The Paducah Board of Commissioners met on October 2, 2025, at 5:00 PM with all five members present. The meeting included a proclamation declaring October 2025 as City Government Month, a presentation on a proposed ordinance to prohibit retail dog and cat sales, approval of consent agenda items, a municipal order to purchase property for a new police station, adoption and introduction of several ordinances, and an update on the new 911 radio system.
Good afternoon, everybody. It is five o'clock, straight up and down. So I'll go ahead and call this meeting to order on October 2nd, 2025, and ask uh our city clerk to please call roll. Commissioner Henderson. Present. Commissioner Smith. Here. Commissioner Thomas. Present. Commissioner Wilson, present. Commissioner Mayor Bray. Present. I'll ask Commissioner Thomas to do the invocation, and we'll remain standing for the Pledge of Allegiance. We praise you and we thank you. We thank you in Jesus' name. Amen. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it is one nation under God, indivisible with liberty and justice for all. And whereas City Government Month calls on city officials to get involved in their local schools and in educating and engaging elementary school students in city government. Now therefore, I, George P. Bray, Mayor of Paducah, Kentucky, hereby declare October 2025 as city government month. And just as a quick follow-up to that, since I've been elected since I got elected the first time. I've been in many elementary schools, uh talking to fourth, fifth, and sixth graders. Um just trying to educate, I get the craziest questions about uh, you know, people, these kids like to ask the mayor, you know, the first one is like, how old are you? And uh, you know, I mean, it's just some, you know, kids will say the darndest things, right? I mean, but I I will have to say it warms my heart, and I know that uh Commissioner Thomas has been to an elementary school, maybe um I maybe all of us have, you know, but you know, this um uh recognizing a city government month is something that's very important for our our kids, you know, as they are getting educated in the elementary schools and understand uh the importance of government. Mayor, one of the questions I got was are you older than I am? Am I older than you? Yeah. What'd you say? I said absolutely. You should have taken the fifth. Okay, um tonight we have a presentation uh from Todd Blovin Blevins. Hi, Todd. Hello, Mayor. Who is uh Kentucky State Director? Uh State Affairs for the Humane World for Animals, which is formerly known as the Humane Society. Yes, sir, it's a very long name, uh, especially when you add the formerly to it. But you can think of me as the state director for the National Humane Society. Okay, great. Well, it's great to have you, and I know that uh uh Todd has a presentation and he wants to talk about something that he's that he's uh pitching to all of us commissioners uh so I turn it over to you. I do. Uh am I able to let's see, have you got this uh Claudia? Or I was just gonna put it in the full mode here before I kind of get underway. Um First Mayor, I actually want to uh I want to throw a little bit of a curveball because I myself am a former uh practitioner of local government. Um so I am a former assistant city manager for a small town called Yorktown, Indiana by Muncie, if you guys know where that is. Uh it we had about 10,000 people, but uh needless to say, fan of local government and the civic process, so thank you all for what you do. Uh but now in my current role, uh, yes, as you said, I am the Kentucky State Director for an organization called Humane World for Animals. Uh and I'm no stranger to Paducah. I've run into chief layered at probably the past four or five police chiefs association conferences because one of the things we do is animal cruelty training for law enforcement, because as he will tell you, they are not getting that in the academy. So we try to offer that as a as an auxiliary training so that everybody uh when when you run into animal cruelty out on the street, you're you're able to uh to to do you know something about it.