Lexington, KY - I hope everyone is enjoying this beautiful fall season. I want to take this opportunity to share with you information about two working groups that I'm spearheading.
On Sept. 24, neighborhood association leaders, merchants and city staff met at Buddy's to consider a possible redesign and beautification project for Chevy Chase. The goal is to create a conceptual design for the intersection of Fontaine, Euclid and High Street to reflect the beauty and charm of the neighborhoods. I believe the crumbling medians and poorly designed traffic flow need attention, and we hope to work together to create a vision for the area that will improve the aesthetics as well as traffic flow with a pedestrian-friendly, village environment that includes components such as cafĂ seating, landscaped medians, flower boxes, brick pavers and public art, to name a few.
As of now, the area is not even on a waiting list for funding consideration. We hope to create a plan for short term and long term improvements to be used in a grant application for state funding. In reality, funding is not likely in the immediate future, but at a minimum, we will finally be in the pipeline for consideration. I will diligently advocate the funding as a member of the Metropolitan Planning Organization (MPO).
Our intention is to be completely inclusive - and all ideas are welcomed. If you are interested, please contact me. I am very excited about putting our creative minds together to design something absolutely spectacular, and I'd like to thank Steve Austin for his willingness to facilitate the design phase.
Secondly, I was asked to chair a special work group to create a long-range finance plan to implement the new parks master plan and update our existing facilities. I've heard from many of you about tennis courts in disrepair, lack of playing fields for youth sports and inadequate restroom facilities in our parks. With very few federal and state dollars for parks available, we need to think creatively about how to fund these improvements. The first meeting of the Parks Funding Work Group took place on Oct. 8 and will meet monthly. My thanks go out to community members who have volunteered to serve on this work group, as well as to council members Andrea James and Jay McChord for joining me in this endeavor.
In other district news, I am excited to announce the grand opening of a new Family Dollar in the Idle Hour shopping center on Richmond Road. Also, congratulations are in order to the Ashland Park Neighborhood Association for obtaining a historical marker in the South Hanover median commemorating the original architectural designers, Olmstead Brothers. Only 30 permits are granted in the entire state each year. I am glad to have worked with the neighborhood association to make this happen.
Congratulations also to Mr. Jim Render, a District 5 constituent who served our country on the beaches of Normandy on D-Day. I was honored to present a Distinguished Citizen Award to him recently and I extend thanks to the Castlegate Neighborhood Association for inviting me to be a part of honoring such a deserving individual.
Lastly, we still do not have the repaving list for the '09 -
'10 fiscal year. The delay in receiving that information, according to the mayor's office, is a new evaluation method for distribution of our resurfacing funds. I believe this new method of distribution will be more equitable for all and will benefit the 5th District. As soon as we receive the list, it will be included in my weekly electronic newsletter. If you still need to sign up for the newsletter, please contact my office.