Tagged: Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer

Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer has chosen former Kentucky Secretary of Justice Ishmon Burks to be the 2013 recipient of the city’s Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Freedom Award.

Burks is a retired army colonel who also served as the first African-American commissioner of the Kentucky State Police. In 2011, he served as interim chief of the Louisville Metro Police Department and as Fischer’s chief of public safety.

Burks says he is humbled by the mayor’s choice, and accepts the Freedom Award with a sense of gratitude.

"I wasn’t quite sure how to take it, but he said ‘I think you’re the man’ and I said mayor if you think so it’s fine with me. And so I was surprised by the whole thing," he says.

Louisville Metro Councilman Ken Fleming, R-7, is concerned that Mayor Greg Fischer’s push for a local option sales tax will burden residents and wants to examine cutting other levies first.

For several months the mayor has been lobbying that the city needs the tool to be more competitive and independent.

Fischer argues his administration is not seeking a tax increase, and only wants voters to have the power to decide whether or not to fund special projects through a temporary hike to the state's sales tax.

But Fleming says the mayor has provided few details on what a specific proposal would look like, and is ignoring his campaign promises to spur economic development and job creation.

"Their goal should be economic development, and adding an additional tax on individuals regardless of income is not the right way to go," he says. "What we need to focus on is to try to find those strategies and tactics like getting rid of the occupational tax. That will help development incur job creation. I think we ought to look at that process and not a tax mentality."

State Sen. Kathy Stein, D-Lexington, has introduced a bill in the General Assembly that would give cities a local option sales tax.

Louisville Mayor Greg Fischer has been a major proponent of the measure, which allows local voters to decide whether to fund special projects through a temporary sales tax increase. The mayor recently outlined the measure for Metro Council members, saying it gives Louisville more independence.

The bill was introduced Jan. 8 and will be in the State and Local Government Committee.

Stein says many lawmakers oppose any new taxes, but this gives local residents decision-making power.

"It is an option, unfortunately whenever some of us hear the word tax we jump 10 feet up in the air and say 'no, no, no.' But you need to pay attention. It gives the taxpayers the option of doing it. The people who vote have the options," she says.

Joined by Councilwoman Attica Scott, D-1, and other city officials, Mayor Greg Fischer says Louisville Metro Government is increasing its efforts to tackle vacant and abandoned properties.

The demolition of abandoned properties went up by 30 percent in 2012, and city officials are aiming to foreclose on another 100 homes by June 30. According to different housing reports, Louisville has an estimated 7,000 vacant homes and approximately 1,300 of those are abandoned.

Fischer is spending $125,000 in the current city budget to file those foreclosures, and says the goal is to reduce the number of abandoned properties by 40 percent in the next three years and 67 percent over the next five.

"This is one of those projects that is so big it's easy just to throw up your hands and say it's been going on for decades, and we can't do anything about it. Well, I want to say that if you live next to an vacant or abandoned properties and the weeds are six feet tall, I can tell you that it is not an acceptable answer to say there's nothing we can do about this," he says.