Music Thank you. Okay. Okay. Okay. Okay. We're going to call the meeting to order of the March 10th Intergovernmental Committee. and we've just got our quorum so hopefully some other committee members will join us soon. Today on the Intergovernmental Committee we have three items. The Construction Apprenticeship Program, the Oath for Commission Members and Board Members, and the Grievance Procedure. And I do see some folks here that are with the Construction Apprenticeship. I'm not sure who's going to discuss the oath for commissions and boards. I did see Commissioner, are you going to speak on now? We'll have to check who the contact is for that. And I did see human resources sitting back there for the grievance procedure. So we'll get started. The construction apprenticeship program, just a little bit of background. and maybe Councilmember Beard do you have the background from the initial meeting we had a small group meeting just to kind of hear about this do you have a more of a background than I would have on that no not really you know it was kind of a meet-and-greet and introduced to us exactly what the the apprenticeship program was, thus being the council. But beyond that, you know, this was going to be the next step. Great. And for them to have an opportunity to, on camera and such, to be able to talk about their business and why they are bringing this forward. Okay. It's fairly benign. Okay. It is fairly benign, and we're trying to move it on up the ladder a little bit. So we started with a smaller group. Now we're here at this committee group level, and we'll work this. And this is a working committee. So if they're just a full exposure or disclosure, there's no, it's not necessarily that there will be legislation moving out of this committee today to go to full council. This is the working group. So if there's any changes, amendments, concerns, this is the group that you can kind of come to and share that discussion with, and hopefully we'll give the input that's needed to move this out of committee and forward to council for an up or down vote. And whoever will be your spokesperson today can step here to the mic. And if you would just state your name and the organization that you're with, and do you have information that needs to go on the overhead or anything for us today? No, we do not. Everything that we have, we will get copies and make available to everyone here through here. My name is Robert Akin. I'm president of the Central Kentucky Building Construction Trades Council, and we have brought this ordinance or worked with the council, several people here in the city, to try to get it out. And what it basically is is promoting the training of construction workers through apprenticeship programs, which are very old, even back through the Middle Ages, you would have people that were indentured servants and things, and that's how people were trained in crafts, and that's passed on to the modern age. Currently, the United States Department of Labor certifies and recognizes all apprenticeship programs, as does the Commonwealth of Kentucky. These apprenticeship programs have to meet certain criteria and qualifications. Kentucky is at the level that they can certify their own programs because they meet or exceed all federal standards. There are several programs already in existence in this community. They're not being taken advantage of, we think, for training people as well as they should. There's a lot of emphasis anymore on training people, not only scholastically through the universities and our high schools and stuff, but we need a higher degree of technical training for people that build our homes, streets, and buildings in our community. You're always hearing some story about somebody doing something improper or bad in a house or a building and things like that. Apprenticeship programs give people a course of study as well as on-the-job training that emphasizes the correct way to do things, building codes, inspection, as well as working with a qualified person for a specific period of time to be able to be trained and certified at different levels. And once you have a certificate through graduation from a Department of Labor approved apprenticeship program, that is a lifetime reportable thing. The programs in this state and this area are recognized nationwide. I went to apprenticeship program from 1978 to 1982. My certificate that I received from both the Commonwealth of Kentucky and the Central Kentucky VOTEC, which I went to at that time at Leastown Road, are recognized nationwide. So over the course of the years, when I wasn't working around this area, I was able to travel to other places and was able to receive top wages and benefits due to having that certification. And, of course, I would bring my earnings back home to spend in my community and support my family and things. And one of the things, we don't have a lot of people in this community, I don't think, in apprenticeship programs. We have a lot of people that commute in on construction work. And I think it would be advantageous to the community long term to develop a more skilled-based group of people here. As you bring in new industries and business, they have certain needs and things. And most of the apprenticeship programs have a lifetime learning experience. I know when I went through the training program as an electrician, things such as fiber optics and teledata didn't exist that time. But I was able through the existing programs to go back and upgrade my skills over the years to where I became certified to do fiber optic installations and teledata as these industries grew and progressed. And even the electrical mini pieces of equipment and factories that run conveyors and stuff, they're all computerized now. and you have to go back and learn how to actually run a computer to run a machine. And things like that, you're able to upgrade your skills, and it's at a minimal cost. The cost of these programs are really minuscule. I can't speak for all of them, but most of the ones that are covered either already have self-sufficiency or there are programs here in the community where any contractor, the associated builders and contractors have a program in this community, independent electrical contractors, to where if you join their organizations, you can send your apprentices through their training programs. Most of all the trade unions do have also training programs in this area. This statute or ordinance that we're trying to work with today only involves projects that exceed $250,000, which is the state threshold. So there's no additional changing of any financial requirements or anything. Under state law now, a prevailing wage kicks in on any project over $250,000. This ordinance mirrors that. We're not pushing for anything more or less. And within those prevailing wages, which Fayette County has listed on the Kentucky Department of Labor website, there is a wage and a benefit package. And within those benefit packages, the money is there already approved, so there's no additional cost. It's just a matter of moving that money to apprenticeship program should you choose to participate. This ordinance does not mandate that you participate in there, but it does give you a little bit of leeway of 3% there if you do choose to train people, which is kind of a reward in the bidding process if an employer chooses to train their people. But there's no penalty if they do not choose to go that route. And we have some people here, too, that I'd like to let you speak to more about the apprenticeship programs and I don't know if you want to I'll let you introduce yourself. I'll step aside here. And Mr. Pancake here is going to talk about he is an apprenticeship director and he runs an apprenticeship program and he can talk to you about some of the technical aspects and legal aspects involved in it. Thank you very much. Thank you. If you'll state your name. Thank you. That is correct. It is Todd Pancake just like on the box. I am the Director of Education for the Indiana Kentucky Carpenters Apprenticeship and Training Program. We currently have about 2100 registered apprentices across Indiana and Kentucky. I'm actually in charge of nine training centers across both states. I just wanted to try and kind of shore up or reinforce the investment of what apprenticeship means and what it can mean to your community. Currently, of those 2,100 apprentices, right now we have 29 at local 16, 1650. We run about 13, almost 13% on our minority mix. But here in Fayette Care, out of 1650, we're at 17%. But what I want to kind of really stress with this investment, It's an earn while you learn type program. In other words, most of this training is going to be building buildings in your community. And basically our apprenticeship program are going to have the students basically one week for basically one week each quarter per year. Basically that's going to come up to about 160 hours. The rest of their training is going to be what we call on-the-job training. A good example would be like at UK. They're going to be there for basically 1,300 hours while the best thing about the program is this. When I say it's an earn while you learn, a graduate of our program, after four years, and we do have a four-year program, a graduate is going to come out as compared to having $50,000 plus worth of debt. one of our graduates is going to come out with insurance, health insurance. They're going to come out with a pension plan, and they're going to come out also with this certificate that was mentioned earlier. This certificate is basically issued by the United States Department of Labor. This certificate is recognized all across the United States and every country. If they're going to do some work in, like, rebuilding, say, Afghanistan or Iraq, I mean, these are the type of credentials that a contractor is going to look for. On top of that, they're going to get their certificate from, in our situation, the United Brotherhood of Carpenters and Joiners of America. This is recognized all across the United States and Canada. So if there's no work in Lexington and maybe there's no work in Kentucky or Indiana, and I'm talking about our council the area that we cover, this allows that graduate to travel any place in the United States and Canada to work. Then on top of that, one of our graduates is going to receive an associate's degree and the applied science of either carpentry, mill riding, or floor covering. So as you look at that, there's a lot of benefits with this. We try to help just on our intake with our program. Of course, you can come in through the front door. I think everybody was provided our intake process. In other words, that you need to be at least 18 years old. basically be a resident of the jurisdictional area, but we have other ways to get into our program. We do request that you have a high school diploma or a GED, but we have a couple other ways that I would like to talk about. One is an articulation agreement with, say, an area of school that might have a building trades program. And I don't think we currently have one here for Fayette County, but that's something we could definitely be looking into. I mean, that's a direct entry from a building trade. It's a targeted individual that can come directly into our program for another four years of education. And then our H2H program, which is Helmets to Hard Hats. This is for an individual that has recently served. They come home. It's what we actually, we owe this to those individuals that have served our country, and this has proved to be a great success with our program and with all the building trades programs. Currently in our program, we've got 179 Helmets to Hardhats apprentices in our program. And bottom line is, they get back, that is a direct entry into our program, and in some cases, we can give them some previous credit for some of the training that they've had. And that puts us at almost 10% in our program. So we've got a few good things. It's a major investment. Once an apprentice has completed our program, our current budget last year was about $6.8 million. So we take this training very seriously. This is not just apprenticeship training, though. We have a continuing education program. just like any profession. And what we want to do is we know to provide the best, you've got to continue to update and hone your skills. So we invest a great deal in our continuing education program. And if you have any apprenticeship questions, especially, I can speak for carpenters and millwrights and floor covers, and some apprenticeship in general. But I appreciate the opportunity just to share that with you and would be happy to answer any questions that you might have. Thank you. Thank you. Mr. Aiken, is there anyone else that has a different spin on this that you'd like to have come to the mic? We have Mr. Larry Hujo, and he is a school board member of Jefferson County School System in Louisville. Okay. And he just came up here today to give a little information about how this kind of works in other areas of the state. Great. We'd love to hear from you. Thank you. Thank you, Madam Chairman, members of the committee. As you said, my name is Larry Hugio. I am one of those elected volunteers called a school board member in Jefferson County, Kentucky. And one thing I want to say about apprenticeship, and Todd mentioned articulation agreements with the vocational programs that you have in Fayette County. Training and education has a lot to do with opportunity to be trained and educated. It also has a lot to do with the opportunity for employment. Young people today in our schools, in our educational system, they're looking at what am I going to do when I get out of here and what kind of opportunity is going to be available. So if a person, and I've had a rough time in Jefferson County, I finally got a superintendent that agrees with me, not all of the children that leave our school systems, and I'm sure Fayette County is the same way, are going to college. It's just a fact. And so what are we doing to create opportunities for them to stay here in this community and provide for their families? An ordinance like this does a few things. It sends a strong message to the community and the construction industry in particular that you're encouraging investment in their workforce in the form of training. And you're willing to spend a little bit of Fayette County's taxpayer dollars, you're part of it, to further encourage that investment and create those opportunities. By giving an employer a 3% advantage on bid day, you're saying we know training and education is not free. And whether it's a union program or a non-union program, this says to those employers, we agree with you. We agree that training is important, and we're willing to spend a little bit extra of our taxpayer dollars to encourage that training and leverage. and I think this is the important part you have to think about is you're leveraging a public expenditure to encourage that post-secondary education. You're saying we're spending our dollars, and certainly we can build construction and not have any training. I can't think about it. But we're going to spend construction dollars in this community as a city. How can we leverage that to do something else? I think most of your economic, probably all of your economic development professionals will tell you that education and educational attainment in a community are key to encouraging economic development there. Now, you heard everybody talked about getting these certificates and going someplace else. I like to talk about getting these certificates and staying right here. And I think if you have economic development professionals from this community in the room, that's what they're interested in, too, keeping things here. And I think that when you increase the level of educational attainment of the people that live in your community and that will work in your community, you're automatically socioeconomic development is taking place. Because to me, there's economic development over on the business side, and then there's socioeconomic development over here. So training people to go out and earn a decent living gives them buying power in the community, which supports your local businesses, supports their families, gives them a little better quality of life. No one's getting rich in construction. But these are good jobs. They're rewarding jobs. But again, this ordinance creates the opportunities. It helps encourage the opportunities for that training to take place because it all can't happen in a school setting. So I would encourage you to take a good hard look at this. Louisville has this ordinance, or it's not exactly this way, but Metro Louisville government has a 3% bid advantage for apprenticeship programs, and there are contractors that come in and take advantage of that. And in those cases, the city, in my mind, you know, as a resident of that community, I think it's good public policy because it is. It's encouraging that investment in education for the workforce of the future because I'm certainly not getting younger. And I'm here if you have any questions. Todd mentioned articulation agreements. And just to kind of connect the dots, let's say you've got a young woman that decides she wants to be a block layer or a brick mason, and she goes to the vocational school here in Fayette County to become a brick mason. And so, okay, she goes to school, she works hard. I tell school kids all the time there's three things that employers look for, and your transcript tells you, they say, will you show up every day on time? Their attendance record tells us that. Are you going to work hard? Their academic scores tell you, yeah, they're going to work hard or they're not going to work hard, and can get along with other people, and that's their conduct score on that transcript. So those are the three things. But when they leave that school with a reasonable expectation that I've gone to vocational school to learn to be a brick mason, and she comes out of school and she's got her diploma and we're really proud of her. She's done this secondary education thing, and now what? That's where the post-secondary, and that's where these articulation agreements with the programs, the various apprenticeship programs, come right into play, because that articulation agreement spells out to the school, the vocational school, while this young woman's still in high school, these are the things that she really needs to know to be prepared to walk into the apprenticeship side and onto a construction site. And it's the earn while you learn situation. And so the school sits down and they work all this out and they say, okay, when she leaves here, she's going to know these things. So the apprenticeship programs through that articulation agreement give them direct entry and gives them credit on what they've learned. and plus it prepares them to walk, like I say, go right straight from a high school environment, if you will, a classroom environment, out to a construction site. So there's a lot of advantages for a community and especially for young people nowadays that with the economy like it is, it's like, what am I going to do? And so I think this is good public policy, and I would strongly encourage you all to look favorably upon this kind of ordinance. Thank you, Mr. Ujo. I'd like to at this time have Anthony Wright come forward from our economic development, and then we have council members or committee members have indicated they'd like to ask questions. So if all of you all don't mind just kind of hanging around, and we'll have committee members ask of you. Thank you, Anthony. Sure. What's been your involvement with the ordinance? And just give us a little bit of what you know that we're going to ask, legislative background, from economic development standpoint, administration standpoint, is this favorable, not favorable? What direction do you think we should take? Thank you, Council Members, for the opportunity to be here today. I think from the perspective of economic development, this clearly is a workforce development initiative. I think you've heard some of the comments that the speakers before me have mentioned and what it would do to get us in a situation where we have people who may not be employed now in a situation where they're employed immediately, in a position where they're getting good paying wages, and also a position where they're getting benefits. So I think that understanding some of the things that's going to be coming forward in our community very shortly, particularly related to the stimulus and as we look at how we may modernize and maybe green up buildings, we are looking at an opportunity where these folks can be a workforce that can help accomplish those things. We have been talking for quite some time in terms of trying to put this ordinance together and also engage the folks in the building trades organizations to look at policies and structures and approaches in their curriculum that would also lead us toward more of a green economy. How can we change some of the processes, procedures? Most of the aspects related to green-collar jobs is related mostly to the materials that are used in the process, but from time to time there are some structural changes in terms of the techniques that are used that would need to be employed. We've asked these folks to take a look at that in addition to some other organizations that provide this kind of work and this kind of activity. I frankly think it is an opportunity for workforce development. As I said, I know that there are some people in the community who would immediately benefit from the opportunity of being involved in this training program. day one they get trained into a career that they can use later in life with skills and workforce development being a key tenant to economic development. Economic development depends heavily on a qualified workforce, a skilled and qualified workforce. And I think that this group and this ordinance can certainly give some incentive toward that. Thank you very much. Committee members, I have Council Member Crosby, Figo, Henson, and Blues listed. Council Member Crosby? Thank you, Madam Chair. I agree that anytime anybody can be better trained and qualified to do a job, that that is a good thing. Something that you said kind of struck me, and I don't have any questions for you, actually, so you can probably sit down. But when you said, mine's for law, but just as a sidebar, when you said for workforce development, it just appears to me that this opportunity already exists. So I don't know what we're doing while we're currently – the opportunity already exists for our employers to take advantage of this. So that's just something that kind of struck me that you said that for workforce development, they already exist. So for people to have the ability to go from school or whatever it is, their traits, to be trained, they exist currently. So anyway, that's just something that kind of struck me. But I'm looking at Section 1 of the proposed ordinance going to number 6. And I'm a little hung up on the 33% of total labor hours of a single project shall be performed by apprentices who reside in Fayette County. Obviously, that's great for economic development, and, of course, it helps us with our budget. We'd all love to see that, but is that even enforceable? Is it legal? Is it enforceable? The draft I'm looking at actually says 25%, but 33% is fine as well. Generally, this is different than what you're going to hear probably down the road soon enough on minority business preferences, which have different legal obstacles. As a market participant, the government does have flexibility in doing things like this program. Actually, a lot of the case law at the Supreme Court level that upholds this type of preference is actually based upon using local contracting. So I think the idea that it would be a certain level of Fayette County is going to end up being legally defensible. I'm sorry, I didn't hear the last one. It would be legally defensible, and the reason that that's in there more specifically, the draft we were presented didn't have any requirement that any of the apprentices necessarily reside here in order to tie in the economic development directly to Fayette County. We wanted to put some threshold that was reasonable in there and that was doable. The threshold we had was 25%. Mine's crossed out to 33%. I guess you're talking about 33%. As long as I think... Mine's crossed out and has 33%. That's the copy I was provided. I don't know. The 33% is the most up-to-date copy that is in the packet. It's added 33%. All of this was drafted with, let me be speaking out of place. Anthony, do you want to come and talk about that? I think the 25% is the lowest that could be used to meet some of the requirements in the federal rules. Is that correct? There are situations where when you're training an apprentice, there could be up to three journeymen and one apprentice on a project. So when you tie it to the total labor hours on a particular job, that's the greatest percentage or the lowest percentage, I guess, that you can have. You can have situations where there's one journeyman to an apprentice, two journeymen to an apprentice, three, but that's no more than that can it be. So why did you decide to go to 33%? Well, actually, the 33% was something that was mentioned before. I didn't cross this out and put 33% there. We talked about 33%, but 25% is what it will be written in the language. And I think in our discussion that we had with a small group, we recognized that we could be in a situation where it could be challenging for us to meet that requirement if we made it 33%. And there's a situation where really you need three journeymen to one apprentice on a job. So it would take it out of that situation. Okay, so it was 25%. So I don't want to get hung up on numbers because that's something that will end up changing back. Right, right. So, okay. So you're saying, I'm sorry, back to, so you're saying that this is. Based on the existing case law, it would be defensible to have a requirement, an additional requirement that some percentage of them be affiliated directly with Fayette County, the apprentices. Okay. And then, and maybe this is for Anthony. I'm so sorry. I'm going to get you to exercise. Have we looked at, and I'm not sure how to maybe word this appropriately, but through the bidding process, and have we looked at our local construction companies and when they bid, and maybe could we be disadvantaging some of our local businesses through this process, perhaps, if they cannot meet these requirements and then in turn only allotting for maybe two or three construction companies to be able to actually bid to receive this type of credit? Well, it will be a competitive bid situation like all of our bid situations are. And any time we have a large construction project where there's an RFP and a bid, as you well know, there's generally a team that gets together and reviews those projects and those submittals. And so we determine not just on low price but various qualifications and evaluation criteria on who the awarded bidder would be. So would this be, I guess my question would be, would this be considered on those bids part of the inclusion criteria for whether or not for economic development purposes, would that be listed as one of the criteria as part of the bidding process? would they get preferential treatment because it goes towards economic development and workforce development during that process? This is certainly considered a preference. It's a 3% preference that we're talking about. So in turn we could be. It does not preclude any of our other purchasing rules and policies that we have in place in how we award contracts. Okay. Thank you. That's all I have. Thank you, Council Member Crosby. Council Member Feigl is next. Okay, I guess first I'd like to talk about the program itself, so I'm not sure who wants to answer those questions. Thank you. Got Mr. Pancake coming forward. I think this is a great idea, particularly because my husband and I do some renovation projects, and we've found that it's very difficult to find skilled labor. So I think this is a wonderful idea. But I do have some questions about it. You had said that some of the outcomes are health insurance and a pension plan. And where does that come from, the health insurance and the pension plan? For every hour that an apprentice works, not only do they get their hourly wage, but they get what we call the benefit package. And in that benefit package, there is X amount. and I've got 35 different collective bargaining agreements across the two states, so I don't know the one for here exactly, but the X amount is going to go toward their health and welfare, and then X amount is going to go toward their pension, and then that is put in that individual apprentice's, I want to call it like a bank account. Okay, I've got that now. So they're just treated as an employee, and those benefits that are provided to other employees are extended to them as well. Is there any guarantee that they will stay with that company? Is there any guarantee of a job once they have finished their apprenticeship? Oh, I highly, that's what they're working toward. In other words. With that company. Well, every company is going to probably get into some slower times. So if you're, we call it, you're starting out with a good reputation. In other words, you work hard and you've got the skills, that contractor's going to want to keep you. And if that contractor gets in a situation where they're going to get low on work, a lot of times they're going to find a place for that individual to go. So a lot of times that contractor's problem is getting that individual back whenever. So ultimately the goal would be for them to find a home with a contractor, yes. And that's really kind of where I'm going is that is there any way that we can work to make it more attractive for them to stay here in Fayette County? If Fayette County is going to participate in paying for their education through this process, is there any way that we can ensure that they will stay in Fayette County? because you had said that once they complete this, that their qualifications can take them all the way up into Canada, correct? Sure, sure. And what most of our apprentices and most of our graduates, the only reason that they would ever really want to leave, I mean, this is just an opportunity if work got slow in a specific area. So, you know, most of them, if most of our apprentices want to stay in the area that, I mean, that's their home area. But there's nothing written in the contract for them that they have to stay within the area for some period of time after they've completed their apprenticeship? No, ma'am. No. So they're free to leave if they want to? Correct. Okay. Does UK or the Fayette County Board of Education participate in this? I'm sorry. I said, does UK or the Fayette County Board of Education have a similar agreement? No, they do not. There's no agreement in place at all this time. This does not mandate that anyone pay health care insurance, pension benefits, or anything like that if you don't already have a program in place. Right. All this does is give you an on-paper advantage if you're training people. Now, the monies to train the people, as we said, this does not kick in until it mirrors the state prevailing wage, which is a quarter of a million dollars. At that point in time, you are paying your employees either directly on their check or through a bargaining agent the portion of that prevailing wage that is geared toward training. So it's not costing an employer any more money. No one has to participate in this. Right. But the incentive for them to participate is they get a 3% reduction in their... Yes, but there's nobody, you know, you're not mandated under current law, if you do not have pension or benefits for your employees, you just move the money to their paycheck. And that's the way they can do that. So they're not mandated. There's no additional cost to an employer to take advantage of this. That's what I was trying to say. But we don't, the school board or University of Kentucky, even though we do work for them, and a lot of them they do quite a bit of work. They're not participating. We would love for them to. Have you approached them? Not at this time. No, we thought it might be better if we worked through city government first and then approached some other people after that. I would think with it being an educational program that that would be the natural first step. But that's okay. And there's a coming, if you do studies, economic studies and things, I'm sure Anthony and some other people, there is a great shortage coming up of skilled tradespeople. And there already is in many sections of this country. I agree. And a lot of that is, which I went to, I went to Central Kentucky Vote Take out here. But it's just like anything else, a doctor, anything, you can do all the book work you want to. But when it comes to the hands-on, you've got to have the hands-on to be capable in whatever craft or skill you're in. It's kind of a joint thing. That's where apprenticeship fills that gap where you're doing actually the school work to learn the technical and mechanical aspects of your trade, whatever that might be. And then you're actually working with a professional each day or professionals that show you the proper and correct and safe ways to do things. And then one other question is, I guess there are a couple of things that I would like to see in this ordinance if it moved forward, and that would be some incentive for them to stay in Fayette County. But secondly, that there might be some agreement on a cap on change orders, because I wouldn't want somebody to come in and make up that difference with a change order. So those, I guess those. Also, I'd really like to... And if I might add, our programs are solely funded by these collective bargaining agreements with our contractors. So we don't... We're the training arm or training entity of the building trades, so to speak. I think you're talking about more of a contract issue with the... Please. Again, like I said, Louisville Metro government has this ordinance. There's nothing to make up. The way this works on bid day is if someone comes in and bids $100 to do something, and my bid is $103, and the person with a $100 bid has no training program, and I'm a participant in a registered training program, I win the bid at $103. So there's no change order to make up. It's not a deduct from my bid. It just gives me that extra cushion to help defray some of the cost of training. Okay. And so that's the way they do it in Louisville, and it's quite successful. And if I might comment to Ms. Crosby's concerns about opportunity, you're 100% correct. The opportunity is there, but there are so many employers that don't provide training programs. And that's – Are there other training programs outside of the vocational school or outside of this trade that employees can take advantage of to earn their trade? There are – KCTCS has, I know, construction training programs. I know the associated building contractors have construction training programs. Of course, the unions have training. Those are all registered programs. And the reason this talks about registered programs is there's two ways that people learn a trade in construction. They learn it through an apprenticeship which has substantive standards which must be met, and that's how they get their registration through the Bureau of Apprenticeship Training or the U.S. Department of Labor. They create these substantive standards, and the term escapes me right now, but they have standards, apprenticeship standards. And then there's the Bubba method, which I'm not saying there's folks out there that don't have training programs, don't learn to trade, but are they learning it properly, and are those skills transferable to other things? for example, to go on to a construction management, a four-year program to learn construction management. Or we've seen folks that have gone through our apprenticeship program, and I can't speak for some of the others, but I know with the Carpenters Union, we've had folks that go through our program and then go on to become engineers. So that a lot of things they learn, the standards that the apprenticeship has, are transferable towards that engineering degree. So some of the mathematics that they learn, and all the programs are similar in that regard. Okay. Thank you for the explanation. Council Member Feigl, did you have other questions? I think that's all I have. Thank you. Okay. Next I have Council Member Henson. Hi. Thank you, Chair. I had some questions probably for, well, I know you talked about the decrease in skilled workers. I feel like we've probably seen that across the country and that studies have been done to show that that's maybe a trade that people are not particularly interested in going. a huge number, but there are a lot of individuals out there that are not going to go to college that need to learn a skill. I was interested to know, you talked about like CKTC offering classes. Are they required before entering the apprenticeship program to complete that sort of training? I don't know whoever wants to answer. Basically, to enter these programs, you're basically required to have a high school diploma, and some of them like you to reach certain math skills, which math is a lot of construction work because you're measuring and doing things. But there's very few prerequisites to apply to get into these programs. Other than that. Or GED, excuse me. You don't have to have a high school diploma or GED, either one. Okay. But what you, I know the programs I deal with, you get, people are interviewed and they get points. If you're a veteran, there's a certain, and these are part of the apprenticeship standards that you're talking about. And all these standards are approved by the state of Kentucky and the United States Department of Labor. Whether it's a union or a non-union program, which back to, I think earlier, she, there are associated builders and contractors represent Open Marriage Shop across the United States. They have programs across the United States, including here in Lexington. The independent electrical contractors are the same way. And they have apprenticeship here. The associated general contractors have apprenticeship programs in some areas, too. And they're open. This is more of a matter of people, and a lot of our young people, even in our school systems, guidance counselors and vote, they're not really pushing these programs because we've become more geared in our society to data-based jobs and computer-based jobs. and over the last few years while we've tried to train technical people, we've kind of fallen behind in our hands on our skill craftsmen, and that's a nationwide problem. But it's an open-door policy for applications and ongoing thing, and like I say, there's a tremendous amount of work coming up in this area the next few years. And I think if some of these issues aren't addressed, you're going to meet a crunch, And you can't, like I say, you can't learn all this stuff either by simply doing the work or simply going to school. And the best method is through apprenticeship where you have both the technical training from qualified instructors as well as working with qualified people. And that's where a lot of our contractors and stuff eventually come out of, people who get these skilled trades and then eventually work their way up into becoming an employer in our communities. What's the average wage of a person in the apprentice? By federal law, if an apprentice, usually most of them will start out around 40% of the top wage. Which is? That's pretty much, I'd say. Well, it just depends on whatever craft. Okay. Different crafts, for example, if it's $20 an hour, you would start out at about $8 an hour. Okay. And that's for just, you know, I hate to say a green kid. It could be a 50-year-old man or a 45-year-old woman, but that's the starting wage, usually around 40%. Some of them are more. Some of them, I know, go up maybe 50% to 60%. But it just depends on the type of craft and what all is involved. So if you were in plumbing, it might be more. If you were in electrical, it... Yes, and what they base that on is usually the top wage rate when you become either a master at whatever craft you are or a journeyman. They'll base the percentage on that top pay. And throughout most of the programs, you have to attain a certain point to get your raise to the next level, and usually it's around 5%. And you might have to pass tests over your schoolwork and have worked so many hours on the job without missing work and things along that line before you're allowed to get a pay increase. What's the average length of an apprenticeship program? They vary. Some of them are five years, some of them are three, but usually they'll fall somewhere in that range right there. It depends. I know the electrical is five years. It used to be four when I went through, but over the years you've developed so many technical computers and fiber optics and things that a lot of them, Not just one program is five years now, the one I went through. Some of them are still four. But all of those standards are submitted to the Department of Labor and approved before they're put into effect to train people. And that 40% wage rule, does that apply the entire time you're in the program? Oh, that's just your starting rate, roughly. Then you get increases. You will get incremental increases as you attain the number of hours or days worked, as well as your school work involved when you reach grade levels, certain classes and things that you have to pass. And my last question is, would all contractors or construction companies, whatever, be able to participate? Yes, it would be voluntary. and anyone that was wanting to participate, there's two or three different modes they can do that. They can even develop their own programs through the state if they choose to do that. Or they can join an existing program and send their people through those programs that already affects them. And they could take on apprentices. Yes, it's not mandatory and it's voluntary, but it's an open opportunity for any employer that chooses to participate. Right. Well, thank you. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Henson. Council Member Blues is next. Thank you, Madam Chair. Following up on what my colleague, Ms. Henson, was asking, while it would be voluntary for any company to institute an apprenticeship program, by passing this ordinance, the government would be actually encouraging such companies to do so because we'd be giving, in effect, preference to those bidders that have those programs. I think that's fair to say. And I have some concerns about, along with Council Member Crosby, about how this affects the, if we adopted this ordinance, how would this affect the competitive bidding process? I'm not sure who would answer that, but I think it's a question that, as we consider seriously this proposal, that we'd want to have answered. And I'm not sure that... In effect, I'd like to hear from somebody who can say, here are some problems with this program, if indeed there... there are any. Council Member Blues, to that point, I was just going to say that we can have, Brian Markham from Purchasing was not able to be here today, but at our next meeting we'll be able to have Purchasing here, and we can let him know that we have that concern. That would be helpful. Okay, thank you. As an educational program, as a workforce development program, all of this sounds very good. I would like to have some data for us to share on the success of apprenticeship programs. I mean, are they really, you know, producing the, you know, the skilled workers that we need in the various trades? I don't think any of us would disagree that we need this kind of well-trained workforce. And it's a clear need for our community. But I would like to see the record on this. And whether this is a program that really is effective, whether it's more effective than others, and so on. Mr. Akin? Yes, sir. I want to tell you, the most recent data that I've been able to come up with was a study in 1997. I have contacted the state apprenticeship department, and they're gathering up some more current data about the number of apprentices, the graduate rates, and what fields and stuff they're in. Is that kind of what you're looking for there? Yes, sir. Okay. What I will do, as soon as I get this data, I will get copies to the entire council here, everyone here today, probably in the next few days if that's acceptable. Okay. I'd appreciate that. Yes, sir. That could be helpful. Another question that I think will be coming up in our deliberations, or I think ought to, this is more a question for the committee and the council, I think, along the line here than it is for any of you folks here. But we, to the extent that this is an educational program and the government would be funding, subsidizing an educational program, we took up a not entirely dissimilar question a year ago. when we considered the scholarship program that was proposed by the administration. Several council members had some questions about whether local government should be funding scholarships. Now, agreed, this is not scholarship, but in the sense where we would be funding students going off to college. But it's not entirely dissimilar either. So I think that as a council, we're going to have to consider that question on down the road. And I'm sorry to be taking so much time here, colleagues. but this is a question I brought up when we met some weeks ago in a small group, and I think an answer to it or a response to it would be helpful here, too, and that is if one out of three workers on the job or one out of four, whether we're going to 33%, 25%, whatever, is learning. is a student on the job, how does that presence of the apprentice affect the quality of work? And the, you know, and let's say the expense of the work. Council Member Feigl brought up the question of change orders, which I thought was appropriate in this context. In other words, is there a price to pay for on-the-job training to the extent that there would be on-the-job training in this program? As far as the person working there, as far as the apprentice, they work with a qualified person all the time. A vast majority of construction tasks on projects usually will take, in some form or fashion, two people. Whether you may be pulling wire through a pipe, somebody's putting it in, and somebody's, that's where a lot of your training will come in when they're working with people. If you're doing concrete, somebody's pouring the concrete, somebody's finishing the concrete. So these tasks are close together and hand in hand as far as the quality than the qualified person and of course the site foreman or supervisor is watching over that quality. That's an ongoing task regardless. As far as the price, what you look at on a lot of quotations, bidders may, is what's called a composite wage rate. You may have 10 people at $10 an hour and your composite wage rate would be $10 an hour. if you put a couple of apprentices in that mix at $6 an hour, your total overall rate for the project should come down a little bit because your composite wage rate is pulled in by the addition of these training people at a reduced rate. And many of the tasks you will learn fairly quickly. Some of the more technical stuff is what takes a lot of time and training. But usually in estimation, in my experience, you'll use this composite wage rate when you bid your job, and that kind of constricts the cost a little bit and makes you a little more competitive, but yet again you've got the trained people overwatching the trainees to see if your quality is at the standards that it should be. Thank you very much. Thank you. This is a very intriguing initiative here and something that I think we do want to consider carefully, and I'm hoping that as we go forward, a lot of these questions can be can be more fully answered. Thanks very much. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Blues. Council Member Beard is next. Thank you, Madam Chairman. Chairperson, actually. A couple of questions. I want to be sure we're right on the numbers, I guess. When you speak of 25 or 33%, and let's take 33%. You're talking about one apprentice for every two other employees? Journeyman? No, you'd be talking about one in four. By the federal Davis-Bacon standards of state, when you have an apprenticeship program, you can only work one apprentice to every three qualified people. That's the maximum ratio. So you could have nine and three apprentices. But in a smaller situation job, you could have one apprentice, one journeyman, or qualified person, two to one, up to three to one. That's a maximum that legislation exists now to allow you to put on the job. Okay, well, you know, I take one plus four is five, and five divided into one is 20%. and on down to the point where if there's three in total and one is an apprentice, that's 33%. Is there a sequence in a curriculum that's embedded in an apprenticeship where everybody is going on the same track, or is it willy-nilly just depending upon what the job is? And I guess I'm thinking about portability, where a person may, their company may go out of business, but they still want to be an apprentice and they go over here, and they don't have a body of knowledge to get to the point that they may need them over here. You're talking about portability, as far as the apprenticeship? Yes. Usually what will happen is our apprentices, our apprentices, and these other programs, ABC and IEC, most of them take care of their apprenticeships through a pool. For example, contractor A may run short of work. He cuts back, lays off an apprentice. They go back into the pool until contractor B says, I need an apprentice. Then they send them to contractor B. And that's construction work in general. You bounce between companies somewhat. Some people, in my career, I've worked for people seven, eight years, and sometimes worked for three or four in three months. And a lot of that depends on the type of job, the size of the project, and the size of the employer. The bigger the employer, of course, the more people they're going to constantly employ. The smaller companies a lot of times will lay off and hard lay off as their amount of contracts increases or decreases as part of their business cycle. Well, let's take the situation of an apprentice that works at Company A, and he has been working for a month pulling wire. And then he bounces over to the next company, Company B, and they look at him and say, you're an apprentice, you pull wire. And then they go to Company C, and you're an apprentice, you pull wire. and that's all they learn is pull and wire. And so that's what I mean by curriculum. How do you get the person to progress, I guess? Generally, most of the apprenticeships that I've dealt with, you have certain skill levels and types. What you will do, like you have a director or someone that's in charge of the apprenticeship, they will usually fill out weekly work reports through that apprentice is what they did Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, Friday. And even some of them have the authority within their standards and program to say, Contractor B, you're letting this guy pull too much water. He needs to run pipe. So I'm going to pull him out and send him to Contractor B. But that usually is contained within the apprenticeship standards that they have adapted and been approved by the state and federal government. That's what I was looking for. Well, if you want to, God may. That's fine. Thank you. Just if I may to address exactly that, we have a curriculum that is agreed upon with our contractors. In other words, so that we can meet those needs that you're talking about, or those skill levels. And while that's why the pay raises, that's why, like in ours, we're at 60%. But that's what we want. We want them to get exposure to every bit of that craft that they can. And it's in our standards that they have to get certain skills. So our contractors, whether it's an interior systems contractor, they might be working doing ceilings and metal stud framing and drywall. But it's a requirement that they also get some concrete form, in other words, where they're doing building layout. We're teaching an all-around programmer, apprentice, to where they get just those exposures. We don't want them marked as, like you were saying, a wire puller. I mean, they're going to be more employable with the more skills that they have, and it is designed in those standards of what we have to provide for them, that training. That's what I was looking for, and I'm glad to hear that. I guess one other question, that involves building code. Building code varies from one state to another, does it not? That is correct. And let's take electrical, for instance. And they've done their training in Kentucky, and they want to move to Indiana. And Indiana's code is more stringent than Kentucky's. How do you handle that? I mean, do they – because, you know, you almost have to dig – I've looked at some of the code books, and it's not easy to ascertain, I guess. Or a person might be on his learning curve as it relates to the code. To address that, I believe you have to have a license, I mean, with the electrical. And I don't know if you could practice in Indiana. The carpenters don't have that problem, sir, I guess. But the electricians would. The electricians are the plumbers. Would have a different, correct, license, correct. All right. One other question, and then I'll be through, I think, and that involves a similar question with Canadians. And let's say a person starts his apprenticeship in Canada and then wants or needs to move to the United States. Yes. Does his time as an apprentice in Canada count? Yes, sir. toward his travel, toward completion of the program? Absolutely. And with our standards that are set up, this is working with our contractors and with our international union. So we have specifics that I'll say hoops or tasks that each apprentice must jump through. I'm speaking solely for our trade, but absolutely, that apprentice would have credit. If he moved from Montreal to Lexington and had two years invested, those would count with us. And some of the same rules about the salaries and things of that sort would be parallel to what we've... We have found across the United States and when people transfer into our program, while there are some differences, we can get it close enough to where we look at their experiences and even within our council, we have different demands. When I say different demands, we might need scaffold training at a certain level of their apprenticeship, and we may not get into blueprint until a later level, but in another section of the country it might be totally opposite. So we're going to give somebody credit. They might be doing something here that would be third year, but in another jurisdiction it might be fourth year or it might be first year. So we're going to give them credit for what they've earned. That's great. That works very well for why I asked the question, and that is I have a friend whose daughter has a relationship with a young fellow who's an apprentice in Toronto, and he wants to move to Lexington. Okay. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you. Next on the list is Council Member Martin. Thank you, Madam Chair. This is a great program. I'm all in favor of workforce training and having people do better and know better and to have an opportunity to learn and to take on a new skill that's going to help them have a job and not lose their house. I'm a little concerned about attaching a lot of government strings to this program, and I guess this is in part a response to the comments of Councilmember Feigl. My experience in government programs is the more strings you put on them, the harder it is to sort of manage it. Strings for example, whether the apprentice has to remain in the county after they finish the program, or whether the company has to employ the apprentice after they finish the program with a company. I think all those things are very good, and I'm certainly in favor of it, but for us as a government to require those things, once you require it, you have to enforce it in some way. And who's going to, for example, who's going to monitor whether or not the employees are staying in the county or staying with a particular company? And what are the penalties if they don't? Are we going to have some sort of a recapture? and three provides a sort of recapture for companies who lie on their bid process, their bid documents about having an apprentice program. Well, would we have something like that if the employee finished the program but then moved out of the county? It certainly is not the company's fault if they move out, and I would be very hesitant to try to require an employee to live in Fayette County when he or she doesn't want to. And so, you know, my experience with government programs, and I've written a few, is that you want it to try to be as simple as you can. We want to encourage the training program, but I'd be sort of hesitant to try to put too many strings on it. I don't want to sort of create requirements that we don't have the capacity to enforce, I guess. The recapture penalty is very complicated to enforce. The federal government has a program called New Market Tax Credits Program, and Mr. Wright is familiar with New Market Tax Credits Programs. And if you get some percentage of the lending program wrong, you have to recapture interest and all that kind of stuff. It's very, very complicated, and it would really make this a difficult program to administer, to have requirements that we have to penalize somebody for if they don't meet. I think this is a great training program. My one question, and I'll leave it to the gentleman out here about who would be the one to answer it, is the 3% enough of a bump up in the bidding to make this actually have any real impact? One of the questions, I guess my question is, I'm assuming the 3% is going to allow the company to charge slightly more than it otherwise might charge in order to recapture some of the training costs. and perhaps someone could talk about whether that is enough incentive to have companies do this or would companies just underbid and then make it up in a change order later in order to get around doing this. Because what we want to be effective, what we don't want to do is go through all the trouble of putting something on our books and just have some other companies low bid it in order to get around it and make it up later. Well, Councilman Martin, certainly if you want to make it 25%, we'll be happy with that. In Louisville, we went – and that's a great question because that question came up when we were going through the same process in Metro Louisville to pass this. And the 3% came from contractors that said, when you've got training programs and you take your overall cost of a building or a project, what does that training cost? And it's like if you ask a contractor, if you're going to build a building that costs a million dollars, material, labor, and everything, you know, you can ask a contractor, what's your workers' compensation cost on that million-dollar building? And they can give you a number. And the 3% came from contractors, and it ranged anywhere from five down to two. But the 3% was basically an average of where the contractor said, on your average building that costs a quarter million dollars, the monies we spend on training is around 3% of the total cost of the job. About $7,500. Yeah, and that's where the number came from. Now, is that valid? I just know that's what the contractor said. But you all think that's enough to sort of incentivize a company to do this and to help compensate them for bringing on the apprentice? It's been helpful. Now, like anything, is this a fix-all for everything? No. And I can tell you from, and again, they asked me to come up here and talk because I've got extensive experience with this in Metro government in Louisville. And I know it has helped tremendously in courage. We now see contractors that are not union that are participating in training programs that weren't doing it before. And to me, that's what the bill, even though I would love to see everything union because I'm a union guy. But to me, that's the whole purpose of an ordinance like this is to encourage people to provide a substantive standard type of training for their employees. And I know it's helped because when a company loses a job and they've invested the time and the energy to bid on the job and do takeoffs on the job and get all their estimates together and their material costs and everything else, And they lose a job, and they come in and they say, wait a minute, I bid $100,000 on this job, and he bid $103,000, and he's getting the job. Well, he's getting it because he's got a training program. So they have to go back and reflect on what just happened and say, do we want to do this again, or do we want to provide training for our people? So I think, again, it's not going to fix everything, but it sure encourages people to take a hard look at providing training opportunities for their employees. And we're not paying the entire salary of the apprentice anyway because they're getting work out of it, and so that's work that's coming under the contract. And that's part of the contract, the salary of the apprentices. And, again, there's been some discussion about how that works. I know with the carpenters, basically if they're going, and I think Todd touched on this, if they're going to school and participating in school and they're working on the jobs, they've got a 5% increase every six months. So they're improving themselves. In terms of the question that Mr. Barrett or the comment Mr. Barrett thing, I think it was or maybe it was Mr. Blues that asked about the person who just pulls wire going there. In our industry, if you're not in construction, a lot of this is very foreign. In our industry, if I'm a superintendent on a project and I call the union hall and I say, I need four journeymen and two apprentices out here on the job tomorrow. When the apprentice shows up, usually the first question that he or she is asked is, where are you at in your apprenticeship? Well, I'm second year, you know, or I'm third year. Within the industry, those supervisors on those job sites have a pretty good idea of what the capabilities of a second year or third year apprentice will be in their respective trade. So it really is a good system because it keeps that person from getting locked into that loop of just doing the menial task and not really learning the trade. So the bottom line is you think that this will be worth the company's time and give them enough incentive to do this? Yes. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Martin. Council Member Crosby has a follow-up? I don't actually have a follow-up question. I just wanted to make a request that maybe since we're getting one side of the equation today, that it appears that we are going to be continuing this next month. And I know that you said our procurement people are going to be here, that perhaps we invite some of our local industry to be here. I wish we actually have an expert on council, and unfortunately I know he had a conflict today and could attend this meeting and probably could offer a lot to this discussion. But I know we have a lot of people in our community who probably would, there's probably construction groups that probably would have a lot of input, I think, on this ordinance. And I think that we should try to reach out. I don't know what those organized groups are, but I'm sure that maybe Sarah perhaps could look. And there's probably some organizations or something that she might be able to reach out to and invite them to come. Well, we may take your suggestions. I don't know that we really know what you're looking for, but you are welcome to offer. I would assume that there are, or maybe we can defer to the vice mayor. I'm sure he probably would know who to contact to possibly invite people, or maybe it's just we invite construction companies or whoever this might affect within those different trades to come and just give us their perspective, because obviously this is going to affect them tremendously if we were to pass something like this. And I think it's good for us to get all points of view. Yeah, would your intent be like anybody that would ever bid on anything for urban county government, like anyone that would bid on something to be invited? I don't know if it necessarily has to be anybody, but I think most of the time there are often groups like, I don't know construction groups, but I mean I think of like Realty, for example. They have an organized group where everybody is part of a membership. So perhaps that membership group could be invited. What I'm saying is I don't know who it is for the construction industry or maybe there's a home building or whatever it may be. That could be invited to give their point of view. We might have to find out who that is. I can't tell you right now. Well, I would offer any recommendations you want to send our way. And we could, the meetings are posted. All of this is publicly noticed, but we'd be happy to, if you want to. This is going to be covered over. I'll be happy to do it. Yeah, and I'm sure they might even be able to tell us who those groups are as well. And I'll be happy to contact the vice mayor because I'm sure he's, with the business that he's in, he probably has some information on that. Great. Thank you for taking that challenge. Appreciate that. Council Member Feigl is next. I'm going to withdraw my question because if we're going to come back at this again, I'll be right until later. Yes. We are intending to come back in April to have this discussion, to continue this discussion. Is there anyone else in the audience related to this that didn't speak before that would like to say something now? I didn't give everybody the opportunity to speak. Okay. Well, we appreciate. Anthony, did you have anything to wrap up with? Okay. We appreciate all the comments from committee members, and hopefully this will help to draft. Oh, yes. Madam Chair, just if I could, I would like to extend an invitation to each one of you to our training center in Louisville at 1245 Durant Lane. And I think just being able to see it happening firsthand might be just a great opportunity for you. If you don't mind, I may have my assistant or Paul, either one, contact you to maybe set up a date where everyone could come. We don't want to necessarily inconvenience, but if we could come down in a group setting, if anyone wants to come, maybe that would be something, Council Member Crosby, if she knows someone on the construction side that might want to come, that would be a good opportunity for them to see how it works. We'll get some dates, play around with some dates, and hopefully before April, or maybe, I don't know how that's going to work, but with timing, but be able to come and tour the facility prior to. Great. And the vice mayor, we will make sure he is part of this committee, just was not able to be here today. So we will extend the offer to all committee members and council members at large. Thank you very much. Thank you very much. If there's nothing else on that item, we will move to item number two on the agenda, which is Oath for Commissions and Boards. Council Member Beard, this is an agenda item that has your name beside it. So if you have anything to offer, I'm not too sure. I've read through it, but I'm not too sure where we go from here. Okay. Well, this is an idea that popped into my mind for a couple of reasons. One is, as most everybody knows, I had a career in banking, and all bank directors are administered an oath before they can become a bank director. And in some cases, other industries require oaths of their directorate. The other evening when chairman of the airport board, Bobby Owens, was here, and after we broke and he came up here and the vice mayor and I were talking to him right here, and I brought up the subject of an oath, and he lit up and thought it was a very good idea. Now, the question is, in my mind anyway, how far we take this oath, whether it's – I don't think we can very well single out the airport board without looking at some of our other quasi-governmental entities. And I'm just going to bore you all with the list, but I'm going to miss somebody, I'm sure, but it's Lex Tran, the Civic Center, Housing Authority, Board of Health, Parking Authority, Downtown Development Authority, Convention and Visitors Bureau, maybe, and the Library Board, maybe. Both the Convention of Visitors Bureau and the Library Board have some dedicated tax that is peeled off of what we assess to our citizens. In some cases, the Convention of Visitors Bureau actually is not so much our citizens because it's the bed tax that they get from the hotels. Or do we go a step further and require an oath to be administered to all entities that we fund in one way or another, to one level or another? And I'm thinking of the outside agency group that we have and the people that are involved and asking for, and we're getting ready to get into that pretty soon with the budget, asking for help or funding and whether we would as a requirement to that, as it is the requirement for them to have an audit, require that their directors be initially given an oath and then all new directors would be given an oath as they came on board. So that's my intention. I think obviously it's not a cure-all by any means to any problems that occurred out at the airport board, but it sensitizes the directorate to the seriousness of the duties in which they've embarked upon and which they represent the government and all the other citizens. and allows them to think a little bit about what their duties may be and what their responsibilities may be. So that's why it's here, and I wanted your all's input from this committee and see whether we need to go forward and any type of discussion we might want to have about it. Okay. Well, it looks like you've got some takers for the input. Councilmember Feigl. Thank you Madam Chairman. I think it's incumbent upon us as council members, as city leaders to learn lessons from bad experiences and if nothing else we can learn from our situation with the airport Board that not all volunteers who serve on our Board do so with the full knowledge of what is expected of them. And we've talked about an orientation process which I think goes hand in hand with this oath. And I very much support this and feel like that we need to do a better job in describing what the, in creating job descriptions and making sure that our board members understand fully the responsibilities that they take on. So I would support this as well as ensuring that we have some kind of an orientation in place. Thank you, Council Member Feigl. Council Member Blues. Thank you, Madam Chair. I couldn't agree more that an orientation process for citizens appointed to boards and council members appointed to boards for that matter. And I know that some boards are very thorough in providing that sort of training and education and some are not so much. but I think that's a good idea. I think that providing all board members with the guidelines that State Auditor Llewellyn has said that she will bring to us would also be an excellent idea. as far as for a particular oath I wonder who would have to administer it to so many people but it might well be that it could be a signed statement that would do that job and I if we do pursue this subject and I think we are talking about preparation of members for serving on boards. It might be good to hear from the Ethics Commission. And so, Madam Chair, maybe the next time we take this up, if we could have some input from that direction, I think it would be really helpful. Okay. Thank you. Good input. Councilmember Beard wanted to be able to respond. Let me give a quick response. And it's in here somewhere in some of the information I've provided as examples. But in some cases, a notary public can administer the oath. And then the individuals who the oath has been administered to, and early on it will be the whole group, and then from that point on it will be one or two at a time. But they sign this piece of paper, and the notary certifies their signature. In one case in here, I believe, and I went through the great Google search on all of this, And in one case, it's two notaries, and I guess one notarizes the other signature is the thought behind it. But, and obviously it cannot be, one of the notaries cannot be one of the directors. It has to be somebody from outside and probably not one of the employees also. in the case of the airport, the airport board. It would need to be an independent outside notary. Okay. Thank you for that. But it doesn't have to be a judge, and I don't think we have to talk about fighting duels or not fighting duels and such in this oath. Okay. Thank you for that explanation. Council Member Martin? Thank you, Madam Chair. I appreciate the spirit behind this. One of my things is that I think one of the problems we have at the airport is the somewhat clubby nature of the relationships that have been there through the years. I'm not opposed to this at all, but I don't know if it's the magic bullet that's going to help us get this fixed. Some of the things that might be considered, and I don't know whether they would be advantageous or something that we would want to do, but one of the issues is whether or not the directors of, I guess, city-affiliated agencies would be subject to the ethics rules. And do I understand, Mr. Askew, that they're all not necessarily governed by the ethics rules? That's correct. So that's one thing that we could consider that might be a double-edged sword. You might get more compliance, but you also might discourage some very capable people from participating, since there's a lot of disclosure in that. And that's part of the reason, as I understand, when the General Assembly passed the law requiring all local governments to adopt an ethics code, there was a lot of discussion here about which boards and commissions it would apply to, and I believe there are only four that are specifically listed. But you could apply the ethics code concerning financial disclosure, which is one piece of the ethics code, to some but not all. And then you also have a code of conduct that you could apply, which, you know, somebody doesn't have to assign the disclosure. But I do know that Council Member Myers has been very interested in that. We've actually done some drafting on a revised ethics code. Right. And one of the things is that while I don't want to sort of comment on pending investigations, it's at least conceivable that the parties involved at the airport are in violation of our rules as they exist anyway. And so if folks are going to violate the rules, having something else, they'll just violate that as well. Now, you know, one of the other options available to us would be having the directors certify compliance with a conflict of interest policy on an annual basis. That is, in fact, one of the part of the IRS's good governance rules under the new Form 990 for nonprofit organizations. And that is something that would make directors on an annual basis cognizant of whether or not they are in compliance with stated conflict of interest policies. And perhaps State Auditor Llewellyn's report on good governance and good financial practice might give us some direction about what would go in those conflict of interest policies. Thank you, Madam Chair. Thank you. I saw the Council Clerk walk in, Susan Lamb. Did you have anything to offer? I didn't know if you were here about this issue or not. No? Okay. Well, Council Member Baird, I don't know if you got – oh, Council Member Feigel. I really think that what we are attempting to do here is to communicate the magnitude of the responsibility that people are accepting when they accept a position on one of our boards. Not so much that we're trying to ask them to make sure there's no conflict of interest because we hope there isn't, and we hope that they would disclose that. But I think this is really more to help them understand the role of the job that they're accepting and how serious we take that role, and to be sure that they completely understand, you know, through the orientation process, that they completely understand that there are laws and policies that have to be adhered to and that they know what those are. So I'm not so sure this is really just trying to flesh out conflict of interest as much as it is to just make a statement that this is serious business and that we want them to take it seriously. Council Member Beard. Well, if everybody would turn to page 24, which is a copy of the oath of bank directors in the state of Kentucky, and you'll see some broad statements 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5 down there that pretty well cover most everything that Council Member had mentioned earlier. You know, it's kind of a broad thing in that it's like go forth and do good, and that's the end of it. But it pretty well says, you know, while not specifically, it pretty well generally says, you know, do things honestly and ethically and such. and it is not a huge burden. This whole process takes 15 seconds to administer the oath, and people line up to sign the paper, and that's done. And no, it's not a magic bullet by any means, but it's a step. And again, as I said earlier, it sensitizes the various and sundry directors to their responsibilities and duties. And I can't see how that could harm anything at all. It's not in a position. And if someone is not willing to sign the oath, as far as I'm concerned anyway, they don't need to be a director. Because again, it is as benign as can be. So, anyway, just take time to read that, if you would, and we can go forward if it's your pleasure. Thank you, Council Member Beard. Council Member Martin? I just wanted to clarify to Council Member Beard, I don't oppose your motion. I'd be happy to support it. Could I make a suggestion maybe to the committee to suggest that what we have in front of us has to deal directly with the bank? And I'm wondering if there would be a group that might want to work on getting some language that could be more appropriate for government and maybe get to that intent, the reasoning and intent that Council Member Feigl talked about. and at the same time talk with the ethics committee and maybe even share our concerns with the state auditor to let her know kind of what we've talked about here today and if we can offer any guidance in moving forward with any recommendations or how can we assist. I'm sure the auditor is familiar with oaths because I'm sure she is in and of itself has sworn them in the past. and that would be a good idea. I don't want this thing to drag out, though. I think while this is at the top of the mind of our constituents, that we need to act, we can always add to that, but we wouldn't necessarily have to subtract this and replace it with a training program or something of the sort. I mean, a training program makes a lot of sense, but so does this. Okay. And I'm thinking we have the, there's an annual boards and commissions function that happens, and this could be something potentially that could be given at that joint group. It's usually more reception kind of event, but this could be something that would be an opportunity to have, you know, maybe 100 or so folks there to do the oath at one time. So if that's something that you were looking at, just kind of looking for a venue for you. The boards and commissions thing, though, is generally in November or December, as I remember. And I wouldn't want to wait that long by any means. And I wouldn't want it to look like a three-ring circus. I would like for the people to, you know, have some level of seriousness in what they're doing as opposed to, hang on just a second, I need to get another cup of punch. Okay. Well, how does the committee feel about how to move forward with this? I'm open to any suggestions. I would be happy to work with Councilman Beard. Wonderful. Any other takers? Let's make Logan draft it. Logan? Yes. Thank you, Madam Chair. Let me just say. We'd like to bring you all involved in it also, by the way. All right. Thank you. I just thought you'd like to know that. When this suggestion came up the other day, we started preparation of a memo about oaths. And I will tell you, and you're aware of this from some prior memoranda that you've received from our office, when it comes to boards and commissions that the state law has specific requirements about how people are appointed, what the functions of the board are, and so on, we are very limited in what we can do. But I will explain that more in the memo. I will also tell you that what Councilmember Feigl was talking about with respect to training and this code of conduct that Critt Wellen mentioned, Councilman Myers has already approached us about that as well, saying about requiring some of that, the training and also the code and the adoption. But all of that will be part of this memo that we'll get out, and we'll be happy to help any way we can. We'll try to get the memo out of here pretty soon. Okay. Do you think next month, do you think this is something that we need to talk about next month? Would everything be prepared and ready for us to have full discussion? Well, sure. I mean, we can make ourselves available in accordance with Councilmember Feigl and Beard's schedule and get something worked out. Excellent. Thank you very much. Sure. Anyone have anything else on that? Oh, thank you. You're welcome. So last item on the agenda is the grievance procedure, and I do see that Michael Allen is here. I'm guessing you probably don't really have any update or anything different from last month. What I have proposed, this is just for some background for the committee. it's almost been about a year ago when the issue of the grievance process came to Intergovernmental. And at that time, as the chair of the committee, I think Paul was with me too, me, Paul, and my legislative aide, talked with Human Resources. We had received some resident complaints about the grievance process, and I'm talking about people that work for Urban County Government, but are also residents of Fayette County and have been hearing some things that we felt like needed to be addressed. Someone came forward in a governmental committee, and we put the issue of grievance into committee to deal with that. And part of that that was agreed to was a survey. And that survey was going to be able to address the effectiveness of the grievance process. And we were working with the human resources manager senior in that division and waiting and waiting and waiting. and it's always been something's not able, I'm not able to do this, and timing, and there's always been projects and things such as that. And it's just that it's been lingering. And you may recall that last, I think it was last, intergovernmental, Commissioner Coe at that time stepped forward to let us know that at that point the PeopleSoft implementation, the HR section of that, was kind of tying up the issues and that at that point had been given preference over the grievance process. I still have those concerns. The concerns have never been addressed with the grievance process, and thus I've put together a proposed resolution, and this is not something that law has given any input on yet, and we do know that law will need to give some input. But as the chair of the committee and as we try to deal with the thought that things are put into committee to die, I know that you all have heard folks say, don't put it into committee because it will die. It will take forever to get out. This we're trying to do, I think, as the chair. This is something that I think needs to happen so that we can show that we're making an effort to get this issue brought forward. And I'll give you a few minutes. I'll give you just a couple of minutes to read through that. I know it's the first time you're seeing it. I think I will have it put up on the screen as well. Thank you. is really to show that the grievance process has to be dealt with. It is a serious issue. We still have lingering complaints. It would be the same as a house was flooding from some type of stormwater problem, and we're not fixing it. And I'm not married to the wording here, but I do think I need your help as a committee to figure out how do you feel, to find out how you feel about this. If you feel like that this is something legislatively that we need to take steps to deal with the fact that we've had this issue within our committee for over a year and every time we ask it's something else that is a barrier to why this cannot be complete and we have people every day that are told, fill out a grievance report, fill out a grievance form. I seek your guidance, and I see folks that are chiming in to speak. And please be very open and honest with it. Again, I'm not married to it. I just have to let the reasoning and intent, and as the chair of the committee, I have to let it known that this is an issue that's sitting here. Council Member Martin. Thank you, Madam Chair. I'm sort of new to this issue being new to the council, and it takes me just a little bit off guard having to consider a matter such as this without an adequate amount of time. Resolutions, and on resolutions sometimes the devil can be in the details. There's no rush. There's no rush. And my preference is that we take this up in the next meeting so we have time to look at this and for me to sort of become familiar with the issues because I'm not familiar with it. And obviously we got this about just a short while ago. Absolutely. Thanks. And with that comment before moving on is it may be appropriate to have a timeline. I actually thought about that last night. I thought, what if I could create a little timeline of the time that it came forward to committee and all the emails thus far and the reasons why things haven't been complete thus far. And I'd be happy to share that at next intergovernmental. Council Member Blues. Thank you, Madam Chair. I agree with Council Member Martin that the act on this resolution now would be precipitous. and so I would think that if there are issues with the grievance process, we want to know exactly what they are and work on correcting them, and this would involve some work on behalf of the council. I think rather than a resolution, we might think about a task force of Council members that would look at the grievance process, its problems, identifying them, and proposing resolutions to them. So that would be my suggestion here to address whatever issues may be involved here. Thank you. Council Member Blues. Council Member Beard. Thank you, Madam Chairman. I did it again. It's okay. I've been aware of at least two different situations, which I kind of scratch my head about as far as grievances are concerned and how they were resolved. But I have to agree to a certain extent with Council Member Martin in that it would take some time to do. But I would hate for it to linger much longer. And a task force could be there for a long time, I think. I think if we wanted to appoint a subcommittee of some sort that would have a relatively nice fire built underneath them to get back to us next month, that would be fine. But again, if you're the grieved party, and this has been going on for a year, that's just hard for an individual to live with, if it's a valid grievance especially. If it's a nuisance grievance, that's a different story, and I think we'll need to flesh some of that out. But I do think we need to address this sooner rather than later. Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Beyer. Council Member Feigl. Again, I have no information to act on other than what I see on this proposal. How pervasive is this problem? or is this just maybe a personality conflict with a few people? Well, as you see in the resolution, there is one particular person who is designated as the final grievance appeals. and it seems we've found that there almost aren't enough not-involved people in the process to even figure out if it's personality or process. That's why the survey was going to be so important, was to distinguish between personality versus process, because that could be given as the reason for every time someone's mad about a grievance is we just didn't get along with each other. So that's kind of been our barrier is the person who is the grievance person is also the person we're waiting to help put together the survey for the grievance that we can't move forward with to even correct the problem. And this survey was to survey employees? That's correct. would have been included. The intent was that we would have a summer employee that would actually put together the survey, have a summer intern that would put together the survey, get approval, have that go through the approval of human resources. So we'd include them all in on this, and then they would actually be either put on a website to where everyone would be able to go into a website and respond to this and somehow have it to where one of the issues was tracking it to employees. It didn't necessarily, employees felt like they needed to do it almost anonymously so that there wouldn't be, what do you call that, retaliation. And then we thought we could drop the surveys in, and at that point it was the beginning of the year, and we thought we could drop them in their paychecks at the beginning of the year and make that something to where everyone would get them. So we've had all the conversations, and you're right, Council Member Martin, Council Member Feigel, you all would not be privy to the long history of the issues with the grievance process. That is something that I do need to inform you about. It was never my intent necessarily with this to get that vote today to move this forward, but to really share with the committee that this is an issue that's in our committee that citizens are waiting to hear response on, and we're not able to act on it. Okay, now I'm confused. So you said citizens are waiting to hear the response, but this is about employee grievances? And they're also citizens of Lexington. They're employees that live here. Most of our employees live here in the city of Lexington. But they're typically employment grievances? Yes, they're all employment grievances, which would be the only – these are only related to employment, the grievance process, which is the only way that you can, if you have an issue with something, that's the process that you go through to get it resolved. Well, not knowing the details about all this, my first reaction to this is I think this is an administrative function. I'm not sure this is a function of the council. Yeah, and to respond to that, that's been the concern from the beginning is that a lot of hands off, that this is an administrative issue. but there are ordinances that council votes on that deals with grievance. So the actual grievance has an ordinance attached to it, the grievance process. So it's a law that we would either enforce or not enforce. And the process is there. That's a government process. And that's it. We've asked administration for help. And any suggestions that you have of how to help expedite this would be important because it serves to, if you don't have employees here to take care of our functions, some of that's administrative issue, but it becomes legislative when you don't have people that can go out and do building inspections or code enforcement inspections and such. So it ends up affecting us in the long run. But any advice that you all have as a committee, and I hope that we can discuss this in the April meeting. I would like to see a copy of the ordinance. Sure. Maybe I should have looked it up before I came here. That's okay. I'd be happy to provide that to you. That would be the first step, I think, is take a look at the ordinance and see if we have some ways to improve the ordinance. Sure. I'd be happy to bring that forward. Any other comments? Oh, I see. Councilman Henson. Thank you, Chair. I was just curious, do we know how many grievances have been filed in the last two years? Do we have any idea? I don't. We might, somebody in the human resources might have that number, might not. I'm not too sure. And I would be interested in getting some history on this issue and, of course, read the ordinance. Sure. Okay. So I have a to-do list, and the to-do list is a copy of the ordinance, maybe to get an estimate of the number of grievances that have been filed and resolved or dropped. Would you be interested in knowing that number? Okay, okay, dropped and resolved. And I will bring those to the next meeting. Anything else? Council Member Baird? Just for the people that have not been around for a while, and I think you probably experienced this more recently, fire and police, to be able to discipline a fireman or a policeman, the chief or his designee comes here and outlines what the offense was. In the most recent cases, it was that somebody was playing hooky, and they were being docked one day pay, and a letter of reprimand is put in his file, and then we are supposed to vote on that and approve that. To my certain knowledge in the last six years, the council's never not approved one of those. And it amazes me that that level of supervision maybe is being usurped by the council. I would think something much more significant than someone playing hooky one day would need to be brought to our attention. But that's probably dictated by ordinance and maybe also agreed to by an incollectable bargaining agreement. But at the same time, it seems kind of silly to me. So this is kind of the other side of the coin. I know in the private sector, there are grievance committees where you get the thoughts of at least two sides with a tiebreaker because they're generally small committees. And so that's something that maybe we can tuck in the back of our mind also. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Did you have a comment? Anybody have comment on this? We have Commissioner Askew and then Joan Beck also. Yes. I wanted to, on what Mr. Beard, Council Member Beard just said, with police and fire, that's a matter of state law. And there is a procedure that's outlined in the collective bargaining agreement as to how those matters work their way up to the council, the processes involved. But so there's no mistake, we're talking about two different processes here. One is discipline of employees, and when you have someone that's non-sworn, that's civil service, then that process is outlined in the statute as well, and we have a civil service commission which can hear appeals from a disciplinary process. the grievance process that the chair is talking about is a process that is outlined in the ordinances. And I think the issue is how effectively that process is working and whether the ordinance needs to be changed. I think that's where the chair, because we've had this conversation. We have. Yes, that's exactly it. Thank you. Citizens advocate, Joan Begg. Hi, thank you. I'll just comment briefly. As you're gathering information for next month's meeting, and you're asking for information on how many grievances have been filed in the last couple of years, you might also ask how many of those either followed or preceded discipline within, say, a three-month period. It's my impression, and it's only an impression, that oftentimes the grievance procedure and the discipline procedure are used inappropriately by supervisors and employees, and that they're caught in a cycle that is destructive and wasteful of your government tax money. And so that does indeed concern citizens other than the employees themselves. I think that that points up to that the process is problematic because the grievance and the discipline keep going back and forth and they escalate and work isn't getting done. And I think the process is broken. And anecdotally, what I hear from employees who have filed grievances, especially when they've been also involved in the disciplinary process, is that there is no trust that the grievance process will be fair because the same people are at the table all the time. Okay. And so as you're looking at the ordinance and how the grievance procedure is set up, I would encourage you to consider whether there are ways that it could be changed so that there is a greater level of trust and so that these two processes aren't being misused in such a way that is wasteful of our government, our primary resource, and that's the people who work here. Thank you for your input. I appreciate that. Council Member Blues, did you have something additional? Thank you, Madam Chair. I just wanted to add that this is an issue for the Council to take up or a committee or a task force, And I think that what we need to know perhaps at the next intergovernmental committee meeting is, is there a problem? What is the problem? And how do we as a council go forward to address it? Thank you. Thank you, Council Member Blouse. I don't know how we'll find that answer by the next meeting, but we'll try to do that. Thank you very much. Anything else before we adjourn? Got a motion and a second. All in favor, say aye. Aye. Thank you very much. That was good. Thank you.