LEXINGTON, Ky. — VisitLex, the publicly funded tourism bureau for the Bluegrass region, distributed $155,816.87 in bonuses to eight employees during fiscal year 2025, according to compensation records obtained by the Lexington Times through the Kentucky Open Records Act. The payments came roughly a year after this newspaper reported that a previous round of bonuses totaling $284,745 raised questions under the Kentucky Constitution’s prohibition on additional compensation for public employees.
The records reveal that VisitLex President Mary Quinn Ramer — identified in the documents only as Employee #5, matching her known salary of $282,536 — received a $58,000 bonus, bringing her total compensation to $340,536 for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2025. That figure exceeds her FY2024 total of $339,043 and is more than double the annual salary of Lexington Mayor Linda Gorton. Four VisitLex employees again out-earn the mayor in base salary alone.
The numbers
The FY2025 incentive payments went to eight employees. VisitLex redacted all names from the records, replacing them with employee numbers — a departure from its FY2024 disclosures, in which full names were provided. The highest-paid employees and their compensation:
| Employee # | Base Salary | Bonus | Total Comp. |
| 5 | $282,536 | $58,000 | $340,536 |
| 89 | $219,260 | $32,889 | $252,149 |
| 46 | $235,000 | — | $235,000 |
| 147 | $190,000 | — | $190,000 |
| 22 | $125,542 | $14,186 | $139,728 |
| 87 | $100,000 | — | $100,000 |
| 44 | $98,247 | $11,102 | $109,349 |
| 18 | $97,957 | $11,069 | $109,026 |
Total bonuses came to $155,816.87 — a 45% decrease from FY2024’s $284,745, but still a substantial sum drawn from hotel tax revenue. VisitLex’s total payroll for FY2025 was $2,400,792, according to a general ledger report.
Bonuses persist despite constitutional questions
In March 2024, the Lexington Times reported that VisitLex’s FY2024 bonuses potentially violated Section Three of the Kentucky Constitution and KRS 83A.070, which together prohibit additional compensation beyond that set by ordinance for city officers or employees. Guidance from the Kentucky League of Cities has highlighted the potential illegality of such payments for publicly funded entities.
A salary administration guide produced alongside the data, prepared by the consulting firm Performance Solutions Group, describes a “Short-Term Incentive” program as a built-in component of VisitLex’s compensation structure, with targets expressed as a percentage of base salary. The President’s compensation is explicitly excluded from the bureau’s formal pay grade structure and is instead based on “market pricing, performance and value to the company.” This suggests the bonuses are not one-time discretionary awards but a recurring, institutionalized element of VisitLex’s pay system — raising the question of why they are structured as “incentives” rather than incorporated into base salaries set by ordinance.
Broader context
The compensation disclosures arrive during a period of heightened scrutiny. VisitLex is simultaneously pursuing a Tourism Improvement District that would impose a 2% assessment on hotel room revenue, generating an estimated $2.1 million in additional annual tax revenue — while requesting 60 business days to produce two years of credit card transactions, a timeline that would push disclosure past the expected public hearings on the new taxing district.
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Written by Paul Oliva. Cross-posted from the Lexington Times.
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