It's just regional. Okay, guys. Y'all turn your mics on. We'll be sure that they're pointing at you. All right, we uh we want to call this meeting to order. Today is June 23rd, 2025. I'm going ask Councilman Sconers if here
to lead us in the invocation. We'll follow the pledge of allegiance. Dear Lord, we thank you for this day and we thank you for all your many blessings. Father, thank you for blessing our city and and letting us flourish, God. We pray that you'll keep your hand on our citizens, Lord. Keep us safe. Keep your hand on first
responders. Keep them safe. Keep them healthy while they're out there. Father, keep your hand on our soldiers and our troops overseas as these times are uncertain and very unstable. God bless our country as we bless us tonight, Lord, as we come to do your business, Lord, the will of the people. In Jesus
name we pray. Amen. Amen. I pledge algiance 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, we will start uh entertain a motion to approve the consent agenda as written. So moved. Second. All right. And so if uh any questions or anyone want anything
pulled off to the regular agenda? Mayor, just to note, Council Harrison got with me about some comments in the minutes. Rafie, I'll spoke with him, so he will take care of those if everyone's okay comfortable with that. All right. Anything else? All right, we are going to Glenn. All in
favor say I. I. I. I. I. I. Eyes carried. Thank you very much. On the regular agenda, do we have any changes or deletions? No sir. No sir. Okay. We'd certainly entertain a motion. So moved. Second. We have a motion and second. Any
question? All in favor say I. I. I. I. I. I. Eyes carry. Thank you very much. Now we'll go to 3C1, Mr. Kovi with the financial audit. Thank you, mayor. Um, so council, we have here
with us today Pervis Gray, Megan, and Ryan, the auditors for the city. Uh, they're going to here to give us an update on our hopefully getting this thing approved and completed on time this year uh, for 2023 2024. Uh, this is both the city and the CRA's audit. And I just want to say, you know, they put in
a lot of work. Danielle has done a tremendous job. um getting this the city where we are today. So we thank both all of them and they're here to present. Good evening, mayor and members of the city council. My name is Ryan Tucker. I'm a partner with Pervvis Gray. I have
Megan Camp with me. She was the audit director on the audit engagement and we are pleased to uh bring to you the results of our audit for the fiscal year ended September 30th, 2024. There's been some significant progress as was
mentioned that has been made this year. Um you may recall in the prior uh past couple of years we've not been able to get the report uh finalized within the state's deadline of June 30th, but we're
pleased to be able to do that um as long as this gets approved tonight. uh there were 13 uh findings in the prior year's audit report and 11 of those have been resolved. So there was significant progress. There are only
two that remain that they are still working on. Um, whenever the city has a federal and state single audit, there's a kind of a one-page summary that if you turn to page 64 of the larger of the two reports,
um, I'll just touch on a couple of things here. This is the it's titled the schedule, findings, and question costs. the under the financial statement section there at the top, you're receiving an unmodified opinion on the financial statements, which is the
highest level of assurance that you can receive from a state CPA firm. Uh there were no material weaknesses in internal control or significant deficiencies identified during the course of our audit and no non-compliance that was considered material to the financial
statements. In terms of the federal single audit and state single audit, there were no material weaknesses or significant deficiencies over the major federal and state projects. Uh no compliance matters identified and the
opinion on our uh our uh on the federal and state single audit was also unmodified. So um this is one of the one of the better reports that we will see. There were two uh federal two major programs.
One was federal and one was state. The Corona virus state and local fiscal recovery fund. So we had to do some extra work on that. And then the aviation grant program uh you spent about 1.6 million on that pro project uh during the course of the that fiscal
year. If you flip over to page 67, there are I mentioned there were two uh findings that still remain. And one was the first one is at the top of page 67 is about the water line loss. And um
we've noted from um looking at some of the reports that y'all generate internally um that the the figures seem to be excessive in terms of the line loss. And so we're asking that you research this a little further uh to find out what might
be causing it or it could be something wrong with the reports that are being generated uh from the system. And then the second item there is in the middle of the page on the sanitation fund um having a reconciliation. We're
requesting that a reconciliation be done from the amounts build by Waste Management to uh the the customers that are being served and build um to the customers of the city. And then also looking at the rate structure to make
sure you're properly um recapture recovering those costs that you're paying to the waste hauler. And uh we've we've talked with management about these two items and they're they're working on them and they've issued their response here on page 67.
Um there is another separate letter. It's titled communication with those charged with governance. I'll just kind of report on how the audit went. And one thing to mention here is that we had to implement a new accounting standard
um Gazsby 100 accounting changes and error corrections. We did split out the airport fund from the general fund this year. So it's now a separate enterprise fund u which is most common in in cities of this nature. And then we separated
the water, sewer, sanitation, and gas funds from the what was previously referred to as the utilities fund. So, um there's more information in this report um than there has been in the past, but there's a disclosure in the notes about what we did to separate
those those items in note one. There are some estimates in these financial statements that are described here and uh we're comfortable with those estimates or management's not taking any kind of aggressive position on those
items. Uh the financial statements are uh consistent and clear. There were no difficulties encountered during the performance of our audit. Um, if we have what's called a past audit adjustment, we do have to disclose that.
And there is one item. Uh, there was some an unbuild amount from the, uh, attorney that became known to us late in the audit process. We did not book that into these financial statements. I think uh, they're going to res take a look at
that and see what they want to do about that going forward into the new year. but it was not material to the financial statements. We just have to disclose those items here. And then there were no other disagreements with management or other findings or issues that we needed
to bring to your attention. Um in terms of the CRA, I'll just mention we do issue a separate report on the CRA and there were three findings in 2023. Uh all of those were corrected. Um, so you did receive an unmodified opinion on
those financial statements as well. No significant deficiencies or material weaknesses. Um, and you will be able to meet the deadline. There's some other disclosures in here in the management letter about CRAAS that are required and examination
report in here. There really were no issues on the CRA audit this year. So, um, say congratulations and thank you to Danielle and the staff for all their cooperation, uh, during the course of our audit and be glad to answer any
questions you guys might have. I just have a comment. I want to say thank you uh Ryan to you and your team, but especially to Danielle and our team here at the city because just looking at where we were last year to where we've come to today, leaps and bounds
difference from I think it was a modified opinion to now an unmodified which is the highest insurance that you can get. I want to thank you Danielle and your team because that with everything else that the city was facing and all the other things that we had to
achieve uh with less staff, she's done a tremendous job and thank you to you guys for working with her to accomplish this and for us to be timely is volumes from where we started from. So, thank you very much. Thank you. Any other questions or comments?
Thank you so much. Absolutely. All right. We need to approve. I make a motion to recommend as provided. Second. I have a motion and second. Uh any question from council?
Any questions from anyone? All in favor say I. I. I. I. I. I. Carrie. Thank you very much. And um yeah, Danielle, we can't say enough about what you've brought up. All
right, Kobe, we'll go to uh 3C2. Thank you, Mayor. Mayor, this is uh RFP 20252 PW. This is historic Walton Phoenix Library Construction Contract. Uh this, if you all recall, we went out to bid
for this. The council awarded this project to Diversified General Contractors LLC. We have uh I told you we would meet with them, myself, the library director for the county and uh the UF UWF historic trust went through the bid, talked to them about everything
they were going to do, walked the building. Um they did tell give to us that um they did not believe that their allocated amount for electrical was needed anymore after further discovery. And so that was originally $162,000 of the original bid. um we have halfed that
um because they don't feel it's necessary. Spoke Mr. Atkins about it. He's seen that to be appropriate. And so the contract is in the amount of $361,790. Um and the council has allocated roughly $465,000 to this project. So it's about
$103,000 uh surplus to it as right now, which is what we were after. We were after to have that difference and so we could see what we would get into. Hopefully we won't get into anything, but with it being such an old building. Um and so in the documents you they would start work
15 days after the signing of this um and 120 days to complete. I spoke with the contractor. They have allocated two months to it. So we should hopefully be in that two three month window. Um and so Mr. Add something to say. I recommend we approve this contract to get this done.
Motion to approve uh contract. Second. Motion. Second. Any comments from attorney? None from me. Let's Let's try to get it done this time. Any questions? Any question? Question about the great degrading on the side of the building,
north side of the building. Right now, the ground levels at the base of the window base, but those windows. So, I noticed in the contract that they're going to grade that down rather than dig it out, you know, and remove the dirt away from the wall. Totally. But do do
you know or have they said uh how far that grade will be below the windows or is it I didn't give a specific number. They will grade it down part of it. They they'll remove the dirt from the wall. They'll seal it and they'll put on a barrier, a water barrier outside the building, grade it out. The where the air conditioning currently sit in the
corner that pad that'll be tore out. Air condition will be moved further up the hill so it's not leaking into the building. Yeah. Um and that'll all play into they will rip out the backside where the stairs are and that concrete pad. They'll tear all that out, relevel it, so the water's actually draining properly. Um, and it rebuilt the
staircase to historic perfectly historical. Um, so it'll all be great that way in terms of the actual amount. He did not provide that to us. I'm assuming it'll be lower than that window is for sure. Yeah. Okay. I was just
curious about it. Good evening. Mark Hamley, president of Friends of the Library. I want to thank everyone for their support. It's important effort to say the least. Kobe, the council, everyone just want to know the bats are back. Um, unfortunately, we had a $14,000 effort which paid for by
the county which stepped in to remove that problem. But, you know, they always find a way of getting back to the roofs repaired. So, the $130,000 surplus you may find. We're going to have to use some of that again to make sure this building is is signed, sealed, delivered as as we want. But, thank you very much for all your support. Thank you very
much. All right, co. Anything needs to be said? I guess the contractor about that. You can Oh, absolutely. So, the roof will be it'll look similar, but it'll be metal. Um, so hopefully that'll they'll and they're going to redo all the uh facing and stuff. So, we hopefully will
not have that issue anymore. Hopefully, we'll solve that permanently. Thank you very much. Anyone else? All in favor say I. I. I. I. I. I. Eyes carry. Thank you very, very much. and we'll go to 3C3. Thank you, mayor. RFQ
202502 CM uh strategic planning services. The council did narrow it down to three biders, which was Raftelis, AIRS, and uh solution focused culture. I have met with all three of those companies, uh listened to them, spoke to, asked my questions. Um and at this
time, I'm comfortable with, uh recommending to the council that we move forward with Raft Telus. Um, if approved, I would bring back a contract hopefully in the next meeting with that. So, I'll work with them on the fee. Um, they all assured me and especially Rafelis that it would be within our
budget. So, I'll bring that back at our next meeting. Motion to award strategic planning services to Raph Telus. Second. All right. Motion second. Questions, comments? Questions or comments from the public?
All in favor say I. I I I I eyes carry. Thank you very much. And now we'll go to four. Mayor, this is RFQ 202503PW uh engineering design, permitting and CI for wastewater effluent force main
replacement project. Um so the council did uh elicit the RFP for this RFQ for the design of this and so uh awarded was to three notch group that they provide a contract to us. It has been reviewed by legal and uh and so the fee in that is
$86,000. Uh it's two parts. The first part is for the engineering design permitting and bidding phase services in the amount of $482,000. You all recall we have a $300,000 grant from the water northwest Florida water management district to help with the
design portion. The other $182,000 will come out of impact and capacity fees depending on uh legals inter approval of that or not. If not, it will come out of capacity fees. Uh the other remaining $324,000 is for CI services. We do not have the funding for that now, nor do we
have all the funding for construction. So as we go through the design process like we have done with many other projects um these engineers will help us with our SRF application. We will lean on Liberty Partners for grants and uh appropriations. And if you uh senior update, we are currently a million
dollars in for the state budget pending approval by the governor hopefully. Um and then uh Tim's here, but uh Congressman Dunn did move forward our $3 million request. So hopefully that'll go through at least a portion of that. And so as we move forward through the project, we'll submit SRF and that
funding will come from those those dollars. So we're just uh asking for approval of the contract with three notch group for the engineering design permitting and CI for wastewater effluent force main replacement projects. So moved. Second. I have a motion
second. Any questions, comments from anyone? Go ahead. Yeah. Did did we get any clarification on that 3.01 part of the contract about a reasonable time?
Mr. Rollins is here. Mr. Rollins, you mind uh coming up real quick? I got Blake, one of our project engineers with me as well. Oh, what was the question? I'm sorry. Well, it the contract said, let me open it real quick.
What do you have is 3.01. It's a 3.01 schedule for rendering services section A. Engineers shall complete its services within a reasonable period of time. Right. So are you referring to the design portion or you looking at the CI portion? I'm well
whatever that refers to. Okay. So um yeah I mean Blake what was our timing on the for the design? Do you remember what we kind of set for? U the construction was based on 12 month 12 month timeline for construction and
then design would take yeah probably depending on permitting six to six to month there you go six to nine months for because of permitting and then about a year for the construction part goal would be to be within June 30th of
2026 because water management district grant is expires on 63026 obviously we always ask for extension but we sure We don't rather not. So that would be the goal is definitely within a year. And we and we talked with Kobe about that. Yeah. Before we even sent him this contract. So well that was just
my kind of concern. I know there there's there timelines associated with this and that was just vague as far as what a reasonable period of time is. Right. So okay. Okay. Thank you. Any other comments? Thank you. Any other comments?
All in favor say I. I I I I Carrie. Thank you very much, Kobe. I guess we'll go to Skada. IB. Thank you, Mayor. Uh SCA ITB 2025PW. Uh council, we went out for this a few
months back now. Uh we received one bid from Hydra Service in the amount of 395,530. You all indulged me to continue to the next meeting for me to do a little more information gathering and research. Um, from that I just 100% conf there's conflicting information, right? There's
so many different ways to go about this type of system. Um, I do believe that this is something that is significant to the city. Believe it's something we need to address immediately to ensure that we don't have spills and that we're protecting our services and our citizens. Um, so with that and
information I've gathered, I would recommend we move forward with this um to get this done. This would come out of capacity fees. Um, so the capacity fees are paid for by developers. Um, and so it would have a reduced operating cost to us on an annual basis. Um, so that's
my recommendation. I'm open to any questions or discussion on that. Um, but that's what uh I've come to questions. Mr. Mayor, go ahead. Kobe, can you you and I had a conversation about this on Friday in our meeting. Can you are you
able to elaborate on what had kind of come to light that has made you make the recommendation to proceed with the ITB and the award? So through research the the various other ways of doing it. Um other companies provide the hardware at a cheaper cheaper rate. Right. Right.
There is extensive data cost along with that similar to what we were paying for previously. uh we would do a little different than we were. Um but it would have new additional operating cost to the city every year versus the bid that was provided. Um so looking at it again from that upfront perspective, right?
There is that cost that's large portion up front but the operating cost will be minimal versus another way of going is a minimal upfront cost but over year-over-year annual operating. Um and you know one of the things uh we talked about in that is these
capacity fees are from developers where those operating costs are from our revenues every year in the utility fund. Um so looking at all those factors and the data which is used to operate them. Um looking at it in in the situation we're in that's where that's how I come
my decision. Okay. Any other questions comments? Motion to approve the SCADA ITB and award. Second. Any comments, questions for anyone.
All in favor say I. I. I. I. I. I. U. Carrie. Thank you very much. And now we'll go to the lift station review. Thank you, mayor. This is lift station review and assessment. Uh, well, it would have been roughly four months now. So, uh, the council had direct staff to
bring back a 90 days, uh, assessment and review of the differences between our current lift stations and the tech manual. Uh, we brought that, we continue to this meeting due to the length of the last one. And so, you'll see on there short description from Kyle Jacobs, kind of the differences between our stations
and what the tech man will require and then an assessment of our current stations in terms of the pumps, the panels, the bypass pumps, the wet well, how many is required there, how many are currently there. Um, and so there's that assessment. So, uh, bringing that back for discussion on what the council would
like to do and, uh, the conversation had originally generated from starting to replace pumps and panels at stations and should we start placing on what's currently there and how it's currently configurated or should we start to upgrade it based off tech manual. So, I think that's kind of where we're at.
So, again, you and I had extensive discussions on this Friday. Uh, I'm at the point where I think we instead of doing the kind of one-sizefits-all of of saying, "Okay, if we're going to upgrade a station, we need to apply the tech manual, right? Because at that point,
we're going to have every single lift station out there be a Cadillac lift station." Uh and in kind of going over some of the details with Kobe on Friday, I believe that maybe we should ask staff to come back with recommendations
uh and maybe classify the lift stations based on some sort of appropriate category. And and for me in my my simple understanding of it, we have some lift stations that are on the outer edges. They're only collecting from uh you know, some homes and then they're
pumping. But then we have lift stations that pump to other lift stations. An example of that would be um out at Best Western, we have Best Western, the lift station out at Best Western, which I was told u could actually outpump the actual treatment plant. It's actually capable of, you know, overflowing the treatment
plant with its capabilities. So I really think that we should look at uh each of these uh lift stations and maybe classify them and then say okay if the if the lift station is you know a secondary lift station it's not a primary lift station whatever the case may be come up with some sort of method
for identifying these lift stations and saying this is deficient and we need to have it replaced but we're not necessarily bringing it up to the tech manuals um standards that we would for a brand new lift station may that may be
going into a subdivision somewhere. Uh case in point is the lift station that's right here behind us. Um you know it needs work but we don't necessarily need to apply the tech mangle to it. Um the again the lift station out there at Best Western's another good example of where
we applied the appropriate resources to that lift station to bring it up to where we needed it to be. But my understanding is we have other list stations that need that same sort of forward thinking on but not necessarily a one-sizefits-all of the tech angle. So that's that's kind of where I where I
sit on is that we really should ask staff to maybe come back with some sort of what they started here with the grading system like we've identified deficiencies but let's come back with like a smart plan for these lift stations you know need to be upgraded because they support other lift stations
etc. Amy, I'm not sure what kind of ranking system you want to use, but whatever they do come back with, let's task them with also make sure at least by volume is there. Whatever's running through by volume and the number of households it Yes, sir. serves because I
think those two things will give us a lot of data that we uh would do. So, whatever we choose, let's add those two criterion, please. Yeah, I think that's a good se segue into something that I I had mentioned to Kobe. You know, for years we have have kind of danced around
the idea of maybe doing a master plan for our sewer system. Um, my understanding is we have a water model, but we don't have a sewer model. So, uh, having a sewer model would actually help us make some educated decisions on these
lift stations. So maybe this is um the the starting point for us tasking staff with going out and doing a a ITB on a sewer master plan that that comes back and gives us a complete inventory and then makes recommendations and actually
kind of gets us a long-term plan for how we we are going to address not only the current deficiencies but maintenance. You know obviously you get you can't run a pump for forever. So at some point you got to replace it and here's the schedule on which you should be anticipating replacing pumps etc. I
agree. Yeah and Kobe if you just sort of for the public sake the difference between a tech uh setup versus one that was done for a small neighborhood.
In other words three phase manual much larger. Yeah. Well, I don't know if I I don't I don't know if I can speak to the exact difference in the power part of it, but the tech manual is written in which developers come in. We are requiring them to put in a very good system, very
jam up, top of the line. U that is if they're going to give it to the city. If they're going to eventually ask the city to take it over, we require them to put in very good systems and equipment. If they're not going to give it to the city, they don't particularly have to put in that system. Their system does still have to function properly, um be
checked, inspected, and ensured that it works. Um but you know if I don't know that we have put in a lift station since I've been in the city so I'm unaware of how we internally follow process. I think that's what council GM was getting at not only the upgrade portion of like for station 9 but when we go to build a
new one taking into account the factors that councilman spoke about the households the flows or what you know what size pumps are needed what size wet well the panels associated with and so forth um would be kind of what council was talking about but the tech manual is specifically for developments um and
what they are required to put in yeah so there's a big cost difference yes and for for no good reason y you know So now in the future we probably won't do these little bitty, you know, some of these were done sort of out of ignorance, you know, but they're there and there's no
sense turning into a Cadillac when Volkswagen be just fine, you know. Yes, ma'am. I just want to say I like his idea about getting a master plan because I think otherwise we're always running blind and I can't stand it. you know, one week we'll have something before us
because it's got it's problematic, but with if we could just get coordinated enough to where we could get a plan together, I think all of us here want to see infrastructure bettered, but we don't we're all kind of going off in little directions, not on purpose, but
because we don't have such a guide, and I like that idea. So we have uh I know Randall utility superintendent has reached out to Flur Water and Circap which are you know regional or statewide uh service for that. So we reached out to them to see if they'd be willing to do that and what service they provide in
that capacity. Uh it would be free to the city as a service. We're going to see what that looks like where that may turn and materialize for the city. If it's something that we feel uh is good for the city then we may move forward. If not we we'll reach out to our engineers and see what they can provide to us uh in in such a master plan. So
was what you do you have a motion need to be made? No, it seems like the general direction is for staff to bring back basically a guide for internal internal guide for lift stations and replacement. Go ahead. So So new new lift stations would be by the tech
manual. Is that correct? That are provided by the contract. Yeah. So the techn So if we had to put one in, we wouldn't necessarily go by. I can't tell you if we have or have not in the past because I because since I have worked for the city, we have not put a new one in ourselves. I think it's a
great idea to do what you're talking about. Uh Councilman Berbomb and and there are some things that I I noticed though about the what the tech manual requires like surge protectors and I don't think any of them have them. And so my qu that what popped in my mind at
that point was insurance lightning strikes would our cover would our insurance cover that damage if we don't have sur protectors on these on these systems. Um, so that's a tech manual
requirement that we we have not done, you know, and this goes back a long long time, but but I'm just I don't know about the insurance aspect of it, but that's what popped in my mind whether they could, you know, uh, not not pay a claim, you know, on
something like that. So, I just like to think about that. Um, let's see. fences. Is that a tech manual requirement? Not. It should be. I'm not sure if it is, but a lot of these stations, I noticed on
Kyle's um assessment sheet, which is fantastic, by the way. I don't know if he's here at night. Um but they all need fences just to prevent, you know, vandalism and that kind of stuff for sure, but um I think we made good
progress on these according to that chart. I mean, we have very little critical in the lower half. We've got what 40 lift stations and the bottom half from like I forget what number from um 18 through 40 there very few
critical. It's all in in in good shape. So, you know, we're making making some progress here, but I think it's a great idea to find out get some direction at this point because we got a lot of money to spend here for sure. Is Kyle in the house?
I didn't see him. Jacobs. Okay, that's fine. I'm here. Go ahead. The additional information you're asking, is that focusing specifically on the lift stations and lift stations alone or does it include any of the um
antiquated sewage system, the pipes? Well, I think the master plan would include the piping and inventory of our pipe, but to me, I think what I'm asking for immediately is for the staff to basically take the spreadsheet that's
before us and kind of reclassify it and then come up with a plan for a like ABC categories or ABCD or how whatever staff thinks is appropriate for us to as a council to kind of chew on and say we want to prioritize this in in redoing it. But I but I think
that the the master plan that I think we should really go out to bid for would address what what you're talking about. Thank you. Yes, sir. Okay. So, so what do you need, Kobe? I think general direction to bring something
back. Okay. All right. Any other comments or questions? We'll move on then. All right. All right, we'll go to the public hearing ordinance. Yes, sir. Mayor, this is the second reading and
public hearing for adoption for the chapter 11 code enforcement review. You saw it at your previous meeting and we are now before you seeking to hold that second reading public hearing and to adopt. So moved. Second. I have a motion
second. Any questions, comments from anyone? All right. Uh, all in favor say I. I. I. I. I. I. Eyes carry. Ordinance number 987, Mr. Ordinance number 987, ordinance to
the city of Fenix Springs, Florida, repealing and replacing ordinance 909 in part, thereby amending chapter 11, code enforcement of the city of Phoenix Springs code of ordinance in its entirety. Thank you, mayor. That is now adopted and comes along. Thank you very much. All right, we got a request to be
on the agenda. Samantha Smith, JMT. Good evening, Mayor, council, members of the public. I'm pleased to bring to you tonight a set of draft standards that we've been working on with our consultant, who's actually Samantha here in the audience who will be giving the
presentation. But this was uh a result of our redevelopment plan update that we did back in 2023. That was a recommendation the consultant provided in that particular plan. And then meeting with Ford Defunia, we discovered that they were actually trying to uh craft some historic standards that were
tailored toward our districts, but we're striking out with trying to, you know, borrow some from this site, borrow some from that city or whatever. So, in any case, we hired JMT back in November of last year during the week of January 26. They were here uh for kickoff meeting,
and tonight they're here to kind of showcase the very rough draft standards. again the very start of something to come. Uh we have a public workshop tomorrow night where we'll be presenting the same standards to the public at large and then again on Wednesday before our CRA board. The goal tonight is just
to get this information out there to the council with an open invitation to get your input on this. Um definitely expect to have a lot of revisions. What we have tonight is more or less a generalization of the standards based off of the Department of Interior national standards. So, we want to make these
tailored toward our community. Uh, and so that's what we're here to do tonight. So, with that, I'm going to ask Samantha to come up here and go over presentation. Let's make it real clear when and where? Tomorrow. Uh, it's at Stockhol Brotherhood at 5:00 p.m. 5:00 p.m. Okay, sir.
All right. Thank you, Josh. My name is Samantha Smith. Um, and I work with JMT. So, I'm just going to give a brief overview of the first draft we've been producing the last few months. Um, and what are like next steps and more about us and such.
So, myself and my colleague Carolyn were here in January. We're both architectural historians with JMT on their cultural resources team. Uh, we've worked on a number of design guidelines or design standards across the country. Our company itself is primarily
engineering. Um but it's multi-disiplinary again includes cultural resources, architectural historians, archaeologists as well as um planners and architects and designers. So some of the previous work uh we've worked in Maryland, we've worked in
Iowa, um we've worked on design guidelines in Titusville, Florida, as well as Tarpon Springs, and then all the way up to Wisconsin, just to name a few. Uh a brief overview if anyone's unfamiliar. Uh what are design standards? So these are a set of
standards that would be adopted to guide rehabilitation new construction um and additions on historic structures within a locally designated historic district. The goal being to preserve for the future the visual elements um to maintain integrity. Each city has its
own history and part of that is visual. um so to preserve for future generations. So on top of that they also provide a basis for making fair decisions consistency and design review at this time that would be the planning director any other future entity as well um in
incentives for investment property value enhancement and preservation education. So again these should be used as a framework to evaluate the appropriateness of exterior um proposed exterior work. So again, just exterior. This is not interior. And these are
buildings within your historic districts. So Josh kind of gave this introduction already, but we were contracted by the CRA and the CRA board um to construct some design standards for the residential and commercial properties within your three historic districts.
So I'm sure you all know, but here's some maps of the districts. Um, so also acknowledging that the Definiac Springs Historic District is also a National Register District. Um, then your evolving downtown business district that overlaps it as well as the Dorsy Avenue
Historic District. So, how do we go about developing these? Um, uh, we were here in January. We did a survey of the districts. We talked to a number of property owners and stakeholders just to get a sense of what they're looking for, some reservations, some recommendations. Um, we've since
reviewed all of our imagery to produce what are common building forms as well architectural styles within all the districts. Then we reviewed your history, your history of your districts of the city, um, even like the Florida building code, your ordinance. So, we've reviewed all that, compiled it together,
and use the Secretary of Interior standards for the treatment of historic properties as a foundation, and that's standard across the country. um while also utilizing the standards for rehabilitation which are especially necessary if a property especially a commercial property is looking to use
federal grants or funding. So in all of that we decided it made the most sense to actually create three documents one for each of the districts. Um obviously a residential property within Dorsy is very different than Definiac Springs historic district as well as a commercial building in Dorsy
and the downtown business district. So just to make it as user friendly as possible, a property owner would just need to know where their building's located um and if it's residential or commercial. So all of them are organized the same way. So I will go through more of this
tomorrow at the meeting. Um and again, this is evolving, but the end goal would be that the final document could be interactive. And so a more advanced property owner or architect looking to new fence, they can just click fencing. And all of the verbiage is also
referenced to different diagrams as well as the ordinance. So again, that should be together. So it's just putting a lot of information in one place. Another big thing that is important about design standards are visuals. So obviously a lot of this text is found in
the ordinance, but there's no pictures and a lot of people are visual learners. So we developed a set of even color coordination with levels of appropriateness. This is corresponding to diagrams as well. Um we also have a lot of imagery found both within the
district as well or all the districts and then some bad examples from places across the country. So no one will see their building in these documents. Um yeah. So here's another example of the importance of creating three separate documents. These diagrams show
appropriate and not acceptable setbacks um orientation and alignment within all three districts. So as you can see very very different building types and forms. So this is just a representation of this makes all these concepts um easily digestible for the lay person.
We've produced um flowcharts that go through the design review process uh as well as QR codes that link directly to the certificate of appropriateness. Um, here's some example pages for our building forms architectural section. That'll help the property owner figure
out what their building style is to know what character defining features would be appropriate to preserve that'll help the integrity of the larger district. Um, here's some more pages just again showing the organization of our larger chapter of standards. We provide references to national park servation
links as well as diagrams and imagery. And then we even have sections on storefronts. So in this this is examples upper facade information, more information on the location of additions. Um the appendices also provides a variety of information. Well like one of
the main comments we heard from stakeholders was just putting everything in one place. So a lot of links are in here both like state of Florida links um the springs all the preservation briefs are here. Um, and then funding resources are also here from state and federal to
the CRA grants. So, again, kind of all in one place. Um, another comment we also received was maybe making a page about like frequently asked questions within a historic district. So, this could be taken out, this could be given to realtors, they could hand it to new property owners, it could be sent to all
the property owners just to remind them like you do fall under the ordinance and this is important to protect our community and for the future generations to come. So, as Josh said, what's next? This is a first draft and it's a very rough draft. It's a lot of information that we can
we're looking for community input. We understand each community, each city is very different. So, we would like participation to know what we are producing will be actually helpful. We would we don't want to make a document that no one's going to use or touch. So, we will be at um Shitakqua Hall
Brotherhood tomorrow at 5:00 p.m. to go over a little bit more about all the documents. Um, here is my contact information as well as my uh senior Carolyn's. I we're both out of town. So, please feel free to email. We can set up a call. We would just like participation for the future to keep working on these
and produce something that's helpful. So, awesome. That's it. So, give us a just a real quick brief. What do you plan to How you going to run through it tomorrow night? Um, so I have pretty similar presentation, but I also have some printed out papers. I'm going to go
through um I can like pull up the actual documents, go through them a little bit more intensely so that people can ask what does that mean or I know there's been spec specific standards people have a lot of concerns about. So address those concerns. Um, and all the standards are available on the city's
website. So that can also be viewed at the moment. So, we're diving into specifics tomorrow. Okay. Uh, some got some questions and some comments. Um, has this been or will it be presented to the planning board?
I'm not sure. Okay. Um, has this been or will it be presented to the code review and land use committee? It most certainly can. Okay. Has Main Street been involved? We actually have a meeting with Main Street
tomorrow. Okay. Um, I've got I'm going to channel my inner mcnight here for a second. Uh oh. Knight love props. This is the physical repres
representation of of it. It's 509 pages, 509 pages of code of telling people what they can and can't do with their property. Um, I have serious concerns
about overreach. Um, I I hate to have to do this in a public meeting like this, but unfortunately, uh, the way that this is all scheduled out, this is kind of one of my only opportunities to, uh, to put some of the things on the record. Um I I see I guess first and foremost
there's an extreme amount of duplication between the three documents. Um this could easily be reduced down by 90% to probably 50 pages or less. Um there's also just very basic um errors in this document or in these documents. Um as an
example referring to our business district which is a district. It's not an overlay. It's uh constantly referred to as an overlay in here. Um there's lots of references and this is this is something that having walked through this not only in rewriting the
charter but in working through code and the committee that I chair is working through rewriting a lot of our code. Um one of the things that we seek to remove out of code are references that will quickly become stale. Uh so that in
every one of these documents there's references to to code that we really should just say go here see this see this statute see these do design documents you know go to the national parks park service um I'm not sure why
it's pertinent to put in a design guideline the entire history of our city um for a for a guideline it just seems superolous. Um there's there's again a lot of things
in here that I think um go way way way too far. Um there's appendices regarding flooding. Um I checked the FEMA map today. There's not a single flood zone besides the lake itself in our historic district. So I'm not sure why there's over six pages dedicated to flooding.
Um, you know, the the this is supposedly just uh guidelines, but yet all throughout the document there's references to shall be, shall not be. Um, that there are a lot of uh handcuffs
placed on property owners uh on what they can and can't do. If if you were to do what this manual says, which is have the uh city planner interpret everything based off of the this guy, this be effectively becomes law. Uh so I have I
have serious concerns about basically it telling you what wood you've got to use. Uh who's going to c certify that a a door or a window is old growth lumber? How how are you going to get that? Um there's there's issues around I think at
one point it was referencing that it should be locally made. Um I don't know anywhere around here that makes windows that makes doors. Hardly anything is actually made locally uh besides professional products and that's certainly not going to be stuff we put on a building. Um
it's again I I really do think that this could be distilled down into less than 50 pages. I really do believe that what this document should do is lay out the groundwork for here's what is in our districts. Here's what you can build
that looks like this. Look to your left, look to your right. As on the code review and land use committee, we have openly discussed this about doing form based code. And to me, this should re this should reflect that. it. This should reflect all the discussions that
we've had over the past two years about form-based code because that's that's where we were driving before this popped up. Um, you know, there's references to ADA, numerous references to ADA in here. Um,
number one, first and foremost, I think that's again repetitive. Everybody knows they have to comply with ADA if you're building a new building. Um, but again, ADA also deals with interior. She just said it doesn't deal with interior, but yet it talks about elevators, etc. Um,
there's references to how we need to bring in utilities. Uh, on my building in particular that's downtown. They originally brought my utilities all the way to the front of the building. Well, this guide says that that's not right. But if we want to follow this guide to
do historic preservation, should I bring the utilities back to the front of the building or not? There there's a lot of contradiction there. As an example, my building downtown has been reconfigured at least three separate times. The the the facade that you see on the side as well as the front is completely has been
completely reconfigured in its 100redy year history. So, which one of those am I allowed to go back to? Because this references that I'm allowed to go back to opening to original openings, but I've got three different versions. Which one do I go to? There's a lot of ambiguity in this that I think could be
simplified and made uh digestible for for the lay person. So again, 509 pages of rules and regulations. Um in in my six years of being on the council, I've yet to have anyone beg me to write 509
pages worth of rules and regulations for the city. If anything, they're they're telling me to to reduce red tape. So, I I have real real concerns I want to put on the record about this being an overreach, if it's even accepted. Um,
and and then Chris would have the the feeling that he needs to somehow comply with with with these with these guidelines. So, and I can probably go on with some more specific examples, but let them respond to that if they want to, and then you can Yeah, I'll just just add I appreciate
your comments and certainly appreciate your input. that that's exactly, you know, why we're here today is to get those comments and if you know the document that they have presented is significantly different than what the council would like, you know, by all means, we're here to make this work for
this community. As far as the history is concerned, one of the the conversations that we've had numerous times with a lot of the public is the lack of understanding of the historic significance of the original Shiitaka district. Uh, and so we we felt like it
would be important to explain kind of the the reason why it is important to preserve that historic district and explaining it um we thought would be a good segue into that. Um but but I I completely respect and appreciate your
input. Uh I think we're trying to put together a document that a will be wellreceived by the public, b will be illustrative. you know, now we have a certificate of appropriateness that can be subjective at times. Um, and so this
was an an exercise to try to make it more objective, to give some flexibility, to give some illustrations on what we're looking for, um, as far as, you know, improvements or new construction perhaps. Um, and and so, you know, at the end of the day, this is
a growing document, a changing document, and we can make it into whatever this council would like. But this is kind of what they put together, which is why we want to go ahead and get this out here in front of the council so we can get this input before we go too much further down the path because if it's significantly, you know, uh, different
than what you had envisioned, then let's not spend a whole lot of time with this document. Let's let's start over perhaps and bring something back that would be more suited for this council. And is this agenda item forformational purposes only or is this to take action?
Information. Okay. Yeah, just a presentation of information. Okay. Any other comments from the in light of their presentations to planning code and land use review CRA and our waiting on the governor to make his final decision
on Senate Bill 180. Certainly don't need to take any action, but let them work through and we'll see how all of those things shake out. Um, one more question here. Would this require um
a significant increase on Chris's workload? Would this be the responsibility of the city? You've passed. Yes. And we're under a hiring freeze. Okay. Thank you. Yeah.
Okay. So, any other comments? No. Thank you for your time. Okay. Well, thank you very much. I know you got put a lot of hard work into it and uh like you got a little bit more to do. Yeah. Thank you. Thanks. Thank you very much. May I ask a
question? Certainly. Come on. Excuse me, Kim Wberg. I'd like to know, did I understand correctly that this is on the website on the city's website? It's kind of hard to find, but yes, it's okay. Because I've been looking on here and I can't find it. Okay. You go to the CRA page. There should be a link on the
left side that talks about the design guidelines and then from there you can see all three of the documents if you go to tonight's agenda. It is linked on the agenda. Okay. Um and then my next question would be um and I I guess it would be more for um Josh and Samantha.
How is this being advertised to the public for them to know that this is going on? Because outside of the agenda I I hadn't seen anything. Okay. Yes. We we actually uh advertised this in Definiac Carol Herald three consecutive weeks. Uh we also advertised
it on Facebook. Believe for Defunia sent out quite a bit of information about it as well. So that's how we've advertised that. Okay. All right. Thank you very much. All right. Well, we'll move on and uh
we'll go to John Gilleski of Bestcom Builders. Good evening, mayor, city council, and the public. Um, I'm back to talk about the Village Springs project just because the last time I was here, there seemed to be a little bit of confusion. Um, so
I just want to give a, you know, brief overview. I'm not asking for the council to do anything at this moment. It's just to clear up, you know, the public record and, um, go through the timeline since a lot of people weren't here during the
initial stages. I know Mr. Atinson, Beer Bomb, and Mayor were here, but um so you know, basically I've come in as the contractor in August. Not nothing official yet until
everything's turned over, but I've been working with the city since August. Go back through the history, fix all the, you know, problems that were brought up in the past. I've done extensive research. um you know read all the communication
between the city, the previous contractor um of what the problems were to try to resolve those and get the the project moving forward again. Um this over, you know, big picture, it's still going to be funded by Florida housing uh for
affordable housing. So I'm not, you know, doing anything different than that. We're just basically continuing the project um from where it left off. Um yeah the history I've included some attachments there but basically you know
whatever process was followed back when the development order was issued for engineering review um that went through planning went through the city council was all unanimously approved uh for the project to start the uh doo did include
the three conditions of replacing the old sewer line upgrading the existing lift station to accommodate and then granting the 20ft ease ments uh for utilities. Uh following the DO issuance, you know, substantial construction
commenced. About $4 million was put into the project. Um so from 2018 until August essentially last year when I stepped in. I have a brief timeline there. I'm not going to go through everything, but uh you know, there was a
lot of problems with the the developer and going back and forth with the city. One of the main issues is you guys talked about tonight was this lift station and you know, you guys are even a little bit up in the air about how, you know, this should proceed because
the lift station is a city lift station and, you know, the developer was supposed to upgrade the existing. Well, there's a lot of confusion over that term. You know, do we put a Cadillac one in? That's what the city wants. And, you know, the developer was saying, well, to
upgrade it, we would meet these requirements. So, there's a lot of gray area, but unfortunately, you know, there's an active sewer line that runs right through the middle of the project. So, until that was cleared up, you know, I've read emails where they've had approvals and the city manager, you
know, was changed out, so he had to restart the process. Um there's a little bit of you know problems on both side obviously because of the way it's funded the you know you typically build the infrastructure first but he was building the buildings first and it was causing
erosion problems and access problems and um which led to multiple stop work orders back and forth. There was some easement issues where the city was on installed stuff on private property. They were using private property access.
They didn't know that they had an easement which has now been resolved. um which ultimately led to the final stop work order in 2021 and that's when the you know Brian Smith which GHD development walked away from the project leaving it in the hands of
the bank the nonprofit um and you know we're at where we are now in 2021 that's when he walked away they tried to get the bond to pay there were some issues with the issuance of the bond u
from you know, goes deep into the contractor, but essentially they, you know, couldn't finish because they didn't have a plan to finish and there's a lot up in the air still. Um, now Northwest Florida Water Management did,
you know, put a petition of enforcement against GHD and he was communicating with them. Uh, they had to do a new storm water plan which was approved in 2022. Um, and basically part of that plan was that that, you know, they were going to do
the remediation for the the problems that happened on the site. So, like I said, I've stepped in in August. I've been talking with the city on a continuous b basis trying to get all the problems resolved so we can just start with a clean slate and basically
start and get this project finished. It a lot of the utilities were installed. you know, all the buildings that are constructed are going to be the final buildings. We're not constructing new buildings. Um because there was three buildings that, you know, were partially built that uh the we demolished those
and we're just going to go with the ones that are built right now. So, the project is pretty close to getting, you know, finished. It's just working out the problems that were the past. Um that's why I approached the city last time because of the lift station. Uh
basically the the development did account for about 10% of the capacity of that lift station. So you know talking with you know Kobe and stuff they you know because they want the Cadillac lift station. Um and that was one of the things well maybe they could do a cost
sharing because this it's already an existing lift station. It's not a new development uh lift station. So we were going to pay for a majority of it the state essentially and then work out a cost sharing agreement after that last meeting you know because there was
confusion about the upgrade existing verse, you know, brand new. So that was always the the contention point. But talking with Kobe some more, it would just take way too long to do a cost sharing agreement and send it out for
bid. So, I was able to adjust the budget to, you know, basically that we're going to be in control of upgrading that lift station to new, you know, we're right now we're designing to tech standard. So, it's going to be pretty much a Cadillac lift station and um talking
with Jacobs and the city exactly how they want it. You know, that's what we're we're going by with the design. Um, so that will be coming across here pretty soon because we didn't, you know, it took several months to get that uh
through the city of what they wanted because if we wait for the cost sharing, it's it could be a year or so down the road before something's even started. And that would not make the project viable because it's it's viable now, but the longer it sits there, it's deteriorating and it's there's constant
maintenance to keep the erosion under control. So we really need to try to get it, you know, finished quickly. Um, you know, so basically that cost sharing idea was scrapped. You know, the talk to
the state, we can find a little bit of the extra funding to get that lift station under control. Going back to the last meeting, there was some confusion on some items, I think, about the impact fees not being paid. Those were fully paid um back in 2021 for 50 units. Now
we're only building 39. I know that the developer did kind of wait to pay him for some reason. I'm not sure why, but um those were paid. the the city, you know, in between the 2021 and now, they've figured out that they have
actually a right of way on Lincoln Avenue where there are sewer lines, electric, gas that the city's using right now to access the lift station. Before they were using private property, so obviously when the building started going up, there was a confusion on how
the lift station was being accessed, but that's currently how it's being accessed now and how it will be in the future. Um, as far as the, you know, what the city's getting, I think they're getting a really good deal. One, they're getting affordable housing, you know, for the
community. That old sewer line, it's at least 80 years old, the old terracotta sewer line. And when they installed it, there was no permanent roads. It, you know, it was on basically dirt. So, over time, it became very brittle because a
lot of it was exposed to the elements. That's why it kept uh breaking because, you know, the sewer line should go underneath the road, but this one was installed pretty much on raw dirt. There's a lot of it exposed. Um from, you know, reading past history about
that. That's what the problem was. But there's a sewer line, a brand new sewer line already in place. And if you go by the site, you can see where it's waiting to be connected at the road. They were just waiting for the details on, you know, getting that lift station. So, you
know, that sewer line will be completely gone, the old one and the new one. As soon as we can get the release of the stop work order, that would be the first thing that'll be taken care of. Um, Florida Housing did last Friday commit
to the additional funds based on, you know, all the work that we've made to resolve a lot of the problems. So, you know, at that's a very hard thing to get and they were very hesitant about doing it, but this is the viability to get the
project completed. Um, other than that, you know, I'm, you know, it's been a little bit slow, you know, working with some of the I think the outside agencies and stuff like that, getting answers from them. I know
the city and Kobe's doing the best that they can. Um, Dubberry has been real slow about, you know, when we came in, there was an approved set of plans for the DOU. They wanted some changes to update what got missed on the, you know,
the original approval, which was fine, and we agreed to do that. Um, but it was very minimal stuff on the stuff that was not built. And I just think they've, you know, been a little bit excessive in their review process because it's
they've had it since January. I also put in there, you know, remember at the last meeting they said we didn't submit uh some items that was from Deubberry and I went line by line. It said an attachment there how we did submit all that information to them. So that was
incorrect. Um, and we're right now they we resubmitted the the third set of round of plans to do very on June 2nd. And uh, I think the guy went on vacation for two weeks and he said he was going to have it back to us at the end of last
week. I emailed called I was hoping something for this meeting would be available, but I haven't heard anything back from them because I know Chris was out of town um, last week also. And the other issue is, you know, I'm going have to go talk to the magistrate
because code enforcement has a basically a lean on the property. You know, they want the lean to be released when all the buildings are complete. Well, the we can complete the buildings when we have permits and follow the normal course of
construction. So, we got I got to talk to the magistrate about that. And I think there's a little bit of confusion, but you know, for right now, we're keeping the site, you know, pretty clean, graded as much as we can, but we really just need to get in there and get
all the infrastructure done and, you know, the paving to get this project completed. And, you know, we're going to work hard to get it complete. Longer it sits, the more of a problem it has a question for you. Actually, it's just a comment. I think he cleared it up. So,
there's nothing you're waiting for on us. We've resolved whatever it was at the last meeting. Um I understand you're only waiting on to have some review back from Dubberry. Is that accurate now? At this time, yeah, the city wants to have
an approved set of final plans and Deubberry is, you know, since they're the city engineer, we're waiting on them to give that back to the Kobe. Um Kobe, what what is a reasonable amount of time if he submitted them on June sec because
this is only the 23rd, so that's only less than 3 weeks. Um so we spoke to uh Rudy and Alex earlier today and they plan to have them done by the end of the week. Again, Alex was out of town. I think it was out of the country last week and a half or week or so. Um so that was our conversation this morning.
Thank you. I appreciate that followup. So sounds like we're all on our way then and and we're good. You're good with the city. We're everybody's responding now and your update. Thank you so much for updating us all. It seemed like Yes.
Michael Michael on the rightway. Is that been cleared up? The utility rideway. I'm just talking about as far as the property itself. Was it was it on private or Yeah, that's a city right
away. Excuse me. So, um the the access that we're using right now uh for the lift station is in a private access easement that was granted back in the
30s. I believe I've got a copy of it um with the legal description. It splits I believe there's 10 ft on their their property and there's 10 feet on the property to the south, but it is not city right away. It is simply a access
easement to that lift station. And we have gotten um approval from D and Northwest Florida Water Management to make improvements to that uh drive down there to add some aggregate just to stabilize it because I
know the trucks were getting stuck on a pretty regular basis. So that's one thing that we would like to have. I I remember driving down there with Steuart when he was here and it I was afraid we were gonna get stuck going
down. It's so Well, usually when they're down there is in the middle of the night because we've gotten two inches of rain. Yeah. Which makes it worse. Um so yeah, that is Has any of that loose sole been improved upon throughout this whole
time? Because it still looked pretty sandy the last time I drove by. Yeah, not much. I mean, they've done a better job of doing some erosion control and things like that, but um yeah, it still needs a lot of stabilization for sure. It's good to hear they're still moving forward, Mr.
Mayor. Hey, we're making progress. We're getting there. Thank you for the update. Thank you. Okay. Thank you very much. All right. Um so, you're hoping you're about line things up with Newberry? Uh yeah, I just you know I know Chris
has been working good with me and stuff. So just waiting on Deubberry because we originally did submit the plans back in um you know late January. So they've nothing has really changed that much about the plans. I think they're pointing some new things out that were
on the original set. But I'm hoping this latest revision they don't have any more comments because we've, you know, gone back and forth. And you know, the problem is it it's because the site is so unstable. That's why there's a little
bit of more urgency because of, you know, basically you do all the planning, then you start the construction. Well, this is halfway through. So, that's why there's a little bit of more pressure, but I appreciate the city doing um as much as they can. The other thing
I wanted to point out was the easements. Those have been sent multiple times um all the way back from 2018 to grant those to the city. I know Mr. Atinson had sent him and uh Kobe easements to
grant those to the city. So I'm not sure who's in charge of that process or what else needs to be done. So those can get, you know, granted as per part of the the development order. We typically don't record those easements until the development order is
final. Final, meaning you've done what you're supposed to do. The city's not going to take something that it's going to then be used against us to say, "Well, we gave you an easement." if the city ultimately feels like it's going to have to cancel the
development order or terminate it. And that's what we told their attorney back when they communicated with us many years ago was the city does want the easements, but at the same time, the city's not going to place itself in a position where it says we accepted the benefit of a bargain. Now we have to go
through with something when they're not doing it. Our ability to resend the DO or issue stop work orders are our teeth to get this thing done correctly. We don't need the ease ones. We need the project finished. Yep. And that's what I'm here to try to do. Yeah. So, that's
fine. If that's the process, then we can go with that. I I just send them out and don't get a response. So, I don't know if that's something the city's waiting for or Well, it's not something we're waiting on. That's not a hold up. Okay. Yeah. Just um you you mentioned a lift
station and you used the word upgrade. So, Has that changed? Because last time you were here, we talked Well, no, actually it was after the last time you were here, I think you contacted city manager and said that um you all would
pay for a new lift station. Yes. So, but you just used upgrades. So, are we still talking about are we talking about upgrading that lift station or we talking about replacing it entirely? Well, what I was saying is the terminology in the development order is upgrade the existing lift station. So,
that was always the confusion between the previous developer and you know of what standards they were going by. Okay. What what are you doing? We're bringing it we're doing a new lift station up to the current design tech manual. Upgrading. So, you're no longer
replacing it with with a new lift station. Yeah. It's going to be a new lift station with the current design standards. Okay. So, basically ripping out the existing one, putting all new, you know, pumps, panels, everything that
you know. So, you're you're replacing the the wet well. Yeah. The top portion of the wet well, the bottom portion is going to be it's concrete. The concrete's fine. The engineer Okay. Then it's not a new lift station. If the existing wet well is
still going to be there, still be the same depth and it's not a new lift station. The in we can't move the structural lift station to surround by wetlands. Well, you keep saying that there's confusion and the only confusion I'm hearing is your terminology. You keep claiming that there's a new there's a new lift station and then there's an
upgrade and when people ask you direct question, they don't they don't get a direct answer. The lift station is going to be in its current location. It's there there's many technicalities of it, but it's being brought up to the new
design standards. It's it's being brought up to the new tech design standard. So, that's an upgrade to answer your question. It's an upgrade. Okay. Good enough. I mean, what what would you guys like us to do? We're bringing it up to It is all good, Mitch.
Just keep doing what you did. I do have another question though on the on the sewer line. Um, has that been fully replaced? the sewer line you were talking about that was in the dirt and No, it's hasn't because there's a stop work order and they're they're waiting
on the I gota specifications of the and I know this had nothing to do with with you and I don't want you to think that's what I'm talking about. But is this the same sewer line that we're talking about that were covered with half cut PVC to make it look like it had been changed by the previous developer?
So it's still not replaced. We discussed that last time that he could fix that last time without having the staff work order lifted. Okay, he can. Yeah. Yeah. Why is that? I mean, educate me. I didn't It wasn't prohibited. Have Chris come up, but the stop work order is only
related to the buildings. Okay, thank you. Oh, that makes sense. Thank you. And one more thing. I'm sorry. And again, that's not a reflection on you at all. That line, I'm not saying that. Um, but it's still one of those things that's just left undone. But, you know,
we're we're we're the problem. You know, what what are the additional funds that you you mentioned that you got approved for the project? Um, I missed that. But you said something about somebody had just approved additional funds for Yeah. Florida Housing because they're the ones
that are funding this project. Yeah. So yeah, I would love to be able to go in there and do, you know, peacemail type stuff, but the problem is Florida housing wants to make sure all the additional past problems are solved, cleared up, you know, everything is good
to go. So then they can since there's a change of a general contractor and then they can release that additional funding. So that's what we're waiting on. I understand you said we can go in there and fix this sewer. Well, the the main parts of the plan changes
that we did were for the road and the structure and the slope. So there we can't go in there and fix that if we don't have that approved back from the city engineer. Um yeah, I know the stop worker says you can work on the the site, but the main the buildings that
are there right now are already constructed and pretty much dried in. The only thing we're really changing is the roadways and the storm water. So there's no point up to dig all that up to to address the pipe. So whether your
grading plan has been approved or not is irrelevant. You still got to dig all that up to fix the pipe. Yes, I agree. But it's relevant because we can't do anything until the city gives a full clear that every all the issues have been addressed and then Florida housing. Then one we can go to the the um county
to get the permits and then Florida housing can release the funding and switch over the contractor. This is to prevent us starting again and then stopping and know these plans change. So you know that's why we want the approved
plans back to make sure there's no more confusion. And unfortunately, like I said, this sewer line runs right under the road. So, um, we want to make sure everything is cleared up and, you know, the go-ahad, no restrictions because that's what Florida housing wants
because they don't want any more of this stop and forth uh, back and forth again. That's what we've been doing since August is trying to work through those issues. Mayor, yes. Just for clarification, does your plan include all brand new
sewer lines? Yes, there's a brand new sewer line run right next to the old sewer line right now. It's just not hooked up and we provided as built to the city engineer back in January, but it's not hooked up to the lift station or the road because they were waiting on
clarification of the lift station. So, it will. Yeah, that'll be the first thing that gets, you know, fixed. Yes, ma'am. Uh Chris, can I ask Chris Wallace a question, please? Sure. Uh Mr. Wallace, is the last whatever revisions
we're waiting for on Deubberry that will come in the next couple of weeks. Will that clear everything up? I mean, I know the magistrate will then I'm sure I'm confident that she'll release things if there if the project's been approved and we're moving forward. And I'm not concerned so much. We certainly hope so.
Okay. Um, so you don't anticipate any other hiccups along the way other than this? They I I can't promise you that. Um, well, what do you foresee when you say that? That gives me hesitation. The latest revisions which um
were given to Mr. Townsen today. Um, latest comments from our engineer which was um dated back May the 16th I believe. um included and then their engineer responded in kind on June the 2nd I
believe. Okay. Uh with a written response and some of their written responses were not uh correctly identifying some of the problems that we have. One was stating that the access to the lift station was on city rightway.
Um that needs to be clarified. um their access, the builder's access. No, the city's access to that lift station off of Lincoln Avenue. Mhm. Um that they claim is right away, which it is not. Um the other issue is that the
lift station is being designed by another engineer um not Mr. Eubanks who is doing the site work itself. Is that problematic? Uh generally you would have it's not problematic that you have two different engineers working on the same
project but it gets problematic when if we approve the site work and issue a deal for that but we don't have that piece of for the lift station which is kind of the holdup here. Um so you're breaking it into two dos rather than
one. Would that matter as far as if we don't ac I mean is that something the developer then maintains all of that stuff or Well, I don't know how how we hold their hold them to the original DU
without having approval at lift station. What what leverage do we have to ensure that the work gets completed outside of the lift station? And to your extent, we'll know we typically do not allow privately owned lift stations that
are an integral part of the city system. It's not as though this serves as one development. And I I would say so you're so the h foreseeable hiccups could surround the lift station because I think it's a reasonable request what they're asking.
Hey, look, we just want to get it all approved up front because we got different funding sources. We got Yeah, absolutely. And that is what we would like to see, right? And there is work that could be done tomorrow out there in terms of the retention
pond. Um, well, you know, stabilizing. I didn't realize that it was the buildings, but the land work could be done, but I on the other side of the table, I do recognize the developers issue and the this gentleman, Mr. Carleski with his funding and trying to
put everybody all the pieces together and the the new sewer line. Yeah, I'll I'll call it new. We I don't have any evidence that it's there. Um if there were asbuilt submitted, we've never I've
never seen them. Uh and I'm not doubting that they weren't submitted to I'm not sure who would have accepted those back in January. Um, it is not under the roadway. It is located to the
west of where the the new roadway, 16th Street extension would be. Um, but we we have not received any uh normally that line would be cameraed. um
that we would have significant details on that sewer line to know that it's been in and we have not received any of that as to um the best of my recollection. What can we is there anything that we can do to help?
Well, it's really this is just like any any other subdivision. Anytime you're putting in any infrastructure, it is up to them to provide cameras of your sewer line, bacterial tests on your water line, draw down tests on your lift station. You know,
there's a number of things that that go into the process that we rely on them to provide us and then we give them the go-ahhead or say no, you know, this there's something inconsistent here you need to read. And none of that's unusual. I want to be clear, that's very
standard in our process. Yep. So, we're working with uh Mr. Carleski. We want to see this this job get completed as much as he does. U but we want to see it done right. And
unfortunately, the first time around, things got a little skewed when this was originally approved back in 171 18, which is no fault of anybody at this table. Well, I think we can all attest to when it's chaos and you got to start
from scratch again. I mean, we've all been even not in this project, but in other projects, we've had that happen to us. So, thank you for what you're doing so that we can help this. I like I can assure you that Mr. Townsen and I are working Yeah. very closely with Mr.
Carleski and thank you and his engineers and and and our engineers to try to coordinate all these different moving parts. But our main goal here is to see it come to completion. So yes, sir. Um yeah, and just to comment on that, yeah, when the sewer
lines are ready to be turned over to the city, that all that documentation will be provided before they're hooked up. We're not going outside of any normal procedures. um you know that so what will happen is they are partially installed because
there was a stop work order everyone stopped working on the site so when they go back to finish it we're going to follow the normal procedures to you know what the city requires and Craig with the utility solutions group is a big contractor here he's the one that did a
lot of the work so he knows the procedures and then before they're officially hooked up and turned over to the city they'll do all the cameraing and just you know the part about it being installed is they are that was they're partially installed waiting for
the connection. So when they go in there they're have to you know survey everything make sure it's still good and um and then at that time they'll you know turn it over to the city following every normal development procedure. We're not asking for the city to take
that right now. the as far as the lift station, what I was told is that, you know, that's a separate process because it's the city's lift station and that, you know, because if we wait for that to all get approved, it's going to just
keep delaying the project. So, that was going to be done in concurrence. Um, and then they weren't going to issue the DOS to the houses until that was signed off and ready to go. That was the solution that was told to me because if
if you want to wait for the lift station to get installed and approved, like I said, that we won't be able to work on the site for another six months, but they can do them together because they're going to be bypassing the lift station regardless.
Yeah. And none of our sewer water is going to be going into that lift station until it's completely signed off by the city and turned over. And then the development sewer will be, you know, connected to that. And then I think it boils down to, you know, just get things
cleared up with Deubberry. Yeah. And uh yeah, you got to tell us every every step of the way. Uh hopefully y'all can get those matters cleared up and we can get you guys back to work, you know. Okay. All right. Thank you very much.
Can I ask one more thing? Yeah. I mean, you know, this project been out there for so long and and it's a ecological disaster uh w with with the runoff uh towards those wetlands. So, that's my concern. I
mean, this is in our lap at this point in time. Um the lift station, the sewer connection, all that stuff. That's minor. That has to be right or it won't go forward. But that erosion is my big concern. Um and I don't know how you can work in there. You mentioned that it's
graded. I walked that this afternoon, not on the property inside the fence, but down to the lift station. And uh I had a hard time just walking the road to the lift station. But looking out across that landscape of these buildings, um it's it's awful. That has to be
mitigated. That has to be resolved because I mean, if we approve this, let it go forward, and it's not done the way it should be, this is a difficult project, and you're a brave man for taking it on. because it it's it's a it's a
it's a site that has to be done absolutely 100% properly or it'll come back later and I don't want to deal with it later personally. Uh but I would like to see it completed. We need the homes, but it needs to be done absolutely right and everything needs to be right. And
and we're supportive of I think finishing this if as long as it's done right. The tiered way in my mind or something, but but a straight downhill run of all the water and stuff. I just don't uh I don't think that's adequate plan for that particular piece of
property. And we didn't have anything to do with approving it, but here it is. Um well yeah there's storm water plans and engineering and you know an engineer designed it for that site and it'll be built exactly per those plans. The problem is just getting the plans
approved so we can start. So I mean there's engineers that you know look at all that and they're experts and right you know we get the plans approved and then we'll follow it. So that that won't be an issue. The problem is now where it's exposed
and it keeps deteriorating. That's why we're, you know, trying to mitigate a lot of the erosion and start the the process of getting the approved plans built and finalized. Well, I hope we can move it forward and hopefully do burial get back with you
here shortly. Yeah. We're going to do a real quick 7 minute recess break. Got some Thank you. need to hit the hallway. Okay. All right, we're going to call this um this meeting back to order. And now
we're going to citizen comments. If you have a comment, we ask you to hold it three minutes or less. Please state your name. If you're representing a organization or business, state that as well and we'll open the floor at this time.
Come on up. Hello. I'm not good at reading scripts and some allergies have gotten a hold of me, so I'm going to do my best. My name is Randy Lightner. L I G HT N R. It's been brought to my attention recently that the city is considering handing
over control of their fire department to Walton County Sheriff's Office. Um, this would be absolutely the worst decision that you could make. I could give you a laundry list of stories, but I give you two that affected me greatly
personally. The first in 2022, my son was in an accident resulting in over a month-long coma and a three-month hospital stay where it was suggested to us to remove the ventilator and let him die. Lifelight was grounded the day of his accident and it took both medics on
the ambulance to keep him alive to Fort Walton. A volunteer firefighter had to drive the ambulance because Walton County Fire Rescue had no other hands. This was in 2022. If everything had been dissolved at that
point, we'd have been waiting on Okalos Homes and I would have buried my son that day. Once Walton County Fire Rescue arrived, you cannot find Better Care. You could search the world over. They're amazing. But they got to get to you and they can't. So, that's the short version of that. The second story, uh, just over
a month ago, I actually had a medical emergency. My call was not dispatched for two minutes and help did not arrive for 15 minutes. I only live a couple miles up 331 north. The state to compound this issue, the state is currently discussing doing away with
special districts. If that happens, we're going to lose both of our volunteer fire departments. That's only going to lead to Funia Springs Fire Department and Walton County Fire Department or Walton County Fire Rescue. Just as you guys are having to crunch your budget, figure out what you're
going to do. Walton County Sheriff's Office and Fire Rescue have to do the same thing. So you will not I promise you you're going to regret it if you get rid of it. There's going to be no backup. If the Phoenix Springs Fire Department is
gone, Walton County Fire Rescue has had to crunch their budget, spread their health thin like they're already doing now, who's coming, Okaloosa, Egglund, or Homes? You don't want that to be your family member. Um, I wish I could have talked my son into coming up here
tonight just so he could see how great he's doing now. But that wouldn't have been the case if Liberty Fire Department had been had been dissolved that day. And it could be any of you in this room if you get rid of your fire department the next time. If you make this move after the honeymoon phase is over,
response times, I promise you, are going to greatly decrease and this council will live forever in infamy. Um, that's just a fact. promise you I don't care about the CRA. I love some things I've seen with the CRA, but if
the CRA is the only place to get money from, this shouldn't even be something we should have to discuss or question. You know, you could decrease it to 50% and the county would still be awarded $300,000. A $200,000 loss to keep your fire department. That's not even a
question. Just remember, once this decision is made, it will take millions to reverse it. millions. Everything's going to be gone and you will be starting from scratch. The next sheriff, if he doesn't want Walton County Fire and Rescue, he can just hand it hand it
back to the BCC because they are ultimately responsible. If that happens, the county is under no obligation to give you one red cent to rebuild a fire department. You will be It's been three minutes already. Okay. Okay. I think this is important enough to give just a
couple more seconds here. In 2024, Liberty Fire Department had 123 mutual aid calls to assist Walton County Argyle. 70 mutual aid calls. I'm not going to give the defuniac numbers because I don't have them yet um
officially, but that's 223 times that Walton County had to have help. Goes both ways. All of those departments had to have help as well. But that just tells you help may not be coming if if if there's nowhere to nowhere for Walton County to rely on that backup. And the
last thing I'm going to say, and this is not personal. I don't believe that anyone who works for a department you're considering giving a contract to should have any vote in it. And that's not personal at all. That's optics. I think that should be heavily considered. If
anyone works for contracts through Walton County Sheriff's Office, they should not be a part of this discussion and not be a part of this vote. And please understand, it's not personal at all. I've watched a lot of meetings. They're refreshing. I know everyone up here seems to want to do what's best for the city. So, don't take any of my words
personal on that regard. It's a matter of of optics, how things look. And as Mr. Harrison said in the last meeting, okay, th those matter. Those matter more than anything. Thank you for your time. Thank you. And of course, you know, you may hear comments, but we've had no
discussion about shutting down. It's not fire department. I was going to ask you, mayor, are um it's news to me if the fire department's on the chopping block. Is it? No. May May I comment that we're Mora? No, ma'am. It was brought up in
your budget. Why not? U you know, there's a lot of things that need to be talked about. Uh you know, we talk about fire department. We talk about PD, we talk about a lot of things in this city. Uh what if PD and fire department took 98% of our budget?
Should it should it be talked about? And so, you know, that's that's the thing is like, you know, we got to put things in perspective. And uh to not consider an alternative would be very irresponsible on the council behalf. You don't have to
go out there and blast that publicly or on Facebook or anything like that. It's something you should always think about. And not with just them. Everything that we do, is there an alternative? Is there a way to contract it out? It's not just PD and fire department. Everything that we do. And so we're constantly having to
shake the bushes to see does something need to change. And uh our fire department was at my house for two hours Tuesday night. I don't want them to go anywhere. The fire department has been at my house five times in 2021. And uh and three of those times I had to
have somebody hauled to emergency room. I know what it's like to have mercies. I've had them for years. So I definitely don't want to see them go. But we're going to keep things in perspective and we're going to always keep shuffling the cards to see if we can come up with the best deal. U I don't know. You know, I
talked to Sheriff Sheriff Atson probably five, six years ago. We talked about it. It's just a conversation. He doesn't want he doesn't want our PD or our fire and rescue. Uh but if it were dumped on him, he'd take it. But that's that's the
only that's his only thing he's ever appealed to me about. And so I don't think anybody's trying to, you know, gain another big expense. And trust me, it is big expense. But we love our PD and we love our fire department and we
want to keep them but we got to keep them in check, you know. And so, uh, you know, if there's been discussion made, it may be one private individual, but it's not council, you know. So, just wanted to make you aware of that. Anyone else?
Public comment. All right. I'll close the floor for public comment and we will move on to uh Clay, you got anything? I just want to say one thing, mayor, and I by no means mean to take away from city staff because what Danielle and Kobe have done
with this audit is absolutely stellar. You and I have been through a lot of these, mayor, but but I also want to make a comment because the council will sit up here and get criticized for the reports of the audit. Sometimes it's the staff. Sometimes it's things
beyond their control. You as well, mayor. So I just want to take a moment and at least say that I hope everyone does recognize that this council at this DAS has sat here for two and a half years and every time one of our financial team
has asked for help getting something done approve those opportunities. the city spent a lot of money getting right from where we were very very bad and they spent a lot of time and effort this dies and I can just I just want to make the comment that as somebody who sits through far too many governmental
meetings um this council has had to take a more proactive role and it has over the last year and a half in its audit than any other government board I've had to deal with because it's been necessary and it's happened. So that's taking nothing
away from Danielle's efforts, taking nothing away from Kobe's efforts. Your staff is the one you've done. But the council at least deserves somebody to call out. We're turning an audit in on time for the first time in at least five years that I can think of.
I mean, I know back in CO, but we got an extension. Everybody got extension during CO, but we definitely took it. So there's I mean this is a lot of effort to get us here and hopefully it's on the right track but I don't think anybody needs to lose sight of we've come from some really difficult times and this
council has given its staff everything it needs and I you know so Kobe and Danielle certainly have done a great job with it but I wanted somebody at least be able to say that for the council because this council's borne the brunt and mayor you have as well a lot of criticism for it not being done right.
So yeah, if nobody else could say, I just want to put that on the record. Thank y'all for what you do because I'm a taxpayer and resident right here in the Kak, too. Like to see it done right. So thank you. Thank you. Thank you. All right, we're going to go ahead and move Miss Heaven on the Clay. Thanks for
recognizing that. And I want to again reiterate, thank you Danielle Kobe. Leaps and bounds from when I started in April of 23 and that was my main goal. I was really frustrated by the airport being co-mingled inside the general fund
and you couldn't really extract things and I am so tickled to death because this was a big achievement. I mean you just I told you it would take us two complete cycles and I probably three and I think we've got a little bit more to clean up but thank you both. Thank you
Danielle to your team. It's not an easy effort. I know what you've gone through. late nights, long days, weekends just to get the city where we are today. And I'm very blessed and pleased and um I kind of want to encourage her to apply for
the for this role that I have. But what do we need to do, Kobe, to move forward? Because I don't want her to get burnt out. I don't want us to get behind. I'd like to go ahead and move forward now that the audit's out. We're on time.
What do we need to do as a team up here to to move forward the finance director position? Obviously, we currently already have an approved job description and ordinances there from prior hires. Um but we went back and you know listen to the workshop we had a few months a
few months ago on some of the requirements that the council had discussed and talked about. Um I have those here but I mean ultimately I don't know about Mr. Atinson would be more on the ordinance but it would require those would require an ordinance change. in order for us to come back which would require two hearings. So it take some time and then the job description will
be updated. I can leave it for you at the next meeting if that's what we want to update. But the job description we can start it now. I know councilwoman you want the job description the ordinance to match. What I'd say is that we want to expedite the process here. We approved the job description. We can get that out on the street and I'll bring
back an ordinance that conforms to it. But I can have the ordinance ready to go based on the notes. In fact, I have a I'd say I'm in the 85% stage on the draft. Basically, I just need to go back and pull all the old ordinance numbers and make sure I'm doing the correct repealers versus amendatory language.
And I'm not looking to rush it. I just want to move it forward so that it's not we're not stagnant. I don't want to see it just the ball drop and now that we're in a good place. Job description for their next meeting. Would that be acceptable to everybody? I know we got a Fourth of July holiday in there. So,
I'll defer the staff Yeah, we can have we can have that back and um it's up to you. I mean, we have the requirements y'all discussed. There was the war option, you know, we had uh that and then you also had your preference updated a little bit, but we can bring that back with those changes we discussed at that workshop.
Yeah, I just I remember us, you know, working through that and and it being being brought back that I don't remember complete consensus uh in from that workshop on what we do in the job description versus what we do in the
ordinance. And so I definitely want to I definitely want to see the the position be advertised again. Um, so I'm wondering could we be sent the existing job description and maybe if if there's consensus we could
go in at least advertise that versus do we do we need to have a meeting uh to discuss you know refining the job description. Um I I I'm okay either way. I'mable to I just don't want her getting
burnt out. I don't want the team getting burnt out and I think it's you know just verbiage and uh you know I'm I'm willing to Okay, mayor. Yeah. Go ahead. Play
if we move forward on this. Are we required to advertise it again? Yeah. Well, you're going to have a job posting advertising. I mean, and technically, I mean, I guess the council could try to could hire somebody. They had somebody in the house that wants the job, but I
mean, you can't hire Daniel. She says no, as an example, but if you're not going to do that, you got to advertise. Thank you. Go ahead. Can I don't know if I want to prolong all of this out tonight. Maybe it does require workshop, but in
speaking with Kobe, off off the record, preparation for the meeting and all. We talk about things and and one of the things is what would make this more um appealing to applicants versus the way that it is now. And I know that we've
had discussions across the bow about this in the past at different times, but it was who the finance director actually reports to. And there's reasons why it's written up the way that it is today. But it could also be causing issues with with a quality pool of applicants, too,
because some people may not want to answer directly to a council rather than just answering to the city manager. I also know that you brought that up once before at some point and I really at that time I didn't understand why
until talking to Kobe last week and then then it kind of made a little sense to me. So you want to expound on that a little bit for us Kobe said that everybody I don't know if you had the same talk with everybody else but that way we all ex understand it completely and fully.
So, um, you know, my recommendation when we had our workshop and prior to that and the same one I I spoke with all of you about prior to this meeting, um, I do believe that the the current process may be a hindrance to applicants. I do think we're going to do some things over the next couple of months. Hopefully, we'll make that more appealing to
applicants. Um, but my recommendation has been and will continue to stand that I do believe the council should either contract that person directly to the council um such as the county board of county commissioners do or put that directly under the um city manager. Now, if you do that, if you're not
comfortable with that whole, maybe it requires confirmation by the council of a certain amount, however it looks. I do believe personally in my conversations with other professionals in my um my realm that it it does seem to be very unique and could be a challenge to the reason we're not getting certain happenings. That is my recommendation to
the council. But obviously in the day we're going to make anything happen that this council wants to see done and I'm just curious how my other colleagues up here feel about that. So so do we know. I I like the idea in the beginning, what's going on at the county level and
the way that they have their structure right now, that's a long time coming. That didn't happen just from day one. And I would appreciate it going back under the city manager. I mean, you're going to have a lot I I'd like to see that relationship first before it actually comes here because I think, you
know, it's it's a lot of pressure being on that side of the desk talking to the five of us. And you know, um I just think if that is a hindrance that it might start better by being put back under the city manager. Mr. Mayor,
so co Kobe and I had had a fairly lengthy discussion about this particular topic. Um I'm I'm as the one of the only people on on here that was actually part of the process of moving it back out and
directly under the council. There was two there was two main pieces of logic behind that. Number one was there was not a desire at the council level at that time to have to do
multiple public employee reviews. You know the thought process was that for day-to-day management in other words did you show up on time? Are you performing the work that you're you're asked to do etc. that is reviewed and handled by the city
manager and then that that allows some of the politics to stay out of it um at a council level. But the thing that that council undertook as well as in subsequent extensive discussions even when we were rewriting the charter,
I firmly believe that the finance department should operate as a check and balance on the the powers that are endowed to the city manager because everything always comes back to money. And so that's why I believe that the
city the city finance director should have an ability to report directly to the the uh council directly on financial matters and not have to have it filtered because and I'm not saying this about Kobe whatsoever and Kobe and I have had
extensive conversations about this but I have seen in the past where financial information gets filtered out and then you look back later on it you go I wasn't given a complete picture on that And as a as a council member, as an individual council member, that's deeply
troubling to me. And so I want to seek out ways that we can offer checks and balances um that that make us better and provide accountability and transparency. But to this to this idea that it somehow is is
limiting our pool of applicants or maybe providing confusion, let me offer this anecdotal piece of information. I have a direct manager. He has a direct manager. They have a direct manager. So
in essence, that's not much different than what we see going on structured here, right? Any one of those people in that line from my man my direct manager above could look at me tomorrow and say, "Todd, you're not working out. You're gone." That's no different than the five
of us. And actually, it is different in that the five of us, at least four of us have to agree on that termination. So, so this idea that there's am ambiguity and that there that it's somehow I again when I when I've had these these one-on-one conversations, I've really
pressed CO before where I understand that there's this idea that it's limiting the the pool of applicants, but show me proof. Show me where people have that we wanted to have walked away because they felt like there was some sort of reporting ambiguity because I
because I firmly believe and this is what I told Kobe on Friday. He's a professional. He manages it. He's got five bosses. Why would we not expect the same out of our finance director when they're dealing with the finances? The one thing
that we can all get in trouble for and the the the thing that we all get in tr we'll get in trouble for the fastest is our finances. So why would we not want to have that direct reporting capability? Let me ask Clay a question. Um,
now we have limitations as to what the council can do in with our manager. They can't tell him how to run day-to-day operations. Uh, I'm sure that they can give an opinion, but they can't give him directions. Is that correct? Yeah, of course. Okay. So, basically that would
be the same thing for the finance record, of course. Okay. And so uh but for any action to be taken it had to be back here at least four I guess. Absolutely. Okay. Well to higher fire I mean three just to do general action.
Yes. Got okay. So uh I don't know unless you know you just I guess if you had a situation where you really concerned about your manager I could see Todd's point. Um, and I guess
this could be changed in a matter of 30 days if you did it one way and wanted to change it. Absolutely. Oh, we can bring it back that quick. And I note the council has taken a step in this direction
where it is understood that the city manager now has the ability and has now for several years the ability and the authority to discipline and fire. exec fire the finance director for violations of personnel policy. We've
strengthened those relationships in light of the grand jury report to make sure the city manager does have oversight over what the finance director is doing. Uh one thing, and we've talked about this before, I know council beer bomb will recall this. One thing we've
talked about before is the provision says the city council shall appoint the finance director in consultation with you, mayor. Nothing says the city council can't let Kobe go through the process of doing all the interviews and bringing you back
your person he wants and you approve his hire. It says you're the one who makes the appointment at this level by 4 to1 vote. So I mean if you didn't want to do the interviewing publicly if you thought that was a stop there's no reason you can't let Kobe bring you the short list. Say here's my short list here's my
number one. It's up to the council how you do all of that. But I think ultimately that's what you got to decide is how that process plays out. Tammy, I I'm flexible. Look, for the last couple years, you know, we had a rocky start. There was a lot of
chaos. Uh that was the interim director or city manager before you. There was just uh other chaos from us missing deadlines for several years and, you know, u not getting financials out on
time. Um, I'm okay either way. I'm flexible. I All I want is us not to fall into a mud hole and not get the, you know, start on the search to get the position filled because now I want to move forward now that we've got a good
starting base for somebody uh, and Kobe and the team. I mean, we can just make leaps and bounds. We're making them in all these other different areas. I just want to see us not not fall short here because you're right, this will keep us all. He did he did bring up a good point
too. If there's disciplinary action has to be taken, it can be handled by the city manager rather than all of that being brought out. Can or cannot can instead of instead of all that being brought out some things that the public doesn't care to see or want to see, it
hasn't got to deal with that. But I think there's ways that we can I mean look, everybody said that we wouldn't get a new city manager that five of us wouldn't vote on the same thing. So, you know, we're living proof of our own. We can do this. We can come up with some reasonable way of doing it. Whether it's
a hybrid, whether it's full on the council or I'm going to work with everybody. So, I'm fine with it. I again the reason why I wanted to bring that up when you were talking about it was because I wanted to know everybody's feelings on it. This is the only time
that we can talk about it together. So it going along with what Clay was saying too about the city manager could bring back the applicant. I know we there's ways we may or may not want that to come back too, but I can agree with it standing the way that it is and letting
it go that way or stand the way that it is and us continue. You just have to designate the hiring process. As long as you do that, we're compliant with code. Well, tell us what we need and I'll put something together. I'll put something under my name for the next agenda meeting. I think Kobe's going to bring it back under his with the job
description. I'll work with him to have a draft ordinance to mirror. We'll be back at the next meeting. But you want a couple recommendations then of what we're talking about now on how it's going to how to hire them. Kobe, you want to try to put together? Can you do that, Kobe?
I mean, if the council wants to go and advertise it as was discussed, we can definitely do that. And if y'all want to move through that process and make those changes as we go, then we can do that as well. And then next meeting, we'll have the job description back or Mr. Atinson have an ordinance and then process that's either something you finalize now or you can all think on it and next
meeting you decide on. Yeah, you can look at that ordinance that next meeting. It's not going to be for adoption obviously because you got to have two readings, but that way you can give me the guidance of what you want advertised and if we change our process or change the ordinance terms, we can address it then. Yeah. There seems like
how many applicants did we have the last finance director we hired? It seems like there were like 15 or so. Is that right? Yeah. I had to put up I don't lie. It was it was just more than 10. Yeah, it it was. So, but that doesn't mean because we we narrowed it down pretty
quickly. So, it doesn't mean they were all unqualified. That's exactly right. So, we really don't know um whether it's affecting our applicants or not. It very very likely could be. That's easy to see. Um but, you know, I'm kind of open-minded about it. I mean, we get a
financial report every month. You asked for it, right? I think it was you. And and we've been getting that. So, we're updated on well to No, I'm bind. I've been working on your audit. I'm sorry. I didn't do it,
Daniel. I didn't say it. Well, I'm being honest. I'm just kidding. But we stay pretty apprised of of expenditures. We've got we've got our our our our policies in place that well, we just did a updating on, right? And so we're
pretty open and and I mean there's not a whole lot I have a doubt about. If I do have a a doubt, I can go sit down and talk with Danielle. And she has been serving as, you know, our finance director plus her old position. I mean, she's been filling a lot of shoes. That's why she's getting so many
accolades tonight. She's been incredible uh through all of this. But um I'm kind of open to it. it, you know, on one hand, I think it how difficult it is for a person to be hired and work for five different people and how very quickly
that can become political. Um, and that that's one hesitation I have about it. Um, at some point I understand the rationale for for having the council, you know, the finance director report to it. I get it.
But, you know, y'all heard me talk about continuity of of the city manager in place and hopefully continuity of city council uh and how important that is. And so, I put a lot of faith in our current city manager that that he's going to do what's best for the city
because it's in his best interest to do so. Um, and and we all know that. So, but I'm openminded to think about this and and uh and see what what we think is the best way because I agree with you. We can figure it out. Yeah, we've been figuring out a lot of things. Yes, exactly. What's the school board
structure? Do you know how does the finance director do they fall under the board or the uh superintendent? Tenant is the superintendent, but the superintendent school board structure is wildly different than anything we have here. Yeah. Attendance under the super
Yeah. All right. So, he's going to bring us back. He worked on his other at the same time. And just to be clear, Mayor Kerbal made a good point. I know him and I talked about it when he asked, "Well, CO, how is it affecting our applicants?" 100% good question. I said, "Well, I can't
tell you that, right?" Because we never asked. So maybe it's something if the process we go, we ask that question. Hey, is this a hindrance to something? So I think in general, you know, because mainly we we know managers all over the place work for five or seven council
members, you know, and that has been problematic, you know. I mean, of course, their dismissals have been unbelievable how many we see, you know, just in our neighborhoods from Pensacola, Tallahass. It's just unbelievable. And uh so it does make it
very difficult. I think that you can get u arranged to get the same continuity and attenuation to them with those people through and with your manager because there's very little you
can do anyway without him. You know, uh you can't go give him any direction not unless you do it from this table right here. I I just having having been there, done that, bought the t-shirt on what I felt like I was I I'll just be
frank. I felt like at least two different city managers have deceived me on financial matters in the past. Have what? Have deceived me. Oh, on financial matters. And and that that is why I am so adamant that we retain some sort of
maybe we could get a different type of reporting mechanism like either quarterly that would be flexible enough to give you the information that you're wanting because I'm I'm really like that too. I mean I need data and statistics. I don't want to be tricked, you know, or
misled by what they might the knowledge they might know or not want to disclose at the time. I I don't think that we're going to face that right now with the existing city manager. So, we're not saying anything like that. But I I hear what you're saying. But maybe we could come up I think we can come up with a
different solution and and accommodate all of our concerns. Yeah. And one of the things that again we we kind of talked about this mayor can recall with with Mr. Mcnite rewriting the the charter. We really
felt adamant at that time that the finance was that functioned almost like a inspector general, you know, check and balance uh type of u mechanics to just an unlimited spend from the from the
city from the city manager, right? And it's infamous, so I'm going to bring it up, but you know, this this kind of came up in the workshop the other day, the street painting. The infamous street painting. One of the things that absolutely sent me through the roof was finding out that
the city manager directed the finance director to transfer the funds between various accounts to actually have that street painting come out of the executive committee. The executive our budget that's for us to like have a have
an iPad and random stuff. They they put all the money in there and then suck the money out of there to pay for the street painting. Why? other than maybe it was an attempt to make us look bad if if it went south. There's there was little things like
that throughout those years that that added up to me to where I I really that's why I'm so passionate about having the the finance director kind of function in in this in have some independence that they can come to us because they report to us and and be able to communicate with us and not feel
like they they have to have it filtered through the through the city manager. So I I don't want to be a dead horse but but you know back forth but you know one thing we I don't think we did back then that we could have done it could have been brought to the dis and talked about and if it
was clear that that's what happened I believe we could have dealt with it you know but I think that most of that was kept in the in the ears of one or two people not whole council. So, I mean, I think you can get what you want, you know, through, you know, even if
he's a hiring person, uh, we still do our investigations and bring it up as long as the council's in agreement with it. So, I think you can do everything you want. It's probably more about the hiring and firing than anything else because he
sees that there's three or four people on this council are very upset with that finance director. I can't imagine that manager keeping them around. I think you can get what you want either way. I just try think it'd be a little easier to hire and a lot easier to fire.
I don't I don't want to stand in the way of of progress and getting a good finance director in here. But I I just want that the rest of my fellow council members to kind of understand where I'm coming from. That's a good point. It's a good point. Good point that you know you keep your measure in check you know u
but that that's a two-sided coin. Sure. So it's uh we're just going to have to I think we've been paying more attention to detail than any council I've been with. This is my 13th year. So and we needed to though under our circumstances
and so I I think it would be foolish for somebody to pull some of junk that was done few years ago. Go ahead, Mr. Mayor. Just one last food for thought. And I love Danielle being here and sitting here, but sometimes if
we do move forward and get somebody that lives a distance away, this is difficult because you still got another hour or so drive back to your residence. So, um, we just don't need any more nine o'clock at night meetings. Thank God. I know,
right? Well, how about but we might want to consider can we do they need to attend every single meeting? Um, you know, how much input is there? Is it something that the city manager can bring back to us? I mean, it's just food
for thought right now. Nobody has to put it in, but just kind of think of their input on a routine basis because if we do get one, Danielle, that that lives a distance away, then it might be nice that they're not here so late because
they do put in a lot of hours. This is not an eight hour a day job. Hint hint. Yeah. All right. So, you're gonna bring that back. Yes, sir. All right. Let's move on, Mr. of Florence Park. Okay. Back when I was
knocking on doors and meeting people, Florence Park was one of the places I like going to. Parents were u willing to share suggestions and one of the things that they were concerned about at that
park was um the busyiness of 11th. Now, if you position yourself at um for the benefit of the audience at the intersection of 11th and Live Oak East and go south, Florence Park is down just
a couple of blocks. Um they were concerned about the children chasing balls out into 11th. They weren't uh concerned about Clay and they weren't concerned about Ellis. They were concerned about something to
stop the kids from chasing a ball and running into 11th. So I said if I find myself in a position to bring this up, I will. So this is one of my um one of the things that I said I would try and do. I don't know if there's any money in the
budget, if it needs to be if this should be discussed at the um budget meeting or if this is something that we can do now. But I stepped it off. That's 500 linear feet. Um, put on the
east side of the city sidewalk. Uh, coated in plastic, black, 4T 4T tall. Uh, no right angles. Uh, just a safety barrier there. And, um,
I wanted to see how y'all felt about that. I'm being supportive. asking if that's part of the original thought on that. There was some discussion around it, but we just we only had so much money. Uh
Tony's here. Tony, can you address that? Well, actually, mayor, can I ask I've already had this conversation with u with Kobe and can you share how the do you remember how the money was
discussed on the fence? So when we first did the project, the the playground equipment was a deal with FPL for easements. Everyone remembers that. Um and we had discussed last year about the park and the progression of it and when we might do various elements of it. Um another part of that FPL donated the
solar bench. We poured a slab so that's there as well. Um we are currently you know working with tree board on you know looking through the master plan. So maybe part another phase of it. But when the council did bring it asked me about the park, I told him this probably the best avenue to bring it to the council see if it is a priority if it is a
priority of some sort then to probably for staff have to go back get a cost estimate for that bring it back to the body and then the body decide if it's this year next year or when it may be. So okay so the best way to do it would be to make a motion to uh get a cost is
that correct? I don't I don't even think we have to make a motion. Just direct staff to general bring it back. I'd support him bringing back a cost estimate. Okay. And would would we discuss this at the at the next budget meeting? He can bring back at the next
council or as soon as he gets those estimates for you next council. Okay. All right. So, that's Florence Park. Uh the next thing is can comment on Yes, sir. um on I I live down Clay Street from
that park and and they're quite often and it is a hazard, you know, for kids to run off that playground. Um even if they're not chasing a ball, the kids kids are kids, you know, and those little ones, they take off and if a parent sitting on a bench or whatever, they they might not get to them in time.
Uh because there is there is a speeding problem on 11 Street there. No no no no question about it. Um, but I think if we're going to look at doing a fence and get um estimates or or ballparks or whatever, I think we need to consider um all the way around that particular
playground, not the entire property. Um, that'd be kind of silly, but just around uh down the inside uh edge of the sidewalk um behind the park bench that's under the oak trees uh across in front of the parking spaces, but because kids run
over from that playground to their cars and Florence is narrow. Two two full-size pickup trucks can barely pass without somebody going on the grass. And so a kid darts out between those uh cars,
they're in Florence Street and could get hit by a car there. So a gate at you know for people to park, get out, enter that gate, closed gate. Um and then the water fountain probably needs to be inside that fence as well. So I would say something in that area would be and
Kobe and I talked about this the other day and um maintenance is always a problem. everything we do is required more maintenance and and I suggested, you know, considering um a narrow foot wide section of narrow sacree or
something under that fence and and what does that eliminate? Weed eating, you know, and then the mower can just run right down the edge of it and it's it's it's they're done quick with those zeroturn mowers. But so if we do it in a smart way and the code of fence like uh like council co is talking about, it's a
safety thing on the playground, but I think it's important that we the money was not there when this just like the bathrooms were discussed for this park as well. Um so we're at the point shade cloths um by the way um it where where does that stand with the county? We have
ordered them. We're waiting to receive them. I'm sorry. We have ordered them. We're waiting to receive them. Okay. So is the county has the county have we got an agreement with them to you said they're so I reached out to uh Walton County's building and facilities uh I think facility maintenance and
construction department is the name of it uh we purchased we purchased the shade sales are waiting for them to come in from the manufacturer or the vendor when they do I've talked to them then they will be willing to come and and help us out to kind of teach staff on how to put them in because I don't imagine this the last ones we ever put in they do take a little bit of
structure they have some pretty good size footers in them they're pretty tall and heavy so they they're willing to come over and help out with that as well. So, how close would we be to that that particular agreement with the county for them to help us out with that? As soon as we receive them, we'll coordinate with that director of that department
and make sure the county administrators involved and he he's okay with that as well. Okay, good deal. But that defense is um I I would just suggest that if we're going to get estimates to protect from both streets. Kim, wait. Thank you. Kim Winterberg uh coming tonight from
the not as a well as a citizen but not as a citizen in this uh per se but as the beautifification and tree board. Uh Mr. And we have talked about um uh on the board here for a couple years about uh improvements to Florence Park and uh
we uh one of our former members uh had brought up about fencing and it's definitely uh something that I think as a board we would be supportive of um and and not to the to the detriment of safety of our citizens, but I know we're
in a budgeting process right now and uh the beautifification and tree board is having a second meeting uh to discuss uh requests for what our continued um priorities, if you will, that we had presented to the council previously. So,
um I I don't know if if Fencing Florence Park is on that, but if that's something that the council uh would like to see, um we would definitely want to know about that so that we can discuss it. I know we've talked about the dog park and
trying to get that implemented. Um, that's one of the bigger items that I would say would be a a budget request along with just general uh other items. And I'm just going from memory right now. I'm I'm not recalling some of the other stuff, but I just wanted to to say
it is something that we've talked about. Uh, the board collectively wants Florence Park. Uh, I think one of our members called it a a mini central park. We'd really like to see it be really beautiful. Um, and I'm I'm certainly not opposed to fencing. But I would love to
to chat with you uh and any of the other uh members about it if you guys would like to give us your your insights. Okay. Okay. Okay. Make sure you're engaged. Thank you. Thank you. Go ahead. Um I've been conditioned to where when you
go into a hiring freeze that money is tight, tight tight. So I didn't want to get go overboard. So would it be too much trouble to get two estimates?
I like his idea. It's going to be more costly. And also get an estimate for the 500 linear feet. Also like the idea on the concrete footer. Uh that's
a maintenance issue. Um so could you bring us back to Are you okay with that? I'm good. Okay, I'm in support of that as well. If whole council's in support, I I'll bring it
back. Okay. Uh the next thing is is um the tennis courts. Um what's the do you have a up update for us on the lights? And that's just one issue. there's another issue. But um so the last uh communications I we had
with FPL staff reached out to them pretty regularly to see where they're at. Uh we were mid June 1st of July. So obviously you know we're toward the end of June now. Um I believe I've seen communications where our uh the lights that we are receiving has been backlogged a little bit. I don't know how far that is. They didn't give spec
specific timeline but we have paid the invoice which we needed to which was $600. That was uh $50 per light apparatus. They'll come, they will remove it, and they'll put the new one. And so, we're just waiting on FPL to come and put them in. So, we've been in contact with them. They've been in contact with us. Um, and so we're on a
work order system. Who owns those light bulbs? The city does. Okay. And we don't have a bucket truck. We do, but uh it was $50 a piece for them to take them down and dispose of them. So, we fel we felt that was a pretty good
deal. Okay. Um, so have you talked to Mr. Bernard Johnson today? Not today, I have not. Okay. I I received an unsolicited text from
him. He was just, you know, bringing me up to speed. Let me know what's going on. Um, right now the supply problem is on FPL's table. uh they're backordered and uh he said he'll stay in contact on
a regular basis because he knows that this has been an issue and we've been talking about it for a few months now. Mhm. Uh the next thing is is that there's a group of tennis players uh in town that um before they go out and play
tennis, there's a lot of cracks in the court and uh grass and weeds grow up and before they can play a game of tennis, they have to um weed the tennis court. And so I said,
you know, you know, being new, I said, "Well, no problem. I'll just I got a I got a square bottle full of Roundup. I'll go down there and hit it. And he said, "No, this guy was a city councilman for 20 years." He said, "Tell tell the city manager, put it on the agenda, however
you want to handle it, and let them start doing it the right way." So the right way would be to go down there with some Roundup and to kind of pick up their game a little bit on the maintenance and weed eating and stuff like that for the tennis courts because it's a big thing especially for the
senior citizens and um they really they really take a lot of pride in their neighborhood tennis court. Yeah. Go ahead. Didn't we just have the the tennis courts resurfaced not long ago? I believe in two years ago, I think it
was early 24, late 23, they had we had pickle ball lines and I thought I thought we actually had I I actually rode rode my bike over there two days ago and looked at it and
uh he was right. I don't know if the construction was shoddy. I don't know what I don't know who built it, but it's the tennis courts are cracking. Does anybody remember who who did we do that in house or did we pay a company?
Because that if we just had them redone then they should be cracking. We did have we can we'll look and see when the last time was. Would you like some photographs for the next meeting or No,
I see it every day. I'm about two doors down from it. Um, but that company was hired and it was probably I would say somewhere 21 22 23 somewhere somewhere along in there and it's and it's already it started
cracking a while back. Um, so I think from my understanding is it was about $35,000 or so to have it resurfaced. Um, so it it you know it's one of those things until the the foundation of it is
done like it's just like roads if it's if it's not done properly it's not going to stay. Um, so I'm not an engineer, but I do I do know that, you know. Um, and the last thing, uh, was the, um, I
think it's old communication lines. I sent, uh, I showed you the video. Um, there's a lot of loose hanging from the, um, telephone poles, corals on the ground, a lot of communication line laying on the ground
right there. just uh a block down from the library on Live Oak, right at the corner of Live Oak and Crescent. Um one of the citizens um mentioned it to me and it's been there so long it's kind of gotten invisible to me. And when
he mentioned it, it was like, "Yeah, you're right. It's been there for a long time." And since it is on one of our main stretches, uh have you been able to do anything since we talked since we talked about this during the agenda briefing? Uh, no sir. We will reach out
to u I'll let them start with it because it is comm so we'll find out if it's spectrum or central link or who it is. Uh, and then we'll we I'm sure we can put a work order in with them. Okay, that's all I got. Thank you. In terms of maintenance to the tennis courts, I'll get with staff. I'm sure it's on their schedule, but I'll get with them. I know
we started spraying a lot last week. Um, 331 South 90 and downtown, so they're starting to go through and start spraying. So, I'll get with them about that as well. Thank you, Kobe. Any comments? Yeah, mayor. I'll keep them short. Um, first one, the lake testing. Uh, we
appreciate the sheriff's office coming out, dive team coming and taking those samples for us. They did on Friday, so hopefully we'll be getting those back here relatively soon. So, we do appreciate them coming out and helping us with that. Um, tree planting project was a USDA grant uh in coordination with the tree board, our city cation tree
board. I just want to thank polar work staff for getting out there and doing and doing the irrigation and planting the trees. They did a great job on that. uh tree board uh extensions office and the forestry also were part of that and helping out. Um third triumph agreement
for the airport was approved 70 to zero by the triumph board. So that was that was good for the city. Um the affluent line just a little bit we will be you as we go through this process we'll be coordinating with county public works. I did meet with their director buddy right out there. Uh the countyy's looking at repaving old landfill road. So we're
going to work with them closely on on that so we're not duplicating work or tearing up what they're doing and also looking at maybe some potential more easements along that road for to help out everyone. So we will be coordinating with the county on that. Um spoke to county admin hopeful that we'll be
talking about the easement for the airport in East Live Oak or West Live Oak their first meeting in July. I will make sure I speak to admore and inter county administrator about that. Hope we can get that moving as well. I'm sure we probably can rely on some others. Um,
next, Born Learning Trails is a program through the United Way. They reached out uh about the city and possibly doing that here in the city and they view if you've been a week here, you've seen different paintings in the concrete and stuff like that. They reached out. We will here in the next month or so be going to a couple parks and see what
might be best for us and where to put that. So, we hope there might be an improvement to city parks, a new feature with low cost to the city, coordination with them. So, we'll update you on that as well. And then lastly, just on everyone's calendar, National Senior Citizens Appreciation Day, which is an
event put on by our live senior center, will be August 20th at the community center. So, be sure to put that on your calendar. Last year was a was a big deal and the mayor spoke there and there was a lot of people there. So, Susan does a great job and we all be there to help. So, that's it, man. Thank you very much.
All right, we will go to Glenn. Um, I'll say it again, Danielle. Thank you, Kirby, and all the staff for the audit and all the hard work. A tremendous amount of hours that we all know you put in. You probably work on your way home, too, don't you? Um, but
we appreciate you. And Kobe already mentioned the trees, but they planted uh satsumas, figs, loquats, what was the other? I believe olive. Olive trees. That's right. Olive trees.
So they planted and these were six, seven foot tall trees. So they've got a great start to survive. And they planted them like Pat Kobal parks. Uh one down by the cemetery and then one over here by the small fields of Little Park. They
planted 15 at that on in West End at that back oval and I think five over at the other one by the cemetery. So they did a great job. They laid irrigation and um they did a lot of work. They kind of showed up and worked. They got it done.
Thank you. Nothing down any comments? Not really. You know may Okay. Quick. Barry said not really. minutes.
So, um, y'all y'all just tell me if you want to entertain this idea or if I need to quit bringing it up, but we've had a lot of problems before in the past with um, city managers, okay? We used to go
through city managers like toilet paper and but we didn't give up. We kept going until, you know, you got to keep going. So, you had a bad experience with the airport committee.
Um, that was the first time you ever had an airport committee and it wasn't a good experience. If we've got some put some names together, I mean some cracker jack people who have spent their life here,
the life here in the aviation community to help us on the airport to get some suggestions and it wouldn't be anything that would they would be mandating to us. It would be a lot like the planning commission
with the county. Uh they can make suggestions all day long to the BCC, but the BCC doesn't have to take it. But it's good to get some professional
input. Um I told you before I ran that if I was elected that I'd be your biggest ally on that airport. There's some things coming down the pipe that I think will impress you. Um,
would y'all think about maybe revisiting the idea of a airport committee? I think everybody would think about it. I I think it would be appropriate to put it on the agenda so that we could actually have the discussion on the appointment of it. Put on the end of the next meeting so
they can actually talk about it. They can't give you up or down and it's not really appropriate for them to give consensus tonight with it not being on the agenda either. Okay, I'm done now. All right, um again, thank you for Danielle and Kobe and all the finance team for all
the hard work on the audit. That is huge. That really is huge. Um I'm good. Mr. I I too reiterate again uh it is a huge uh monument that they we've achieved right now. And I also want to
thank Miss Sarah for being here in the audience because Fourth of July is coming up. If everybody hadn't signed up for the parade, please do so. And thank you Sarah for how many years now? 31 years of putting together the This will be I think 35 or six. 3 I think you said
36. So 36 years of Fourth of July fireworks. So thank you very much. That's all I have there. Thank you very much. We did a little better call. Is this