All right. So, our attorney should be on the way. Um, the council person. Okay. So, we're going to call the meeting to order. The special council meeting for Monday, November 10th, 2025 is called to order at 7:20 p.m. Let's have a moment of silent meditation followed by the pledge
of allegiance. a special shout out to all of our veterans who may be in the audience. Tomorrow is Veterans Day. Madam Clerk, may I please have a roll call? >> Roll call. Mayor Nickerson >> here. >> Vice Mayor Martin, >> present. >> Council person Urban >> present. >> Council person Lightford Ward is on the
way. Council person Winters >> here. Also present for the record, Janisha Kobe, village clerk, Chris um Christie, I'm so sorry. Um Joseph Geller is on the way and we also have the CFO present. >> Thank you very much. Moving on to approve the agenda. I just want to flip G1 and F1. You guys, we're going to do
the village manager position first. If nobody has any objections, do I have a motion to approve the agenda? >> So moved. >> Second. >> Moved by Vice Mayor Martin, second by Council Person Winters. All in favor say I. >> I. All say nay. Hearing none. Next is good and welfare. Um, everybody will
have their three minutes to talk for each item, but if you guys want to come up and say anything right now, um, feel free to do so. And you have three minutes. Name, address for the record. You come up and talk about anything on the agenda.
on the agenda but in the last few meetings we've heard >> hello >> it likes her better >> um there were a couple things spoken about in the last couple meetings and I I guess I'm just going to use this time
to follow up. I encourage I encourage the mayor and council um to look into legal remedies regarding how we may per protect oursel in light of the news uh that the kavista building is
now going to be operating under the terms of live local. Um obviously that is a dominant dominant piece of legislation that does turn out in 2027 I believe in the fall. So in that time in
that time I'm hoping that we uh can look to any means by which we can protect ourselves from foreseeable drains on our resources and impacts on public safety. Um secondly, uh I'm going
to encourage the mayor and the council to put on the agenda, um a meeting regarding, as was uh told to us at at a certain point, uh that we would have a special budget meeting. um which is important in and of itself,
but is especially important if we end up spending another $200,000 or however much more due to any upcoming other agenda items or emergencies that may happen. Um
I think um I'm just going to leave it at that for now because I'm going to speak about uh a couple of the agenda items. Um so thank you very much. >> Thank you very much. >> Anyone else good in welfare while we
wait? Greg Steer, 120 Northwest 86th Street. So, as we continue to go round and round about the roundabout, there's a couple things we're not talking about, which one of which is the budget again, which has been quietly swept under the rug, $5.5 million. We were promised another
meeting to review the final version uh and possibly make revisions, and that has not happened. Uh the only other thing I wanted to bring up was Adam Newman. So Adam Newman of We Work
and Flow was a guest speaker at the Miami Business Forum uh last week which I attended where he publicly thanked three people for his success in Miami. one of which was the mayor of Miami and there was the Aventura mayor and then lo
and behold there was the Elportal mayor who he thanked in front of thousands of people and I was wondering why why he would be think thank thanking the mayor usually you thank someone when they've done something good for you but what we've been told is that nothing has
transpired nothing's been presented nothing has been planned so why is he thanking the mayor Adam Newman is potentially going to double the population of Elportal. He wants to build more than 2,000 apartments,
200,000 square ft of retail, and 1 million square feet of office space. That's roughly the equivalent of 15 football fields. Don't we have the right to know who is talking to him or his people? Which
council members are involved? What meetings have already taken place? what if anything has been promised or agreed upon. I look back at all the planning and zoning meeting agendas for the past year. There's nothing in there about either the Raider Church project or the
Little Farm project. So once again, the residents are left in the dark. By the way, Adam Newman doesn't have the greatest track record or a stellar reputation. In fact, his his we work IPO
failed in 2019. Thousands of people lost their jobs. Investors lost billions of dollars. Adam Newman was forced out of the company, but not before he received a payout of $700 million.
Meanwhile, the company went from $ 48 billion valuation to 8 billion in one week and then to zero when they declared chapter 11 in 2023. So, you talk about accountability, you
talk about transparency, now you have an opportunity to prove it. Tell us about Adam Newman's plans. Thank you. >> Anyone else good in welfare? Good evening, Noel Pace 206 Northwest 91st Street. Yeah, I just, you know, in
terms of being reasonable and I I know there's a lot going on and I know you're trying to schedule meetings and so on, but tonight is a very important meeting uh not only about the village manager position, but also to talk about increasing the budget to cover cost for
the westside roundabout, but then also more importantly of of you know, again, we haven't even heard about, you know, the budget uh and what the plan is there, But you guys are the council. We talked I I mentioned this to you guys last time. I
mean, you guys need to hopefully I appreciate that we we scheduled this meeting tonight for the attorney who's coming in now, but come on. Like like there's not enough notice here. We a lot of people in this town were like have pl tonight. Tomorrow's a a national holiday. Hey, I have I'm a guest
speaker. The Miami Beach Veterans Day parade. I'm still trying to pull my uniform together and like, hey, I got called over here to come to this. So, like, you know, please let's plan our work and then work the plan. I know you guys can do this. Thank you.
>> Thank you. Anybody else getting welfare? >> Good evening, everyone. Good evening, council. My name is Ian McKenzie, 8950 Northeast 4th Avenue. Um, I just want to uh echo some of the uh that people have mentioned about uh the traffic circle. So far now we're
being um I guess uh we have a $167,000 roughly increase to this project. Um so uh our budget for this year was uh passed but it was on a contingency that would be adjusted because we're in the
deficit right now if we proceed with all the plans and therefore we need to make sure there are cuts made. We haven't decided on where the cuts are going to be. Uh it has not been presented yet to anybody. So, um, any increase in spending, I urge you council to, uh,
defer from tonight and wait till a budget proposal is prepared properly. So that way you can give an informed decision on what you want to do, where the cuts are going to come from, where the increased revenue is going to come from, if it's going to be coming through. But we have to balance
something at the end. Uh, we can't be in a deficit all the time. And uh we're lucky we didn't have a hurricane this year. So, but we need reserves for hurricane tree trimming and those type of infrastructural things that benefit everybody in this community. So, I just
want to make sure that you know everybody understands that this is a critical factor. And I urge you to defay from uh passing any sort of things you might regret later on until you have a full budget ahead of you to make an informed
decision. Thank you. Thank you very much. Anybody else getting welcome? Hello everybody. It's good to see everybody here. Good to see the council, Mr. Mayor. Um, so I sent the council and the mayor um and
the city attorney an email this week. Um, and I do appreciate some of you guys acknowledging it. Um, and I just wanted to share my email with the people that come in here. Um, I don't know if you all agree with me or don't agree with me, but um, I do talk
to a lot of residents who don't attend these meetings. And I do that because I know that the people that are here care. Um, and it doesn't mean that the people that aren't here don't care. They're just not involved in the politics of what goes on dayto day. So um my thought
process is we should change the charter um alto together of how Elportal works and look to put on the agenda a mayor strong system. Um you know the El Portal was once run
on a mayor strong system and it changed. I don't know the year that it changed but it did change at at one point. Um, and you know, it's I think part of my feeling on this is just it's very disheartening to watch this process take
place. And I feel like um within just one week, we've gone from hearing that there were two potential candidates for city manager to now having five, maybe even six. Um, last week we watched the clerk say there were two, followed by a debate suggesting that there might be more. You
know, it's just it's hard for me and other residents to have confidence in a process that shifts this quickly. And ultimately, the person chosen for city manager will be entrusted with shaping the village's direction, even more so than the elected officials themselves.
And to me, that makes no sense. Um, most residents that I talk to that don't come to these meetings don't realize that the city manager is responsible for the majority of issues that frustrate them. Um, easily, you
know, 90% of those problems. Yet, time after time, our mayor is blamed for problems that fall squarely under the city manager's control. um you know and and and so you know my I'm not going to read the entire email
but my thought process is let the people let the residents vote on whether they agree or disagree that it should be a mayor strong system. It doesn't mean that we should eliminate the city manager position. It just means that
we you know redictate how that how the government structure works. Um because I feel like when you look at accountability, why not vote out someone that's not doing the job verse versus having no say? I cannot eliminate the
city manager. I have to rely on the council to vote whether they're going to eliminate um a city manager that's not doing a good job. I want to be able to vote um and decide whether the mayor is the person that I elected can do the job
or not do the job. Um, and so the way this works is that the mayor says, "Hey, can can the council vote on it? If the council by majority says we can put it on the ballot for 2026, we can go in and say whether we want it or not." If 60%
of the people say, "Yeah, we want a mayor strong system." It changes. That's it. If 50% vote on it, then it doesn't and everything stays its course and runs the way that it's currently running. But to me, like to to put so much power and
weight on on a position that the residents have no control over um doesn't make sense. And so, you know, I think it would be smart to go back to an old system that worked um and have an
elected government such as you you folks and the mayor run the village of Elportell. And if they can't do it, then we vote them out. Very simple. And you get more talented people. I mean, we're literally today.
And no disrespect to you guys. I'm sure y'all are super talented people. And I'm going to I mean, we're all going to hear about it. But I didn't vote for you. I don't know who you are. And this is such an important position. And once you're in, you know, we the residents have no say,
zero say. We're represented by the council and hopefully the council is representing us. But we know that it doesn't always work that way, right? And so, um, and and that happened last week when overwhelmingly the residents were
against tearing down a hundred year old property that shouldn't be te tore down and we're all up here saying, "Please don't do it. Please don't do it." And it's happening and it it was voted for. So, that was that just means that we're not being heard. So if the mayor um has
control over those situations or control over Kavista or some of these other things that are happening um we can just vote them out. Very simple. Um so I would I would I would like to see um for next meeting to to have put on the
agenda um for the council to vote on whether or not we should get on the ballot a mayor strong system. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. Anyone else good in welfare? >> Good evening, council. Uh Lewis Pila,
103 Northeast 89th Street. Um, and to your point, uh, that was one of the questions I just had for the council. If any of you, um, personally know the any of the applicants or if they were referred by anybody, um, uh, applicants
for the village position, village manager position. Nope. >> If you're asking, um, I personally, uh, do not know any of the candidates on a personal or professional level before, uh, contacting them or speaking with
them tonight. >> Okay. >> Same for me as well. I don't know any of them. >> Okay. Mr. Mayor, any recommend anyone was recommended to the village or >> Yeah. Well, let me just say first off, um, usually when we do good in welfare,
um, it's public comment and then it comes back to the council and the council um, responds, but no, I don't know anybody here. >> Oh, okay. Okay. The rest of council, Mr. Winters, I guess he's busy. Uh, >> I wasn't listening to you. Can you say it again?
>> No, I'm not going to um, repeat my question, but uh, you're being noted. >> Thank you. Anybody else getting well for you guys? I'm sorry, mayor, because the question was brought up and it's also an ethical question. Um, you guys do have to disclose if any of you knew any of the
candidates in any business related matter or any personal matter. It has to be disclosed for ethical purpose since he did ask the question. >> Again, I did ask him to repeat the question. He refused to do so. So, yes, I' I've met uh Mr. Hector Roose before
and I missed David Roseman briefly a few years ago when he was the manager here. Yeah, it was not just appointed to you. I'm just saying if any business or any any question, that was all. >> Yeah. Um, yeah, like Mr. Roseman, he was
a manager, but I don't and at that time I was vice mayor, so I didn't work with him intimately. So, >> award, >> uh, council person life for a ward, but we're still in good and welfare. Hold on. We're still council person life for a ward. Can you wait one second? Let me just see if there's anybody else for good and welfare. One second. Is there
anybody else with good and welfare? Okay. All right. Good and welfare closed. Back to the council before we get to our first item. Um, council person life. My apologies for being a little bit late, but I can't drive right now.
Everybody, thank you for your prayers, my surgery. Um, I don't know where we are, so I'm just going to continue to listen. All right. >> Okay. Thank you very much. Um, as we go into
F, which is the village manager position, that's our new village manager position. Let me just state for the record that um, first of all, our last meeting, Madam Cler, correct me if I'm record 28th. It was Tuesday the 28th. This is the first meeting since then. >> Correct.
>> We said in the meeting Tuesday the 28th that we will choose a date at a future meeting. >> Correct. >> Correct. We have a meeting next Tuesday. Correct. >> Correct. >> Thank you very much. The budget is still going to be coming up. We're not out of time on the budget. This is the first meeting since the last time we had a
meeting where we discussed that we will pick a date in the future. Okay. Secondly, in June, Madame Clerk, did I not become the president of the Miami Day County League of Cities? >> Correct. >> In June, Madame Clerk, is the Miami Day County League of Cities
does it not encompass every municipality in Miami Day County? >> Correct. >> All 34 municipalities. Therefore, I'm the president of all 34 municipalities within Miami Day County. I'm also on the executive board of the Aventura Marketing Council. I'm on the board of directors of the Aventur Chamber of
Commerce. I'm on the board of directors of the Sunny Als Beach Chamber of Commerce. I'm on the board of directors of the Chamber South, which is Homestead, Florida City, Pinerest, Kindle, uh, Palmetto Bay, Cutler Bay. I'm also, Madam Chair, on the executive
board of the Hyia Chamber of Commerce. Madam Chair, in my in my usually in on the on the um council meetings on the agenda on the report, I have a usually like 21 25 things there for that month of meetings I've attended. Correct. >> Correct. >> So I don't only do Elbertile things.
Therefore, all developers and people that I run across might be in my other capacities. So when I run across individuals and developers like Adam Newman, it's in many different capacities. He's built things in Avator. As I just recently stated, I'm on the board of directors of the Aventura Chamber of
Commerce. I'm on executive board of the Avator Marketing Council. I'm the president of the Miami Day County League of Cities. Therefore, the president of all Miami Day County. Thank you very much. Moving on to uh F1. This is the village manager position.
Madam Clerk, if you want to kind of start us off with that. >> Sure. Um, I'm going to I'm going to go ahead and be in this part because they are going to be voting members and they I want to disclose they have not been part of any of the questions that are going to be asked. Um, they're going to receive it now and you guys are going to
be asked. Um, I'm probably um I'm not sure if the the attorney wants to disclose anything before we start. Is there anything you would like to add or >> where the village manager position item >> or worth noting? The only thing I'll I'll comment on is we discussed
previously um you know in kind of an emergency situation at the previous meeting you appointed the village clerk to be interim village manager. That's not tenable. I mean in an
emergency we certainly couldn't have no manager but either you pick an interim manager tonight. You're not picking permanent picking an interim manager. If you do not pick an interim manager tonight, you need at least to pick an
interim clerk to continue doing the duties of the clerk because it really is not appropriate for someone to be holding both positions for, you know, a week and a half. Not a not such a critical issue as opposed to having no
one. But hopefully you will pick an interim manager tonight. If you do not, you must at least designate someone to be an interim clerk so the clerk can f or permanent clerk can focus on being interim manager. That's really my only
comment. >> Thank you very much. We have many individuals um within the administration already that can fill in as a interim clerk. I would suggest if we get to that point, I have all faith that we um will pick a manager tonight. But if we get to that point, um I think Mr. Perez who's
our administrative assistant has worked um amongst various departments um and understands departments within Alberta. He's here every day and uh I think he can fill in his intern we get to that position but let's get on with the process of the village manager position. >> So good evening. We will now begin the
public interview for the position of municipal manager. The purpose of this process is to ensure transparency and allow the public to observe how candidates respond to questions related to leadership management and village operations. Each candidate will be asked the same set of
standardized questions. Answers will be timed to ensure fairness. We kindly ask the public to hold all comments until the end until that part of the meeting's end. Now for the candidates, thank you for being here today. You will have two minutes for your introduction, three minutes per question, and two minutes
for closing remarks. If you need a question repeated, please let us know. Um, this is the point where the candidates will be called one by one by their candidate number and I ask for the rest of the candidates to please step to the room. The first candidate to be
called is candidate number one and candidate number one is Hector Rose. Please stand podium. We giving time or should I >> No, wait for her to get back. She's start. >> There you go.
I will be passing on to each of you the set of questions so you guys can look at it. You also have the resumes of every individual that's here so you also can be comparing and looking at it while um you guys while the questions are being asked. I do have a question madame clerk. Um is
there any point at which what where we will have an opportunity to ask the candidate our individual questions? >> Yes. >> Okay. Good evening, Mr. Rose. Is that am I pronouncing it correctly? Okay. So, um, the first part of it is, please introduce yourself, share a brief
overview of your municipal or public sector experience, and explain why you're interested in serving as our village manager. >> Okay. >> Introduce yourself. >> Okay. Am I going to time? >> Huh? Sir, >> did you want to time you or >> You can go ahead and start introducing yourself.
>> Okay. Uh, thank you everybody for, uh, having me here tonight. Uh, thank you to the mayor and council members. Uh, this is a special treat for me to be here with you. Uh my name, first of all, my name is Hector Roose. Um I I'm a little bit of a different kind of candidate
that you would you would expect here tonight. Uh I'm probably the only one that does not have the formal uh city or municipal manager experience. What I do have is the the the 20 years of background in in local and uh county
government. I've actually worked in county government. I currently advise a number of of local governments. Um, and I've been open and that also includes in terms of procurement. Um, and so I've I've seen the inside and the outside of government. Uh, I come at this with with
uh the eyes of a of a of a concerned uh person. And I like I've applied for this position because I believe that Elporta has a unique opportunity. Um, it's small, but that doesn't that doesn't mean it can't be great. Uh, it it has a lot of resources in terms of natural resources
uh that uh that I love as well. I am uh I I support uh green spaces and placemaking. Um in my heart I believe that Alport is a great place for people to actually raise families, start a life here. Uh and I'm very surprised about one thing is that Elporttowal has a one
of the highest home ownerships I've ever seen in Miami County. But they're not the people aren't that involved as I mean I see you here, but there's 2,000 residents in in Elporttow itself. And I think that's something that that needs to I think there there's an opportunity to change the way government could
operate in a portal in regards to again there's a a staffing issue right um we have a a current clerk who's doing double duty right now because there's an issues regarding staffing and I want more people involved that means setting up more advisory count uh committees u
allowing volunteers to participation and and uh addressing uh the staffing issue where we understand where it matters with the residents, the people who are affected by the policies and the implementation thereof. So, I'm I'm very happy to be here. I'm uh I'm also a licensed realtor and community association manager and a property
manager. So, I've uh also have the understanding of of how to look at budgets, services that go to residents. uh and u million-dollar budgets are are not that uh are honestly not far out of the scope of my of my involvement
because I have to judge I have to judge every community when I uh uh want to tell somebody about real estate investment or I want to tell somebody what's the value that is in a community. That's why I'm here today because I believe that Elportal has a lot of value and I want to be part of this. I I
believe there's something very special happening here with the leadership of uh Mayor Nickerson and with the the team he's assembled here with and the membership the the member council members that you've elected and I I would be very proud to be part of this uh this opportunity. Uh first of all, I'm I'm a servant be a servant to you. I
would keep an open door policy and I believe at the end of the day that the the desires and uh of what you want to see upward become have to be on the consideration of whoever is managing this on a on a day-to-day and I feel like I have the energy and the experience to do just that and I
appreciate your time. Um and I would be happy to take any questions. >> Um we haven't started yet with the questions. That was an introduction and thank you for that. >> Sure. >> Okay. Each candidate receives the same question in the same order. The time allowed is going to be three minutes which that clock will start. This was just the introduction. So the first part
is leadership and management. Describe a time you had to lead a municipality or a department through difficult changes such as budget cuts, staff re restructuring or a politically sensitive issue. How did you communicate the change, maintain staff morale and ensure
continuity of the to of the services to the residents? >> You know uh thank you. >> Okay. Through the mayor. Okay. Right. Uh so one of my uh uh one of the most recent and poignant examples
I've had uh in terms of uh performing watchdog duties um had been uh had been something regarding the city of North Miami Beach. In fact, one of my uh one of the people who refer uh who had written a recommendation to me was the mayor of North Miami Beach. And what had
happened uh was the a former uh a former mayor there had made uh had uh been caught actually living outside the city outside the county uh and it it had been incumbent on the community to actually say something and people asked me to
help them because in my in my experience I and I do get around entire through the entire county uh in the state uh the uh there was an effort put together in order to say well what's what is right in this situation, right? The the the
question of of uh of public trust is very very important to me. Uh and what ended up happening, of course, if you've not noticed the news in there, the governor ended up suspending that mayor. The uh the attorney the state attorney ended up charging the person with three
felonies, and that person is now banned from ever serving in public office. Now, it's important to understand that local government decisions don't happen in a vacuum. So, when when someone decides to break the public trust, all sorts of
things go haywire. And the example that uh you have to have a clean slate in order to start from there. So, one of the the things I've advised people in in North Miami Beach, for instance, have been well, you need to you need to start fresh on the same on the same uh side. And uh and I will say I'm very happy
that they actually have a Mr. G there as a city attorney uh because you you needed stability in that local government and uh and and not to toot my own horn, but I would say that that you have a great a great attorney here to who can provide that type of service here as well. So when we're talking
about mistakes that get made, we're talk, you know, in in a in a city like North Miami Beach or the city of Miami when they had their pension issues, you're talking about tens sometimes hundreds of millions of dollars at stake and you pe investors, bond investors, the residents, people who invested in
their their homes and uh their they invest their livelihood to put a home uh in these communities. At the end of the day, uh, to have a public trust means that someone is taking care of your biggest investment in your life. And that's what I'm here to support. And I appreciate any other questions anybody
has feedback on. >> Sorry. Municipal experience and operations. Question number two. What is your experience? What experience do you have with the day-to-day municipal operations such as public works, building, planning, or code enforcement?
Thank you. So, uh I'm on the other side making the complaints like you are. Uh so, but what I the difference is my expectation. So, if there's a code enforcement issue that I have to call uh call about, I expect it I expect it to be taken care of and I know who to call to make that happen. So, if uh if it's a
overgrown garbage for instance, which is probably the most common thing in Miami County because we have a this is a common issue throughout the county. No matter what municipality you're in, uh someone is you have to be able to know uh that you have to call in these complaints the same day or else it it'll the garbage will stay there. When it
comes to planning, if um I've advised many neighborhood associations uh HOAs uh regarding uh use of their properties with local government and the the truth of the matter is is that you're never going to be sat you're never going to get a satisfactory answer out of zoning
uh or or permitting or giving permission. you have to make do with what you have. Uh and the point of the manager role here is to set reasonable expectations to the public because ultimately I'm I'm here to serve the council to facilitate their their policy decisions but the way they get
implemented is all on the manager. So if you are upset about what what's it's occurring either the manager is not been given clear direction or they don't have the resources to actually accomplish their their tasks and you have to be able to tell uh you you have to have
that tough conversation with your elected officials about whether there is enough resources or not and how to help frankly and I believe uh could you repeat the question I think you said one other topic >> um yes it's um your experience with public works building planning and
zoning ing or code enforcement >> public zoning. Uh and Okay. So, uh no, I think I think I'll I'll rest my question there. Thank you. >> Perfect. Okay. So, um the third part is budget and financial management. Question
number three, walk us through an experience you've had with municipal budgeting, audits, and financial oversight. So for the last two decades, I've I have gone over the uh the financial uh uh reports for almost every county, mun
local government in Miami day county. Uh that has taught me one one thing which is uh there there is a there's a problem that generally people don't understand where their money is going. Uh and frankly and on on the other side of that uh elected officials may not even
understand how their the cost of of operating government works. So uh and I say this in the in because there's a uh there's an idea in Vogue going on here about outsourcing. What's outsourcing? Uh what is outsourcing? Right? Where you're basically transferring your the
capacity for for operations to a to a third party and then they handle the liability and it sometimes works and it sometimes doesn't. Uh but the biggest benefit for local government and and as I've advised them is that you're writing off your long-term liability onto
uh away. But short term you you may get what you may get exactly what you pay for or you may not. So the um uh in regards to uh for you know and a good example of this is u uh in the the question of of u there was a debate
regarding uh insourcing garbage you know in different municipalities or actually in our own county we have to have a conversation as well. We're we're currently paying uh paying our t uh taxes for for uh for garbage and recycling services much of which we we
don't get. Now when I uh one of the things that that I would u I would like to contribute is that is that in my capacity people ask me well what's the what is the the better best way to to uh to tackle these cost these cost issues and it really does come down to well
what are you willing to live with? Uh so if it's uh if it's you really pri prioritize insourcing and making sure things happen uh uh happen here in house for example public safety you know we have you have a you have your own little police department police police department here it it works for you um
keep it right because if you decide to change anything from it then uh that is an unforeseen cost that you'd be introducing into your uh into your budget that you wouldn't want uh that you don't know about. So the most important and practical thing to do is fix your costs. Uh because if you if you
change anything else uh if you change anything um frankly it's not just this wouldn't be just this council but the next council uh and having questions about well how do we either get back to that or how do we uh or how do we pay for now something that costs more uh
because we didn't we had our fixed cost earlier. So, uh I've that's certainly something I've advised in on um in another uh in another issue. Uh I've uh when I was working for the county, uh one of the things I was I was involved in was uh was uh establishing the rules
for uh enterp uh enterprise zones or opportunity zones is what they call them now. Um and those are policies that that effectively uh combine the uh the different resource. >> Okay, >> you can wrap it up. Oh, just come that com that uh that's an overlay district
that combines uh federal, state and local resources into into creating economic uh development engines and those are those are worth billions of dollars. So like I said these um these questions of of finance I I have a
very strong grasp of these things. >> The other bullet point is community relations and governance. How would you balance the needs of the residents, staff, and elected officials, especially when they conflict? >> Well, this is a great question. Uh,
and I appreciate the the the question at the end of the day, we have uh we're all in this together, right? I don't mean that to be to be cute, but the reality is is that we're all neighbors. We uh so when we politics will always exist. There'll always be differences of
opinion. politics is designed to to for us to be able to reach a cons consensus over topics uh that we we all care about and the reality it comes that back to is setting expectations. So, it's um when when you hear a piece of advice and you
uh for example, the the issue that you'll hear later regarding a roundabout uh issue, well, you know, you you've heard some good counsel from your attorney, but ultimately a job needs to get done because there's question there's questions of liability involved. Now, it's just about reasonable
expectations. Can what can and what can we live with? And if you really can't live with it, then it's then there's a there's a reason why we have to explore that. I think uh communication is very important with all stakeholders. Uh and I think in in uh in the in as a
managerial role, the the the citizens the citizens have to be able to have access to the manager because they're the they're the day-to-day of that gets hired by the council to affect the operations of the city. So if you have a problem with what's going on in the city, there's there's really the buck stops with the the the chief executive
of the city. uh and I and I cannot I I cannot say that um I want also be to be very aware that the the manager also is in is the is the gobetween between the council and staff. So this the manager
is in a role to protect staff. Uh so so that if they're hearing criticisms, it's not getting in the way of their own their job, right? You have to set expectations even with the staff itself because ultimately what what occurs is is that morale really is an important
thing. This is not some people aren't here to make money. They're not. Uh and I will say something that um that you know people have said a lot about the the the wages and salaries here. You know, I I'm for one am I'm uh would
support a manager that makes not not the minimum, but the reasonable amount. And uh and I think that 90,000 mark is is a good mark. Why? Because the the average salary per capita that means each individual person makes on average $50,000 in this this community. So the
chief executive making double that about double that amount is reasonable. And this is a communication that has to happen and we should get the money question out of the way already. All right. I appreciate the question. Thank you. >> Policy, compliance, and ethics. Question
number five. What steps do you take to ensure sunshine compliance, procurement integrity, and transparency? >> This is a big one because the uh procurement rules in the state of Florida that were basically governs all this were written decades ago. I mean
like 40 years ago. So it it's as you can tell it's generally doesn't work the best. So what managers have to do is is over uh and of course with the work for the clerk uh overannounce um and even call around and and talk to
the organizations the the actually the Miami day legal cities is a great resource to reach out to and for advertising uh even for the for advertising the role of this job because if if it doesn't get if you don't get enough qualified uh participants that doesn't just say that just doesn't
communicate the worth of the of the community uh that commun commun that communicates there is a failure to communicate. So I I the the fact that you do have enough uh sufficient number of of applicants here tonight is a is a credit to the clerk. I want you
everybody to be a note this is a good sign for this uh for this and I as and I've said privately that the the number of applicants that have city management experience is is surprising that's here today. But I also want to point out that in terms of ethics, I would not be able
to be here if to be able to say that uh that's not the end of the story. U the difference why what I bring is something actually just different because the we're this is a a small municipality that relies on a small number of staff.
Uh and most city managers don't operate uh by themselves. Frankly, they're not a one-stop shop. this require I mean it's impressive what the the for uh what the previous manager has done and what the city clerk is doing now as the interim
manager you cannot take vacations you cannot respond to emergencies the the emergency is whatever happens in the village so um and the last thing I'll say about that is that you have to figure out a way to uh to accomplish things in a meaningful way otherwise you
have to set a different uh expectation for what can be accomplished in the village uh and that ultimately definitely will reduce a lot of conflict. Uh and I I think there's a lot of conversation that can be had regarding policy. Uh the manager can
facilitate but it's not the policy maker. Uh and I will say that more conversation is is better than uh more conversation is never a bad thing. So I I appreciate the I appreciate the question. Thank you. You have my time. >> Um okay, the next bullet point is vision
and fit. Not question number six. What qualities, experiences, and perspectives make you an ideal kind an ideal fit for the village at this stage? >> I'm sorry. Could you repeat the question? It didn't get picked up. >> Of course. I'm sorry. Okay. What
qualities, experiences, and perspectives make you an ideal fit for our village at this stage? >> Thank you for the question. the to members of the council and mayor. Uh this is uh qualities. I I've been talking about qualities all day. Uh the
a lot of times when we set expectations uh we're making qual qualitative statements and not quantitative statements. That's where things start uh going wrong. I actually I went to engineering school. I uh I've worked with a lot of different nonprofit
organizations. I work with a lot of different boards. one and they all have their different nuances but one thing is true about all every person that has uh that is that I've interacted with and that is they have a very strong opinion uh and the number one thing that I have
I believe in in in terms of quality is I have two ears and one mouth so I have learned that I should be listening twice as much as I uh than I would should when I instead of saying anything. So uh that is the that's an important
quality I believe that a city manager must have because they do have to engage with the council. They have to engage with staff and they have to engage with stakeholders and residents. Uh that is abundantly clear to me that this is the number one mission of the manager. Uh and ultimately until here's um in
because you have this lines of communication open. I'm going to tell the reality come the truth comes in that nobody really knows every how to solve every problem. exactly the way it should be solved. It's all hindsight. So when you have au an open dialogue and a
communication going on, what accomp you can accomplish is we will find the the answer together. We will find that answer together. We will provide that information to the council so that they're adequately advised. uh that the you know like I said it's there's like I
said the question about the roundabout issue before is there's got to be a lot a lot of listening going on in regards to how a problem would escalate after six years of planning uh to be what uh somebody had mentioned uh well I won't
use that word but the uh how to resolve these problems that's that's really the point of it uh and it starts with listening and I think that's the again just coming back and concluding that is the number one quality that any city manager should have any executive any person who's going to make a decision. I appreciate it.
>> Um I'm going to go ahead and ask him for his closing remarks and then the council will be asking any questions. >> So you have >> Sure. >> Uh thank you residents, stakeholders, mayor and council. Uh you know
ultimately this is as I said in my opening remarks this is an opportunity do something different there. the mun the municipality does not have a huge budget, doesn't have a lot of budget commitments. Uh that means you guys can actually do things differently without having to be concerned about rocking the boat in terms of of how things you
should be because honestly is it hasn't been working for you. Now uh I come from a school of thought that uh that innovation starts with just looking for opportunities being open-minded. You know I work uh uh in in my um in my legal work I actually talked to foreign
governments. I've uh looked at what's going on in Argentina. I I see that they're employing overseas, by the way, outside this country. They are able to implement very different styles of governance that actually work for them efficiently and effectively. They've already are years ahead of us in terms
of what uh AI is doing for improving uh efficiencies in government. You might have heard of some of it in in the federal government here in the United States. But uh honestly, it's probably best effective uh it's best implemented in local government and and the smaller the better. Um ultimately I would also
say this this last thing I would commit if hired I I would uh walk every door in this in this village. Why? Because I can. That is something very special to say. I've supported green initiatives. I um I feel like I'm a champion of parks
and green space around the county. I believe in wilderness corridors and and natur and that we we have a beautiful nature and fauna here and and and particularly in upper tal that needs to that should be protected and and I think the residents have been asking for somebody who will work with them to
devise ways of how to do that whether through policy or just through personal initiative and I think it all it all works together beautifully if if we give it an opportunity to do so and so I'm at your disposal. I have uh I will say that uh I'm I'm very interested to seeing
what we can do together. Thank you. >> Thank you very much. Questions, comments from the council. >> I do have a question and it's something that you said. First of all, I do want to say thank you so much. I know it's tough to come up here at such short notice. Um and you did a great job uh
presented your case very eloquently. Your passion for this city is evident. Uh and I appreciate that. I appreciate you this evening. So whatever happens at the very end, you did a great job and thank you. Uh you mentioned that you studied engineering which brought me to
your education section. Do you have a bachelor's degree and if so in what discipline? >> I do. Uh it's it's a bachelor of science. >> Okay. And the engineering was just >> I >> because I see two things. >> Yes. I had to choose between uh this is
the story I like to tell you. I like had to choose between working for the Air Force and and making drones that kill people or or not doing that and I and I chose not to. I instead went to real estate and and uh consulting. >> Okay. Awesome. Uh other question for
you. Do you belong to any of these uh organizations like the ICMA or any sort of uh >> Well, because I because I haven't been a in a in the formal role of a of a manager role, their membership's contingent on that. Mhm. >> So, no. >> Okay. There's other organizations. I
know there's the NFBPA where you don't necessarily have to be a manager, but it allows you to just have a really strong group of folks who kind of know what the position is that you're able to share information with. >> Absolutely. I I if if obviously if I was hired, I'd be I'd be joining these
organizations. I also believe in the cross training and and having access to a a wise council that been through all this, you know, because honestly I'm I'm not trying to reinvent the wheel in terms of uh of uh procurement still going to be a procurement uh public safety still going to be public safety.
Our parks are still going to be public parks. There's the details are what matters is what is why I'm here because I believe I can do a better job on the details >> for sure. I'm just saying that this is this is going to come at you fast. Sure. um when you step foot into that office,
it is essentially you and you are all points. So I I do think that if you do have the occasion to step into this role, uh maybe one of the first uh course of action is making sure you have a strong group of managers that have the experience that you can lean on very
quickly and ask pertinent questions. So I I say that as a question but also a source of guidance. Um, another question for you. Your, it seems that you have many jobs because a lot of your
occupation say until present. There's some talking in the gallery and it's it's really Excuse me. Excuse me, Mr. Pace. It's so difficult to keep track. Thank you so much. I appreciate it. Um, a lot of your positions
uh and say present. So, I wanted to know exactly are you doing all of these positions like con simultaneously? I guess >> uh some of them are have less time commitments than others. So, I didn't put list to how much time commitments uh in in in the resume, but I'm glad you
asked. But in in the case of that I would be hired, then I would I would my my number one priority is upward. >> Okay. But currently now you're a principal consultant with human scale strategies, a strategic research manager and policy adviser with various municipalities
and a community and property manager, >> right? >> All three. Okay. Um question, human scale strategies, is that your company? >> Yes. >> Okay. Uh I took a look on Sunbiz and I know you say that it's from 2011 to
present, but it says that it was created in 2019, >> right? I had uh switched the LLC name to uh to that one. >> Okay. And currently it says that it's inactive, >> right? I I have to go and pay this on biz uh fee this year. >> Okay. So, it's inactive, but you're currently still
>> Yes. >> And how long has it been inactive? >> Uh possibly since September 1st. >> Okay. >> October 1st. and for the various municipalities that you mentioned, right? >> I just want a bit more specificity on
that as to what municipalities and exactly what projects you worked on for those municipalities. >> Sure. Uh, so as I mentioned earlier, I worked for Miami Day County uh for the board of county commissioners uh and was there uh one of the policy uh uh people
there where uh I was uh where I was divi uh in charge of putting together the policy the county policy in response to uh opportunity zones which was the policy that happened that was implemented in what 2018 uh and is now being renewed again uh for uh to
encourage economic development in poor uh poor zip codes. So there's that uh in um in uh uh in North Miami Beach had to principally advise the mayor uh the current mayor there now um on on various issues including uh I mean if you uh you
name some of the issues that that they've come across uh the uh for instance they have a water plant. So there's a question about county policy in regards to impact on on there uh and impact of state policy that would that that is existent now. Um so part of my
work there is is uh both providing uh uh research into uh both the policy issues or impacts um as well as what has researching the topic generally. So for uh not going to say I'm answering legal questions, but what other legal
professionals have have put out there uh and the uh in in terms of of city Miami, I've advised local communities in terms of the zoning matters uh uh worked um with uh actually with commissioner Rosal over there as well. Um and uh generally
I've been involved in their citizen one of uh their citizen boards uh to uh uh toward their park master plan and uh basically I don't know if you heard what happened with the city of Miami but most of them somebody thought it was a good idea to to to uh have half their parks
uh were uh were built on top of of uh trash dumps basically. So that had a huge environmental factor uh question in there in regards to uh how to mitigate uh and what dollars were going to be there and frankly were they even going to keep them as parks or were they going
to create super sites that all of them and let developers have at it right uh no but obviously cities value parks they have a they're huge resource available to them um uh in terms of parks was also uh working with the uh uh the there's the parcel B group I don't know if
anybody's heard of it here but there's a supposedly a public park behind uh the uh downtown arena uh that is supposed to be dedicated for the public uh and it's not. So uh it's that's an ongoing uh an ongoing issue uh there
that I've I've still been managing uh their uh the group's communications through on on online. >> Thank you. That that adds a lot of specificity and I appreciate that. It seems like you've done a lot of like really good research and thought leadership on these topics, >> right? I mean
>> is there something else you want? >> Yeah. Well, there's um so there you have to it's uh something about u uh municipal f uh uh municipal budgets. Something I want to uh I take pride in be able to read uh a uh an annual
financial report and know what uh and know the uh the processes of the inspector general >> uh that is the auditor general uh for it. Uh, and I have uh I'm uh I've been thrown into the deep uh for years uh when I was uh started out in like 2012
with a group called uh lower taxes now. Uh just to see that the that t taxes generally continue to go up over over time and be able to provide information both to the public and elected officials as to what is the st what is the standard that people are uh around the
state is is a you're not going to hear that. Pardon. Uh pardon, Mr. Mayor. You're not going to That's not a report that typically gets released uh by uh by the county legal cities uh because they're only focused on one county, but we have comparable markets. We have five comparable markets to Miami in in the
state of Florida. And every and people's tax rates really do look differently different even for the sake of gas, you know, gas costs and fees. So it is uh it's something that uh I'm I'm very passionate about and it's very small group of people in uh the municipal
government. I mean you may I'm sure you know this that that even specialize in in uh in this area and you know your CFO of course has is going to have to be sharp as sharp as attack because there's few people like him out out in um in government in in this government space.
>> Thank you so much. I appreciate it. I don't want to give my colleagues the moment to ask their questions, but I appreciate the clarification. >> Thank you, Madam Vice Mayor. Questions, comments from other council members. >> I may have missed something. Can you hear me?
>> Uh, let me bring a little closer. >> You can hear me now? >> Perfect. >> Very good. >> So, you you've never you've never done city management because what you said is around the corner and coming back on the
first street. It doesn't sound like you ever were. >> Uh it's >> well everybody every city manager started with this much experience. So the difference is is that I come here with a with a a vision in mind. Uh I'm
not here to replicate the same effort that that any other any experienced city manager would come here with with an expectation of oh I'm going to let staff do all the work for me because that's what they're there for because there really isn't So that means that you need somebody in the capacity who's trusted, who will put
the time, make the effort, and who and really who will be respectful of the council members and the residents and stakeholders. So that's the that's what that's why I'm here. I'm I'm here to provide that alternate option for you. Uh and I and I have the energy and the vision to make that work.
>> The reason I asked the question, you can hear me, right? >> Uh it's a little it's a little low. Maybe just bring it closer to yourself. How about now? >> Okay, now you think you got it. >> You think you got it?
>> I think I got it now. >> So, you haven't actually done many city management, >> right? >> Okay. So, you went around the circle and came back. You really haven't ever been a city manager. The reason I'm asking is because I've been a city manager of five cities and the first one was Dallas,
Texas. They were the first ones that that that that made it what it is and I was among that. I haven't heard anything that says that you've ever worked for city management. City management is not to be played with. >> Absolutely not.
>> Okay. So, so your honesty that you have not done city management, I commend you because it is it is uh uh coming to a little city like this. Don't don't think it's little. We have to do the same thing the big cities do.
>> Okay. And um we know what we want. We know what we need here. We appreciate you applying for it and your honesty that you've never done it before. We need we need experienced people. Yes, we're a tiny village, but we do big stuff in El Patel. Otherwise, I wouldn't
be here. >> That's right. >> All right. Thank you. >> Thank you. Thank you very much. Council Le from council. Um, Mr. Roose, thank you for coming out today. I very much appreciate it. Like,
uh, all the other candidates who've shown up, I appreciate you taking my phone call and answering a lot of questions. And I I guess I have two dozen pages of questions here. I don't want to go through all of these. We could talk about budgets and CRAAS and
how we're going to bring grants in and take care of staff, but one thing I noticed among everyone that was signing up here is uh Elortell itself and knowing Elortell. Um I was just wondering if you could uh tell us in a
few sentences about a a few times when you visited Elortell. >> Sure. Uh so uh so I've worked closely with the homeowner association in uh in the upper east side of the city of Miami u which is right around the corner. So I'm I'm in the area I've been in the
area for a long time in terms of visiting and seeing what uh seeing what the communities around here look like. Now I don't know if you're aware of but just on the other side of the border into the city of Miami uh is the largest uh his both commercial and residential
historic districts in the state. maybe maybe in the top three in the in the in the country. So, my experience being in the community uh is is this u I' I've enjoyed the uh participating here and and and just being involved and seeing
this the uh the the nature that you have here preserved. Um, honestly, I've gotten to I've walked the neighborhood, too, and I've gotten to know some of the neighbors here, uh, and stakeholders. Uh, and I've, um, and the it's it's been one of the most, uh,
interesting experiences, the warmest people I've ever met really in in among that says a lot because I've been in I've worked with a lot of different communities in Miami County and in Florida. So, but one of the warmest communities I've ever I've ever had the uh, the chance of interacting with.
>> Wonderful. Um, part of our conversation, you mentioned that you overseen a $4 million budget. Can you tell me about that? >> Sure. So, I was part of the team that uh for uh that managed the campaign for Congresswoman uh Sherless McCormick. Uh
she's a Brower County Congresswoman uh and was the deputy in the campaign and uh the minimum that we spent there was like $4 million. And it was one of the uh one of the most interesting campaigns that went on for for about uh 18 months.
There was like three campaigns in one uh that and with about a staff of uh a staff of about 40 people and then when we had uh in terms of volunteers uh we had about another 150. So it was not uh
that that's not a small a small effort that uh uh and it that effort continues today as uh as you've seen you may have seen it in the news. >> Thank you. U as part of our conversation you had some very interesting stories. Uh can you tell me how you exposed fraud
in the government? >> Sure. So, uh, one of the problem, uh, uh, one of the problems that you have in in local government is, uh, is, uh, what is something really cost in order to to,
uh, uh, what's what does something actually cost in order for it to to take place? So, we have a there there's this question here of of uh, vendors, right? Uh and typically what I see uh what what
I see is a lot of vendors come in and they've expressed one one price when they have zero intentions of honoring the price and then come back later and say well uh here's my change order. And so the number of times I've been able to point that out to elected officials saying here's a comparable to uh to this
uh to the uh to the sim service. Uh and the most common ones are like streets and uh streets, sidewalks and u uh the partition between uh swale management right uh that's a very common issue uh and I have uh I have I've
communicated to especially particularly at the county level where we have a uh there are these uh there are these contracts that local governments can can kind of piggy back off of that says that is the standard for how how much something some service cost and uh and
uh that's that nature of that experience. On the other side, I have been involved on the um the ethics side of of zoning issues where uh where a a zoning applicant can come before a board and say they are the owners of a um they
are the owners of a a project. And what they're really saying is that uh that they are they are a land they are a land speculator who is uh whose uh purchase is contingent on some zoning approval. And as soon as they get their zoning
approval, they sell the project. And now the residents are left with a project with the person who originally brought the project has no connection to uh to the area. and uh and ultimately the pro the property the land effectively
becomes uh slum and blight uh for uh for the community. So there's been a number of times when I have I've had to actually do that. Why is it important? Because basically it's the public the public has to underwrite the cost or the local government has to underwrite the cost of managing that property
ultimately uh right in security uh particularly uh and keeping people off of it. Uh I'm sure you've you may have seen that problem occur uh with some vacant land on the east side of the village. >> Thank you so much. Um so I expect all of
our applicants to be in touch with the real situations going on in Elportwal right now obviously visiting and knowing the streets and and knowing what we're about to go through. Um, without giving you any background, would there be a way that you would be able how would you recommend to the council to handle the roundabout situation we're about to talk
about later tonight? >> Well, I I think you're uh there's a liability question that's open there uh that your city attorney or your municipal attorney here has has given good advice on. Uh I think if if you guys go back to your other uh I think
you you have an issue of trust with your current vendor. uh you have also a backup vendor that you don't know what their pricing pricing is at and I do not know if there's recommendation regarding emergency uh emergency bids uh just to basically cover a street uh but but that
has to be that is a liability issue you guys do not want to continue having uh so some action necessary no action is not a good idea >> and certainly listen to your listen to your attorney >> so what's your management philosophy when it comes to balancing innovation
with fiscal restraint. >> Uh as I said before, setting expectations is important. Uh certainly there's there's four uh there's four departments in in in the village. Uh and they all have their uh besides the the police department which has a very clear
mandate. Uh the the question there's a question about and and there's a question about do you have enough resources? Do you have do you have reasonable expectations about what we want to try and accomplish? uh what are your key performance indicators? But more importantly, just getting the buyin
from each department head as to what what do what does that department department want to accomplish here uh is important uh because that buyin is is uh you don't want to impose a one-sizefits-all or this is my idea of what you should be able to accomplish.
Tell me what your department can accomplish. Let's set for it and if you don't make it, let's try to figure out how you can can make it. And I don't uh and again this is part of my philosophy about listening more than speaking and we need to talk to the people who are actually doing these services a lot more
as well as the people who are who are on the receiving end of services in order to understand where there is a breakdown. >> So our village operates with limited staff and uh and a high millage rate uh compared to a small tax base. How would
you maintain financial stability without increasing the burden on the residents? >> Uh so details is important. Um, so if if um this is going back in time, but if I was going to ask the uh a real estate project that's going to uh asking for
permission here to uh basically transform the village or any municipality, any other city actually does something uh does uh perform actually asks for an agreement with them that they're going to commit to that growth and they're going to commit to some sort of
some sort of funding for for the municipality to offset the services that they're going to require even and they're going to require that from day one. Uh so how are we how are they going to offset those expenses to the village if they're not even part of the tax yet?
So you need an an advanced agreement ahead of time for that. Now that's that's so that that's the plug like like known holes that happen in budgets, right? That that can be anticipated. Now there are other uh budget issues uh that are also anticipated. for example, uh
capital improvement projects that are either ill- advised or or are already way um are unfeasible. And so don't lock money in like that if you don't have to. Um and just look over look over where the city is spending money and see where
if any improvements can be made to these uh to these arrangements and these plans. So uh and that's a good an example of that was what I've heard regarding uh the streets master plan, right? there's basically uh some commitment toward transforming the the
the look and feel how people get around in the village. Um but there's a certain philosophy about if it ain't broke don't fix it, right? So how do you prioritize that the the balance between uh planning and budget and that's that's goes to key. Now in regards to services um in
regards to services or it's people services come first. So I don't want to say that I'm going to be locked in a room and I don't want to talk to anybody. No. It it's important to engage uh the residents and stakeholders. Important to be able to have access to council
members. I would I would pledge once or twice a week to sit down for a coffee with each of you and see and answer questions and go uh and and and answer questions particularly before you come to these chambers and then have to uh and have to figure it out on the fly
because I think that's I think that's the most appropriate way to uh preparing people and take time to do so and that uh that would basic that would also um that would also uh uh budget time better during the meetings because then we're
not going back and forth asking a whole bunch of questions for hours. Um, lastly, I would say is that yes, we there's there's a shortage on staff, but there's no shortage of people who want to help, right? So, residents who have who want to participate, like I said, this community has one of the highest
home ownership rates uh in uh in the county. The people who own their home, they want to be involved. give them an opportunity to do so whether it's just as a volunteer capacity uh provide uh provide programs through the you know the college universities make this make
this a village again frankly right not you know not walled siloed into uh onto ourselves um and ultimately it takes you know a vision uh you know I will it's um you know they say an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure but you know
when you apply that to local any municipal government. The the idea that you can have all these dialogues ahead of time before a meeting, that uh problems are nipped before they become crisises, uh that uh revenue is is taken
care of uh before it becomes a a black hole, right? These are important matters and and people being involved would actually be able more people being involved would catch these kind of errors before they become costly. And ultimately, it's you know what, we're all neighbors. We're all human beings.
We should have fun at this as well, honestly. And it's it's worth it. It's it's it's just it's there's so much more so uh economic value to uh uh to this village that is just untapped. And I don't mean that just in nature and the you know and with the value of real
estate uh trees impact on real estate. I mean the human factor. I think this is a beautiful community that that deserves an opportunity to be to be sustainable in terms of its growth, be sustainable in terms of of the of what you can do on your property and that you have
neighbors helping neighbors. I mean, these are values I believe that this this community is looking for. So, sorry, I went on the right. >> Well, thank you. Um, so last questions here. We got to keep it quick so we can get to the next um applicants. The um
main thing is that you have not been a manager before. Correct. >> Uh enough for Miss Ballot, right? >> So, but in El Patel, the last few managers have never been managed before. So, as we're thinking about this position, one of the things I see here
that's a key to something you've done would be that when a manager or mayor has a crisis that they can't handle, you're the one they've gone to. Is this correct? >> Uh yeah. Many times elected officials whether in any uh in many municipalities
have have said come to help. >> Okay. Um I appreciate your time. Thank you so much. >> Thank you. >> Anyone else from the council hearing? Seeing none.
Um very quickly, do we have any questions from the audience for this candidate? >> No. Oh, I'm sorry. It's come up the mayor. >> These questions have been screened. >> Um, the village has a liability for questions that are asked, and that's why
there are pre-prepared questions for the council. They've asked some others, but if you start opening it to questions that are not screened from the audience, if you want to receive them in writing and you decide to read them out to screen them, that's appropriate. But if
you open this up to every resident, you are potentially exposing the village to liability depending on what questions are asked because they're not screened and and there could be an inappropriate question. Sorry to do that, but there is
a mechanism which would be to have citizens write questions and the mayor can determine whether they're appropriate and if you have a question, you can seek some guidance on it. But otherwise it is a liability issue. All right. Um so we'll do this madam clerk.
Uh call the next client or call the next uh >> fix the next candidate. >> Next candidate client. Next candidate. >> Thank you Mr. Rose. >> If if anybody out there has any questions that you guys want me to ask from any of the um individuals
once they're are done I'll ask those questions of the individuals. So, if you guys need a piece of paper and a pen, let me know and you guys can write those down and give them to me. Okay. probably. You're probably correct, frankly. Um, however, if I heard one
from a council member that was inappropriate, I would cut it off. There is a liability. But really, I think you're you're probably correct. Yeah. >> So, um, if anybody has any questions,
if anybody has any questions and you guys want them to to write them down, just, um, let me know and I'll come collect your questions. it would be on this podium >> also. Um I'm not sure what transpired while I was gone, but I think in order to be more effective, we have taken a
numerous amount of time and I understand for the position, but each um council member should be limited also to a threem minute question in order for us to have uh a fair more transparent and moving along as well because we do have
them waiting in the room. So, this candidate is candidate number two and his name is Bob Cook. Good evening. >> Hi, good evening. Can everybody hear me? >> Mr. Cook, I will um read first. Thank you for being here today. You will have
two minutes for your introduction, three minutes per question, and two minutes for closing remarks. If you need a question, repeat it. Please let me know. >> Sure. I do have some handouts for the Sure. Give me a sec. Let me read the question so then you can start talking
and then I will deliver the handouts. So you can start with uh introducing yourself and sharing your uh municipality experience and the public sector and explain why you're interested in serving as the village manager. >> So
madam this is for the >> madam. Okay. Is there good evening everybody? How are you? >> How are you? I am really delighted to be here with you guys. I am Bob Cook. Uh Mr. Mayor, deputy mayor, council, general public.
Thank you for giving me the opportunity to present uh this evening. I really appreciate you and what the work you do for El Porto. Uh I am a dynamic experienced government leader. I have spent more than 30 years more than 30
years of government service. that includes federal, state and local government. Uh I have provided executive leadership, strategic planning, economic development and all oper operational oversight uh for all government
functions for a multi-million dollar agency. I'm the former director for HUD housing and urban development where I spent almost 31 years uh 20 years of that was in executive leadership. I have demonstrated qualifications, the knowledge, the experience, the ability
again with emphasis that is more than 30 years. U I think I can hit the ground running and uh this has been my life's work. This is my passion. This is what I enjoy doing. I enjoy making a difference in uh in the difference to the local
community. Uh you probably ask why me as a candidate? Uh I'm seasoned in local government, state government, again federal government with a strong background in municipal operations, financial management, strategic planning, economic development,
knowledge in state, local, and federal law and regulations. I can bring unity to this community. Uh I can bring growth if that's what the residents and the council would desire. Uh I understand there is a limited budget. I look
forward to working hand inand with the council, with the members of the residents on that budget. Uh, for one thing, I would like to be the first I would like to be the first to make the budget amendment. I will accept a $5,000
reduction. I don't do this for money. I do this for job satisfaction. I do this because this is something I enjoy doing. I enjoy giving back to my community. Uh so with that being said um I demonstrate
a high level of emotional intelligence, outstanding interpersonal skills, organizational awareness, uh quality decision making that is so instrumental here at the local level. U I'm well verssed again in budgeting. I want to be
able to make the first amendment to your budget by giving a $5,000 reduction. It can come through a donation. It can come through a reduction in salary. Um, we can go over the budget line by line.
Um, I have deep familiarity with budgets. I've worked with multi-million dollar budgets. I'm the former director for housing for city of Los Angeles, Dallas, Texas, and most recently Knoxville, Tennessee. I have served as executive director for the North Miami
Foundation for five years. Uh, keep in mind We never walk alone. This is a village and we are a village. Again, I have more than 30 years in capital planning, grant administration, contracts,
uh with the knowledge of infrastructure, utilities, community development processes and procedures. Again, adding quality of life for the residents. Um I think accountability
I think accountability is instrumental. I think transparency is instrumental. Uh as a village manager, we again we don't walk alone. We collaborate. We communicate. We decision make together.
It's your community, our community. At the end of the day, this impacts on all of us the decisions that we make. Again, I enjoy giving back to the community. >> Thank you. Um, we're going to go ahead
and ask ask the questions. Now, each candidate will receive the same question in the same order and three minutes total per question. As a reminder, leadership and management. Question number one. Describe a time you had to lead a municipality or a department through a difficult changes such as
budget cuts, staff request structuring or a political sensitive issue. How did you communicate the change, maintain staff morale and ensure continuity of the services to the residents? You will have three minutes to answer. >> Thank you. Great question. As I
indicated earlier, being the director for housing in Los Angeles, one of my first tasks was to redevelop an entire community, East Los Angeles. Uh for those who don't know the history of East Los Angeles, we had a 600 unit complex that was gangfested.
Uh my task again was to bring about unity uh in a troubled community, demolish and rebuild the entire community. So with that being said, it took leadership. It took strong leadership. It took collaborative
leadership. It took trusting leadership. It took leadership where we had to design process and rebuild an entire community, a non-Englishspeaking community. We did it. We did it
successfully. Uh we did it within limited budgets. We didn't need change orders. Uh we did it through community efforts. We met uh one community group after another. We met both with federal,
state, and local. We met with nonprofits. We collaborated. Uh we maintained staff morale. Uh we did the extra mile. Uh we built an entire new community. It
was not an easy task. But again, you built that trust. I built that unity and I provided leadership in a very difficult community. Second bullet point, municipal experience and operations. Question number two, what experience do you have
with the day-to-day municipal operations such as public works, building, planning and zoning or code enforcement? As a former director for HUD housing and urban developed, I work day in and day out uh with local governments. uh we met with them, we helped collaborate, we
helped design a process uh on a day-to-day basis so that the local governments would have capacity, so that we could provide them with funding, so that we could provide them with industry best practices. Uh that included public
works, that included information technology, that included uh all operations. Uh again in a collaborative transparent fashion where we collectively came together with municipalities,
provided them with the leadership, provided them with the funding and at the end of the day we had viable communities uh communities where I provided operational uh input 247. We work very closely with
public works. We work with the infrastructure. We work with the sewer system. We work with the police department in bringing unity and bringing change and bringing the needed housing to communities across America.
>> Thank you. Bullet number three, budget and financial management. Question number three, walk us through your experience with municipal budgeting, audits, and financial oversight.
As a former director for housing and urban development, uh we were the monitor for city governments, uh we work very closely with them. Uh we provided industry best practices, we provided
training, we provided training the trainer. Uh we confirm the uh local municipalities worked in concert with providing economic opportunities. One of the uh
the points I want to uh make with you guys tonight, I understand budgets. We monitor budgets. We monitored uh city budgets. One of the things I want you guys to walk away with tonight, if you're having
financial issues, again, I want to be the first to make that budget amendment for El Part $5,000. uh working closely with your administration, your uh your your
program departments in an effort to run through those budgets. Again, this has been my life's work, financials, the financials of cities, the operations.
Um, again, I've reviewed your budget and I would like to have that opportunity line by line. Uh, and we have a budget. We have to work within the budget. Uh, we have budget constraints. Uh, in this
administration, we all have to tighten our belts a little. Uh, but it takes clear, transparent, concise financial and budget planning. uh we have to be a part of the process. We have to work
with the local leadership. >> Thank you. Bullet point number four, community relations and governance. Question number four, how would you balance the needs of the residents, staff, and elected officials, especially when they conflict?
The audience cannot see but I did provide the council with significant amount of community relations and community engagements. Uh being a stakeholder I think it's very uh instrumental that we form those
relationships those collaborative relationships at the federal level at the state level and at the municipal level. Um I have developed relationships with FEMA. I have developed relationships with the governor's office. I have developed relationships
with the senator's office. Uh the local mayors, uh in my capacity as executive director for the North Miami Foundation, um I have to outreach. I have to provide community relations. I work with the
electeds. I work with other nonprofits. I work with the stakeholders in a clear and concise manner. Delivering products and services to add to quality of life to the residents. Uh community relations is very important. Uh being able to to
provide balance uh is instrumental. I think we're going to have to provide that trust, quality decision making, input from the residents, input from the council members, all in a collaborative fashion to come together
in a unified sense. What is the mission? What are your goals? What are is it that you value? What is it that we can bring to the table that adds value to your life? U as a village manager, again, we don't stand alone. So, community
relations, balancing those relationships, delicate, sensitive relationships that involves millions of dollars in contracts, procurements, processing, laws, codes, regulations. Uh, we have to be at the forefront. We
have to be instrumental in creating that balance, creating that unified front and that unified force. I want to be your village manager. Policy compliance and ethics. Question number five, what steps do you take to
ensure sunshine compliance, procurement integrity and transparency? >> Repeat the question, please. >> Sure. What steps do you take to ensure sunshine compliance, procurement integrity and transparency?
Clear, transparent communications, notifications, communications, honest, transparent communication is critical. U again, know what the goals are, know
what your mission is. Uh work with the council, work with the residents. How is it that you can bring your leadership for that uh leadership? What can you bring to the community? How can you add value? Uh
work within the program and the process that are at hand. Uh again, clear, concise, frank, transparent communications. >> Bullet point, vision and fit. Question number six, what qualities, experiences, and perspectives make you an ideal fit
for the village at this stage? >> As I indicated earlier, this is my life's work. Um, I see vision. Excuse me. I see a future for El Porto. I want to be a part of that future. I
want to be at the table. I want to add value. Um, I can bring 30 years of government service. I can bring quality decision making. I can bring transparent communications.
I can bring stakeholders to the table. I can leverage both inside the organization and outside the organization. We're at an inflection point in the city of El Porto.
What we do internally impacts us externally. Not today, not tomorrow, but for 10 years, 25 years, for future generations to come. I have a
vision that includes quality decision making, clear communications, the ability to inspire and motivate, again, moving the masses from within and from outside. I want to bring leadership to
the city of El Porto. I see a vision. I want to be a part of that vision. Okay. You have two minutes for your closing remarks. Your questions are up. >> In my closing remarks, uh, as you can see, I demonstrate the knowledge, the
skill, and really the abilities to move El Porto forward. Let's do this together. We have a village. It takes a village. Let's make a difference. Uh if there's not unity, let's bring unity to the table.
If there's conflict, let's dissolve the conflict. Let's bring resolution. It's been my life's work. Uh 30 years of life's work. You guys have a a unspoken treasure here in El
Porto. I treasure that. The residents here treasure that. Let's make a difference. It's been my life's work. We are a village. Let's maintain a village. Let's move forward. I've been providing
uh housing, leadership, management, and supervision. I've been a pioneer in government, national, state, and local government. I would like to come in and demonstrate and prove to you guys, I'm
your next leader. We are a village. Let's make it work. Let's make it a success. Let's make a different. Let's change the quality of life for the residents in El Porto. >> Thank you, Mr. Cook. >> You're welcome. Thank you.
>> Questions or comments from the council? Yeah, I have a few questions. >> Sorry. Um, appreciate your your time today and it was very nice to speak with you on the phone this week. Um, so um I'm going to ask some of the same questions I asked
some of the other um applicants. Um, you spoke about Al Patal as an unspoken treasure in just a few sentences. Can you tell me about time a few times or a time when you visited Alert? uh many times again I think uh council
person winters it's an unspoken treasure uh you guys are probably not aware but you're one of the municipalities that's in my portfolio as executive director for the North Miami Foundation we have
received funding from Elportal U and Elportal is a very small unpopen treasurer I've been out many times times u and I would like to be here not just part-time I would like to be here full-time I would like to be able to provide leadership I would like to be
able to provide a better future for the residents of Elportal >> thank you um so I'm going to jump ahead here um real scenario are you premier what's going on right now with today's agenda and the the circle
>> uh slightly yes sir I am >> I was just wondering uh if If you had any if you how would you recommend to handle it with the council for this roundabout situation if you were the manager. I would have a I would review the facts at hand.
I would have a candid open conversation. uh with all the stakeholders take a look at what's at stake. Uh if there would have been clear
communication, what would be the need for the change order? Is it negligence? Is it errors and omissions? we would need to take a look at exactly where we ran into the issue.
An objective point of view. Uh again, we will need to focus on the facts and at some point we're going to have to make a very difficult decision on what our next steps are going to be.
>> Thank you. So um during our conversation this week, you manage you told me that you managed a billion dollar budget. Um so this village operates with limited staff and high mill rate compared to its small tax base. How would you maintain financial stability without increasing
the burden on residents? Going back to what I I noted earlier, council person, uh I think engaging, leveraging stakeholders, uh not only at the local level, but at the federal level, I think Elportal is
an untapped market. When I say an untapped market, I think there is a lot of opportunity financial grant philanthropic uh that can come to the table and contribute to the vision and the mission
of El Porto. Again, I think it's going to take that collaborative environment where you leverage both internal and external stakeholders. uh having a knowledge of that and having more than
>> gohead >> having more than 30 years of that I can certainly bring that to the table. U again I do think that a portal has some untapped marks although council person and we need to be able to uh see how we
can bring in additional funding. Uh how can that funding bring us stability? Uh I understand it is a very limited budget and I have worked on many multi-million dollar budgets, approved budgets, reviewed the financial statements, you
know, city of Los Angeles, Dallas, Texas, and most recently Knoxville, Tennessee. >> I have one last question for you. U looking for where I put it. Um it I I read that you were recently retired, but
you're looking for something to do in the meantime. Would you expand on that? >> Yeah, I retired from HUD housing and urban development. I spent almost 31 years. I started right out of college as an intern uh and quickly worked my way up through the leadership. For the last 20 years, I was in leadership, executive
leadership where I uh was managing multi-million dollar budgets, all operations, all processes, all procedures uh at the federal level. I spent almost again 31 years there. I did retire. Since that time, I've been the executive director for the North Miami
Foundation, uh, providing services to nine different municipalities here in the Northeast Miami Date County area. I do enjoy work. I do make work a part of my everyday life. I enjoy the work uh, in local
communities. I enjoy collaborating. I enjoy forming those network, professional networks, that collaborating. I like bringing successes to local communities. I have a history of that and you will see in your handouts uh where I've been able to
inspire and leverage both within and outside of the organization to bring in additional funding that may be necessary. Uh but again also going back to budget and financial uh with my 30-year history, I would like to be able to sit
at the table and negotiate with not only the residents but with the department heads of how each one of us can go back to the table and tighten our belts. This is a time, this is an administration where we really don't have a lot of
choices. Again, I want to be the first in that budget amendment by reducing the amount of salary for the role of the village manager. Again, I don't come in for our salary. I come in to make a difference. I come in because I enjoy
work. I am federally retired. I do get a pension every month. So, again, the ability to make a difference is much more important to me. I'm not out for the money. >> So, I just want to really quickly clear one thing up. Um, so in Alberta, we're
looking for longevity with a manager. We want someone who's going to be around a while. We don't want to go through this process every four, five, 10 years. Um, so in in terms of being retired right now, how long, if you were to get this position, would you intend to work before retiring again?
>> I really have intention of working 15 to 20 more years. Um, actually today is my birthday. Happy birthday. Today Bob is 63 years old. >> Happy birthday. >> Happy birthday. >> Happy birthday something.
>> We're happy birthday. >> I didn't We're going to go ahead and bring the next candidate. Thank you so much. >> Thank Thank you guys. Thank you for the opportunity. I look forward to serving you here in the very near future. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Happy birthday to you. This is candidate number three. Please
um state your name for the record. Miss Estein. >> Yes. My name is Kyla Esther. Okay, perfect. Thank you for being with us here today. You will have you will have two minutes for your introduction. three minutes per question and two minutes for closing
remarks. If you need a question repeated, please let us know. To start, if please um introduce yourself, share a brief overview of your municipal or public sector experience and explain why you're interested in serving as the village manager.
>> Hi, my name is Kyla Estan. Um I currently work at the city of North Miami as a admin coordinator and a public record liaison. I've worked there for two years. Um I've done public records requests. I assist in passports. I'm a notary. I also do um supervisor
over election. So I do I have verification for signatures as well. Um I've worked with the Miami Day County as a um subpoena liaison as well. So I was processing subpoenas there. And I also worked with the state attorney's office for three years in the case screening
unit which was a 24-hour unit. I worked there for three I worked there for a year then became the lead worker. So, we were the first point of contact for defendants and victims and things of that nature. Everybody's awake now. Just kidding. Um,
now your first bullet point, it's going to be each candidate. I'm repeating it so you just, you know, each candidate receives the same question in the same order. Time allowed per question is three minutes. Your first bullet point is leadership and management. Question number one, describe a time you had to
lead a municipality or a department through a difficult changes such as budget cuts, staff recruiting or a political sensitive issue. How did you communicate the change, maintain staff morale, and ensure continuity of services to residents?
>> Um, I would say I have two examples for that. The first one was working at working as a case screener and working at the city clerk's office. I mean, I'm sorry, working at um the state attorney's office, being there and just being after one year just being a lead worker and then because we were we were
a 24-hour unit and we never closed. We had people that would call out, people quit because of the budget cuts around that time. So, being that I had to be the like the the forefront of everything. So, I would work like all throughout the night, still having to support my team, still having to make make sure I'm able to train new staff
because we have people coming in and out all the time. And even at the city clerk's office, um just being given public leaison out of nowhere, like I just came to work and it was like you're the public leaison. Um not being trained. So I had to learn how to train myself and also be able to manage what I
was already given to do my my tasks that I were already given. So doing that as well and being able to budget and still being a team player with my other colleagues because we were doing we were at the time doing passports, notaries, and we were supervising election. So, we're qualifying our candidates for the
election year. So, budgeting all those things and being able to be there for your staff and also for my supervisors, being their second point of contact as well. >> Municipal experience operations. Question number two, what experience do you have with the
day-to-day municipal operations such as public works, building planning, and code enforcement? >> Um, so I would say that the experience I do have is I do work alongside all of those departments. Being that I was doing public records request, I was always in contact with building public
works, CPND, like basically all the departments within the city of North Miami, ensuring that they follow all the um Florida sunshine laws and making sure they give the requesters their requests that they need within a timely manner. So making sure that whatever they requested, whether it was things from
building, whether it was things from planning, those things were were in the public records request before releasing them or if things needed to be corrected or anything like that, I was working alongside them. Um, also training those departments as well because when we were given the public record um public records request, these departments
didn't really have a liaison. So we had to find liaison and I had to train the liaison on how to properly submit a public request and also train them on redacting as well. That's it. >> Thank you. Bullet point number three, budget and financial management.
Question number three, walk us through your experience with municipal budgeting, audits, and financial oversight. I will say I don't have much experience in that, but I do have a lot of experience when it comes in um to auditing, especially with public records request, making sure everything is there. So, if we did ever get an audit,
I had to explain and express what was going on. I will also say when it comes to budgeting um just within within my office, we do a lot of city events. So, we had to make sure that we were within our budget and that we can afford the things that we want to give to the community because we do believe in staying civically engaged within our
community, especially with the youth. So, we had a budget that we had to stretch. So, that was something that um I was able to learn a lot about and also being that I have a masters in public administration, I do have a lot of background when it comes to those type of things as well.
Thank you. Bullet point. Um, community relations and governance question number four. How would you balance the needs of the residents, staff, and elected officials, especially when they conflict? That's a that's a powerful question
right there. So, I'm not going to lie. So, right now, um, as working as a am coordinator, um, I have contact with the public all day long. Um, like I said, we do do passports and we do notary service and we do do social work as well. And I
do work for an elected official. So, I'm kind of always budgeting in between all of these things and half the stages very transparent and staying in the middle of everything and just watching how everything plays out. Um, so I would say like and even with my staff with with the people I work with as well, I would
say that just always staying transparent, always hearing everybody out and always just doing the best that you can at all times. And even if you don't have the answer, trying to find the answer because I don't believe everybody has the answer at all times. But even if you don't have the answer, try to find the answer. Try to assist them in the best way possible. And um
just within the city of North Miami, there's so much going on at this time. So just being that pillar for people um being the pillar for our staff and being the pillar for our bosses and the transition that they are going through currently. So I just believe that our residents are important, our council is
important and even the people that you work alongside is important because when these environments are environment is conducive to you, then it's like conducive for great growth. Thank you. Next bullet point, policy compliance and ethics. Question number five, what steps
do you take to ensure sunshine compliance, procurement integrity, and transparency? >> Read. That's like reading is fundamental. I'm not going to lie. And the reason why I say that is because um one of the things that I would say is just don't go based off of what you experience or how people train you, but
actually go and read read the manuals, read the policies. Um never be afraid to ask and to be trained on something because one of the things that I've witnessed a lot. I'm not I'm 27 so I'm kind of young but what I witnessed a lot just with working within these different
environments and within different places I realized that sometimes we are either afraid to speak up or we just we fail to read and get a better understanding. So, one of the things that I've learned is like not only just hearing what people have to say, but actually reading it and being able to like dumb it down for
myself so that I can understand to see how I can better explain it to everybody else. Cuz I do believe that everybody have a different learning style. And if you have a different learning style, it's probably that the situation that you're reading or looking into is probably so simple, but you just not being able to like receive it the
correct way. So, that's like one of the things that I would say. >> Thank you. Then vision and fit. Question number six, what qualities, experiences and perspectives make you an ideal fit for this village at this stage? Um I would
say that my background with um I have two degrees in criminal justice as well. So I do have an extensive background with the legal and working at the state attorneys and also with Miami day fire rescue. I have a background with that as well. I'm also an author. So I have a book called Finding Grace in my process.
So I do talk a lot about um awareness within the foster home system. So I am very much family oriented. Um and I do believe that even I work I live in the city of Hollywood but I also believe that um it's very important to create great environment and I also believe it's very important to even create a
nice working relationship between council residents and staff. And one second >> no you got it. And I think firstly that I will be a good fit to be a V village manager. And honestly, even if I don't get this position, I'm so grateful that
I had the opportunity because it makes me know that I am valued and um because I am young and personally I didn't think that I would get a call. But for what it's worth, I'm extremely grateful for the opportunity. >> Great. Now you have two minutes for your
closing remarks. >> So that was kind of my closing remarks, but I would again Again, I would just like to thank you all for the time. I'm extremely grateful, honestly. Um, because I know that I don't take this for light at all. I know that a lot of 27 year olds can't do this or probably won't have the opportunity. So, the fact
that I even had the opportunity, like I said, even if I don't get it, I'm happy that I had the opportunity to speak before you all that maybe after this I can be able to introduce myself formally to you all and just thank you so much for the opportunity. Are there any questions or comments from the council?
>> I just have one quick question. Uh on your resume it says that your MPA is anticipated in June of 2025, but it's did you? >> Yes, I got it in June 2025. >> Perfect. Congratulations and also awesome interview and I know you got the interview and you say you got the interview, but you earned it. You're doing a great job and I'm excited to see
where your career leads you beyond this. >> Thank you so much. >> Anyone else from the council? Uh hello, thank you for being here. Um so in your interactions uh so in your interactions with building department
specifically public works generally as well um do you feel like you would be able to come in and uh speak with the building department on a datab basis with everything from uh new construction uh permits being uh discussed, reviewed
and uh otherwise notated for advancement or or uh pause. um uh down to and including uh you know basic day-to-day things like people coming in for just permit for plumbing or electrical things to that effect. Uh if you could just
speak a little bit to any experience you have with direct interaction with a building department. >> So I would say that um being that we do get a lot of calls that come through our office because of like either they're having a building issue or they're having an issue with certain code compliances and things of that nature.
So sometimes I would either walk the resident over there and try to see how we're able to better assist them and sometime I would ask questions like so how do they properly like get a permit and things like that so I'm able to have a day-to-day conversation with them as well and again even if I don't have the
answer I'm able to find the answer. >> Very good. Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Hi. Oh are you going to talk first? You can go. >> So you've been the go-to person. >> I am the go-to person. you're the go-to person.
>> Mhm. I try to be I think it's very good to and it's also a learning curve for me. Um I just believe that even if like any any in any moment is always like a learning moment for me. So even if I don't see even just being here tonight and just seeing the residents speak, it was very much a learning curve for me.
And then watching the prior meetings that I did watch, I was able to learn what was going on within the city. So yes. >> Well, you just made me remember me. >> You did exactly what I did. I'm going what? Well, that was a long time ago, but you you you remind me of me. >> Thank you so much.
>> Exactly what I did. Just keep going and keep looking and keep doing and make the circle blend. >> Thank you so much. >> Hi, Kyla. >> Pleasure speaking with you. It was really nice. We had a wonderful conversation. >> Yes. >> Um I wanted to ask you a few questions.
A lot of them are the same ones I asked the other uh applicants. Basically, I have 20 pages, but I'm only going to leave it to a very few questions. Um, and it's basically because we could talk about budget and CRAAS and grants and everything else, but I want to know kind of like about you and Elertell at first.
So, can you in just a few sentences really quick tell me about a few times when you visited Alportell? >> So, um, I was raised in um I consider Upper um 30 well 3rd Avenue Northwest 75th Street. Um, so I was kind of raised
somewhat close to this area, not too much around this area. Um, so being that the most I've experienced in airport honestly was getting on the jitney as a kid. I'm not gonna lie. Um, I'm not. Um, so but I was actually looking into airport and I was looking at your mandates and I was looking at you guys
have a bird designation and I was looking into that. Um, so I don't have too much experience when it comes to this area particularly, but I was looking into like the historic and things of that nature just to kind of like freshen my mind to see what is in a pertow and what you guys are looking for
for a city manager and what the city is like, you know, what the city is missing and what I can bring to the city. >> Beautiful. So the next question is going to be about a real live scenario. Right now, we're about to have a talk and about an agenda item about a circle. And
this circle um has to have a manager's input to provide it to the council. I want to know how if you were the manager, what kind of advice would you give to the council for this roundabout situation? >> So, I was kind of actually I actually wrote it down, but I left my phone
inside, so that's not going to work. But I was actually looking on a situation about the pricing and the it was a bid error. So I was kind of looking into it and seeing what I would suggest. Um I think that we are kind of already at this point. So what I would suggest is
for the future is number one keeping a tracking like keeping an an Excel sheet where we can keep track of what's going on being very open within for the residents and within the council trying to figure out exactly how much each thing is costing um so that we can keep track of that as well. Um, I think at
this point I was kind of looking into and listening to the meetings before. Um, I don't know if it's I don't know if it's overstepping to say, but if they don't I feel like if they don't meet the time of when they were supposed to be able to provide this service, then I don't see why we can't just drop the
service and trying to find another bid that would like another vendor that will be able to provide us maybe with a, you know, with a more reasonable price. >> Could you hear us from the other room while we were talking with the other applicants? No. >> All right. Um, next quick question. So,
the the previous budget you said you work with on the phone was $20,000. Is that correct? >> Yes. >> Uh, our village operates with limited staff and high millillage rate uh compared to its small tax base. >> Um, but our budget's a little higher than that. How would you maintain
financial stability without increasing the burden on residents? Um, I would say like within our because I do work for the city clerk's office. So, we do have a a specific budget that can cover all the things that we want to do whether it's events and whether it's for clothes or I mean like for our our
uniform and things of that nature. The first thing I would say is always try to um to speak to the vendors, get prices that are like that that are reasonable. Um, finding negotiable places that we can attend and we can go to. Um, looking at grants and things of that nature that
we're able to qualify for. So trying to stay within those bounds. >> Uh have you had experience with grants or CRAAS? >> Um I have not had really too much experience with grants and CRAAS, but we do work alongside CRAAS when it comes to our council meetings because I do prepare the council agenda. Um so we
have our council every second Tuesday of every month. So I'm the one who actually like puts the council agenda together and I also provide the minutes. So that's that's like when I'm working with long when it comes to making sure that the resolution is signed, the ordinance is signed, the resolution is prepared correctly.
>> Wonderful. Thank you so much. >> Thank you. >> Thank you so much. >> Thank you so much, guys. Have a great night. >> Thank you. This is candidate number four, Kamich, our driver.
Thank you for being here today. You will have two minutes for your introduction, three minutes for questions, and two minutes for closing remarks. If you need a question repeated, please let me know. As a candidate, please introduce yourself, share a brief overview of your municipal experience or public sector
experience, and explain why you're interested in serving as our village manager. >> Awesome. Thank you. Good evening. >> Good evening. >> My name is Kamitra Driver and um I am originally from Tulsa, Oklahoma. I was born and raised there. I have been in
Miami Day County for uh since 2001. For the last um poss about 10 years, I've served as a city administrator in roles in government uh that included economic development manager, uh community redevelopment director, and deputy city
manager. Through these positions, I've had the pleasure of creating and implementing redevelopment strategies to revitalize a downtown, to preserve a historic district and the main street, to support small businesses,
to recruit and uh new businesses to the town, to recruit developers uh to bring in housing, to recruit developers as public and private partners for a multimodal uh uh transport multimodal
um multi-enter entertainment center excuse me and I developed vision for the transformation of an econ of an underinvested community. All these engagements involved uh community uh involvement
um it involved resident engagement and required us to maintain consideration for the community's character and charm. So these are qualities in this experience I think are what I would bring to the village of El Pratttowal. U
maintaining the village's character while understanding how to grow using smart growth uh for the village u maintaining its beauty its beauty maintaining its quality and making sure that the quality of life is what the
residents desire and uh look forward to. I'm trying to stay on time. You said two minutes. >> Each candidate receives the same question in the same order. Time allowed per question is going to be total minutes. I mean, three minutes, I'm sorry. >> Okay. >> Leadership and man and management.
Question number one. Describe a time you had a to lead a municipality or department through difficult changes such as budget cuts, staff restructuring, or a politically sensitive issue. How did you communicate the change, maintain staff morale and ensure continuity of the service to the
residents? >> Uh well, I think anytime you have a challenge and you have to deal with staff and maintain morale, it starts with open and honest communication uh being upfront with what's happening. Uh and then building the change around uh
the vision of what it is that that department is um is is its purpose. Um specific examples uh would be with our uh I was the community redevelopment director for the city of Homestead and
um when I first started uh we had we were trying to figure out where we were going and how we were going to grow and the way that we wanted to often um posed or or possibly conflicted with what the community understood as the the best
interest for the comm community for the city as well as the area we were revitalizing. So, it was important for us to make sure that we had community buyin. It was important for us to make sure that we had clear communication with all the
constituents and stakeholders. Um and then that included staff and staff were engaged in the decision making uh coming up with the vision and the strategies to understand how we can bring about the change that the community so needed but
didn't understand um that they needed. So we worked together collaboratively um with our our leadership, our the board at that time as well as staff and the community to make sure that um what we needed to make happen happened um with
the support of the community and all the stakeholders. >> Question number three, >> budget and financial I believe is number is number two. Um what Okay. >> Budget and financial management.
>> Question number three. Walk us through your experience with municipal uh municipal I'm sorry, budgeting audits. >> We're in number two. >> Oh, we're in number two. >> Yeah, we are number two. I'm so sorry. Municipal experience and operations. Question number two. What experience do
you have with the day-to-day municipal operations such as public works, building planning and zoning, or code enforcement? >> As deputy city manager, um, I oversaw those departments. So, my day-to-day involvement with with them was every day meeting with them, uh, understanding
what was going on, making sure that they were on st on task, um, addressing any challenges or issues, uh, creating, uh, ways of improvement. Um we had u a challenge with one of our with our public works department and some some
billing and so we had to figure out um you know why we were losing so much money and fortunately we were able to discover the error and then put policy procedures in place so that uh we would no longer have that shortfall in that department. Uh that was as a deputy city
manager. I also um assisted the manager to create the budget for the city um during that time and unfortunately it was a time uh a lean time for the city which required uh some creative uh planning to create come up with a
balanced budget and thankfully we did and did not have to lay off staff and so those were two positives that we had a balanced budget and and maintain our staff um level. Another um time that I had to manage budget was as a CRA director. Uh I managed a budget that was
um at one point a little less than uh the village's current budget and then ended where it was more than the village's current budget. Um I created the budget, I implemented the budget and provided oversight and managed and ensured that uh we stayed on budget
throughout the the year. budget and financial management. Now we're in number three. Walk us through your experience with municipal budgeting, audits, and financial oversight. >> That wasn't the question. Just
>> Well, we could No worries. No worries. So, it was what? No, it was what is your experience? I know the confusion because I came back. >> I answered number two, anticipated number three. It really I mean she >> she kind of covered both. >> Okay. Are you okay with that?
>> Yeah. >> Number four. >> So moving on to number four. >> Okay. >> Community relations and governance. Oh, because you answered both questions at the same time >> cuz I asked them almost at the same time. Sorry. That was my confusion. >> Community and relation.
>> That was a good thing. Nice. Concise. >> Yeah. Community relations and governance. Question number four. How would you balance the needs of the residents, staff, and elected officials, especially when they conflict? >> That's a really good question, and seems
like I've spent my entire career uh balancing uh government officials and and constituents. Um before going to the city of Homestead, I ran a nonprofit organization and our responsibility was uh bringing community partners together
uh to work together to collaboratively provide social services uh within the community. That took a lot of effort bringing folk from all walks of life from government down to a resident um and everyone in between uh bringing them together to see a common goal and a
common vision and then working to make that what we needed in our community was provided through this means. Uh same with uh the city of Homestead um as the economic development manager and the community redevelopment uh director.
Everything that we did uh involved the council or that sat as the board and our community. And that was important for us to make sure that whatever decisions or whatever vision that we came up with that we first brought in
the the community and got input from the community. When we started our revitalization of downtown, I can't tell you how many presentations um I made to the community saying, "This is what we'd like to do in your downtown. What do you
think? Do you like it? What would you change? Um do you support this idea? And so having that uh engagement allowed the people to feel that they had a buy in that they had that this was their vision. So when it was time to move
forward with it, they bought into it. They celebrated it uh when we celebrated and they really took ownership for it and that way we had um had co cohesion between uh the city and the residents that it served. And I must say that
during the time when we started our revitalization project in downtown um our our council uh was unanimous in all the decisions related to um our efforts. So every vote, every item that we took before them was unanimous decision. So
they were all on one accord and that was because before we even started the vision, we made sure that they were engaged in what we were doing and they stayed informed throughout the entire process. So, we constantly informed the community, constantly informed uh the
the electeds and staff. Um that was another thing is that we didn't forget about staff. We made sure that staff was informed about everything that we were doing. And not just informed, but we got their opinions and their feedback. And that I believe is how that we were able
for about seven years to be so successful with that revitalization effort, the dream, and then the implementation of that dream and then to see the fruition of the dream. Thank you. Policy, compliance and ethics. Question number five. What steps do you take to ensure sunshine
compliance, procurement integrity, and transparency? >> I think that there are no exceptions that you you follow it and um that there's no gray area, there's no in between. I think it is absolutely
critical that um everyone involved u make sure that they follow those and whenever someone steers off or looks like they're may about to steer off you know bring them back and and and remind you know okay we can't discuss this
because of sunshine or but it's important for us just to make sure that we know our policy number one you got to you got to know what the policies are you have to know what the laws are and then um make sure that everyone the staff and everyone involved are knows
what they are and then just stick to them. Just just stick to them. Maintain honesty and integrity in all communication. Maintain honesty, integrity in all dealings with um with with staff, with public, with the electeds and treating everyone with dignity and respect while doing so. I
think that helps us stay on policy. But you got to know what your policies are. You got to know what the laws are and so it starts with education and then standing by it. >> Thank you. Vision and fit. Question number six. What qualities, experiences
and perspectives make you an ideal fit for the village at this stage? >> Well, as I mentioned u my my government experience as a as an administrator um I have worked on budgets. I have worked as I mentioned revitalization projects. I
have worked from large developments to small single family home developments. I have been involved with um communities and and residents and training programs for residents. I understand um the importance of the balance between um
having a have follow implementing the vision of the council but then also having a vision um for for the council and for the community that incorporates what the community what the community wants. Um I would also like to say that since
arrival in in Homestead um all those years ago, I have been an advocate for the community in which I worked and in which I served. And I solely believe that a city, a village, a town, a community has to be its own best
advocate. And so that's something that I would bring to the village of El Pertow is that if nobody ever believes in us, we have to believe in us and we have to stand up for us. So we have to make sure that we have a seat at the table where it's needed. I would make sure that you
know the um the septic to sewer project that the county is doing. It's important for Albertal to be at that table when they're discussing and trying to understand what's being what they are planning um for our community. Um, I would address, you know, looking at the
budget and the budget shortfall and and how do we how can we overcome that? How do we plan for the future? How can we increase revenues? And those are things that I've done I've done before. Um, looking at our codes and our policies and to make sure that we have um the
right things in place to maintain the village's beauty. Um, these are things that I've done before. or we've done I've done community beautifification projects um in the city of Homestead and started in the city of Belglade. And then also just ensuring that permitting
for home ownership is is is seamless. It's effortless so that our homeowners are able to make the improvements to their properties that they wish to make so that our community stays beautiful. Um I have partnered and worked with um code enforcement. Um I oversaw code
enforcement. I have worked um closely with uh permitting every project that we did in the city of Homestead. It was a collaborative effort between public works, between utilities, between um uh code enforcement, the police department,
every single department. Whenever there was a project that I needed to put forward, they were all a part of the discussion. We all worked together. So when we needed to do infrastructure, I had public works there and I worked closely with them. when it was time for utilities or when it everything and so
that is what I bring is that experience of of working with those departments hand inand um partnership collaboration and understanding how a vision works. >> Thank you. Now you have two minutes for your closing remarks.
>> Um thank you for this time. I I really appreciate you welcoming me into this lovely lovely community. I am delighted to have this opportunity to to speak to you all to share a little bit about myself. I would come in uh day one um
boots on the ground uh understanding the community, understanding the residents, understanding where where you all want to take this community. Um I would come in um to not just bring a vision but you
have a vision and it's important for all of us to to join together and and implement that vision. I am delighted for the opportunity. Um as I said I am an advocate. So I would be one of the biggest advocates for this city. I am
not afraid to stand up and say hey give us our just due. Give us what's fair. give us what what we need and what we are owed for this community and then also to believe in in in in this community and we used to always I used to always say in Homestead it's like
don't sleep on Homestead you know we we have a lot to give we have a lot to do and it's the same thing with this city you have your identity you have your culture so I would come in to be a part of that to not change that but to help that become more and greater and to be
exactly a place where residents can can continuously be proud, feel like they they are heard, feel like that they are understood and feel like that they are a part. So, thank you so much for for this time. >> Thank you very much. Uh comments,
questions from the council. >> I do. Um good evening. Thank you so much for being here. Um so, uh so I would I would venture to say you're the first candidate we've seen so far that I would be able to ask this next question of
you. There are no wrong answers. Um uh so it seems like you've done just about everything there is to do including some oversight of police department at Homestead. Is that right? >> So well we under our budget under my CRA budget we had um a code enforcement
officer and then we had community policing. >> Community policing. Okay. Yes. All right. So even with the community policing there was um was there any degree of certifications or or training uh that required um you know just standard diligence to be sure that
people were in compliance with one type of certification or another. Was there any type of of that activity within the community policing um uh force >> through the police department? Yes, they they went through trainings. Um they were every year they had to go through
trainings. I can't tell you what specific certification um they they had to receive, but yeah, there was ongoing um training for for the police department. >> Very good. And then um I on the policy compliance and ethics section, um I
would just ask if you would agree that maintaining uh rigorous ethical standards would best serve the community and ensuring that we would have um uh above board relations with vendors and other parties
that would be coming from outside the village to be interacting with us. >> Absolutely. And I think that what helps is if we remember that we are governing for the greater good. We're not governing for ourselves. We're not
governing for that developer. Um we're and we're not governing for one particular party. We're governing for the greater good. And if we focus on that, um, because oftentimes when we steer away from into the the gray area
or the dark area of ethics violations and or doing things underhanded or it's because we're we're governing with the wrong emphasis and the wrong focus. So for me it's I feel like that if we continue to remember that we are here
for the greater good and ethics is absolutely important and that we must maintain ethical behavior at all times. >> Very good. Um and then my final question um had a second ago. I might need to circle back if I can't come up with it in just a few seconds here. I did have a
final question. Um and uh uh I'll think of it in a minute and I'll come back to you. >> I'll help you out. First of all, awesome awesome interview. Thank you so much for considering sharing your talents with us. Um because they seem to be
plentiful. Uh from our conversation, I gather that you have directly been responsible for public works, building planning, code enforcement, all departments that um could use just like another eye to figure out how we're doing and if we're doing what we can do
to the best possible level. Um, I think one of the largest issues that we experience in Elportal is uh the communication uh between residents, the council, all of those things. So, I love how you talk about creating community buyin from the base level, talking to
residents about what they want, building consensus with the council, having frequent communications with the council. I think all of that is lovely. Um, and to that end, I just wanted to know in your opinion, what do you think is the most effective strategy for
building this type of community buyin that you spoke about that you achieved uh at the CRA in Homestead? the most effective I I believe is when people feel they have a voice um and they're able they're allowed to
express their their voice and their thoughts and their ideas and that they are heard um even if their idea is not the one that moves forward and is not the one that's implemented that gives them encouragement to know that at least I'm seen and I'm and I'm heard and I'm
valued and I'm appreciated. And so if it's not their vision that goes forth or their their idea, they can still get behind the overall vision because if they see how it's going to be again for the greater good of the community, then they can often support
it and get behind it. And we got to be open, we got to be honest, we got to be trustworthy and all those things when bringing bringing the community together. um not hiding or or or giving
them a sneak preview of what what the plan is, but letting them know this is where we're trying to go. This is what we want to do. >> Give us your feedback and your thoughts. >> I love the response. Uh just a followup to that. It we have a very involved uh citizenry and I I love it. The folks
Yes. the folks in Elport, they want to be heard. Uh >> and they want to be able to stop by this lovely village hall and know that their city manager is going to be there. Um and if not the city manager, someone who is knowledgeable about the questions that they have, um they can get those
answers, questions resolved. Um what is your policy as far as uh meeting with residents? uh of course within your uh hours where you're working within certain time parameters but but what policy do you have on that? >> Oh I mean
I I would be here because of them. So my policy is I'm here to meet with you. I believe in leading outside of the walls. So I you know you can't lead um a city and you're just in your office all the
time. So, you know, they don't always have to come to to my office. You know, I would be out going to see them. I would be out at the, you know, going to see the business. I would and then we could create, you know, a form. One thing that we did um with our our
businesses is that uh we would have a a um a breakfast for them every quarter and we'd bring them in, serve them breakfast and say, "Talk to us. Tell us what's going on." We did the same thing for some of our other constituents uh in the community where we had a regular
communication where they knew they they could come any time to see me, but they also knew that on this day every month that we were going to have a gathering so they could come in and they could share their thoughts and their ideas and then also hear from the CRA. It was important for us because we were doing a
lot of development projects. So, it was important for us to keep them updated regularly and to get their their feedback because the last thing we wanted to do was build a monstrosity and then they come and be like, "Oh, that is ugly. We didn't want that. We didn't even know you were going to do that." So, we by having that ongoing
communication. Um, that's how I would do it. I would figure out what works best in this community. But, of course, my door would would be open. My phone always on. >> Thank you. I appreciate it. Impeccable interview. I appreciate your time. >> Thank you. No, thank you. >> Anyone else from the council?
>> Yes, sir. >> How you doing? >> I'm doing all right, sir. Getting a little sleepy. >> Oh, well, usually these go till pretty late. So, if you're manager, you'll have to keep yourself awake every single what? Third Tuesday of the month.
>> That's why I I have tea with me. >> So, I got a few questions for you. And of course, you and I had a really beautiful conversation. It was wonderful speaking with you on Friday. and um I learned a lot about you which is really nice. Um but after going through all the grants, CRAAS, different things that
you've worked with, uh I'm going to start with this first question which is basically about Elortal because uh the citizens take it very seriously. It's very different than other cities. Absolutely. >> Tell me about a few times when you visited Elportal and and why it's a lovely community. >> Well, I was Well, I'll start with the
most recent time and which was yesterday. Is today still Monday? Yesterday, Sunday. Yeah. Uh Sunday. Um, I was here uh driving around the community and and let me tell you this it when I moved here, one of the things
that I said that I love the most about Miami Dade and the Florida in particular is that everything is always alive and everything is always green. So, driving through El Prel, seeing all the greenery, seeing the the tree canopies,
just lovely. I love how um people it looks like that homeowners pride in their homes. They take pride in their yards. Um, that says a lot about a community. Um, I loved it. It was Sunday, so there were a lot of fam families out walking. Um, so I love the
the family how it's family oriented. I So, it's just a wonderful community. I love the fact that it's small. I I like small communities. I like small towns. I feel like you get to know your neighbor. Um, and I I just really appreciate it.
So, those are some of the things that I really found um that I really like and enjoy about >> Thank you. >> So, um you've been to the community, you've you've seen Are you familiar with all the craziness we're going through right now? The agenda tonight, for instance,
>> uh I I I have um seen some of the items that that have been a little contentious. >> So, I'm going to throw a real world serinary at you. We did it with everyone else, so no worries here. Right now, we're about to also have another agenda item about the roundabout. I want to know how you advise the council to
handle the roundabout situation >> right now. How how you would handle this? >> This is a hypothetical how you would uh hypothetically uh recommend a point of action for the council about the roundout situation.
>> Explore all of your options. Explore all of your options. um ensure that you have all the information uh that you need to make a sound good decision that will be in the best interest of the community.
So explore your talk to your attorney and uh see what potential options are available. Um and then also um look at maybe think outside the box. I understand that um your neighboring city who shares part of that that roundabout
has not contributed anything to this project. Maybe it's just has anyone ever talked to them and ask them if they would uh contribute. Maybe it's a it's a time to reach out a hand and and and have a conversation with them to say listen this is the bind that we're in.
Their budget is a lot bigger than Elport House. their um their revenues are a lot stronger and their reserves are are greater. So perhaps there's something that they can do to contribute towards it. But I would my advice would be explore all your options.
>> Okay. So u after we spoke you said that when you joined the CRA and Homestead uh the previous budget there was about between three and four million but after you worked there for what five to seven years you brought it up to seven million. But of course the CRA's goal is to spend all of their money. So, how
would you be able to um operate this village with a limited staff, limited budget, high millage rate, a small tax base? How would you maintain financial stability without increasing the burden on residents? >> Well, CRAAS are different and um yes,
folk craas because that is the goal of the budget is to spend all your money at the year's end. But I also ran a nonprofit organization prior to joining the CRA, which was completely opposite and where we had lean years. We had some good years and then we had some very lean years and we had to figure out how
to make ends meet um with whatever small amount we had. Sometimes that takes making difficult decisions. Um and unfortunately um in government uh we have to make those those difficult decisions. We have to do it in our personal finances or at
least we should. Um, so we definitely should do it with with government finances, looking at it, making sure that the money is um we're we're make we're making good use of our taxpayer dollars. So regular monitoring of of our
spending uh planning uh beginning early on to look at year to year end spending, estimating what your year-end spending is going to be and then begin preparing your upcoming budget um based on that. um get us I don't know when you all
start your budget process here far as looking at where you are but um I'm accustomed to starting around April Aprilish and and looking at okay this is where we are this is where we're trying to get to and this is what we have. So
just making sure that you have your time frames in place that you start preparing early that um in lean years tighten the belt and and encourage everybody you know that that it won't always be this way. >> Thank you. So uh one of the things we're looking for here is longevity as the
city manager. I saw that you were only at Belmeid for five months as the deputy manager and when we spoke on the phone you said that after five months of driving the 2-hour drive from Homestead up there it was a little much for you to handle. Now uh it will be another large
drive from Homestead up to Elort and I know that it's it's not going to get any better as they keep doing construction on 95 and 836. It's only going to get worse. So seeing that there's this propensity before to leave a job after
committing to it for the long travel, how are you going to guarantee us that you're not going to leave after 5 months when you have to drive a long period of time to get here? >> Well, the the difference is Belgrade is
108 miles from my home. Um and Elportal is like 39 miles from my home. If I had a an emergency at my house, if I had a medical appointment, if I had business that I needed to conduct, it's
impossible to say, "Okay, I'm going to drive home um and take care of this or I'm going to come in maybe a an hour late so I can go to my doctor's appointment." Belg Glade, it was like a two hour late, three hours or not at all. You do it on a different day. So my
quality of life um was tremendously impacted and I I enjoyed working in Belgrade. I enjoyed the community there and believed that I could, you know, do a lot of good things there. But when my quality of life got so negatively impacted, it was time to make a
decision. Because of Elpertile's proximity to my my house, um it's different. It's it's I I perceive it to be different. Is the traffic crazy? Absolutely. But it was still over an hour to get here today, right? Without
>> Yeah, it was an hour to get here. U But again, an hour going 39 miles versus going8 miles. Um, for me, it was a big difference. >> Okay. Thank you. >> I've also placed the resumes for the
residents to look through on the piano, so you guys are free to look at them. Just wanted to note that. >> Any other questions or comments from the council? Thank you so much. >> That's it. >> Thank you. Thank you so much.
candidate number five, Mr. David Roseman. Thank you for being here today. You will have two minutes to introduce yourself, three minutes per question, and two minutes for closing remarks. If you need a question, repeat it. Please let me
know. Please introduce yourself. Share a brief overview of your municipal or public sector experience and explain why you are interested in serving as our village manager. >> Thank you, Mr. Hovy. Um I am David Roseman. Good evening, Mr. Mayor,
council members, residents. Um, thank you for this opportunity to um show you and tell you the things that I would like to to be able to implement should I receive the u the
vote support of this council. As you all know, um I served here as a manager um actually almost nine years ago and um I'm a little emotional because it's kind
of a a a a interesting experience to to be back here where I spend such great times serving this community. So I am forgive me if I'm a little you know
halting um in my um presentation but um I'd like to say I'd like to begin by saying to you that um I have over 30 years of leadership experience in government um a nonprofit organization.
Um, I served here as the village manager, but I also uh was u the chief of staff of u um the city manager of of Miami. Um Mr. Aola, I have worked for
the state and the federal government um in a number of capacities, particularly that of of communicating with the community. I feel very very proud of of the work that I've done in making sure that the
communities in which I served were informed of the things that were going on, both things that were positive and things that were negative. When I first uh came here, um the village had not had
a u audit in the previous three years and we were under the threat of having the the funds, the tax dollars uh withheld by the county and the state. Um remember talking with the council
members they had lots of ideas of things that they wanted to do and one of the things I said we are not going to spend any money until we are cons uh certain that there is money to be spent in these kinds of things. My approach to to to
this work is to be very very conservative to make sure that what we plan is has been informed to the community and um that there are support and and folks would not feel that things
are being done um without their input. Um I have a a open um door policy. Um I enjoy working. I have been someone um let me just say I have been someone
who can who can come in on the weekends and do whatever needs to be done um to to make sure that the the that the trains are running on time. So thank you. >> Each candidate receives the same question in the same order. Time allowed
three minutes total per question. Leadership and management question number one. Describe a time you had to lead a municipality or department through a difficult changes such as budget cuts, staff recructuring or politically sensitive issue. How did you communicate the change, maintain staff
morale and ensure continuity of the services to the residents? >> That is a fantastic question. Um I experienced I would say during the time my time at the city of Miami um after serving as the chief of staff of the city manager, I became the director of a
department called neighborhood enhancement team. And at that time, it was right before um the economy went bad and we had to make major cuts and the city manager allow us
to make the decisions of who and what were we going to cut. Um this is a department that was had 13 uh neighborhood centers that were very very dear to the residents of Miami and we had to make tough decisions knowing that
these things were coming because they didn't take us by surprise that the economy was going down. We remember those days in 2008, 2009, 2010 when the economy was was failing and and home
values were declining. I knew that we were going to have a a difficult time meeting uh our budget uh requirements. So I made sure that every year prior to those um we made investments in our own infrastructure. So things like copying
machines and even stocking copying papers etc was done with the pro previous budget so that we would have support financial um resources to to be able to weather the the bad um storm.
the the way that we worked around it. I brought everyone together. I make sure that even the person who had the least amount of of responsibility in the department understood why we were having to make the cuts that we had to make.
And uh they understood it was being felt throughout. um we the executives had given part of our salary to to make sure that our folks could um you know survive a little better. Uh but these were things that
that we could see coming and we prepared ourself for that for those decisions. Um I I think that communication is one of those things that many times don't happen. We see it now with the situation with the government shutdown. there's
lack of of communication. People don't want to speak. They don't want to have those awkward conversations. I am about speaking. I am I will stay here until 9 10:00. Um and some of you know because you have been in in the in the council
before and you know that I will let you know exactly what the news is and what things that we can recommend to uh make things better. So that's the my style. That's my philosophy. Um
I was just going to say my staff always ask me, you know, you say too much. It's like I would rather say too much than not enough. >> Next bullet point. Municipal experience and operations. Question number two. What experience do you have with the day-to-day municipal operations such as public works, building, planning and
zoning, and code enforcement? Well, as the director of of departments that had to do with all of those functions at the city of Miami, um it was really easy for me to come over here and and be
integrated in all of those things. You know, you never know how much um how benefit how beneficial it is to have extended amounts of staff when you are the only person who has to respond to things. It's like I would say, "David, go and do that." And then I would go get
up and do that because there was no one else to do it. So, um there are there are things that that are innate to me to I'm kind of a a get up and take charge kind of person. I'm not
afraid to to u to do those things. I remember when we first had to to deal with the uh military. Um I had never done that before in spite of the fact that I worked at the city of Marian but we had people who were very well trained to do those things and they managed that
that process. We had to go to the county um meet with the folks who who dealt with this and I became educated in the process. It was many many days working with our financial person working out
figuring out exactly what was it that we needed to do and how to make sure that all of the new properties, all the new residents were paying their fair share of taxes in the in in our port town. And we got it done. When we got the seal of approval from the county that we managed
to do all that we needed to do, I was quite relieved. I was sure that something was going to come back and say you did this wrong people. But we made sure that we got as many people involved in the process from the county um the state um to make sure
that we were doing things correctly. I I have no shame to say when I do not when I don't know something to say I do not know that but I will find out. I will learn it. I will figure it out and I'll become an expert at it. And that's what I have done all my life. Not only here
or city of Miami, but everywhere that I have been there have been areas that have not been something that I have known to do. But of course, um that's what you know. Now with computers and internet you can learn just about anything. So this is the the the
philosophy. This is the strategy that I follow whenever I'm in a situation where I encounter something that I do not know or I do not master. No shame in in in acknowledging that. >> Budget and financial management.
Question number three. Walk us through your experience with municipal budgeting audits and financial oversight. following what I just said when the budget um at that time the budget of the village was only $2.2 million. So I was
kind of like um happy to see that Eltown had grown uh as much as he had grown. Um I was very very conservative. I made sure that whatever the council wanted to do that we had sufficient dollars to do it or we would
strategize how to do it better. Um I remember that there was a system that was kind of not very very well organized or having the trees trimmed. So I said instead of just trimming the trees when they needed, let's all the trees be
trimmed about the same time so that we could save with volume so to do it all together. So I divided the village in in quarters and then I said let's set this out for for bids and see how much
somebody a tree cutter would would charge us to do this. Then I I I asked the uh our solid waste. I said can you add this to the the payment of the daily collection of garbage and says of course and then that's how I I did it. So there
was a coordination between the tree cutter by area and the the picking up of of those uh tree cutings. Uh that was being done at the same time and people could see the improvement of of how we
were doing it, not just one tree at a time because then the neighbors would say, "Well, you did such and such. Why you could you do mine?" Everyone knew exactly when things were going to get done. It was a map that says this is when your is going to be addressed and this is the reason why we're doing that.
I did the same thing with um um street mainten um residents would come in and says I have a hole in my payment and says I'm adding you to the list of things to be fixed that have child
payment issues so that we can we don't have to buy the services of a contract of two houses, we could do it for the same quarter and that way we can do it all at the same time. So, it was it was just being able to be prepared to do
things in a from a broader perspective, not just let's deal with with things one at a time. I think >> that was Mayor. >> No, I'm going by number four.
>> Number three. >> Oh, I'm so sorry. Okay. Community and relations and governance. Question number four. How would you balance the needs of the residents, staff, and elected officials, especially when they conflict? >> I'm a great negotiator. uh I like to get
people sitting around the same table and and discussing what are the the issues that we disagree on and what are the things that we can agree on. And that's one of the ways that that I like and I do it both ways, collectively and individually because I think it's
important that people have the the faith and the confidence that whatever their issue is, they can share it with me and and I'll keep their confidence um to myself. But these are things that can be addressed that should be addressed in
any democracy. Let's talk about what it is that that is happening. Um there are lots of of issues and I have been in those situations where I'm fighting between a an immovable object and a a
unstoppable force and how do you bring those two together without having both of them destroy each other. So I think that's some of the ways that this can be addressed is just by having not the moment that the situation is happening
but let's keep this process this protocol active whether it's something huge like what do we do with the roundabout or is something minor as to what kind of furniture or what kind of colors we want to paint the
uh the inside of city hall. So that's to me an element of of communication that that needs to be given all the attention that we possibly can to make sure that people hear and understand what the reasons are for
making things and deciding those elements that need to be decided. >> Policy compliance and ethics question number five. What steps do you take to ensure sunshine compliance, procurement integrity, and transparency? >> Well, as I mentioned before, I was the
um um director of communication for MDX and the public information officer for the Department of Transportation. Uh these were things that were very very impactful because nothing can be more impactful than the decisions of
government regarding um the public right of way and how is it being addressed. Um these kinds of things have a historical um presence in our lives. We know
exactly what is it that we should be doing or what is it that we should not be doing. And we always have to be very very careful to make sure that there is no conflict and that we are not in violation of anything that could possibly bring us some some serious pain
just because we made a decision to have a conversation between two council members or two commissioners or two state representative, whomever. and and to make sure that those decisions, those uh conversations are done uh
legally and and ethically. So, I think that it's just a matter of making sure that we know that we can do this or we should not be doing that. And if we somehow begin to slide into a situation that we we should be able to call it out
and report it to ourselves, we did this, you know, and it was not the way that it should be done. But these are the kinds of things that can be avoided if we have enough training and enough conversations about what are the path what are the challenges what are the the element of
things that we should be looking at so that we don't find ourself scratching ourself scratching our head saying how do we get out of out of this jam it's just a matter of of just being clear with the the how how the work should be
done and and I have that experience gained it here. I have gained it all in other places. So I bring this with me to to this job. >> Vision and fit. Question number six, what qualities, experiences or
perspectives make you an ideal fit for the village at this stage? >> Where do I begin? I live like 10 minutes away from here and um this is one of the things that that I envision myself like it did the first time coming in on
Saturdays coming in under a storms. We had one situation that I was remembering. Uh a big storm came and and took out half a tree a couple of blocks from here. And um the person had my number called me, David, half of the
trees on my house. What do we do? I had very good relationship with uh some of the executive of FPL. I call Eloy Vasu. I say Eloy, I have a problem. I need for you to send me one of your repair. David, it's Saturday midday. There's
football going on. It's like I don't care. My folks are not only under a tree, but the cables are lost. So, if one of those kids gets electrocuted, FPL is going to be, you know, paying through the nose. and I am putting you a
notice that you are my friend. We went to school together, but this is business and I need you to to send me someone to address this. Within 45 minutes, I had a not one but two trucks with their ladders and whatnot, fixing the whole
thing, and I had the guy who did the the tree uh collection coming by and picking up the uh the tree, you know, trimmings. So uh those are the kinds of um actions that you can have if you have
a good relationship with those folks with whom you have to do business and they understand that there are going to be time that emergencies have to be addressed and they have to go they have to be addressed. It may be Saturday it may be your daughter's wedding find
someone to come and and help me with the problem but it has to be solved and it has to be solved now. So, >> you have two minutes for your closing remarks. >> Wow. Okay. Um, thank you again for for this
opportunity. Um, it's been a while since I had to to think about these things and sometimes it's it's kind of fun to to look back and say, "Yeah, these are the kinds of of experiences that I have had." And um I I feel that I should be
given serious consideration because I I bring in a wealth of experience, knowledge, and a good attitude. I um I like to have fun while I live, you know. I like to have fun while I work. I I think that being a public servant is
something that is important that you do it from the heart and not as a job. So you will see me some, you know, because I live 12 minutes away from here. It will be very easy for me to come to work and to leave, go back, come back, you
know, and um so you pick me, you have someone that you can rely that is going to be responsive to the needs of this community. >> Thank you, Mr. Roseman. >> Any questions or comments from the council?
>> I have question. >> Everybody knows that he came with us. Everybody know that we had him. We had him before. He's a very dear friend. I I got it on.
You're wanting to come back. Why? >> Dr. Ward. um as I mentioned to I don't know if um or I spoke to one of the council members um
you and basically the way I was driving we were doing an event uh helping the homeless in downtown and uh but I really wanted to have that discussion so I pulled over and says I'm not going to be too wordy I'm coming back because I have you know stuff that I still would like
to to accomplish. I want to finish I have unfinished business with with the village. So that's that's the quickest way. I can give you a list of stuff that I was involved in that I was very sad to see that some of them had not moved forward um or things have gone in the
different direction. But I'm also very excited with all the development that you have right up around the the corner. So this is like this will be great. This will be fun. This I can see me, you know, rolling up my sleeves coming here
to do some serious um the work and accomplish those things that that you have been planning and wanted to see in your village. Thank you for the question. >> Mayor, you remember um you remember our
dear friend? >> Yes, I remember when uh Rosen >> Uhhuh. We didn't forget you. We missed you, but we didn't forget you. >> I I I missed you, too. Um and and since I drive by here every day, it's like,
you know, I have this this thing is like if I have been working at upper town, I will be at work now, you know, so as opposed to heading all the way down to uh to uh downtown Miami. So, this this is um I'm excited. Put it that way.
>> Excellent. Thank you, Counc. Anyone else from the council? >> I have a few. Um, so I appreciated our conversation while you were driving and talking about unfinished business when you came here on Thursday at 2 p.m. It
was wonderful. Uh, it was great having the talk and we had some good ideas and I I would start this first question asking you to tell me about Portal, but I already know you know about it. So, I'm going to kind of skip that question. Uh I'm going to go on to my my second question I asked everyone uh that came
up as the application was uh you mentioned earlier the roundabout as manager what would your hypothetical be solution be to give to the council to kind of fix the situation. I have some ideas um which I I it may be premature for me to reveal because then they say
well remember when you came before us and we were going to hire you and you said this things and now it proves that that it cannot be done. I'm of that an an elderly man who was very very instrumental in my success said to me
once he's a old carpenter he says measure twice cut once and and I'd like to follow that same protocol that same philosophy I would want to see I'm someone who because of my work with the department of transportation I'm very
familiar how those things get done and what are some of the the challenges in getting those kinds of projects not to impact uh traffic or the properties around it negatively. Sometimes we do them and then it's like oh my god this
should not have gone there. It should have been some some other way of minimizing uh the traffic flow etc etc. So I would want to get more detail how far are we what are some of the options that the contract with that contractor
provides. Um and you know with the help of our attorney you know we will see exactly you know what can be done to make sure that we can remedy the situation but everything in life has a solution. Um, and I think that it's
important to to be to look at things with fresh set of eyes. Sometimes we think that something is just bad and has it's a problem and then somebody comes in, it's like, what if we were to do it on the other side of the street or something something simple. And so all
of those options should be explored before we make a final decision. And so part of the uh unfinished business conversation we had was that you were part of the original trying to get septic to sewer here in Elortell. Are you familiar with the current status
of our septic sewer and our setbacks? >> I have not wanted to ask because you know this was something that we sped through uh a a phenomenal um opportunity presented itself. We were able to get some monies from the state uh to further
study that project. We I was surprised. I was under the impression that things were moving that we had some consultants that we were paying them uh to do this and then come to find out those folks um let me not say they didn't know what
they were doing because they could come back and summing but they were not as aligned with the reality of uh of climate change and water rights and etc etc. So a lot of the calculations that I
had from them, they had plans here that went back x amount of years and I said these things are not um what we need to do in in in this situation. So we stepped back and began to to do it. So I
have this is talking about things that that I have that I felt that was uh I I would have hoped that by this time there would have been you know areas that would have been already began to to get connected etc etc. we didn't know where
we were going to put the the uh the collecting um areas and we began to to do that do it uh shortly but we knew that once the state and the county will start helping us with money um they would not stop. So we would have done a
great uh advance, a great progress as far as um turning a portal into a sewer um community. >> So my next question actually you previously already answered about the $2 million budget you handled here in the
past and of course you understand our high millage rate and the tax base and um basically the burden on residents. So I'm not going to get into that because you've already answered the question. So thank you for doing that earlier. I'm going to jump on to my last one here. So, um you were in Elportal for 1.5
years, right? 1.6 years. Um I want to hear a little bit about uh how you left. >> Well, basically it was it was a mutual decision. Um I had from the very beginning as I would tell you if if I'm
to be chosen um I feel very very confident on on my abilities to do what I want to do here. But the the day that you are not happy you're not satisfied in spite of all my efforts to communicate openly etc. If you think
that I'm not properly suited there will be no hard feelings. I am a person who lives in the moment. I I like to live happily. I don't have resentment in my soul. You know, there are no old girlfriends that I want to kill. There's
not nothing of that sort. I live today um with the blessings of of the Lord to to do the best that I can. Um and if someone is not in agreement with that, then that's fine. That's that's that's part company, my toys, and go play
elsewhere. But um that's how I left. It was a decision of the council. There were residents here who had told me, you should fought harder for for your job. I said, why should I have to fight for something that I know that I'm doing as hard as I
possibly can? It's a relationship. It's like it's not like when two people are married and and the husband feels that that the wife does not take care of him and and she says, "Oh, I'm going to cook for you. I'm going to do this." Oh, you should have done that before. Why are
you waiting until I complain to do to remedy the situation. So, communication from the very beginning, the day, excuse me, the moment that you see something that you don't like, I can be called on the on the floor about this and and that will be fine with me.
>> So, at first you said it was mutual, then afterwards you said it was decision of the council. >> Well, I didn't want to I I did not resign. The council decided to to to let me go. So it was a decision of the council. I did say, you know,
I've had it, you know, it was just, you know, we came to a impass with some of the things that were being done. I worked really hard to get those meetings and the approval of the residents to do the this the septic time to sewer. Um, I
was working seven days a week during that period of time. Um there were council members who who helped me through that process, I I could not have done it alone. But um when you put that much effort into
something and then there's, you know, I remember one comment um from one of the council members saying, you know, there was something that I asked you to do and and you didn't do it. And I'm like, I don't know what could that possibly be, but you know, everybody has their
opinion. And if you asked me to do something and I forgot it and I want to do it for whatever reason. Um, I needed to know then you don't wait until this moment I'm ready to fire you because you didn't do something x amount of time ago. You know, tell me what
happened. How did that how did that come to be? But so that's um that's my answer. That's um it's I say that it was mutual because I didn't oppose it. I didn't go seeking um
retribution. I didn't speak badly of of the portal. I was I do know that I was I was hurt. I I have to acknowledge that I love this, you know, I love this place. I got along with with the chief of
police at the time, Dean Morales, get along with Joe Geller. Um it was it was a wonderful place and I was away from home which is all my friends were like oh I'm stuck in traffic I'm like you know I can actually
take my bike bring home come here on my bike so um it was a wonderful situation and and there was so many challenges at the time but um okay um I don't fit this this is not mine I'm here on loan you know
>> thank you Mr. Roseman, we're going to continue with the comments from the office. >> One more question. It's just after what he said. Um, you said there was a certain impass you experienced with the Elporttow Council. Um, I just want to if you could elaborate to make sure we're not at the same impass because I I don't know what that was and if we're still at
the same impass, there could be an issue, right? So, if you could elaborate, I would really appreciate that. I'm with with all due forgiveness. Uh I I'd rather not revisit this because I I work
very hard. It's been eight nine years uh since this happened. I work very hard to push that aside. Um I know that I'm eight nine years older and I have learned. I'm one of those individuals who learns very well. Um, you don't have
to uh I don't have to catch my my my finger on the door twice. You know, I'm making mistakes. Okay, I should not do this again. And um but I I have improved in my communication skills in what I say
and how I say it to make sure that everyone understands what it is that I propose to do. And if you're not in agreement with it, I want to know because I'm not I'm not perfect. Um my mother thought that I was but you know that's that was her. Um but these are
the kinds of things that in a in any kind of relationship what I consider to be the most important element is is open communication. Open and truth true truth truth truthful communication. Thank you Dr.
Ward. >> Thank you Mr. Roseman. Anyone else? >> Okay. So, um we have some questions here from the audience. The first question that we had was about um for all the
candidates about pay. The range is going to be 90 to 150. That has to be negotiated with the contract. All right? So, it's not up to them um necessarily. has to be negotiated in the contract. Whoever gets hired, all right,
all that that's with like PTO, how much vacation they get, salary, all that's negotiated back and forth in the contract. Okay. Um, she took him away. She did take him away.
>> Yeah. Yeah. Can she Can you get her, please? Yeah. Yeah. >> Oh, did he? Okay. Uh, let's get number one out here. >> Yeah. Hector Hello. How you doing? These are questions from the audience.
>> Oh, good evening. >> The first one is uh tell me of a time how you resolved the city issue which consisted of immediate attention. Provide what was the outcome? >> Could you repeat that one more time? Tell me of of a time how you resolved a
city issue which was which was consistent was consistent of an immediate attention of immediate attention provide what was the outcome? >> Uh okay. Uh one idea that come comes to mind uh was uh I mentioned earlier about
uh contaminated parks in the city of Miami. Uh you know put this way working with one of the homeowner associations there that uh had uh that had one of those parks that was closed right before Christmas. So the question the question of of uh reaching out to neighbors uh
organizing a meeting with uh with neighbors of stakeholders at uh at the city hall uh kind of surprising the u the the local government there to actually uh to basically approve funds for immediate remediation. So I mean
actually put things into a capital uh an emergency capital improve uh uh yeah capital improvement plan uh to put it into that's one uh and then the um that those like that uh an idea an example like that is what comes to mind for me
um but if I was going to say uh uh after after the hurricanes um after some of the hurricanes where we've had we've had um substantial uh damage because of falling falling tree limbs. Uh besides just going out asking for people for
help, the the more import the more important thing is is actually powers out. Uh can how can people help coordinating with uh with the homeowner associations with uh local public safety and law enforcement? I mean these are we
we've grown up here in everyone if I grew up here in South Florida. So these are experiences that either in emergency situations or in the practical situations that I can that I can point to in regards to uh uh im immediiacy of of of getting to a solution.
>> Thank you very much. Um next question is how would you disclose any conflicts of interest and would you be able to perform your duties ethically in the event of any said conflicts? Uh well the f the the first uh first of
all conflict of interest is um if if there is a situation with a conflict of interest not that one comes to mind but I would uh I would consult with our attorney the the municipal attorney uh for what the guidelines are of whether something like a situation arises that
could be a conflict of interest uh and what what would be needed to uh uh avoid uh the uh appearance or because to me appearance of a conflict of interest. The appearance of impropriy is enough uh to that think it needs to be taken
seriously at that step. Uh but the the proper way to do that in a in a in a municipal government is take the advice of council. Uh so that's that's I hope that answers the question. Yeah. >> Very much. And the um next one second to
last uh did oh was asking did any applicants so did you go to the Elpertile website to view the manager's budget and reports to become more familiar with Elertile have you have you looked at the manager's budget and reports?
>> Yes. Yeah, I have. >> Okay. And the last one um are you the same Hector Roose that ran for governor of Florida? Uh, long story short, yes. >> Okay. All right. Thank you very much. Um, let's get number two. Thank you
everybody. >> Mr. Mayor, if I may, the first question that we're asking, do you think that that might be a little redundant because it it kind of lines up with the first one that the the clerk asked? >> Yeah. The tell me a time how you resolve
issue. >> I think it just kind of leads them down the path of telling us. They already told us. I got you. >> Okay. I think that might have been only for him also. So I think >> number two is not uh send out number
three. >> It's all good. Send out number three. >> Oh, number two's coming. All right. Hi, how you doing? >> Thank you. >> Good to see you. >> Great. How are you, man? >> Um, questions from the audience, from the residents. Uh, the first one for you is, what is the future you see for
Alberta? >> I think El Porto has a very very bright future. Uh I think it's going to take some leveraging both inside the organization
and outside. I think the ability to be able to partner to be able to bring federal, state, and local governments together in unity is going to be paramount. Uh I think working closely
with the council it's going to be a very very bright future. Uh I think Albertell is a quiet spoken gym that most people are really not aware of. U
it's golden. It's an opportunity. Uh I see progress. I see great things. And I would really like to be a part of that success and a part of that progress. Again, I want to be your next
El Porto manager. I will work within my power leveraging both internal and external motivating staff uh bringing together our partners bringing in additional funding. There's
a lot of untapped market for El Porto in philanthropic organizations, the federal government, Department of Justice. There is a lot of untapped opportunity for the market here. Again, it's an
unspoken gym. I would be delighted to join you. Um, I think there's a lot of opportunity here. There's a lot of opportunity for growth. Uh there's a lot of opportunity
uh to make El Porto our future, the future. And I think it's very bright. >> Thank you very much. Um two more. The second one is how would you disclose any conflicts of interest and would you be
able to perform your duties ethically in the event of any such conflicts? U any conflict there needs to be full disclosure. There needs to be full transparency. Um I come forward with complete
transparency. Uh quality decision making decision making based on facts. I think it's very important that all decisions are based on the facts at hand. >> Thank you very much. And your last
question is, have you been to the Albert website? Have you looked at or read the manager's budgets and reports? >> I'm sorry. Would you repeat that again, please? >> Have you been to the Albert website um and looked at the manager's budgets and reports? Have you looked at the budget or any of the manager reports? >> Yes, I have. Okay.
>> And again, as I indicated during my first presentation, I would like to be the first to provide you guys with a budget amendment. It could be through a $5,000 donation in
terms of reducing the salary for the role. In other words, uh instead of accepting the minimum salary of $90,000, I can accept $85,000. Again, this is my life's work. This is my passion. This is stuff that I enjoy
doing. I enjoy bringing in partners professionally, networking, adding quality of life for the residents here of Elbert Hall. I have watched the budget very closely. I think there is significant progress that can be made in
the budget. I think the budget uh can be quite frankly reduced in some of the budget line items if you looked at them and if you work with the public I'm sorry you work with the program directors u there's opportunity there for us to tighten our belt uh there's
opportunity there for us to make additional progress with the current budget there's opportunity there to bring in foundation money there is opportunity there to bring in federal money there There is opportunity there to bring in state money, but you need to
leverage those partnerships. Uh yes, I am familiar with the budget and I would really be delighted to work with the um the staff on amending the budget. >> Thank you very much. Thank you. You're
welcome. We got number three. >> Thank Thank you guys again and thank you and thanks for having me. >> Thank you very much. Give me a minute. How are you? >> I'm good. >> Um, two quick questions from the residents. The first one is how would you disclose any conflicts of interest
and would you be able to perform your duties ethically in the in the event of any such conflict? >> Um the first thing I would do is um remain transparent to notify the council and notify the resident if needed that I know this person or I know of this
person working at the state attorney's office. We do we are the first one in contact when someone is arrested. So sometimes unfortunately I would know these people sometimes. So when you do that, you just notify your supervisor um and let them know that you do know the person and you won't handle the case.
>> Thank you very much. And the last question is um have you viewed any have you viewed the budget or have you read any of the manager reports that are on the website? >> Absolutely. >> Okay. Thank you very much. >> Thank you.
Hello, Miss Driver. Mr. Mayor, >> how you doing? >> All right. So, two quick questions. The first one is how would you disclose any conflicts of interest and what would you and and would you be able to perform your duties ethically in the event of any such conflict? any conflicts interest for me?
>> Yeah. How would you disclose any conflict of interest that you have for you and um how would you be able to perform like your duty with that conflict being >> um I could I would disclose them I guess in writing and
I don't believe I have any so but >> if it ever came up I think they were asking like if anything ever came up while you had the position a conflict of interest like how would you disclose it and how would you know how would it affect your job performance? how would you be able to still perform your job at
>> it depends on um when it was so if it was something that was outside of a meeting then I would advise um I would advise you as mayor that I had a conflict for an item that was coming up on the agenda for an example um and um if it was in a meeting I would
immediately disclose it and probably you know excuse myself um so I it depends on when the conflict arised and what it was. >> Thank you very much. And the last one is um the budget. Have you viewed the budget and have you viewed any of the manager reports?
>> Yes and yes. >> Thank you very much. How you doing? Um, Mr. Roseman. All right. So, the two quick questions for you. This is from our residents. The first one is um if you had a conflict of interest, how would you disclose it and
how would you go about performing your duties ethically with that conflict of interest should one arise? >> Well, this this will be a very easy um problem to have. Um let's assume that there is a the council chooses a
consultant or a contractor um with whom I have had dealings with. I would, you know, let you know. I says, you know, full disclosure, this is my uh cousin, whatever. And uh so I'm not going to
even participate in any discussion regarding, you know, his ability to to do this work. Um so that's this is ethical issues are are very easy for me to to address because the the
environment in which I have worked most of my life has been one where those concerns are very very important. So I make sure that even when I'm talking with my family uh my brother and sister
that you know I keep the information uh confidential because I don't want to to soil um stain the process by sharing with someone that should not have been knowledge made aware of of those
decision. So >> okay thank you. And the last question is um have you looked at the budget um and have you read any of the manager's reports? >> Um to be very honest I I um
I I wanted to because I was curious but I abstained because I wanted to come to you with a with a a pure heart. I didn't want to come in with any kind of um of um bias of what are things being spent
etc etc. I did not look at the budget the first time that I was here. U I knew that we had not done an audit and that was the only thing that concerned me. But I figured that there will be time to address whatever is in the paper is already been spent or committed to and I
said this I want to come in with with the enthusiasm of tackling whatever problem I may find. So um I have I chose not to to get too involved into get too far into the weeds. so to speak. Um, so that I
could um be enthusiastic and full of energy to to do this work. >> Thank you very much. >> Thank you. >> All right. council um thoughts uh comments
>> for me there are two u vi first of all great interviews all around but for me there are two viable candidates that seem to have the mastery to be able to show up on day one and kind of do the job and that would be David Roseman and Kamitra Driver um so I think at least
for me we can narrow the conversation down to a selection between those two. >> Anyone else? >> Yes, I actually um I actually agree with uh Council Person uh Martin. Um it does seem that as far as looking for someone
who can step in to fully function on day one. I do agree that the two candidates would be uh Miss Driver and Mr. Roseman. Um I will say that for me I do put uh Miss Driver and as the first choice and
Rosemont as a second. Um, I feel uh exceptionally comfortable with her ability to uh stand here and answer every uh every question posed to her in a
in a clearly experienced and uh ready manner uh while also being able to handle that kind of on the spot. So I would say that I'm I'm most I'm most uh most impressed with M driver so far.
>> As a if I may as a second to that I completely agree with that the nuance way in which she answers those questions. So it shows a significant mastery on the topic even when it came down to answering about the whether or not she had a conflict. the way she parsed through that question as far as
when it happened and what it would trigger. I mean, just beautifully done and the type of uh leadership that we need. I also really like her commitment to being open to residents and having an open door policy. I think that that's something that we've been missing.
That's been the source of a lot of the conflict and angst and I get that and I think that that is a solution to that problem as well. Um, so I agree with you that I would place her at number one. >> And I will add just one more addition to
along the line of of what you're saying in terms of her um nuanced ability to answer the question. So uh you know even the even the question regarding the agenda item tonight which is borderline whether or not we should be
presenting that question to candidates tonight. Um her response I believe was the most professionally competent answer um in that she gave us the answer without
stepping into the quagmire itself by saying explore all solutions. So um uh I know that there was another candidate who also talked about exploring all solutions. Um but um but the way she put it was was note not noteworthy and
impressive. >> Anyone else? >> We know that David was with us once, right? Yeah, we know that David was with us. So it's nothing negative about him. It's just that the his presentation was what it was.
And as as my colleague just indicated, it'd be interesting to see how I would like to see how um Miss Driver conducts. We know what David can do. We know that he's available. We know. We know. We know. But her her
presentation told me that just give her. >> All right. So after the uh 20 plus phone calls I made to the qualified people uh at those who are trying out for this job. Um
these two are the most expensive their own words out of their own mouths. Um and I'm a little worried right now because one Camitra did quit her job as deputy manager after five months because it was a long drive from homestead to to Belgade. And just to let you know,
that's a long drive that's not in city traffic. Most people don't want to drive in city traffic. They'd rather have a long easy drive than city traffic. So now we're looking at the same exact thing about to happen where she drives from homestead to help her talent. She hasn't witnessed all the traffic she's about to have. So if she already has a
pattern where she has quit a job after five months as deputy manager and suddenly she's going to another job that's also very far away, how are we going to get a guarantee that we're not going to have to do this whole process again in six months? So that for me is a
no-go. It's not even a possibility. Second is uh you know David is very well knowledgeable when it comes to the city but the fact that he had an impass with the council would not speak about the impass means that there is something else that could possibly be being an impass with the council at the current
time. So then further he was not caught up with um our budgets or issues or manager records and it was for emotional reasons and I think that the people who showed up today and were caught up with the agenda they caught up with the budget the manager records these people
already invested into Delportal and they showed that I think it's important that whoever we choose that they are completely knowledgeable about what is the current situation. Do I have a motion? >> Yes, I I do have a comment. Uh the first candidate that we saw was a good
candidate, but he forgot to neglected to register his own business that he claims to be his primary source of income from 2011 to now. Uh the city manager role requires you to remember lots of things. Um, and this should be an important
thing that he would remember in his own life. So, that gives me pause. I think our second candidate was great. She's young. Um, I skipped over the second candidate. Second candidate was great, but his experience is localized to
housing. I question mark about that. Third candidate is really great. She's young. Would love to see her in another capacity. Maybe if we build out the staff for the city. Uh, Miss Driver, as we said, was just an impeccable candidate. And I understand that 130 mi is quite different from 30. So with that
being said, I would make a motion that we extend the interim city manager position to Miss Kitra Driver tonight. >> I would second that motion. >> We have a motion. We have a second. Madam clerk, please have roll call, please. >> Roll call. Council person Winters.
>> No. >> Council person lifewood ward. >> Council person. >> Yes. Vice Mayor Martin, >> definitely. Yes. >> Mayor Nickerson, >> yes. >> Motion passes four to one. >> Thank you very much. Can you please tell
the candidates to come outside? Um, first I just want to say I want to thank all of you all for coming out. I want to thank all the candidates. Um, all of you all had very impressive resumes and your interviews were very very impressive. Um, appreciate all
We don't take that lightly. We know it's late. We know that you guys have been here and you guys have been in that room most of the night and we appreciate you guys taking your night out. Um, we've decided to go with Miss Driver. Congratulations. We appreciate you. You and I will have a discussion. You'll
have discussion also with the attorney and with the clerk. Um, and so we'll start to sort things out in in that in that aspect. you all. Thank you all very very very much. And this might not be the last time we see you all. You never know what the future holds in other
capacities. And so you all keep doing what you're doing. You have a bright future ahead. You have a wonderful history with us. We appreciate all the work you've done and we and and you keep doing that consulting and keep keep holding those
managers and those mayor's feet to the fire. Maya, mayor, you need to um as a council decide what you're going to do to move forward to negotiate with your choice. >> Yeah, I'm going to I'm going to. So, we just want to say we appreciate all of
you. Um please stay with us. The four of you guys are free to go or you're welcome to stay till the end of the meeting. It's up to you. All right. But we really appreciate you all. Thank you very very very much. So when it comes to the next step in the procedure, you
guys, we need to talk about the contract and negotiating the contract. Attorney Geller, if you want to jump in here, you can jump in also. I would say so normally it's the mayor that so it has to be a council person who's a point person negotiating the contract.
I believe that my vice mayor is the intellectual heavyweight here on this council and and if she doesn't mind, uh, Vice Mayor Martin, if nobody has an objection, I think you should be the one to negotiate
the contract. Um, >> I'd be happy to. >> All right. Thank you very much, Madam Vice Mayor. >> But we're all the intellectual weight on the council, man. >> I appreciate you. I appreciate you. So, um, so Clerk Jacobe, Attorney Geller, you guys get in touch with Vice Mayor Martin. Attorney Geller, is there anything you want to add with the procedure?
>> No, sir. I think that's fine. The only thing I would say is depending on if we can get it done very quickly. I mean, there is a a legal holiday tomorrow, very important day, Veterans Day, but it's at least possible that we might be
able to get the contract on the agenda for the meeting next week, the regular council meeting. That would certainly, if possible, that would be our goal. Having said that, I also recognize that
our selection needs to be able to get whatever it is that we do to her council for review. So, I don't want to promise it, but we'll certainly work with the vice mayor to see if that can be >> I'll make myself available. So, I'm willing to move as fast as you would
like. >> Yeah. And remember, the good thing about it is, right, you guys can do this by Zoom. So, you know, it doesn't have to be in person. You guys are like kicking this off. All right, sounds good. All right, you guys. Um, let's move on to the the G1. We reversed the F1, the G1.
So, the G1. So, this is the resolution. Attorney Gella, do you have that in front of you? I can bring it over to you. >> All right. Uh this is now the G item previously after resolution of the village council of the village of Elertal, Florida of Miami date county, Florida approving change order number
one in connection with professional engineering services for the Horus man middle school safety roundabout project number 21-2211 for the village of El Patel Miami day county providing for incorporation of recitals providing for an effective
date. >> All right. Um, can I get uh Mr. Thampy and Mr. Hubio up here just in case any questions arise? Um, you guys, we as a council, we went through this. Um, there were a lot of
questions that came up. Um, we're going to see if we can get more clarification tonight, but what I want to really focus on is we kind of have just a decision to make. All right, which is number one, do we want to move forward with it or not? And are there any outstanding questions?
And is there any way to find a way that this can be repaired to the point where we're comfortable with this in any sort of way? It's kind of like the three outstanding areas I kind
of see. Attorney Geller, if you want to chime in. >> Yes, sir. And let me just make a correction, although I it reads that way. These are actually for contractual services. The money is not going to the engineers. The money is going to the contractor to complete the work. So, let
me just say, mayor, I mean, I understand that some people wish that this project had not been entertained and some people wish this project had not been done, but the council voted to do that in 2019. I wasn't here either at
that time. Um, and it's taken a long time and it's close to being done. I do have to say to the council, whether or not you think that there should be some further action, whether or not you think
that we should seek any kind of cost sharing, reimburse, or anything of the kind. This is $166,000 60 or 67. We will lose
$300,000 in a grant if this project is not completed by I don't know the exact date, but it's in the month of December. We already have the low bidder here. The second bidder on the project was
as much higher as I think the amount of this change order and they would have charged the same amount to get this completed. So our ability to rebid it not only is not physically in existence,
but there's no reason to think we would get a better price rebidding it. What we cannot do is leave a street that's been torn up and that's being in the process of being
restored half finished from a liability standpoint. Any car driving through this intersection that had a problem had damage to the vehicle, much less some injury because we didn't complete a
project is a horrible liability for us. Now, I don't know how we got here. I wasn't here when it was voted. I'm not sure why it took so long. Uh there's a lot of factors, but we cannot leave a street
unfinished and we can't cost ourselves double the cost of this change order by losing a grant. We also had a completion date from the
contractor of December 8th. We hoped they might be able to do it sooner. if they're not done timely, depending on if that needs an adjustment because it's now a couple of weeks since we were supposed to approve this.
>> Jump in one second. Um, Attorney Geller, um, I need to extend the meeting. You guys are past 11. That's why I was saying time. >> Um, do I have a motion to extend? >> I move to extend the meeting to 11:30.
>> Do I have a second? >> Second. All in favor say I. >> I. >> Say nay. Please continue. >> So just to finish, we I don't know if that December 8th date is still applicable. If the contractor does not finish timely
based on whatever the time extension is. Hopefully maybe they can keep to the same date. They will pay us liquidated damages. They have to finish. But council, we we cannot leave the street
unfinished. We we can't do that. Whatever else we might contemplate, and I'm happy to discuss that individually with you on the record, I've talked to some of our citizens about it after the last meeting and I'm happy to continue
doing that. I understand there's confusion and there's, you know, unhappiness, but we can't undo the project. We can't not finish it. Please protect the tax dollars of this village
by voting to complete this project. I don't make a plea like that ever, but the liability to us is just too great for me not to speak on. >> Amen. Uh CFO Tottenfell, uh I know that there was questions last
time about where like where is this coming like the money for this is coming from and just explain how the CITT and all that. >> CFO Talenfeld, uh to answer your question in short, mayor, uh the CITT funds are funded by the county. Uh these
are funds that are allocated uh annually to the county from from sorry from the county to the village which is allocated on that 8020 split 80% going to uh transportation 20% to transit. Um, as it relates to the specific project,
um, the initial cost was 252,000. Um, speaking from memory, I believe, uh, we had budgeted 320,000 on the original budget. Um, leaving that placeholder for a possible change order. Lo and behold, we had one. Um, as far as the answer as
to where the additional funds are going to come to pay for the uh, excess, it's going to come from the CIT funds, which is Miami Dade County. Um, it'll probably take the village a year to recoup the excess funding based on the amount of
money that we had in reserve, what we've collected against what we've actually had to spend. Um, but uh to answer everybody's question, the funds do come from CIT from the county. Nothing related to Adrian or real estate taxes.
>> That's that's good to understand because I think a lot of people think um this is taxpayer dollars when it's not taxpayer dollars. Now, it doesn't mean that the CITT funds couldn't go for something else if this didn't exist, but just to be clear, this is not taxpayer dollars where they'd be coming from. Uh,
questions, comments from the council. You also have Mr. Rubio, Mr. Ty. I mean, I guess my only comment is, um, you know, I've had some time since the last meeting to, you know, talk myself off the ledge basically. Um, but uh I
agree with, you know, I I agree with the the attorney's assessment that um that uh this is going to be a hard pill to swallow, but um it's got to be it's got to be dealt with and um and there will
be opportunities to to further develop that that intersection, that entire avenue more to our liking as we go forward in the future. But but it does seem that um we need to uh address this
uh even though it's not an outcome that we uh that that we're looking forward to, but we we certainly need to be um uh getting moving forward here. >> Anyone else question, comments from the council? >> I don't have a question. I just I just
did what what my my colleague said. >> Thank you very much. Any other questions or comments? >> So, council person bomb, I agree with you, but we we cannot develop the intersection in the future according to the contract they signed with Miami Dade. Is that correct?
We can't add trees. We can't change the development of it. We basically stuck with that design because we made that contract with them. >> Yes. You made the commitment not to put a a landscape island in the middle in the middle of that roundabout. >> So, we can't do any kind of changes properly. It's >> a county road. Yes.
>> Um Let me say counciloman um we don't have a right to make changes but there's nothing that says that we cannot approach the county if we have some reasonable
design alternative for further future changes. The my understanding is the concern about landscaping in the middle has to do with visibility and I might c certainly happy to be corrected if that's incorrect.
It's it's for large vehicles using that and and first responder vehicles. But that that said, if we, you know, wanted to do something >> that did not pose any possible traffic or safety hazard, you know, the county
has been I mean, they're now funding to a lot of money this septic to sewer that we're trying to do. if we you know so we obviously and I I don't like to be unduly complimentary but it is a fact
that our mayor as president of the Dade league of cities enjoys a particularly good relationship with the county mayor who has the ability to direct staff. So, I I wouldn't go as far as to say there
is no possibility that we could have any further improvements, particularly if it wasn't right in the center in the island, but maybe things could be done around the edges. It is certainly
something we're entitled to inquire about. And while we don't have the ability to force it, we certainly can request something that's reasonable if as we move forward that's something that the council and the citizens want to
see. >> So the the statement is illogical about plans for safety because simply putting grass in the medians was denied which does not stop traffic, does not stop buses, but we filled it with concrete, right? >> Oh, pavers.
Well, on the the medians on in between the roads on the outside of the inside concrete, the medians over there are just filled with concrete, not grass. But grass wouldn't preclude a bus from driving or it would wouldn't cause a hazard. But we're not allowed to have that either. Correct.
>> It'd be torn up if if you have vehicles going through it. If you had to have vehicles going through it, it'd be torn up over time. >> Pavers are typically not concrete. The idea is that pavers typically are used because they are permeable and that is a
little different than >> No, it's solid concrete. Per it's in the center that is papers on the outside of it in the medians. Those are all solid concrete. >> Yes. It's ugly as sin. It's it's worst thing you've ever seen. The middle is not bad looking with the papers, but the outside is just concrete. And I don't
see why we made a contract with the city saying we won't put grass in. I mean, talk about Tree City USA having no plants right there in that section. They can traffic department. >> No, this is not your time to speak.
>> Their traffic department >> has certain things that they demand for safety reasons. But again, as long as it's not just grass that would be torn up, could we possibly use pavers to
replace some of the concrete? as long as it was still a hard surface that would not end up being nothing but ugly mud, which would be what would happen if vehicles during wet rainy season were consistently running over just grass. I
would think that as long as we had a sufficiently hard uh but possibly permeable surface that we could at least get some consideration for that. I certainly can't guarantee that. >> That would be lovely. I am saying that
it is possible that we could get what's done in in the island to be possible. >> Unfortunately, they'd have to tear out the entire things. They've already been filled up with concrete to the top and we don't have to money or we don't want to spend the money to redo those exterior concrete sections. But I agree with you. It would be nice to have
pavers there, but I don't think we're going to pay for that. Can I just mention something? I I do love um Councilman Winters. You're always thinking of like innovative things to do and and I think that that's great. Um and we need to continue to
explore those things. Um but I do want to take us back to the decision that's at the core and I want to do it before time runs out. Um I do take the attorneys council very seriously that right now what we do have is a significant liability just kind of out there in the middle of the city. I've
seen the emails from residents who um are finding it difficult to traverse the area who have already found this to be hazardous. I've or or a possibility for it to be hazardous. I take that seriously. I think we are in the position that we're in right now and we
can continue to discuss the innovative solutions to bring it closer to what um you might think is aesthetically pleasing. However, as it relates to the issue at hand, um I do think we do have to do all we can to keep our residents safe and insulate the city from
liability and also um protect those funds that might be lost. So, in that vein, I would like to make a motion to approve change order number one in connection with professional engineering services for the horse man middle school safety roundabout >> construction services.
>> Thank you so much. >> Um I'm going to go to the audience, but do I have a second? I will. Yep. No, that's right. Like forward seconds. >> Like for award second the motion. Okay. Um let's open up to the audience you guys for questions, comments. You guys are comfortable. >> Say your name and address for the
record. Floor is yours. Are we are we good with this mic? Are we working here? Okay. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Uh the mayor and I had a conversation about uh about this project. Um, I don't know if anybody in the council uh has visited the site in
the last week. Um, but uh I I was um I got a I got a message from from a resident who told me that I should go back up there. I hadn't been there in a while. Um
basically telling me that there was a uh a sort of a un ideal version of symmetry in the completion of this circle as well as uh what one of the workers then told me was going to be 18 largecale
decorative lights. So I didn't realize that the circle was going to have an electric utility component on top of the engineering and road construction uh component. Um I I humbly uh disagree
with with Mr. Geller, who I like a lot. And uh I also respect I also respect I mean it. I also respect I also respect uh Mr. Toenfeld's comments, but I think that that something was omitted there. CITT funds.
No, they are not adverum tax dollars, but they are money that is allocated to small villages just like ours to deal with pedestrian transportation. the 8020 split that was alluded to. We get about
100 what is it about 105,000 a year something like that about 105,000 a year this project minus the FDOT grant of around 300,000 is now at $730,000.
So 730 minus 300 equals 4 plus years of CITT funds that we're not using on any of the other pedestrian 80% or transportation 20%. And the previous years, I'll I'll I'll I'll I'll
contextualize the previous years that we have that were input in the legislation as written that was passed in July. That was from years that we did not get because we were not in compliance. We
did not give our audit correctly for the CITT to fund us. So Miami date said until you give us the papers we need then we cannot fund you. So that $30,000
some odd dollars from the CITT was money that we could have used in an 8020 split for transportation or for pedestrian improvements. So
that's a lot of money that we could have used for other things. So I appreciate the mayor and there was another council person who did uh communicate with me. They were interested in the emails of the public
records that I had requested. I made the request in August. I received the request incomplete about a week ago. So, I did mention it when I when I uh la last week. Um I thanked those of you who inquired about
it. That that list of emails indicating so many things that are really kind of cause a lot of questions in my mind. also however indicated that Miami Dade County rejected our previous
requests for speed mitigation because speeding was not an issue. Now I know that some people I live on the west side every once in a while we hear it in the middle of the night somebody's got a new car and they got to stretch its legs. It might be you council person or I I don't
know probably not this time. So, we do we do hear it every once in a while, but it's not it's never been during school hours where things are under control. It has never been that. So, they wouldn't even give us four stop signs at that
intersection because they said that we did not meet the requirements for four stop signs that according to them only two stop signs. So, we had an opportunity, however, if speeding was of
such an issue to put a patrol officer there and to cite anybody who's speeding unreasonably or or whatever the criteria would be. We did not do that. We have never done that. I've at least I've never seen it in any mornings that I've
gone by. But that could have been money. And if safety were an issue, gosh, that would have gotten it through people's heads by hitting them in the pocketbook that they should not be speeding there. So then we through the leadership of
some of the people who are on the deis were able to get our speed limit in the village reduced down to 25 miles per hour. The traffic and transit study done by Miami Dade was prior
to getting the speed limit down, which means it's theoretically even less dangerous now. So, in interest of wrapping things up, I got five t-minus 5 seconds. Four, three, two. And in districts of uh wrapping things up, I would suggest that you guys think
about this as what is the quickest between point A and point B in terms of finances. I have never known a public works project that hasn't gone way way way over b over budget. And when I read that the traffic circles of a larger
size, larger intersections in South Dade and in North Miami were under $400,000, that gives me pause. I think that if traffic and speeding is really the issue, and there's nothing
wrong with wanting to beautify the the Thank you, Vice Mayor. Okay. >> There's nothing wrong with wanting to beautify the village. nothing wrong at all, but I would argue that it's not a priority if we are
running at deficit or if we've got six years of CIT money that could be used elsewhere than on this especially when the result and this is the penultimate thing when the result is if I may show you
what it looks like right now. >> Thank you. No, you can go. I I live next to it. So, >> would you like me to show you the pictures that I took there? >> Yeah. You can see off symmetry. >> I was there. >> The inner circle is about 4 feet, maybe
5t further north than would be the center of the intersection. So, I say that we do not should not put good money after bad. I thank you for your indulgence, Vice Mayor. Saw you. >> I appreciate you. >> There's the video. I was there. So the
the the the video does not exactly show um but I know you I know what you're saying. Anyway, thank you for your time. I think it it I think it would be much better and much more effective if we had cobblestones in that intersection the way we do on like
87th and Northeast 3rd or Northeast 4th where anybody who drives on 87th slows down especially if they've got expensive eggs in their car from Publix. Thank you for your time.
Um, anybody else know it? >> Say your name and address for the record, please. >> 173 Northwest 88th Street. Um, 12 years. I've been there since I was 12 years old. Since I was 12 years old, right? Okay. So, um, roundabouts here. We have
to pay for the roundabout no matter what happens because it's already in construction. And like I said last last meeting, if your house isn't if you constructing your house and they the contractor say you need more money, you got to give them more money or you don't got no house that's finished. You got to stay in Abri. So we got to give the
people their money. So you know, thank you for being here again so that we can view you just a little bit. Um but every time we talk about the roundabout, some of us care about what how pretty it is and how beautified it is. We don't have
any money. you get to interrupt me anytime you want to cuz I interrupted you and fairness is fair and I love it. So, you know, you keep coming at me and we going to have a good time about it. But I'mma keep talking cuz I get to talk now cuz I couldn't talk before you said, but I'mma talk now. In fact, I only got
up to talk now, sir, because this is my time to talk. So, I get to talk about it. So, the fact that we want to beautify, we want to spend more money on something that everybody is complaining about, we spending too much money on, the contractor said we needed more money. And then no matter how much we
talk about it, no matter how many times people are like, "Oh, we really didn't want it. We didn't care for it. We didn't really want it in the first place." Hey, how are you doing? He's so cute. I love him. Right. What you call it? Um, you just keep talking about beautifying it. When we beautify it, we
have to spend more money. I don't know if we keep saying the same things over and over again. We're in a deficit. You want us to give salaries of $67,000 and beautify the roundabout and have a roundabout. You want it a lot, son. We
little and we little elort 12 by four. They sell me 12x4. I think they told me we 12 by4. And you know, but here we are again. And every time we talk about this, you come with the same thing. Let's make it pretty.
We didn't want it in the first place. The city didn't want it. One of the residents said she she went to Miami Shores Council and you know they talked about it for five seconds and laughed at us. Laughed at us, but you want to beautify it.
How how beautiful you want it to be. I'll go put a flower pot there if you want to. We can make that pretty. I'll put faux flower pots if you need to. Because if you want to beautify it right now, you gonna have to beautify it by yourself. We don't have enough money to beautify it. That is a problem in
Elportal. Now, I saw beautiful things in my little trail. There's a little trail. I saw beautiful things. Lots of things added. But the people who are flooded and still have holes in their streets, still flooded and have holes in their street. And you want to beautify the roundabout.
We need money to pave the roundabout. Not beautify it. To pave it. That's what we need money for. That's what we talking about. And every time we talk about it, you talk about beautifying it. That's my time. It's up. I don't want to beautify. Not a dag on thing, but I will
put a two flower powder too if you need me to. >> Anyone else for um public comment? >> Okay, bringing it back to the council. Um we do have A motion uh moved by M uh Vice Mayor Martin. It was uh second by council person life for
Ward. Are there any last comments or questions from the council? >> Hearing seeing none, madam clerk, uh may I have a roll call? >> Roll call. Council person Winters. >> No. >> Council person Lightoot Ward. >> Council person Bomb.
>> Yes. >> Vice Mayor Martin. >> Yes. >> Mayor Nickerson. >> No. Motion passes three to two. >> Thank you guys. Um, do I have a do I have a motion to adjurnn? >> Moved by council person. Do I have a second?
>> Second. >> Second by Vice Mayor Martin. All in favor say I. I. All oppose say nay. The special council meeting for Monday, November 10th is adjourned at 11:30 p.m.