With all the interesting and truly innovative things your City has done in
the past year, it may seem less than creative to begin an annual report to
you with something as mundane as finance. Yet, in many ways, with the daily
headlines filled for much of 2003 with news of impending fiscal crises in
Washington, in 49 of the 50 states and even with our new Metro government,
just how we steward your tax money is an important issue, indeed.
Once again, after all was said and done, your City of Prospect ended up the
fiscal year on a positive financial footing. The annual audit will reveal
your City added about $412,000 to its General Fund surplus, bringing reserves
to more than $1.6 million. As you can see by the chart to the right, this
has been a steady trend in the decade during which I have been your Mayor,
but it also reflects dramatically increased services to all of you. A survey
of cities in Jefferson County shows the range and level of services in Prospect
represents the best package for residents anywhere – from back-door garbage
pickup twice a week plus once-a-week back door recycling pickup and weekly
curbside yard waste collection to a Police Department which, among many other
things, conducted 11,000 home checks. Our Community Events – from the
Fourth of July to Pun’kin Paintin’ to Light Up Prospect and the
Mayor’s Beautiful Day – are unmatched by any suburban city, our
Reading Center is the envy of many and, additionally, we spent in excess of
$250,000 this year paving roads. However, since that did not get paid until
the current fiscal year, the figures I’ve cited are not totally accurate
– they should be reduced by the road paving expenses.
As long as your City Council and the City Administration continue to watch
our finances and budget wisely, as we have for the past decade, this trend
should continue. It is not an easy feat, given simple inflation as well as
expanding services but working together, we have accomplished this and more.
How? By running your City like the multi-million dollar business it is.
Taking a businesslike approach to City government led me to recommend and
the Council to approve joining the Metropolitan Sewer District’s drainage
plan this past year. While Prospect will have to pay more than $500,000 over
ten years to become a part of this plan, it is the right decision to make
for the benefit of all. The City’s use of outside engineers and contractors
without particular expertise in drainage has become increasingly costly and
inefficient. Drainage projects which we consider to be major undertakings
are simply routine maintenance to MSD.
We have been fortunate, also, that we have been able to make good use of grant
funds and donations to the City as a means of expanding services to you. As
an example, dozens and dozens of you have donated used books throughout the
year. Most of these books have been sold at our book sales, the monies used
to pay for some of the costs of the Reading Center. Too, our Community Celebration
sponsors – Kroger, Prospect Point’s merchants, McDonald’s.
Max & Erma’s, Republic Bank and Smithfield Green at Prospect Village,
plus almost 20 smaller donors – have allowed us to constantly expand
these events. And when we asked for help in funding our new Identification
Program, Republic Bank most generously volunteered to underwrite the costs.
We have also been successful in augmenting our tax dollars with federal and
state grant money for a variety of programs, particularly in the Police Department.
Always the Bridge
While the decision on the bridge came late last year, a very positive one
for our City, it seemed there was no letup in the meetings, discussions and
issues which had to be addressed.
Your City government was extremely active in working with federal and state
officials in choosing the overall contractor for the bridge. We were pleased
that Community Transportation Solutions, which designed the trench-and-tunnel
concept we favored, ultimately was selected to head the actual design and
construction.
Most of our efforts this year, and for the foreseeable future, will focus
on aesthetic and construction issues. I was most gratified for the assistance
U.S. Rep. Anne Northup gave us to help insure that, if we must have a bridge
in our area, it will have the least impact on Prospect as possible. Rep. Northup
came to a Council meeting this fall to pledge just that to all residents of
our City.
As an example of the positive impacts the bridge can have on our community,
the rendering above shows one design we support for the sound walls to be
erected at Bridgepointe. Construction elements such as this are the sort of
thing we will continue to strive to make reality as planning progresses
.
Your City Hall and Reading Center
Our goal in expanding City Hall and building a Reading Center was the same
as when we inaugurated our Community Celebrations: to bring people together.
Now that the “newness” has worn off of both, I am pleased to report
success on a number of fronts.
Hundreds of you have “library cards” and the Reading Center is quietly
abuzz with activity every day of the week. It is a regular stop for many residents
of all ages, and it also gives us a chance to interact with people more regularly.
So busy has the Reading Center become that we have moved Anne Brunner from
the position of City Secretary to Reading Center director. She keeps rather
busy, with help from a number of volunteers, especially Joan Bitely and Ruth
O’Daniel. “Ruthie” somehow found time to also build a new house
this year and, though not finished, held forth with coffee and cake for all
the Pun’kin Paintin’ workers.
With Brownies, Cub Scouts, Webelos, neighborhood associations and civic clubs
all “discovering” the facilities, we also keep a pretty busy schedule
hosting meetings at City Hall. It is great to have so many people using this
wonderful community resource.
At the same time, our Community Celebrations have really “come of age”
this year. More people attended our three big events – the Fourth of
July, Pun’kin Paintin’ and Light Up Prospect – than ever before.
We added a skyscraper slide and jumping area for the kids at Pun’kin
Paintin’ (and plan to have them back for the Fourth), to the delight
of several hundred kids; we augmented our spectacular fireworks on Independence
Day with some ground displays and the way the kids flock to Frosty the Snowman’s
“arrival” you would think he was Santa himself! It is a great source
of pride to see so many kids, their parents and grandparents at these events.
On a distressing note, however, we have been totally unsuccessful in our attempts
to work with the Louisville Free Public Library to allow you to pick up their
books at our Reading Center. We have offered to both pick up and return Public
Library books to a branch for residents who wish to reserve them. Those efforts
have been met with apathy, at best, from Craig Butthold, the Library director,
and our District Representative on the Metro Council has been completely ineffective
on this issue. We are hopeful, however, the Library leadership will come to
realize their responsibility is to serve all the people of the Metro area.
We have suggested a similar plan could be put into effect for a wide variety
of areas and constituancies, such as nursing homes. To no avail.
The Big Job of Reviewing Laws
We have only just begun a project that may last well through the year: a Task
Force will be reviewing every one of your City’s laws and recommending
changes as they see fit. Those recommendations will then be acted upon by
your City Council.
A number of the ordinances your City has on its books need a fresh look these
days because, to be frank, there are gaps in what they cover. As an example,
it is not a violation of any ordinance to park a car in the grass in a front
yard; nor, per se, do we have a law that prohibits general accumulation of
trash in residential areas – unless we can prove such trash attracts
vermin or insects.
Many of these problems have been addressed in the past by homeowner associations,
which enforce deed restrictions attached to various properties. But a number
of the deed restrictions (and the associations themselves) have time limits
on them. Some have already expired.
I asked 42 persons to serve on this group, and 37 of them accepted. They include
businesspeople and stay-at-home Moms; folks who have been active for years
and newcomers; real estate agents and business owners. We will be meeting,
generally, on a weekly basis, going through the City’s Code of Ordinances
pretty much line by line. I look forward to working with this outstanding
group.
A New Government and How It Works
At this writing, we are almost a year into the new Louisville-Jefferson County
Metro government and, as last year, the most often-asked question I seem to
get is how is it working out.
Prospect had, by far, the largest delegation from any City at the inaugural
festivities in January. I think this reflected our belief – and hope
– of a new and more efficient partnership and cooperation.
By and large, this has been so. This has, in no small measure, been due to
the fact that your City administration has worked with many of the people
who became “Metro” employees for years. Those relationships have
changed little, if at all, now that “Louisville” and “Jefferson
County” employees now have “Metro” as part of their titles.
I believe, too, it is fair to say the process has not been an easy one for
the elected officials. With the budget problems facing the new government,
and the need to see where everyone stands and what they are supposed to do,
the first year has not been easy. However, by and large, I am reminded of
the comment Tevya makes in “Fiddler on the Roof” when someone asks
how he gets along with the Russian authorities. “We don’t bother
them and they don’t bother us,” he says, with a hopeful glance toward
heaven.
I have spent the entire year as a member of a small group seeking to interface
cities in the county with the new government. Organized by the Jefferson County
League of Cities, I believe we have been able to make some headway, especially
given that so many Metro officials are former Louisville officials who are
unused to dealing with cities, as opposed to neighborhoods. Fortunately, Prospect
resident Stan Curtis was appointed by Mayor Abramson as a laison between the
League and Metro government. He has been extremely helpful and will, I am
sure, continue to be so.
What is unhelpful is the Metro Mayor’s decision to sue Prospect over
its annexation of an area adjacent to the City; an area where all the owners
petitioned your City Council to join Prospect. Allowing this annexation to
take place will increase the value of these properties because of the services
Prospect will provide; services which Metro does not. The Metro government
will not add a dime to its treasury if their suit is successful; yet they
will spend thousands of dollars (for an outside law firm, no less!) to litigate.
From our perspective it makes sense: we will get additional property taxes
through the annexation. But, as each of you know, those taxes are in addition
to Metro taxes. Frankly, I have always believed cities are an excellent way
to deliver services to residents, services which the larger government unit
cannot afford. Would that the folks downtown understood this.
A Prospect Potpourri
_ What grew out of a discussion about the most efficient way to keep you informed
when our garbage collection days change due to holidays ended up being a new
Prospect calendar which should appear in your mailbox shortly. The calendar
features times and dates for all City events; a wide-range of multi-cultural
holidays’ factoids about your City and some nice photographs. There is
space for you to put in your own appointments as well, so we hope the new
calendar will be useful to everyone.
_ I am most pleased with the performance of your Prospect Police Department
under the leadership of Col. Marvin Wilson. Our emphasis has finally shifted
from seeing how many citations officers can write (one former policeman was
not-so-affectionately known as “Ticketron” several years ago) to
protecting our neighborhoods, solving what few crimes we have and, generally,
making the motto “we serve and protect” more meaningful. Nothing
seems to have brought this home more than the self-defense classes the Department
has sponsored during the past two years. We certainly hope no one will ever
need to put into practice the techniques taught in these classes, but the
willingness and enthusiasm our officers have brought to this project –
as well as many others – speaks volumes for how Community Oriented Policing
is supposed to be done.
_ I am so proud of our Mayor-for-the-Day program. The youngsters selected
to participate all wrote excellent short essays explaining why they would
like a one-day immersive course in local government and then have thrown all
their energies into the experience. This is a project I really look forward
to working on over the next year. And we do still have some spots open so
if you have a child or grandchild who is interested, encourage them to sign
up.
_ Our new ID program is a source of pride. We have been able to produce high-quality
ID cards for children and adults who may be at risk and we also are able to
now capture more information. The initial response to the program has been
overwhelming. So much so that we have scheduled ID Saturdays to augment the
signups we do during our Community events.
With All of Our Thanks
From the members of your City Council to the Ann Brigade (three of the four
office workers at City Hall have that name), Prospect is a City that works
because of so much effort on the part of so many.
I cannot begin to tally the amount of time and energy that Council Members
Lee Zimmerman, Alan Simon, Sandy Tucci, Harold Smith, Nan Milliman, David
Krost and Charlie Sell put in on a regular basis. David, as many of you know,
took a job out of state during the year and the Council replaced him with
Charlie. Now we know why the Bridgepointe Homeowners’ Association, of
which Charlie is president, runs so well. Prospect is, indeed, fortunate to
have people like these who so willingly give their time and energy to making
our City a great place to live.
We are fortunate, too, that Ann Simms, as your City Administrator, is not
covered by federal hours and overtime laws. If so, my budget would be completely
blown. It is a good thing her husband is a good cook because Ann is usually
off doing something for the City rather than slaving over the proverbial hot
stove.
Cathie Parrott manages the business side of things with aplomb and Anne Brunner
has taken on the Reading Center challenge with a vengeance. And we have been
very lucky to add Ann Melton to the staff as City Secretary; she is one of
the most efficient and likable people I know.
City Maintenance Director Ron Cundiff has “graduated” from being
Mr. Pothole to Mr. Street Striper, and taken on a passel of duties in between.
He also stepped into a lot of the computer breech when Ed Ellers passed away
this year.
Patti Baker, the Police Department secretary, has taken on added duties manning
the front desk to make things easier for everyone while still keeping tabs
on the men and women in blue and assuming primary responsibility for the ID
program.
But the truth is we could not get anything done without all of you who volunteer
for everything from staffing the used book sales to helping with office duties.
I would easily run out of fingers and toes if I tried to count everyone who
contributes. Still, the continuing work Jeff and Miriam Hansen do to keep
up our web site and the ongoing attention to everything meteorological Russ
Conger devotes to Prospect’s “weather station” are more than
anyone could ask someone to do. I would keep on, but I will forget someone
simply because there are so many who are a part of our “City family.”
In Memorium: Ed Ellers
Most of our residents never knew Ed Ellers, but he was one of those folks
the people at City Hall relied on whenever something went wrong with anything
electronic. Indeed, he was one of those unsung heroes who keeps things going
even though he does it in the background.
While not a resident, Ed loved the City and, particularly, the Reading Center.
Just before he passed away after losing a battle with esophageal cancer at
the age of 42 late this year, he asked that anyone who wanted to remember
him could do so by sending a donation to the Reading Center. His Mom has also
donated a large number of his books in his memory.
We paid Ed to fix things. But half the time he forgot to turn in time sheets.
In that regard, as well as many others, he was as much a volunteer as an employee.
He was a unique character and all of us miss him.
What is the State of the City? I am pleased to report to you, for the tenth
year in a row now, that thanks to all of you, and to all who spend their time
working for you, Prospect is growing, prospering and serving you well.
Lonnie Falk
2004