Two of the more significant events in Prospect’s 26 year history occurred, perhaps appropriately, in the year 2000: the new Prospect Village Shopping Center opened for business – with a wide range of services and stores – and, after a study lasting more than a year, we broke ground for the new City Hall and Reading Center.
Just as significant, your City made important strides toward ensuring that the community celebrations, which we began and have expanded since our first Fourth of July seven years ago, will be able to continue to provide opportunities for all of us to celebrate together and enjoy one another’s company. We did this by establishing a sponsorship program which allows local businesses, large and small, to be a part of these events.
None of these activities, however, are important if your City does not deliver the basic services which are our raison d’etre for being a City. The statistics show our Police Department conducted more house watches than ever before and gave more assistance to residents – through what we call “motorist assists” and “on-view runs” – than we ever have before. While there were more vocal complaints about garbage and recycling collections than in the past, more than 99 percent of you had these pickups on time and without untoward incident. Our snow removal program did just what it is supposed to do: remove snow and ice and keep it off our streets. Other services, such as drainage, enforcement of our ordinances, maintenance of streets, lights and signs operated smoothly and efficiently. These services are the unsung successes of your City; they take a great deal of the staff’s time but are vitally important to everyone.
We were not without our problems. As many of you know, a number of us expressed concern years ago about the effect on crime and traffic a new shopping center would bring. Those concerns have become reality, but our growing tax base has given us the ability to handle it. We do, however, look forward to a solution to the ever-increasing traffic problem on U. S. 42 and have been working with the State to bring about a way by which traffic from Oldham County can be routed to I-71 without the necessity of moving through Prospect. It is a blessing, however, the new center opened in 2000 – when we had the personnel and financial resources to handle it – rather than in 1993 when we did not.
Finally, if one issue dominated your City officials’ time in 2000, it continued to be the proposed east end bridge. The public part of the environmental impact study is a veritable tip of the iceberg. For every hour spent in meetings which you may see reported in the newspapers or on television, there are a dozen spent in consultation, study, formulating proposals and in smaller meetings with the consultants. We feel, however, that we do have a handle on this project and while we continue to contend at every opportunity that a bridge in the far eastern part of the county is unnecessary for the foreseeable future, we are hopeful that a compromise route will greatly minimize any environmental impact on the City and surrounding area – during construction as well as if or when this project gets underway.
What makes Prospect a “City That Works” is, of course, the people who are involved day to day in its operation. And although she occupies a paid position, no one devotes more time, energy and creativity to Prospect than your City Administrator, Ann Simms. Ann, as many of you know, volunteered to “help out” when Catherine Chamberlain, our former long-time city clerk and administrator passed away suddenly in 1995, shortly after Ann was elected to her second term on the City Council. She’s held the post ever since and we are all lucky to have her dedication and commitment.
When Mr. Justice Martin Johnstone of the Kentucky Supreme Court swore in the members of the City Council January 1, 2001, there was a familiar face missing, that of Raymond Burse. Raymond chose not to run for a fourth term. Actually, Raymond chose not to run for a third term, but, as but a typical example of a life in which he has always done more than his civic duty, he agreed to serve “one last time” because of the many issues which confronted us in the past two years. We all owe Raymond a debt of thanks.
Raymond’s seat on the Council was won by David Krost. David, as many of you know, was chair of the Library Committee for the City as we struggled with deciding just what our Reading Center would be like and how it could best serve all of you. In all, I don’t think David missed a single Council meeting in over a year. As it turned out, he brings a depth of experience and participation from a new Council member that has extremely seldom been matched by anyone. As our Reading Center gears up for operation, his work on this issue will be a great help to us all.
Another member of the City Council, Sandy Tucci, has been heavily involved in the Reading Center from the outset. It was Sandy, in fact, who led us to the system we will use to populate the Reading Center with books, but her contributions and wise counsel on many issues have made her a valued resource for our City.
I doubt that any member of the Council has devoted more of his own personal time to dealing with City issues than Lee Zimmerman and Harold Smith. Lee has been heavily involved in several issues dealing with the Police Department, including sitting on several day-long search sessions. Harold, an engineer by trade, is “the man to call” when there is a big drainage, paving or other similar problem. I think I’ve seen him in his going-through-the-mud boots more than in dress shoes. It is a cinch a lot of problems would be bigger ones without Harold’s advice and help.
What would the City do without Nan Milliman’s calm, reasoned advice or Alan Simon’s eagle-eye? Both are approaching a decade of service to your City. When we need a well-thought out opinion or someone who can look and analyze all sides of an issue, Nan is the one who does that. Alan, perched across the street from City Hall, sees all and tells all. If there’s a pothole, Alan will find it before the Police do.
Prospect owes a special vote of thanks to Larry Johnson. He stepped into the breach when our former police chief resigned unexpectedly and has been acting chief all of 2000. Larry is calm, reasonable and knowledgable in law enforcement issues and will be a highly valuable second-in-command to our new chief, for whom we are currently conducting a search. The City Council acknowledged Larry’s contribution to the City by making his temporary rank of Captain into a permanent one. No one deserves it more.
It is important that you know the level of efficiency by our other City Hall staff – City clerk Phyllis O’Donnell, secretary Anne Brunner and police clerk Patricia Smith. None of their jobs are single-dimensional, while Phyllis is nominally in charge of “official paper,” she is also the one who takes care of the finance duties; Anne’s job description calls for her to type and act as receptionist, but there is not a special event the City holds which could be pulled off without her enthusiastic work; Patricia keeps our police department organized – a task which would daunt Wonder Woman herself.
Grover Potts, as our City Attorney, has not only brought us outstanding legal counsel, but excellent advice in a number of areas; Joe Kehlbeck did a massive job updating our house watch database – in fact, he rewrote the entire program; Woody Smither, though semi-retired, has continued working and providing us with his wealth of knowledge as City Engineer Emeritus; Raleigh Baker, as architect for the new building, not only involved us in countless details, but did so with humor and verve; Russ and Scott Conger, who run the City’s weather page on our web site, provide you with probably the finest truly local weather information anywhere in the world. Last but not the least, Cornelia Yankovich, as editor of the Newsletter, for another 12 months kept my subjects and predicates agreeing.
As I have said before, the problem with this Annual Report is that it is confined to four pages, and the “thank yous” would, to be comprehensive, consume more than that. The truth is I have left out a huge number of people – like Dr. David Wicks and his Harrolds Creek study group and Lonnie Walker who donated an original of his Kentucky Derby Festival Poster to the City (see, now I haven’t) – but, truly, the list is endless. Thank you all.
The Reading Center: A Community Place
The mighty (cold) men of Cambridge Construction are hard at work every day as the new Reading Center and City Hall literally rises from the ground. There was a point where we thought the construction cost would simply be too high, but Larry Heck, president of Cambridge, employed what is called “value engineering” to make the money and the wants and desires of the City fit.
David Krost’s Library committee determined a year ago that we simply could never fund a full-scale library in Prospect. One of the lessons I learned while in business was that paying for one-time capital expenses is a whole lot easier than funding the continuing expense of operating whatever it was we were buying. This ended up being the guiding principal which brought the Reading Center into being.
We will have three reading collections in the new center: for young children, for young adults and for adults. I get a lot of flack for calling the latter the “adult book collection,” so I am trying to remember to call it the “book collection for adults.”
The Prospect-Goshen Rotary Club, under the leadership of John and Eve Herzfeld, has made a substantial donation to the City for the children’s collection. Working with library specialists at Hawley-Cooke, we are identifying special kinds of books which young children will, first of all, enjoy, and, second, will most likely not have at home. So, while you won’t find “The Cat in the Hat” at the Reading Center, you will find books which will stimulate and excite all the young readers in our community.
Through manager Steve Goddin, Kroger has committed to fund the book collection for adults. This, as well as the young adult collection, will consist of books on a rotating basis which will keep all the current best-sellers and exciting new fiction and non-fiction books available to you. Once demand slackens on a particular title, we will have the ability to return it and get something more current. This system will keep our collections fresh and new without burdening us with a large number of books for which we will have little call in the years ahead.
Kroger at present is in the midst of taking donations from customers to add to the money the store itself is contributing. Please stop by, get one of the “book posters,” put your name on it and help the Reading Center. Any amount is accepted.
Once it is up and running, the Reading Center will do much more than loan books. We want it to be the home for book clubs, childrens’ reading sessions and the like. We see the Reading Center as an important and lively place in our community.
Similarly, the new City Council meeting room has been designed for use by groups in our City. We raised the platform for the Council “table” not so much to provide perspective to the Council members as to have a low stage that could be used by groups. The “table” is in sections and removable.
We hope homeowner associations, social clubs, scouts and other organizations will see the value of meeting at City Hall. We look forward to having the space to host them.
Celebrating Community
To my mind, nothing has transformed Prospect over the past seven years more than our Community events.
When, at the urging of John Evans back in 1994, we decided to hold a Fourth of July parade and picnic, we inaugurated a trend for the City which now includes Pun’kin Paintin’ and Light Up Prospect.
These signature events, plus the 3-on-3 Basketball Shootout, our neighborhood meetings and occasional concerts at the Gazebo, afford us opportunities to enjoy our City and to meet, play and enjoy leisure time with one another.
We have been successful in securing non-tax funding for our major community celebrations by making prime sponsorships available. This past year, Republic Bank, Kroger, Prospect Dairy Queen, Papa John’s Prospect Village Office Condominiums and Rumpke Sanitation were the prime sponsors for all three major events. It has been through these sponsorships – plus generous contributions from other area businesses for individual programs – that your City has been able to increase the quantity and quality of our programming.
Our Fourth of July fireworks display is the largest in suburban Jefferson County; Pun’kin Paintin’ is a unique idea which has been copied now by others; the delight on the kids’ eyes when they see Frosty the Snowman “arrive” to usher in the Holiday season are what makes these programs special.
We couldn’t do it without the cooperation and help of a large number, chief among them Hunting Creek Country Club, which is the location of our fireworks displays on the Fourth and for Light Up Prospect, and the Harrods Creek Fire Volunteer Fire Department, which not only monitors the potentially adverse effects of the fireworks, but also provides trucks and equipment for the youngsters to learn a little about fire prevention.
The Commercial Area
With the opening of the new Republic Bank branch on an outlot in Prospect Village early in 2000 and the Kroger store as the first tenant within the center itself in early Spring, a new era began for the City’s commercial area.
As I wrote earlier, the new shopping facility has not been without its problems for the City and its residents but, on the whole, the center has certainly been a plus in terms of additional services and communuity involvement. It should not be lost on residents that half of our prime sponsors for our community celebrations are housed within Prospect Village.
Developer Monty Helm won an award for the center’s design and we at City Hall can testify to his concern for the aesthetics of each tenant in the new facility.
The City’s primary concern, of course, is with the quality of tenants in all the commercial area. The Winn-Dixie grocery at Prospect Point closed only 45 days after Kroger opened, leaving a huge “hole” to fill in that facility. There are significant vacancies in another center as well.
This, coupled with the growth of nearby Springhurst Towne Center and the new area being developed by David Jones at U.S. 22 and the Snyder Freeway, does emphasize the need for Prospect to realize its commercial areas should, essentially, be for the use of its residents and those in the immediate surroundings. For this reason, I cannot see the City willing to expand commercial space in the near future – except, possibly, for eating establishments, of which there seems to be a dearth.
It is an axiom of planning that new shopping facilities do not contribute to economic growth in a community, they merely move it from one location to another. This, coupled with the critical shortage in employment-seekers, the general slowing of the economy and the transfer of shopping habits from brick and mortar facilities to click and mortar dot-coms, means it is important for us to carefully restrict commercial growth in the future.
Looking Our Best
There is no doubt we get more comments about the way our City looks than any other thing. It is for this reason, obviously, that a great deal of our budget goes to beautification and maintenance.
One of the major ways we try to help keep Prospect looking in tip-top shape is simple maintenance: repairing signs, mowing grass in City-owned areas, an agressive program to insure that private lots are not sources for weeds and debris and street-cleaning – both by our own efforts as well as the enforcement of our laws which prohibit mud and dirt on your streets.
Our Beautiful Day in the Fall gives us the opportunity to give away bulbs that will bloom in the spring. Our fall planting program insures there will be pretty flowers almost year-around and our Derby Deadline is simply that – the date when all of our cleanup from Winter is done and our flowers are planted and looking their best.
We have installed new entrance maps at several of the subdivisions and are in the process of reviewing all street signs for replacement. In the meantime, we are doing our best to keep up with lights which need to be replaced, storm drains that must be kept clean and filling potholes as they form.
The whole issue of maintenance has been a difficult one for the City in the past year, due to the lack of a regular maintenance person. Our part-time maintenance man went to work full-time for MSD, leaving us in a catch-as-catch-can basis. Fortunately, as of December 1, the City was able to hire a full-time Director of Maintenance, Ron Cundiff. Already the small problems which would either bedevil us, or force us to pay private contractors to fix, are becoming much less a dilemma.
And . . .
I knew I would run out of space, and now I have. I certainly enjoy serving as your Mayor and appreciate every one of the comments, suggestions and constructive criticisms that come to me by telephone, letter and, now, email. Prospect government has only one goal: to serve you. That is what we strive to do every day.
2001