City hall debate looms over race to become Lexington vice mayor

Lexington’s need for a new city hall loomed over a Saturday forum of candidates vying to become Lexington’s next vice mayor.

“I’m tired of this being kicked down the road,” said Chuck Ellinger II, one of six candidates in the at-large council race. “The next administration needs to make this a top priority as soon as they get in. I know we are going to have some developers now who are going to be a little apprehensive because they spent lots of money to go through this RFP process and they didn’t use it.”

Ellinger’s comments came during Saturday’s League of Women Voters, Lexington Public Library and the Frankfort-Lexington Chapter of The LINKs at-large council forum. The forum came just two days after the Lexington-Fayette Urban County Council voted 7-5 to kill a potential deal with CRM Companies to remodel and expand the current Lexington Herald-Leader building on Midland Avenue and Main Street to use as a new city government center.

The city has debated for decades on whether it should move and consolidate its five downtown buildings into one location. The vote to not move forward with the CRM Companies proposal is just the latest proposal the city has scrapped.

During Saturday’s forum, incumbent Vice Mayor Steve Kay said he supported the CRM Companies’ proposal. That deal would cost the city $5.1 million over 35 years or $178 million over the life of the lease. CRM Companies would also guarantee it would pay $3.1 million annually in operating and maintenance costs for the building.

“Nobody has suggested that (the CRM Companies proposal) would not have been fiscally responsible if they looked at the numbers,” Kay said. Kay said there was not enough support on council to approve a final contract with CRM Companies. The vote on Thursday night was to start negotiations. Those negotiations would have been long “and an expensive process” and Kay didn’t think it was prudent or cost-effective to enter negotiations.

Incumbent At-Large Councilman Richard Moloney, who voted against entering into negotiations with CRM Companies on Thursday, said Lexington needs a new city government center.

“I think we can build a good building for the city, and I think we can do it right and we need to have council input and public input,” Moloney said. “I think we can build a good building for the city and a lot cheaper.”

Adrian Wallace, former president of the Lexington chapter of the NAACP who also runs nonprofits, said it’s too expensive to keep the city’s five downtown buildings. “I want to see more public input, council input,” Wallace said. “Let’s look at what we could do with those five properties, whether it be rehab or folks that may want to buy them.”

Lillie E. Miller-Johnson, who has served three terms on the soil and water conservation board, said she wasn’t convinced the city couldn’t renovate its current buildings. “That $5 million a year could go to renovating the old buildings if the infrastructure is sound. This has been something that has (been) looked at through, I think, three administrations and they still haven’t come up with a solution. My thing is to look at what we have available and what the money is.”

Connie Kell, the sixth candidate, declined to participate in the Saturday forum, according to the League of Women Voters. The six were the top vote-getters in the May primary. The race is nonpartisan. The vice mayor makes $34,451.

All other council members receive an annual salary of $31,606. Kay — who has served two terms as an at-large member, including the last four as vice mayor — finished first in the May primary.

The top vote-getter in the six-way race on Nov. 6 will become the next vice mayor, who runs the 15-member Urban County Council. The second- and third-place finishers will serve as at-large council members, a four-year term.

In the forum, the candidates differed slightly on what the city can do to address substance abuse.

Ellinger, who served three terms as an at-large member from 2003 to 2014 and ran unsuccessfully for the 3rd Council District seat in 2014, said the city couldn’t “incarcerate its way out” of the growing number of people who are addicted to heroin and other drugs.

Ellinger said he has a friend whose 21-year-old son recently died of a drug overdose. It’s a disease that affects all social classes equally, he said.

The city has to have a holistic approach that includes education, more opportunities for jobs for recovering addicts and more treatment, he said.

Kay also said the city needs to focus on education and providing more job opportunities to combat drug and alcohol addiction.

Miller-Johnson said the state must make sure doctors are not over-prescribing pain medication and monitor patients who are taking painkillers. “We are not arresting the people who are selling the drugs.”

Wallace, who said he serves on the board of Lighthouse Ministries, which offers drug treatment, said the city needs more residential drug treatment options. “Thirty-day programs are not sufficient,” Wallace said. The city needs more nine-month programs with three-month transition programs. “We don’t have enough in Lexington,” he said.

Moloney said he pushed the city to sue drug manufacturers who flooded the state with painkillers. That lawsuit is still pending.

“The city can’t do this by themselves,” Moloney said. “We have to work with nonprofits.”

Other topics covered during Saturday’s forum included encouraging development within the urban service area, or growth boundary, crime and addressing the needs of the city’s aging population.

The candidates were also asked what book they were reading. The forum was held at the Lexington Public Library on Main Street. Some candidates said they were too busy to read during the campaign. Ellinger said the only thing he has been able to read lately is the city’s budget.

Kay said he was on the last chapter of “ House of Names” a book by Colm Toibin. It’s a retelling of the Greek tragedy of Agamemnon and Clytemnestra. Kay said the book’s depiction of the violence of the Greeks had put the current at-large race and city government in perspective.

“Although we may have our own level of difficulty and divisiveness and even in-fighting, we aren’t killing each other,” Kay said.

This story was originally published September 16, 2018 at 1:11 PM.