WQXE News

The Elizabethtown City Council met for a work session Monday afternoon.

Elizabethtown Planning and Development Director Joe Reverman provided an update on his office’s research on expanding historic preservation in the city, as requested by the council following a zoning change for a property on College Street earlier this year. Reverman said the city’s Historic Preservation Commission has been considering updates to the Historic Preservation Ordinance and properties to consider including.

“This first phase was just to look at expansion of the district to the north up to Poplar Street, so that would be from Mulberry to Quince, and just taking that straight up to Poplar Street,” Reverman said. “This doesn’t mean all of those properties would be recommended for approval to be within the district. It just means that they’ve asked staff to do a study and research those properties and provide information to the commission to see if they do belong within the preservation district.”

Any recommendations from the commission would ultimately go before the city council for final approval. Reverman said any residents with recommendations should contact his office.

“They don’t have to be districts, and they don’t have to be downtown,” Reverman said. “We can designate anything, any building, any structure, any site as an individual landmark within our city that can be regulated and guided with our historic preservation program.”

Project L.E.A.R.N. President Ann Borders provided an update on the organization, which provides support and day habilitation for adults with intellectual disabilities. Borders discussed the growth the organization has seen since its founding in 1983, such as acquiring their building in 2022, along with challenges including funding and facilities.

“Our utility costs run well over $1,000 a month because of no insulation in the walls and floors, and when we put the blown insulation in the ceiling I talked to the gentleman who did the work about doing the walls, and he said ‘well, you can do it, but it’s going to be very expensive,’” Borders said.

Learn more about the organization by finding the PL ProjectLearn account on Facebook.

The Elizabethtown City Council will next meet for a regular meeting on May 12, with budget meetings scheduled for May 5 through 8.

A second confirmed case of measles has state and local health officials reminding Kentuckians of the importance of vaccination.

The Kentucky Cabinet for Health and Family Services says the second confirmed case of measles in the commonwealth this year occurred in March. The patient was a child who was traveling through Kentucky when they sought treatment. The child is not a resident of the United States, but because they were diagnosed at a health care facility in Kentucky it is counted as a state incident. There are no other cases or risks of exposure associated with this case.

The CHFS says immunization coverage for Kentucky kindergartners has dropped to its lowest in seven years. The national coverage average for the measles, mumps, and rubella vaccine, which is legally required for school attendance in Kentucky, is 93 percent. Kentucky’s coverage average is 86.9 percent this school year, down from 90 percent last school year. This comes as the United States experiences the largest outbreak of measles since the disease was declared eliminated in 2000.

The first dose of MMR is routinely administered between ages 12 and 15 months, then a second dose is administered between ages 4 and 6 years. The CDC says two doses of MMR is 97 percent effective against measles.

The Lincoln Trail District Health Department provides measles vaccinations at all of its health centers. Contact the health department or your primary care provider for more information.