By MELINDA J. OVERSTREET
for Glasgow News 1
In addition to the hourlong discussion Monday evening by the Glasgow Common Council regarding whether to accept a property donation, which has been reported separately, the other hour-plus of the meeting was chock full of other business ranging from the installation of a “Baby Box” at the Glasgow Fire Department to multiple law-enforcement-related matters and temporary and permanent street closures.
Early on in the meeting, Ron Lafferty, director of the Barren River Drug Task Force, provided a report on the agency’s efforts to bring mid- and upper-level drug traffickers to prosecution.
“If we focused on just users, we’d never be able to cut off the head of the snake,” he said.
Lafferty said he was first hired as a police officer in 1999, and he was hired in 2004 – the second year of the DTF’s existence – by the Barren County Sheriff’s Office as a DTF detective.
“In 2014, I became director,” he said. “One of the things that I promised when I became the director is to educate the public on the trends, the things that’s going on in our community.”
Since then, he’s presented more programs than he remembers, he said.
The members of the DTF are the BCSO, Glasgow and Cave City police departments and Metcalfe County, he told those assembled for the council meeting, adding that they are hoping to expand again soon but would hold off on details about that.
As he continued, he cited the networking relationships the task force has with other law enforcement agencies both regionally and across the nation.
“You get a lot more than just a few police officers fighting drugs,” Lafferty said.
He is the vice president of the Kentucky Narcotics Officers Association and a member of the national version of that organization and, through those, he’s had the opportunity to meet with legislators at state and national levels to discuss concerns.
Lafferty also provided quite a few case statistics and trends, noting that use of crystal methamphetamine has far outpaced the meth that had been “cooked” locally, and fentanyl has mostly replaced heroin, for example.
Many of the figures he provided were included in an interview he did with Glasgow News 1 recently.
As he introduced Lafferty, Mayor Henry Royse said the DTF is an operation that does a very impressive job. Just prior to that, the mayor administered the oath of office to the Glasgow Police Department’s new officer, John Wallen, who comes here after six years with Western Kentucky University police, and the mayor introduced the new canine member of the GPD, Niko, who attended with his handler, Officer Jonathan Pendley.
Another item that garnered some discussion and questions was the proposed agreement for the installation of a Safe Haven Baby Box at the GFD. State law allows to leave infants younger than 30 days at a staffed police station, fire station, hospital or participating place of worship that has this type of device without fear of criminal prosecution or allegation of neglect.
This device allows a parent to open it and place the baby inside, after which the “box” is locked and neither the parent nor anyone else can remove the infant from the outside of the facility, GFD Chief William Rock II said. The firefighters, in this case, would then retrieve the child from within the fire station and see that he or she gets safely transferred into care. An alarm sounds to alert the firefighters and certain others of when the box has been used.
A private donor, Leland Glass, approached the city offering to donate the cost of acquiring, installing and maintaining the box, but according to the resolution, the city agreed to continue maintaining it if the private donor decides at some point later not to do so.
Rock said that multiple people are helping the named donor with the funding, but Glass is the one who has taken on the responsibility for communicating with and getting that funding to the city.
City Attorney Rich Alexander said the city does have a provision through which it can stop with 60 days notice.
The initial cost, as outlined in the five-year lease/service agreement, is a $15,000 fee, not including delivery, installation and alarm expenses, and there’s a $500 annual fee and then a renewal fee at the beginning of each new five-year term.
Rock said that while many may judge someone who would turn over their baby like that and think they’ve done an awful thing, a parent who uses this option is actually doing a good thing when one considers some of the alternatives of what else they might do, up to and including putting that infant in a garbage bag and throwing it in a dumpster.
“We will go to that baby, and it will get all the care it needs,” he said.
Councilwoman Chasity Lowery expressed gratitude to the gentleman who initiated the project here.
“Whether or not this goes through, I think it shows the heart of our community,” she said.
The resolution authorizing the plan was approved unanimously, with all members present either in person or via Zoom streaming service.
A trio of interrelated items that came later and were all approved unanimously all had to do with the upcoming construction of a new justice center along West Main Street, some of the property for which was purchased from the city.
“The project is now to the point of doing some demolition of existing buildings and other sitework,” said Alexander, who is a member of the project development board for the new facility. “Back in December 2022, when the city sold the property to the Barren County Public Properties Corp., the city agreed that, at the appropriate time, portions of the public streets would be closed to accommodate the project.”
First, a resolution provided the general authorization for the plan to:
– temporarily close to public traffic a portion of West Water Street from roughly the property line of the Glasgow Water Co. westward to the edge of the justice center property as well as the portion of Ford Drive between West Water and West Front streets plus allow fencing off of the area and storage of materials within the fencing;
– reopen the temporarily closed sections of West Water and the portion of Ford Drive from West Water to West Front once the justice center project is complete; and
– permanently close the existing Ford Drive from West Main to West Water and allow the right of way that was with it in that block and little ways into that next block that would be reopened to revert to the owner AND accept into the city’s street maintenance program what would be a newly relocated portion of Ford Drive in that one block between West Main and West Water roughly 175 feet to the west of where it is now. A color coded diagram was provided to council members and the news media to illustrate the changes.
This map illustration provided to city officials by American Engineers Inc. shows portions of city streets that would be temporarily and permanently closed during demolition of existing buildings and subsequent construction of a new justice center. The blue sections on West Water Street and Ford Drive would be temporarily closed and then reopen once the project is completed. The orange section of Ford Drive and/or its right of way would be closed permanently, and the green strip is where the newly constructed portion of Ford Drive is intended to be.
Following that resolution, the first readings of two ordinances – one to more formally and permanently close the portion of Ford Drive that is being relocated and one to then accept the then-relocated portion of Ford Drive, contingent on its meeting all the standards for city streets.
Other items addressed during the meeting included the following, though not in this order, and all of these action items were approved unanimously as well:
– an announcement by Austin Sims, regional transportation planner for the Barren River Area Development District, inviting city leaders to the Comprehensive Economic Development Strategy Mini-Summit planned for April 9 at the Cave Area Conference Center. The free event – the second of its kind that BRADD has organized – is from 10:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. and offers workshops on varying topics related to community and economic development for the 10 counties served by BRADD. Registration is at this link.
– first reading of an ordinance increasing the city’s insurance premium fee to 5 percent on all types insurance policies, including life and health, which had been at 2 percent since the fee was implemented in 1966, but with the life insurance fee only applying to the first year’s premium and with exceptions continued for “insuring employers against liability for personal injuries to their employees, or death caused thereby, under the provisions of the Worker’s Compensation Act” and policies of group health insurance provided for state employees or premiums paid to any self-funded health insurance program for state employees as laid out in state law;
– second reading of an ordinance amending an earlier one making the Entertain Glasgow Committee a standing city committee, with the primary change being that the finances of Entertain Glasgow will now be included with the city’s financial accounting;
– second reading of an ordinance that amends the budget for the current fiscal year to add money to the correct accounts to cover some unexpected expenses such as the Plaza boiler repair and replacement of a trash compactor at the landfill as well as adding in some grant and insurance funds revenue, with the changes, in summary, appropriating from the unappropriated General Fund $394,508.01 for grant expenditures and equipment; receiving $154,253.41 from grants, donations, insurance check and opioid settlement monies to the General Fund; appropriating from the unappropriated Plaza Fund $24,500 for repairs; appropriating from the unappropriated Sanitation and Landfill Fund $1,006,100 for equipment; and receiving a $410,582 insurance check to the Sanitation and Landfill Fund;
– a municipal order appointing Andrea Gentry to the Glasgow Economic Development Loan Fund Board of Directors;
– a municipal order establishing the members of the Entertain Glasgow Committee as one member of the council, currently James “Happy” Neal; the superintendent of public works, currently Jim McGowan; the director of parks and recreation, currently Eddie Furlong; the police chief, currently Guy Howie; the fire chief, currently William Rock II; a City Hall designee, currently City Administrator April Russell; and five community members at large, currently Victoria Hunley, Katie Baise, Kelsey Stephens, Jared Pursley and Matthew Compton, with the community members’ initial terms starting now being one, two, three, four and five years, respectively, and terms thereafter being for three years; and
– a resolution declaring certain property of the Department of Public Works as surplus, including a Western snowplow, a Rosco pothole patch machine, a 2009 John Deere bushhog and a 200 CAT D300E articulating dump truck, all to be auctioned online at www.govdeals.com.
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