# Social Services and Public Safety Committee - August 26, 2025 > Auto-transcribed civic record · Committee · August 26, 2025 - **Permalink**: https://meetings.lexingtonky.news/meeting/6527 - **Source video**: https://lfucg.granicus.com/player/clip/6527?view_id=14&redirect=true - **Date**: 2025-08-26 - **Body**: Committee - **Last revised**: February 14, 2026 - **Length**: 13,170 words - **Speakers**: Chair > ⚠️ **Auto-generated content.** Audio from the official Granicus video was auto-transcribed by OpenAI Whisper-1, with speaker labels folded in from Granicus closed-captioning. Structured facts were extracted with GPT-4o; the narrative summary was written by Anthropic Claude Sonnet. Speaker labels and verbatim wording may contain errors. See [methodology](https://meetings.lexingtonky.news/about/methodology) or [report a correction](mailto:editor@lexingtonky.news). --- ## Meeting Overview The Social Services and Public Safety (SSPS) Committee met on August 26, 2025, at 1:00 P.M., with J. Reynolds presiding. The meeting covered four agenda items spanning administrative, informational, and legislative matters. Two items were approved — the July 3, 2025 Committee Summary and proposed amendments to Section 4 regarding the keeping of certain animals — while two items were presented as informational briefings: a comprehensive review of code enforcement and a strategic growth plan for the Lexington Fire Department. Across the meeting, three motions and votes were recorded, two informational presentations were given, and no public comments were heard. ## Attendance The following 10 members were present at the Committee meeting on 2025-08-26: - J. Reynolds - W. Baxter - D. Wu - C. Ellinger - T. Morton - S. Lynch - J. Hale - A. Beasley - H. Boone - Lisa Higgins Hoard No members were recorded as absent or late. ## Votes and Decisions Three votes were taken during the August 26, 2025 Committee meeting. - **Approval of the July 3, 2025 Committee Summary** [timestamp: 0:03:34]: Moved by W. Baxter and seconded by Denise Gray, the motion to approve the July 3, 2025 Committee Summary passed by voice vote. - **Approval of proposed amendments to Section 4 of the Code of Ordinances regarding the keeping of certain animals** [timestamp: 1:21:33]: Moved by A. Beasley, the motion to approve the proposed amendments passed by voice vote with one nay recorded. No second was noted in the record. - **Motion to report out the amendments to Section 4 of the Code of Ordinances at today's work session** [timestamp: 1:22:39]: Also moved by A. Beasley, this motion to advance the Section 4 amendments to the day's work session passed by roll call vote. No second was noted in the record. Individual roll call votes were not recorded in the available data. ## Contested Items - **Amendments to Section 4: Keeping of Certain Animals** — This item generated debate among committee members, centering on a proposal to limit the number of roosters permitted and to increase associated penalties. Concerns were raised during discussion regarding the practicality of enforcement and the effectiveness of communication surrounding the proposed changes. The item was decided by a split vote, indicating that committee members were not in full agreement on the merits or implementation of the amendments. Specific vote tallies, the names of members on each side, and the final outcome of the vote were not recorded in the available data. ## Approval of July 3, 2025 Committee Summary [timestamp: 03:34] The committee took up the approval of the summary from its July 3, 2025 meeting. J. Reynolds was the key speaker during this agenda item. No significant concerns or debate were recorded in connection with the summary's content. The committee approved the July 3, 2025 meeting summary. ## Comprehensive Review of Code Enforcement [timestamp: 04:10] Councilmember S. Lynch presented an update on the comprehensive review of code enforcement during this agenda item. The presentation covered several topics related to the city's code enforcement practices and policies. Key areas addressed in the presentation included: - **Condemnations** — processes and considerations related to condemning properties under the city's code enforcement framework - **Administrative hearings** — the role and function of administrative hearings within the enforcement process - **Naturalized spaces** — enforcement considerations as they relate to naturalized landscaping or vegetation on properties - **Equitable enforcement** — examination of how code enforcement is applied across communities, with a focus on fairness and consistency The item was informational in nature, and no vote or formal action was taken as a result of the presentation. The discussion served to update the committee on the ongoing comprehensive review of how code enforcement operates and is administered. *Note: The available data for this agenda item is limited to a high-level summary. For full details of the presentation, specific concerns raised, and the complete discussion, viewers are encouraged to consult the meeting video beginning at timestamp 04:10.* ## Strategic Growth Plan for Lexington Fire Department [timestamp: 27:42] Chief Jason Wells presented the strategic growth plan for the Lexington Fire Department, with the presentation focusing on future station locations and resource allocation based on risk assessments. J. Hale and T. Morton were also among the key speakers during this agenda item. The presentation was informational in nature, providing the committee with an overview of the department's planning framework for future growth. The plan addressed how station placement and resource distribution would be guided by risk assessment data, indicating a data-driven approach to expanding the department's capacity and coverage. No further details regarding specific station sites, budget figures, staffing projections, or particular risk findings are available from the provided materials. The item was received as informational, with no vote or formal action taken by the committee. ## Amendments to Section 4: Keeping of Certain Animals [timestamp: 55:24] Councilmember A. Beasley presented proposed amendments to Section 4 of the Code of Ordinances addressing the keeping of certain animals in non-agricultural zones. The amendments focused on two primary changes: establishing limits on the number of roosters permitted in non-agricultural zones and increasing penalties for violations of the ordinance. The item was approved by the Committee. --- ## Decisions - **Motion** — passed (0-0): Approval of the July 3, 2025 Committee Summary - **Motion** — passed (0-1): Approval of proposed amendments to Section 4 of the Code of Ordinances regarding the keeping of certain animals - **Motion** — passed (0-0): Motion to report out the amendments to Section 4 of the Code of Ordinances at today's work session --- ## Full transcript so so so so so so so do so so good afternoon everybody and welcome i will now call to order the august 26 2025 meeting of the social services and public safety committee thank you for being here i especially want to welcome our new council member lisa higgins hoard to your first official meeting you are being baptized today with lots of meetings and we're glad you're here the first item on our agenda is the approval of the july 3rd 2025 committee summary are there any additions or corrections motion approved second uh any anything anyone wants to talk about if not all those in favor please say aye all those opposed that motion passes thank you next we have a comprehensive review of code enforcement our first presentation today is an update on the comprehensive review of code enforcement that council member lynch worked on with former councilwoman gray and since uh council member lynch is the sponsor of this item i will be passing it over to her for the intro intro and also uh she is going to do today's presentation thank you council member thank you chair um thank you colleagues for um being here today to listen to my presentation i want to start out with some thank yous of my own thank you to my cao lashawn barber elka kunder who was my 2024 summer intern she did a lot of research for the work that you're going to hear about today kendra thompson our council research analyst commissioner lanter code enforcement director lee steel code enforcement supervisor michael hauserman code enforcement administrative officer koyuki king code enforcement foreclosure specialist steve gehafer the entire code enforcement team and family law department acting commissioner barbery and all of the lexington neighbors that gave us time and input into this work from starting since 2023 so um let's get into it yay i have the clicker today i got all the power so councilwoman gray and i place this item in committee based on the recommendations of the housing and gentrification subcommittee of the mayor's commission on racial inequity and so i was uh i was honored and privileged to be the co-chair of that subcommittee in 2020 so i was glad to join her with the work to actually put some of those recommendations into practice so that's what we're going to talk about today so this is where we our work stemmed from on this slide you'll see a timeline of our work to date the work of the division of code enforcement is vast and varied and so the since so are the city ordinances that apply to our division of code enforcement so councilwoman gray and i decided to divide up the topics she took took on four and i took on four which is why our presentations were split because there was no way we could talk about all eight items in one committee meeting so she presented on four in the spring and then i'm doing these four now and we chose these topics based on feedback received from our town halls a community survey that you all know that we did in 2023 and 2024 and of course the housing and justification subcommittee report so linked in your presentation today is councilwoman gray's presentation with the director lisa that she had in the spring and at the end of this slide is just a reminder of what actions council took as a result of her committee items this slide just tells you we took where we did the town hall locations we tried to hit as much as the city as possible we were very grateful to all of our lexington neighbors that came out and gave us lots and lots of good feedback about their experience with our division of code enforcement i also want to especially thank our my colleagues who did come out to some of our town halls appreciate your presence there as well and so the based on what we heard from our neighbors and based on the survey the four topics that i took on were condemnations code enforcement administrative hearings and our administrative hearing board naturalized spaces and geographic equity and enforcement so let's go ahead and dive in so lots of concerns centered around the landlord tenant context of condemnations was there fair treatment to all parties based on our by our division of code enforcement and our and their staff so under direction under the director lee steel's leadership he has implemented several meaningful measures already that the division has become and they've become more proactive than reactive as the division has been in the past with a new mission of customer service and being solution-based the division is now doing the following taking preventive steps by working more intentionally with property owners when it comes to condemnation issues our division of code enforcement are conducting tenant education outreach even going door-to-door hanging door hangers to get knowledge and put knowledge in the hands of tenants when there may be issues trying to get out in front of a potential condemnation they've hired bilingual staff which has been great i know council councilwoman reynolds has has worked with directly with code enforcement in her district with the bilingual staff to get more education and knowledge to our tenants there and residents the director still has implemented flexible staffing schedules to allow our team to work on evenings and weekends so they can make intentional outreach to our neighbors about condemnation issues and property maintenance issues and then they're even researching a mold remediation certification for staff so they're trying to director still has been intentional about putting in some preventive measuring steps just not even not only just to build a better stronger relationship with our neighbors and division of code enforcement but to really do some preventative work there condemnation notice has helped to bring all the parties to the table so condemnations are not necessarily 100 percent negative it's kind of a mechanism to get all parties the landowner the tenant at the table to see if a solutions can be found and if it is deemed that the property is condemned that triggers our city services such as the community resident services which helps with relocation as well as our community as well as our housing advocate that can help that tenant find new housing should they need to should the housing be condemned so based on my research ride-alongs and speaking with staff i did not have any recommendations for changes to our condemnation process thus far next the next topic is our administrative hearing board so code enforcement has a its own hearing board that hears the appeals so when someone receives a citation due to a violation they can appeal that citation so they go before the hearing board this hearing board is comprised of five individuals but currently we only have one on the hearing board there are five seats we currently have one in today in our today's work session packet we have a second person that were to approve for the administrative hearing board which is not good it's been a struggle over the years to fill those seats on the hearing board so i wanted to do some research around this to see if we can get a better stronger pipeline of folks to serve on the administrative hearing board normally amongst the five members when it's fully when the board is full the hearing board members act as the hearing officers and they are the ones that adjudicate the appeals hearings and so they staff those on a rotational basis the board is supposed to meet annually but they do not and have not in some time and so the requirements to be on the administrative hearing board is either you have to be licensed to practice law in kentucky or complete a course in mediation training and as a historically lawyers have been the only ones to serve as hearing board members and hearing officers and so i think that's great they bring a knowledge and skill set however i think that because we've only limited to those that people in those professions that we've kind of gotten to where we are now with not being able to find folks to sit to be in those positions and so i would like to and i've talked to directors still about this opening up and being more intentional about letting folks know that they can be a hearing officer and be on the hearing board and i think that in looking at what other cities do they've opened up the the door to people that are engineers urban planners architects university faculty university students i think that if we open that window of who can be a hearing board and hearing officer and communicate that better i think we'll get a more diverse applicant pool to staff those five positions so i would love to i'm going to work with director steel and his team to encourage advertisement and trade publications contacting professional organizations to try to have a more diverse applicant pool and a more diverse hearing board for our for our appeals hearings once we are able to fill those five seats i'm confident that we'll be able to do that i would like to have a pool so some cities have a pool of hearing officers a pool being 20 or 30 folks they can call from the bench to come and enter the rotation to staff those appeals hearings which happen quite frequently and so once we get the five seats filled my goal is to start to recruit folks to have a pool of folks that we can pull from and that will probably involve an ordinance change to do that but i would like to have a bench for this hearing board because they're seeing and hearing important cases every month that they meet and so we want to make sure that it's not just saying few folks are cycling through every month but that we have a nice rotation and so that these are and these are community volunteers volunteering their time so we don't want to overwork them and so my goal is once we have the five seats filled is to start to build a pool of applicants that we can draw from for the hearing board and then with their annual meeting i would like to see that happen again because every board needs to meet that is our expectation as a city as a city is that all of our boards meet at least once and so i my i foresee that one meeting that we do a training media mediation training and i think that's something fiscally that we could pay for through the division of code enforcement to get folks that mediation training if they haven't gotten that get them have training on code enforcement procedures how to run a successful appeals hearing and things like that so that would be my goal once we have our bench is to continue to implement training so that the hearing board and hearing officer so confident in doing their job another issue that we heard a lot in the town halls is that the administrative hearings are very intimidating for people to come before the hearing officer and staff during those appeals hearings and so director steel as soon as he took office he jumped on a lot of things and he jumped on this very quickly and i'm very appreciative of that and so he implemented changes to make these appeals hearings less intimidating and so he down he decreased the amount of staff in those appeals hearings so it's just essential staff in that room and i've attended appeals hearings before the change and since he's implemented the changes and it's a much more comfortable atmosphere for our neighbors that go before the appeals hearing in my opinion another issue another thing that i would like to see us implement to again make this process more user-friendly is to you do some use some technology so many other cities have an online case management portal so if you want to file an appeal because the citation that you receive you can submit your appeal online via the portal you can track your case via your appeal via the portal you can submit documentation and evidence for your appeal via the online portal and so i would like to see us adopt some technology to make this to streamline the appeals hearing process and make it a little easier and so i've talked to director still about this and they're looking to see the technology they have right now they can use or something that we can maybe purchase in the future and future future budget years to kind of streamline the appeals hearing process next let me check my time okay three minutes perfect um the next issue i took on was naturalized spaces and i did not realize and so i took it on there was such a huge controversial issue and so um and speaking with director steel and his team about this um i was i was hesitant um to recommend any ordinance changes because the code enforcement staff they need more technical knowledge and expertise regarding naturalized spaces regarding plants what's an invasive species what's not and so i didn't want to make any ordinance recommendations because there needs to be some technical training with our staff in order to for them to be confident to do the work of investigating invasive species investigating naturalized spaces i think there could be a cross-training opportunity between our environmental services team and our division of code enforcement in the future but i'm not making any recommendations regarding naturalized spaces at this time and then last the last topic is topic is equitable enforcement and this work is ongoing so we got a lot of complaints at our town halls about feeling that certain council districts were targeted for enforcement versus others and so i've been working with the division of code enforcement they've been sending me data and i've been analyzing data and they're still working on getting me data so i will report out on this topic more fully probably next year so i'll be i want to keep this item in committee chair so that i can report out on this and then in a year report out on the other things how things are going but um this um because i'm still collecting data and analyzing data for this topic um i would like to um this is what you'll this is a preview of what you'll see um in 2026 when i come back for this topic alone um i think that is about it and i'm happy to take any questions oh look at me two minutes left i did it thank you very much council member that was very informative colleagues does anybody have any questions if so uh please log in okay i don't see any oh there's one council member martin yes i don't have any questions i just like to give flowers where flowers are due so to director steel um his timely response and solution focused leadership continues to set the standard for excellence in our city's services each day he demonstrates a steady commitment to addressing challenges head-on finding practical solutions and supporting both his team and the community his leadership is exactly what the kind of leadership we need in our city services focused responsive and dedicated to delivering results for our residents i mean every time i contact mr steel it's always solution focused it's always very responsive very timely and i mean if i if i had to give a shout out if i had to pick um a city uh a staff member from the city um to give flowers to director steel will be that first person if i if i set up some program he is great and it's been great to my office so thank you thank you i don't see anyone else signed in oh there's council member ellinger thank you chair and thank you uh councilwoman uh lynch for for all your hard work on this uh going forward it looks like some of them had no recommendations will what what will we see coming forward out of um your uh analysis here well it could be a few things um the reason why i want to keep this item in committee is to have a follow-up report in a year on some of the items that um that are just best practices that um the division of code enforcement are working to implement so i'd like to follow up in a year and come back to you all with that that may come with some um recommendations for ordinance changes and then the equitable enforcement issue depending on what comes out of that there can that can be some changes as well but i didn't have anything substantive today because um they're doing the work and they're doing a great job and they've been and they're continuing to um upgrade and elevate their their work and so um it's been great working with them and i look forward to um implementing some of the recommendations well thank you for working with them and thank you all for listening and making some changes so look forward to getting uh the annual update here next year so thank you my pleasure thank you i do want to chime in and say how much i appreciate uh director steel and what he's done uh for the division of code enforcement i feel that you are extremely responsive and care a lot about um doing the best job possible and i appreciate you responding to these concerns uh council member lynch when we talked about um you talked about the condemnation parts and you said that you felt like code was already responding to concerns did you feel like they implemented some things after hearing the concerns in in your public forums or they were already working on those ahead of time i think both and director steel since he's become the director of the division he came in the door with ideas and things he wanted and changes he wanted to implement um to make the relationship between the division of code enforcement and our neighbors better and so regarding condemnations i think that um is definitely something that they've been intentional about um because it's not easy because it can cause displacement to a tenant um and they it's pretty prevalent in the landlord tenant space um they don't have a lot of condemnations every year but um oftentimes it's in the landlord tenant space and so i think they're they've been very proactive um when it comes to that um to work with the property owner and to work with the tenant and make sure they get access to resources the tenant gets access resources when they need it so i think of both end on that thank you for your answer and then on um you mentioned the the hearing board was meeting once a year so do they meet more frequently for condemnations in between that or they generally don't need to meet more than once a year so the hearing board only hears the appeals when some from citations so if when when a property owner receives a citation from a code enforcement officer if they want to appeal it they go to the hearing board and so um the board they are by the what i read in our city ordinances they're supposed to meet once a year at least and they're just not meeting but they're just um adjudicating the hearings the appeals hearings so as a board they are supposed to meet at least together once a year and they're not doing that so my hope is in working with um director still in his team is that we um initiate reinitiate their annual meeting and then make that annual meeting fruitful make it make it be a training um education piece um because that ongoing education should be happening um at all on all for all of our boards and commissions quite frankly um but i would like to see um get to once we have more than one person as a hearing officer have the board meet on an annual basis and make that meeting be a training that makes sense i really liked what you said about um expanding who the eligibility of who can be on it do we as a council need to take any action to change that board requirement i don't think so at this time i think um the requirement is fine because it's either a licensed lawyer or anybody else you just have to have the mediation training the remission mediation certification training so i think um the criteria is pretty broad we just need to let the public know that yes you can be um a hearing board member and a hearing officer i think most folks just think lawyer because they see that on our website so i talked to director still about some way about um improving the website for this board so that it's more obvious that anyone can be and be on the hearing board you don't have to be a lawyer so just better communication about the x aspect and then doing some intentional recruiting from folks that are not lawyers and i say that being a lawyer but and we're great but i think this should be an opportunity that people the general public should know they can participate in local government in this way okay thank you so much well i appreciate it um and i'm pleased to see we're taking steps uh i have just a little bit more time i was going to ask one more question um in terms of the uh the the naturalized spaces and how that's viewed i know that's come up um in my neighborhoods quite a few times uh is there any reason or maybe this is for director steel uh director so could i ask you a question about this uh council member munch talked about getting training for officers to help them know you know what's in the bounds of being natural and what's not um what are things we should you know maybe cite for and what things are okay and i don't know maybe even we need to change those parameters is there any reason why we couldn't get that training for our officers so that we might be able to further define this i know myself and my co-workers would love to see that implemented by the vision environmental services we would like for them to set the standard on what is invasive and non-invasive for the front yards or the naturalized yards if they would do that and there are several lists already out there floating around but the problem is with our turnover you're never going to find everybody up to speed on what species is in that yard i mean we've gone to the point where we've started using google pics to to identify noxious weeds and things in the yard we don't need to be doing that we need to have a set protocol but one of the divisions and i feel like it's home in environmental services would be wonderful for them to set the bar on what we need to enforce currently we're using words like naturalizing your front yard with intent growing wild but you're cultivating we're trying to keep people to keep a one foot border around the public pedestrian highway just so that doesn't lean out onto the sidewalk some folks extend out to the right-of-way mostly we have to tell all naturalized yards are not are illegal in the right-of-way so we try to get them slowly to undo that and bring it back to its normal uh grass covered but that's that's where i'd like to see it i i do feel like it's it's very broad it's very particular what plant i i've been a native kentucky in my whole life i've been an outdoorsman and i still to this day cannot you know tell you a tree from hardwood pine i just you know it's a pine tree it's a hardwood tree i it's a very difficult thing for us to do as a division to go out and say what you can and can't have in the front yard the the ordinance if it's over 10 inches it's to be cut we give a lot of leniency in this town to those people that already that do those naturalized yards and what we're doing now is basically saying we don't know exactly what's all in the yard we recognize poison ivy we recognize honeysuckle but if you'll just keep it bordered within your confines of your yard we'll live with it for now thank you that's that's really helpful i appreciate it and thank you council member lind for your presentation okay council member ellinger thank you and director we met talking about that with some constituents about the naturalized and i've actually asked law to look into that to try to come up with some better definitions so it would be easier for you and the community to know exactly what falls in that yes sir but thank you for meeting with us on that and we are trying to address it so thank you thank appreciate y'all thank you thank you all right the next item is the strategic growth plan for the lexington fire department this item is sponsored by council members hale and morton and council member hale since you placed this into committee i will turn this over to you to make introductory remarks thank you chair all right public safety is our commute in our community has always been a priority for me and when i think about public safety it has a very broad and multifaceted meaning yes i think about law enforcement and crime prevention patrolling and traffic control however our other first responders and emergency services those professionals who are typically the first to arrive on the scene at an emergency and save lives and property they also come to mind the firefighters who respond to fires vehicle accidents chemical spills and other technical rescues emts and paramedics who provide immediate medical care to the sick and injured i also think about violence interrupters who can mediate and de-escalate potentially dangerous situations non-police crisis response teams who are able to respond to calls related to mental health crises homelessness or substance abuse programs aimed and at education and prevention and not to be underestimated those who prepare for plan and coordinate responses to various events like floods storms mass casualty events or other public health crises lexington fire department is integral to all these parts of public safety as i watch my own district change and develop i know other districts are experiencing similar dynamics for example district 7 is the site of one of our recent expansion areas there are already multiple schools in the area a soccer stadium and complex close by and an industrial area that provides the opportunity for more businesses jobs and economic development with all of these exciting changes it is incumbent upon council to make sure we are addressing all the needs across all of the growing and changing areas of lexington since the first time i met with chief wells and many members of his team i have been impressed at the way he sees all of the moving parts and his big picture thinking the strategic plan 2024 to 2029 a product of many hours of engagement and community stakeholders the public the lexington fire department command structure and the ranking and file members of the fire department was last completed in 2023 and there's a thoughtful general road map for where lexington fire department has been and where it is going i'm looking forward to hearing from chief wells today about the lexington fire department strategic strategic growth plan and objective thorough and data-driven explanation of the department's plans for the coming years in lexington fayette county thank you chief wells for taking time to put this presentation together and thank you for being here today thank you thank you very much councilmember hale councilmember morton chair reynolds vice chair baxter i appreciate the opportunity to come and talk to you all today uh very briefly a couple of words of thanks again thank you to the social service and public safety committee for hearing us i also want to thank commissioner armstrong cao hamilton mayor gordon and her leadership team for walking with us as we went through not only the accreditation process but our strategic planning process to put all of this together with me today i have some really important members of our team who were deeply involved in putting this together and know frankly more than i do about all of this stuff miss dawn morris who is our accreditation manager slash guru of all things data battalion chief jeremy cooper who is our logistics deputy and captain kevin pletsky who also is in the accreditation officer it's also worth mentioning that captain pletsky is also the local 526 union president and i believe that a strong labor management relationship is incredibly important to the growth of our division so there's a lot of information in this presentation i will be moving through it rather quickly but some of this dry information at the beginning is really foundational to understanding the why and the how we get to where we get so basically this is the overview of the methodology as part of our department's long-term planning efforts we've taken a proactive approach to future station location placements and ensure that they align with the actual community needs not only where growth is occurring but also where risk and service demands meet we utilize a nationally recognized model through the commission on fire accreditation it's known as the three axis risk model and we'll get in depth on what those three things are but they involve the frequency of incidents or the probability the vulnerability of the population or consequence and the response times or impact we apply that framework to all 82 census tracts in fayette county and we come up with some really cool multi-colored maps that you'll get to see here shortly this provides us with a transparent and objective way to identify which areas benefit the most from new stations and we want to make sure that we are being fair and data informed when we prioritize our investments a few definitions as we move forward erf or effective response force varies based on the call type but that is essentially the number of personnel and apparatus that are required to show up on scene to effectively manage an incident initially a benchmark response time so that is the complete timeline from the time that someone calls 911 until we have that effective response force on scene and that is something for your all knowledge up front that is something that we as a community decide what our benchmark response time is and then as part of our accreditation process we continually work toward improving that and then the social vulnerability index is a cdc metric that assesses how different communities and different people are impacted by emergencies they use factors such as poverty levels housing access to health care access to transportation and that helps us as a division make sure that we are prioritizing equitable service delivery so here's where it gets really mathy so essentially you take those three things you take the the probability and and all of those different things and you put them together and and to a magic formula called heron's formula which is that triangle there and then it spits out a score and that score is directly tied to our standard of cover and for ems calls we want to have six people on scene this is for medium risk ems calls and we'll get into what that entails in a second we want six people on scene within 13 minutes from the time the call is placed until we have six people on scene for high risk fire calls that number is 17 people in 13 minutes ems medium risk consists of things like cardiac arrest respiratory issues overdose trauma those are calls that would require an ambulance and a first responder you may ask why not high risk ems calls are things um unfortunately like active shooter events things that are are very rare and so there would not be sufficient data these are not only high consequence but they're also high frequency a fire high risk is a structure fire which is also a relatively high risk and high frequency event that requires 17 personnel to really get operations going so we center our analysis on those two things i'll go back just for a second we center our analysis on those two things and we're going to come up with a map that shows ems medium risk and that's going to have the the different census tracts that are at high risk at medium risk and at low risk we're going to do the same thing for fire it'll show the census tracts that are high medium and low risk then we're going to take those two maps we're going to overlay them and average them out and that's going to show the composite score and the composite score is really what we want to look at because what you find there is we're not overweighting our service to the community either too much toward ems response or too much toward fire response we are an all hazards agency so it's very important that we are competent and capable to respond to whatever emergency so you'll see that moving forward when we decide which tracks are high moderate and low basically we we try to take we try to divide them up into thirds the composite risks or the risk source go anywhere from 4.89 to 73.48 and and so you take the top the third and that becomes your high risk and and so on so on this particular map you'll notice that the areas of high risk are generally centered in and around the downtown area and inside the urban service area that is primarily a function of ems call volume and social vulnerability index so those are the areas that that are receiving lots of calls and where the individuals are likely to suffer the worst from those from those events fire high risk is a much different picture so we may have we do have certainly within the urban service boundary some areas that are red but you see a lot more red on the outside as well and that's actually the function of two different factors so inside the urban service boundary that is again where high call volume and social vulnerability kind of come together on the outside that sort of horseshoe around the urban service area to the the northwest north and northeast that is typically a function of call volume also draw your attention on this map and you'll see that on future maps as well there are some shaded areas and those shaded areas are where we've identified future urban service boundary growth so this is the composite risk assessment and we ended up with 28 census tracts in the high risk 27 in the moderate risk 27 also in the low risk areas and now is when it's really important now that we've got our full picture in the composite risk assessment we also want to take a look at those urban service potential or future growth areas and where those things overlap is certainly our areas of concern now when we looked at the recommended fire station locations i think it's a little bit reassuring to know that we identified the the ideal locations for station 25 and 26 actually prior to the announcement of the urban service boundary growth so that sort of gave us a little bit of reassurance that we were on the right track and so i'll just go into the locations a little bit station 25 winchester road and polo club boulevard as you probably know that property has been secured station 26 will be in that richmond road athens boones borough hayes boulevard somewhere in that corridor would be the ideal location for that station station 27 somewhere in the vicinity of main award boulevard parkers mill and station 28 somewhere around newtown pike and i-75 it is worth noting that newtown and i-75 is the only location noted on that map that is not adjacent to or in a an urban service growth area this is a little bit clearer map we took some of the colors off to make it a little bit more visible for you as well as added the little red dots a little red stations for current station locations and this may just give a better overview of the county and then where gaps may be and and where we would like to fill those gaps with future fire stations so the station by station apparatus and staffing overview this is one of those slides that i think obviously we have to to start with an ideal scenario so each of these stations would essentially in an ideal world come with a full complement of personnel right off the bat that would include ambulance engine ladder truck for station 25 27 and 28 our state our span of control is for a district chief about five stations so when we add the 26th station that's going to also necessitate the addition of a sixth district officer all right so we're going to move now to the transitioning to implementation and this was something that that council member morton actually had sort of recommended the way that that we put this together and i think it worked out very well it talks a little bit about some of our current and future budget implications our capital projects our staffing and an action plan to get from point a to point b so our near to excuse me our near term priorities fy 26 and 27 obviously our focus has been and continues to be the fire training academy design and construction that's something that has been moving along well we're very excited about it and that has been a top priority as you all have heard for for some number of years additionally we'll be continuing to to look at records management software and recurring investments in heavy fleet ems equipment and personal protective equipment some of our mid-term priorities in capital include station 26 administrative annex fleet fleet maintenance facility, excuse me, those are long-term, multi-purpose storage buildings, Station 25, are medium-term, and then 26, administrative annex and fleet maintenance are long-term. One of the things that we potentially discussed when I made lieutenant, I opened up Station 20 on Harrisburg Road. That was designed at the same time as Station 21 on Maple Leaf, so I think, you know, there are some things, as time goes on, it would be incumbent upon us and you all to look at the budget and see if there's a way to potentially save some funds by looking at, you know, designing a couple of stations under one design. Personnel, staff, personnel, we will continue to advocate for paramedicine as it continues to grow. That's something that we're constantly analyzing and looking at. Some other items that we would like to continue to look at would be things like a civilian PPE tech, a behavioral health clinician, a PIO, and then the future addition of EC14 to continue to meet demand. Something else we're looking at is potentially looking at adding clerk positions. That's something that the police department has done very, very well, and they've proven those positions to be cost-effective and beneficial to the organization and the community. And then, excuse me, an action plan moving forward. In FY26, we hope to finalize the fire training academy design. FY27 requests the construction funds for the training academy capital support for Station 25's apparatus. As you may know, we are still three to four years getting apparatus, so when we look at a station construction, it's going to take just as long to get the trucks in as it is to potentially build a station, so we're gonna have to order those ahead of time. Continuing to move forward, we will look at the construction for 26, multipurpose facility and construction of an administrative annex. And I have 30 seconds left. Thank you. You're good. Thank you so much, Chief, for the presentation. It was very eye-opening. Council members, does anybody have any questions or comments? If so, please log in. Council Member Higgins-Hort. I have a couple of questions. This is going to be in District 6, Station 25. How will this improve the response time? Thank you. How will this improve the response time in growing Winchester Road corridor, including the Kroger development area? So, thank you very much for the question, and I recognize the fact that you only have five minutes, so I'll try to be very succinct here, and welcome also, by the way. We're excited to have you. Thank you. So, what ends up happening is, while we put a station in a specific district, and it definitely has a big impact on that district, there are second and third order effects that play out for many surrounding districts, and one of the examples I like to use is, Engine 1 is the corner of 3rd and North Martin Luther King, and one of the reasons why that area is a red area is because they are very often busy. Oftentimes, they get pulled into Engine 2's district. Engine 2 is located behind Eastland Shopping Center, because Engine 2 has had to go out to, further out Winchester Road to respond to a call. So, if you put Station 25 now on Polo Club Boulevard, Engine 2 gets pulled less, which means Engine 1 gets pulled less, which means that area becomes less red, more yellow, hopefully green. So, that area is growing exponentially. I go home that way, I live out that area, and it is absolutely an incredible area of growth, and I don't think we fully know yet how important that's gonna be, but it is crucially important, particularly as you look at mixed-use occupancy, which I believe is gonna be one of the things. So, we're gonna have residential, we're gonna have commercial, lots of different things out there, so it will be very important, and it should shorten response time significantly. That is an area where we see a big gap. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Martin. Thank you. Thank you, Chief Wills, for the presentation. It was a great, great presentation, and I appreciate your work, and the team's work on this item. You know where my main heart is, paramedicine. So, I just have a couple questions for paramedicine, then just a question about the EC unit. So, I know in this budget cycle, we successfully funded the expansion of one additional crisis response team unit, set to begin, hopefully, in January 2026. Can you share any updates where we are in the process, any current barriers, or just anything tied to that? Please jump in if I'm misspeaking, but I believe we've done the JPQ? Yes, so we have done the necessary legwork to be able to hire for that position. There is a job description, for lack of a better term, so that legwork is out of the way, and we should be ready to roll as soon as the calendar year turns. Great, that's amazing, that's amazing. The presentation mentioned in FY 2028, 2029, the expansion, possibly, of paramedicine. Could you speak more about this, and provide additional context on what that expansion may look like, where it could be implemented, however you wanna go, or wherever you wanna take it? Well, one of the things that I think, and I may have mentioned it in small conversations, I don't know that I've mentioned it up here before, but one of the things that makes our community paramedicine group so wonderful is the fact that they are pretty agile, and they can respond to whatever the needs of the community may be. For example, during COVID, they were able to pull and start giving vaccinations, and things like that, so I hesitate to go too far out, because we wanna have a quick reflex time to be able to serve the community however that looks, and I wanna thank the council, and everyone who played a part in moving them into their really fancy new building out there. It is a beautiful facility, but five, six, seven years from now, if that team continues to grow, they probably will outgrow that space, so we're gonna have to look at a new space for them. As far as what that expansion looks like, I'm really excited to see where the data lead us, because I think we might determine that two crisis response teams is adequate. We also might see that that's nowhere close, so we wanna add a couple of more crisis response teams. One of the things that's becoming an issue that we're seeing is the number of lift assist calls, non-injury lift assist calls, that are pulling frontline units away from more emergent runs. Under the umbrella of paramedicine, I think we potentially could have a small unit that responds to lift assist calls, and maybe while they're out there, they can see, is this an individual who's trying to age in place and needs an additional resource that they don't have? So I think there's lots of ways that we can reflex quickly to best serve the needs of the community. Thank you. And then lastly, in the presentation, it mentions EC14, and we know there's a need for an EC unit in the Massachusetts station area, and it's not in my district, but it's very close to my district, and it pulls from the services that are in my district, so could you just outline any future plans for that area, and how LFD is preparing to address that need? Sure, I think looking at our standard of cover, if we were to magically get EC14 today, it would go to station 24 in Masterson station. That's where the data is steering us right now. In full transparency, we're going to run EC13 at station 16 for probably six months to a year, and make sure that it's having the intended consequence. If it's not, we may have to reevaluate where it is, but as of right now, station 24 would be the next one, and that would alleviate a lot of the pressure on the north and west corridors. Yes, sir. Thank you. Council members, was there anyone else that wanted to chime in? Okay. I want to thank you for all your hard work on this, and we talked a long time ago about dreams of where we might put new stations, so this is really helpful. I guess Council Members Morton and Hale, my question is, do we have next steps? Is there an action plan, or was this for mostly information only? Yeah, this is mainly for today's information purposes. The action plan will be our next budget, I would say, and the future budget is to come, making sure that we have a plan in place on the record, and knowing what needs our fire department has. So the action plan will come just in budgetary conversations as we approach those in the years to come. So referring back to this plan and saying we had this plan, and this is where we want to go first, et cetera? Correct, correct, indeed. Thank you very much. Anything else, Council Member Hale? Yes, speaking of budget, Chief Wells, is there any way you could speak to possibly bundling two stations at once and the possible cost savings there? Sure, so I had mentioned that when I made lieutenant, we opened 20 and 21 at essentially the same time, and that's gonna have to be a decision made, I think probably, I won't say game time, but there's gonna have to be a couple of different ways that you can look at that. One of the biggest costs with opening a new station is not necessarily the construction and design of the station, it is the number of personnel that go into it. So I can see a scenario where the council may decide they want coverage because these areas are building out and because we need to meet that need immediately instead of putting a full complement of engine, ladder, ambulance in the station. Those are incrementally scaled up over the years, but if there's a significant cost savings in designing two stations or constructing two stations, maybe you scale back the number of people that go in or the number of apparatus that go in at one time. I think there are different ways to attack that hill, but again, it's gonna have to be a data-informed discussion based on the budgetary constraints of any given fiscal year. Thank you, Chief. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Morton. To wrap it up. Thank you, thank you very much. So as our city grows, Lexington Fire Department must grow with it to meet the needs of our community. We have to be prepared with a plan that not only keeps pace with growth, but also reflects realities of this day and age. Public safety is not static. It evolves, especially in areas, specifically like I've already highlighted, paramedicine and that mental health field. So we must continue to support, expand, and adapt these units so they meet challenges for our residents face today and tomorrow, but also making sure that we're expanding all of our services to meet the needs of our community so they can get effective and responsive and timely service. So again, to Chief Wills, thank you so much for this presentation. Thank you to your team, all those who came out to put this presentation together and all the hard work that they're doing. And most importantly, thank you to our firefighters that are out there every day risking their lives, going to the different calls. And so appreciate all of our Lexington Firefighters out there and everyone in the fire department. So thank you. Yes, thank you all for coming out today and for all your hard work on this presentation. We appreciate you and it's always in our minds that we have a world-class fire department. So thank you. Next, we have a presentation on an amendment to section four of the Code of Ordinances regarding roosters and the keeping of animals. And I am gonna turn this over to Councilmember Beasley who is the sponsor of this item and will also be providing today's presentation. So Councilmember Beasley. Thank you, Chair. All right, y'all have to give me a little grace. I'm a little nervous. This is the first time I've ever done this. All right, so I'd like to start by thanking Gabby and our law department, the Fayette County Attorney's Office Animal Care and Control, Kendra from our CORE staff, Jennifer Sutton from the CAO's office, and everyone else who helped work on this for this presentation. We appreciate you. Oh, sorry. I'm supposed to click this little button too, right? Okay. So the purpose of the change in the amendments is to help with the noise complaints, the public health, and the quality of life of our neighbors and increase the penalties to encourage, oh, sorry, to encourage our neighbors to comply with the new ordinance. Sorry, the amendments, it's not a new ordinance. So what we wanna do is we wanna change the number, we actually want to limit the number of roosters that we have in Fayette County in zones not zoned agriculture. Right now we don't have a restriction on that. We wanna increase the penalty for the restricted animals. We want to increase the penalty for the noisy animals, part of this ordinance. So currently there's no restrictions on the number of roosters you can keep in a non-ag zone. The proposal is to limit it to one rooster within any area not zoned agriculture. So this won't include any of the areas that are ag. So whether it's, I know that there's a farm here in Fayette County that's inside the urban service area. It will not include that. It's only for our neighborhoods. The other restricted animals that are already in this section are hogs, goats, and pigs. The current fine for keeping a restricted animal in a non-ag zone is $5 per offense per animal per day. We propose to increase that to up to $100 per offense per animal per day for each additional, and that would be for each additional animal found on the property shall be deemed a separate offense. Currently, this is the keeping of a noisy animal, so currently the penalty for that being violated is not less than $5, but not more than 15. We're proposing to increase that fine to no more than $100 for each offense to match the other fine, and this is separate from the rooster limit in the non-ag zone. We spoke with the Fayette County Attorney's Office, so nothing will change. You'll still, if you have somebody that has 13 roosters in their backyard, you'll still need to come to the Fayette County Attorney's Office and make a complaint, and they will be who decides like the fine, and when we spoke to the Fayette County Attorney's Office, they said that they're not gonna start out with the $100 fine. It'll be based on, oh, sorry. It'll be based on how many times they've had to be called out there, how many animals you have, and how many days it's been, if they've been out there multiple times, and we propose this take effect on November the 1st of this year, just so people have time to rectify the situations if they already have multiple roosters in their care now. What we hope that it'll happen is that it'll reduce the number of complaints. It may combat legal activity. We know that people like to fight roosters. It'll have a stronger enforcement impact and clearer rules for animal owners, and the next step is we request the committee support and approve this proposed amendment, and we request that the amendment be reported out at today's work session. Are there any questions? I'm sure there's lots. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member. Vice Mayor Wu. Thank you, Chair. Council Member Beasley, under the amendment language, how is area defined when you talk about no more than one rooster per area outside the ag zone? So when we did this with law, they said it'll be any area not zoned agriculture. So if your house is zoned for ag, then you would be allowed to have more than one rooster. Okay, so by area. If you have just a residential neighbor, like you're just zoned residential, you'd be limited to the one rooster. Right, so I guess my question is, does area mean property in this context? Because an area. It does. Area means property, yes, sir. Okay. Is that, I don't know, do we have anybody from law in the room? Oh, hi, Gabby. Hi. So I'm curious, like from a legal definition point of view, is area and property the same thing in this reading? Well, that is actually something that has not been changed. I could look into that, but as I read that, that includes property. Okay, so that's just what I'm curious about because one could say an area is a whole neighborhood and that if two neighbors on two separate properties each wanted to have one rooster, what is, how is area defined in terms of property? My other question on the fines for the keeping of noisy animals, I'm trying to think about like how that would be either reported or enforced. If I have what is considered a noisy animal, is that separate and apart from having a noise complaint lodged against me? Like if I have a rooster, for example, but nobody has called in a noise complaint specifically, they're just saying you have a noisy animal. Does that make sense? I'm not sure how that would be like defined or reported or enforced, I guess. So do I understand your question to mean if just even if you have a rooster that's not noisy, is that still in violation of the ordinance? Yeah, if it's categorically a noisy animal as opposed to the act of having the noisy animal. So the noisy animal addresses basically any animal that is bellowing or I guess in this instance would be crowing and is making a noise so to disturb the neighborhood. But this section 411 is prohibiting the keeping of more than one rooster. So even if there's one rooster and it's not being noisy, then that is not in violation of the ordinance. But if there's two roosters, that would be in violation of section 411. If there's one rooster that is noisy, that is still a violation of section 412 under the noise ordinance. Okay, so if it was one animal, the violation would be I guess the act of being noisy is what we're enforcing, not the keeping of an animal that could be noisy. Okay, all right, great, thank you. Thank you, Chair. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Ellinger. Thank you, and thanks for bringing this forward. At this point, do we have a limit on how many and we're going to one and why? We don't currently, we don't have a current. That's what I thought, so why down to one? What's the significance of only one? Well, only, so what happens if you have more than one chicken, or sorry, more than one rooster, is they crow at each other all day. And we in District 8 have had a neighbor who has, the gentleman who lives behind her has multiple roosters, and they crow all day. And there's things that they can do to keep them from crowing all day, but because we don't currently have any language that limits how many they can have, nobody is doing anything. So that's why we picked one, because you don't need more than one rooster if you're like for your egg business. Okay, and so, do you go to one? Does that mean they won't crow then? They won't, they'll probably still crow, but they won't crow at each other all day. Like, roosters are territorial. And then, if we're starting on November 1st, are we gonna, do we know where all of them are, and are we going to contact and let them know, or how will we let people know starting November 1st that you only can have one? Will we have a time where we can give a warning and say that you're in violation, and by this date, how are we gonna go correct that issue? Yes, the Fayette County Attorney's Office, I'm sure, will still do that. Like, they won't just come out on November 1st because you have 13 roosters and tell you, here's your $1,300 fine. Right, so are we gonna do something prior to, if this passes, up to November 1st to let people know that starting November 1st, if you're, you will be in violation? I guess we could. We could. I think it would probably be helpful just because of people, to let them be aware. And when we did, like, the STRs, that we gave them a grandfather period in there to let them know that they are in violation and to get it done. I think it always helps to be informative to the public. And I'm sure that we can get a list of maybe that from the Fayette County Attorney's Office who've had complaints filed against them for having multiple roosters and send them letters. I think this is also, if this is going to go in front of the council for a vote at some point, that will also serve as notice. Sure, but still, I think it does help. It should be a finite amount of people who have roosters, I would think, that we could probably, like you said, there could be a potential list, so just let them know. And I don't wanna start fining them that $100 without knowing, hey, I didn't know that it was no longer allowed to have. So just notice, I think it's always helpful. Thank you. Thank you, Vice Chair Baxter. Thank you, Chair, and thank you, Council Member Beasley, for bringing this forward. When you were developing these amendments, did you engage individuals who currently have roosters for their feedback? No, ma'am. Okay, and then just double checking, this will be enforced by code enforcement, or by? Fayette County Attorney's Office, which is who enforces it now. Okay, so I'm comparing this to our barking dog ordinance, which is Animal Care and Control currently does that now, and that's a huge issue in my district. It's just, it's not that Animal Care and Control does a poor job, it's just that it's really difficult to prove that there's a barking dog. And similarly, I feel like this might be the same type of situation. When you first went, I know you have a specific instance in your district that you kind of based this on. Yes, ma'am. But do we have any idea how many, like what the number of overall complaints are citywide, or? When we talked to the Fayette County Attorney, they seemed like this was a common practice, like there were people complaining about roosters a lot down there. Okay, so if my neighbor has five roosters, and I want to complain currently, I call the Fayette County Attorney's Office. I think you have to go down there and make a complaint, is what he said. That you have to make a, okay. Yes, ma'am. And that's what they currently have to do. Okay. With that whole ordinance, is they have to go down and make a complaint with the Fayette County Attorney's Office. And then, I guess my last concern is the fine. And I know you said that the Fayette County Attorney's Office wouldn't go straight to $100, but up to $100 per offense, per animal, per day, just, it seems like a lot, especially if we don't have a really well-thought-out plan of attack, as Council Member Ellinger said, just trying to make sure that we're getting this information out as efficiently as possible. I think I understand the overall intent of the changes. I just have some general concerns about the fee structure, and maybe the complaint process as well. I just, I'm really cognizant of us passing legislation that is really difficult to enforce. So, that's kind of where I am right now. So, thank you. Thank you. Council Member Martin. Thank you. I'll just give my sentiments, just from my experience within my district, about roosters, chickens, et cetera, tied to this ordinance. I've had actually many people ask in general, well, why do we allow roosters at all? I look at some of our surrounding counties, Midway and other counties, they don't allow roosters across the board in Irvin. So, and like I said, my constituents have actually reached out to me, several, and have complained about having multiple roosters next to them, or the loud noise working them up in the morning. So, I do actually thank you for bringing this forward. Regarding going to one rooster, you know, there were some, like I said, there's sentiments of, should we even allow any? And I think there was a compromise to allow for one, rather than zero, correct? Correct. Okay. And with that being said, you know, let's see. And then, I guess, other than, I know in some cases, like, you don't even know it's a rooster until it gets to a certain age, is that right? Correct. Okay. And that's when they start to, I guess, That's when they start to crow. That's how you can tell. Okay. Oh, and then, so, let's follow me. Regarding, like, reaching out to the community, I think there's many different efforts and many different ways we can reach out to the community. We have a PIO office and a council office that can do that work. We have, the mayor's office has a PIO office. We have the news, as mentioned by law, if it comes forward through that process, that will be a legislative process, so it still has time to get first and second reading. There's still many time that we, as council members, can reach out to our constituents, get feedback, all these different things. So, regarding communication, I don't see that as much of a hindrance for this. Yeah, I appreciate you for doing this, and I'll support this coming out of committee. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Lynch. Thank you, Chair, and thank you, Council Member Beasley, for your presentation. My question is for Ms. Thatcher. I did not look in our ordinances, but is it defined what noisy animals are in our ordinance? Is it specifically defined? I believe in section, I don't have it in front of me, forgive me, but in 412A, I think it's not strictly defined. Noisy is not strictly defined, but it's basically any kind of animal that makes noise that disrupts the peace and quiet of the surrounding people. Okay, all right. Thank you. Thank you, Chair. Thank you. I'm going to chime in, as I don't see any other comments. Council Member Beasley, I really appreciate you bringing this forward. This is something that I personally have dealt with on and off for years with my constituents. I remember when I first got elected, there was a couple that said they could never get a night's sleep because their neighbors had roosters, and they were trying to raise the roosters for fighting, which is illegal, and they tried to have some enforcement and could not get any. So I appreciate this, and I do think this is a major issue. Our constituents are complaining about noise, but we're not really regulating it. When I lived downtown, I would hear a rooster every morning, and where I live now, there are chickens all over the place, even running all over the road. So I am very sympathetic to this. A few things I wanted to say. One, so if, and I think, I think if someone has a rooster, and let's say this passes and they're in the legal boundary, the neighbor can still call in that the rooster is being a nuisance, correct? Yes. Okay, and I think to go along a little bit with what Vice Chair Baxter said, how, this hasn't always been enforced, so how are we going to, now that we're making it stricter, do you think that strictness is going to help it be enforced more, or do we still not know? Do we need more teeth in it? I don't know that we're making this any stricter. Like, the process is still the same process. All we did was add roosters to the animals that they couldn't currently, that are restricted. And then we just raised the fine in the noise part of the other ordinance to match the fines for keeping of and the noise complaint. So it's always been the same. Like, you've always had to go down to the Fayette County Attorney's Office, you've always had to make the complaint, and they have a process that you have to follow, and then they send, like, they can hold you, like, you can have a court date because of it. And, but we don't have any proof yet that raising the fine structure is going to have them basically enforce it more. Correct, the raising of the fine is to hopefully keep people from wanting to have that many. Like, a $5 fine, if you have 10 chickens and it's a $5 fine, it might be not, it's not as much as if you had 15 chickens at $100 a piece. I agree with all that. And I know somebody asked what, you know, what do you, why do people have roosters, or is there reason to have more than one? And I know that the reason to maybe have one is to help keep prey away, because there's many different prey that chickens have, and roosters can help keep the birds away, et cetera. So I know that's one reason, I guess. So I am in favor of this. I think overall we've been looking at how do we address the noise ordinance, and it's been a challenge. It's been a challenge to see how we can enforce it, and how do we know if something's too loud, one person says it is, another person says it isn't. So that's really tricky. But I am in favor. I had one question about goats. I have lots of questions about animals. This is the last one I'm gonna bring up. So I have recently gotten the request to amplify how we allow goats to be used to eat invasive species. There had been a pilot project in my district around that, and then other folks popped up and said, we wanna do the same thing, but that's against the ordinance. We could come back and add something like that here that said goats are prohibited except for this particular use. I would have to look into that, but in my reading of it, I would assume that's permissible. But if you wanna work with me behind the scenes on that, I'd be more than happy to look into it. Or maybe we could keep this in committee and come back and look at other ways of addressing the goats. Okay. I'm not ready to do that in this moment, but I wanted to throw that out there, that that was something that I've heard a lot since we're talking about goats in this ordinance. That's all I have. Vice Chair Baxter. Thank you, Chair. So I just went to Fayette County Attorney's website just to look at what is listed here, because you actually can download the complaint form on their website, which is nice. But it references a different section of the code of ordinances that has to do with just animals in general. Section, okay, so it's section 1472.10. It says it shall be unlawful for any person to keep or harbor within the urban county any animal, including but not limited to domestic pets, that repeatedly or frequently emits any sound, including but not limited to barking, yelping, howling, or otherwise creates a noise disturbance across a dwelling unit boundary. So I guess my question is, is this a duplicative ordinance in general? I don't know if, Ms. Thatcher, if you, I know it's different, but both of them relate to noisy animals, so I just want to make sure that we're not contradicting ourselves in the. So I'm, there are two separate noise ordinances, and I'm not sure why there are two separate ones, but that they essentially both address noisy animals. Yeah. But I will say that, potentially, maybe, I think right now, there is a contract with Animal Care and Control, and they are actually not responsible for enforcing section 412. Okay. And it would be solely the responsibility of the Fayette County attorney. Okay. I guess I just want to make, like I said, I just want to make sure that we're consistent. Right. And this is just an amendment with section, sorry, of section 4-11, and even, like there's even some other sections within that chapter that talk about animals in other ways. So, yeah. Right. First, the Fayette County attorney would be responsible for enforcing 411 and 412, and Animal Care and Control does 411.1, 412.2, and so on. For whatever reason, 411 and 412 is not a part of the Animal Care and Control contract, so it would be the Fayette County attorney's responsibility. Okay, thank you. Thank you. Council Member Curtis. Sorry, I was looking for your name on here. Thank you, Chair, for recognizing me since I don't serve on this committee, and since I was unable to sign in on my computer for this meeting. So, I just wanted to clear something up really quickly, because when you look over the text of the proposed amendment to the code of ordinances, we're not adding any text about noise levels or any animals. So, while that might be the motivation behind considering this policy, would you consider this policy to be more just about the keeping of roosters on property, not so much about the noise that the rooster makes? Yes, limiting the number of roosters that they have on property would be the main goal of this. Making the fines match them may make the Fayette County Attorney's Office more likely to prosecute people who have animals that are disturbing your peace than if it's $5. Thank you, and I just wanted to add that as a point of clarity during the discussion, because we've had a lot of discussion about the definition of noisy animals and what have you, and to my eye, this is largely just a question of whether or not we should be allowing folks to keep a large amount of roosters as pets on their property in residential zones and outside of the urban, excuse me, outside of the ag zones. And in my mind, that's a common sense answer that you shouldn't be keeping a bunch of chickens at your house if you don't live in an agricultural area. So, thank you. Thank you. Council Member Beasley, did you have a motion? Yes, ma'am. Give me one second. What did I just do with it? Yes, ma'am. I have a motion that the amendments be reported out to the report session. Point out, first, you have to pass the amendments on. We have to have a motion to pass them out of committee, and then you can make a separate motion to report out, if that's okay. Okay, so I then request that the committee support and approve the proposed amendments. So moved. Second. All those in favor? Aye. Aye. Aye. Any opposed? No. I think we have one no. And if I'm correct, then that motion passes. Okay. Yes, ma'am. Do you have another motion? Yes, ma'am. I move that the amendments be reported out at today's work session. So moved. Second. Are there any comments about the motion? Seeing none, I have one. I have two reports to read today. I would rather see this go through the normal process rather than be reported out today, but I will give you a chance to explain why you want to report it out today. I just wanted it reported out today so we would have more time to contact folks should this pass for that November 1st date. Okay. Thank you. All those in favor of the motion? Aye. Aye. Can we do an electronic vote, please? All right. That motion passes. So we'll work on getting that added to the report. Thank you, Chair. Thank you. And now we're going to go to items referred to committee. I just wanted to say that I will entertain the motion to remove the assessment and enforcement of the noise ordinance as that was Councilwoman Gray's item. But before I entertain a motion, I wanted to check to see if any of my colleagues were willing to pick this item up at this time. If not, it might come back in another fashion. Okay. Move to remove. Second. All right. All those in favor? Aye. Aye. Thank you. Other items that Councilwoman Gray had? The next one is the Youth Council. Is there anyone that would like to pick that item up? Okay. Councilmember Beasley will pick that up. I don't have to have a vote on that or anything. And then the next one is Domestic and Sexual Violence Prevention Coalition. Does anyone want to pick that up? Okay. That will be Morton. All right. The National Alliance on Mental Illness and NAMI update. Technically you can. It's a little easier if you're on committee, but people can. Is that something you want to do? Okay. We'll have Curtis. And then the last one I will take. It is the Office of Affordable Housing Initiatives and Project Updates. So I think that takes care of all of Councilwoman Gray's items. Okay. Does anyone have anything else they want to comment on on the list of referred items? All right. We have one more normal Social Services and Public Safety Committee meeting in October. And that is our last one. And currently the agenda is full. If something changes and someone has something, let me know. Otherwise, please talk to me about scheduling for 2026, which sounds crazy. And remember that tonight we have this special meeting at 6 p.m. It will be from 6 to 8 p.m. here for public input on recovery houses or residences. And remember that I will be keeping that meeting a strict two hours until 8 p.m. So I wanted to thank everyone for all of your time today dedicated to social services and public safety. We are adjourned.