Music Thank you. We'll go ahead and call to order the Lexington Fayette Urban County Council work session. And today's August 11th, and we will get rolling here. the first item on our agenda is the public comment for issues on the agenda and we have a few people signed up the way this works is that i will call your name and you'll come to the podium over here and you will need to restate your name and you'll need to state your council district and then you'll have three minutes. So the first person signed up for an item on the agenda is Cheryl Birch and the next person following Cheryl will be Tammy Bright. Welcome. Good evening. I was still working on my notes. here on behalf of First District Councilman Morton. And my concern this afternoon is about East End. I suffered through Bluegrass Asmendale, and it was redone, and was not able to move back. I currently reside at 371 Wilson Street, and that is my fear again, for it to be redeveloped, and I will not be able to afford to come back. We bled, suffered, some died. And so if you're going to redevelop, make it where that the folks that did suffer through that are able as for us to come back. Make it affordable. All right, next is Tammy Bright. Tammy, are you here? I think she's still downstairs. Okay. She is our last person signed up to speak right now. To someone who knows her, could you go see if she's out outside? Tammy. Hi. Welcome. You'll need to state your name and your council district, and then you'll have three minutes to speak. Okay. My name is Tammy Bright. I live at 960 DePores Avenue. And what else was it? My district is District 1, Tyler Perry. I mean Tyler Perry. Tyler Moore. Okay. Okay, I just wanted to get information on what now is the reason why, like West End or Georgetown Street and on up the road is wanting to be called a part of the city. because in that, we are concerned that we'll lose our park. We have a, that's my mom back there. She's the first owner of one of the houses in St. Martin Village, or she is the only owner of that house. She's 95. And this is the third time in three years we've been in here about one thing, one after another, about different changes trying to be done to our area. Georgetown Street and West End and East End has a very rich history. We were put on that side of town, redlined, and our parents made the best of it. They made that community what it is. And so I don't understand, and a lot of us are afraid that, you know, with this planning, now being counted as downtown, the whole dynamic is going to be changed. And I don't know if you've had complaints about the people coming through, because I see a whole different demographic coming through Georgetown Street now, which is cool. It's a city street. Or maybe it's state since it's going to Georgetown. But we're concerned that our culture is about to be taken away from us in our area. So our kids, Sunday was a beautiful day. I think it was Sunday. And you had the basketball going on. They had the jumpy house for the kids. You had music on the stage. It was a beautiful thing for the whole family. So what's going to happen in the next year or two once all of this city is going to now come through our area? Is it going to change the whole dynamic of our culture, or will we be left alone? So that's all I have to ask. Thank you very much. That concludes our public comment for issues on the agenda. And, Council Members, we next have a docket and rezonings. All right, Council Member Ellinger and then Council Member Curtis. And if you have anything to add to the docket or changes, now is the time. Anyone? Council Member Savigny? Is this the time that I would do my for a zone change? Correct. Yes, you have a zone change on the docket. I do. Thank you. I move to place on the docket for the August 13, 2026 Council meeting without a public hearing, Item 0650-26, an ordinance changing the zone from a professional office P1 zone to a neighborhood business B1 zone for the property located at 500 Southland Drive. So moved. Second. All right. Vice Mayor Wu seconds. Are there any questions? Council, all those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, that motion passes. Is there anything else for the docket? All right, all those in favor of the docket as amended, please say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, that motion passes. Thank you. Next up, we have the July 1st Council Work Session Table of Motions. Could I have a motion to approve? To approve. Second. thank you council member reynolds council member curtis seconded and are there any corrections or additions anything at all all right all those in favor please say aye is anyone opposed all right that motion passes uh page four starts our budget amendments i'd like a motion to approve vice Vice Mayor, second by Council Member Baxter. And are there questions about the budget amendments? Please log in. Anything? All right, all those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, that motion passes. We do have for your information only some budget adjustments. and that brings us to new business. Is there a motion? Council Member Curtis and Council Member Reynolds seconds and please log in with your questions. Council Member Brown. Thank you, Mayor. I have a question for Director George and item J. It's the Sick Leave Bank Program. And I've spoken with Director George about this, but I think it'd be good for folks in the community or our employees to know what this is and how this has the potential to benefit them going forward. So, Director. Good afternoon. So our current program is the sick bank transfer program, or sick leave transfer program, which has been in existence since 1997. And what we have found is that we don't have much success with that program. So when employees need sick donations, employees aren't really willing to donate their sick time for a variety of reasons. They get a sick check. They need it. So we would like to implement a new program, which would allow us to sweep up or take hours from employees who are either being terminated or resigning. And we would put those hours in a bank, and they would be available for employees to use if they needed them. But is this going to have any impact on the existing program? No, we'll keep the existing program in place. So in 2025, we received seven requests for donations, and we only had three employees who were willing to donate. So there were four employees who actually needed sick time, but we didn't have any hours available to give them. Yeah. Yeah, no, I just want to commend you and your team, your department, on creating this policy. I remember last year, it might have been last year or the year before, there was an employee that was receiving cancer treatments and used up all their sick time and had sent out that email that I think a lot of us have seen where they're asking for time, and somebody asked me for time, and I couldn't get my time, but my legislative aide gave their time or some of their time so the person could continue to get treatment. And so I think this is a way to make more time available to folks that need it for health reasons. Yes, so this would actually help employees like that when they need time. We would have time available to give them. Okay. No, I think that's a great thing. The next thing I want to ask you about is the CDL program coordinator. Okay. From my understanding, this is a service or something that we contracted out or had a partnership with the agency that provided CDL training. not just for our employees, our staff, but also for other agencies. So how is this different, and why did we go this route? So this is going to be different because this position would allow us to do that all in-house. Currently, when we contract it out, I think it costs about $5,000 per employee to go through the CDL training, and sometimes it's difficult to get our employees into the training academies, and sometimes they shut down. And so this is just better overall for us just to be able to do it in-house and we'll be able to train our employees and see them through the whole process of getting their CDL. Are there any protections in place to prevent us from making a hire for somebody that needs a CDL, train them, and then they leave and go use that benefit somewhere else? Yes. So through our program, it is our intent to restrict their license. So it's something that would be more specific, and I may need some help here. It would be more specific to us and not something that would allow you to just go out and use your CDL license for any business. Okay. I don't know the letters. Yeah, I may follow up with you more. I think this could be a benefit. I had some questions about it at first, but I know we have a real need for CDL drivers, and if this could help us meet that need, then I'm in support of it going forward. All right, thank you for that. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you. Councilmember Ellinger. Don't go anywhere, Director. You answered two of the questions I had. The other one I had is N, about the security officers. Was that the ones that we added that we're going to try to beef up our security up front then? Yes, I think those were created as part of the budget. Okay. And then we talked briefly about this one, the KK. Yes. And I thought that was a number that maybe was incorrect, but you said in that one that the deployment to 2049, I thought that was a – That is correct. So can you explain that because that one kind of – I've never seen that before. So we have a sergeant who has received orders for the National Guard, and he will be deployed until 2049, which will create a shortage of sergeants at police. And so what we would like to do here is to create an additional sergeant position so that they are able to maintain their authorized strength as opposed to just having someone acting in that position for a period of time. And we hold that position until 2049? Is that what the federal law says? When he returns, he would be able to come back to his position, yes. Okay. Thank you. And Q? That's not me. Director Conrad? Can you explain these three houses and how we go about doing that? Yes. And do they have other requirements by living there? Yes, Council Member, we have three on the agenda today. We have one more that is currently vacant. So four homes that we are currently have residents in on our park. We had three additional homes that we have since moved away from having residents in those homes. So we've gone from seven down to four. We used to have that one by Cardinal Run, didn't we? We used to have one at Cardinal Run. Yes, we used to have one at Heisel, and we used to have one at Caden Lane at Caden Town. So we now just have four. What's the fourth one that we don't have? Raven Run is currently vacant. Yeah, we're in the process of filling that, so you'll see that come across. So we have an application process, an interview process. The residents who live on those properties are essentially our first responders. At the case of Masterson, it's a lot about our equine facility that is there. And when horses sometimes get out in the middle of the night, we have folks that are right there. At Raven Run, similarly, for any hikers who may be lost, we have an opportunity then for that employee to be able to stay on site. you know, an emergency personnel. And then our other one is actually just a land lease at Jacobson. There's a mobile unit that has been there for a number of years. So in the future, we probably won't renew that. But at this time, we're just leaving that as it is. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. You're welcome. Thank you. Council Member Morton. Thank you. I just had questions regarding item number T, letter T and U, and they're both related to the Bluegrass Area Development District. And I guess just to start, could you just please speak towards what both those items are, the personal service agreements, and what they would allow for resources-wise? Welcome. Hi, I'm Teresa Maynard, the Senior Administrative Officer in Social Services. And we've always handled this contract, and it basically pays the city's local dues based on our population with the Bluegrass ad. And it does cover their aging services, workforce services. They give us a report every year with the purchase of service agreement. So it's an annual thing, and it's built into the budget. and the item U is the same thing, but it's for the home care match that we have for aging, where they have home services for aging. It's an in-home assistance, and again, it's an annual thing we do, and it's always in the budget. Thank you. And then for residents who want to access these resources, where do they go to access that? To access the resources for the home care program, they need to call the Senior Center and one of the social workers at the senior center will help them and fill them in and get them going with that. And we work through different parts of the government with the workforce development, with the Economic Development Office, and just whatever we need. It's part of the 17-county member dues system. I appreciate you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Vice Mayor Wu. Thank you, Mayor. I have a question for number EE. I think that's Commissioner Martin. This is the Kentucky Infrastructure Authority loan. It looks like we changed the loan figure from $20 million to $45 million. Commissioner, can you give us a little sort of background on it and then why this change? Well, this project is related to the consent decree that we needed a storage tank out in the Hamburg area, I-75 Winchester Road. And as you recall, when we added expansion area two, that presented an opportunity to move that downstream, build a new pump station, build an entirely new complex that would serve not only the existing customers, but the new customers that were going to be created by the expansion area. Roughly, that project's current estimate is somewhere around $53 million. And so we got the first loan approved. obviously didn't pay for the whole project, so we continue to have that as our largest priority here in Fayette County. So the intended use plan that was produced last month rated that the highest project in Fayette County for sanitary sewers. So more funding, low interest loan, 2% loan, much like a home construction loan. You don't start paying the principal until the project is done. Very favorable. So the $45 million is the total loan amount for this? That's the total of it right now. $45 million. We are in the design phase right now, working on property acquisition. Hope to be able to break ground sometime next year. Okay. Thank you, Commissioner. Next one is letter GG. I don't know if Chief Wells is here or Chief Bowman or someone else from FIRE. This is the grant from Homeland Security for an emergency communications vehicle. So if you could speak a little bit about kind of what the use of this for, and please introduce yourself to the council as well. Thanks. Assistant Chief Chad Traylor, Division of Fire. That grant would be a three-quarter ton pickup truck with an enclosed bed with communications equipment that would allow us to operate in areas that, on deployments where communication infrastructure is either nonexistent or in this area where it's been reduced or just allows us to communicate on scenes more effectively with a lack of a normal. Can you give us an example or a scenario where that vehicle would come in handy, like when you're talking about the lack of communications? Flood deployments like we had back in 2022. There was basically no comms available that would allow us to operate efficiently with each other and also interoperability with other partner agencies throughout the state. Okay. Thank you very much. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you. Council Member Savigny. Thank you, Mayor. Commissioner Martin or Director Neal on G. I don't mean G. This is an intelligent traffic system, and it looks like we have a grant match that's not budgeted, It's not budgeted, so I just kind of wanted to understand what this grant was about. Thank you. Is this about the ITS grant? Yeah. I'm Jason Allender, the traffic signal manager. This is a grant we've had yearly for the last about 20 years that I'm aware of. It's just continuations of previous projects where we retime arterials or bio-detection equipment for different signalized intersections. and our traffic data subscription that we currently have with street light data. Okay, great. And I kind of wanted to understand, too, like whenever something says the project wasn't budgeted or a budget amendment's coming up, I just kind of wanted to understand. It is budgeted. They're just moving the money from their department ID to the grant. It was budgeted. Thank you. Thank you. And while you're there, Commissioner, on EE, the storage tanks since we've had some discussions about storage tanks in the past. So this project went from a $20 million project to a $45 million project. And it says you have no budgetary impact on this. Is that just basically none this year? But in the future, I mean, obviously we're going to pay more on a $45 million loan than we are on a 25. It was always more than a $20 million project. It was a $53 million project from the get-go, and that's shown in our cash flow model. And so when we realized that was such a big hit, I mean, you know, we've used KIA over the years, and so this seemed to be a very, very favorable project to score high points. You usually get a lot of points in the evaluation of funding, either by solving sanitary sewer overflows or providing for unserved customers. This one does both. That's why it scored so well. We're working to try to get the project down to where it becomes affordable and no of our money other than the loan would be able to cover it. We're not there yet. And then my next question on this one might be to our finance folks. Does this affect our bond rating? Does this just go into our total pool? Because it's a decent amount of money. I'm just kind of curious. And I know we probably think about it anyway. So Charlie's being modest. When he told me about this project, it was actually $67 million. That's now a $53 million project. So I actually like the direction it's going, and I appreciated it 2%. But, yes, it is considered. Previously, our sewer was separated in our evaluation. But in recent years, Moody is putting that together with our GO, and they're considering the entirety of the picture of LFUCG finance when they look at us for our credit rating. So they do ask us about all of our sewer operations and include that when they do our analysis. Wonderful. Thank you so much. That's all I have, Mayor. All right. Thank you very much. If there are no other questions, all those in favor of approving new business, say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right. Thank you. That passes. We do have communications from the mayor. We have appointments. Moved to approve. Second. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Second by Council Member Curtis. Are there any questions? Council Member Lynch. Mayor, I logged in because I have a motion to amend the report. I move to amend the mayor's appointments report to remove the Green Space Trust appointment. All right. Is there a second? And the motion is to remove the Green Space Trust appointment. Okay, any questions? Council Member Savigny? Yeah, could I understand the rationale? Yes, this appointment was put on our work session without it going through the trust. So the trust has not voted on this appointment and submitted it to the mayor's office. and the executive board of the trust have not voted to submit this name for appointment. So it needs to go back and go to the trust for the appropriate process. So it may come back. Any other questions? All those in favor, say aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, thank you. Are there any other questions about appointments? All those in favor of the amended appointment, please say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, that passes. Communications from the mayor, we do have donations. Could I have a motion? Council Member Curtis, second by Vice Mayor Wu. Are there any questions? All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, that motion passes. And the final communications from the mayor is procurements. Could I have a motion? Council Member Curtis, second by Council Member Savigny. Are there questions? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, that passes. Thank you. That brings us to continuing business and presentations. First is Council Capital Projects. Is there a motion to approve? Council Member Reynolds, second by Council Member Curtis. Are there any questions? All those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, that passes. Next, we have Social Services and Public Safety Committee, and I'll ask Council Member Reynolds to give that report. Thank you, Mayor. The June 9, 2026 meeting of the Social Services and Public Safety Committee was called to order at 1.01 p.m., followed by unanimous approval of the May 5, 2026 committee meeting summary. The committee received an update from GlobalX highlighting its continued role in providing language access, immigrant and refugee services, multilingual outreach, and Title VI compliance. Staff reported significant community engagement and outlined plans to expand language access services and educational programming during FY27. No action was taken on this item. The committee unanimously recommended a bike lane ordinance prohibiting stopping standing or parking in designated bicycle lanes with limited exemptions for loading and emergency operations. The proposal is intended to improve cyclist safety, support Vision Zero goals, and align Lexington with practices adopted in peer cities. I will now read the motion and then entertain amendments. Pertinent to the actions of the Social Services and Public Safety Committee at its meeting on June 9, 2026, I move to place on the docket for the August 13, 2026 Council meeting an ordinance amending section 11 through 119 of the Lexington Fay Urban County Code of Ordinances to prohibit stopping, standing, or parking in designated bike lanes except when necessary to avoid conflict with other traffic or in compliance with law or the directions of a police officer or traffic control device within a bicycle lane. So moved. Second. All right. Council Member Curtis seconded. Are there any questions? Council Member Sevigny. Yes, Mayor. I've got four amendments to the motion, and I'm going to go through those one at a time per law. These are all kind of somewhat germane, just kind of cleaning up some language. The first one is I move to amend section 18-119A, contained in section 1 of the ordinance, beginning on page 88 of the packet, to include peace officers, safety officers, or employees of the Division of Fire and Emergency Services, acting in their official capacities to those who may provide direction to persons requiring stopping standing or parking a vehicle in ways that would not conflict with the provisions of Section 18-119. Currently, the ordinance only includes direction from police officers. So moved. Second. Second. Council Member Curtis seconded. Questions about the amendment? Are there nothing about the amendment? All those in favor say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, that passes. And I've got a second amendment. I move to amend Section 18-119A 15B1C contained in Section 1 of the ordinance, beginning on page 88 of the packet, to exempt a driver of a vehicle otherwise in compliance with Sections 18-132 through 18-138 of the code to provide better explanation to the public regarding which sections apply instead of merely referring to a division or an article within the chapter. It also better mirrors the intent of the original changes. So moved. Second. Council Member Eblen seconds. Are there any questions? All right. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? Thank you. That passes. My third amendment, I move to amend Section 18.119A15B1, containing Section 1 of the ordinance, beginning on page 88 of the packet, to end in the paragraph with the following. Notwithstanding any other provision of this code, the limitations and requirements set forth in this subsection, shall control in the event of any conflict. So moved, but while there's similar language was already included in the ordinance, this text would replace it to make it clearer, even if another section of the code allows for stopping, standing, or parking longer than the time in the ordinance. The ordinance requirements will still apply. Well, I'm not sure we heard the end of that, but basically it was in the ordinance already. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yes, it's just cleaning it up. Clearing it up. Is there a second? Vice Mayor Wu seconds. All right. Any questions? All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right. That motion passes. And lastly, I move to amend Section 18-119-A15-B5, contained in Section 1 of the ordinance, beginning on page 88 of the packet, to remove the phrase, otherwise in compliance with Section 18-10. That's to ensure public safety can park and bike lanes to prevent emergencies instead of only in response to them. So moved. all right council member evelyn second are there any questions all right all those in favor say oh did you have a question council member beasley okay all those in favor please say aye aye is anyone opposed all right are there any other amendments thank you for indulging me so the motion did you have an amendment is the comment on the original motion okay the motion on the floor is the original motion as amended. So, Council Member Lynch. Thank you, Mayor. I just want to, again, emphasize, and I've talked to Council Members Vigny and Eblen multiple times because I'm concerned about my neighbors that live along Georgetown Road and them receiving a fine because they are parking in front of their house, especially if their house does not have a driveway or if they're entertaining guests or family is over and the driveway is full and they have to park in the bike line the bike lane that's on the street. I don't want them to get cited for that. So I want us to find a solution for that problem and then this will have my full support. Thank you. Okay. Council Member Morton. Thank you. I agree with Council Member Lynch related to Georgetown Street. But I guess my main question was to Council Member Savigny. I know that I've received multiple emails of constituents reaching out related to the exceptions in bike lanes and that they feel that we shouldn't have any exceptions. Can you speak towards that and why those exceptions are in the policy and why we feel that those cannot be removed? Yeah, I'll speak to that and maybe Council Member Ebeling can add in. But it's a great question. We struggled with it mostly because we went back and forth between police and with Lex Park about what's the best way to do things. And everyone recognized that we now have Ubers, we have Lyfts, we have temporary deliveries, we've got Amazon trucks. and there's a general safety issue with letting someone off in the middle of the street, off of a bike lane. So we were concerned about that. And in general, we felt like if something was happening in 10 minutes or less, it probably could even be tightened. It would have at least the least impact and was more enforceable. So we just came up it was a compromise, unfortunately, but it is what it is. Thank you. Are there other questions about the amended motion? All right. All those in favor of the motion as amended, please say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right. That motion passes. Now, Council Member Reynolds. Thank you. The committee also unanimously approved amendments to the animal care and control ordinance, and those amendments were reported out at work session on June 16, 2026, and the meeting adjourned at 2.09 p.m., and that concludes my report out. Thank you, Mayor. All right. Thank you very much. Are there any questions for Council Member Reynolds about her report? All right. We will move on to a special presentation. I would like to invite our historic preservation officer, Betty Kerr, to join me at the at the podium. As most of you know, the legendary Betty Kerr is retiring. Betty has served as our city's historic preservation officer and the director of the Office of historic preservation since 1991. Some people here might not have been born. Well, it's why I also qualify for this. 35 years. That is quite an accomplishment. And I know that we have all counted on Betty's knowledge of Lexington over the years. And I know we have learned a thing or two from in terms of historic preservation. When you need to know something about historic preservation, you call Betty. And she usually has it in her head, but she can always find the answer. And it's been a real blessing to have you all these years. Her knowledge of Lexington and our region is really immeasurable, and so is her service to our city. So we wish you nothing but the best as you start this new chapter in your life. And I want to present you a proclamation to honor you and the many years you have served the city of Lexington. Thank you. All right. Here's how it goes. Whereas Betty Kerr has served as Historic Preservation Officer and Director of the Office of Historic Preservation for the Lexington Fayette Urban County Government since 1991, and whereas Betty has overseen all aspects of historic preservation in Lexington Fayette County, including architectural surveys, providing technical assistance on renovation and design to owners of historic properties, nomination of properties to the National Register of Historic Places, administering the design review process for Lexington's 17 local historic districts, and many, many other programs. And whereas Betty formerly served as the executive director of Ashland, the Henry Clay Estate, and as Kentucky Historic Resources Survey Coordinator for Lexington Fayette County, and whereas Betty has curated exhibits on local history and architecture, serving as co-curator with Patrick Lucas of the 1994 Lost Lexington exhibit. And whereas Betty is the author of Lexington, A Century in Photographs, and whereas we thank Betty for her many years of dedicated service and offer her our best wishes as she begins the next chapter of her life, now therefore I, Linda Gorton, Mayor of Lexington, do hereby declare August 11, 2026, Betty Kerr Day in Lexington. Congratulations and thank you. Thank you. Yes, thank you, Kim. Thank you. Thank you. Would you like to say a few words? Oh, I'll say a sentence. Okay. We'll put this here. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you all so much, and thank you, Mayor. This is a lovely thing for you to do and so very much appreciated. And I have had the wonderful opportunity to be with this government for the largest part of my career, to say the least. And it has really been an honor to hopefully facilitate things within our community that help retain the character-defining elements and neighborhoods and view sheds and all these wonderful things that make Lexington Fayette County the spectacular, wonderful community that it is. And so it's been a real treat to be able to do that work in my hometown, and I really appreciate that. And I appreciate all you council members, what you do, along with the mayor. all the administration staff. People would be amazed until you become an employee of the urban county government and really become absorbed in all the things. Well, you can't be absorbed in all of it. If you were, you'd give up. But learn so much about what it is that all the things, all the parts of this government do that come together to really make Lexington the wonderful place it is. So thank you so much for this just delightful recognition. And it's been my good fortune to be part of it. Thank you. Thank you so much. Shall we get a picture of the council? Oh, sure. Do you have any of your hand here? Amelia's here. Okay. Amelia, will you do me a picture? And Keith? Keith? Where's Keith? He's back there. You know, you're a part of this. You're a part of it. Thank you. There you go. Thank you again. All right, now that brings us to Budget Director, Melissa Luker, who will give our ad valorem tax options presentation. Welcome. Welcome back. I'm excited you all get to hear this presentation on your first council work session after your summer recess. So here we go. So in the presentation, we're going to go over a calendar of our dates, which explains why we're doing the presentation today on your first day back. We'll talk about the different taxing districts. We'll show the Lexington real estate values. And we'll go through the options for the general fund, urban fund. And we have a couple of special taxing districts that we also have to look at. So the schedule we have, it's dictated by a Kentucky Revised Statute 132.0225. and it sets the date for establishing the final tax rate. The calendar is based on our certification date of July 30th, so that starts day one. We have 45 days to approve the Avalorum tax rates to be in compliance with the statute. So this proposed timeline keeps us in line with that. So rates are scheduled to be decided today, and then we have first reading Thursday. We will have advertisements approximately the 14th and 18th, depending on the days that the Herald-Leader is printed. That has varied over the years and is getting less and less. That's dependent on that, but we will have our two ads. And then we will have second reading and a public hearing at the August 27th council meeting. This schedule will allow us to complete everything that needs to be completed within the time frame that we are allowed. So the taxing districts that we're going to discuss today are the general services district, which is paid by all property owners in Fayette County. The urban services district, which is paid only by property owners who receive the service. So that service would be street lights, refuse, or street cleaning. You may have all, you may have one, you may have two, you may have none. Then we have the three special taxing districts, which are paid by all property owners as well. soil and water conservation, health department, and agriculture extension. So what is ad valorem? It's a tax based on the assessed value of an item such as your house, boat, vehicle, things like that. So how it is calculated, the rates are, you'll see with decimals, the rates are for every $100 of value of the property owned is how it would be. So The average property is $270,000. A $270,000 home, the way you would get that tax rate is it would be $270,000 divided by 100 gets you $2,700 times the tax rate. Whatever rate with all the decimals that you'll see in a couple slides, that would be how you would get to that calculation. If you would like more information and you just want to go on a deep dive here, you can find that information on the sheriff's website. So here are some selected cities in Kentucky. You'll notice some of the larger cities, some of the surrounding cities are on there. The tax rate listed here are real property rates only. It doesn't reflect the total tax burden for households. So for comparison's sake, Lexington City Rate is the full urban services rate, and the county rate is the combination of the general services, health department, LexTran, parks tax fund, extension, and soil conservation rates. As you can see, we have the eighth lowest tax rates among the larger and contiguous counties around the state. So here's a slide that shows, now this is prior year tax rates because we haven't adopted the tax rates yet. So this just shows that approximately 80% of a property tax bill goes somewhere other than the city. Around 20% of a property tax bill comes into the city, and only 6% of that tax bill is for the general fund. So you can see we're only a small portion of the total property tax bill that residents receive. So the real estate values for FY27 is $41.6 billion. It's a 4.8% increase over the FY26 real estate values. That was $39.7 billion. The 4.8% increase is more than the assessment increase in the adopted budget. So the tax rates for consideration that we have prepared today, we have the compensating rate, which gives approximately the same revenue increases prior years for existing properties. Any revenue increases are derived from new properties. The House Bill 44 rate allows a 4% increase in revenue from existing properties. this isn't subject to voter recall, but it does require a public hearing. Setting the rate above 4% revenue increase for existing properties is subject to voter recall within 50 days. This is something that changed during the General Assembly this calendar year. It used to be 45 days, and now it's gone up to 50 days. So it's subject to recall within 50 days if a petition is signed by 10% of the voters in the last presidential election, which is about 14,500 voters there. Setting any rate above the 4% would also lead to having two separate property tax bills. So the options for the general services fund, you can see here. Option one is the compensating rate, which would decrease the real estate rate to 0.073 and personal property to 0.0869. These rates would decrease revenue to the general fund by $371,350. Personal property includes tangible personal property, aircrafts, inventories, and personal property of public service corporations. So that's what that second line is there. Option two is the 4% rate. It maintains the real estate rate of .075 and decreases the personal property to .0893. So you'll see the prior year rates and option two rates are the same. We have to lower the personality in order to comply with the statutes. But everything else in that column is the same as the current rates for this option. This option does require a public hearing, and it would increase revenue by $502,650. The last line on there is the abandoned property. The Vacant Property Review Commission has established a rate of $1 per $100 evaluation for abandoned urban property. This tax will apply to 44 parcels of land for the current year. It went down from 45 last year, so it's one less. So this is what the options would look like on that average of $270,000 house. So you can see the prior year rates, the cost would have been $202.50. With option one compensating, it would be $197.10. And then option two, which is the house bill 44, 4%, that's the same as the prior year, $202.50. The administration is recommending option two, which is the House Bill 44 allowable 4%. Now, Urban Services Fund, you'll see we have different options here because we have different services, and different services have the different property tax rates for the fund. Avalorum is the largest category of revenue to the Urban Services Fund. It's nearly 90% of all revenues to that fund. Property owners in the urban service area have one or more of the services, refuse, streetlights, or street cleaning. So the options. The option one is the compensating rate. It's the rate that generates the same amount of revenue for existing properties as the prior fiscal year. This option would decrease the service rates for refuse and streetlights, as well as the public service commission rate companies, which is the sum of the three services. So if we change those service rates, then the public service company's rate changes because it's a sum of the three. But it does maintain the rate for street cleaning. It decreases our revenue to the Urban Services Fund by $1,264,145. So it would be a decrease to the fund. Option two is the House Bill 44 rate. This would maintain the rates for all categories, so it keeps them the same. and you'll notice the prior year rates and the option two rates are the exact same on there. And it would generate $835,535 in additional revenue to the Urban Services Fund. The cost of service rate is option three here, and it is a standalone without using any fund balance. And a cost of service rate using these numbers would generate $776,655 in additional revenue. The rates for refuse collection and street cleaning under this option would require a public hearing and would be subject to voter recall. It would require two property tax bills if we went with option three. Options two and three both require a public hearing, but only option three would be subject to recall in the two bills. So this is the illustration of what it would look like on a $270,000 home. You'll see with the prior year rates, which are also the same rates as option two, it would be $467.10. Option one is the compensating rate, and that would be, there's a typo there. That didn't, that math doesn't math. Give me a second here. We'll get that figured out for you. It is not 197.10, I can tell you that. Somebody has a calculator because I don't have a phone up here with me. We reviewed this multiple times and missed that. Elizabeth has it. It's $450.90. Sorry about that. We are struggling here. Okay. So the administration is recommending option two, which is the House Bill allowable 4%. It's keeping rates the same for all three services in the Urban Services Fund. Here are the special tax districts. We have three of them. The only two that you all are required to approve this year is soil and water conservation and the health department. Extension is going with their compensating rates, so you all do not have to approve that rate. It's not part of the motions that will occur after the presentation. Soil and Water is recommending to keep theirs the same. Their board met. They want to keep theirs the same, as well as the health department. They met last night, and they voted to keep their rates the same as well. We just got the information around lunchtime, so that is why it was not included in your packet whenever the presentation came out on Thursday. So those are the options, and we'll be happy to take questions. All right. Thank you. Are there questions? Council Member Ellinger. Thank you. Is there a reason why we use 270? Because if we did 300, then it would just be a lot easier to do the math and figure out 102, 3, 4, 5. You know, it would. We go by the average property, and so it changes. 270, is that the average property? Yes. Because I thought it had gone up to about 3 now. It's based on all the parcels. So it was $260,000 last year, so it went up $10,000 from last year to this year. And I always, the nomenclature here on compensating, because it's, when you say compensating, it's how much total revenue, because we have the assessments go up, so you get more revenues coming in because of the price of the houses are going up because of the reassessment. But when you start looking at the numbers, when you say you're raising taxes, you really, because it's, say, on the general services, it's .075. Because at one point, when I first came on, it was .08. And we've rolled that back four times since I've been on here. But so we're still keeping the same amount, the .075. So it's saying the 4%, but that 4% is just because of growth of what the properties actually have gone up. Is that correct? The 4% is in regards to the revenue collected from the property taxes. That's what I mean. So it's with growth, it's with new properties coming on, and we budget for 4% as part of the adopted budget. Whenever we're working on the revenue, we assume the 4% each year as part of the budget. But in order to go, what would be the compensating? When I think of compensating, we're not raising the tax because it's still staying the .075. So I think of that being the same. but in order to have the same amount of revenue, we'd have to decrease it to .073. Is that correct? Correct. If you went with the compensating, that would decrease the rate, and it would also require us to cut $371,350 out of the general fund because we had budgeted for the 4% as part of the adopted budget. But I guess my point is, do you consider this raising taxes or not? Because it says a 4% rate increase, but I don't consider that because we are keeping the same number. This is not raising taxes. If your house was not assessed by the PVA this year, your property tax bill for our portion, if we go with the options that were recommended, will remain the same. And I guess where it comes up is that the house has been reassessed and then the number would go up. But we're still keeping the same rate as what we had last year. Yes, we are not proposing to change the rate. We are not proposing to increase the rate. And then the urban service, it looks like that actually outside of the refuge, because we did street lights before and raised that, and actually we were raising more than is required, it looks like now. The cost of service is a little bit hard at this point in time because it's based off of the prior fiscal year, and there's some collections and things that they're still working on getting booked, and all of that as the counting is closing out the fiscal year. So there's a little bit of play, and we don't put a lot of emphasis on those right now, if that makes sense, as the year's closing out still. But we do provide them for everybody to see. That's all I have. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. All right. Thank you. Council Member Civigni. Thank you, Mayor. And if you could just, you can stay on this. Thank you for the presentation. So just if you don't mind explaining again on the, and this is something that I've kind of harped on, and this will be the last time I get to do it, so I'm going to try it one more time. The cost of service option three for refuse collection is basically higher than the option two that you're recommending, and I know we need to stay under the 4% limit. But for someone to understand it, I kind of look at that as we have a fund balance and we're churning through some fund balance each year at the rate of that difference between the 137 and the 141. Even though you haven't attributed it to everything, but that's the way a simple person, I think, can look at it. Yes, that's correct. So I know we emailed yesterday about this, but the budget assumed using $5 million of fund balance in the Urban Services Fund, the net that what was put into the top line and what would come out on the bottom line, we used about $2.2 million of fund balance to fund the capital. So those large purchases with the refuse trucks replacing those, we've had a lot of stuff at the MRF, and we have the fund balance available to do that. And so that's what we've been doing for the past several years. Okay, thanks. And then on the one before it, the real estate one, just so that I understand this, the impact on the budgeted fund balance, isn't the option two 4% rate, shouldn't that be zero on the fund balance? That's because you did, we approved a budget that had the 4% increase, and that's what those numbers represent. Isn't that correct? Or are you saying that we're going to have an extra $500,000 over what we've already budgeted? So we also had new properties come on. So if we go back to the slide, it doesn't have percentages. Okay. But we went up 4.8%, and we had budgeted 4%. Because we have new properties, we don't know from year to year new properties that are going to come on. So that's the difference, and that's why it would be an increase. Okay. So technically we have a half a million dollars in addition that we were not planning on in this fiscal year 2027 budget if we approve option two. I just want to. That would be correct. Okay. All right. And it's the same on those other ones? You do the same philosophy on the other ones? Yes. Okay. We will bring forward budget amendments once the rates are finalized to adjust the budget. Okay, cool. Thank you so much. That's all I have, Mayor. All right. Thank you. Council Member Morton. Thank you. And I think you've hit it a couple times. So the current FY27 budget that was adopted was just under the assumption that we would adopt the 4% increase or the 4% option two? Yes, it was. And this is just from public transparency. If option one was chosen over option two, that would leave us in a space where basically we would have to find that gap to provide the services based on that budget? That's correct. We would have to reduce something in order to have a structurally balanced budget. Okay. And then lastly, and I think you've already hit at it, but option two is not raising taxes, correct? Option two is not raising taxes. Thank you. Does anyone else have questions? All right. Council Member Brown. Thank you, Mayor, and thank you, Melissa, for the presentation, Director Luger. So I have some motions in regards to Avalorum tax rates. The first motion is I move to set the general fund Avalorum real property tax rate at option two. So move. Council Member Baxter seconded. Is there a discussion? Questions? All right. All those in favor say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right. That motion passes. The next motion is I move to set the general services fund at valorem personal property tax rate, including public service companies, non-commercial aircraft, and non-commercial watercraft at option two. So move. Second. Vice Mayor Wu seconded. Are there questions? All those in favor say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, that passes. I move to set the general services fund at valorem tax rates for motor vehicles, tobacco and storage, agricultural products and storage, insurance companies, capital, and abandoned urban properties at the same rate as the prior fiscal year. The current rates are .088, .015, .045, .15, and 1.0. So move. Second. Council Member Hale seconds. Are there questions? All right. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right. That passes. In regards to the urban services, I moved us at the Urban Services Fund Refuge Collection Avalorum Real Property Tax Rate at Option 2. So moved. Second. Council Member Baxter seconds. Are there questions? All right, all those in favor, please say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, that motion passes. I move to set the Urban Services Fund Streetlights at Valorum Real Property Tax Rate at Option 2. So moved. Council Member Civigni seconded. Any questions? All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, that passes. I also move to set the Urban Services Fund street cleaning, ad valorem, real property tax rate at option two. So move. Council Member Savigni seconds. Any questions? All those in favor say aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, that motion passes. I move to set the Urban Services Fund public service companies, ad valorem, tax rate at option two, the combined amounts of the three urban service rates and insurance company capital at .092, the same rate as the prior fiscal year. So move. Second. Council Member Baxter seconds. Are there questions? All those in favor say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, that motion passes. All right, and this is a motion for all the LFUCG taxes. I move to place on the docket for the Thursday, August 13, 2026 council meeting, an ordinance pertaining to all of the tax rates for general services, urban services, as provided in the respective amounts from the above motions and levying them at these rates on each $100 of assessed valuation. So move. Second. Vice Mayor Wu seconds. Are there questions? All right. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right. That motion passes. And then these two motions are for the special districts. I move to set the public health ad valorem real property tax rate at 0.0243 and the public health ad valorem personal property tax rate at 0.0243. and to place an ordinance on the docket for the Thursday, August 13, 2026 council meeting levying the taxes at these rates on each $100 of assessed valuation. So moved. Council Member Reynolds seconds. Are there any questions? All those in favor say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, that passes. And then I'll also move to set the Soil Water Conservation District ad valorem real property tax rate at 0.001 and to place an ordinance on the docket for the Thursday, August 13, 2026 council meeting levying the tax at this rate on each $100 of assessed valuation. So move. Second. Vice Mayor Wu seconds. Are there any questions? All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right, that passes. And I further move to schedule a public hearing on all of these abelorum tax rates for the August 27, 2026 council meeting at 6 p.m. So move. All right. Thank you. Council Member Baxter seconds. Any questions about the public meeting? All right. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Is anyone opposed? All right. That motion passes. Thank you very much. Council Member Burhound. All right. Now it's time for council reports. Council Member Beasley. Thank you, Mayor. I move to place the issue of mental health support, resources, and well-being of our first responders in the Social Services and Public Safety Committee for review and recommendations. So moved. Council Member Curtis seconded. Are there any questions? All right. All those in favor, say aye. Aye. Anyone opposed? All right, that motion passes. Thank you, Mayor. Council Member Lynch. Thank you, Mayor. Just a few announcements for my District 2 neighbors. And the first one is for everyone. The Boards and Commission subcommittee will be meeting on Thursday at 1 o'clock in the second floor caucus room. This meeting is open to my colleagues and the community. So if you want to come and find out about what the subcommittee is doing regarding the city's boards and commissions, please come on out on Thursday at 1 p.m. Also, some events happening in the 2nd District. There are many, many activities happening at the Black and Women's Neighborhood Center, so please go online and look at the calendar. But a few I want to highlight is Chair Yoga is tomorrow at 1130 a.m. in the gymnasium. And then there's going to be Back to School Bingo on August 17th at 6 p.m. Those are free and open to the community, so please come out and support those events as well as a whole host of other events that are happening at the Black and Women's Neighborhood Center. And then for my district two neighbors, our district-wide meeting for the fall will be on Monday, October 26th. Time and location will be forthcoming. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you. Council Member Sheehan. Thank you, Mayor. Black Soil has been hosting their Sprout Mobile Farm Market around town recently. And tomorrow, from 3.30 to 5.30, they will be at the Julius Marks Elementary School on Pepper Hill Road in my district. So I hope people can stop by and check it out. And I want to send my best wishes to everyone that is starting school tomorrow, to all the teachers and the families around the county. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you. Council Member Ellinger. Thank you, Mayor. Tonight at 6 p.m., the Mayor's Task Force on Hopelessness will hold a public input meeting to gather community feedback on task force draft recommendation. The meeting will be held at the Lexington Senior Center, 195 Life Lane. We've been working on this task force now going on eight months or so, and we've got recommendations that we'd like to get feedback from the public tonight. So at 6 o'clock, I hope to see everybody there. Thanks, Mayor. Thank you. Council Member Morton. Thank you. I think I've got a little slideshow or something. Let's see. Cool. So while council has been on recess, we certainly haven't taken a recess in the 1st District. I want to take a few minutes to recognize the incredible amount of work and community engagement that has taken place over the past several weeks. As you'll see in the slideshow, we've been all over District 1 and across Lexington supporting the people and the organizations that continue to make our city stronger. We begin the recess by attending the Back to School event hosted by the University of Kentucky Healthcare and Consolidated Baptist Church, followed by another Back to School event at the Alcove Apartments in Winburn. It was great seeing students receive backpacks and school supplies and knowing they're headed into the school year, prepared for success. Thank you to everyone who donated, volunteered, and helped make those events possible. I also had the opportunity to spend time with our youth at the PAL event in Douglas Park and later at Youth Empowerment Day at Spiegel Heights Park. These events remind us how important it is to continue investing in positive opportunities for young people. Every child deserves access to mentors, safe spaces, and programs that encourage them to dream bigger and reach their full potential. I was honored to return to Antioch Baptist Church as a keynote speaker for their youth empowerment program. Being able to speak with youth about leadership, civic engagement, and believing in themselves is always one of my favorite parts of this job. Our youth are not just the future. They're making an impact today, and it's our responsibility to continue to pour into them. Throughout the recess, I also had the opportunity to celebrate several neighborhoods and community traditions, from St. Martin Village Day to Smithtown Day. It was great seeing neighbors, both past and present, come together to celebrate the communities that have shaped so many lives at Smithtown Day into St. Martin Village Day. I had the honor of announcing the winners of the Food Change Grilling and Chilling Competition while also continuing our Neighborhood Voices Project in Smithtown. Hearing stories from long-term residents and collecting their ideas helped ensure Smithtown's history is preserved while also helping shape the future. One of the best highlights of the recess was celebrating homeownership in District 1. I attended the celebration of affordable housing development on Shropshire, and it's exciting to see more opportunities for homeownership in the neighborhood that continues to grow and thrive. I also attended the grand opening of Food Chain's Green Grocery. Access to fresh, healthy food continues to be one of the greatest needs in our district, and seeing this resource opens the door towards a major step forward in our community. I was also honored to attend the Lexington Arts Award Luncheon at the Historic Lyric Theater. I will always enjoy seeing the lyric full of life, serving as a gathering space for our community. It was inspiring to learn more about the talented artists who continue to shape Lexington's culture and to celebrate the creativity that exists throughout our city. Another special moment was attending Senior Day at Seventh Day Adventist Church in St. Martin Village, where I had the privilege of presenting Mrs. Bright, who's actually in the crowd today, with a proclamation from the mayor in honor of her 95th birthday. Happy birthday to you. It was equally meaningful to celebrate all of the seniors being recognized that day for their wisdom, for their faith, and their continued contribution to our community. One event I especially am proud of and was the first for this year was the first district resource fair at Douglas Park in partnership with the Georgetown Street Neighborhood Association as they celebrate their 110-year anniversary of the park. We brought together dozens of organizations, connect residents with valuable resources, while creating a fun afternoon for families. Thank you to everyone who participated, Honeychow Provided Entertainment, and especially to my legislative aide, Jaden Norris, for coordinating the resources, partners, and everyone who came out. Jaden really led that. And finally, I had the opportunity to attend the Lexington Dirt Bowl Championship, one of the longest-standing traditions in our community. Congratulations to this year's champions and award winners. It was the Bulls that won. So as you see from the slideshow, this is only a snapshot of everything that has taken place during the recess. But I want to sincerely thank every neighborhood, every neighbor, every nonprofit, business, city department, volunteer, and residents who welcome me into your spaces. While council meetings may pause for a few weeks each summer, the work of serving District 1 never stops. My office remains committed to being present, accessible, and engaged because that's where the real work happens. In our neighborhoods, alongside the people, we have the privilege of serving. And lastly, I'd be remiss if I didn't acknowledge my constituents who are in the room today. And I'll just leave it at this. Put it simple, your voice matters, your neighborhoods matter, and I understand your concerns and fears. And what I'll say is I won't be diving into the subject right now as of today, but we do have a future presentation in September. And obviously, you know, I'll communicate those dates and share those dates where they will come before council. But I'll do my due diligence to be your voice at that meeting. And my commitment and my promise remains the same, to uplift, support, and defend all of our neighborhoods. And that's exactly what I'll do. Thank you. All right. Councilmember Reynolds. Thank you, Mayor. I would like to put in the Social Services and Public Safety Committee the Signalize Crosswalk Study. that is an item that is being co-sponsored with council member curtis and council member hale so i am putting that in in that committee and it should be heard at the next meeting next i just wanted to echo my desire to wish everybody a happy back to school day tomorrow in fayette county including my son who's starting middle school i wish the teachers their best luck and the students and the parents juggling the schedule that was different over the summer. So I hope that it will be a fabulous school year for everyone. Thank you. Thank you. Vice Mayor Wu. Thank you, Mayor. As some of you might know, I'm part of the Abundance Elected Network and Abundance Fellowship, and through that program I had the good fortune of picking up a student intern, and I want to introduce him. This is Daniel Stein. You've got to wave a little bit. Taller than that. There you go. He is a college student from Stanford. He is with me all summer. He's midway through an eight-week internship, literally moved out here to Lexington to kind of be with us and primarily working with my office on housing issues and trying to figure out how we can take down some of our barriers and create more housing, particularly affordable housing. So you'll probably be seeing him around various meetings. You might even get an email or two from him as well. And please make him feel welcome. And I'm very lucky to have him. Thank you all. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you. All right. That brings us to public comment for issues not on the agenda. We have a few folks signed up. And when I call your name, if you'll please come to the podium. And you'll need to restate your name for the record. you also will need to state your council district, and you'll have three minutes. So first up will be Don Ament, followed by Rick Day, and then Rolanda Wolfolk. Welcome. Good afternoon, and I want to just explain my attire here. This weekend is the 50th anniversary of the Woodland Arts Fair, and you all need to go out there. Probably 20 of those years I exhibited my work there, but this year I'm volunteering, So I get the t-shirt. Will you state your name in the council district for the record? Don Amont, 5th District. Today though I would like to comment about the revisions the Planning Commission made to the data center ZOTA after their meeting on July 30th. They altered the staff ZOTA, tightening some restrictions, but I feel there are some problems with the latest changes in the form of possible legal challenges. First, however, I do want to say this. If you adopt the ZODA as presented to you by the Planning Commission, the Dark Points project is effectively dead. And I say that is a good thing, but the Dark Points attorney was at the Planning Commission meeting, and he made several comments indicating what they want. And what they want does not fly with the new ZODA. For instance, number one, the attorney asked the commission to, quote, allow the site to scale up to a maximum of 50 megawatts of power on our current footprint, end quote. The Zoda says 25 megawatts max. Two, the newly adopted maximum 30 decibel sound level would be virtually impossible for dark points to meet. 30 decibels is generally considered the volume of a whisper or a calm, totally rural area at night. The attorney stated they anticipated operating at 50 decibels. But it has yet to be asked by anyone, where is this measured? Is it measured at the property line at 1,500 feet away? 50 decibels is actually lower than typical ambient urban noise. And if they are adding 50 to that, we are approaching ear-damaging range over 100 decibels. This really needs some thorough investigation. Three, the 1,500-foot buffer zone rule. I used some Google satellite maps to take some measurements, and 1,500-feet distance from dark points is well into the Green Acres residential neighborhood, stretching all the way to Hollow Creek Road. Hello, 1st District. And also, dark points would be 1,292 feet away from the YMCA Center for Children's School. And the Legacy Trail, only 479 feet away, and that is a park. So the legal issues that I mentioned, I've got about 20 seconds left. The Dart Point's attorney wants to write that Zota for you, and I'm going to quote him from the meeting. If you watch the video, you'll see that at 1.06.40, quote, we're going to have to come up with something, and I would say, nope, the we. and at 108.57, they, meaning dark points, bought a property that's currently zoned B1, and data centers are currently allowed in that zone. We've got to figure that out, and we need to be part of it in terms of coming up with the ultimate language. Thank you very much. Thank you. All right. Next is Rick Day, followed by Rolanda Wolfolk. Is Rick Day here? Rolanda, you're here. We welcome you. Welcome. Yeah, welcome back. Feel free to adjust you. All right. Rolanda Woolford, 2nd District. Lexington's downtown master plan was passed July 23rd by planning commission. Adopted. Let me put it that way. will increase the development pressures adjacent to the neighborhood without target protection to Georgetown Street, a historical black and working class neighborhood. Facing risk of involuntary displacement, council must adopt an anti-displacement policy before implementing the growth initiative. Our recommendation is an anti-displacement impact statement for all zoning incentives, deep affordable requirements between 30 to 60 AMI tied to high density and height bonuses, A Georgetown Street anti-displacement overlay district. A right to return and relocation assistance. Property tax breaks for, and I just voted on some, long-term homeownerships. An anti-supplement speculation measure. rental registry and proactivity inspections and legacy business protections against this. On Sunday, no, it was Thursday. On Thursday, we had our volunteers that were vendors who gave out food to over 200 people during our event. Well, part of your master plan shows Newtown Pike being taken away, putting housing there, removing the business that are in light industrial zones. Those are our neighborhood mechanics that are there. We rely on them because they are affordable for the neighborhood. We also, those people that gave the food away, have the business there. They are a mechanical company who gave away free food. It wasn't cheap food. It was fish, macaroni and cheese, and all the rest of that good stuff. It was a full-cust meal that they gave away for free to 200 people. But yet, we say their business doesn't exist and it's vacant. But they also live right down the street from the Lyric, who is also included in this downtown plan. When we gave our information to the city, we wanted to give for downtown, not our neighborhood to be included in downtown. Thank you. Thank you. All right, council members, that brings us to adjournment. So do I hear a motion? All those in favor, say aye. We are adjourned. Thank you all for coming. Take a Chevy, baby, just come back There's a shortcut to the highway out of town Why don't you take it?