We'll call the special meeting to order. Uh, Mr. Smith, give us the prayer and the pledge, please, sir. Our father once again for your presence. Thank you oh God for this opportunity to serve the servants of this city. We ask father you bless now this meeting tonight lead guide us in the direction
you would have us to go that all that we shall say and do be pleased and accepted in your sight in thy son Jesus name we pray. Amen. Amen. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands one nation
under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all. All right. Is it Glenn or Vlad? Who's Glad? Glad. Come on down. So, this is the special meeting to talk about the the uh proposal, the sixth amendment to
the St. John's Water Management um contract. Good afternoon, mayor, commissioners. Vladimir Simonowski, public works director and city engineer. Oh, is this on? Is it on?
Okay, let me move a little. Okay. and thank you for coming to the last meeting of the fiscal year. I know it's a special meeting, but it's a it's a very important topic for the city as well as the water management district.
And what we're going to present to you is uh the sixth amendment to the memorandum of agreement by and between St. John's River Water Management District and City of Apka for the district conveyance of the Golden Gem Road property to the city.
Um, a little bit of history to the project. On May 15, 2009, the city of Apka and the district enter into a memorandum of agreement whereby the district conveyed to the city the Golden Gem Road property. The conveyance was conditioned
upon the city commitment to design, permit, and construct the reclaim water storage and Aqua Richard enhancement project on the property. Since the original execution of the memorandum of agreement, the parties have approved five amendments to extend
the project completion deadline. The first amendment was on April 9, 2014, which was extended to 2019. The second was extended to 2022. The third amendment would extended to September 30 of 2023.
the 4th to March 31st of 2025 when we enter into the fifth fifth amendment uh which is which told the deadline to September of 30th of 2025. The city has encountered several challenges in the meantime that have
delayed the completion and operational implementation of the project and in response the city is actively developing a series of technical and feasibility reports to guide the next phase of work. These reports are anticipated to be
finalized by late 2025, early 2026. To allow adequate time for the city to complete it to complete its internal evaluation and for both parties to review the findings collaboratively, the proposed six amendment will extend the project deadline to May 29th of 2026.
This extension will support the development of a feasible and coordinated plan to fulfill the city's obligations under the memorandum of agreement. The memorandum of agreement, the memorandum of agreement amendments number seven will be decided based on
ongoing design recommendation. Some of the required items uh for the memorandum of agreement amendment number six to be considered are the consumptive use permit modification application. Uh this was submitted the application
was submitted on August 21st of 2025 and this represents a continuous effort and both parties are working together on this including the state department of environmental protection. The hydraologic and liner material evaluation is the second condition which
is also ongoing. Uh Tetrote is one of the city consultants that is on pace to finish by October of 2025. uh monthly status meetings with St. John's are also ongoing until May of 2026
and reclaim water operating and water balance model analysis is ongoing as well and Tetrote is also working on this task and it's on pace to complete by January of 2026. The south pond design is another
condition um that is the project is also ongoing. The pump station design is at 75% completion and should be completed by spring of next year. And ultimately we have the
St. John's River Water Management District Board approval that happened on September 9th of 2025. And I was there in person with the interim city administer Mr. Williams and I believe Commissioner Nester was the
only one present on behalf of the elected officials from the city. So by that being said, uh staff recommends approval of the sixth amendment to the memorandum of agreement to ensure continued progress and alignment with the district's
expectations and the city's long-term water resource goals. Uh we have uh Susan Davis here with us from the water management district and we want to take thank her and her staff and the district for the years of working together with
the city and working together with other municipalities on this regional project that is helping uh the northwest section of the of central Florida including city of Alton Springs um city of Longwood
Wood, Orange County, of course, the city of Apapka, city of Mount Dora, and the surrounding cities in the area. And I'm ready to answer any questions you may have. Questions for Vlad? Yeah, just a few just to kind of recap
some of the things we discussed. And I appreciate you taking the time out there. Uh we met out at Golden Gem Pond uh sometime this week, Tuesday, Wednesday, one of the days. Yeah, few days ago. and and I appreciate you guys taking the time to just be on site again. I I was there about a year ago and it's nice to be back on it again
more so kind of see it firsthand what we're talking about the issues firsthand that uh we're dealing with and then the plans to move forward as well. I think it was very productive. The on the presentation here it says south pond. Is that the I call it like west and east
pond. It Yeah, this this is a separate project. It's actually another uh reclaim water reservoir storage that we're that's under construction just south of the wastewater treatment plant on Cleveland Street. And this property is just south
of Snowen Road. Gotcha. Okay. So that's part of the bigger system. So that's next to the two other recline water storage ponds that we have uh 8 plus 8 million gallons for a total of 16 and this will eventually bring more storage capacity there primarily for the recline water we're
getting from the city of Altimon Springs. Okay, understood. the the the smaller pond that's at Golden Gem. Is that There was some documentation that was sent to me today or or last week that is it 41 million gallons or was it 50 million gallons?
It's exactly 49 million gallons with another 1 million gallon for each area. Okay. And that's on like the further Yeah. Like an overflow. Correct. Okay. Just in case of overflow. Okay. And so the goal of this agreement is just to get basically the exactly
what's labeled here is to achieve these goals, show some specific metrics of progress and then from there is a bigger discussion of more specifics what exactly and how exactly we're going to
accomplish getting the site up and running. Correct. Correct. Okay. So by I guess we'll have a new amendment seven prior to May or in May maybe of 2026. Correct. And we'll already have a plan in place
with funding in place, timelines in place to figure out kind of map out what that looks like moving forward. Correct. The funding is in place. Uh at the last council meeting, the council approved the budget for the next fiscal
year and we have allocated $12.5 million for the recline water pumping station and additional $2 million for replacement of the smaller pound uh damage liner. So that's total of $14.5 million. And we
expect by the time we get into the next amendment extension, uh we the project is pretty much at 100%. Uh we'll probably be advertising for construction before the end of the year and we anticipate to be construction to be
the end of 2025. Correct. Okay, understood. And so with that 14.5 million, that will get us a functioning 50 million gallon or 49 million gallon pond to be able to send that water out to our residents. That's correct.
Okay. And you had stated this and and we discussed this as well. This isn't just to benefit Apaka, this pond. The the goal with St. John's and and other um entities that contributed to this is it's uh San Lando. It's
Yes. Sunshine Water. I'm sorry I forgot to mention the private partner in this case. So yeah, so we have that Altoont Springs, Mount Door, they all are integral or important part of this process or this project. So our success on this is their success.
Yes, it's a regional project and district has been very helpful of uh leading this regional project over the years by contributing uh financially helping a lot of these projects especially to the city but also to city of Altoon to city of Mount Dora
to my knowledge with uh building the pump station at the county borderline uh of Round Lake Road that's the borderline of Orange County and Lake County and also extending the piping system from Um I think it's the intersection of Kelly
Park and Golden Gem all the way to that point. So basically at some point when there's need for recon for Mount Dor city of Mount Dora to use some reclaim water they can take actually from this facility. Okay. So that so these contracts are already in place
and their demand is projected of possibly immediate like 500,000 gallons per day to ultimately up to 3 million gallons a day probably at the buildout and that's going to depend on the available excess water that the city of
Apka has at the time. But that 14.5 million that will get us that for sure correct that will make the facility completely operational. The only remaining part will be um of course the modification of the larger pond and the
replacement of the liner which will include additional time of course because of the size of that pond and logistics of bringing it up to what it needs to be. Okay. And that pump station that we're installing for 12.5 million that will cover the larger pond as well once that
is up and running. the the the 12 the the pump station that we're installing for 12 and a half million that will also be able the the 300 million gallon pond will also be able to use that as well. Correct. Correct. The piping is already in place both the inflow and the outflow
from the pond. So basically once the ponds are fixed everything could be operational. Okay. Understood. Thank you and thank you again for your time this week as well. Absolutely. Any other questions? So originally on on September 17th you
had you had provided a schedule B of the schedule project milestones. Is this new is this the newest schedule B as of today? Yes. That that's part of the agreement B of the amendment.
The the one that the exhibit that's part of it. Correct. That hasn't changed. Yes. So this still stands. This is that states that's exactly what was uh requested by the water management district and approved by their board. And this is and this is what I'm showing
on this uh screen right now. Some of the conditions are there and what is the progress on the most important ones. So, Commissioner Nea did say that the 14.5 million that we have budgeted for this upcoming year,
correct? will satisfy everything that we need to do before May 26. The design, do we have the design regular? The constru. So basically the construction can take up
to two to two and a half year possibly depending on the availability of equipment and material. uh but our anticipation is to start the project before the next before we request the next amendment before the expiration of this amendment and the
water management district is willing to work with us on this. So that was the main reason why amendment number six is only till the end of May. So we can show progress by completing all of these conditions and also possibly starting a
construction prior to that and at that point uh there will be uh amendment number seven drafted and it will be drafted by the water management district and presented to their board for another extension. So there's going to be an additional cost on top of this 14.5
million. The additional cost will be only related to fixing the larger pond. And do we have an estimate on that? Right now I don't have an exact estimate
because that's kind of a more complex issue because we will have to bring some fill. Uh we're still we have only the draft u hydraologic and liner material evaluation but once that's completed
possibly by the end of next month sometime at the end of October we're going to have a better idea what the cost is going to be for that because it's going to depend of how much fuel we're going to have to bring at the northern section at the upper section of
the pond and also at the lower at the south section of the pond. So, I know you referencing Phil, correct? Bringing Phil in. Are we actively as the city selling any fill right now? We're not. We're not. Okay.
So, uh then we have to go out and purchase Phil. Yes. So, so that's going to be in addition to these are all course in addition to this 14.5 million. Correct. and we're looking into
different options to make the project feasible. We as of this moment we actively looking into that. Okay. Any other questions? No. Thank you very much. Yes. Thank you,
Mr. Smith, Mr. Anderson. Any questions? Good. Good. Okay. Public comment. Albert McKim, 3603 Golden Gem Road. I've got three minutes to try and undo the nonsense that you've been told for the last year and a half. For a start, I
sent you all documentation that dated to February of 2024. If you check that documentation, that was before any of the uh sinkhole or before the second liner had been damaged. At that point,
our engineers were projecting $19 million and a completion date of September 2027. So despite all these increased problems that we now have, we're going to reduce the cost by $5 million.
It's going to get done quicker. Here's the problem. Nothing is going to get done for a start. And we have someone here from St. John's. I'm going to tell you tonight, the city is not in compliance with Florida statutes as it currently stands at that pond.
If you want to debate it, I can debate it, but not in the three minutes that you're going to give me. So, that's the first problem. The second problem is before you can define what that pond needs, you don't know if if it's going to need liners that are made from polyethylene or or or whatever composite
is or whether it's clay liners, the only way you're going to be able to figure that out is by removing the existing liners in there and testing the substrate that's already in there. At this particular moment in time, you don't even know where you're going to put the water if you do remove it from
the pond. So, it's pie in the sky to tell us that this is going to happen in this timeline. It's not going to happen. In fact, there's so many things I can tell you has gone wrong. I can't do it. So, what I'm going to suggest you do, if you've got any questions on anything
I've sent you, I'm here. I'm not promising I can answer everything, but see over there, that's all your own city documentation that tells you when Narrett, who was fired by the city, made observations that the liner was too tight, it wasn't
the correct material, and he was fired. So, it's all there. Not only that, all the pictures that I've currently used are city documentation. I've suggested that there is liability within the the contractor, the engineer who did work
for the city and put stuff into there. The shapes of the ponds are going to have to be changed. They're not going to stay as they are just now. You will not be able to decide what sort of line are you going to put in and how much fill you're going to bring in until you've done your due
diligence and working out where the bottom of that line is. Commissioners, it's your job to protect the public. For a year and a half, we've been promised aqued. We've been promised interceptor treasures. We've been promised the volcano would be fixed. We paid a million dollars to Divo for it. Can you
tell me how many things were done? I can tell you, you put a plug in the pipe. St. John's are complicit in this as well. And I'm going to deal with St. John's in due course because I'm sending a letter to the inspector general. I'm here as the supervisor of the Orange
Soil and Water Conservation District. Uh my concern is for the aquifer, for that water that was exposed and what went down inside it. and for
the fill that was placed there. Um, we've got to be careful about the fill that goes in there and it was supposed to be clean fill and something could have been laid in
there, a tarp, uh, a liner, something before the debris was put down there. the but we know that construction debris was put in there. Um, old concrete, etc. And plastics were dumped down in the
aquifer and there's photographs of it and they've been shared with you over time and and shared publicly. I've seen them. Concrete doesn't belong. Post
construction concrete debris, wood and plastic does not belong in our aquifer. And that was placed by your vendors in there, the contractors. And there was supposed to be should have been somebody there supervising that job
and making sure it didn't happen. Now that stuff is being leeched by the water. We know that water is a solvent. And then that water is being sucked up through our
water system and into our drinking water and bathing water and into our springs and we're absorbing that into our bodies and drinking it. So my concern is what's happening to our
watersheds because of what happened in that pond. And I beg of us in this continuing time that we're working on this to repair it that we do so diligently
with inspections and carefully repair it and remove any bad materials that have been placed there so that if it gives way again. And we know that with this thin mantle, as was explained to you, that we protect
this area for another collapse or another sinkhole in that area. just as those um tacky um apartments that are going up on thin mantle up there where we've had a a long series of
sink holes that we protect this area that's precious above our aquafer and that we watch it carefully. Thank you. Anybody else? Okay, close the public hearing and look
for a motion to approve. So, there's a couple questions there if we may discuss those a little bit. So in the construction of I guess the the facility itself was do we know or we have we confirmed that it's constructed properly into an engineer's
uh standard and it was stamped and that it was done correctly and just faulty in general or do we have recourse on what's happened? Do we have an understanding of where we had the failures while we had the failures? the the saw part the draft that they provided on the liner material
evaluation and the hydraologic evaluation was uh very inconclusive of the the main reasons for the for the sinkhole and to my understanding I wasn't here at
the time the repair was completed it was uh per the recommendation of DVO Engineering and Mr. do serum. He's well known in the area and in the state of Florida as one of the experts in
in geotechnical engineering and also these kind of projects. So again, I don't know if what how much information I can give you on that uh related to some of the comments that you heard, but basically the probably the
solution for that will be not to have an exposed liner and to have actually a covered liner with probably um some more extensive thickness of the liner. Is that how the current liner should have been installed? No, the current
liner was per the report was per the recommendation of the geotechnical engineer at the time. So that was so there is an engineer record somewhere that said this is correct and proper and exactly the way it should be. Yes. And there was a BM stability analysis as well. So
so this was just we're calling kind of force measure in a way that's that's why probably everything is inconclusive because it's really hard to determine if Okay. And then so who did was it a third party we hired uh during the building
and development process or was that in-house that we did that the investigation for? No, the the actual development itself when we took over in I guess 2009 101 whenever we started the actual construction was that a third party that we hired a vendor to
to design and then um No, the design was completed in house the construction was done through a vendor through a bidding process. Okay. Were you here when that design was going on? Uh yes.
Okay. Did you were you overseeing that at that time or to some extent? Yes. Okay. And it from your knowledge and experience and background it was done properly with the right oversight.
Well, the liner and the depth were per the recommendation of the geotechnical engineer and they confirmed with the stability analysis. So, do you remember who the geotech engineer was? Uh it was universal engineering sciences I believe.
So we did have a third party then come in to confirm some of this then. Yes. Okay. So we created it in house and then sent it off to get approvals from a third party from there. Correct. Okay. And they said no problem. Looks great.
Stamp of approval. Yes. Okay. All right. All right. All right. So again, it's just trying to understand and kind of unravel this ball of of um problems that this project has created for a while. So
again, the goal is obviously to to help our residents get this back up and running because it's part of our comp plan, too. So if we don't get this site up and running, what do we do with our comp plan and how do we approve additional projects? That's everything is connected. Exactly.
And just for illustration, right now we have about 8.2 million gallons a month average, I'm sorry, a day average uh on the reclaim
water side and we are producing about 3.4 internally. The rest of it comes from the partners like Sunshine Water and City of Altim Springs and Orange County to some extent. So, city of Mount Dora is actually not
participating in this. They're not contributing any reclaim water to the system, but they will be taking some water from the city. So, they want to buy some from us. Correct. Okay. And that you're saying 8.2 per day is what we're using currently. That was within that was some average I
was able to retract from the last uh 12 months. Sure. Yeah. Not I'm not holding you to that. It's got to be that number, but somewhere in that range. And this is important just for illustration at the buildout originally when I believe ACOM did the first uh uh mutual master plan for the recline
water in 2014. I believe this was projected to be at the buildout 12 million gallons a day uh recline water plant just out of that site alone. out of that side with a 2019 uh utility master plan that was uh
completed by Bright Pierce by another consultant. It was uh up to 13.8 million. And so do we know I mean I'm sure we do have this number somewhere and you may not have it on you right now. With all the projects that are currently approved, not in the works but are
approved and in construction, we got to know how much I'm sure there's a number somewhere of how much we need per day once those are online. Yes. I don't have the exact number. I didn't. Yeah, I didn't think so. So that so that's a that's obviously a number that we need to be working. It's it's pretty close in line with what the expectations are for the buildout.
So that's why this facility is so important, right? So and in a way it's it basically we're investing into a commodity long term because that reclaim water Yes. Even now the recline water is a commodity. Well, I'm saying but it's not we can't use it right now. So I'm saying I understand it's a long term. And so the
alternative to in this agreement, and we didn't touch on it, but just to make sure that we kind of touch all the bases here, is there is a provision in here if we were to not use the site for what it's intended for. If we wanted to develop on it, not saying that I want to do that at all in any way, but or create a landfill or
pick your thing, we would need to pay the St. John's back approximately 10 million, maybe just under. Yes, I think I calculated some numbers. I think it was 10 point 24 million. Let me just double check my
numbers. Uh the original price is roughly around 4.5 million. Uh 5% interest over 16 years and 5 months. It's additional 5.75 million approximate in interest rates
for a total of 10.24. Okay. So if we don't do anything, we still owe 10 point if Well, this is the second condition. So the first condition is that we we return the property back to to the water management district, which I wouldn't
recommend. The second option is to actually keep the property without any conditions by the water management district, but we pay this $10.24 million. So I think the district is working with us. Uh again there we're
all trying to uh make this a successful regional project and I know it takes time. It's it's a huge site 100 acres uh very complex logistics of making all the corrections that need to be made and
I'm confident that we can progress with this. It will take some time but we can we can make it a okay vital and it's clear the district definitely has been patient with us and in working with us to get what we need because again this is multiple counties multiple jurisdictions or or uh municipalities
that this is impacting and it's not only for this facility I just need to add to give them an for this they have invested millions of dollars in multiple pipelines throughout the region just helping the reclaim water system being branched out and
actually cover more and more area for the all the future developments to come in and this is happening since probably early 2000. So there's a good relationship for 25 years of partnership. Absolutely.
So let me ask you is moving forward then with that 14.5 million and the project that's going on there are we going to do that in-house again or is that going to be sent to a third party? This will be done by one of the consultants. Okay. Yes. And it's it's going to be designed The
current design that is pretty much at 100% okay is done by one of the consultants actually by right Pierce and then of course it will go for bit for open bit construction and the second part will uh tetrott is
currently working on that together with these reports they'll probably continue on the final design okay which is the repair of the larger pond which yeah that's a different beast I mean that's the funding for that and how much that's going to cost yes The
will that all come out of impact fees? Yes. Yeah. All of that should come from the Okay. Do you know the current number that we have in impact fees right now? I don't have So we did discuss this previously because the facility Why can you use
impact fees or why can't you for this project? Yes. Okay. We can look into more details on this. We need to consult with our finance and legal and uh we'll definitely get back to you on this matter.
Okay. My ask too, I guess once should this get approved is once we get close to May, kind of do some type of deeper dive into a workshop or something along those lines to really understand what that next phase that that number seven extension is going to look like. Um, with a lot of detail, a lot of
understanding, funding, understanding where that's coming from. I think that'll just be beneficial for everybody to understand exactly how we look moving forward. Yes, the basically the amendment seven will be related to extending the project with what is included in the $14.5 million task for
repairing the liner and building the pump station. That will probably be underway at the time and of course as a separate condition. That will be our goal for the district to consider to have a separate condition for the repair of the larger liner of larger pond
because that will require a little bit more time. kind of have that a separate timeline than this one. Yes, understood. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Maybe it can be incorporated in again it's going to depend on the board on the water management district board. Sure. How they want to structure that but
that's what the ask is going to be. Correct. Okay. Understood. Thank you so much. Thank you. Okay. Looking for a motion to approve the sixth amendment to the memorandum of agreement by and between St. John's River Water Management District and City of Apka for the district conveyance of
the Golden Gym Road property to the city. So got a motion by Commissioner Anderson. Second by Commissioner Smith. All those in favor? I. All oppose. Motion carries. Now