At a special meeting at 3:30 p.m. Monday, Bowling Green city commissioners are scheduled to discuss - and possibly vote on - a major expansion of the ongoing downtown redevelopment plan.

Warren County magistrates gave a first round of approval last week to more than tripling the existing 106-acre district and adding tens of millions worth of projects. They must give it final approval, however, and commissioners must sign off too before it’s sent to the state for consideration.

The existing plan calls for construction of a baseball stadium, parking garages and a host of residential and commercial space downtown, with more development, including a hotel, adjacent to Western Kentucky University’s campus. The proposal would add 277 acres to that.

The existing plan would issue about $100 million in bonds, hoping to attract an additional $145 million or so in private development. The expansion could require another $80 million in bonds to draw $100 million more in private funds, according to documents attached to the county ordinance.

The new boundary would include about 1 1/2 more blocks next to Western along Kentucky and Adams streets, then swallow most of the downtown area - from the CSX rail line southward, encompassing all of that land and The Medical Center’s campus to U.S. 31-W By-Pass, and crossing the Barren River to cover most of RiverWalk Park.

New projects named thus far include a building near The Medical Center to house much of Western’s nurse-training program, and another for an enlarged Graves-Gilbert Clinic. Each would need about $20 million in public bonds.

Potential sites for Western’s new College of Business building lie within the district, for which the university intends to ask the state for $40 million. Also on the list is construction of a “vintage round house” and a new Kentucky Museum of Transportation at or near the L&N Depot and Historic Railpark. No bond amount is yet listed to fund that, but the project description calls for $5 million in private donations for the roundhouse, and a final summary mentions $5 million in financing for the railpark museum.

Public recreation makes up a big part of the new projects: an indoor pool, indoor soccer and ice skating rinks, and a long-discussed whitewater rafting course on the Barren River make the list. The public funding summary calls for roughly $5 million for the whitewater park and another $5 million for the other recreation facilities. It also figures spending almost $14 million on land, and another $4 million for infrastructure.

The goal is to get $200 million in total investment in the area by the end of 2014. If that happens, the state would release millions in expected tax revenue to help repay the bonds.

Drug testing

If a municipal order on the subject passes, Bowling Green will start randomly drug-testing a majority of its employees, perhaps by the end of the year.

The policy would get the city a 5 percent discount on its worker’s compensation insurance through the Kentucky League of Cities.

Bowling Green now tests job applicants before they’re hired, as well as existing employees “reasonably” suspected of having an alcohol or drug problem. City employees whose jobs include use of commercial driver’s licenses are already subject to random testing.

The new policy calls for random tests of anyone in a job with “heightened safety awareness” - possibly up to 80 percent of the city’s employees.

Factory retooling

Commissioners are asked to join Warren County in exempting new bonds for Bowling Green Metalforming from taxes, thus encouraging the factory to use a $128 million industrial revenue bond issue to re-equip its plant in the Kentucky TriModal Transpark for diversified vehicle part production.

The factory, less than five years old, produces truck frame parts. But the market for those is drying up, so the firm is seeking contracts to make parts for a variety of vehicle types, according to Dan Preston of the Bowling Green Area Chamber of Commerce. Company officials say they don’t expect layoffs among the 900 or so people who work there.

Auto displays

Rules for showing new cars at public events will ease if commissioners vote for an exception to state law.

Auto dealers want to display their wares at an upcoming golf tournament, and the city frequently gets similar requests, Mayor Elaine Walker said. But a state law prohibits sale or display of vehicles away from car lots unless local ordinances allow it, she said.

That’s just what the city may soon allow, temporarily, with city permits.

“What we’re doing is not allowing off-site sales, but simply allowing off-site display,” Walker said. She expects to get a notice approving the move signed by local dealers before the vote.

“If there’s opposition to it, we probably won’t approve it,” Walker said.