and things like that. $106,000 is for an endowment that will go toward ongoing programming of the space once the exhibit has been designed. And then there's $175,000 in special projects. That's for the cemetery and the historic marker program that we'll talk about shortly. These are some of our named sponsors who have contributed over, I believe, over $5,000. So Columbia Gas, Nysaurus, 250 Legs, Mount Brilliant Family Farm Foundation, Visit Legs, and the Kentucky Thera Bread Association. These are all those who are named sponsors. We have held 12 public community engagement meetings. These include meetings with Hamlets, as well as our Juneteenth events, as well as our all-Hamlet meetings. At these meetings, we collect oral history, we share project updates, we get input from members of the community. This does not include the biweekly searing committee meetings that we hold to make sure that the community is top of mind and is leading this with us. So last year during fund balance discussions, after fund balance discussions, we received $100,000 to do a historic marker program with every hamlet. There are sites that have been already identified in the 2006 rule settlement study, so that work is really pretty much already done for us. But there are some things where because the history of the hamlets just isn't noted or celebrated, we haven't had the traction and movement until recently. And so Kentucky Historic Society at the state level is retiring or slowing down their process for the Historic Marker Program. So LFUCG, we are developing our own historic marker program in which this program will abide by that and see to that every hamlet has a historic marker identifying their significance. And so it will cover the design and production of the historic marker, installation costs, and site preparation and labor, educational material related to the historic markers, promotional costs directly associated with the markers unveiling. And so we'll support the community in that way. So moving forward, we're continuing to develop a comprehensive community engagement approach. We're going to continue to provide robust community engagement to gather input from resident stakeholders and preservation experts on the unique needs and priorities of these historic black hamlets. Historic resource inventory and assessment. And so we're conducting a comprehensive inventory and assessment of historic black hamlet resources, landmarks within the hamlets, including building structures and cultural landscapes for future opportunities to educate and preserve the history of the hamlets. We're doing targeted preservation and rehabilitation efforts, which we just talked about at the 705 Caden Lane property, where we'll implement targeted rehabilitation initiatives to stabilize and restore key historic structures in Caden town, while ensuring accessibility of these communities for current and future use. And then capacity building and historic tourism, investing in capacity building initiatives and economic development strategies to empower residents, support their long-term vibrancy and self-determination of these historic black hamlets. So that's it for me. Any questions? Thank you, Ms. Brown. Council Member James Brown. Thank you, Chair, and thank you, Ms. Brown, for the presentation and your work on this, as well as Council Member Plowman and everybody that's involved. I know I see some folks from our Parks Department that are heavily involved. And then some project managers from General Services back there, as well as folks from CAO's office. And then Ms. Green, and I know it's been several community partners, so it's a lot of people dealing with this work. It sounds like you're well underway in regards to recognizing the Hamlet, getting community input and engagement on the project, and working to preserve the building and some of the existing history. What more can we do as policy makers to help in regards to preservation of the hamlets, the lack of infrastructure in the hamlets? I know since they're outside of the urban service boundary, then they don't qualify, so to speak, for some of the services and infrastructure that we provide to the rest of the city. And I remember last year during Lexington's growth conversation, and there was some conversation about protecting the hamlets. And I'm all for protecting the hamlets, but a lot of times when you protect something, try to protect something but you don't put the resources there to help the folks that live there then you're are you really protecting them or are you holding them back so what more can we do and what other conversations do we need to have about so i don't know if this has been explored since 2006 when the rule settlement study was done but there was a recommendation in the rule settlement study to explore the idea of creating a new protection for historic small communities. So a new designation, so to speak? That was a, yeah, a new designation. So I know PDR may not, I mean, those were some of the conversations that were happening in that or ideas that were lifted up in the rural settlement study in 2006. But a lot, yeah. So who conducted the rule settlement study? Was it planning? Was it offshoot of rural land management? Does anybody know? It was, I believe it was rural land management. You think it was rural land management? Yeah. I know we still have Miss Beth, do you have any context or any information about the rule settlement study? And if not, if not, I think that's fine. I think we can dig into it deeper. I think we just need to know what direction to go. Mm-hm. Councilman Brown, I don't think the Rural Land Management Board conducted that study, but certainly the rural settlements were noted in the original Rural Land Management Plan, and there were some recommendations. Probably that study was done by planning or contracted out. But there were, it was, they were discussed in the original 1999 Rural Land Management Plan. So you think the rule settlement study is a component of the rural land management plan? I think they were identified in the rural land management plan, but the study of the rural settlements that studied them in detail, I think was probably done by planning. Okay, okay. But I'm not certain about that. I'll send it to you. I can send it out to the council. Okay, and I think what that leads me to think is that we just need to figure out who has the capability of doing that study and maybe having it updated, if not done from scratch, because I think some recommendations came out of that about how to address some of the issues that folks that live in these settlements are experiencing. So, like I just said, I just appreciate all the work that you've done and are doing, and I'm looking forward to joining the committee. But I think we ought to be thinking as policy makers that allocate resources in this community to do more to see what we can do to allocate resources and policies to help these. Yes, ma'am. UK did the study. UK did the study. Okay. So it sounds like a partnership opportunity. All right, thank you. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Councilmember. Any other comments or questions from the committee? I would just add that I think this is great work that I'm really proud we're a part of as a city and that you're doing. I'm a history major. I think any way that we can preserve our history is fantastic. And also, Cadentown, the Rosenwald School, is in the 7th District, so I'm very proud of that. And it's evident that this work is already bearing a lot of fruit. anyone that came to the Juneteenth celebration at Cadentown Missionary Baptist Church. We saw already some of the oral histories that have been added to this work, and a lot of folks that came that either grew up or their family members grew up in the hamlets, and so it's a really, really important history. So thank you all for what you're doing. The next item on the agenda is bring back the bluegrass. Council Member Gray. thank you chair and chair just so you know you're we gave that to you from the sixth district cadentown you're welcome we lost it our loss is your gain um so um next up we will be talking about the naturalization plan which was implemented prior to me being here however um i Sixth District does not receive a lot of calls from our residents, but one thing, if we do receive a call, it will be complaints about the naturalization plan. And so I sent some questions, and I'm hoping they will be addressed. But the floor is yours, Director Conrad. Great. Thank you, Council Member Gray. Chair, thank you for having us today. We appreciate the opportunity to update. Deputy Director Chris Cooperrider will actually be providing the bulk of the update. Chris and his team, including Jeff and Justin, along with supervisors within each park, have really been integral over the past several years of defining in this initiative. They take time to talk to many citizens, adjust areas as needed, and really educate the public. But we know the change, taking a turf moan park and changing those into naturalized areas takes time, takes patience, and it takes education. To give you a little bit of background, the 2018 Parks Master Plan is really what informed our decision to look at a naturalization process. We knew that the top places to improve were walking trails and nature parks. Chris will share a little bit more of how we've added more trails by adding naturalized areas within parks. But we haven't lost sight of how important nature parks are, with Kelly's Landing and the Floyd property along Paris coming on board as nature parks in the future. But we also heard the need for nature programming to be more accessible for everyone. Not everyone can make it to Raven Run. They can't make it to High Soul. They can't necessarily make it to McConnell Springs. So we wanted to bring that nature programming into neighborhood parks. And so creating Bring Back the Bluegrass and naturalized areas within parks allowed us programming opportunities to get kids' nature programming out into individual neighborhoods. So that gives you a little bit of the background. And now I'm going to turn it over to Chris, who's going to walk us through the plan. Thank you, Monica, and thank you, Council Members, for allowing us to bring you this update today. So the naturalization plan is known as Bring Back the Bluegrass, as mentioned, and it was started from the 2018 Parks Master Plan. I know that's been said already. And the plan is a statistically valid survey using web, mail, and telephone. So it wasn't just an isolated group that was solicited for input. It was a broad-based plan survey. And it's interesting to note that walking trails were the number one in natural areas, or number one in natural areas, or number two in terms of importance and need above other parks and assets, such as indoor pools, which we hear a lot of conversations on dog parks and playgrounds. So as we hear about these other important park amenities, you know, naturalization was a part of the 2018 master plan. Respondents were asked for their top four choices that were important to their household. The graph up above shows the response to it, and the dark blue is the number one choice. Overall, you can see that natural areas was number three in priorities, where walking trails were number one. As part of Bring Back the Bluegrass, we've added 4.6 miles of additional walking and hiking trails. As mentioned, Bring Back the Bluegrass Natural Relations Plan did start from the 2018 Master Plan and included representation from the Division of Environmental Services, Division of Parks and Recreation, Administration, and Council. So this plan had a good broad-based background in starting. areas considered for naturalization considered existing features, such as creeks, topography, passive recreation use that was brought out in the master plan. And we also considered other areas that were brought out in the master plan, such as flat field space. Kids like to have pick up play. Consideration of other naturalization efforts was included in this Bring Back the Bluegrass, as the mayor's monarch pledge and also the 2006 epa consent decree the wedding plan was began public engagement march 1st 2020 and we know pretty much what happened about seven days later covet became the major topic so the opportunity to get out and engage the public was limited but we We were able to do that with social distancing and the use of technology. It's interesting to note that coming out of COVID, naturalization has become a significant volunteer effort within parks and continues to grow. It's important to note these volunteer hours do not include High School, Raven Run, or McConnell Springs. They're all within your local parks, community parks, and neighborhood parks. Coming out of COVID in 2021, there are 687 documented volunteer hours. In 2023, 4,586 documented volunteer hours, representing a growth of over 460%. Naturalization has proven to become a community need. We started out with, actually, 28 parks are included in Bring Back to Bluegrass program. and there's currently just over 80 acres within the plan. And the naturalization program was implemented through efficiency savings, thus not requesting any additional funding. We didn't come to council asking for additional funding. We did this through efficiencies. We know that not all sites look like the photo you see above, but that is the goal that we're shooting for. So hopefully we answered one of your questions. As mentioned, Bring Back the Bluegrass Natural Asian Program is supporting existing efforts. The short prairie savannah habitat that we started with, we've added more colorful flowers to help support the Mayor's Monarch Pledge, which has been an ongoing pledge of the Mayor since 2016. We've also partnered with the Division of Environmental Services and volunteer groups on riparian areas, that support efforts associated with the 2006 EPA consent decree. Our team, and we recognize this, and I hear, just as many of you up at the horseshoe, people at Cohen tend to call in with complaints. But our team out in the field, we hear positive comments, much more positive comments than negative comments out in the field. And they're using the previous underutilized areas such as walking on the grassmown trails. Parks has also partnered, as I mentioned already, with Environmental Service to include reforest the bluegrass in habitats designated as forest. One of the areas is over at Bella Woods off the end of that park. Bring back the bluegrass in partnership with other divisions, friends groups, and park neighbors have certainly brought diversity to the park landscape. In 20, I just want to touch on some improvements. In 2023 and 2024, we've planted native trees in multiple parks. You can see up there, you know, a variety of them, Marlboro, Dogwood, Waverly. In addition, we've planted new wildflower beds in multiple parks. You can see the parks, Marlboro, Castlewood. I won't read the whole list, but they're up there. And also, I'd like to please note that all but the one previous photo from Higby Mill are indeed from this year. so they are from this year except for Higbee Mill. So we continue to make adjustments and priorities on implementing naturalization efforts. Here's some more pictures of improvements of this past year and these are photos from this past year you can see Dixie, Marlboro, Kirk Levington, Liberty and what really drives our limited resources is council support and neighborhood interest. It helps elevate the priority of using what we have to continue creating improvements. Moving forward, what we're looking at, as Director Conrad mentioned, is increasing our programming, Nature in Your Neighborhood, for educational efforts. That's a part that we recognize. And this past year, we've had 15 nature programs in five different parks. We continue want to continue successful partnerships such as the Friends of Waverly Park, Friends of Dogwood Park, and also the Friends of Jacobson Park. All three of those Friends groups have become huge help in our efforts of naturalization and just general park maintenance. We'll continue implementation of wildflower and tree plantings and we'll seek to increase partnership opportunities in other parks. We do anticipate continued efficiency improvements that we're going to capture and use in this naturalization effort. So with that, questions? Thank you, Mr. Cooperrider, Director. Any questions, comments? Council Member Lynch. Thank you, Chair, and thank you, Mr. Cooperrider, for your presentation. And I just want to add that as you're doing educational stuff in my district for Highlands Park and Whitney Young Park, please, I would love to help out because I still get calls every now and then about, they're not cutting the grass in my park, and it's a naturalized space. So I think that means we need to do some more education. So however I can help with the two naturalized parks spaces in my district, please let me know because I'm happy to help. I appreciate that. Absolutely. Council Member Baxter. Thank you, Chair. I don't have any questions. I just have some comments. I just wanted to say thank you to you and your team. All the concerns that my constituents have had have been answered with education and or adaptation in the parks that we've had some concerns with. So I just wanted to say thank you for always being responsive and educational. Happy to help. Thank you. Council Member James Brown. Thank you, Chair. And I just want to share the same sentiment. And I remember when the program first rolled out right in the height of the pandemic and we pulled back on mowing and got it started and it wasn't very pretty to get started and folks thought we were just selling them short. But once we got out and explained to them what we were doing and I appreciate you and the other folks from parks for coming out to neighborhood meetings, getting on Zooms and actually being in the park and showing folks what it was that we were trying to do. And making adjustments when it didn't work. We made some changes in Douglas Park just for safety reasons and you all were amenable to that. So I think as long as we keep working at it, keep trying, keep communicating, keep educating neighbors, I think this program has the potential to be successful. So thanks for all your work and effort with this. Thank you, Council Member Brown. Council Member Reynolds. Thank you, Chair, and thank you, Mr. Cooperrider, for the presentation. understand the intention behind this project and I think in some cases it has turned out really well especially adding the trails. I am going to say what my perspective has been with the constituents that I've worked with over the past almost six years and some of the parks not even in my district that I've heard feedback from has been really, I guess, one of concern. For one, feeling like a lot of their space in several of the parks has disappeared and is full of tall grass now instead of grass that can be used to play soccer or play catch or do a number of other things. So that's one of the things that I've received a lot of feedback about. And then the other is just the safety issue in several of the parks that some of the plants are really tall and people are hiding in the plants. I actually, I did report this once, but have been at a park that has this area and saw it myself during some softball games. And so, and there were multiple parks where that was the case. So I guess as we move forward, I would just like to ask that we take those concerns seriously and see if there is a way that we can make sure that, you know, plants aren't getting so high in certain areas that people are hiding, even camping out. There was one park where people were camping. People reported to me that they were afraid to go to a park because they felt like people were hiding in the grass and that they couldn't see clearly. I know we did a walk in one of the parks where some of those concerns were. So I just hope that we can maybe adapt where needed if we have to cut back in some places and make sure that we're looking out for safety and providing sufficient space for people to use the parks fully. We agree and thank you. Yes, we have tailored the plan to address field spaces that kids play in. So we've done that, obviously we don't know everything about every spot, but we've done that. And so far, we've been successful in it. The thing that I draw on is really from a council task force from years ago, I happened to be on about safety in parks, which your previous predecessor was on. And it had to do with making parks safe, and it's really about increasing activities within parks. And what we found to be very good, and it falls in line with our master plan, is by adding grass-wound trails. We did that at Kirk Levington not too long ago. We prepared to do it here shortly at another park off the top of my head, I don't remember. But we continue to do that along with the beautification efforts that bring out color and let people recognize that there's an intentionality here. And I really appreciate that. In terms of the one park with softball, the park was packed with people, and there were still people camping. in the naturalized area. So if we could just take a look at that overall, maybe take a step back and say what else could we be doing to make these areas safer for everyone, I'd really appreciate that. Absolutely. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Ellinger. Thank you. Thank you for the presentation. I think one thing that's been brought up here is just education and communication. What do we do about signage to let people know that this is a naturalized area media and let them know that we're doing this intentionally. So we did initially put out signage at each location that came a little bit later. Again, we're dealing with COVID during that era, but each site there is signage. We could obviously update that and make it more colorful because we have some real life examples now. When we started it, we didn't have those examples. And also, we have done some educational efforts through social media as well. pushing out whether it's Facebook messages, on our webpage, et cetera. And I think one of the big things will really help is when we do this nature in your neighborhood program, that's the piece that's really going to help because that gets more in depth. And as we increase that program, I think it will help answer your question or address that concern. I agree. I think signage does help just to let people know that this is intentionally being done that we're just not not mowing because we are lazy but we're actually trying to this is what we're trying to do and and it's going to be better for this the community and this is what they're asking for so i think if we could do that put some time and also get i guess have a number we don't have to put your number on there but somebody's if they have any uh questions that they could contact i got monica on speed dial okay sounds good thank you council member civigny Thank you, Chair, for recognizing me, and thank you for your hard work. I'll tag on a few things. Whenever my neighborhoods that these are in have had an issue, you guys have been, with a very nice and polite email, you have responded to people that were maybe not as polite, and I really do appreciate what you're doing there. I do think, because I didn't really know about some of the Friends of Parks things, I wouldn't mind doing some of that in Beaumont and Garden Springs Park. and I do think that perhaps if there was more signage that might even be QR code based that you could say report an issue or slash you know what's this like because people are like well people that know weeds are like well this is we know this is a non-desirable thistle you know And, you know, yeah, you got us on that, you know. But I do think some educational experiences using a cell phone and to be able to report something like, hey, I noticed this in this area would probably be positive. So thank you. Thanks for the hard work on this. And as someone who's managed a naturalized area myself, I know it's kind of you have neighbors that always are like, complain and love, complain and love. And you just, you got to deal with them all. Thank you so much. Thank you. Councilmember Gray. Thank you, Chair. And, Chris, thank you for your presentation. and thank you to your entire team because earlier this year there were a lot of questions regarding liberty park and we were able to have you all worked with me and we set up a public meeting for the district and it was a very successful meeting for the people that did come they can't say we did not show up we were there and so I say thank you to you to everyone because I know that you will when I call it's interesting so thank you so out of these parks so three out of my six parks are naturalized. Particularly with Kenilwood Park, which happens to be in my neighborhood, Brookwood, we have parents who are refusing to allow their children to go to that park because of the plan. And we do have in-house individuals who are residing in those areas. When I do see them, I do call and make sure we get someone to alert it to that we have people living in our parks. So that is an issue that has been what people hiding out there. When people are running from the police, they know to go to Kennewood Park and get in the ditch where all those what they call weeds are there, not what we call them, though. So when we put together this plan, and I heard there was a survey, did we go through the surveys by geo uh by where they are um do we have um listing of the zip codes that were or or the people resided that actually did the survey i know there's well yeah yeah so we would from from the parks master plan we certainly have all of that data and we can you can find that online on our website and that will take you to all of that background data I don't know that it would say specifically this person responded as nature parks as their top three on this question, but certainly all the data is there. But we did not define the spaces based on that zip code response, if that makes that a little more clear. So it was more so about areas that were not flat green space, because we know flat field green space is the number one of young kids. It may not be walking trails or nature parks, but flat green space for people to play soccer or lacrosse or football or whatever. So we were very intentional to try to avoid that in every instance. So basically using more natural areas where you have slopes for detention or areas that you're just not going to be able to play on made sense to select those as more of an investment in naturalized area. Okay, thank you. Yeah. Nice. And so with the different parks that we have, particularly, let's think about the sixth district, since we have three of our six parks that are naturalized. Were any groups that, because I know in the Kenwood Park, We do have a group that comes in for the plants that we have that are gorgeous. But what groups were part of that helped with these? Because there were certain groups that were helping. And I'm just making sure that we had groups from the area. Or were we having groups coming from outside of the area coming in? Or who's I? I just want to make sure it's an idea for that neighborhood. Yes. So I'm not sure. I'm not certain that we can, and Chris jump in if I'm incorrect, but identify groups that were involved in the 28 initially. And that's grown from when we started back in 2020. But we certainly had conversations with many of our partners and friends groups. You know, I think what we're finding now is we're finding this explosion of people wanting to be, and you see that from the volunteer numbers, people that want to be involved in parks. We just launched the Adopt-a-Park program. So I think that there's more opportunity for us to engage neighbors, engage organizations, engage neighborhood partners in getting more invested in those parks and in those naturalized areas. But at the time, let's take, for instance, Liberty or Kennewood. I know that the Rotary Group wasn't in Kennewood at that time. That came after, which was great. But Liberty, I don't know that we had a real organized group that was even in Liberty yet when we kind of started it initially. Well, my time is up. I'll come back. Okay. Thank you, Council Member. Council Member Ellinger. Thank you, Chair. Actually, I was going to just put a plug in for Adopt-A-Park. I think we have seven right now. And for people who want to get more vested and use that park, I think this is a great opportunity to do that. So I'm sure you've sent that out to all the council members, all the districts, but I think that it's something that we can really build on and try to get Adopt-A-Park in all of our parks, or at least most of them. So I think it's a good opportunity here to get our constituents involved in something that they really love. Thank you. Council Member Gray. Thank you, Chair. And speaking of adoptive park, congratulations to Bryan Station High School for adopting Constitution Park. So, hey, I'd love to see that. Next question was, so I didn't ask a question regarding the pictures, which you did speak on. because my areas they don't look like that I just want to make sure but you said they were from this year except for Higby mill so we do and we know it just takes time for some of those to develop but yes and in some instances we found that the soil quality quite honestly is just not what it needs to be to have a naturalized area so in some of those instances we'll have to go back and do something else. So there's a number of factors that can influence whether or not it's successful. But the first one is giving it time to determine if it will basically, you know, grow in that area depending on what that soil condition is. And my last question is, by the way, I promised a resident I stopped by her house this morning before coming to the government center. She wants you to know she cannot sit in her backyard because of the bugs that she lives behind dixie elementary school she cannot go into her backyard because of the bugs and her family laughs laughs about it they make fun because so i just want she wanted me to make you aware um so last question is um so how can residents petition to have a different plan for their park i think we remain open um as we have throughout this process of meeting with neighbors meeting with them on site i i know i took a call last week um from a park along armstrong mill and so immediately our team dispatched went to look at this went to look at the site determined that there needed to be additional cutback we had a similar issue in bellawood or kirk levington where we've had to to go in and do even more cutting. So we just encourage, please let your residents know they can contact me personally. I am happy to assist them in organizing our team and being responsive. It's important that we're responsive and that we're constantly looking at opportunities to improve it. And if that means changes need to be made, then that's what we'll do. Thank you. Thank you so much, Director and Chris. I appreciate you all for always saying yes. Just about. Almost. Not always, but a lot. Thank you. The next item on our agenda are items referred to the committee. Does any member of the committee have any work we need to do with that? Any changes, corrections, removals? Seeing none, we're at the end of our agenda. We'll stand adjourned. I'm sorry, Council. Second. This motion is second. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Thank you. We're at the end of our agenda. We'll stand adjourned. Thank you.