Good. Welcome to the January 20th, 2026 General Government and Planning Committee meeting. It is one o'clock, so I'm going to call our meeting to order. To begin, I want to welcome Councilmember Boone. He has joined our committee in place of Councilmember LaGrie. Welcome. Our first item of business is the approval of the December 2nd, 2025 Committee Summary. Are there any additions or corrections? Okay, I'll take a motion to approve. I have a motion from Councilmember Ellinger, I heard a second from Councilmember Baxter. Any discussion on the motion? All in favor, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Okay, that motion passes. Our first presentation for today is an update on the Downtown Area Master Plan. I'm going to invite Mr. Sewey up to give our presentation today. Good afternoon, Councilmembers, members of the public. My name is Boyd Sewey, I'm a Principal Planner with the Long Range Planning, and I'm also the Project Manager on the Downtown Area Master Plan. This effort aims to shape the future of downtown Lexington based on community values and data-driven planning. This is a community-driven effort rooted in input from Lexington stakeholders, residents, and businesses. This is a year-long process that started in July of last year, and it has six tasks with this. Right now, we are wrapping up the housing and market analysis. We are deeply involved in the plan development, and we have ongoing community engagement. The housing and market analysis that we are wrapping up, this is a foundational analysis evaluating downtown Lexington's housing inventory and affordability gaps, retail and dining trends, visibility, I mean, sorry, visitor experiences and needs and demand for office and commercial space. This data supports a stakeholder-informed approach to identify opportunities and guiding investments. You can view the full draft at the downtownlexplan.com, and that will be updated as we move along. When it comes to the community outreach and community events, we had a community-wide event on October 8th at the Historic Lyric Theater. We had over 200 participants for that, and the event included hands-on activities, inviting residents to share their ideas of downtown improvements. Those who could not attend the Lyric Theater event, we also had online surveys to get their inputs, and of those who participated in the online surveys, 84% of them did not come to the Lyric Theater. 27% of those who responded to the survey were between the ages of 18 and 24, showing that there's a lot of enthusiasm from the younger generation. The survey respondents mostly lived in the 40502 and 40508 zip codes. This map shows how those who participated in the survey, if I go back one, you can see that's the number of people who participated in the online survey, most of them coming from the 40502 and 40508 zip codes, but when you put it all together, you can see the changes in who participated. East End, Belcourt, and Ellsford were some of the biggest participants in that survey and attending the Lyric Theater. Some of the topics that were discussed during the survey and the Lyric Theater included housing opportunities, 44% want affordable housing, followed by mixed use and adaptive reuse. Themes included the need for diverse housing types, accessibility, and neighborhood character preservation. That's one thing that we are really working hard on, is to make sure that neighborhoods don't just change and are taken over. We want to preserve some of the good qualities of our neighborhoods. Then when it came to retail opportunities, everyday retail is a top request. There's also strong interest in supporting unique local shops and improving workability. When it came to dining opportunities, people want casual sit-down and food hall or market style options. There's demand for diversity, family-friendly spaces, and healthy choices. When it came to parks and open space, residents prioritize green infrastructure, pocket parks, and linear parks. This was one of the survey questions that I found really interesting because two of the places that we've tabled at was the opening of Phoenix Park and the opening of Gatlin Park. And if you can see, the gathering area and event lawns scored the least on this. Then when it came to mobility matters, people want safer pedestrian corridors, fewer auto-oriented spaces, and better public transit. We've had strong support for people-first corridors with tree covers, buffers from traffic, and pedestrian-friendly complete streets. So from these meetings that we've had, the engagements we've done, we've had a few emerging themes. These stakeholder-driven themes validated across all input channels. Safety and connections, housing that people can afford, a downtown that works for businesses and community, and realistic planning that reflects Lexington's uniqueness. Our goal reflects that we've heard from the community and stakeholders, as well as existing condition analysis. They are designed to guide future decisions and set the tone for a plan that is both ambitious and achievable. Our goals reflect what we've heard from the community and stakeholders, as well as existing condition analysis. They are designed to guide future decisions and set the tone for a plan that is both ambitious and achievable, as I said. Out of all those, there have been draft goals for the project. These include keeping downtown vibrant and unique, build more diverse housing options at multiple prices, foster a dynamic retail, restaurant, and business environment to help local businesses thrive, improve the visitor experience, prioritize walkability and multimodal transit, support underserved and unhoused populations, continue making downtown green and enjoyable, strengthen connections at the neighborhood, city, and regional level. These goals are stakeholder-informed and community-driven, and we are asking, are we missing anything? So part of the goals included defining the downtown area. One of the most important steps is developing a community-supported definition of downtown. This definition will guide future council decision-making, prioritize infrastructure, connectivity, and investments, celebrate downtown's identity and history, ensure planning aligns with community values. Importantly, defining downtown does not change zoning, does not displace current residents, does not alter neighborhood characteristics. It's a positive, future-focused tool to shape policy with clarity, build with and for our community. One of the activities we had when we go out in the community was asking people what they felt downtown was, what were the ages of downtown, what to them qualified to be defined as downtown. And we gave them maps and asked them to sketch where they think downtown starts and ends. Of those, we had 180 maps that were submitted that met this criteria, and this is what we ended up with. We had a very compact area, which had 24 maps showing that. Then the medium-sized had the largest support from the community, and the expansive downtown that started from Loudoun all the way to UK was the second most. After looking at this, putting all this together, this is what we came with. We took all the three areas that were given to us by the community, and we've put this out there, which is changing. In fact, this is this way because this is what we submitted, but since there's been input from the community and some of these lines have shifted. If we take a closer look, this is the defined CBD, and then we have the downtown core. Let me go back one. If you look at the area of influence, that will mostly affect our policymaking. Right now, we are calling it area of downtown influence, but when we met with some of the council members, Council Member Brown specifically said, why don't you call it midtown? And that has caught up, so hopefully you guys support that and we end up having a midtown, a downtown core, and a CBD. So what are the next steps? Setting project goals, selecting opportunity areas, community meetings. Meeting number two will be held on March 4th. I know it says February, late February there, but last week we confirmed we are having our next community-wide meeting at the Gray Line on March 4th. And then we have our ongoing outreach. We will be meeting with community members, and if you guys have an opportunity in your districts that you want us to come talk to your residents, we are willing to do that. I welcome your questions, feedback, and any thoughts on how we continue building a strong, inclusive vision for downtown Lexington. Colleagues, go ahead and log in if you have questions or comments. Council Member Baxter. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Mr. Saway, for your presentation and for your work on this. I think this is a, this is just a really interesting exercise, and I'm excited about just the potential that our downtown has. I know we had a really productive conversation, you know, my viewpoints on downtown, and so I'm really excited to see that the community kind of agrees with some of the points that I made. I am curious how you reached, like what was the student outreach, what did it look like? For us to have 27 percent of survey responses from 18 to 24-year-olds is huge, and I want to know your secret. So first, shout out to Civic Lex, specifically Lily and Kit. We've been, we've had engagement with UK students. We actually went, met the Student Government Association. We had an event strictly for students, what was this, I'll get the name to you later, but it was strictly for students from Transit, BCT, and UK, and those who participated included people from Centre College, which surprised us. It was just like the night before Halloween, and we invited the students to go on a treasure hunt around downtown while they answered some of the survey questions. And then we've met with BCTC several times, we've met with Transit, we've met with UK, so we are really out there meeting the students, not just neighborhood associations. No, that's really great, it's really impressive, because those are the people that we want to make sure stay here, so we want to make sure we're providing opportunities for those individuals who are graduating or starting their careers here. As we were looking at the housing opportunities page, when these different housing types, I guess, were listed, was there any amount of explanation, like if we're looking at affordable housing, was that, were each of those explained at all, or are people thinking affordable housing, like housing affordability, or are they thinking affordable housing? There's, I need to stop saying this, there's two parts to this, there's the survey that was done online that was just questions, but the in-person meeting at the Lyric Theatre, we explained all this, and just to answer, it was, do it for the plot, the event we had for students. Yeah, I just want to make sure that, and I think it's hard on a survey, but in person, it's nice that you're explaining everything, I think there's some, there's always misconceptions on what a mixed-use development looks like, or affordable housing, that kind of stuff, so I was just curious there. And then, I think that is all that I had right now, if I think of something else, I'll come back, but thanks again for all your hard work on this, and I look forward to the future community events. Thank you, Chair. Council Member Savicny? Thank you, Chair, and thanks so much for the presentation, and all the work that's been done, because I do think you're doing, you guys are doing a very thorough job, which I appreciate. Just one or two questions. Is there something that surprised you at the response that came out of any of these responses? And then, is there anything that you feel like might have been gamed a little bit, you know? Like, we might think that everyone in Lexington loves pickleball, but it's just, there's a great lobby for pickleball, right? So, is there anything that you feel like is skewed a wee bit on this? I wouldn't say skewed, but personally, the open space requirement for gathering areas really surprised me, especially considering part of the survey was taken in the opening of Gatton Park and the Phoenix Park. We thought people would be like, we need more of this, but people are like, okay, this is enough, let's move to something different. Landscape areas, green infrastructure, I expected that to score highly. So I expected that to be maybe first, second, but as I said, it was the least. And then, let's see. When it came to the downtown maps that were sketched, I was also surprised that the compact CBD scored that low. But once again, this is a community-driven plan, so my personal thoughts doesn't affect it. It's what the community thinks. All right. Thank you. Thank you very much, Chair. Council Member Curtis. Thank you, Chair. And thank you, Boyd, for doing this, and thank you for all the work that you've put in on this project, and I'm so appreciative of the way that you guys have been out in the community collecting this input. I attended the event at the Lyric and was really blown away, both by the turnout and the degree to which y'all were engaging with people one-on-one. I think that's really impressive and something that we need a little bit more of in our government overall. So thank you for that. I have a couple of quick questions. They might be a little bit higher level, and if where you're at in the project doesn't really provide the information now, I just want to start the conversation on it, which, you know, again, affordability is kind of a buzzword right now, and there are various different perspectives on that, especially when it comes to housing. And so when we are talking about this, as we're imagining the goals of the project and the themes, how are we considering what could practically bring about more housing affordability? So that is something that is specifically, the consultant development strategies specifically looked into that. As I said, the theme includes the need for diverse housing types, accessibility, and neighborhood character preservation. So it's not just the buzzword affordability, it's who can afford these houses. If you have a diversity of houses, those are things we are looking at. And hopefully by the next community meeting, as I said, we are wrapping up the housing and market analysis. Hopefully by then, some of these answers will be obvious and he can explain it way better than I can do. This is, he's a technical person on that. Wonderful. I really appreciate that. The other question that I had that was also a little bit higher level is, a lot of what we're talking about here, increased pedestrian bike infrastructure, increased density and whatnot, these are things that tend to be controversial with people here in Lexington. There has been some contradictory desires, it feels sometimes. When we talk about these policy changes, and it's something that I saw when we were doing the street safety task force, a lot of what comes up is really the need for cultural change and shifting people's ideas about what's even possible to begin with in Lexington. I was just wondering how y'all are taking into consideration people's need to understand that something is possible or feasible in Lexington and what role LFUCG is going to play in that. So first thing is just be transparent. We are out in the community meeting them. We've had things people don't want, things people want. We've been in community meetings where at the end of the meeting, we walk away not knowing what we discussed. But we still go back and say, now that this is what we have, what do you think? So that feedback, it's continuing feedback. If you go back to the, you can see the community feedback will go on throughout. So listening to people is extremely important. Some people say no because of what they had, but once you sit down and go through this with them, they see the difference. And it's, personally I think it's been really amazing to see where we started and where we are now. And it was a way of documenting that because there was a lot of resistance, but now it's people holding hands and saying, let's do this. So that makes me happy. That's really wonderful to hear. And again, I can't commend you all enough on the public outreach that you've done and the engagement that you've done. I think it's been really effective and I'm excited to see how that develops and how we can continue to shift the culture of imagining what is actually possible here in Lexington. So thank you for your work and keep up the good work. Thank you, Chair. Vice Mayor Wu. Thank you, Chair. Thank you, Mr. Shaway, for your work on this. It was very interesting to me, even when I went to the stakeholder group on the government folks, we all drew the map of downtown and looking around, seeing how different everybody's maps were. It was really fascinating. What I really do appreciate seeing is how much alignment there is from what the public has told us is important and that alignment with our comp plan and our complete streets on things like housing, accessibility, bikeability, all those things. I think it's really good, if for no other reason, just as a good temperature check on our community's values and does it still align with what folks told us when we created the comp plan, when we updated the comp plan. But I think also this is beyond just a great exercise to see what people are thinking. This is ultimately going to be a planning and visioning tool. So I really do appreciate the depth of work that you all have done on this and really, really gathering community input in a real substantive way. So I appreciate it. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Reynolds. Thank you, Chair. Thank you so much for you and others from planning for working on this for so long. I think it's very needed and I appreciate all the hard work that's gone into it. I just had two kind of topics I wanted to touch on. One is housing. I noticed that when we look at the project goals, that's one of the items, build more downtown housing at various prices, but it doesn't seem like it's mentioned very much in these pages. Could you expand on that a little bit? Okay. Yeah. So I think this will show it better. Nope. Let's go back one. So what's happening with housing, by the time I submitted this presentation and now, you can see the housing and market analysis is completely in the draft phase. I do not want to put out something that, when I haven't seen what the draft is, and then say something different. So since that is in the draft phase, they're actually drafting the document. We left it alone. And after that, we will know more about it. I can come give you the presentation once we get some material and we can talk over that. Okay. That's helpful. And so with the public engagement on housing, did you hear from a lot of people that they wanted housing or was it mostly around these other topics? Yeah. Housing has come up constantly. You can see even here, there's concerns from everyone about housing. So that's a topic that's come up in every community meeting. Even with the student meetings, that came up. So it's something that's coming up constantly. People say that it's too expensive, we don't have enough, we need a diversity of houses. All these are topics that keep coming up. And shout out to Mark from Development Strategies. Some of these things took a lot of explaining and he took his time to explain it to us, how all this add up and how it will guide us into the future. So I'm really looking forward to reading what he has written. And as I said, I can share that with you once it's out. But he is really good at this and we expect nothing but the best from him. Yeah. I would love to see kind of more of a breakdown of how all of these different pieces would work together in our plan for downtown and how we would build that housing. So yeah, that's, I look forward to hearing more about that. And then I know, I appreciate you all trying to incorporate some more of this in your work that several of us asked you about demographics and how can we track more the people that we're reaching. And I noticed the breakdown in the zip codes. How much more can we do in terms of making sure that we know who is taking this? I know we have the zip codes and we have our ages, but even more demographics. So that when we point back to this plan, we can say we did actually reach a cross section of Lexington and of downtown and not just one demographic. Yeah. So the in-person surveys that were taken at the Lyric Theater had all those breakdowns. The online survey didn't go into that much detail. So right now, as you can see, it's just combined. But there will be a breakdown of all that in the final report. There will be a breakdown in the final report about that. And then moving forward, any additional surveys would include that demographic information? Yes. That's part of what we are looking at. Okay. Thank you. I appreciate it. Thank you, Chair. Council Member Brown. Thank you, Chair. And thank you, Boyd, for the presentation and your work on this initiative. I just have a few questions and the first one is, do you think that some of the information that you're receiving is going to lead to either a recommendation or a conversation about a downtown development authority either being reconstituted or reinitiated to help make some of the vision for the downtown come to fruition? So as I said, the market analysis and housing study is in the draft process now. They've gone through everything and there's, I cannot give you a definite answer right now because I don't know what's in that draft, but I can get that to you as soon as we get that draft back from the consultant. Yeah, and I'd appreciate that, but I guess I'm talking about even outside of housing in regards to businesses, in regards to activating sites and in areas of downtown that really have potential. I just wonder if this report is going to help inform us on if we need to take an additional step and do more to make some of these things happen. So there will be recommendations from the report. This is a really, really high level master plan and out of that, there will be, that might be one of the things that, if the recommendations that they'll give and they'll like to make this plan work, you need to do additional studies for certain things. That might be one of them. I don't know for sure. I cannot tell you for sure that it is one of them, but hopefully, as I said, those are the experts. They know what they're looking at, but I can get that information back to them and tell them to make sure that, see what can be done about such recommendations. Yeah, the other thing I'll say too, and this is kind of a statement and a question. So I think when we first started rolling this out, there was a lot of conversation about gentrification, displacement, and then I've even heard from other neighborhoods about just change. They didn't want any change to their neighborhood. I don't think displacement was a concern as opposed to just changes, period. Sometime when people have a negative either outlook or perspective on something, that generates engagement, and I think that's been a benefit to the public engagement process. Can you agree or speak to that at all? I'll say yes to some amount, because the people who were there at the beginning have not dropped out. They are still very active and they listen, and as I said, it's amazing to see people who are just like, you're taking our land, so how can we get this to work better? Most of the people who were at the beginning are still engaged to date, and that's a very positive thing. It seems like a bad thing, but in some ways it's going to be a good thing, and I just appreciate your patience and your team's patience with hearing this out and sharing the information and getting some of the real information out there. As I said, this is the community plan. It's not an outsider coming in here to do something and leaving. We live in this community. We want the best for it. So what about, and have you all been hearing any comments in regards to two-way streets? I know a lot of times we don't want to have that conversation down here because it's kind of hard for us as policy makers, or it could be challenging to do that work, but I wonder if the conversation's a little different in the neighborhoods and in some of the other areas. Are they advocating for two-way streets, and are they asking for it or talking about it in regards to safety? Go ahead. So there's been conversations about safer streets, and one of the issues on safety is finding a more efficient way to move traffic through the downtown area. So the consultant has everything on the table. They are looking at all the options that can make this a safer neighborhood, not neighborhood, but a safer downtown. So everything that will make the streets more efficient, make the streets safer, they are looking into it. Yeah, I know, when I think about two-way streets, when I first came into office, it seemed like a hard and a heavy lift, but talking to folks in neighborhoods, they seem somewhat supportive of it, just off of the safety aspect and slowing down traffic. So I'd be interested in how that conversation progresses in regards to this plan. The last thing I'll say as I'm running out of time is that Midtown term, I actually used that term in regards to just come up with a term for that area. Is that an appropriate term to use for that? Does that really describe what we're talking about, or is that too far out of the box? I like it. I want to, where are you going? I'm going Midtown. I like it. Hopefully, it sticks, and so far, whenever we're in community meetings and discussing it, it's beginning to stick, and you might get credit for that because you came up with it. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Council Member Morton. Thank you. So on the meeting survey response map, does that reflect just the surveys after the event at the Lyric, or does that reflect all input throughout, all the surveys throughout the process? So this is the attendance for the Lyric Theater. This is the survey that was done online, and this is all the responses both from the online survey and the Lyric Theater. Okay. So we did a big push for online survey after that Lyric event. So does this information highlight the respondents after the Lyric event, or all those that took part in the survey throughout the whole Downtown Master Plan? Throughout the whole Downtown Master Plan, to that point. Okay. Thank you. Cool. So can you share examples of how this plan will influence outcomes in looking towards 30 to 40 years out, and what that may look like on the surface level for those who live in that area of influence, and what possible changes they could see? So once this plan is done, this will be recommendations. There's no immediate changes. This is going to be a slow, not a slow process, but a process that any change will go through the same process. If it's a zone change, it will go through the same process. If it's a development plan, it will go through the same process. So this will just be recommendations. Okay, cool. But with this plan, what would it push for more so in that area of, we call it the... So the CBD is a central business district, typical central business district. The Downtown Core is where the consultant will have recommendations like catalytic sites and connectivity, safety aspects like that. And then the area of influence will be more policy-based. All this, once again, will have to go through the process. These are just recommendations that they'll give, and then if someone decides they want to build something, we have to go through the same process that we go through. That is not going to go anywhere. These are recommendations. Okay. And have y'all had any conversations tied to any recommendations tied to anti-displacement or gentrification? Say that again? Have y'all had any discussions tied to anti-displacement and gentrification recommendations to kind of combat that? Yes. That's part of the recommendations. Okay, cool. Thank you. And that's all the questions I have. I just have a little something to say. So I just want to thank the planning staff for their work on this so far, but then also, every time requested to show up to a meeting for community engagement, they showed up, and I think they have been committed to listening to folks and showing up for community engagement. Just through this process, I have emphasized intentional engagement with neighbors who live in the surrounding communities. That was important to me, as they will be, in the future, most impacted by future developments. And the feedback I heard from the district was a little different from much of the typical feedback we often receive in a process like this. Recurring themes centered on concerns of displacement and gentrification, on comparisons between the adequacy of city services in the downtown versus their neighborhood that is also being considered as downtown, highlighting infrastructure such as roads, services like public safety. Someone mentioned the new unhoused street outreach, and a common sentiment I heard was, you know, we are only considered downtown when it benefits them, the city, but not when it benefits us. So there are also some strong desires for more welcoming downtown, and one that feels inviting and accessible to all communities, and for a meaningful investment in areas that have challenges specifically related to building healthier and safer communities. But what became clear to me through these conversations is that there is a disconnect, a disconnect shaped by perception and lived experience for many on the north side. Some of those neighbors feel that downtown is not for them. To me, this is valuable input, as mentioned by Councilmember Brown, even though, you know, some positive input, negative input, I think it's all valuable input that should be taken into consideration when we're doing these recommendations. And as areas are included in or adjacent to downtown, it's critical that those neighbors receive the same level of investment, services, and benefits as the rest of downtown, and that we create a more welcoming downtown for all. So I'll leave it at that. Thank you for your comments. I'll make sure that I'll come talk to you more about the recommendations and see what the people want so that we make sure we're on the same page. I don't see anyone else signed in. I want to say thank you for the presentation and all the work that you're doing. I really appreciate, like my colleagues have said, all the work that you've done on community engagement. I also attended the Lyric event, and I was very impressed with how many people were there and how engaged everyone was. It was very interactive. Could you remind the community really quickly on how they can find out more information and engage in the future? Yes, we can definitely do that. As I said, our next community-wide meeting is March 4th at the Gray Line, starting – let me not give you a start time because we've not confirmed that. We just know the venue and the date and tell everyone to do that. Another thing I would say, right now we've engaged with the downtown area community, and now we're expanding to engage countywide. So if you have any meetings in your districts, let us know. And even if we don't talk, we will drop off some materials updating people on what's going on. As I said, this is a community-driven plan. It's not just for those who live in the downtown area, because this is – as someone said, this is our living room. This is where we come and hang out, chill. This is some people's – some people consider it their bedroom. This is where they live. So we need all these people working together so that this is a unified house. Yes, well, thank you again. Next on our agenda is the presentation on our Rural Settlement Study. Vice Chair Lynch, this is your item. I'm going to turn it over to you for introduction. Thank you, Chair. And first, I would also like to thank Councilmember James Brown for helping me to direct my steps toward this Rural Settlement Study. We had a conversation about it back in 2024, and then I did a bit of a deep dive into the study. So I thought that it was ripe for solutions and further work, so I put it in committee back in 2024. In 2025, our Preservation and Planning staff were pretty busy with a little thing called our Growth Management Plan, so – which is why we're having the first presentation on the Rural Settlement Study in 2026. I spoke with Director Duncan about, okay, I don't want you all to be working to your width end, but how can we work effectively? So 2026 seemed like a great time to kind of launch this, because we'd have – the management plan would be pretty much done at this point. So colleagues, this presentation is a level set and a launching pad for taking a closer look at our unique rural settlements via an already completed study that we can look at. When I met with – I've had several meetings with our Preservation and Planning team, and Director Duncan said the most poignant words about kind of what the focus – we should focus on in looking at the recommendations in this study and how we implement them. And he said the words preserve, protect, enhance, and enable. And I was like, that's it. That's exactly what I want to do. So through this work with the study, I hope to preserve, protect, enhance, and enable all of our rural settlements, and so this is the launching pad for that work. So I'll turn it over to Director Duncan, who's going to give her presentation. Thank you, Vice Chair. As Councilmember Lynch said, this is essentially a refresher to some of us and perhaps an introduction to others about what rural settlements are in Fayette County. About 20 years ago, planning participated in a study of the rural settlements along with University of Kentucky, and that enabled us to gather a good amount of information that perhaps hadn't been codified before and form the basis for subsequent decisions. So while it may seem like there hasn't been a lot done, I do believe that within the community, community leaders and others have used the work of the rural settlement study in 2006 and other resources to keep the efforts for recognizing rural settlements front and center. So this has been a sustained effort over the past 20 years, and we are certainly happy to work with you all to see what next steps we should be taking. And I do want to say that even 20 years ago, and just as now, many of these rural settlements remain vital and vibrant communities in our rural area and contributors to the culture and character of Fayette County. So when we think about rural settlements, this is the definition. It certainly is something that is small, that's either a residential or a business community, generally without a lot of urban services, but recognized for its historic contributions to Fayette County's rural landscape. Our rural settlements were largely established around the time of the Civil War and through the early part of the 20th century, and are generally divided into three categories. Free black settlements, accommodations for former slaves, crossroads communities and rural service centers, which provided urban services in a limited manner in the rural area so that people didn't always have to come into town, and in some instances, just simply some rural subdivisions that sort of predate our contemporary idea of a subdivision. As far as we know, the first significant and comprehensive study was done in 1971. The Historic Survey of Rural Settlements in Fayette County. And in 1999, when the first rural land management plan was created, they referenced that study and called back out the rural settlements as something that needed to be remembered and reimagined again. And so that led to the 2006 study with the Center for Historic Architecture and Preservation at UK, where we went out to all of the rural settlements, provided modern mapping, GIS mapping, gathered the information, met in the locations, and then came up with new recommendations. The rural settlements had been referenced in all the comprehensive plans this century, and they were included when the rural service area land management plan was updated in 2017. And at least from our perspective, the rural settlements came back to our understanding or back to our conversation in 2023 when the Advisory Committee was considering expanding the urban service area, the recommendations for that. And some of the rural settlements were starting to get closer to the urban service area as a result. According to the studies, there are 16 rural settlements in the rural service area, totaling just over 500 acres. And they're not that large. As small as 5 acres, up to 66 acres. And these are the settlements. Sometimes, some of these names are recognized as being associated with something else, like Athens and Avon, and others may be less familiar, particularly the smallest ones that are perhaps some of the subdivisions in TAM, in the rural area. They are on the southwest side of the rural area, and then along the eastern side, really from north to south, all the way down. Some of them are even seen as spoken together. For instance, Columbus and Uttinger Town are usually said in the same word because they are adjacent rural settlements. Features of the rural settlements, particularly the residential ones, include perhaps a church building, or if it's a more modern church, it's a longstanding congregation that was established decades ago. Presence of a large building, such as the Union Benevolent Society. By rural standards, the lots are small. There are rural businesses in the area that you don't ordinarily see in the rural service area. And again, minimal urban services. Now, not all rural business areas in Fayette County are rural settlements. There are a number of perhaps existing and former roadside motels, gas stations, very good hot dog places. And those are not necessarily rural settlements, but they are business areas that were established in the second part of the 20th century, not to be confused with what the rural settlement study has done. So in 2006, the study came up with several recommendations that might be applied, depending on the interest of the people who still lived in these rural settlements. Some of them are easy to do, and perhaps not intrusive at all, such as signage. Other things that might cost some money, such as the government providing financial assistance to those who may need help in keeping and refurbishing their homes. And then preservation through regulation. And again, if we were to pursue that, that's certainly something we'd want to have conversations with the people who live there. Say just a few words about the difference between a rural settlement and a rural activity center. If we've already defined what a rural settlement is, rural activity centers are much bigger. They're hundreds of acres. They're places of commerce, public access, and they were established in the modern era, and they're still very much viable to our economic vitality in Lexington, including the airport, the Spindletop Office Park, and Blue Grass Station, which used to be a federal military base. Now most of that property is owned by the state, but still a lot of military-related activity takes place out there. And then we've crossed out Blue Sky, because that was always our fourth rural activity center on the eastern edge of town. But as that was brought into the urban service area in 2023, that's now part of our urban area, and you all may recall that we are studying that with a small area plan to determine how it should be activated more as an urban use in the future. And then one final word about rural settlements that were formerly in the rural area. Cadentown in the Liberty Road, Old Todd's area, Bracktown on the far western part of town off of Leestown Road, and then Jonestown, which is off Tate's Creek Road between Armstrong Mill and Man O' War. Cadentown and Bracktown have a lot of their original character intact. In fact, Cadentown has one of the preserved Rosenwald schools there. It's also protected with the H1 overlay, so it's probably got the most going forward in the way of protection and recognition. Bracktown has conditional zoning so that the lots have to be a minimum size. Jonestown really has no recognitions or protections. In fact, all that's really left of Jonestown is the church. It has been highly and densely developed with townhouses around that. So to wrap this up, the 2006 study is still good. It's still useful. We do not believe it needs to be started over again. It's actually a place to launch from. Revisit some of the recommendations about protections and how we may want to look at the rural settlements in the future, and certainly as a reference for what the source of the people who live there, why they're there in the first place, and how the rural settlements can continue to contribute to the vitality of Fayette County. Thank you. Thank you. Colleagues, sign in if you have comments or questions. Council Member Morton. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for the presentation. Rural settlements are definitely very important to me. I come out of New Zion, which is right on the borderline of Scott County, Fayette County, so not within the city's Fayette County rural settlement, but very close to it. So I guess just my thoughts are I understand the protections that you've listed. I guess what are the next steps on those and what's the timeline to start implementing those protections? Council Member, I believe that working with Council Member Litch, we can decide what sort of shape a review of that should take. And again, I do believe that the public engagements, particularly with the individual rural settlements, would be very important to the outcomes here. But certainly lead that up to council, how we want to proceed with that, how quickly, and what we want to approach first. Okay, cool. And actually, you just hit on my next question. I was going to say kind of tied to is there plans to engage with the folks or families or past families of those folks in the rural settlement and kind of get their input, get their needs, and kind of do a needs assessment of what they see protection may be? That would certainly be our recommendation that we do that, yes. Thank you. Council Member Brown. Thank you, Chair. And thank you, Council Member Litch, for the reset on this issue. And thank you, Director Duncan, for the research and bringing us up to speed. You said you don't think we have to start over from scratch. You think the study is a good starting point. What do you think it would take to update the work and bring things current? And I'm talking dollar figures. How much do you think we would have to spend to update information and to see what changes have been made and that sort of thing? Council Member, that isn't even something I've contemplated because I feel like that we'd first want to decide what it is we want to do. And do we think we have enough information working with the people who live in the settlements to know what the next step ought to be? But if we discover that there are other things that the property owners and residents ask us to do that perhaps are beyond what has been originally recommended, then we may need to come back and do that. But we really had not contemplated any further expenditure as far as study goes. We're rather picking this up and moving on, kind of engaging and seeing what we want to do next. Okay. Can you pull the map back up, the one that had where they were located? And my next question is going to go back to something that you and I have talked about previously. And it was the conversation about the classification of some of these areas when we're talking about expansion or not expansion and inclusion and not inclusion. Was there an opportunity or a place in the study that made a recommendation about how these areas needed to be and should be treated when expansion was a conversation in, near, and around them? You know, that's an interesting angle on this, Council Member Brown, because at the time of the study in 2006, there was hardly, well, at least certainly from all the decision-maker side, there was no appetite for expanding the urban service area. So it really wasn't on anyone's mind at that time. I think that when you're looking at what the study recommended as far as preservation, when it's talking about things like the H-1 overlay, that's a pretty strict preservation tool, one that certainly would stop any changes there. It wouldn't necessarily bring it, keep it from coming into the urban service area, but it would certainly make sure that whatever was there, whatever the buildings were, whatever the lot layouts, all of that would remain intact. And if you remember one of my concerns, and I hope I didn't cut you off, is the concern was if we preserved these areas or we protected these areas, it could potentially put the folks that own these properties in a position where they couldn't maximize their investment. And I didn't think that was, in some instances, that wouldn't be a benefit to those property owners. And we have seen that, Council Member Brown. That's why when we talk about, you know, I try not to be too editorial about what the H-1 overlay means, but it is certainly a strict regulatory approach to land. And it does. It does perhaps, it certainly has an effect on how property owners can then use their property in the future if you have an H-1 overlay. So that may be something that if there is a group that's formed and discussing with the residents and property owners what other things that the study didn't recommend might that we want to do. And there could be some things. One of them would just be to make sure that as we move, if we move the urban service area line, that that's one of the strong considerations when we do so. Yeah, and I appreciate that. And I understand not having any answers today. These are some pretty tough questions. But that's one of the things I would like for you to be thinking about is what is a potential recommendation for how these are treated if the land around these hamlets or settlements change just, you know, based off of some of the things I mentioned to take into consideration. So thank you. Thank you, Chair. Council Member Savickney. Thank you, Chair. Time's up. Time's up. Thank you so much for the presentation. And thank you, Council Member Lynch, for bringing this back up. It does seem like the rural settlements kind of keep they kind of keep coming up without any real it's like we want to recognize them and do something about it. But it seems like we're never really we're never finding a way to make them more of an official something or an official protection or whatever. My question is along the line to Council Member Browns is you would think that these rural communities there should be an advantage of being a landowner in one of these communities. And I don't know if that advantage is that they actually can petition to to be included in the urban service area like as a as a group. I don't. It just seems to me if we throw a historic overlay on them without them wanting it, it does create an issue. But if there's an advantage to them coming into the urban service area as something that wants to be preserved and recognized differently, I just think there's something that there's something we should do for that. Otherwise, I'm kind of my guess is I think there's only three or four of them that still are. I don't know that there's that many that are strongly formed. I know I think little Georgetown is basically gone because of the airport expansion. You know, there's things like that. And I don't I just don't know exactly how how we're going to move forward with this. And it's not really it. So there's no real question here. It's just is there an opportunity to my colleagues to do something that actually is advantageous and then kind of creates these cool little communities that we really can celebrate because they've got some great things going on because they're so such individuals. That's it. Thank you. Council Member Baxter. Thank you, Chair. Thank you. Thank you, Director, for the presentation and Council Member Lynch for for putting this in the committee. I think it I do think it's really important work. And I like that it is an expansion of the sense of place, an initiative that Council Member Plowman started. Like Council Member Morton said, I think as we're going into these communities and we're talking to the residents and the people who have lived there for an extended amount of time, talking about what their needs are, this isn't necessarily a planning responsibility. But we would be remiss if we didn't take that opportunity to talk to those individuals and gather historical information. Like my family ran the general store in Athens. So, you know, we've got ledger books and all this kind of stuff. So that would be interesting stuff to give to to gather and give to the history museum. So as we're there and we're having these conversations and we're we're listening to verbal history, it would be it would behoove us to gather any any written history or pictures or anything like that. So that those memories can be preserved for areas that that may or may not always exist. So that's just I just wanted to add that in there. And I'm happy to help with any of those initiatives as well. Thank you. I have one quick question. You know, Council Member Brown mentioned hamlets. And then Council Member Baxter mentioned the sense of place program that Council Member Plum, former Council Member Plumlin had started. Could you talk about the difference between the sense of place program and and hamlets versus what you're talking about here with the rural settlement study? Madam Chair, I really can't talk about a sense of place because I have not been involved with it. I'm aware of it. And I know that there was good work done on that. But and I do believe that they were using some of the resources that informed this as well. So I believe there's a lot of crossover there. But what other outcomes are coming from sense of place? I can't say because I haven't been. We're not involved in that in the same way. But I will say and this may not even be the question you were asking, but I will say that when it comes to hamlets, we in planning have been very careful over the past 20 years, particularly when we were involved in the 2006 study, to use the term settlement. Because that's the way it's referenced in the 1971 work. And that's not to say that they can't cross over. But there's also the concern that if you start mixing these two, that hamlet may start to sound something more storybook and not convey the gravity and importance of the history of the settlements, which has been the term that's been used throughout the years, the decades, to describe and define these. So we will carefully try not to use the word hamlet unless that's what seems to be appropriate. But we believe that rule settlement and these are the rule settlements that have been studied is the way to refer to these to ensure that they are treated as something that's important, part of our past, and can be addressed for the future as well. Okay. And one of the reasons I ask is because, for example, Cadentown has been mentioned in this presentation and that is one of the areas that a sense of place is focused on. And I believe that the focus of that program is also, you know, recognition of these communities and preservation of these communities and their history. So it seems like there's some overlap, but I understand what you're saying about the terminology from a planning perspective and that kind of work going forward. I just want to check in. We have a couple people that are signed in. Council Member Lynch, do you want to talk again or do you want me to take the questions for you? I didn't know if you had a closing or a wrap up or if you want to have the discussion. You can take the questions. Okay. I'll take Council Member Brown first and then Council Member Morton. Thank you, Chair. And I just wanted to speak a little about the sense of place and kind of the difference. We are talking about a lot of the same locations, and I think the sense of place initiative is also talking about the terminology in which they reference these areas, whether it's settlement or hamlet, which is the most appropriate. And some of that feedback is coming from the families that live and own the property and how they want to be referred to. I also think sense of place is more about recognition, acknowledgement, and seeing what we can do to help support those efforts and those communities in collaboration with those families and those neighbors, where I think this study is more of a policy planning document that suggests and help us allocate resources to those areas. So I think they're intertwined and connected, but kind of have separate modes of transportation, so to speak. So I hope that helps. Yes, thank you. Council Member Morton. Yes, I just want to put a quick point. So just under the protections, it highlights financial assistance to low-income homeowners. That's not within planning, but we could say that sometimes in that case that we know that displacement and gentrification could sometimes due to lack of resources from those folks could be a leading factor. While that wouldn't be under planning, that could be key information for protections or for resources moving forward. Would you say that's correct? Yes, I agree. And in fact, the financial assistance was one of the recommendations for several of these settlements in the 2006 study. So yes, we are happy to be a part of reporting that and helping to facilitate that. I appreciate it. Thank you. And Vice Chair Lynch. Thank you, Chair, and thank you, colleagues, and thank you, Director Duncan, for the presentation. Just to share with you what my next steps are going to be. So I'm going to convene a diverse workgroup to review the study recommendations for each settlement and come up with solutions that are uniquely tied to the settlement. While there are similar characteristics in them, they all are different, very, very different. So I don't think there's going to be a cookie-cutter resolution for this. I think every settlement will have their unique needs and will work with that unique population, the families, the history, to kind of work to meet those needs. I know a sense of place has been brought up, and I do see some overlap there. And so Council Member Brown, I think we should continue to work collaboratively with you leading a sense of place in this study so we can make sure that we're taking care of those hamlets comprehensively. So I look forward to working with you more on that. And then I'll just end with I've always been a history nerd, so this kind of feeds my history nerd passion, because the study reads like a history book, which I love. There's lots of data and details, but there's a lot of history in it about each settlement. So it's been a great read for me. And my ultimate goal, as I said earlier, is to preserve, enhance, enable, and protect each settlement. And those solutions are going to look different, as I said, for every settlement. So I'm looking forward to this work, and we'll convene a diverse workgroup to begin the work to do the dive into each recommendation for each settlement. So more to come in the future. Thank you, and thank you, Director Duncan, for the presentation. Colleagues, the last item on our agenda today is our annual review of items in committee. So I am just going to run through the list that's in our packet, and if you have something to add, please do so briefly so we can be efficient. The first item on the list is a sense of place. Council Member Brown, that's your item. Do you have any updates for us for the moment? Not at the moment. Okay. The next item is mine. It's the examine opportunities to relocate programming and initiatives from the Mayor's Office to other relevant divisions or within LFUCG. This was added to committee a couple budget sessions ago because we were having discussions about the Mayor's Office being a place where you start up a program like an incubator, and then once it's shown efficiency, then we can move those programs to more permanent places within government. But those conversations require structure and budgeting to move them. So this was kind of a placeholder to have a space for those conversations. I'm going to make the motion to remove this at this time because there's nothing that we're currently working on, but if anyone has an item, a specific item that they want to introduce in the future, they can do so. So I'll make the motion to remove. I have a second. All in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? I didn't call for discussion on the motion. Did anybody need to discuss? Okay. So that motion passes. Charter review is the next one. Vice Mayor Wu. Thank you, Chair. At today's work session, I'm going to be walking on a resolution expressing support for the work of CivicLEX and organizing a Lexington Civic Assembly. This resolution will serve as our commitment to receive and consider the recommendations relating to the Urban County Government Charter. The Civic Assembly is meeting in March, and our plan is to have CivicLEX present their recommendations of the Civic Assembly at GGP later this spring. Thank you. The Boards and Commissions Comprehensive Review Item. This item is now a subcommittee, but Vice Chair Lynch just gave you a little promotion. Vice Chair Lynch, did you have any updates on this item for the subcommittee? We are, I think, trying to schedule an update for the committee in the fall of this year, so probably around October, so we'll confirm that. The next two items are for Council Member Reynolds from the Planning and Development Study. Do you have any updates on those? Yes. We've picked this back up and are working on it, and you should have an email, but we also will have an update around August. Council Member Baxter, Regulation of Digital Billboards. Thank you. I have a few items in committee, and they are all on a very lengthy agenda with planning coming up, so I should have more updates on each of my items probably at our next meeting. Council Member Ellinger, this is the Homelessness Need Assessment RFP. The results were presented to the full Council, and we now have a task force on the homelessness, and we have a motion to remove it from the committee. We have a motion and a second. Any discussion on the motion? I'll actually give you time for that this time. All in favor say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Okay, that passes. Meeting with Planning. We met with Planning actually in December. They provided us with an updated timeline on both the Equity Policies 1 and 2, and the Planning Education Academy. For Equity Policies 1 and 2, we're working towards lab reports to be published on the Imagine Lexington Analytic Research Center. And if you haven't had a chance to check out the Analytical Research Center, known as the ARC, you should. It's an essential function of Lexington's preservation and growth management program. That's it. Thank you. The Bring Back the Bluegrass item, that feels like a tongue twister, is Council Member Morton. So we have a pilot project that we're doing with Mr. Naki with Geomancer, to educate the community on what Bring Back the Bluegrass is, the environmental qualities tied to it, but then also teach them how to invest in the Bring Back the Bluegrass and make it as beautiful as possible. So we look forward to presenting in the fall on that. Great. Absentee Landlords, this one's Council Member Curtis. Yes, that's something my office is working on, planning to present in the fall. And Council Member Savigny, this is the solar energy system, ZOTA. Our work group has been meeting, and we will bring an update to the committee when it's ready. Council Member Lynch, we just did the rural settlement study, so I'm going to move on from that one. Council Member Brown, we have efficiencies in our development processes and compliance with House Bill 443. I think we're slated to give an update in either February or March. Okay. Council Member Morton, you have revitalizing LFUCG youth programming. Yes, indeed. So Phase 1 was pretty much assessment. Phase 2 is going to be community input, where we'll send out surveys and have different town halls where the community can give input on their thoughts of youth programming and how we can make it more impactful and kind of highlight some gaps. Thank you. Next we have Blue Sky Small Area Plan. I'm going to kick it to Council Member Boone. Thank you, Chair. We've been meeting regularly, and our next meeting is February 19th. I think spring of 26 is when it will be presented on. Thank you. Council Member Morton, yours is the next one, Neighborhood Voices Project. Yes, indeed. So the Planning Department, specifically the Community Engagement Office, is working diligently on this project. Meeting with stakeholders and have planned a community event. And we are hoping that we can present just a little start of the project this spring. So looking forward to that. Okay. Thank you. Downtown Area Master Plan, we just had our presentation on that, so I'll move on. Council Member Beasley and Council Member Morton, the review and analysis of the LFUCG operated community centers. Thank you, Chair. We are slated to present in February on that. We have one last recommendation meeting on Friday at 1 o'clock, but we'll be ready to present in February. Great. Thank you. It's the same update as my other one. Just currently still working on it. Okay. Thank you. Vice Mayor Wu, Planning Education Academy. Thank you, Chair. The Outreach and Strategic Planning section is going to present on this item in the fall of this year. Great. Council Member Baxter, I think you have the same update from planning? Okay. For drive-thru facilities and drive-up windows. Council Member Curtis, review of artificial intelligence policy. Great. The next item is my own. It's on data centers, and that item is underway. So I'll bring the committee updates once we have them. And then Council Member Reynolds and Lynch, affordable housing solutions. Yes. Council Member Lynch and I are actively working on this, and we hope to have something to present in the fall. Thank you. Then we have our annual and periodic items. First is the Purchase of Development Rights Program. That's an annual report that is required by ordinance, so that one is going to stay. The next item is the Lexington History Museum. We don't think that the relationship between the museum and council at this point necessitates an annual update anymore, so I'm good with removing this from committee. Okay. I'll take that motion. So moved. And I have a second from Vice Mayor Wu. Any discussion on the motion? Okay. All in favor say aye. Aye. Council Member Lynch, landlord and tenant advisory groups. We are solidifying that. I think it's going to either be in February or March. We're working with Alicia to get that date. And then Council Member Brown, short-term rentals. Council Member, I'm inclined to want to remove that item unless you see a reason why we should keep it. I think it's good for us to have the data updates. Let's have the presentation one more time to just give us an update to the committee potentially, and then maybe make the motion to remove it after that. Okay. Yeah, I'm fine with that. And then the final item is our Subcommittee for Boards and Commissions, which we have already talked about. Thank you for your participation in today's discussions, and thank you to our presenters. There's nothing else on our agenda, so this concludes our meeting. Our next meeting is February 10th.