She's a fool. Y'all don't wanna hear this. I'm gonna say it anyway. Oh. Is sleeping in my bed. Oh. That I'm gonna get what she's been giving. Get myself together and start living. I'm gonna hold somebody's baby. Y'all gonna help me say this. I tell ya, somebody. Somebody's gotta be. Sure been holding mine. Holding my baby. The reason why I know it, 'cause you know my baby told me. Not so very long ago. She said, "I don't love you, Daddy. And you gotta let me go." That was too much for me. That's why I walked the backstreet and cried. It hurt me so bad. To hear my baby say goodbye. She said another reason. It made me wanna leave. She said, "Milton, you know you ain't got enough of nothing." To keep me halfway, please. I tell y'all that was too much for me. Yeah. That's why I walked the, the backstreet and cried. Yeah. It hurt me so bad. To hear my baby say goodbye. Let's go ahead and get the work session underway, if we could, please. Is there anyone here who wishes to speak on any issue on the agenda? Seeing none, I, I don't know. Council member Ellinger, are you the most senior member of the council, ma'am? Actually, no, the lady to your left is. But I'm getting closer. Has anyone ever spoken, commented publicly on matters on the agenda? Because I don't think it's happened in the two years I've been here, so... Yes, it has happened. Yes. All right. We don't have a docket to approve today, but we do have a summary from February 24th. Is there a motion? So moved. Do I hear a second? Second. Council member Blues has moved that we approve the summary. Council member Gordon has seconded. Any discussion? All in favor, please say, "Aye." Aye. Opposed, "No." Motion carries. We don't have any budget amendments. We do have some new business items. Move approval. Second. Council member Beard has moved approval of the new business items. Council member Gordon has seconded that motion. Any discussion? All in favor, please say, "Aye." Aye. Opposed, "No." Motion carries. Council member Stennet, we'll let you give the Budget and Finance Committee report. Mayor, actually, we just got finished today with the, uh, that meeting so we'll actually be reporting out next week. We can do that. Thank you, sir. Let's see. Shelly, there we go. All right. Let me step to the podium here briefly. Shelly, if you'll come up and join... As some of you may know, March is, uh, Severe Storms Preparedness Month. And it seems like, uh, sometimes we just sort of take this for granted until January 28th rolls around and we have a severe s- winter storm in that instance upon us. And we're hoping everybody is prepared, but you really don't know. So I am pleased today to, uh, share a proclamation about Severe Storms Preparedness Month. Uh, as part of an ongoing effort to encourage folks in our community to, uh, try to make sure they have the things necessary to deal with severe storms, whether they occur in the springtime, as is often the case, or at other times of the year, as we saw in January. So let me, uh, read it for just a moment here and then I'll turn the microphone over to Shelly, who can, uh, talk with you just a bit. Whereas, severe weather, including thunderstorms, straight-line winds and tornadoes can happen any time of year and at any time of the day or night. And whereas, each year many people are killed or seriously injured by severe weather that also inflicts costly damages to property. And whereas, proper preparation, including involving all family members in the establishment of an emergency action plan for all types of severe weather can significantly reduce loss of life. And whereas, all citizens should have an emergency preparedness kit capable of sustaining each family member and pets for at least three days. And whereas, residents are encouraged to visit local, federal or state websites or call 258-3784 for more information concerning emergency preparedness. Now therefore, I, Jim Nuether, Mayor of the Lexington-Fayette Urban County Government do hereby proclaim March 2009 as Severe Storms Preparedness Month. And with that, I am... ... pleased to, uh, turn the microphone over to Shelly Bendle, who's our preparedness coord- coordinator. Shelly? Um, thank you mayor and council. Um, I just wanna take this o- this opportunity to encourage everybody to make sure that, uh, you and your family know what to do in case of severe weather, um, that you have an emergency plan and a kit, um, and that you practice your plan. And, uh, the most important thing that you can do to prepare yourselves for severe weather is to have a NOAA Weather Radio. Um, and if anybody has, um, any questions about what they are or what they do, I'd be, um, happy to give you some more info. Thank you. Rocky Burke from LexTran is here for the presentation on, uh, our par- para transit service. Rocky? Thank you, sir. I just, uh, wanted to take the opportunity today to update you all on some, uh, recent changes to the, uh, para transit service, uh, that's currently operated by, uh, Red Cross. Uh, several, uh, weeks ago, possibly a month or two ago, I came before the, the council to explain the, some of these changes, and, uh, just, uh, wanted to a- again update you on some of this stuff. So as a look, matter of background, um, um, several, uh, months ago we actually had a, uh, a triangular review by the Federal Transit Administration where they come in every three years and do an audit of our operation. During the course of the audit, uh, one of the things that they discovered is that we were providing para transit service, uh, pretty much county wide, and outside three-quarters of a mile of our, or of, of our fixed route services. And for it to be a pure ADA service, um, it has to be within three-quarters of a mile of a fixed route. So they decided that we were doing more than we should be doing, and because of that, it was causing some constraints on the purely ADA para transit service. Uh, so what they said was, uh, "You folks, uh, should not be doing that. And if you choose to do that, then you should, uh, implement a, uh, a higher fee to do that sort of thing." So we had two choices: discontinuing the service outside the three-quarter mile or charge a higher fee. So that's a little bit on the background. So what these changes, uh, essentially are, uh, uh, they became effective, uh, March 1st, so just a few days ago, we started this process. So, uh, essentially anything that's, uh, a pick up or a drop off, uh, outside the three-quarter mile of a fixed route is essentially what we're talking about today. Um, these rides are available on space available basis. In other words, when people call in to make a reservation, those folks who live within the boundary are, you know, given first, uh, are, are allowed to make the reservations, and those that live outside that, it's on space available. A fare for para transit service is a dollar and 60 cents a ride, so those folks who want pick ups or drop offs outside the three-quarter mile, it's now $3. And of course there's another piece of this thing as well. It not only does it apply to the three-quarter mile rule, but it also applies to, uh, service after hours. And what that simply means, for example, if, if the route that goes out to Hamburg, for example, stops at 10 o'clock, then service on para transit service also should end at 10 o'clock. But if someone wants to be picked up past the 10 o'clock, then that's the after hours, and that's when the three, $3 fare would, would be applicable. Um, another piece of this audit was, uh, the eligibility requirements. Um, the FT- FTA auditors discovered that we weren't, uh, uh, determining a, a person's eligibility th- in appropriate ways. So what we have since done, we've gone out and entered into a contract with Cardinal Health Rehab, and, uh, they're providing the, uh, the service to determine a person's eligibility for para transit service. So essentially what happens, if someone w- wants the service, uh, they call our office at, at LexTran. Um, we send them the, all the information that they need so they can apply for service. They contact Cardinal Health, go out for a face-to-face interview, and their determination is made at that time. Uh, as a part of this, there's also an appeals process available, and the Mayor's Commission on Disabilities has agreed to provide that, uh, appeals process for us. So in other words, if Cardinal Health denies them service or says they're no longer eligible, then they can appeal that to the Mayor's Commission on Disabilities. Uh, and then, uh, their decision is, is, uh, is what we, or is bounding in what we go with. Uh, just another key point. Uh, we just entered into a new three-year contract, uh, with, uh, Red Cross to provide this service, and of course, as a part of this, we made some minor changes to their contract, and we now have a performance base contract, which essentially means that the, the money that they receive from us is, is based upon the performance measures or incentives and disincentives so that they can, uh, well, determine how much they make. So obviously, it's in their best interest to provide the highest level of service possible. Questions? Does anyone have questions for Mr. Burke? Council member Hinson? Thank you, Mayor. Hi, Rocky. Yes, ma'am. And, um, I do wanna say that I think, um, LexTran has showed significant improvement over the years, especially with getting the property tax referendum passed, and, but I, I did have some questions, um, about the fare increases, and were the riders notified of the increase? ... the current riders? Yes, ma'am. We, we just, uh, we just had a series of, uh, public hearings. We had five public hearings that covered all the geographic areas in the city. Okay. And, uh, they were pretty much, you know, at the public libraries and, and, like, one of the hospitals around town. But, uh, the notices went out, that we had some people attend the public hearings. And at this, we, we briefed them on this and what the fare increases were and, and those sorts of things. In addition to that, we've had some folks come to our, our work sessions and, uh, in the, uh, LexTran board meetings where we, where we talked about this. So the information has been out. Yes, ma'am. Okay. And also, um, as far as the eligibility determination, your current riders, will they have to go through that process? At some point in time, probably so, but, but just given the so many changes taking place at this time, we've decided to, at this point, focus on simply new applications right now. New, new applicants? Just new applicants, yes, ma'am. What's the cost for those assessments? Uh, the person, uh, requiring the assessment is... there's no charge to them. LexTran bears that cost. How much is the cost for LexTran? It's, uh, $25 per assessment. Okay. And it, and it is my understanding, it's about a 90-minute session- Yes, ma'am. ... to complete the assessment. Correct. Um, I guess I was just wondering why a, uh, eligibility determination couldn't be made similar to what they use to get your, your handicapped parking pass, which is much simpler and less costly? You know, the... I guess the answer to the question is, you know, we have simply gone on recommendations from the FTA and their auditor, what they're- Okay. ... suggesting, uh, that we do. And, and then... and then they provided several examples of what an assessment should be. The, uh, FTA doesn't require that you do the assessment, right? Yes, ma'am. They d- They only give you the op... They, they say you have the option. Is that correct? No. W- There actually has to be an assessment performed to determine if, if they are eligible for paratransit service. Okay. Now, to term... you know, exactly how we do that, again, they just made some suggestions of, of how to do that. Okay. But they clearly indicated that, that w- an assessment has to be performed. Okay. And I guess, I, I am very, very glad that you kept the border-to-border service. And I feel like, you know, $3 is probably fair for someone that lives outside that 3/4 mile, but I did have a question about if a person, say, uh, you... they're transported to a location and dropped off. While they're there, that bus service may be... Some of your routes run, you know, like, f- until n- um... and I may be incorrect on this, but some of the routes stop at, like, 9:00 AM. They just run during the peak hours, and then they pick back up, say, at 3:00 PM. Yes, ma'am. During that period of time, there's really no fixed route. Right. So would that person have to pay the $3? No, it would be the... It'd be, it would be the $1.60. Okay. So the after-hours is just, like, in the late evening. Late evenings or early AM, yes, ma'am- Okay. ... before, before regular service starts. Yes, ma'am. Okay. Thank you. Yes, ma'am. Any other questions? All right. Thank you very much for coming. Thank you. Good to see you. Hi, Rodney. Hey. How are you doing? It's good to see you. We'll turn the podium over to, uh, Harold Tate now for a presentation on the Streetscapes. Harold? Good afternoon. I'm Harold Tate with Lexington Downtown Development Authority, and we're here to give you all an update on Streetscape. As you all remember, in August of 2008, we presented to you the plan itself. Uh, Mr. Martin, I apologize. I have not gotten with you yet. I, I will and give you a plan. I met with Cheryl yesterday to kind of go over those things, but I will be getting with you to give you more of an update on that. Um, but we, uh, have been working on this now for a little over year and a half. And we are ready to come and give you an update on what we call Phase 1. So to do that, I... we've asked Cleet Benkun with, uh, KKG Studios to come and do the presentation for you. And for those who do not know, we do have, uh, like, a public viewing of all the boards that will run from, uh, 5:00 to 7:30 tonight, right outside here in the mezzanine. And we hope that you all will come out and look at those boards as well. So I'll turn it over to Cleet. Good afternoon. Um, again, my name is Cleet Benkun. I'm a principal with Kinzleman, Klein, Gossman in Covington, Kentucky. I'm pleased to, uh, be able to present the update on the Phase 1 Streetscape, uh, project. Um, we have, since, uh, September, been working to determine the feasibility of, uh, the proposed Phase 1 projects. And when I say that, uh, I'm talking about both the technical, uh, and logistic feasibility of developing, um, a dramatic transformation, uh, within downtown Lexington. The mayor, uh, made comments last week about the dramatic impact that these streetscape improvements can and will have on Lexington's ability to serve as a place for business, as a destination for, uh, downtown living, and as a destination for, um, uh, events that benefit the entire community, not just the downtown population. Um, it's important t- to start by talking about what the conclusion of the Downtown Master Plan was, and that conclusion was reinforced by the work that preceded it with the Downtown Plan, the Bicycle and Pedestrian Master Plan, and the Collegetown Plan. Um, all of those plans pointed to the need to create a stronger pedestrian orientation throughout downtown, talked about the need to, um, improve opportunities for the development of new businesses and new service, uh, offerings within the downtown area. And when I say service, I just don't mean private services, I mean cultural services, civic services, and events. And so we've, we've, um, begun to expand upon the ideas in the Downtown Master Plan to show what they really would look like on a, um, really a foot by foot basis as you go, um, along the phase one area. So let me start by, um, just summarizing what the phase one areas are. Um, it is Limestone from Avenue of Champions, um, first down to Main and Vine, and then secondy- secondly from, um, Main all the way up to 4th. Uh, we are looking at Main Street from Broadway all the way to Elm Tree, and we are looking at Vine Street from Broadway to Limestone. Uh, and that map, um, color codes those areas. We are also looking at Cheapside Park and the area that, um, is, is currently occupied by a green space between Cheapside Street and the sidewalk along the, uh, west side of the Courthouse. Um, we are in the, in the middle of, uh, what we call design development. It's a, a design and engineering phase where we begin to understand the technical challenges and the logistic challenges or hurdles. Um, we had identified these project areas in phase one and said that we needed to look at what would have to be done with traffic modeling, what would have to be done with, um, utility issues to be able to accomplish the idea of creating a more walkable, transit-friendly, um, business-friendly downtown streetscape. So, um, later this afternoon, uh, when we have the open house, you'll have the ability to view the boards and see everything that we're doing. Um, I've... I am not going to go into the, uh, the nitty-gritty aspects of all of the design at this point, um, and instead, I'm, I'm just gonna try and update you on, um, on that feasibility aspect of, of what we're doing, and, and then we'll take questions. So with that, unless anybody wanted me to pause, I'm gonna talk about each project on a case by case basis for just a couple of minutes, um, and I'm gonna start with Cheapside. If, uh, somebody wanted to, uh, get that on the screen, I also have a board that I'm gonna put up here for your, uh, your viewing pleasure. Um, Harold and Mike are, are gonna help. By the way, uh, with me today to answer any questions, uh, is Mike Woolam from Strand Associates. They are our, um, engineering, uh, consultant on this project and, um, uh, they are currently working on, uh, the traffic model that, uh, is, uh, required for the improvements that we've proposed along Main and Vine. Pardon? Thank you. Okay. Um, the, uh, the sketch in front of you, um, shows the concept for a, a new civic, uh, plaza and event space, um, adjacent to the courthouse between Cheapside, uh, and, uh, and the old curb that ran along the sidewalk along Market Street. Um, for much of its history, that space was a broad plaza. The street ran all the way from Cheapside to the curb of the sidewalk along the west side of the courthouse. Um, that space was home to, uh, both the famous and the infamous in Lexington's history. Um, slave auctions were held there, court days were held there, um, um, merchandising, uh, the trading of commodities was held there. It's got a really, really rich history and past that, frankly, we have an opportunity to embrace and to tell a story that attracts not only people that are currently in Lexington and, and r- may not know about the history of everything that's gone on there, um, including people that maybe will visit Lexington for the first time and be intrigued by the history of that space. So the development of Cheapside, um, I've described, uh, previously, uh, in, in public, um, realms, is, is, uh, probably the, uh, the h- the, the, the most important, um, one space within downtown Lexington that we can influence with this streetscape project. That's not to say that the others are not important, they certainly are, but this is the one space where you can attract user groups that aren't being served in downtown today. Um, the space is designed to accommodate the Farmer's Market, it's designed to accommodate Thursday Night Live, it's designed to accommodate festivals and events that bring in the population, uh, the broader population, I should say, of, of Lexington. Um, it's not just for downtown. Um- You can have a, an apple, buy an apple, buy, uh, a- an ice cream cone, uh, buy anything that you can find at farmer's market by day, and you can spend just a few pennies, uh, to a few dollars for that... for that benefit. Um, you can then, after farmer's market closes, linger, remain around and watch as, uh, maybe an orchestra is set up, or a band is set up, uh, for a performance on the lawn or a performance on the plaza. Um, it's... it's truly a great opportunity to get more use out of public spaces within downtown Lexington. Um, we have proposed the development of a very green footprint, green in terms of sustainability. We've been working with the city's environmental quality folks to talk about how we can design the space to, uh, deal with storm water more sensitively, how we can, uh, preserve existing trees, how we can reduce the heat island effect of pavements, how we can recycle and reuse rainwater that hits the street and hits the rooftops. And we've talked about how we might have a... a te- a, um, a pavilion, a winter garden structure in the center of that space that can be used for a variety of users. And, um, that, those images, I believe, um, were... were... were on the earlier slide and they're on the board in front of me here, again, looking at that per- at that perspective. Um, thank you. That's what we're referring to. Um, in order to do, uh, the plan the way it's shown right now, we would, uh, like to be able to move the Breckenridge statue out of the center of the... of where it originally was on the street, um, to where it would face Main Street. We've talked to the director of the history museum. We've also talked to Foster Ockerman, who is the trustee, uh, for the trust that maintains the statue, and they have both, uh, acknowledged that that would be an... an excellent way to both honor the importance of that statue, uh, and also to, um, to make um... a better use of the park space. Um, what you see in the foreground are a couple of limestone piers, or monuments, that would be used to tell, uh, the story of the identity of the park. Um, Cheapside, uh, for those that have not heard, was actually the name of a market in England that this market was fashioned after. It was a market for the trading of commodities, consumer goods, um, had nothing to do with the cost of goods, although it was in a working-class area of... of, uh, London. So, uh, it's, uh, it's a... it's a reflection of the... of the European mindset and contribution, uh, that, um, that is evidenced in Lexington today. Um, I... I'm gonna talk next, unless there's any questions about that, about Main Street. Um, Main and Vine, as you know, today, are, uh, one-way pairs. They are very wide. Vine Street is about 68 feet wide. Main Street, uh, not quite as wide. But both have one-way traffic that moves at a fairly brisk pace. Um, they are not the most pedestrian-friendly streets. They're... they're far from it. Um, but we have worked with the transportation cabinet, we've worked with the city's, uh, traffic, uh, planning staff to find solutions for both in the short term and the long term to make Main and Vine, uh, better contributors to the quality of life in downtown Lexington. Um, it's... it's important to state that, um, we're not gonna... we're not gonna wave a magic wand and... and we're not gonna fix everything today. Um, the city doesn't have tha- those kinds of resources, uh, and nobody does, in this economy, to do everything that you might wanna do, uh, out into the future. But what we can do is we can work with the resources that we do have today to set the stage for the ultimate transformation of downtown. So, for here and now, uh, this is Vine Street, for example. Um, what you're seeing there is a four-lane street. Um, what is actually there today is a six-lane street when you take into account the parking. What that map shows, that plan shows, is how we have proposed to compress s- the traffic into only four lanes and to get parking in the curbside lanes at non-peak drive time hours. So, through the middle of the day and in the evenings, the two curbside parking lanes, or drive lanes, would become parking lanes. We will actually increase the inventory of on-street parking in the downtown area by about a h- up to 170 spaces. Um, that means real dollars for the businesses that operate in downtown. Also means revenue for the Parking Authority in downtown. Um, um, that... those parked cars have a calming effect on the street in the evening. You're buffered by the traffic that's moving down the street. It's a much more traditional Main Street feel on a street that, for the foreseeable future, will be one way. Um, and we have heard a lot from folks in, uh, the public sector, folks in downtown and folks from out downtown, and you'll have differing opinions about one way, two way. We, uh, promote the... the notion of a phased and incremental approach to converting Lexington's one-way pairs to two way. Um- There's, uh, from the studies that have been done previous to ours, and from the work that we have done, a good reason to believe sound planning principles that support the conversion of the one-way streets to two-way. Um, it provides better orientation for merchants, uh, retailers, dining establishments. People want to be able to be seen. Uh, one-way streets are not as conducive to that. We've shown that, um, if it's going to succeed, it will be, uh, an incremental approach that makes it succeed, because you couldn't turn a switch and convert all of the streets today. If you did, it, it would literally be, um, uh, confusion. Um, if, however, you take an incremental approach, and you start with the easy streets to convert, and, um, in our report we've, we've mentioned that Short and 2nd would be the first pair, uh, that could be converted. Um, the Urban County Government's, uh, Traffic Planning staff have been working at, um, a timeline and a, and a strategy for when that can be done. And, and Mike Webb may want to, um, uh, comment on that later. Um, but it can be in the, in the relatively short term that that is done. The next pairs that would happen would be, um, uh, really determined by, um, a series of benchmarks, not dates, but benchmarks, including the conversion of Newtown Pike, um, uh, I'm sorry, the development of the Newtown Pike extension, and, um, and some other things that right now, uh, we don't have a crystal ball to know exactly when they'll happen. But there is a series of events that will have to happen for all of the one-way pairs to convert. Um, as the mayor had mentioned last week, um, in, in the near term, um, based on some budget limitations, based on the fact that the state owns the right of way, we are not, um, counting on Main and Vine becoming, uh, two-way. Uh, there's, there's too many other things, uh, in the near term that would have to happen to make that successful. So that's gonna be a little ways down the road. Um, but I think it's important to note that the work that we're doing is done with an eye toward being able to make that conversion in the future. We have looked at the geometries and the lane configuration, um, and we have, uh, we have, um, uh, several alternatives in front of us and in front of you that demonstrate how we can have one way today, and then at some future date, we can do two-way, uh, without bearing the, uh, what, what frankly could be a m- a very, very high cost, future cost to convert those. So if we plan smartly today, so that you can make those conversions in the future, um, it just makes good sense. It's just good use of public funds. It's just good planning practice. So I diverged a little bit from talking about what we all like to talk about, the beauty of a streetscape, to, to get to the housekeeping of how we've arrived at what the streetscape is gonna look like. Um, so again, here's, here's Vine Street. Um, um, there's, there's an excellent opportunity to make Vine Street a linear promenade, a park-like space along both sides. Why would you do it along the sides? The Downtown Plan showed a park in the middle of the street. You would do it along the sides because businesses can benefit from the development of dining spaces, café spaces, park-like spaces along the side of the street. It's difficult for them to benefit from a narrow park space down the center of the street. Um, we think that this is a, an excellent opportunity to not wait for something that might be in the distant future to make a dramatic improvement on Vine Street today. Um, any questions about Vine Street before I, um, talk about Limestone? Okay. Um, Limestone Street. Um, UK and Transylvania, as you all know, are important, uh, economic engines to the entire region, not just to Downtown Lexington. Um, and it's been a dream that has been talked about in the Collegetown Plan and, and all the way through the Downtown Plan to have a stronger connection phys- both physical and, and psychological connection to those important institutions. There's a lot of, of, of great neighborhoods along, uh, the roadway corridors between those institutions and downtown, so we have been looking at what can be done along both North Lime and South Lime to create a more transit-friendly, bike-friendly, pedestrian-friendly atmosphere along the street. Um, we've been looking at, um, a lot of the technical issues along with, um, overhead utilities, underground storm sewer, sanitary sewer, uh, to evaluate what the cost and what the logistic, uh, issues are to getting those, uh, utilities underneath the grade and developed as part of a, of, of a new streetscape. We are proposing to narrow Limestone from Avenue of Champions to Maxwell Street. Uh, we've got three lanes that have to neck down to two lanes at Maxwell. So we have a plan that shows the development of rain gardens, um, sidewalk café spaces, uh, in what was once a drive lane. Um, we have shown that we can have one-way streets today that, again, can be t- converted to two-way at some future date, and again, uh... ... just to reiterate, the benchmarks for that, uh, we're starting to understand and we'll be able to talk more about that later. But, um, we're, we're, we're planning for that future conversion. Um, in terms of schedule, um, we have, uh, we're in the, we're in the middle really of the design development phase of the, of the project. Um, with, uh, the authorization of the s- of, uh, the Irvin County government, uh, we will soon be moving into more detailed design and planning. Um, the goal is to have all of the phase one projects documented and the, and the budgets understood by summer of this year so that utility work can begin and that utility work can be followed by the actual streetscape installation, um, as soon as late summer, early fall. And then moving in through, uh, the middle of next year, uh, with any of the projects that would be done being completed by July 1 of next year so as not to interfere with, uh, the, the 4th of July festival and, uh, and, um, and parade and then all of the, uh, activities in the build-up to the World Equestrian Games. Um, that concludes my comments. I look forward to questions. Thank you. I have a number of, uh, folks who've indicated a desire to speak. Let me ask you one clarifying thing. I think you mentioned last week when we talked about this a little bit, that the structure that you show in Cheapside is conceptual in nature. Is that right? You, could you elaborate on that just a bit. Yes. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Um, in, in the, um, outdoor, um, later, we're gonna show a board that shows some farmers markets from all over the world. Um, in the, in the time that we've had, uh, we haven't been able to hone in on what the exact look and construction of that feature will be. We have said that in principle, we want it to be a very transparent structure. We don't wanna compete with the historic inventory of buildings on Cheapside, nor do we wanna compete with the, you know, the, the, the, uh, architectural gem that you have in the old courthouse. So, in terms of what the, the overarching design principles for that building would be is that it should be a modern building, should not be a throwback building. Um, it should use traditional forms which are conducive to markets and events, uh, utilization, but it need not be necessarily traditional materials. Um, so there will be a follow-up, um, uh, design effort to really understand and to work with stakeholders to, uh, arrive at what the final ultimate look for that building will be. Uh, but, uh, this, this represents the concept and how the space would lay out and the general appearance. Okay, Council Member Stennet. Th- that was my first question, to go a little more detail about that, the s- the center there around Cheapside. Did you look at any other type of structures? I mean, do you have pictures of anything else you looked at or is this the... Y- yes, Councilman. Um, out in the, out in the lobby or in the gallery later, I'd be happy to show you some of the, the different alternatives that, that we've, we've looked at. Okay. M- my big question is, in terms of dollars th- that it's gonna take to do each of these individual pieces, do you have that broken out- Um- ... on each of the projects, one, two, et cetera? Yeah. I, I didn't... I don't have those, uh, those exact figures in front of me. Let, let me just say in summary that, um, phase one was proposed to be a total budget of about $18 million, and that's assuming you were able to do everything before the games. Um, and that was obviously proposed back in, uh, September. Um, I'm proud and pleased to report that in working with, uh, staff and working with utility companies, um, we've been able to actually rein that budget in a little bit. Good. Um, it only makes, uh, good sense in times like these to be looking at, uh, where you spend dollars and where you spend them wisely. So we've actually, um, changed, not to the detriment of the quality of the design, but changed some thinking on what you take out and replace. Um, lighting, for example, that works perfectly well today and is attractive probably oughta stay where it is, and we can move pavement banding around to avoid, uh, tearing things out that don't need to be torn out. We can work with a lot of the infrastructure that's there. We don't have to pull out all the concrete just to have new concrete in place. Um, so we've, with an eye toward being responsible for precious public monies, um, have really taken a hard look at what we can do to value engineer the design, and we will continue to do that as we move through. So, um, in round numbers, 18 million is where we started. We're, we're below that today to the tune of about a million. That does not include the utilities. That's just the basic streetscape. Okay? And is that everything you talked about today or is that just the Cheapside area? That's, uh, that's everything we've talked about today. Okay. An- and you're confident we could get all that done by next year? Well, um, yeah, I- uh, i- as we sit here today, it's doable by next year. Now, that is not to say that something won't come up. We might not find out, you know, for example, that, oh, gee, there's a major utility that the, the, the, the, the, um, the cost of it or the logistics behind it might suggest that we not do a certain portion. Um, and I think it's safest to say that we're gonna report back to this group as we move through the paces. We're gonna keep you informed of how things are developing. But as we sit here today, if the money was available, we would be able to, w- we believe, get most of this, most of this done. We have found that there are, uh, the logistics of doing Limestone suggest that we probably are gonna want to do South Limestone ahead of North Limestone, and that may suggest that North Limestone, uh, might not go before July 2010. Don't know that with any certainty, but that's, that's kinda where the, the, the meter is right now on that, based on the, the, the workflow that would have to take place. The Farmer's Market area is part of the Cheapside portion of it. Is that ready to go, that, that portion? And there's funding there for that? Um, yeah, to- tomorrow, I believe, um, um, I believe Mike and Harold will be presenting, um, the Cheapside plan to the Courthouse Review, uh, Board. Um, what we've looked at is a temporary, and I, I should've mentioned this earlier, earlier. We're, we're looking at a temporary improvement that will allow the Farmer's Market to operate there on that space this year. It involves removing two of the circular fountains that are there, converting that space to sidewalk café space, and then creating a center, um, arcade, uh, with a, a prob- maybe a, um, a unit paver, certainly a, a hard surface of some sort, but it will allow the Farmer's Market to operate there on a regular basis without being in wet grass or, or mud. Um, um, so there's a, there's a plan for the temporary improvement of that park, um, which would allow us to operate there this year. Come fall of this year, probably November, maybe as early as October, um, Farmer's Market would, would cease operating there and we could begin the construction of the permanent improvements to, to the space. So, when you say this year, I mean, I think they open middle of April, end of April, so- Right. ... we're talking- Yeah. ... you know, pretty quickly. We have, we have... And that's an excellent question. We have, uh, a plan out there that shows what those temporary improvements look like. We have some cost estimates for, um, y- you know, when, or h- how much that would cost to make those improvements, and we have a timeline that would allow us to be able to be o- operating there in early April. So, th- there's no funding right now that's been identified for that piece? I'll let Mike... Sorry, Commissioner, I didn't, I didn't see you sitting there. Council Member Stennet, uh, there was in the CIP for 2009, uh, there was money budgeted based on the estimate done for Cheapside, uh, for the schematic design. That level, it was, I believe, one, just over 1.9 million to take care of the permanent, uh, reconstruction of that area. Did not include any pavilion in that. That was simply the hard surface, what's on the ground. So, that money is available right now. Uh, the temporary construction, we are working on the, the temporary very quickly here. Uh, hope to do it on our unitized contract. Uh, hope to start next week, if possible, to get that done. It'll be very quick what's done there. And what it, it'll be designed to do is provide hard surface there for the Farmer's Market to get 'em through this summer, where at, I believe in October, the park is again available and that's, that's when construction of the permanent stuff could begin. But the money for the, the temporary would be out of the bonded funds for the permanent. But we haven't bonded those yet, so... Yes, there was, in, uh, there was an approval of a couple of the different pri- couple of the streetscape projects, Cheapside being one of them, to make money available for the two thou- for 2009 fiscal year. Okay, well, we, we can pull, pull those numbers out 'cause, uh, I was under the impression we were waiting to bond that sometime this year. We haven't done those. There, there is some bonding for 2010. I've, I, I have worked with Kina before she left to make sure- Right. We just need to dig those numbers out- ... what was available and what wasn't. ... 'cause we, we did spread it out quite a bit, so- Yeah, I, I, those phase two project, I mean, phase one projects actually are, uh, the majority of the funding is in, was in 2009, 2010 fiscal year with just a little bit to finish out for 2011. Okay. Very good. Thank you, Mayor. Council Member Blues. Thank you, Mayor. Uh, I think my questions, Clete, are actually for Harold. Okay. So... Yes, sir. Uh, Harold, I wanna talk a little bit about, uh, not, not so much the, the, the, the space for, uh, a Farmer's Market facility, but we are intending to modify public space with public dollars for a Farmer's Market. Now, in the discussion so far, I think that the references ha- has always been to the Lexington Farmer's Market. And I'm concerned that if we, if we build on public space and spend public dollars, how then do we select or work with or administrate a farmer's market? There's more than one farmer's market in, in Lexington. Now, heretofore, we have, and of course, the, in the last, the last market season, and I'm referring only here to the Saturday market, we've operated on unmodified public space, uh, with the Lexington Farmer's Market for a, w- w- under a, a purchase of services agreement... And, of course, there's a non-discriminatory clause so that vendors, individual vendors can apply. Now I think that things change fundamentally when we modify public space. So I wonder what, what discussions, what plans are going forward to make certain that we're not going to be discriminating against one, one market or another, or privileging another one? Well, first of, when we, when we laid out Chiefside, it was not just the intent of a farmer's market. We had meetings with other users of the space. Uh, Penny Evil, we met with the merchants around the area. We met with various groups that used the ar-, uh, the spaces in the past. So the purpose of the pavilion is not just for farmer's market. It is for, you know, DLC has a series of events there, Irvin County government has a series of events there, so that's why we encourage and talk to many people about this area and how the space should be designed. Um, in terms of the, quote, "farmer's market," uh, w-we anticipate it being done the same way as done on Vine Street. I think that's one of the reasons why we met with you all earlier to make you aware of this so that we need to modify that, that, that agreement. We need to do that as soon as we can. Um, but in terms of whoever wants to use the space, it would be done just, you know, like it has been in the past, contact Penny Evil in the mayor's office. She keeps the calendar of the park, who goes there, who uses it. Um, we always make sure that no double bookings are occurring, um, because it is a public space that anybody ha-, you know, has the ability to use. So, hmm, have there been discussions, say, with the Bluegrass Farmer's Market? Um, I'll be honest, I'm, I'll be honest, I'm not aware of them. 'Kay. But, well, again, this is, uh, you know, I know that traditionally the, the, the Lexington Farmer's Market has been, you know, on Vine Street, on the, uh, on, for the, on the Saturdays and, uh, and we've worked that out. But, but I think something's changing here now. When we're gonna spend money for a market facility, of course, it, as you say, it will be used for other uses. And so, I, I think we have to be very careful about how we, how we go forward to make sure that, that, that, that f-, that there is equal access and, and fairness. So I'm not exactly sure what the process should be, but I, I'm pretty sure there has to be one. And I'm not, uh, I'm not entirely sanguine about, you know, simply, uh, amending the current PSA. If- If, if we're gonna modify the space in, in certain ways for, for this season on a temporary basis, even. So that's the, that's my question, that's my concern, and I'm hoping that, you know, that we can, we can, uh, you know, look into this. I will contact Penny and get with the administration on that, then. Council member Gordon. Thank you, Mayor. Um, a couple things about the Chiefside space. Um, I wanted to echo what council member Blues said, because I think we are ... This is a big change, and it will involve public dollars. And so, I will just put a ditto under what council member Blues said, that I think that if in fact we are making a market space, which I think is a marvelous idea, um, then we should not, w-we should be looking at being inclusive when it comes to farmer's market. I know that, um ... And I don't know whether the newspaper used the term Lexington Farmer's Market. It may not have, but there are more than, there's more than one farmer's market in the community. So, I'll be, uh, going right along with him to see what you, uh, can come back to us about with that. And then, I have a question for Cleat. I did note that you said that the c-, this was a concept, the marketplace, and already, based on the newspaper article, I've had two phone calls uh, because the ice storm is still in the, uh, recent memory of Fayette County folks, and both of these people said, "Why would we make this glass?" And so, I'm gonna presume from what you said that it's not necessarily going to be glass. Uh, or is that- It, it, it, it- ... a presumption that- ... is certainly, it's certainly an option. I mean, there's, there's, you know, there's glass and there's tempered glass. Okay. That was gonna be- Yeah. ... my next question, is- It's, it, there, there are, there are, um, um, brands, if you will, of glass that are very weatherproof and durable, and, um, they're used in some of the most, um, important civic buildings in the world. And it can be, it can be done here. What, but to that earlier point, um, what, we'll, we'll revisit the designs. What you see there today is a good start. Concept. But it's not necessarily the end point for where we'll, we'll end up. Okay. And so we, we frankly welcome more comments on how the space needs to be programmed. We literally do want the form of that to follow its function. It's a term that's used in architecture a lot. But, uh, we wanna start by understanding who all the user groups are- And we wanna talk about the operational goals that, um, the city has for that space. And then, then we'll come back with a design that is tailored to those needs. Well, I think it's a, it's has wonderful potential as a public space. And we, I received an email which I think all council members may have received. Someone said, "Well, if we're making it out of glass, it'll be a hot house." So, I think it's important for the public to understand that it is a concept and that it may not look like that when it's finished. That's, that's, that's a true statement. Okay, thank you. Council member Beard. Thank you, Mayor. Um, Clete, while I've got you up here, I'm gonna have to, to talk to Harold at some point. But anyway, um, the comment about two-way makes stores more visible, um, isn't exactly totally true because we have trees on Main Street and we have signs on Main Street that are on the faces of buildings and don't extend out. And I know many people who, especially in the block between Martin Luther King and Limestone, don't know what is in th- that block because they can't see the signs. So, the sign ordinance is gonna have to be amended, I would think, uh, especially for Main Street and I would question Vine Street being viable at all. There are n- there is no retail on Vine Street and I don't see where there's any room for retail on Vine Street. There's hotels and there's bank buildings and office buildings and Kentucky Utilities and the Phoenix Building and the transit center, but there i- there just really isn't any space for v- for, at this point anyway, with, uh, for, uh, retail. Um, Harold, uh, let me chat with you a little bit about reinforcing what, uh, Council Members, uh, Gordon and Blue said, um, as concerns, uh, about equal access- Mm-hmm. ... to this space on Cheapside for the farmer's market, a farmer's market. Uh, I was sitting here writing down farmer's market and I said, "Do I use capital letters or, or not? Uh, do I go lowercase and make, be more generic about it?" Um, I too am concerned about this. I have a constituent that's very concerned about this already. He's always kind of at the first o- out of the line and, um, I think he'd rather hear me than, uh, him come down here and, and talk to us, uh, which he has done in the past. Um, the real question is, w- w- how does all this dovetail and coordinate with the TIF, the courthouse TIF? This was something that was already in plan before we did the overlay on the T- on the TIF. O- uh, in the TIF application, we put in money for a permanent structure that could be open year round. So, that's what was included in that. And then we included money in the TIF also for the courthouse building itself. Right. So, so that's kinda separate from ... We're only dealing with- But the sp- but the space on Cheapside was also included and it's probably- We had some money, but you know, most of the, of the money that we were needing was gonna be for the area around the courthouse, not so much the park itself. Uh, h- how detailed was that and do we not have an opportunity to include this concept in the TIF? Uh, it was my understanding Jim Parsons said that we could go back and make adjustments as we, as we went along. And I don't think we're too far down the pike to do that. Uh, yeah, you can go back and make some j- adjustments, but when we were looking at the TIF, you know, we have some accessibility issues to the courthouse. Uh, so that's where that money was gonna be used for to make that building more accessible for, uh, ADA compliance- Right. ... and, and all those items. So, so I think that's where most of that money was gonna be applied for. Well, you know, as, uh, Council Member Stennet said, maybe, uh, TIF money, uh, spends just as well as, uh, as bond money. Right. Uh, thank you both, uh, very much. Okay. Thank you. Council Member Lawless. Um, uh, this might be for Harold, I'm not sure. Oh, yeah. Um, you talked, you all are talking about the, uh, two-way streets on Main and Vine being in the foreseeable future, I believe is the way you put it. Mm-hmm. Um, and then I read in the paper that, you know, that that's not in anybody's foreseeable future. Do you all have some idea about the two-way street issue- In, in- ... on Main and Vine? In, in the downtown master plan and in the streetscape plan, both recommended phasing in pairs over time and everybody's agreed that the short second one could go very quickly. Mm-hmm. Sure. I mean, my goal is that within the next year, that it's achieved. Um, and then as Clete said, then the next one would be the Limestone upper conversion, the High and Maxwell, and then Main and, and Vine. When you get to the High and Maxwell, I'm, and I'm not a traffic engineer, but when you get to the High and Maxwell, you run into some issues that we're gonna have to study a little bit farther because when we did the downtown master plan- We did a traffic, a very preliminary traffic study of those conversions. And the Maxwell, uh, conversion back to two-way did add m-many time delays and it adds some air issues as well. So in terms of what happens after Short and 2nd, timewise, a lot's gonna depend upon Newtown Pike and then probably some additional studies that, you know, the council and, and, uh, needs to move forward with at a pace that you all feel comfortable with. So is foreseeable future, like, am I gonna be alive or? Good Lord willing and the creek don't rise? Yeah, like I, I, I, I just cannot, I just can't say. You know? I just- You can't speak to my health conditions? Okay. Yours and mine both. Uh, the second question I have is, um, for Clete. First of all, uh, uh, you know, I came to your office and saw this. It's really beautiful. Uh, hope it's something that we can place in ordinance rather than just a good idea. Um, but you, when you were talking about putting surfaces down on the lawn, hard surface on the lawn of the courthouse, do I remember correctly that you said they would be pervious surfaces? Yes. Yes. Our, our intent is, is this, that the streetscape plan is a green, and I don't mean- Green pervious surface. ... by plant material- Yeah. Okay. ... but by sustainability. Okay. And I guess thirdly, um, I understand your all's questions about the farmer's market. I also know that this has been talked about for a long time and through the TIF negotiations, trying to find a way because it is such a vital part of downtown and brings downtown alive e- every Saturday from whenever to whenever. Um, and m- I hope that gets resolved quickly because I know that their plans were, they were somewhat courted, if you will, to stay downtown and that their plans were based on this assumption. And so I hope that here at the final hour we're not throwing a glitch into that. I also understand the concern about being fair in other farmers' markets, but this is, this is a really big deal. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Council member McCord. Thank you, Mayor. Clete, I'm, I'm probably gonna ask you a couple questions here, but I, let me just start by saying that it's, it's pretty phenomenal to even see this in, in drawing format, um, to see things that, that have been talked about for y- a number of years and dreamed and schemed and drawn on napkins. And, uh, and to see that in front of us now in picture form and, and moving very, very close to seeing these things done. And I appreciate everything that you've done, uh, to get us as a city to this point. And I know the vice mayor and I have talked a lot about all these moving parts that are happening in downtown and it's kinda tough to, to keep all of that in mind as we're making decisions, uh, about certain things. And it's very easy to get locked in on a tactic like, is that glass versus plexiglass versus a horse barn versus a glass house, whatever. But at the end of the day, let, let's, let's back out to 30,000 feet where we are today and just take a look at, at an amazing vision for our downtown that's going to bring tons and tons of people, uh, into our downtown. All these things we're talking about and, you know, we talked today earlier about Lyric Theater and all of that revitalization and then you start looking at this and you talk about Distillery District and this is a great time to live in Lexington. And I don't really care what the news says and, and how it's portrayed, but at the end of the day, uh, this is the most exciting time to live in Lexington in a generation, maybe ever. And we are in a position where we are literally redrawing the boundaries of downtown and redrawing the vision for our kids and our kids' kids. So to, to your piece in that, thank you very much. Um, leads me into some of the comments that have been made. Um, the bottom line is, you know, this body has heard from numerous places, Toyota, Lexmark, a number of citizens, "Do more for downtown. It is about downtown. It is an economic engine." And I think council member Beard made the point that Vine Street really doesn't have any, any retail on it, arguably our big- busiest street. Um, uh, I, I, I would contend with you, uh, Julian, there is one. We, we do have one retail establishment, Tonio's, uh, Mexican restaurant, uh, is on there, so. Uh, but at the end of the day, that's exactly right. Vine Street's actually a street that leads nowhere, if you really wanna think about it. It i- it starts and stops, uh, at Main Street. And so technically we could close the whole street and make it a park. Now I know that would shock so many people, but let me just tell you what happened this week in New York City. In, in New York City, Mayor Bloomberg had the guts to step up and close seven blocks of Broadway, that little side street they call Broadway that, you know, makes us look like Main and Rose, like a, a country lane. Had the guts to close seven blocks of Broadway to car traffic forever. Camp out on that for just a second. That's Broadway. Here we are talking about, "Oh gosh, what do we do? Main and Rose, maybe someday we oughta make it, think about two-way, what..." You all, this is the vision that, that is causing people to be excited in a very, um, depressing, dark world. These are the types of things that, that we can camp out on and go, "This is, this is what we can do. By gosh, we can do this." So the discussion of one way versus two-way on Main and Vine doesn't frighten me a bit. Doesn't frighten me that, that we, we may not have the critical mass of people living in downtown yet. You, you build this stuff, it will change, change what's going on. So keep, keep that in mind, that I am absolutely pro two-way street. I'll go on record saying it, and, and for a number of reasons why we should convert all of our, our couplings to two-way. But with that in, I know Council Member Stenn and I talk a lot about sometimes we get so frustrated with just presentations. ... Presentation, presentation. We don't have any action items, and so, one of the things that I want to point out, and I want to move to an action item is, is that, um, you mentioned benchmarks and timelines a- as far as moving couplings forward. And what I would like to do, Clete, if it's okay with you, um, please step to the mic and let me know if this is okay with you. But what I'd like to ask by form of a motion is that by Tuesday the 24th of this month that you would come back to this body, either in work session or you can, uh, deliver it to us personally. But I, what I would like is for the benchmarks and the timelines for the conversions of each of those couplings. You know, what, what do you see that we have to do before we can reach, um, a place where we can actually get these couplings done? And for the record, that's Second and Short, that's Limestone and Upper, High and Maxwell, and Main and Vine. Now, some of those Main and Vine benchmarks, uh, I understand are things like New Town Pike completion, uh, you know, the conversion of other things to two-way streets. I mean, I understand that. Mm-hmm. But this body would be absolutely remiss if we do not build into what we are doing the possibility that Main and Vine are going to become two-way sometime in our lifetimes. Okay? Uh, it can happen a lot sooner than, than we may dream, but it, we, as stewards of ci- as the city's mon- of the city's money, it is incumbent upon us that we build that into the program. So, so what I'm saying is, is that as you put this forward, I would like to see the cost of what it is to, uh, to put that in because I know it's not that much more. I know it's, it's certainly within, uh, a very good, um, a, a very reasonable price of what we're paying now. And for us not to do that is so shortsighted, especially in light of something that's as visionary as closing parts of Broadway. Yeah. I think that given that, that's, this isn't a real stretch. So if you don't mind, Clete, would you, would you bring that back to us two weeks from today- Council- ... what those benchmarks and timetables are for coupling? Council Member McCord, you understand that the design does permit two-way streets on all these places. Ab- absolute- and what I'm saying is, is that w- the, the, the cost of whatever we do, we build that in. There is no way that we, we don't build that into the program. And I just want to be on record- Okay. ... as saying that, that that is absolutely what we have to do as a city, so that we can do that in the future. But, uh, i- if that's okay, by motion I'd like to have you come back and - Second. ... discuss it. Rel- rel- Councilman, relative to the feasibility of that, um, we, we are, we'll be able to have some sort of update for you within two weeks. Um, what I would suggest is that benchmarks are easy for us to do. Okay. The timelines are tougher. So we'll take the best shot that we can. Okay. At that. We'll work with, um, what we know and we'll talk to staff, and we'll get, uh, the best answer we can give you at that point. Um, you may have followup questions but- Sure. ... but we will certainly do that. I, I appreciate that and, and again, this, this notion, this picture of Cheapside, uh, really opens up peoples' eyes. And when you start to see this and some of the other things that I've been able to see that, that you have planned, uh, up and down our, our downtown, uh, we need to move post haste o- on some of these things. And if there is a coupling that is ready to go in, in the immediate fur- future, I'm propose, I propose we move forward, and I wouldn't be hesitant to make that motion. Thank you, Clete, for all you're doing. Thank you, Councilman. I think we have a motion and a second to ask Mister Benkin to come back in a couple weeks to provide what information he can provide about the, uh, timing of this. Is that fair to say? All right. Any discussion- Question. I have a question, Mayor. ... on that? Council Member James. Thank you, Mayor. Um, hey Clete, with the, with this motion, and the conversion of some one-ways to two-ways, one of those areas is within my district and that's the North Limestone area, and we've talked maybe a little bit about this. But more than the actual area along Limestone, is there within your plan something that takes into account what will happen to the side streets? Because Limestone, if converted to two-way up to 4th only, will still have to deal with, from all the way from 4th to 7th Street. So what does, what do we do as a neighborhood? Is there somebody else or somebody that comes into the picture that says, "Okay, now traffic's gonna have to be redirected here," and we don't, you know, our streets are very narrow. We have parking on street. So what do we do with that? Well, I, I, you raise an excellent point and I, and I think though w- we're just gonna have to work on that over the next two weeks to give you a, a little clearer answer on what will have to happen. There are, there are some areas outside the phase one study area like that, like the, uh, section of Limestone south of Avenue of Champions that, uh, that, you know, we have to get our arms around that. And, uh, as a matter of fact, we have a meeting tomorrow with, uh, the Limestone multimodal group that is working on South Limestone near the university. Um, and we'll probably arrive at some discoveries as a result of that, so, um, um, as I, as I mentioned to Councilman McCord, we'll, we'll do our best to give you an update on that, uh, in two weeks. So should I be forming a group that's the North Limestone group that can talk with you about things like that? We, we, we have- 'Cause that's residential. ... we had a first meeting with the merchants within the, uh, phase one target area. We will be coming back, and we will certainly get word to you on when we'll be ready to have a, another public meeting or a focus group meeting, and I think that would be an excellent opportunity to bring folks from maybe outside the phase one area, folks that are upstream, or upriver as it were from that, north of there, and we can talks, uh, with them. ... about their feelings on how they're inf- affected and influenced by, uh, the proposals for, uh, North Limestone. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. More, um, discussion on the motion, Council Member Gordon? I just had a quick question. When we converted Third and Fourth Streets, I know that quite a bit of money was involved, so will you be bringing the cost per segment? Uh- Or will someone be bringing that? We, we have, yeah- Up into these dollars? ... we can bring, we can bring some, some of the preliminary cost estimates. Okay. Thank you. I've just got a question. Will this slow down the implementation of this plan or is this something that you can do in 20 minutes or less, or? Uh, Mayor, I don't think, I don't think it, it has to slow us down because we're talking about something that's out in the future- Right. ... in terms of the conversions, so no. But I'm, I'm just talking about do you have design work you need to be doing over the course of the next two weeks that won't get done because you're working on something that's gonna happen out in the future? Uh, uh, no, I don't think this will take on a life of its own. Okay. I think we're, we're, we're in good stead to be able to, to answer any questions. Okay. All right. Any other discussion on the motion? Then those in favor of the motion, please let it be known by saying aye. Aye. Oppose, no. Motion carries. Anything else, Council Member McCord? Vice Mayor Cray? Mike, did you want to say something? I wanted to clarify one thing, if I could. Uh, the question about Council Member Stennet. Uh, I misspoke before. There... What has been passed is a reimbursement resolution, which would in-... uh, that included streetscape, parts of the Streetscape 1, uh, projects, that would allow us to incur debt and bonds be sold at a later time. Thank you for saying that. I wasn't going to correct you in public, but thank you- Thank you for coming to my front and do that. Thank you, sir. Okay. Um, gee, I've got so many notes here, I don't know hardly where to start, and I'll try to contain my... and, and not do too much, but there's so many things that are working here today. I think it's worthwhile for us to, to look at where we are, sorta like what Council Member McCord had to say, where we are, where we've been, where we're going, how fast or slowly we're going at it, what the composition of the people sitting around this horseshoe today is, the sort of political will and support for this sort of thing exists today that may not in the future. And it reminds me of a story. This has been almost 10 years ago, and I think I shared it with you once, Cleet. Uh, there was a guy in town who was a traffic engineer. His name is, is Ian Lockwood. 10 years ago. David Mohney brought him to town. Many of you know David, former dean of the College of Architecture. And, uh, Ian was then the traffic engineer, head of traffic engineering for West Palm Beach, Florida. And he came to Lexington to tell about what was going on in West Palm Beach 10 years ago. The then mayor was elected, female mayor, who was actually landed on the cover of New York Times Magazine section because she pretty much upset everybody and everything in West Palm Beach, including a lot of citizens, but she did a lot of very transformative and imaginative things, including converting a lot of their streets of, to two-way. And Ian, this guy, Ian Lockwood, a Canadian, was amazing traffic engineer because he had a sense of humor. Traffic engineer with a sense of humor. He was a traffic engineer who was self-deprecating. He made fun of himself, and he was thoroughly irreverent. And I remember going down wa-... mi-... riding with him down on Second Street and Third Street then. Third had been made into one-way, it's now two-way. Um, and, and I remember, and Short Street, and I remember asking him, I said, "Ian, so what does it take to convert these streets?" And he said, "Just do it." I said, "Oh, you're kidding. No way." And he said, "You know, you've got to have the political will to do it. And you're gonna hit objections. There are gonna be people who holler about it and don't like it, and..." But at the end of the day, he was saying, "10 years ago, they recognized in West Palm Beach that their economic survival and competitive advantage depended on their urban streetscapes. It depended on its vitality." And in the intervening 10 years, we've only learned that, gee-whiz, that was true. Not just in West Palm Beach, but all over the country. That's what the people from Columbus told us two weeks ago, three weeks ago. What did they say? They said that, "We've g- we, today, are converting as many of our one-way streets in our downtown to two-way as we can." Now, these are not casual people. These are people who are very invested in their city. They're lawyers, they're businesspeople, they're really informed, and this is what they're saying. So my concern is, I heard you say, Cleet, phased and incremental. I sort of know what that means. That's the language of architects. That's the language of builders, phasing and incrementalism. My concern is terminal incrementalism. ... that we never really get there. And that this represents a big investment at a time when, you know, the world's kind of turned upside down and if we can do it, it means a big leap of faith. But there are benchmarks, there are touchstones, there are examples of this having been done. It's not as much of a leap of faith then to do that. Now, as far as, let me shift a little bit, because as far as what you're showing us here visually, symbolically, I mean, it has, as Jay said, as others are saying, this is huge. It is a big deal. Not that other things aren't, but this is right in the center of our city and it is going to inspire some young people to perhaps hang around because they're hanging out on Saturdays here, and it's a compelling place and it's a great and cool space, and it's a big deal. And now, finally, the one thing that I'm struggling with, and I think that 24th deadline could help us with is the phasing. You know, we got some critical mass. Critical mass is an important word in the business world, you know, critical mass. We got critical mass in some areas of the downtown on North Line, on Esplanade. Okay. You know, without bringing up history, you know, we had critical mass in some respects, and I don't, I don't really mean to do this, I promised Julian or anybody else, but there was critical mass in the downtown at night in the Dame block, okay? Once critical mass is gone, it's tough to recover it. Hence, the challenge that we've got is to sustain it and support it and encourage it wherever it is at the time it exists. So, that's the reason that I'm saying, you know, we've only got a fragile amount of money, really. Okay. And when we start this thing, we need to make the biggest, most effective results we can in order to continue to encourage it, which is why the phasing is not an inconsequential question and one that we really need to understand, where we're making these investments in this project and when. Okay. Thank you very much. I don't think I have a question. Okay. Thank you. Council member Myers. Thank you, Mayor. C- Could I, could I just continue the motion going? Yeah. Um, following both the people who talked about, uh, two-way streets, I guess I just have one simple question and that is, um, with the respect to two-way streets, what would be the problem with just doing it, just like the Vice Mayor said, just like Councilman McCord said? Um, I'll, I'll circle around Main and Vine. Right. Um, state controlled right away, state owns the, the ground, state routes that feed into the, uh, well, and, and federal routes that feed into the downtown. Um, it's, it's Lexington is not the only stakeholder in the function of those streets, and with dollars being precious, um, we, uh, have really c- had an eye toward building consensus for something that others will participate with us in. Others from an administrative standpoint, others from a policy standpoint, others from a, um, a, a real dollars standpoint. You know, we'd really like to be able to have the state buy into this notion and have the state maintain the traffic infrastructure that will go there, um, and not force that upon the city. So, frankly, we were told, and, and, um, you know, I, I think it's important to note that when we first met with the state informally to talk about our desires for the future of Main and Vine, the director of District Seven said, "This is the first time anybody asked me-" Hmm. "... um, what I thought about it." Um, and he said, "That's getting off on the right foot." He said he himself said he's optimistic that we can make some substantial improvements to Main and Vine. And I think he viewed it, and I don't want to put words in his mouth, but I think he viewed it as a first step towards accomplishing the greater goals by going about it kind of arm in arm with the state, to get Frankfurt behind the ideas that Lexington has. So I, I'm, I not only am inspired by the Vice Mayor's comments, I, I agree with the Vice Mayor's comments, that you need to take bold action. And for a community that is traditional and conservative in their views, you need some wins. You need to be able to show that, you know, we made a big impact. Um, Cheapside, for example, is gonna make a big impact. It's gonna transform the core of downtown. Um, Short and 2nd, I, you know, I hear everybody saying, "Let's just do it." So by gosh, do it, you know. Um, limestone, maybe we should just do it too. But what I'm, what I think you need to, to, to be sure of is that your institutions buy into it and the residents buy into it. And everything we've heard so far is that they do, but I think we're going to continue to come back to you as we move through these, uh, these design documents and we move through the process, and we're gonna be able to give you better intelligence on what we've learned, what we're able to do, what we're not able to do. Um, we are constrained by budgets. You know, we do have limited means, and we need to be smart about it. But with a mandate from council that, "Let's be bold," it's gonna make our job a little easier. So I think it's important that you have consensus amongst yourselves, and that's, that's gonna make it a little easier for us to, um, to advance the ball for you. So it starts with the fact that the other day at a press conference, I saw the vice mayor and the mayor standing side by side saying, "We need to do this." That's leadership. Um, that was impressive to see, and, um, I agree with Councilman McCord that this is an opportunity that doesn't come along all the time, and why you've got the consensus, do as much as you can with the means you have available to you. So hold on. Don't go anywhere yet. So what can you give us, 'cause the things that Councilman McCord asked for, um, I, I think you're right. Consensus is there. Everybody knows one-way streets are outdated and behind the times, and that has to change. So the documents that he asked for in terms of the timeline, will that be something that this body can then take to our legislative counterparts in Frankfurt to say, "We as a community wanna move forward with this"? Because the one thing that we do here is, just like Councilman McCord said, we study things to death. We, we do all kinds of things except act. And so as we're moving forward with this, let's just ramp up the speed at which we do two-way streets- Mm-hmm. ... and move forward with that. So as you continue your work, I don't wanna sidetrack you on the work that you're doing, but how can you bring the two-way streets more to the forefront to give us the information we need to talk intelligently to our counterparts in Frankfurt? Um, a- as, as we committed a few minutes ago, um, we'll do the very best that we can to bring the benchmarks. Some of those benchmarks might have dates associated with them. Others may not, may be time ranges or scales that we put to it. So we'll take our first shot. We'll deliver that on the 24th. I, I am convinced that we will have to come back and update you again, um, because there's gonna be more work that needs to be done. And I suggested that you allow us to do that work through the course of the, the normal progression of the design phase. Um, with the, the reality that we are not, um, forcing or committing the city to spending dollars in the future to make that conversion. We wanna be smart about how we design these streets today so that it's a political decision, it's not a capital expenditure decision in the future. That's what's really important. Right. But that's what I think we're trying to get to, is that we're ready to begin to make that political decision. So we need everything else that goes along with that. Thank you. Understand. Okay. Thank you very much. I just have one more thing to say and that's that when you bring that document forward, I hope that Mr. McCord, Councilman McCord makes a motion that we can go ahead and begin to meet with and, and maybe even do a resolution and have it signed by the council, the vote comes out that way, that we can go ahead and send that up to the legislature in Frankfurt and begin having those conversations with, um, District 7 as well as the folks in Frankfurt. Thank you. Council Member Wallace. Just real quickly, um, these drawings are in the lobby downstairs, is that correct? Yep, yep. We're gonna, we're gonna set them up as soon as we adjourn. And will they be there for a while so the general public can see them, and are they online anywhere so that people in Lexington can go there? We, we, uh, we'll be here through 7:30 this... 7:00 or 7:30? 7:00? 7:30 this evening. Okay. And then, um, I trust that we can get the, the drawings posted on the DDA's website or, or the city's website. Okay, that's great. Uh, so, um, and West Palm Beach, my son and wonderful daughter-in-law g- got married there l- uh, last year, and I will have to say that it was an extraordinary experience. And this may mean I'm a really bad mother, but when I got home, I had more photographs of downtown West Palm and the bicycles and the little bicycle taxis and the crowds on the streets than I did the wedding. But they had a, quite a good photographer, so my pictures wouldn't have been all that great anyway. And I'm just thrilled to death, and kudos to you and all involved. Thank you. Council Member Feigel. Thank you, Mayor, and thank you for your presentation. I really don't have a question. I would just like to, um, offer a, a, a little bit of, uh, hesitation, I guess, about moving forward so quickly on the plans, uh, without getting input from our community. I think we have, we as a council and as a city have been very critical of others in the past for not seeking input before making major changes to the core of our city. And I believe that it would be incumbent upon us as city officials to make sure that our, um, citizens are aware of this and have ample opportunity for input on it. Thank you. Council Member, I would like to respond to that. Um, we began, uh, a series of stakeholder meetings and public meetings last, uh, January, over e- over 14 months ago. Um, we had, uh, three public meetings, um, uh, that were open houses, design charrettes where the public was invited. They were advertised. Uh, we met with over 50 stakeholder groups. ... um, and it's important to note that we're not done having public meetings. And there will be ample opportunity for people to weigh in on their feelings about the design direction. Um, we're gonna be coming back to council, um, uh, you know, again, uh, for those updates, uh, up until the time that construction would start on any one particular project, and then there would be regular updates as a result of that. So, we encourage public comments. Um, we hope that we'll hear from more, but the overwhelming response that we heard through the, uh, the master planning process, which concluded last September was, this is the right approach, that downtown is the economic engine of the, the region, and that we have to do a better job, Lexington has to do a better job of competing for talent and, and in retaining people that, that are already talented, either grew up here or went to school here and, and wanna stay. Uh, we also need to do a better job of, of providing services and amenities. And, and I guess I just wanted to reassure you that, you know, we've had over a year of public engagement and will continue until we're, we're completed with, with whatever we arrive at. Was that specifically public engagement on, um, two-way versus one-way streets? Uh, that was part of the discussion at the time. Uh, it- it is- Well, that, that's all I'm referring to. I think the plan that you have presented is, is, is outstanding and would be impressive to anybody. But I'd... what I, I'm suggesting is that I believe that before we move forward with changing- I see. ... one-way streets to two-way streets, uh, we need to make sure that we have input from the community before we do that. Understood. Thank you. Coun- Council Member Beard. Thank you again, ma- mayor. I just wanted to, um, make it clear that while there may be consensus up here, it's not 100% consensus, uh, as, as Harold well knows. Um, I've not heard anything about the traffic study that was done and the 35 to 40% increase in transit time from Broadway to, uh, Vine Street intersects Main Street. Um- Uh, I'll comment on that briefly. Um, the, the traffic study that was done during the time of the downtown master plan did not look at some of the changes that we've proposed. Um, the assumptions behind it are, are different than what we have today relative to lanes and operation. Um, also the, the 30%, um, uh, time factor was a little misleading. Um, when you look at the actual time it takes to get from one end of Vine or Main to the other, 30% isn't all that long a timeframe. Um, it, it's, uh, we're, we're, right now, uh, Strand is going through a synchronization model, and I think as we give updates, they'll be able to report on what it means to make the changes we're talking about. We'll have some real data to give you versus my speculation up here, and I think that will help to, um, assuage some of the concerns that, that you have. Well, I, when I started work in downtown Lexington, we had two-lane streets, and I'm quite familiar with them. Um, the, one other concern, I don't know whether you've taken this into consideration, is that all parking garages in downtown Lexington on either one of those streets is on the south side of Main Street, which means that one lane is going to be b- clogged up during rush hour with people tr- waiting for the other, uh, lanes to clear so they can cross to get into the parking garages, which is, um, you know, may- maybe can be fixed or partially fixed. I don't know. Uh, probably the, uh, the Radisson or, uh, th- that parking garage probably could get, uh, retrofitted but some of the others can't, and that is a, that is a concern, especially at rush hour. Um, I guess my last comment, is it not true that the Main and Vine transformation to two-way would be the most expensive of all the options, uh, of the, the other pairs? Um, I, I wouldn't characterize it as more than the others. Um, quite frankly, um, when you look at the expense of putting in conduits and, um, curb changes, um, we can do it any number of ways. We might as well do it in a way that gives you the flexibility. Um, is it, um, is it modestly more expensive in the short term? Yes. I mean, we've looked at Main and Vine and there is a, um, you know, we're, we're, we're projecting a range of something maybe under 10%, might be less than that. I don't have enough, uh, engineering, uh, to go on to, to, to make a more refined estimate than that. However, if you look at the, the life cycle cost or the long-term cost of retrofitting in the future, um, that's, that's a different kettle of fish. That's a, that's a scale of cost that is well above what we're talking about in today's dollars. If you were to attempt to make those changes five or 10 years down the road, you're gonna be spending, um, a lot more money to make those kinda changes then than being proactive, uh- ... and setting the stage now for that to occur. So I think it's good public, uh, policy to, to need to know, to want to know what those costs are. And we can bring those costs, uh, with us the next time we come back so that you're informed about what that is. Um, but I think when you look at it, you're not going to, um, in the grand scheme of things, circle that and say, "That's why I wouldn't, why I would or would not make that decision." I think you need to consider it, but, um, it, it, it may not be as, as, as large an expense as you might think. I'm thinking about the t- the, uh, signal booms that are out over, um, those two streets which aren't elsewhere, things of that sort, that, um, we would have to turn around and do something with. They would have to put signals on both sides, I guess. That's true. Um, I - I'm not saying never, never, never. I like the idea of phasing and going to school as we go along and, and, and, and take these pairs. A ph- a phase could be six months apart, a phase could be two years apart. So, uh, and y- you know, you don't have to go to school forever to get a degree so, uh- Hmm. ... maybe the six months would work. Um, but I, I wanna, I wanna feel comfortable that, uh, uh, we're seeing it work. Understood. Thank you. Council member Stinnett. Thank you, Mayor. I just wanted to kind of bring everyone back to reality and go back to, to the financial numbers. You know, this is a feel-good project. It's a quality of life project. There's no doubt that it can greatly improve our downtown, but we still haven't talked about the money today. Vice Mayor, I love to see your passion on this. This, this is great. But, uh, yeah, at, at, at the end of the day, do we really wanna sit here and talk about this today and, and not talk about how, what are we gonna cut to fund this? What other things are we gonna give up to do projects like these? We keep bringing all these projects to our plates. We keep paying for good plans. We keep doing these things. But at the end of the day, and the mayor started his hearings yesterday on the budget, we really wanna sit here and talk about cutting police and firefighters in our city, or funding streetscapes? That's what it's gonna come down to in the next 12 months. So I want everyone to keep that in the back of their mind, because that's re- that's the reality we're facing. I don't think it's hit every one of us in the face yet, but it will here very soon. I know the mayor, you know, you have 30 days or less to bring a budget to us. And, and he's facing those, those realities, but we're soon gonna get those realities as well. So keep that in mind when we're talking about these type of projects. You said $18 million. That's gonna be tough to find in the next 12 months, long last two years. So, I hate to be the bubble burster today, but, um, if we're not gonna look at the stimulus package money, I know, Mayor, is this project on that request that we sent you? And I believe it is. So that's one angle. The TIF angle Council Member Beard brought up could be another one. But, uh, unless we're looking at state help or other help, it's gonna be very hard locally to justify projects like these, um, or any project for that matter that we're gonna bond in the future if we're not taking care of our basic services. So I just wanna, everyone, no one's talking about that today, and I understand that, 'cause this is a great project. You've done great work. Bless you for coming here and doing this. Uh, you know, I've, I've lived here all my life and, uh, this will change the way people enter downtown and for, and, and give them a reason to start wanting to come back downtown. Uh, several of the projects we're talking about right now downtown will do that, but, uh, you know, I've been a big, uh, uh, proponent of getting out into the suburbs and showing this plan to people in the neighborhoods in suburbia, because we gotta get those folks back down- downtown and sharing their ideas, 'cause this is, their dollar's going there too. So, I'm encouraged to hear that you're gonna try to get, get out there and do that from time to time, because including those folks is, is critical to making downtown succeed. But I just say those things because we gotta keep in the back of our mind, what are we gonna cut to pay for this? 'Cause we don't have unlimited dollars. Thank you, Mayor. Thanks, Council Member Stinnett. Council Member McCord. Thank you, Mayor. And just let me come back around to a couple things that have been said. One, uh, very tactical, and then, then the second to Council Member Stinnett's, uh, very good point. Uh, one is, from, from the drive time side, uh, when you say 30%, people in the suburbs freak out. And so I've seen, I've been fortunate to see the numbers. What you mean is, from one side of downtown to the other going to two-way, the estimates are that it ca- takes you, uh, 120 seconds or two minutes longer to get from here to here. So, it's all how you couch what you say. And I wanna make sure that folks realize that when the traffic study came back, that's, that's, that's the number that, that we came back with, was it takes 120 seconds potentially longer to get from one end to the next. But when you, when you're talking about, um, downtown and, and finding money, we, we are absolutely up against it right now. I mean, everybody in this government is, is exactly what Kevin had said. And I appreciate him, uh, bringing that forward. What's at stake though is the future of funding police and fire and sewers and roads. Because if we don't do these types of things, we don't have a shot of getting an economy sufficient enough to handle this. Now, in the short run, we are absolutely up against it, and, and we've got to figure out what we're gonna do and prioritizing that type of thing. But at the end of the day, um, you know, whether folks like the stimulus money or not, this is the type of, of use that elected officials can stand up and say, "These are the, how, this is how you create jobs from stimulus money." Doing it in this type of infrastructure will create jobs. And in our town, where we're relying on a, on a payroll tax, we, we can't afford not to do this. If, if police and fire feel like you're up against it right this second, it's absolutely gonna get worse if we continue to lose jobs or the economy keeps going the way it's going the next couple of years. If we don't start to lay in the infrastructure that everyone has told us is what people want to come to in a city, it's a quality of life issue. You're exactly right. So, we have to, as a body, temper. ... the stark reality of, of money now, and the fact that we have to be visionary enough to put something into place where our economy's gonna l- uh, thrive, not just survive, but actually thrive in the future. So with that, um, I know that you are sensitive, deeply sensitive, to both those issues, and I would appreciate, uh, the reports you bring back being reflective of that sensitivity, if you don't mind, Clete. Thanks. I sure will. Vice Mayor Craig. You know, this is, um, what's, uh, I think inspiring, encouraging about this, and Council Member James, I think you, you, you've often said that w- we, uh, sometimes in this chamber, we don't get to actually engage the kind of conversation that relates to policy in a meaningful way. And, um, at least today, I think we've had an, a little, little bit of an opportunity to do that, um, because what Council Members McCord and Stennet were just talking about represents the tension and the dynamic of, of what today's times really represent, um, where making investment decisions, or making budget decisions, are tough, and they often cause distress and tension. Um, the, there's a guy that's often cited, the mayor often, uh, cites Richard Florida as, um, as a guy who's a, um, a touchstone in terms of today's economies. And he recently wrote a cover story for The Atlantic, and the cover story was After the Crash, Who Survives? And in it, the theme is fairly consistent. It basically says large urban areas with concentrations of intellectual capital, um, universities, um, s- strong and compelling urban fabrics, those are the places that will recover. And he says something else pretty powerful, he says, "You, we can't shrink our way to recovery and prosperity." So making intelligent and thoughtful investment decisions today is the real art of the challenge that we got before us. And so these kinda conversations that Council Member, and the questions that Council Member Stennet presented to us, um, and that Council Member McCord responded to, I think those are the, exactly the kind of conversations that we need to be having right now. So it couldn't be a better time to have it. Thank you. That's all the council members I have that, uh, have indicated a desire to speak on this issue. I do have one member of the public, Jane Tiernan, I, I believe. Uh, care to step to the podium? Um, you'll have three minutes. Yes, sir. My name is Jane O. Tiernan. I was, um, a member of the downtown Lexington Farmer's Market for nearly 20 years. I am the co-founder of the Bluegrass Growers Only Farmer's Market. Now, I don't know how many of you sh- I wanna see a show of hands, Councilman. How many of y'all shop at the downtown Lexington Farmer's Market? Good. How much do you buy? $25 worth of stuff? 50? Do you leave carrying with bags in both hands? Okay, look at this picture. When I was a farmer, and I go to the farmer's market at the Grower's Market... Well, first, let me back up. The downtown farmer's market, the Lexington Farmer's Market is a co-op. It's a for-profit market, just like Rosenberg's, Tad's Hat Shop, or the Dame. Those are all for-profit. Ours, the Grower's Market is a non-profit market. Second, when I'm a farmer and I go to the farmer's market, I take a van. It has four layers of shelves, okay? I take, uh, 70, 80 dozen sets of flowers, in addition to boxes of tomatoes and peppers and onions. Now, you carry, maybe I take $1000 worth of produce. Think about you leaving with $25 worth of produce. Think about how many trips you're gonna need to make back and forth, back and forth, with 2 or $3000 worth of produce. This is why all of the farmers set up with their trucks, with their vehicles. If you have to unload, if I have to unload a van with four layers of shelves, and I have to carry it all in, and I set it out, where do I set it when it's hot, when it's cold, when it wet, when it rains? Just think about that. I've heard from at least two farmers in this farmer's market having seen the pictures in the newspaper on Friday, say, "If I have to unload my entire vehicle, I will not be a member of the downtown farmer's market." These are orchard people. These are plant people. These are big growers who cannot carry all of their stuff. If you think about the space when we were downtown on Vine Street, you have eight feet for a car, 10 feet for a tent, 15 feet for space between the sets of tents, 10 more feet for a tent, then you've got two feets of Vine Street, two lanes of Vine Street blocked. That's how much space a farmer's market needs. Now, judging from the size of Cheapside... ... you're gonna build a permanent covered structure. You're gonna move the existing farmer's market and you're gonna build a permanent covered structure for maybe 10 or 15 growers. The other 20 or 30 or 40 still are under their tents without the benefit of their vehicles to be able to sell out of. Okay, that's a major design problem. Second, I didn't- Ms. O'Turn, your, your time has expired, if you can wrap up pretty quickly here. Okay. W- In regards to one-way streets, I served tables at Alfalfas for 30 years. If you eliminate the parking in front of Alfalfas Restaurant, there's no place for customers to go. If you change it to two two-way streets, there's no parking on either street. If you shut off... If you take Short Street or Limestone Street and you eliminate all that parking, yes, I may be able to see Faloot or Linda's or the Cock Shop. I may be able to see them better, but if I can't stop and park, it doesn't do me, as a businessperson, any good to have more visibility if my customers can't find a place to stop and park. So when you convert your streets, that's a huge problem. I appreciate most... what Mr. Beard and Mr. Blues and Ms. Gordon have done when facilitating our farmer's market. I do believe you probably know that zoning, um, requires that it be blacktop. You can't set up on gravel. You can't set up on pervious material. You can't set up a farmer's market on grass. It has to be blacktop. Ma'am, your time- Okay, you can change your zone- Your time has expired. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. And I hope you consider it, consider this. There certainly are a lot of other things that need to be said about this, uh, farmer's market. All right, Mr. Estes. Especially when you keep talking. Yeah. Mayor, before you call someone else, I c- May I... Oh, not you, I'm sorry, Ms. Terranon, thank you. I was gonna ask Harold Tate something regarding what you said. Okay. Thank you. Um, Harold, Ms. Terranon brought up something that made me think of... And she said that she had already spoken with a couple of farmers that said that they would, they would be pulling out, um- Mm-hmm. ... if this situation were to exist. Have we talked to Farmer's Market about some type of business plan or, um, as far as what the plan, what the plan would look like? Like, how are they guaranteed that their farmers would be there? Um, and then going back to what Council Member Blues spoke about earlier is, is it in concrete that, um, the Lexington Farmer's Market will be the ones there? I'm, I'm sorry, I missed what your response was to that. That's no problem. Uh, we've been working with Jeff Devil, who's the general manager for the Downtown Farmer's Market, so he's had those conversations. He'll come back with us, tell us some of their concerns, so we'll work through him to do the modifications or, or, or what the plan needs to be. So we have had those, those conversations with the market through Jeff. So as far as like a business plan and a survival of their market. They've done many plans. They've done, uh, you know, growth plans. They've done... Over the years, they've hired various consultants who have helped them through their process in terms of what, what the market could be and what it needs to be. I think if you talk to Jeff, you'll hear that our market continues to grow every year. They have more members. Um, so i- it's- One minute. ... it's one of the situation where I think the farmers, you know, themselves had to work very closely together to come up with what they feel is the best for the market. Sure, I think that it may be advisable th- that as we are moving forward with this that we do have some sort of business plan or something that we're seeing for the viability of the, of the farmer's market or Lexington Farmer's Market or whoever will be, um, in that spot to make sure that it is being, uh- Okay. ... utilized in the way that, that we're expecting it to. We'll get with Jeff on that. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Council Member Crosby. Um, yes, I was just gonna request that maybe at our next meeting for the update that maybe he attend that meet- The 24th? ... uh, yeah, that maybe you have, uh, a representative that you've had- Sure. ... these discussions with so that we can ask them these questions directly. Thank you. Yeah, Mr. Devil is here today. If you have questions you want to ask him today, you can. Okay. All right, Mr. Estes, Bob Estes, is the next person I have listed to speak. If you'd give us your, uh, home address and you'll have three minutes, please. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Council, council members, Bob Estes, 4761 Scenic View Drive, also own, uh, 259 on West Short Street, the corner of Market and West Short, and, um, am acting as a spokesperson for the Courthouse District Business Association, which has newly been formed, um, with members of... uh, core members being on the chief side at the, at the center of the activity we're discussing today. Uh, one thing I'd like to do is encourage the farmer's market people to be involved with that organization so we can discuss issues that, uh, the lady brought up today so a little bit more detail like a, a town square meeting, uh, detail. What I'd like to discuss with you, if you haven't been in that area, uh, within two blocks of the courthouse, the- there have been seven dumpsters over the last two months, which represent local business owners investing capital in, in, uh, different buildings in that area. Myself, uh, along with several others, including the Chief Side, um, Vincent Carlucci, which is doing the bar at the top there on the corner of Main and, and Chief Side. There's quite a bit of, uh, outreach from the business owners, and I'd just like you to recognize that, and I'm here to encourage you to, um, meet with us and we will meet with you and, and try to move forward this project, which we see is critical to establishing a core in Lexington, a center of the downtown activities. And I'm -- And I'm sure we can overcome some of the details that, uh, the Farmer's Market representative brought up and -- and other businesses that are there, as well as the -- the two-way streets and changing the park out. So, just wanted you to know there's an active group of business folks there who are here to support. Who are here to support this meeting, and, uh, we have been following the plans over the courses of -- of all the -- the Town Hall Meetings. It's not that we haven't been involved till today, but we're speaking today to let you know that we're there, and we -- we've, in a way, developed matching funds to improve that part of -- of downtown Lexington. And, uh, we're gonna continue to do that. We hope to -- hope, uh, to see this project go forward. Thank you. Thank you very much. And the last person I have on the list is Lynda Hollenbeck. Lynda? Again, if you'll give us your address, and you'll have three minutes. Thank you, Mayor. Uh, my name is Lynda Hollenbeck. I live at 2244 Savannah Lane and I am officially from the suburbs, so I come to you for two reasons. Um, one is I w- had the opportunity to speak to this esteemed, uh, council end of November on behalf of Lexmark Toyota and other members of this council about the things that we felt we needed to continue to grow the diverse workforce and talent, keep them here, get them here, and then keep them here. And one of the things we specifically asked you for, and I can't tell you my excitement when I opened the paper on Saturday morning, was a vibrant downtown that would attract people, would attract people from not only the suburbs, but would also allow us to have a place that young professionals could gather around and drive festivals, and drive the kinds of things that we feel we need to have to keep the economic development of this city going. Um, I'm a newcomer to this city. I've only lived here five years, um, but I can tell you that other places I've lived, the kinds of things that they have done are the kinds of things that I'm seeing us start to do, and it's really exciting. And I agree with Councilman McCord, um, there is not a better time for us to start thinking about not only the short term. We are in, uh, serious economic, um, conditions, but it's exciting to see us look at what we need to do, not only short term, but long term. I come for a second reason. Um, uh, Vice Mayor Gray knows this story. I have a 94-year-old young, uh, mother-in-law, and we come every Saturday to the Farmer's Market. We need a place for this to come, so she also sent me here today to be sure that we asked two questions. Um, if not now, when? And if not who, but the leadership in this room, what are we gonna do to make it happen? Both the businesses that are here, we heard from some others, and the leadership in this room, we need to make things happen and this is the right -- the right team to do that. Thank you. Thank you. Does anyone else wish to address this issue with the council? Any member of the council have anything else to add? Let me, let me just say, uh, one thing, and this kinda goes back to the comments that you made in November, Lynda, when -- when you were here. Uh, I wish these kinds of projects were such that we could wave a magic wand and one night we'd go to bed and it'd be the way it is, and the next day we'd get up and it would be the way we want it to be. Unfortunately, for far too long, the city has not put into the pipeline a series of projects like this so that we're having things coming along consistently. That's not any comment, it's just an assessment of the historical fact. But we are starting to get some of those projects coming out of the pipeline, and as most people probably know, once you decide you wanna do something, you gotta get some buy-in about what the concept's gonna be, then you gotta design it, then you gotta find the funding, then you gotta get it built. We're, uh, moving along on this particular project, as well as some others, but, um, this is part of a long process, unfortunately. It takes a lot longer than we would like, but, uh, um, we are starting to do the things like you've seen in the other cities and hopefully we will, uh, catch up in as short order as possible. But, I appreciate your, uh, coming both in November and now. All right. That, uh, concludes the, uh, presentations, and looks like we're ready for, for council reports, so Council Member Feigl, you're the first one I have on the list. Thank you, Mayor. Um, I have couple of different announcements. Before I do that, though, I would like to, uh, make a motion to place in the Service Committee consideration of an ordinance requiring underground utilities in all new development. Second. Pardon me. Could you repeat the motion for me please? I'm sorry. I'd like to place in the Service Committee consideration of an ordinance requiring underground utilities in all new development. All right. I have a motion by Council Member Feigl and a second by Council Member Gordon to put into the Services Committee, um, that ordinance. Any discussion? I have a question. Oh, Council Member James. Um, Council Member Feigl, are you including, um, redeveloped areas, as well as new development? Well, I think that's something that the Services Committee needs to discuss and -- and what the scope of this would be. Okay. But, uh, but to start out, certainly with new development. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Mayor. Any further discussion? All in favor of the motion, please indicate by saying, "Aye." Aye. Oppose, "No." Motion carries. Thank you. Um, secondly, I've been asked to announce that, uh, Fayette County Detention Center, Corporal Tanya Garcia, uh, lost her home and a majority of all of her personal belongings in a fire. ... and, uh, they are trying to, to get donations of food, excuse me, clothing, furniture, and items, uh, that she needs to support her and her, uh, daughter, I believe. And on Sunday, March 8th, this Sunday, from 2:00 to 4:00 PM, there will be a chili supper, uh, as a benefit for her at the CWA Union Hall on Delaware Avenue, 1590 Delaware Avenue. The cost is $5, and all the proceeds will be donated to, uh, to support, um, Corporal Tanya Garcia. Uh, secondly, uh, let's see, I wanted to, um, just announce that there are two, um, two neighborhood association meetings tonight in the Fifth District. One is at the Woods Neighborhood Association, and the other is the Fairway Neighborhood Association. And thank you, that ends my report. Thank you. Council Member Crosby. Uh, yes, thank you, Mayor. Um, first, I wanted to thank the Management Audit Subcommittee for, uh, meeting this morning. Uh, we started off with fire, uh, first thing, and I appreciate everybody getting together and fire for all their preparation. Uh, we will be contacting the other groups and having, uh, meetings in the future, as everybody can probably understand, trying to get, uh, the various council people together, and then all the different people who need to be there. It takes a lot of planning, but we have started these meetings, and we'll keep you apprised of how these are going. U- I also wanted to announce the Andover Hills Neighborhood Association will be meeting Thursday at 7:00 PM at Crossroads Christian Church. Um, I also wanna send my condolences to Sergeant Roy Wilson, uh, with Lexington Police Department, on the passing of his mother, uh, yesterday. And then, um, on a personal level, um, I just wanna thank everybody for their thoughts and prayers, and, um, flowers, cards, food, hugs, just everything that, um, everybody provided to me over the course of the past week. I think most people know my father passed away, and, um, it has been probably one of the most difficult weeks, but truly, I appreciate everybody's kindness, and, and y'all have no idea how much it means to me. So thank you very much. Thank you, Council Member Crosby. Uh, Council Member McCord. Thank you, Vice Mayor. First, I'd like to move the, uh, approval of the NDF funds this week. Second. It's a motion and a second. Is there any discussion? Uh, actually, I don't know if... Should I try to amend it now? Because I was... I noticed I wasn't listed. It got... Okay, I didn't see it on the list. Thank you. Okay. Move that. Okay. Any other discussion? Any more discussion? All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no? Motion carries. Uh, secondly, I wanna announce the Stonewall Neighborhood Association's annual meeting is tonight, 7:00 at Stonewall Elementary. I certainly wanna invite all those, uh, all the folks of Stonewall to come out to that. Um, I wanna send a special thank you to, uh, Commissioner Tim Bennett, uh, to, uh, Commissioner, uh, Cheryl Taylor, and Director of Corrections, Ron Bishop. Uh, over the last number of, of years, Director Bishop has been extremely forward-thinking, and, and he and I have talked a lot about a number of ideas on, um, uh, ways to save money and, and efficiencies. And a few years ago, he started talking about using inmate labor to, to clean up certain areas. And for, uh, two years now, he has organized many cleanups on my portion, the Ninth District portion of Man-O-War, from Harrisburg to Nicholasville Road. And, uh, this, this year, we wanted to do something different, or this time around, and I really appreciate y'all's creativity. Uh, we basically captured all of the, the garbage, and then we did an audit of how much was recyclable. And, uh, there were 143 pounds of, of garbage that were collected in that four-mile stretch, and 88 pounds of that was, was, uh, recycled. And so, uh, I think that I would like to make folks aware that, that this is something that's possible in not only your districts, but in your neighborhoods, uh, where we can use... Be good stewards of what we've been given, look at things a little more creatively. So thank you all for doing that, and thanks to Director Bishop. And lastly, I just wanna, uh, uh, to say that Lexington lost a real asset, uh, on February 24th. Uh, Julie Duncan, uh, who was, um, director of spinal cord, uh, injury recreation and, and, uh, rehabilitellu... Let me try that again. Director of Spinal Cord Injury Recreation and Athletics at Cardinal Hill Rehabilitation, uh, passed away. And, um, she had been there for 15 years, and a lot of us know her from being the coach of the, the Hill on Wheels team that won the 2008 National Championship, uh, last year. I got a chance to work with her directly because she also oversaw the, uh, the Miracle League, uh, that's in the Ninth District in Shillito Park. And, uh, for those who knew her, this was, uh, someone who, who really gave a lot to this community, and she will be sorely missed. Our thoughts and prayers certainly go out to her family. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Council Member Blues. Thank you, Mayor. I just have one announcement, and that's of the, uh, Great Acres Homeowners Association, uh, will be meeting this Thursday, uh, that's March the 5th, at 7:00 PM at the Braggtown Baptist Church. This is really an important meeting for, for this, uh, burgeoning and, and, and, um, and still organizing homeowners association, so I, I encourage all the Great Acres residents to, uh, to come out and to be involved. There's lots of things that this, uh, this association can do, and it's, it's important that we, uh, you know, that we start right with, uh, with some energy and activity and a real neighborhood presence. So again, 7:00 PM, Thursday night, Braggtown Baptist Church. Thank you, Mayor. Council Member Lawless. Uh, yeah, I have two announcements. Uh, the Ellsford Neighborhood Association is meeting tonight at 7:00 PM at Maxwell Christian Church, across from Woodland Park. And, um, as Council Member Feigl mentioned last week, uh, the Chevy Chase... ... um, a s-- Merchant's Association, I guess, will be meeting at 6:30 at Buddy's to discuss with, um, the Parking Authority, the plans for parking. Um, and I also have a statement, and I'm not sure exactly what to do with it. But, uh, I've spent, uh, I've spent a lot of hours reading the airport, um, audit report and going over the questions and answers that were asked and given. And I really, uh, hope that we can come up with a next step. I'm, I'm get more concerned the more I read. I've made a list of questions that I'm going to submit to, um, Crit Llewellyn's office, and I guess, maybe the airport board members. But I do think we, as a body, need some kind of plan of a next step. What are we gonna do? How are we gonna get more information? And if other people have questions. So I'm just putting that out there because, at the end of that, we talked about next steps and them coming back and a decision was not made. Thank you. Council member Martin. Thank you, Mayor. I just have a few announcements. Uh, tonight the Southland Association Chamber of Commerce is meeting at 6:30 PM at the Aleka Shrine Temple on Southland Drive. Uh, next week, um, next Monday, the Palomar Hills Neighborhood Association will be meeting at 7:00 PM next Monday on th- the ninth at the Palomar Clubhouse. Uh, and on Tuesday next week, uh, uh, March 10 at 6:00 PM, uh, the Palomar Town Homes Ass-- uh, Homeowners Association will also be meeting at the Palomar Clubhouse. Thank you, Mayor. Thank you. Council Member Hanson. Thank you, Mayor. I just have a couple of announcements. Um, tomorrow evening at six o'clock, there's a, uh, meeting with the Valley Park Board at the Valley Park Shelter. Um, I wanna remind everybody about the Great American Cleanup meeting tomorrow at seven o'clock. And, um, then that is it. Thank you. Thank you very much. Council Member Beard. Thank you, Mayor. Um, I would like to move to place into the inter-governmental, um, the issue of the creation of an oath for the directors of the quasi-governmental entities that, um, um, we are involved with, partners with. Second. Uh, I think that, um, it just heightens the, uh, sensitivity of the members of the board as to what their responsibilities might be. And, uh, but we can discuss that further in, in inter-governmental. Second. Have a motion in second. Uh, any discussion on Council Member Beard's motion? All in favor of referring that matter to the inter-governmental committee, let it be known by saying aye. Aye. Opposed, no? Motion carries. Any ... Does any other council member have a report? All right, there's no Mayor's report today. Does anyone wish to address the council on matters not on the agenda? Yes, ma'am. If you'd step to the podium, give us your name and address. Thank you. My name is Linda Sutherland, and I live in the 11th District. And as most of you know, I've met you one time or another. On, on April the 10th, there is going to be sort of booths down at the civic center for ... And there's gonna be a speaker from the ADA. I didn't know whether any of you on the council knew or not, but that's what's gonna happen. They're gonna set up all kinds of booths for handicapped people. So, I just thought I'd let you all know what's going on April the 10th. Thank you very, very much, Ms. Sutherland. Does anybody else wish to address the council? All right, Council Member Blues. Thank you, Mayor. I move that we go into closed session pursuant to KRS61.8101B and G in order to discuss an economic development matter involving real property. An open discussion would likely affect the value of a, of a specific piece of property that may be sold and would jeopardize the citing, retention, expansion, or upgrading of a business. So moved. Second. Have a motion and second that we go into closed session. Any discussion? All in favor, please say aye. Aye. Opposed, no? Motion carries. Um, we'll recess for just a moment and, um, Mr. Kelly, if you'll come on up, we'll try to get underway promptly here. Ooh, that's a nice weld joint. Looks like Cowboys work. Let's go see. Hi, Angel. How are you doing? Hi, how are you, Cowboy? I'm just fine. I heard you did some welding on this truck. Can you tell me a little more about it? Yeah, I worked on the front bumper and the plow light assembly. We started out with raw metal. Everything was straight. We cut and bent it and got it all formed up, and then we added all of our pieces and got her to the finished product. Can you tell me if you did, um, some of this work outside of like your regular hours, or was it mainly just during work hours? Yes, we worked a lot of overtime on this to get it to turn out the way that we wanted it to. Okay. Is there any more guys I can talk to about what they did on the truck? Sure, they're right over here. Let's go get them. All right, let's go.