We did say that we would go to 530, but nothing is forcing us to do that. We could leave earlier. So, we're going to be really efficient today if we can. I'll just let a few people get settled. We're moving. I think we're moving, Jeff. He's staying? You're staying? Okay. All right. So, welcome, everyone. So, welcome, everyone. My name is Diane Fleet. I'm chair of the Mayor's Task Force on Homelessness. We're going to call this meeting to order. And if you all could take a second and look at the minutes, and if there's any corrections, I would love to hear that, or a motion to approve. I'll make a motion to approve. Second. Wonderful. Any comment or corrections? Good. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Any opposed? Minutes accepted. Thank you all so much. So, just some preliminary things so we can kind of get into the meat of stuff. We are going to change up a little bit of the schedule for the task force meetings, and just to give you an overview of what we're hoping to accomplish. So, you might take a peek at calendars. So, we're not going to meet at the regularly scheduled July meeting. What we would like to do is meet towards the end of July. So, today we'll be looking through the recommendations from each of the committees, and then you'll have a little time to think about it, to work with your committees, and then we'll come back together to take some, to make motions of recommendations that we want to send forward. Then we have the public forum at the Senior Center. And what date is that? Tuesday, August 11th. Tuesday, August 11th. So, we'll get feed at 6 p.m.? 6 p.m. So, we'll get feedback from the community. Then we will take that information back, and then we'd like another meeting at the end of August to finalize everything, and then we would like to have one final, final meeting September. We're hoping to wrap this up in September. Does that set well with folks, that timeline? So, I guess what we're looking at is the next day, which is sort of an end of July, and do we want to kind of stick with our Wednesdays, like the last Wednesday in July? Same time, same place, hopefully. We'll check the availability of the room. The 29th of July. Is that TC? All right, all right. We will do better than candy then. Okay, so July 29th, we will plan that it will be at 3.30 to 5, and then we'll have the room to be determined. Did we previously have something scheduled for July or not? We were just kind of going with the same rhythm, so I don't know if we carried it all the way out, but I think the expectation. 29th. 29th, yes, sir. Then for everybody that would like to attend the town hall meeting at the Senior Center at 6 o'clock, we'd love for people to be in attendance, but we'll get feedback from the community. And then we'd like to pick a Wednesday date after that. Let me look at my calendar. 19th or 26th, does any date work better for anybody else? 19th, August 19th, 3.30, hopefully here. We're really hoping everything will be kind of finalized then, and we'll just tie a bow on it in a September meeting, okay? You're pretty important. You're good? No good? Are you good on the 26th? Let's look. We've seen everybody through. I hate to miss so many people. We thought the 12th was too soon. That's after the town hall meeting. Does it have to be a Wednesday? Can we do the 20th or 27th, which is a Thursday? No. Okay. Diane, there's a council cow at 4.30 on the 27th, so we can't do that day. It's a council meeting. Let's tentatively plan on the 26th then. Liz, what date did you say? Let's tentatively plan for the 26th, but stay tuned. If we're finding that too many people can't, yeah, maybe that's what we'll do. Okay. I was so worried about changing all this up. Okay, all right. We might do that. I'd hate to lose people. Okay, we can do that. Absolutely. All right, perfect. Thank you for all those adjustments. I just thought if we waited every month, then we'd be until November. We don't need to be until November. All right. So next on the agenda, we're going to talk about task force draft recommendations. So just before we kind of move into that, you all should have received it in the packet, the recommendations from each of the committees along with sort of a financial follow-up, kind of a statement that goes along with it. Please, please, please know that this is still draft. We're still having conversation. We'll give a little time after each committee's recommendation presentation for some conversation. I'm afraid if we wait and go through all of them, we'll kind of forget what the first group said. So if we can kind of talk about it and sort of hash some things out, then we'll kind of go through and then we'll open up time for public comment. Is that good for everyone? I'm going to take that as a yes. All right. So first of recommendations, I have Peer Cities and Shelter Models Committee. I've got Amy up front, but Tyler certainly can jump in. But, Amy, it's yours. Thank you, Chair. So these are the we looked at several shelter models in Peer Cities. We looked at Nashville. We've looked at the Volunteers of America. We looked at Loaves and Fishes and the Community First Village in Austin. We identified some themes that we would like to see in our campus here, and the recommendations came from that. And the first one we have is develop a comprehensive implementation plan, which is just prioritizing all the recommendations that we have, a timeline, responsible parties, funding needs, performance measures, accountability mechanisms to guide the execution. We also had one for establishing a centralized homeless service campus, which would include a triage. We call it a triage facility, but it could be an intake facility or whatever that looks like, client engagement, an accountability framework, almost like teaching people to fish. So while we're providing the service, we would like to, at some point, the ones who can stand on their own, make sure that they're able to do that. We looked at doing specialized populations. So the ones that we're looking at first are our families and are over, depending on who you're asking, what our senior age is. I think we picked 55 and up in folks with disabilities. We also said maximizing existing shelter campus resources. So conduct a comprehensive site study, operational assessment of the existing emergency shelter campus on Rosellas Road, evaluating the opportunities to serve low barrier unhoused individuals within the current campus footprint, identify opportunities for transitional housing development in the future, development plans for relocating existing city operations and equipments that are currently occupying that site. We talked about strengthening the public safety on the campus, including having maybe a roll call center, our paramedicine and our public safety on site out there to make the neighbors feel a little better, as well as if they were needed at the campus, they would already be there. Community engagement in the neighborhood, establishing a good neighbor agreement, create regular opportunities for dialogue between the neighborhood representatives, service providers, stakeholders and LFUCG, address the community concerns while building and supporting effective homelessness interventions, and expanding our transitional housing opportunities. So developing transitional housing opportunities to bridge the gap between the emergency shelter and permanent shelter by leveraging an available campus space. Integrating supportive services and helping individuals achieve long term housing stabilization. And with that, I'm happy, Council Member Morton and I are happy to take any questions. And Amy, just before you turn it over, can you, because I know we sort of distilled a little bit, some of those recommendations that you all made from the committee in the whole minutes. But on page, I think it's page eight of everyone's packet, we kind of really honed in. And I know some work has already happened, such as the first one of develop a phase plan to relocate existing LFUCG operations under sales. And I think that conversation is somewhat already occurring. So do you want to just go over that just really quickly? And some of those have already moved, right? Like the bank is already relocated. I don't know what else is already out there. But, yes, we've already spoken with Commissioner Ford about what that looks like as moving things from out there to other places that we already own. But the important thing about the, for sales road location is we've already ran utilities out there. So that's a big part that's already done. And continuing to use this site as our emergency shelter until we have something more permanent in place for out there. Minimize the neighborhood impact by including the location of lower impact populations, such as our family. So like our kids, husband and wives, or boyfriend and girlfriends who don't want to split up. Or partners that don't want to split up. And our seniors, which will, we think, make the neighborhood not as apprehensive about the population that will be out there. Because we're not putting single adults out there. So we think that it will make them feel a little better about being out there. And then making sure that we coordinate with public safety to ensure adequate levels of support to the facilities with their issues and concerns about that. Thank you. Does anybody have any questions? Or, Tyler, do you have anything you want to add? No, I don't think I have anything to add. I think it's kind of all laid out within the recommendations within the packet. But I think we listened to some of the concerns from last meeting and just some of the conversations from last meeting. And tried to make sure that we were being sensitive to those concerns. As well as regarding that existing location. I know that Commissioner Ford had mentioned that we should know that there are some city services out there. And if that is a thought, to use that space or have that space expanded to more so of a campus. That there would need to be a plan to have those services moved and what that would look like. So that's kind of where that recommendation came from. To make sure that we know that from our draft recommendations from the last meeting that we mentioned location. And then Commissioner Ford shared his thoughts on that. So then we just put in a will. Then we should look at possibly moving those services then. But I think just within, I won't re-read all this. I think it's all just laid out within there. And I think the recommendations come from what we think a campus should look like here in Lexington. Thank you. Yes, Mayor. May I ask a question? Is this distilled list, the recommendations? Or is the long list? This distilled list is the recommendations still in a draft form though. So in the minutes that Amy had gone over, if there's something that you don't feel made to that page or there's a concern. So there's still room for movement. But this is sort of the core recommendations. Okay. Because there's no one here, I don't think, from police. But I heard you say roll call center. Which is a multi-million dollar sector that has a huge area of the city. And I don't know if you talked to the chief about that. Because there's space only for a roll call center on that property. Yes, ma'am. And I call it a roll call center. But that's not necessarily what I'm talking about. I'm talking about a building for paramedicine and a resource officers to be in. Not necessarily a roll call center. I just don't know exactly what that's called. Does that make sense? I'll speak with him. Well, stopover. The stopover. So you're looking at a smaller. Yes, ma'am. Some kind of footprint that ensures there's occasional public safety in and out. Is that a fair way to say it? Yes, ma'am. And sometimes just having one of our officers' cars parked up there. Okay. Sometimes that's enough to deter anything that could happen. Okay, I'm good. Thank you. I'll speak towards it just a little bit. And I know just in the past, I know that just in general there's just conversations tied to the need to have a relationship with our public safety folks. For our unhoused communities, whether it be currently where we are or even in the future. And the recommendation just as it lies, it's not to the point where we said this needs to be there or that needs to be there. It just says establish a formal partnership between homeless service providers, the Department of Public Safety, and the Lexington Police Department to maintain an appropriate community oriented presence. I think that is broad enough to possibly establish a pathway forward where maybe it's just an office there. Or maybe it's broad enough. I think it can be from small to large, whatever the council and the administration sees so fit for that area. But I do know that if we have a sense of public safety, we have a public safety presence in that area that is both for our unhoused brothers and sisters. But then also both for the surrounding community, there's a sense of public safety, I guess you'd say. So I think it's hand in hand. And anything, if we do do a campus or do anything, I think there should be a partnership with our public safety folks. And I think that was almost a consensus with the whole committee. So that's my thoughts on that. So may I ask, who else here? What kind of police public safety presence do we have on the Hope Center campus? Does anybody? I don't think we do. I think they just regularly. Yeah. And they check in. Okay. Is that kind of what you're thinking? Well, I think a little similar. Well, so within Hope Center, they have the great privilege of being right next to BCTC. And right next to BCTC, we have our training facility with police right next door. But just looking at the VOA, looking at especially the VOA model, you know, they mentioned that partnership with the Louisville Police Department. And just looking at possible other models that having that sense of public safety is just important. And I think, you know, as we're looking to possibly expand or bring on new services, that should be something, that innovative solution, and should be a part of that conversation, even if it's not in our existing, you know, locations. I would love, especially within the first district, we have a lot of our resources within the first district. And I know that if we had possible, you know, more concrete partnerships within that public safety, response could be a little bit different, or the sensitivity, the nature of the surrounding community may feel a little bit different. So I think that's exactly what we're trying to balance between that. But to follow up on the mayor's point, I'm not aware of any police permanency in any program serving people who are homeless. There's more of a collaboration, but not on-site. Yes. Thank you. Thank you. I want to add that I do, Council Member Beasley also mentioned NROs, our Neighborhood Resource Officers. And I think that would be a valuable person to have in that area, to have one or two that are assigned, that kind of rotate around, but that really can work just like our paramedicine folks to build relationships with individuals. Because I think that part is so important with this community and the services and the needs. So I think an NRO approach might work here. And that has existed on and off, depending on funding and if that position was available. And it was helpful. Jenny, can you use the mic? The mayor was asking. Because you had the flush out, but it says there. At 14 and 15. No. Yeah. This is what starts, and it was their bigger one. But 14 and 15 would be good. Any other comments or conversations? Well, I want to follow up. I was on the committee, but under Recommendation 1, one of the important things we discussed a lot, I thought, was the priorities. Because there's a whole lot of discussion about all the wonderful things we would like to do, but the whole point of having the timeline was to set priorities to make sure we didn't take on things too quick, that we wanted to identify the priority that was first, which in most of our minds is the emergency shelter services. So that's the whole purpose of the Recommendation 1. And it's for somebody, the task force in general or everyone who follows up, to make sure those priorities are in the timeline so that you don't get sort of lost in the shuffle of doing something that takes up the money that we need to do to serve something that might have more of a priority. Thank you. Do you want to tack on a little bit of the financial piece for Zach? Yes, sure. I'll jump in. I'll jump in, and I think I'm working from, as Diane's already mentioned, page 8, the kind of distilled recommendations point by point. And so I'm just jumping in after the Peer City and Shelter Models Committee 0.1. Is that where we're at right now? Yep. So, again, specific to a facility on Versailles Road, the draft recommendations that the funding and partnership committees have come up with so far, and we touched on this in our last meeting a little bit, using a baseline of the study done by EHI presented to Council, that a facility would cost approximately $25 million to construct, I think, just to run through our recommendations for financing that. There's a couple of concrete things and a couple that are less so. There's $2.8 million I think we all know has already been set aside from prior fund balances for a project that would come out of this task force. We would recommend that the $2.2 million set aside for the work of this task force from the opioid settlement funds be utilized for this facility. There is a caveat to that that would say you have to take special attention to the programming of the site in order to use those funds so you do not hinder all of what you can do with certain populations. And there's ways to do that to look at projects on a campus that you can use funds for certain portions of that. And it's very similar to what the VOA model that's been discussed. They did things like that with various sources of money that would have different restrictions. One of our recommendations to fill that gap is to explore a Section 108 loan, which is available to any municipality that has an allocation of community development block grant dollars. And we can borrow approximately up to $10 million under that program for projects like this. Then to fill the balance of that gap, I think our recommendations are to explore a couple of different things. One, something that we already do, and I don't know how fruitful it will be, but continued advocacy to our state legislature for resources. I think that's a no-brainer and already happening, but we want to make sure we included that. Two, to look at any fund balances remaining ongoing and or other borrowing, bonding, that the city would be able to pursue as reviewed by the mayor's office and council. And then lastly, I think, and we'll get to this as we get to some of the other recommendations, I think there's an opportunity to solicit private investment from outside of city agencies to come and operate and construct a facility like this. Any questions or ideas for Zach that maybe this group didn't think of or concerns? Zach, is this all capital costs? Yes. No operational? Okay. The operational plan, just so everybody knows, would be to shift the $3 million spent annually on the winter shelter to various phases as they are completed. Actually, so you see the $2.2 million opioid funds as a separate capital built unit only for opioid recovery? Is that what you're saying, if this is all capital? Yes, within that same campus. I would think that the entirety, and I think Charlie's expressed this in previous discussions, that the entirety of the circumstances in which someone becomes unhoused can't be distilled down to only addiction. And so I think if you utilize that funding across the entire campus, and as I understand that funding, and I can't say that I understand it well, it would require that addiction-related services be used on the entire campus. So I think you'd have to bifurcate a particular building or subsection of the campus to utilize those funds that had addiction recovery services provided within it. Charlie, do I remember we have to, we do a regular report on our addiction, I mean on our opioid fund use, so how would you show that if you, I'm just trying to get a feel for how we comply with being sure this $2.2 Well, we would design it to comply. So you would design us. It wouldn't be used unless it complied. We would have to design it to comply. Do we know how to do that? It's done all the time, yeah, and we blend funds like that all the time with various projects. You just have to make sure that the part you're applying those funds to complies. Okay, thank you. So to understand, we're looking at $25 million to rehab the Versailles Road one. Are we looking at rehabbing Versailles Road and also doing an additional one then too? Because that seems awful high to redo all of Versailles Road. Yeah, I think you, I mean I don't think it seems terribly high, but I think to have a comprehensive shelter campus with triage services, addiction recovery services, you're talking about multiple housing types. I don't think you could physically fit in just what's on Versailles Road, so I think you're talking about kind of a reimagination of that campus, which would include the refitting of some of the existing buildings, but I think you'd have some additional facilities to construct there as well. So if my understanding, the Versailles Road is going to be not really a low barrier one because we're looking at the neighbors and others, so then if we're going to be doing the opioid addiction, I thought that would be kind of a separate one than what would be going on Versailles Road. So I'm not sure how we're looking at over 55 families, children at the Versailles Road, but now I thought we were going to kind of separate the issues with mental health and drug addiction at a different one, and so I'm trying to figure out how we square up the opioid then as being part of that one then. Yeah, that's a fair point, and I don't know that I have a good response to that. It's a function of working with the money you have versus the money you want. The money we have is opioid money. If we had another $2.2 million to take that place and we could use the opioid money elsewhere, we would, but if we say we're going to pull that out and use it for a completely separate project, then we've got to find $2.2 million somewhere else. No, I understand that, but I'm just trying to – if we're going to say that that one's not going to be really a low barrier one, then I'm not sure how we're going to be able to be able to – I'm not opposed to doing the Versailles Road and then another one for the group that we're not taking care of. Hopefully, we're going to be pulling some out from the others that can go into Hope Center because we'll be pulling some out for AIDS and other stuff, but still. No, it's a point well taken, and I think, Councilmember, what you're pointing out is that our recommendations from our funding subcommittee don't completely jive with the recommendations of the Peer and Shelter Models Committee, so we'll have to reconcile that between now and our next discussion. I think that's a well taken point, for sure. I don't think it's – I mean, I think it's a really great point to tease out, but I also say – and I know there's other shelter folks here. Danielle from Salvation Army just got here. Jenny with Catholic Action and Janice, who've done work. But coming from Greenhouse 17, not that there's a direct correlation between who's at our shelter, but there's a high – there's high co-occurrence of substance use and domestic violence. I'm just speaking of our own. I would think that you're probably going to see some co-occurrence with our over 55 and our families. Not exactly, and I don't mean to say that it's a direct correlation, but I think there might still be some wiggle room with the opioid monies even still holding dear to the population that we're talking about is my experience, and I don't know if you all have something else to add to that, folks that have worked in shelter facilities. It's just my experience. Well, is this just not addiction services but opioid addiction services money, correct? That's right. Yeah. So obviously there are people at any age that have opioid addiction, but it's probably not as broad as all addiction. But there's – in every program there would be people with opioid addiction, so it would depend on how you serve them within a shelter because they've got to enter someplace. So that would be the only way you could do it, I think. And it plays out a lot differently too, I think. So if you're looking at it within a family or you're looking at it within seniors, I think the impact looks different. How did you come to the decision at the age of 55? For our seniors? We have a lot of senior living income-based apartments, and that's what they start at is 55. But we went back and forth between 55 and 62, and then we all decided if we was 55 and homeless would we count ourselves. Okay. What about the people that's under 65? I'm under 65 and I'm homeless. Yes, sir. The campus that we're looking at, the ones that we are starting with here, will be families and then those who are 55 and older on this permanent shelter. I understand that. But what about the people that doesn't have family right now, that's really struggling? So we already have some homeless shelters out there, and so moving some of those people who would make it onto this campus, who would be in families that are over 55, would free up some more beds in some of those other shelters that are already in place. Okay. Does that answer your question? Just to give a little bit of context, and I think this may have come up in some other meetings that we've had previously, when we looked at some of the data, like the annual persons that are served at the Hope Center, for example, at least 25% of those individuals on an annual basis are age 55 and older. At Winter Shelter, we also had very similar breakdown of about 25% of persons being 55 or older. So one thing that we're seeing is just the overall amount of persons in that age group. And then in our most recent point in time count, the highest rate of growth that we saw on any subpopulation was those 65 plus. We had 10% of all persons included in our point in time count that were age 65 plus. So I think the hope is that we are going to increase the overall number of beds. We focus some of that development on some of the current unmet need, and then we also would then be increasing the level of availability at other shelters. However, I would like to add, even if we take our 55 and over out, if you do the numbers from this last year, we still have a lot left. We have 220 people. So and if playing with Hope Center numbers and playing with probably not our numbers, because a lot of ours are where they are. I mean, I think I'd ask David, what would you say 25%, Janice, is of Hope Center? Well, I mean, David was in on the dialogue. He's not here today about the numbers, and he thought that they could serve, you know, most of the population that is single males if the 55 and over were pulled out. It was a high number, you know. My understanding was that 25% of the Hope Center would be about 60 people. No, not 60. It was less than that. I don't have the numbers in front of me now, but it was like 58 or something. But the bottom line is that if you take our numbers and start playing with them, you'll see that even with you all taking some. Well, that's kind of, you know, the data that Jeff had and what David. It was a higher number. I mean, you're talking about at any one time, 25. Is that what you're saying? Well, at any one time, 25% is what David had. And the only reason I'm saying that is that we have to look. You know, we are aging, too. I mean, the numbers we work with, 55 and over keeps growing, but it isn't enough to take care of all of them. We know from the EHI study there are X amount of beds, unless you're going to make that a lot bigger under sales, right? So I don't know. I'm just saying, cautionary tale. We can't leave out our 18 through 54-year-olds. But, anyway, we'll get to that. But we also have to start somewhere, right? We have to start somewhere, or else we're going to be kicking the same can down the road in 20 years. Right. That's what I was saying. Why not have the families on one half of the sales and split that and put the people that ain't got families on the other half? Want me to be honest with you? Just split it. Because we can't afford it. I mean, you're building a shelter for the families. I mean, how many families do you think that place might hold? Well, families and individuals. It's just the individuals are 55 and older. I'm talking about families as far as kids, two or three kids, and the husband and wife. I'm saying if you've got 20 of them or 50 of them, the other half of the building is not being used but for offices. Why not turn them into it? But we would use the other half for singles, just 55 and older singles or people with disabilities. So it would be both. It would be both. Yeah. And, Tyler, can you kind of finish us up, just because I want to move on to the other recommendations? Yeah, I think I can do a quick comment. So I know that we're in conversations regarding the seniors and the families, and that, while highlighted as a priority, that was kind of from the EHR report where that was emphasized as the gap in services. That's kind of what brought that front of mind. But we also put right in a recommendation from our committee, and it's recommendation number four, maximize existing shelter campus resources. So conduct a comprehensive site study and operational assessment for the existing emergency shelter campus on Mercedes Road. So evaluate opportunities to serve low-barrier, unhoused individuals within the current campus footprint. Identify opportunities for transitional housing development in underutilized portions of the campus, and develop a plan to relocate existing city operations equipment currently occupying the site to maximize space available for the shelter housing and supportive services. So similar to what Council Member Beasley was saying, you know, I think we looked at it as kind of like a phased approach, knowing that, you know, there's a current gap right now for our unhoused families and our unhoused seniors, but understanding there is still a need to serve our individual unhoused brothers and sisters, and knowing that that's just going to be a need in the future across the board. So how can we phase it and still look at that campus and possibly address those concerns, you know, phased out possibly. Going towards the funding tied to opiate funds, I think I understand, you know, why it's in there. I think there's ability to do innovative solutions, whether that be creating, building a building, or specifically a unit specifically tied within that opiate criteria for our unhoused community, whether it be possibly, and it's not, you know, up to me, but up to the administration, deciding if there's a specific portion of the campus for folks that are in recovery or for folks that are dealing with opiate concerns. So I could, I definitely think that there's ways to use that funding innovatively while also following the criteria and making sure that we have our I's dotted and our T's crossed. So I could understand that being in there. But also if there is a concern, if they're in the future, if there comes to concerns tied to what they might not meet the criteria, then maybe it's just balanced funding. Maybe that then turns to programmatic funding for that site. So I think there's definitely ways and I can understand. I definitely supported that coming to the unhoused task force. And I think there's ways that it could be used, whether it be through development or through programmatic use. So that's what I got. Thank you, council member. Your wheels were turning. Thank you, TC. I'm going to shift to you as far as supportive services and prevention committee, but I'm going to hone you in on page nine. Again, it's sort of the kind of the, to use my word again, distilled recommendations. If you want to talk about that and give the opportunity for people to ask questions. Okay. I'm sorry. Okay. First of all, good evening, everybody. So we were, we were also talking about how the funding request and the proposals to develop and build operation, comprehensive housing and services on a campus of residential space for families and children. That was one. And then as far as our seniors, our persons with disabilities and our persons with low impact populations at that site. So that was, that was, and there was also some concerns also about that the other population that wouldn't be mental health and our substance abuse. So that was, that was areas of, of definitely concerns on that. Developing upon our, our check-in, our comprehensive needs assessment and the housing plans for each of our residents are outlined at steps leading to to successful exit exit from campus. But I'm going to go to my notes that I have that when we, when we were talking about our community engagement strategies and our plans to involve our community partners and learn from one is the model that we even have here. Not they have a model of a goodwill in Louisville and we also have a model that we've been working with Charlie with our goodwill here with our families. Okay. So our recommendations. Okay. So our, okay. So encouraging funding and or spaces are allocated such as residents on a campus as access to housing, it not navigation needs assessment, case management, mental and physical health, legal aid, employment and job training, educational opportunities, streamlining benefit connections, financial literacy, and many of our needs presented to the population. This would include services operated by outside organizations, such to provide space on the campus to offer those assistances. Okay. Holding residents accountable, which that's part of the diversion that we, we have been talking about holding the, our residents accountable to being good neighbors and working towards stability, stability by placing requirements for active engagement in steps outlined by the housing plan. So it's just kind of like what we've done with that other program that we, that we've had. Those who disrupt the community and refuse to work toward a stable, stable ability should be asked to move elsewhere. Some of our feasible to ensure the people asked to leave the campus, not eligible for services or otherwise removed or provided transportation and a destination outside of the neighborhood. Okay. So funding for, okay. Sorry, it was on. I turned it off. I think that's the next part that we need to discuss is everything she just went through. So the services that she outlined that would be provided there, the requirements about a housing plan and what was the last part you talked about? Oh, the one of the things, and this was a big point of discussion that last item she mentioned about ensuring that if someone is removed from the campus, this has come up in several of the meetings that it's not just, here's the door by, because when you do that, they go into the neighborhood and they cause issues. So the exit solution needs to be more advanced than that. It needs to be, we're exiting you and we're taking you to why instead of just, here's the door. That's what that means. Does that mean that they wouldn't get services anymore? Mark, I can understand them not being able to reside on campus, but do we just cut off their services? For the purposes of that campus? Yes. They would have to behave, or they wouldn't be able to stay there. I understand not being able to stay there, but still provide services even if not on the campus. But if they need particular services, those services need to continue or the problem doesn't go away. That is correct. Or they'd be linked to services that exist in the community. Yes. As long as we continue services and we don't just cut them off and say you're done. Like for example, I see this as one of those alternate destinations could be something like we transport you to the empath center. We transport you to a day center where you can access case management that we have to do a warm handoff, not just please leave the campus. And more than just, we're going to transport you out of this neighborhood and to another one, because the crime is not going to stop unless we continue services and try to right the wrong. Alan, I just want to ask with this recommendation, it was brought to my attention and I apologize if I get the title wrong, that a large federal grant was cut from, is it new new life day center? That seemed to provide a lot of day services. Maybe. How is that? That sounded like that was a pretty substantial loss for them. So I don't, there was a time that some state funding for new beginnings, one of our organizations that does housing and supportive services for individuals with serious mental illness was rescinded, but it was reinstated a few days later. Like a lot of these kinds of funding changes, they don't always stick longterm. So I'm not aware presently of any significant amount of funding that was cut from any organization. And we also did have earlier in the year, there was an abrupt stop to SAMHSA grants, which would be federal and that would have been very significant impact on mental health and substance use services. Similarly, it was later reinstated. Thank you. Thank you. We're in this place that we can take them that we don't have now, but we'll be able to take them once we get the facility. Are we, is it to my understanding that the belief is because we're going to do this opioid money, if we get it, it's tied in. And I don't know any, anybody that's going through addiction that has their family in the first place, because you got to sometimes go through courts to get your kids back and jump through these hoops. So I'm thinking of this campus. Would the campus be modeled something like the Salvation Army's campus where they've got a family section and then they have like single people that can come. I'm trying to get a visual of this campus over sales road. Then we'll have, if somebody disrupted and if it's not going to jail, then there's going to be a place that we can take them and they will continue services, but just not on campus. I'm trying to wrap my head around this whole concept. And Tana, can I, I, I appreciate that because we really love the volunteers of America site. And I know that's something that you really appreciated in the Louisville site. I just want to hold the public comments towards the end just to kind of get through the agenda. Yeah. Well, well, but just to the questions at the end, so we could just get through the agenda, but we'll write it down and then we'll kind of come back to it if it's all right with you. We just need to get through this piece. Thank you though. Anybody else around? I have a question for TC. That's on the, sorry. Yeah. I just meant for the board. I'm sorry. I feel it's difficult for me to not let someone speak, but I just need to kind of move through. Okay. So now we're going on to our funding for the recommendation using funding. And then Zach needed to go. Okay. Okay. Thank you TC. I'll move quickly to say that I think this is kind of a key recommendation that we came to as a subcommittee was I think the understanding is that the dollars that are saved by not doing the winter warming shelter operation or significantly reducing the size of that program would be diverted to operating some sort of facility like this. Although I do not believe that that would be near enough to actually operate a facility like this on an annual basis. So our recommendation is that the city issue a competitive request for proposals for an ongoing operator and that no capital funds be no capital funds be expended until an operator is selected so they can have input on how the campus is designed. I think council member Ellinger, council member Morton, your questions and points about the opioid settlement money. I think it would be important to request that the respondents to that RFP demonstrate their understanding of the requirements of that funding and how it meets the other goals of the population served at the site. I think that's kind of a key piece to operating a campus like this is that the city not try to fund by itself operations of that campus. They need to find someone outside, an outside party who has outside funding and discover that through a competitive request for proposals. Any questions from the board to Zach regarding the funding? Okay, TC, you're next. All right. Back to me. All right.  So developing a fund pallet program serving 10 to 20 households that offer transitional housing. It's also a pathway to permanent housing through mandatory engagement in supportive services, focusing on the employment support for people that have little or no income, like for example, the job training program helping them to grow their income and helping them learn a budget plan for themselves and helping them to be more self sufficient within a six to 12 month period. It does take our families longer than just a month. I know with our program that we do at Goodwill that it's, they work with them for a month, but then if they are McKinney Vento we, we try to offer that extended support because it does take a family longer than a month to try to get sustainability as far as income, but conducted also conducting a thorough program evaluation to determine the return on investments and evaluate successful rates of sustainability. So having that, that extra support there to kind of help them stay on track and evaluate where they are and then where they in a plan to where they need to go. Also elements of redeeming a valuable and a new permanent program incorporated elements as appropriate into existing systems. A drawn from a works, a stable recovery and a simple industrial Pacific projects to develop a reconciliation of a model tied to, to local employment needs. Number five though, developing alongside the Lexington Humane Society and local adoption groups for our foster and offer alternative place and programs to assist persons that who are non-service animals and barriers. I know that was one of the things too that we did with some of our families was our, some I had a family that literally did not want to surrender their, their pet to a foster care because it was an emotional support for their kids and so they chose not to even go into a shelter because the shelter wouldn't accept. So that's, that area I know is very important and at one particular time we did work with the Humane Society to actually provide that support. So that will definitely be a area of recommendations. They're expanding our medical capacity, increasing beds and support for chronic and longterm needs for people with medical conditions. That's again, surrounding our, our families that are persons that have our disabilities and have some more medical problems that might end up finding themselves homeless to prevent them from assessing other shelters or emergency housing. Sometimes people in crisis just need to find some help, finding acceptable alternatives to, to a shelter. Shelters and again, that goes back to our transitional programs and services that are out there, that to work more closely with families that are falling into the homeless systems. Each person keeping out of the system of shelter systems is a bed not needed. Lexington should grow its system capacity by requiring diversion strategies. And I know that was one of the areas that Jeff talked about in depth was a diversion strategy to kind of help him on a one. Okay. I'll say, so that definitely helping our families with that diversion to help them continue with sustainability for that. And emergency housing operations, including considering all options prior to establishing basic emergency shelter requiring homelessness, providing receiving from our local funds to operate shelters and emergency housing to present a diversion plan as a condition of funding. Also prioritizing homelessness resources from our local to emphasize diversion practices. And I'm just kind of running through here. Right size, the budget to the emergency financial assistance programs with community and residential services to ensure financial finances is available to the entire fiscal year. I know that's, that's important for our families that need assistance with, with their utilities and like with when they are relocated because of something that they've done and not evictions. But sometimes when they are, properties have been condemned being able to have those services there to help those families. And we find that there's more properties out there that are being condemned because of, of not being taken care of, but also continue and expand in the use of our housing flex funds to facilitate diversion and rapid strategies, establishing as a center intake and a triage location. And we really talked about that. A great deal of a homelessness can go have a place to go 24, seven, seven days a week for assessment and placement in appropriate locations. And so that that's a definite area of recommendations. They're trying to also camp a standalone and locations of existing locations and at the site providing intake and referrals. We talked about that in depth too, is intake systems for our shelters and emergency housing to ensure property placement and emphasizing diversion and reduction on the impact of people arriving from outside of Lexington. And that was a big conversation right there that we, we are getting, having more people come to our city and that are from outside of other counties. Anybody have anything on my committee? Yeah. I like what you said. I'm the homeless to have a place to stay for 20. I mean, all day, if we had a place to, to, to stay and don't have to leave at six, six o'clock in the morning and can't come back in the morning. I mean, if we had a place to stay, don't have to leave at six, six o'clock in the morning and can't come back to the property to six o'clock in the evening. We ain't got no choice, but to walk around the streets, you know what I'm saying? Bagging, uh, holding up signs. Um, just like I said, if we had a place that we don't have to leave the property, you might see a big old change. You might see a huge change in us. You know what I'm saying? Cause we don't have to walk the streets. We ain't out there in the elements. You know what I'm saying? We somewhere that we can call this is safe. this is safe. We have to, it's a lot of us don't even want to go out out of the building and walk around the streets. But if we ain't got no place to go, you put us out at six o'clock in the morning, we can't come back until like five o'clock to eat. I mean, what else is it to do but walk the streets and end up fighting crazy or getting in trouble. I like what your idea is though. Okay, picking it up. All right, we have a lot to talk about y'all. Okay, providing services. These services immediately do not, not shelters, individuals, intake centers. But people must place and exist from the centers in less than 24 hours from their arrival. If someone cannot be placed within the 24 hours, they must be transported to their last known location. And so if I'm not mistaken, Charlie, this isn't that what we were talking about with those that are coming from out of county? Yeah, that's kind of what that's getting at. Okay, because we find in that we're, okay, and requiring a condition of receiving city funds that shelters and emergency housing operates takes reasonable steps to prevent these beds and services being filled with people from outside of Fayette County. And facilitate an on-site operation of services by all partners who provide essential services for the population up to and including office and or sharing meeting spaces. Number nine, providing funding for the development of community-based case management program not tied to the shelter or program providing support for diversion and prevention, target case management, and literally housing persons and ongoing support. So we talked about this in depth about the case management piece is how important that is with services with our shelters. Is that if we have long-term case management, then folks might have a better possibility of sustaining sustaining their housing. And we've kind of even pilot that with with our Goodwill here at Fayette County with the Goodwill Center. Providing funding for development of community-based case management programs not tied to shelters. Oh, I already got that one. Okay, let me move on. Okay, together with the Eastern State Hospital and other mental health stakeholders, develop and fund a high-utilization program to identify and target small groups who are individuals with high for balance and severe mental breaks. And so we talked about, we kind of talked about that too with the Eastern State that a lot of times when they dismiss people from from those facilities that they hand them a piece of paper and said here's the resources. So how do we help them connect to more case management to be able to help those persons that are experiencing mental health crisis and that kind of things instead of just turning them on the street and say here's a piece of paper, go for it. But being able to help them. The program should help community identify those who at most risk of harming themselves or others and target interventions where traditional program has failed. And that was exactly the example that we had. Modifying and improving data collection on persons serving related in origin of homelessness. And that's kind of related also to our folks that are coming in, you know, getting more information from them and collecting more data. What was it that we talked about, Jeff, about putting adding to our data collection? So we talked about a lot of our existing data around homeless origin has traditionally been asked around where was the location of your last permanent stable housing. And that doesn't necessarily indicate that someone came here specifically for the purposes of accessing services. So we were looking at expanding the data points and data collection practices of our providers to have a more granular, more in-depth understanding of any kind of movement patterns that we're seeing. If someone is coming here from somewhere else, how long have they been here? Did they come here specifically for shelter? Were they brought here by law enforcement of another community? Or did they come here for a service like Eastern State Hospital? How many times have they made a move to another community in the last couple of years? It would just help us much better understand, since there is a great deal of concern around this topic, who is actually coming here specifically because of the services that we offer, and who is maybe here for another reason or has been here for a substantial amount of time that they really are a Fayette County resident at this point. I just think it would give us a better ability to explore and address those concerns. Okay. Also to include a public dashboard, results, outcomes for Urban County Government funding shelters and homelessness programs, using the information to inform the diversion strategies recommended above. Okay. So I just want to add it now. TC, I appreciate you going through that and I appreciate Charlie and you and Jeff going through and kind of streamlining the points that we made at the last committee meeting in regards to data collection for folks outside the county. I think that's something that we we continue to hear that we're servicing a lot of folks that aren't from here. I think nobody's arguing the point that once they're here we do need to provide services. But I think this could give us an opportunity to determine whether it's a fact or myth that our numbers are increased. So I think that would be helpful. Did we mention the funding for providing opportunities for folks to go back to their home or place of origins in regards to the flex funding? Did we mention that? Because I think that's what we talked about. So I don't know if it's gonna be reflected here because one of the eligible costs that we have under the housing flex fund right now is if we can confirm that somebody would have a housing opportunity in another community, we would be able to provide them transportation assistance. And there was a recommendation around continue and expand the use of the housing flex fund. So I think that's where you would find that. And then, um, item 12 also encourages that we would explore options for improving coordination between the three continuums of care within the state so that we can try to facilitate getting people back to a community of their origin. Um, but making sure at the same time that they would have adequate support that we're not just sending them there to be on the streets there, but we're connecting them with service and housing and shelter options where they want to be. And just to be clear, that it was voluntary transportation, not I mean, not involuntary. Like, is that somebody wanted to go back? Correct. Yeah, we would still have, you know, a barrier of if someone doesn't want to go, we can't force them. But it would be an option for us to just better coordinate that kind of movement where someone really doesn't want to be here. They're just here because that's where they physically are, and they have no resources to get back to where they want to be. Yeah, I think that's clear. Then also the community based case management program. I think we've all talked about how case management is important to moving folks to sustainability. And as opposed to tying it to a service provider or an agency, if we could have something in place that everyone can access, I think is, um, one of the good recommendations and then also time a diversion plan to city funding just to hold agencies accountable of not just warehousing people, but actually providing, um, a plan to sustainability. So thank you for that. Any other questions to TC from the board? If I could expand just a real briefly on the Eastern State program that was referenced that reflects we've told you all a couple of times that we have a parallel group that's been meeting that meets with Eastern State and all of the mental health providers. And it actually the reason it's been separate is it started before the task force even existed. Um, what that is stating and recommending is what that group came up with. That group has concluded that that program or initiative that they're saying we think we need to try is sort of their answer to trying, trying that. So that's why what we did was just slide that in since they've kind of completed their work. I think one piece to it was dense information. TC saying thank you so much. But I think what we kept hearing to was, you know, so we can build something. But what is the programming around it? And I was hearing a lot of language around accountability and opportunities. And I think there's just been some really great work of connecting people to individuals and programs that are already doing some great work. I think we kind of know what families need and people that are, you know, our seniors and our mental health. But how do we get that to them? And it's really hard to work with folks when they're on the street. You just can't even really focus if you're just surviving. So, so I just kudos to this committee for pulling all those pieces together. Um, Zach, you wanna talk about funding? Sure. I think, uh, next in our packet is the recommendations of the funding and partnership committees outside of, uh, the specific for sales road campus. Uh, first, I think, in anticipation of, uh, some recommendations from this task force, the Affordable Housing Fund, Rick McQuade and his board have actually adopted some updated language into their, um, priorities. That language is here in the packet, and it really specifically allows, uh, Rick and Charlie's office to prioritize projects for funding from state from a state age from Kentucky Housing Corporation based on providing permanent support of housing. So the language is there. I won't read it, but happy to answer questions about it under number 13 on page 12. Um, I think another recommendation is to continue if there are additional opioid settlement funds received and available to explore opportunities to pair those with affordable housing dollars to build more permanent supportive housing. Um, the next recommendation is to, I think I would distill this down to say, uh, provide capacity and training for organizations that aren't building Medicaid that might be able to. So try to find some training opportunities and capacity building opportunities within the existing continuum of care to do that. Um, and then I think Councilman Brown has already, uh, hit on this, but prioritizing through various city funding programs, outcomes based programming with some sort of metric that can be measured and and reviewed on a annual or more regular basis. Happy to answer any questions. I try to go quickly and well, there you have it. That is, that is a slate of the draft sort of preliminary recommendations from those two groups. Yeah, yeah, please. Yeah, there are three at the end that are not that didn't fall under a committee that we took from conversations in the full task force or other conversations that were taking place. And so we're just giving you these there for discussion purposes. You can keep them, you can reject them, you can change them. Of course, you could do that with any of these. They just didn't fall cleanly under a committee. So they're, they're just kind of here. The first one is about the housing authority gives you some context. But the short version is the Lexington Housing Authority is able to adopt a preference for homeless individuals, meaning if you're homeless, you go to the top of their list for whatever they have available. Our housing authorities not adopted that, but they are able to adopt that Louisville's housing authority has adopted that. So we are recommending that they adopt that or pursue that. Um, and then the other two are largely related to education and how we use our system. Um, Lee and I had talked after the last meeting about potentially engaging with some of our legislators about other communities and what they're doing. I think that's a good advocacy step as a community that we need to continue to have that conversation with our legislators in the surrounding communities about, you know, what is your role in this and how do we protect ourselves but also help you? Um, you know, maybe we can improve collaboration there as well. Um, and then finally, um, I threw this in at the end just because I think we can always benefit from helping the community better understand all the things we've all spent a lot of time discussing here. What causes homelessness? What does Lexington do about homelessness and what could be done so that as we're having these conversations going forward as a committee, um, that we continue this is an ongoing improvement process. Um, we used to do more of that. Um, frankly, we just got kind of overwhelmed. Um, you know, the whole system is kind of overwhelmed, so it doesn't have a lot of extra capacity to have a class for, you know, the citizens on how to, you know, what causes homelessness or we used to do ones like how to interact with people who are experiencing homelessness. I think looking into bringing some of that back. It's just something that could help with our culture here. May I ask a couple questions? Did I hear you say earlier that these will be in priority order? The recommendations? Did someone say that? I did not say that. I think I think they're I think they're in priority order under each category. Okay, they already are. Yes. Okay, but we're but we're hoping there that people will still go back and look at the minutes and see if something was left out in the priority or something that we want to redo. But we took kind of what the committee recommended, and then I don't know why I keep using the word distilled, but kind of distilled it to make these recommendations. Okay, that helps. Um, and I also heard someone in the beginning, and I don't know who it was, say that the $3 million we use for the warming shelter eventually could cover operations. This is a lot more than $3 million. That's true. Let me clarify. Let me clarify. Yeah, that only applies to recommendation number one, the Bristow Road campus. Everything else is gonna have to be pushed down the road. So are you intending, then that leads to my final question, are you intending to take a closer look at your recommendations and how much money you think they will cost? I mean, this is sort of a big deal for council members, for myself, and would be helpful because I know you've said, for example, expanded social services, that's our ESR grants, which is tied to a percentage of our previous year's revenues. And you've talked about different applications for current programs in government. So that might indicate increases. So I think, I don't know if council's up for a tax increase, but we need to know more about this, I think. Do you? Do you? I think this is many millions of dollars, so it would be helpful to know a few more specifics for funding. The only thing I'll say, and I don't want to jump in front of anybody, but Mayor, I think we don't want to handcuff this task force with thinking about how much it's going to cost to do what needs to be done. I think that's going to be our responsibility once the recommendations come out, come to us. So I think having a conversation about what research was done, what best practices were discovered, is good to allow the task force to be able to say this could possibly work here, and then we just have to make a decision on how we fund it, and then what priority, and how we phase it. And some things may not get funded. True. Okay, that sounds perfect. And Mayor, I want to make sure that I'm clear from the funding and partnerships committee, we certainly believe that the three million dollars from the warming shelter would not be adequate to operate even a facility on Versailles Road. I also don't believe that there will actually be three million dollars available. I think there's some winter warming that will have to continue, so I don't know the entirety of what we're spending is going to be available after a facility like this is built, even if all recommendations were adopted. So our specific recommendations for operations is to put out an RFP for a third party to demonstrate how they will fund their programming on a site like that. Now I do think that some money should be committed. I think it was a consensus of our committee that some money from the savings of not doing the winter warming shelter will be committed to the ongoing operations as a grant, but finding a third party who can demonstrate financial viability on their own would be the recommendation I think we were making. The RFP would include some sort of annual grant, but it would not be adequate to operate the facility, so someone who would demonstrate outside of government opportunities to fund the operations of a facility, and I think a lot of what we've seen and the recommendations could be priorities in an RFP like that. In my mind that RFP is going to ask the proposer to give us a fundraising plan, and it's going to show what other dollars that they're bringing to the table or that they think they can bring to the table. So they would bring funding. And a track record of having earned those dollars. Like when we met with BOA in Louisville, they had raised significant amounts of money in addition to all those public investments. They had raised significant private money. So some of this wouldn't be government funding, it would be outside funding. Okay. Thank you. Tyler. I'm sorry. Sorry. Okay. Tyler. Yeah, and I'll just speak to it. So just one conversation and recommendation that came out of the peer cities was tied to priorities, and I think it actually goes hand in hand with a conversation that we're having. And I'll just read it. What it is, is basically to develop a comprehensive implementation plan. The task force should prioritize all adopted recommendations and develop a comprehensive implementation plan that identifies timelines, responsible parties, funding needs, performance measures, accountability mechanisms to guide execution. And I think through that, I think Miss Janice's intent in emphasizing that was that we know that this is gonna take a phased out approach. This is gonna take a lot of different community partners, a lot of folks coming around, but then coming to the table. But also, there's a need to set priorities and know that, you know, we're looking to get this done by a certain time. We're looking to get this done by a certain time so that there's transparency for the community. And I think that was going into the comment towards the highlighting priorities and laying out the priorities based on possible recommendations or based on possible action items. And Miss Janice, you hop in there if I didn't explain that enough. Yeah, Mayor, I'm not sure we'll ever be able to fund all these recommendations. I hope we can. But that's why I sort of, from being boots on the ground, kept saying to everybody, you know, let's just focus on what we want to, what we have to fund first. And then the more services we can deliver, the better. And so that was the sort of the concept of the priorities and timeline to make sure that we don't build, you know, like, like stable housing, it's a wonderful program, but it's not going to serve our target population. So we got to put our money into the people who are showing up at the winter shelter every year. Liz? I think having a prioritized list is important and having a plan to work through that prioritized list. But I think we also need to be talking about future fund development. And one of the things that isn't on our list at this moment, because we were talking about from our funding committee of funding specific things, was at one point we talked about our Lex End Homelessness Fund. We have a fund developed. And we have not adequately, I would say, to this point, just because of resources, really made a plan for how to grow that fund. And I think that is something that we can do to work on the long term sustainability. There are people who specialize in fund development. We could hire a consultant temporarily, potentially, to figure out a plan for that. But we've had lots of discussions here about potential sources of funding. Like, we had a long discussion at one of our meetings about the faith community and how they might contribute it. But if we aren't doing some long term discussions about the fund development, even if we have someone like VOA come in and say they can raise all these funds, we do have a long list of things that we want to accomplish. So we need to be making that long term plan, too. So I would like to see us potentially add to the full task force list of recommendations, continue discussions about how to develop that fund specifically that would then be designated for this work. To Council Member Sheehan's point, the most recent strategic plan for the OHPI did include, and we have unfortunately not been able to do that, hiring a fundraiser for the Lexington Homelessness Fund. Thank you. Is this fund that Council Member Sheehan referred to, the one that I've heard discussion about that's currently with the Bluegrass Community Foundation that's kind of been sitting and spinning for a while? Yes. Typically, we're receiving really nominal donations from just the average citizen who cares. It's not necessarily attracting higher end donors, corporate donors. And I think the utility that we would have that somebody would be able to do as a fundraiser would be to potentially pick out recommendations from this and be able to find ways that we can message outcomes, message community needs, and start to receive donations at a much more higher level that help towards the overall sustainability long term. So just real quickly, I wanted to make a few comments. And all due respect to those that are in here that have a professional viewpoint of what we're dealing with here, because I come at this, you know, as a guy that makes horse feed. And I don't have an understanding of a lot of the things that you all do. But there are five. I've kind of boiled down what I've heard today. And I think we probably, in my mind, this task force, for the most part, probably completed its work because I think the most important thing that was said today was said by Zack in about the first five minutes, and that was we need to seek a provider besides the city of Lexington to provide these services. We're wasting our time sitting here talking about how we're going to fund all this stuff, how we're going to provide the services until we find somebody that's got a lot bigger set of wings and what we have. So I think that the next thing that this task force needs to do is write that RFP and get that into the wind. And let's see who who takes notice of that and is interested in participating in our community, because I think we're going to continue to sit here and talk about what we'd like to have with really no way of reaching the finish line without somebody to put those things in place. The second thing that I think that the task force needs to do we've already done is we've identified special needs that this community has that we should share with that provider. Maybe they're unique to this community. Maybe they're not. Maybe they're the same as they have in every community. But that's where this task force, after all the work that's been done, needs to step in after that provider is identified and say, Here's the things that are important. Our community. Can you help us with this? Thirdly, these services need to be provided for Fayette County residents only. I'm you know, I think when we're talking about spending the taxpayer of this county's money, the fact that we're spending it on a lot of folks that don't really belong in Fayette County, but they've ended up here for some period of time. And Jeff made a great point is when do they become a resident of Fayette County? That's maybe something that has to be determined. I don't know. But somebody that lands here and is expecting to be cared for to me does not have the same right to services that somebody that's truly a Fayette County resident needs those services. Fourth, I think we need to put special in my view, my mind. You may not agree with this, but special emphasis, which has been addressed by council member Beasley, is we need to be placing emphasis on families, disabled seniors, Children and emergency homelessness. Those are the people that we can immediately help. They're folks that have needs today that we can address. We cannot address and help the mentally ill today. We can't address the habitual homelessness today. That's a longer term gain. But whoever we talk to, to me, that needs to be something I've heard over and over again. Here are people that we need to address and the council member Sheehan's point. I'm all for development of funds, but we as a community through this third party service provider are going to have to show a track record of success because the community outside of a few people, Jenny, that contribute regularly to the Catholic Action Center, you know how difficult that fundraising can be. They are not going to support this until we show them a cleaner community, a safer community. And we haven't done that. And I'm not sure what we're talking about is going to address that once we've addressed safety, security, cleanliness, that I think the community will rally around that. So to me, those are the five points. I walk away from here today and to use I've super distilled this into high alcohol content. And to me, I walk out today and I think that's that's the game. That's what we've got to do. Um, so I'll leave that with you in lieu of time for some questions if anybody has any. But my simple minded shade tree homelessness advocate, I'm that's what I'm leaving with. And I think it's time for us now to realize we're out of our we're out of our sandbox for what we want to do. We've overstepped what we're able to do today, and we need that level of expertise that we just simply can't provide. So I think it's time for us to move forward with whoever has the way in which to approach that. That's beyond my realm. But I know there are people here with that expertise. Thank you. Any follow ups? Yes, ma'am. So then, with the RFP, to hire that bigger entity to bring money and expertise is the idea we would put these recommendations in it. Not all because not all would apply to that specific RFP. But yes, the RP would be built from the recommendations. I think there's a secondary conversation got mayor to have with that person. Is that what can you do? And these are the things that are specific to Lexington that we'd like to see done. And is that reasonable? Because you've got to remember, you're turning over the keys to the car if you let somebody else do this. And if they've got the money, they have the resources. They're writing the check, basically, and they might be the people to bring the fundraisers. And so we're kind of sitting there hat in hand at that point, waiting for them to tell us what they're able to do. Are we gonna let them leave us out? I don't know. I fear we were going to have be the end of it because we are a community engagement. So we want to give the so they're here. What? Threw me off because you're not in the distilled version. My apologies. There. There you are. That's what happens. All right. All right. Jenny, you're Chuck. Yeah, I'm gonna start and I'll be brief. We had six um, um, meetings either in person or online. We had 175 community members that participated. You can look on page 24 and 25. That will kind of summarize the six different, um, times that we met. And then the last three paragraphs kind of give a general some summary of what the comments were, which are very much of what has been discussed here in the last hour and change. And then from that, you can also look on page 26 and 27. That kind of breaks it down on on how many attended each one and what their main things were. And then with that, we had our recommendations that you could look on page 23 and and I'll I'll let Jenny kind of talk about here. But we had a three phase approach, including unique program that combines accountability, opportunity and safety. You kind of we called the A. O. S. Approach will them and that will impact the future of homelessness in our community. And I'll let Jenny talk about our short term, our medium term and our long term action plan. Thank you. Real quickly, we would continue the winter shelter program is everybody knows, but we we put it into from now through November 2026. If we want to get something done, we've got to look at what the immediate needs are. And also a very big, important piece is to work with the Lexington Police Department and business owners to identify areas that need increased scrutiny and to develop a good communication plan with them, which we have some ideas. I think that is a more is a little simpler than a lot of people want to make it. And I just want to reiterate when we had the business community that was a real big part of that of that issue. So I want to really emphasize that one. And then we also talk about the need for an emergency winter program, which means above and beyond the shelter for those who are not sheltered. We went through it last year. We went to it the year before. We know it's needed. And then the fourth thing on immediate is to implement a pilot program for the accountability, opportunity, safety model of a shelter. It was attached to this. The mayor has seen it. We took it to her first to be sure it was something that made sense to her. But basically, it is recognizing the fact that for sales road will be able to take care of our mentally ill. I mean, not our mentally ill, our elderly disabled and our families. You don't mix populations and the elderly disabled and yeah, and families with Children as well as families that are singles. But yeah, seniors, we're not all elderly. I gotcha. I gotcha. Are you 55 or over you? You could go. Hey, Jenny, are you speaking about? Excuse me, Jenny. On that accountability piece are the say that again. How did you describe that? Some kind of a if you would please repeat what you said about something about accountability and a pilot program that accountability, uh, opportunity and safety model, which is a shelter that would address the 18 through 54 year old. Perfect. So I'm thinking just to share a thought there. I think that's something the city could do. That wouldn't necessarily be your third party operator. That's something that could be a city responsibility because the city has means by which they can put those folks to work. Case point would be a partner. Amen. Case in point, I walked, drove up and down Loudon Avenue this week, and there were people all up and down the street picking up garbage. And I said, stopped and spoke to him. I said, How come you're here? And they said, We're on a 10 99 program from the city Lexington. Thankful to have this job. And I think them all and gave him a little something at something and said, Thank you. So the opportunities there. I just wanted to clarify what you were thinking about there. Well, I want to say it has to be developed, but we would like to do a pilot of it, and it would be sooner than later. Because if we look at a timeline that's reasonable, we have got to do one huge thing is to get the This isn't just the government. We aren't gonna send the whole bill to Linda and to the council. We have got to get the community involved. And after 27 years, no matter what you think we have to do to raise funds, we can. The people do want to make a difference. The community, whether it's through foundations, whether it's through individuals. Now, God bless the fund that has been set up. Liz, I believe in a total, but people aren't gonna give to the government. That's called taxes. They will give to an independent group. We're proof of it. And I really sincerely no and believe that with all my gray hair. So I think we have to do phased approach. We came up and did a lot of work on this, which most of the things are in it. Addressing mental illness comes a second time. Developing a plan for taking, uh, taking care of the most vulnerable for sales road, which are the family's elderly seniors, uh, to have that done by winter of next year. Uh oh. And then to and to increase supportive housing for the S. M. I. S. is severely mentally ill. We can't just broad brush. Definitely working with eastern state. We've got to take all our resources. You all. We have, um, workforce development funds. B. C. T. C. Wants to be part of training. They're doing it right now at, um, the correction facility, the state correction facility. They've just built a big training program. Everybody is recognizing what causes homelessness. The most 35% may be mentally ill and addicted. The others are simply poor. You all. We gotta find a way that people can make more money, and that would be an opportunity. Now, are there still gonna be people left out? What we're talking about? You know, there probably be 80 folks who wouldn't go to the A. O. S. Shelter or go to the sales road shelter because they just want to be difficult. But we've got to also give those people the people experiencing homelessness a lot more credit than we are. We're looking at it like, What do we have to do? So it works. We're saying to them and even the Street Boys Council, we got a very good response, which Greg could tell you. We're saying, What can you give to this process? I think we're demeaning people unless we do that. So we've got short term, medium term, long term, not opening the A. O. S. Until three years. The medium term getting their sales road opened my next winter. If you start looking at the funding, you'll see where it parallels with being able to diminish here, but also looking at the funding. We've got to say to our community, we've got to say to Amazon, we've got to say to all of these. We have got so many resources in this community, and we all have to be part of it. We cannot turn this over and say, Guess what? Mayor Gordon, you gotta go find all this money. And guess what? Jeff and Charlie, you all got to run all this. That's not gonna work. If one thing, if you look, it's not gonna work. Our suggestion is that there's a subgroup of this group and even some other folks like B. C. T. C. Uh, our C. T. E. They do training their specialists in it. They'll help. I've already talked to a bunch of them, and I'll be honest with you in calculating what this little pilot project may cost, because Jeff and I talked about it. I mean, Charlie and I talked about it, but we'd also talked about it with their mayor. I've raised 25% of the needed amount, and I've got another person who's supposed to be calling me back. I'm saying it may happen. It may not. You are our community cares, and they will. It has to go to a non profit or to someplace they can write it off. They don't want to write it to L. F. U. C. G. As much as we can love our government, because it's just not the way people do. So that's I mean, we've got short term, long term. It's in your pocket. But our biggest thing I want to say is that carpe diem. We've got to seize this moment. I've been doing this a long time along with Janice and others, and I can tell you we're at a time now that's critical enough that if we don't go forth with concrete action, it'll be another 20 years, and we'll all be sitting around talking about what a shame it was. And what did that task force do? That's all I gotta say. I was at the lyric theater with my people that is homeless, and it's a lot of them saying that, um, if they need if it's if they had help of getting a job or getting into some type of program, it wouldn't be a lot of homeless people. They don't try to go get get a help that this is what they were saying. They're trying to go get help with nobody help them because they are homeless. They look at us like we piece of trash or something. We just like you are human beings. We just we just fell on hard time. We just need a little bit of help. We asked this drag is in the street voice. Yeah, in the street. What counts at the lake theater? These is people that's walking the street. As you say, it's panhandling disturbing the public, messing with the public downtown. And you know, I'm saying, um, get us some help. Get us off the streets. It ain't about the money. It's about helping each other. That's what we is here for. It's to help each other. You can't tear us down. He no fucking more than what we are. We already beat ourself up. Don't beat us down. Even even more. We don't want to panhandle. You don't want that. Don't know about the highway whole hole in the side. I work for food. Give us a give us a job. If they don't, but sweeping sidewalks, it's a start. It's a start. I like what you said. Believe me, stop messing around. Let's get this shit. I mean, let's get it done. I'm sorry, man. Let's get it done. I mean, you know, it seemed like to me it's all about the money. What about the human being? What about the people who are eating, eating out of the trash cans? If you ain't never been homeless, you don't know how it is out there on the streets. If you don't, you think, you know, you hear this and that, this and that. But if you if you haven't live it, you don't understand. That's mental illness. Look, look at it. I'll look at that man. Look at the trash can for food. Why not stop and say, Look, I would take you to get you something to eat. The guy, Mr Thomas, the past. You talk about an angel. This man will walk right down the street and pick a man that's pissed on himself. Shit on his head. Take him to get him something to eat. Don't care what this man look like. He would pick him up off the streets and marry you hungry. That's angel. That's a man that cares about people. He didn't care about the money. He cared about helping other people to get better. And there's a lot of that. This man done help the winning bought houses cause a living good cause. So I'm willing to step out of the elements to help him. It's all we need is a little bit of help. It's not all about the money. It's about caring and understanding. That's it. That's all we need to win. It's gonna care. But Greg, the money has to be for the programs. And I will say this are give kids a home program, which was established in 2016 has helped 1879 families, uh, to become stabilized in their housing with not a penny of government funding. God bless you. But it is the community. People will help you all. You know, that's all I could. If we advertise on TV to help the homeless fine, fine, fine jobs and placement to home, you'd be surprised how many, um, business owners will help because it's hard to send us out on the street. We just gotta reach out. They want to reach out and help, but they're not gonna help if we keep doing what we're doing strong, destroying property, panhandling people that's going downtown is visiting. They won't. They're not gonna help. But if we could show them that these people are really needs help. These people is willing to to work on getting help. I believe we will get a lot of support, but it's gonna take time. It goes back to one of the things that we also talked about in our committee was public perception is shifting that public perception of what our home is changing the views of our homelessness as a community in involving everybody that it's not just the government. It's not just Fayette County government or Fay County schools, but it's our it's our whole community. We have to change how we even look at homelessness. And that was one of the things that we actually talked about on our committee was the public perception and marketing. I wanted to give a little time for anybody who's for public comment. So if anybody would like to take a microphone, if anyone has a question, we've got three minutes per person. If you have a question or a comment, we'd love to hear from you. Yeah. Yes. Uh huh. Anywhere else? Danielle. You have to do the microphone press. That little button. Okay. Sorry. Businesses, you know, being run differently or them having issues just neighborhood-wise with, you know, these shelters coming into their neighborhoods. I, this is my first meeting, obviously, but I'm just wondering have we not had conversations or have we had conversations and, you know, found like problems or issues, but is there a reason that we're not investing in the already active shelters? Like, I know that Hope Center is, the Hope Center is, would it not cost less to like expand on to what they have going on? Just personally, like at Salvation Army, I talked to Jeff a couple of weeks ago and that is how I got here, because I approached Jeff because we have, you know, we have nice facilities, they're decent, but obviously our capacity could be better and we have started thinking in the direction of trying to figure out, you know, how we can expand or not even just expand, but also, you know, like get facilities that make sense. I heard you guys mention, you know, the, what's going on in Louisville, how they are getting, you know, that entire campus together. Is that not worth like looking in the direction of something that already has foundations and expanding from that? Because, again, like when we started talking about it or when I started even just thinking about that model, I obviously included like a capital campaign just for when I was presenting to pitch to our board and to our advisory team and things like that, but I had, you know, like capital campaign with anchor donors, naming rights attached to buildings that would, you know, take some of that weight away. I know that you guys were like talking about that when we were, you know, throwing out funding opportunities, but is that not a conversation? I'll let other folks sort of respond to it, but my understanding, I do think existing programs have been asked if they have ability to expand their capacity. They just don't have the ability to expand the capacity to the need that we have. So, a little bit of the conversation that I think that Janice was having, if we do this, is the Hope Center able to expand a little bit or Arbor Youth, and for folks that don't know Danielle, she's with Salvation Army. So, I think we're looking at a lot of shelter programs. I don't think that they have the capacity to expand it with what the research said. We were short in bed space. So, it was kind of a both and, I guess, but if anyone else has a better answer. Well, I would just say the city just put two million dollars to expand the Hope Center to do two floors. One is veterans and the other is other transitional. So, that does help the emergency shelter because people move into the transitional and it opens up. So, we just finished that, what, a year ago, Charlie? Absolutely. Yeah. Sorry. Okay. Yes, absolutely. I think I was misunderstood. I meant like the entire comprehensive model that you guys have. Like, is it not a possibility to like bulldoze buildings and then have someone rebuild them like with the capacity in mind? Like, would that not be a thing? That'd be a big thing. I think whenever Salvation Army is ready to have a serious conversation about an expansion, we are more than happy to have that conversation. We are more than ready for more than a decade. We've gotten almost to the finish line multiple times and they've backed out. So, that is a, yeah, two, we committed two million dollars that you gave back. So, absolutely. So, let's have that conversation online because there's a lot. No, absolutely. Completely aware of those conversations and the things happening with that, but we are under new management all the way across the board. So, I think that that would be worth taking a look at, not maybe for full expansion or even for this, but just maybe thinking in that direction as well. Thank you. Liz? I'm just going to point out that on page eight, item number two, is this exact idea. So, it is in our recommendations to make locally controlled funds available for existing shelters and emergency housing providers to grow existing capacity as they identify opportunities to do so. So, I do think that is something we should talk about as it becomes available, but it is up to the providers to kind of come to us and be ready for that. And I would just like to throw in, and thank you because I heard something about the accountability and what's going to happen. What I do know is that some of our facility has an influx of DOC beds. That's not Lexington's residents. These are people coming from prisons from all across the state that has taken the beds in the Hope Centers and Salvation Army and places like that. Maybe we can look at that also as far as some type of solution for our Lexington residents. And I don't know what that looks like, but that's one thing that when I heard that and then like the outcomes of how many people, and I'm pretty sure you guys are doing great jobs with follow-ups of people who have graduated from those programs. And where are they now and have they, is there a revolving door right back into the Hope Center, which is taking beds from other people that could use some services that they've never received? I just wanted to just commend you all on all the hard work that you've done on this task force. And with me, I'm sorry that I asked a question earlier, but as you were going from group to group, that's when I had a question. And that's what community is. They like to get in there and ask something, but I don't want to take a lot of time. But once we start looking at those things, and I understand you and your property and having businesses out there, I understand that. But what we do is we police ourselves the least amount of attention with the police department, because they really need to get these people who's shooting people and killing people. We have communities that complete, that we police ourselves. But what happens is when we run up against the usual people who are at the table, the other people who are really, really doing some really good work that y'all don't even know about. Y'all don't even know about these people that's in our communities making a difference with housing and programming and mental health and all of that stuff. We hardly ever talk about University of Kentucky and the Healers Project with the Black mental health programs that's going on, but there's some really good stuff. And hopefully we can keep the conversation open. Thank you. This has been a really good meeting. And maybe, you know, you talked about RFPs, and usually RFPs goes with the people that's got the money that's been here for a long time. But these startup people that's really doing some good work, maybe we should take a look at them too. I'm going to talk to my council member about it. I appreciate that. Thank you. Any other public comment? All right. Well, then we will bring this meeting to adjourn. Our next meeting is July, did we say the 29th? July 29th. It's at 3.30. We will, to be determined whether it's in this space or not. And then I also hope you all go to the public forum in August. Thank you. Happy Juneteenth.