Mayor Linda Gorton gives State of the City Address

Mayor Linda Gorton gave her State of the City address Tuesday, focusing on the progress Fayette County has made in the past several years.

Lexington, Ky (WTVQ): Mayor Linda Gorton gave her State of the City address Tuesday, focusing on the progress Fayette County has made in the past several years. Gorton shares some dreams she’s made into progress, and how she’s planning for the year ahead. Some of the topics she touched on include safety, affordable housing and improving roads.

“Government must focus on building strong citizens, strong families, and through them a strong community,” she said.

Gorton touched on many topics, starting with safety including technology updates for the police department. Such as FLOCK cameras. saving officers time, and helping them build stronger cases. “This technology provides up to date real time intelligence, allowing our police to respond to calls quickly and with more precision,” she said. Gorton says the new technology helped officers recover 127 stolen vehicles with a total value of $1.6 million and recovering stolen guns through vehicle investigations.

Also, Gorton said the city has seen a drop in violent crimes through the help of ONE Lexington, a program helping to reduce gun violence among youth and young adults She says in 2023 Lexington had 24 homicides compared to 44 in 2022. And, “for the first time in five years. Lexington had fewer than 100 shootings just in 2023.

Gorton also said that last year the city set records in the amount of money invested in affordable housing at $7.4 million dollars, as well as the number of units created at 234. “That includes housing for extremely low income, the elderly, people with severe mental illness, and for people who are homeless, or at risk of homelessness,” she said.

Gorton says the city plans to begin work on the Complete Streets Action plan. That would create safer streets for drivers and pedestrians all over town. The city recently received almost $22 million dollars to make New Circle Road North safer. “With our numbers of pedestrian collision fatalities rising. Complete Streets planning a long-term goal is very important.”