all right good evening everyone and welcome to the BCC's um regular meeting of May 1st 2025 uh please
turn your cell phones to vibrate silence or offsetting the board of county commissioners allows for any person to speak regarding any item on the agenda limited to three minutes unless otherwise determined by the chairperson depending on the number of speakers tonight um we'll we may have to look at that to allow sufficient time for all speakers speaker shall refrain from abuse abusive or profane remarks disruptive outbursts protests or other conduct which interferes with the orderly conduct of the meeting upon completion of the public comment period discussions is limited to board members and questions raised by the board
um Commissioner Stroberger you have the invocation yes sir pastor Gary um Porter please please rise let's pray heavenly Father in the mighty and wonderful name of Jesus we approach your throne tonight and we thank you i thank you for each one of these elected officials that are here tonight serving you i ask that you give them a spirit of unity and wisdom and understanding to guide and direct the business affairs of this county father
God galvanize us to move forward that we might be prosperous in all of our ways utilize all of our understandings to your glory and to your honor we submit oursel to you we are servants of the kingdom not just the kingdom of this world but your kingdom we give oursel to that attention so we thank you we honor you and especially this day the national day of prayer we worship you for who you are and for what you've given us in this great nation as we celebrate you in Jesus' name we pray amen amen everyone please join me in the pledge thank you very much pastor
i pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all thank you pastor okay uh Commissioner Bay are there any items to add to the agenda no sir commissioner May no sir mr chairman Commissioner Stroberger no sir commissioner Hopper no sir i don't have any either all right can I get an adoption to move Mr sham is there a second second please
vote all right we'll do a hand vote just because I think we could have a lot of speakers tonight a motion passes five to zero commissioner Barry commissioner's forum yes sir thank you Mr chairman i'll be very brief i want to uh congratulate Tate Baseball last week they won a best two out of three against Jacksonville Beach Fletcher and moved on to uh the regional quarterfinals this week to play BU Holtz so I wish them uh wish them the best of luck they lost the first game last night play again this evening and I want to wish uh uh good luck and best fortunes to Northview softball tonight they play at Jay for the District 1 Rural Championship um the two weeks
uh two out of the last three weekends we've got to uh gotten to take part in uh some competitions with the Scammy County Public School District and uh want to congratulate Keith Leonard on you know uh coming to the close of what I think's been a very good school year but uh two weeks ago there was a Sunshine State math competition that was held at Washington High School and this past weekend was a Battle of the Books competition also held at Washington High School um hundreds of uh hundreds of young people as well as hundreds of uh educators and teachers and uh sponsors that work
with the young people after school um I doubt there's a real uh uh any overtime or additional pay for those sponsors that work with uh that work with the readers and the math uh uh competitors um and assistant superintendent Denny Wilson who many of us are friends with was there to present the uh you know winning young people and winning teams and uh but they were uh lovely events to be a part of and uh like I said I think Keith's wrapping up a you know a good successful uh school year and
look forward to uh our continuing partnership with them on you know multiple different levels thank you thank you Commissioner Barry commissioner May thank you Mr chairman i I appreciate it first I certainly want to uh thank you Mr chairman and um Commissioner um Stroberger for supporting the Rosemont Johnson um they they were in public form and uh this morning uh I want to thank the clerk uh for I did not know what the host committee was and to our attorney i got it now and so it's going
to be um an opportunity with when you have the ROC the Navy the Park Rangers and this entire community uh recognizing someone uh who at the age of 15 went into the United States military and lost his life saving three other people who didn't even look like him that was not of the same complexion of him uh but um went in and got one two and on the third person lost his life uh and now we have Johnson Beach which is named after him and so we certainly uh encourage people to
attend this Saturday at 10 o'clock i know two of my colleagues have already indicated that they will be there uh but what an issue and for my parents my parents didn't have an opportunity to go to Pensacola Beach they went to Johnson Beach because it was the colors only beach uh and I see Irma here and Miss Whimmer and all those in the Purito Chamber thank you for your efforts and thank you for your work and recognizing the great contribution of Rosemont Johnson and uh back in those days we couldn't afford to go to the beach so they went to Johnson Beach and
uh today uh I don't know if it's a tariff or a tax or a cost uh but it cost 20 plus dollars uh to get in to go to Johnson Beach uh but on this Saturday it will be free to all to recognize the great contributions of a veteran American hero a war hero and someone who sacrificed his life and so we certainly appreciate West Marino uh Allison uh and uh Miss Childers for help in making sure that those people will be fed uh this weekend certainly want to recognize I see some familiar faces
uh there i see my dear friend Eric Stevenson the best attorney in the world i call on often because I sit in this seat uh he still charges me but it's good to know that he's attending our meeting and to council person Allison Patton thank you for seeing it and uh Steve I still got it taught me to learn to count to three and that's Wilson Robertson uh Commissioner Robertson thank you for being here i know there's an issue that you probably will address but it's uh great to see all of those and to all of our public safety our paramedics EMTs uh there was a call in my district
um this past week and with you guys I did not make a call but uh the response back that I got uh from my constituents was how concerned and how quickly you responded uh to their situation so thank you so much Mr chair thank you Commissioner May and I'm I just noticed Councilwoman Patton i'm sorry I didn't notice i also saw Commissioner Robertson in here uh welcome welcome good to see you sorry I didn't announce that all right Commissioner Stroberger yeah uh last week uh the homeowners
association uh homebuilders association celebrated their 75th anniversary i was there along with um commissioners Hoffberger and May and it was a good event um good food um I had a town hall this week my first well it was not really my first one i think it really counts as my second one and it was a good turnout it's good time uh for me because um they didn't set me on fire and they didn't set the church on fire which is a good thing because there's not a firehouse nearby um which we're working on but good results I think and I think uh I got a lot of feedback from that the Chappie
James Flight Academy grand opening I went to that um this week too and that was that's always a good event i love going to that because I get to see um u Chappie James' grandkids Frank uh maybe Britney's gonna be there next time or that's a cousin and then there's uh and Jamie i get to see them joe Denman's always there i love seeing those folks i hope that the next time I see them that we're much further down and we've actually started breaking ground and building that uh outdoor
museum navy days begins next week um the 9th 10th and 11th the 9th is the u uh what is it the 9th is the gouta that's in the evening so I'll be going to that and um there'll be others there lots of others uh the 9th uh the next day on the weekend Saturday is the um the run uh runwalk uh that begins at 8:00 and then there's the uh I'm sorry I'm having
stupid attack let's see uh then it's the And then the parade follows that and then there's there's more to follow um this is our second annual Navy Days i hope everyone comes out and checks it out um so when I arrived in Pensacola I made friends with a gentleman named Frank Burko um at 85 I thought Frank was probably the most entrepreneurial person I'd ever met and and I remember in my NBA classes meeting young entrepreneurs none of them compared to
this guy this guy had a motor um I found out that he passed away about a month ago so my my thoughts and Gina's thoughts are with with Frank's wife Leavonne my last thing is my favorite thing and that was the mullet toss last Saturday i was bragging about my toss to uh Commissioner Barry earlier um I was out there throwing with Commissioner Kohler i threw your time's up
yeah was it i was out throw there throwing with Commissioner Kohler um and uh it ended up I ended up throwing 24 ft further than him a mammoth toss there's a video too i uh I think I heard someone they compare me to a combination of Willie Mays and Dan Marino anyway I will present the video when it's when necessary thank you i want to congratulate Commissioner Stroberger but as a good
politician it wasn't his district so I I had to let him win but Commissioner May I heard the may I heard the mayor i threw y'all by many yards nobody was paying attention to him yeah wait was he there thanks Commissioner Hopper good old Florida um good evening everyone and thank you for joining us tonight i know many of you are here to support our first responders and advocate for a consistent MSBU your presence shows our shared commitment to ensuring that every
person in our community receives life-saving help in an emergency supporting the dedicated professionals who provide these critical services is paramount moving forward with a consistent MSBU shows that we are one county one community and the best way forward is together this morning at the committee meeting of the whole we gained support to build four new fire stations and add additional living quarters to another station these stations will ensure that when a resident faces a fire a crew is ready to respond many of these are in areas that people are unable
to get insurance or pay 30 to 60% more for their homeowners insurance with Florida's high insurance cost as county commissioners we must do all that we can to mitigate these expenses to our residents yesterday IHMC hosted myself and some leadership from public safety where we met a world-renowned leader in traumaare i am proud to share that many lifesaving cuttingedge practices are already in place here in Escambia County thanks to our EMS team with new leadership including our recently hired medical director we are poised to deliver even better prehosp care leading to improved CA
patient outcomes i am especially proud of the progress that our EMS department has made in the last eight months finally with public safety always at the forefront I've been reassured by our county administrator West that the $10 million from the general fund that has been subsidizing fire that will be replaced by the MSBU will continue to support our first responders these funds are slated for better pay and more resources for our local law enforcement ensuring they have what they need to keep us safe thank you for your support and together we will build a stronger and safer community thank you Commissioner Hoffberger i got a few things tonight and I hope I don't get
emotional but I may um but I won't start out like that first thing I want to do is um one of the great things I get to do every day is come to work with people I enjoy working with and um there's nothing greater than to have a job where you get to come to work and you enjoy working with the people and and my team Dorothy and Cheryl we have a great time but Cheryl I've known for um gosh probably 25 years and most maybe I Yeah for a long time she knew me when I was uh cleaning bathrooms and scrubbing necks and then I came back to beer boss and now she works for me
now again but her birthday was this week and she doesn't drive at night but um I'm glad to have on our team and happy birthday to her this week is or next week is nurses week and for anyone all the nurses that we have on the county especially the ones in the correctional um that work in the jail with the correctional officers and stuff they have a tough job um most people like anyone in public service uh it's hard to get people to work nights and weekends and holidays and I just want to do a shout out for anyone that knows a nurse or the nurses out there i've been a nurse for 34
years i don't do clinical anymore but I'm still a proud nurse this week or in two weeks we got the sheriff's memorial dedication which I think all of us are going to be there we changed the meeting on the 15th to have that later and um that'll be a great day for the sheriff's department our community all right I want to talk a little bit about something that happened last week that there are a few people that are upset but I think it needs to we need to get some clarity out there there is a presidential order and a governor order to change um the Gulf to the Gulf of America i sat
down with the county administrator this board had given him the authority to spend up to $50,000 um administrator Marino did what was expected as an executive order and went out and um did what I asked him to do commissioner Hoffberger shortly before I guess you were in charge of the design or picked out the design I think right yes he brought three options and we selected one of those three thank you for that i I wanted to read this because um this
was from Congressman Petronis he sent this to me and he he asked me if I I'd say something i said I would he said "Big shout out for the update for the iconic welcome sign to read Gulf of America this change is in line with the POTUS executive order honoring the spirit of our great nation excited that the Memerald Coast is helping helping Florida lead the way i know his staff is watching this meeting right now thank you Congressman Patronis for your leadership and thank you for the text senator Scott actually also text me as well as the chief of staff for the governor and this
also went to the White House so it was a small change but with a big impact for our community um and Allison I want to thank you for looking at all the ordinances that we have you'd be amazed at how many have just the word Gulf of Mexico in it that um legals looked at to change to be in line with the with the governor's order so I thank you for that i have another very exciting thing for our community that u this week came up and it was also from Congressman Petronis's office they called and
said "Mike can you get a small business to be recognized up in Congress from our community?" So I said "Yeah no I I sure can." So I called Frank Patty and and they said "Yeah we'd be more than happy." So our area will be rep represented on May 20th in Congress as one of the best small businesses in the United States of America so shout out for um the Marina shipyard as well as um the Marina Fish House Joe Patty's Fish House and Shipyard okay the last thing I want to talk about
I had the honor of um being the exo over the Robert E mitchell Center which for many people here may not even know what that is but it's where PS come um that have been PS and that was a big deal for me but I never I never knew the impact run running for this
office would had and I'll tell you why i've had the privilege of meeting several PS over my career colonel Harvard I brought here years ago still have a friendship with him many people here would know ralph Gaither um Senator McCain I met three times captain Coffee many you wouldn't know but he came here he lived in Hawaii three of them are passed away well actually four of them are
but when I ran for office I knocked on the door little did I know that was going to change my life i knocked on a door over here in Aragon steve was there and did the normal spill mike call her running for office his granddaughter opened the door and I said "Navy guy." And she said "Oh we're not interested." And I hear from the back "Let that man in so I said "There's
something going on." I walked in as I walk in the door I see the P stuff he had American flag out front and I walked in i said "Mr brady are you a P?" He said "I am." I said "I think we have a friend together." He says "Who's that?" I said "Dr albano he's over all the PS meanwhile um my wife's
walking around wonder where I am for the next 30 minutes as we're talking Navy stories and at the end of that he gave me this book it's a book he wrote it's a wonderful story and I left there that's not the end of the story steve Strober and I were making phone calls in my house one day and I called this lady in Egypt named Don Corals steve was stationed in Egypt you remember this Steve i
do i know he does cuz he interjected himself into the call but we were calling people on absentee ballots asking them basically if they'd vote for Mike Kohler little Miss Corals goes "Oh yeah i I got I know who you are i'm going to vote for you i said "How do you know who I am?" She goes "Well you went and visited my dad Captain Brady." And I said "You got to be kidding me." I said "He just gave me a book." She goes "Yeah I'm in the back of it." Open up the back of the book here's Don Corals i'm on the phone talking to her but that didn't where it ended after that my neighbor
former commissioner Bill Dixon he um his daughter writes uh works over at the legislature in Tallahassee and Representative Salsman and a comm a guy named Commander Jacobson I know you folks may not know the I know you know Representative Salsman but not Jacobson had wrote a proclamation for Captain Brady well Bill Dixon happened to be reading the book and I He's my neighbor and
I said "You're reading this book?" And he said "Yeah." And this is where the story starts to get close to my heart so I said "Bill I know this this guy." And he said "Can you introduce me to him?" And I said "Sure I'll do that." So I went by and I asked him if Commissioner Dixon and Bill's the oldest living CEO of Pensacola by the way and uh we took him there and I called Representative Salsman and she had never met uh Captain Brady or I don't even think she met Captain Dixon at
that point but we spent two hours in their house with those two looking at their flight logs they both were A6 pilots they both were on the USS Kittyhawk the day before Camp Brady was shot down Bill Dixon was on that ship and had a and had a flight with his A6 off the ship obviously Bill Dixon was emotional because he wasn't a P for 2 uh 237 days so that was pretty moving but the next two years I um became close with the family i took him
to the Blue Angel Museum or what am I saying the Blue Angel Air Show for two years and then last year at the PIA lunchon it was amazing ed Huard was the speaker and he was a P for over 2400 days and in that uh time they'd never seen each other um as Ps the first time Nemo was at that lunchon and yeah the humility between both of them was just moving so Cam Brady passed away last Thursday
and I'm real close with his wife and I'm helping her with stuff that you would the military stuff that you would need to do but for his service if you think you have a bad day and I served a long time but I never had 2,237 bad days and I just want to thank him for his service and I'm sorry I got emotional but I just really care about that man and his service to this country so that's all I have and uh I hope that story means something to you because it means a lot to me thank you
thanks Mike he left the detail out on that when he made that phone call to Captain Brady's daughter not knowing it was his daughter he was calling her in Cairo Egypt um not knowing it was Cairo Egypt I don't think right and I didn't know it was Egypt but I did yeah i happened to she was teaching at Cairo American College and I used to live in Egypt and my kids went to Cairo American College so that's how I inserted myself in the conversation but I thought that was remarkable what a that we were talking to her from Cairo you know talking about Captain Brady and and
the connection you'd made the amount of PS we have in this area for this community and what Commissioner May was saying about Rosemont Johnson um the sacrifices that a lot I didn't have to make those kind of sacrifice but some of the folks that we serve among here or live among have made some amazing sacrifices i'll just say that and I'm grateful for it all right let's push on have a motion to adopt or ratify the proclamations i make a motion second okay i'll second it with
amendment that you went over three minutes a lot longer than Stroberger i have a mullet to throw at you it was a touching story i'm sure I'll hit you good job okay please vote motion passes 5 to zero now I got something really really special i can go to something that's going to make us all happy can Mr and Mrs past Pastua is that right say that again pasta please come up to the mic now this is just a beautiful story
so this is an interesting night and this is going to be a beautiful evening so we're here to recognize these two's 75th wedding anniversary and so we're going to re I mean it just what a beautiful night and um Jeff reached out to me and asked if we would do this for his parents and I'll read the proclamation let him talk to you but I I had a chance to talk to you and it can I share your story okay so he said he was in the Navy and he went to uh was it you were at Softly
Field correct yeah and his wife I guess was a big dancer at the USO he wasn't so much and she asked him to dance and that was that was the beginning of it right so we're going to give you two a chance to dance after we read the proclamation i think Wes is going to sing an Elvis song and it'll be a beautiful evening but I'm going to go ahead and read the proclamation for you all whereas Joe and Katie Pesture were wed on April 26 1950 and two and 2025 marks 75 wonderful
years of marriage full of love devotion and dedication for one another and their family whereas Mr and Mrs pestu welcomed seven children to their home and raised them with strong sense of faith service to the community and importance of family whereas the pasta family has now grown to wow 63 grandchildren and great-grandchildren including three great great grandchildren that will proudly carry on Joe and Katie's name and values congratulations whereas Katie with 95 years of age you don't look over 50 ma'am and Joe with 98 who served as a petty officer second
class way to go the United States Navy have called a scami county home for many years are an invaluable resident of our community now therefore be it proclaimed that the board of county commissioners of Escambia County Florida commends and congratulates Joe and Katie Pestua on their 75th wedding anniversary and wishes them many more shared years watching their family grow and continue their legacy board of County Commissioners Scami County Florida Michael S kohler chair District 2 Ashley Hoffberger vice chair District 4 steve Stroberger District
1 Lumen May District 3 steven Barry District 5 come on up Joe i want to hear what you have to say would you like to say anything i'm grateful for all that I'm I'm obviously don't know their names and that anyone and everyone that had any part of this is uh tremendously touching um I'm
grateful and appreciate that's about all I could say right now without breaking down hey what was your rate in the name because I was a What what was your rate i was a Yman second class i could Yeah you probably could have wrote this you know all right i want you to say something how'd you put up with it oh I Oh no oh you do okay you don't want to say anything she doesn't okay all right let's take a photo kate you want to turn around we'll take a photo yeah get your
family in come on right here no we want you guys to be recognized as a family jim is our oldest boy i got one daughter when you were seven you sure Jeff it's up to you okay we'll we'll go this way thank you what a wonderful story thank you so much actually hold on i want to
give you that for from me thank you so much thank you so much appreciate it you want to take that thank you so much be careful thank you you're welcome you good commissioner May I'm sorry uh one second
commissioner May you're going to be reason reading the Rosemont John Johnson which one no first uh a constituent of district three civil as I was sorry the proc Oh wow 100 years for Miss Cyel Kane's major come on up huh cybble okay civil all right that's how we say it in district three cybble all right well come on up Mrs majors hundred years man this is a great meeting this is my second I'm nominated in the last couple of months so be sure y'all here in a few years when I have mine
okay don't you have like 20 there sir commissioner love these hundred year old ladies yeah I do well they kept you elected um Commissioner thank you for recommending uh a constituent of District 3 uh to be recognized for 100 years that's a long time and so I saw 1925 my father was born in 1927 and so to be here since 1925 you've seen a lot of things you've seen a lot of changes thank you and Godspeed to you where is Civil L Kane Majors is a woman whose life reflects
grace strength unwavering love for family and community she was born on April 2nd 1925 in a humble home near Century Florida she entered the world the same day the Pensacola Sang Theater was open where she married the love of her life James F majors on June 18 June 18th 1941 together they built a life filled with devotion raising two sons Fred and Tom her family continues to grow now including five grandchildren and six great great grandchildren whereas her work ethic
shown from the very beginning she started at Kim Strand in 1954 and retired from Monteno in 1981 completing 26 and a half years of law and dedicated service her quiet strength and steady commitment left a lasting impression on all who worked alongside her whereas her love for the outdoors brought her and James to co-ound Mystic Springs Airstream Cove Park a place of fellowship laughter and adventure whereas Sila and James share a deep sense of service for more than
55 years they faithfully supported the Florida Sheriff's Association standing along those who protected and served their community whereas in the winter Sila finds peace in Okchobee she spends her days fishing watching the birds and just sitting on the back porch whereas Sibil's legacy lives on in the love she gives the lives she touched and the example she sets her kindness her faith her joy her spirit continue to inspire everyone now therefore be it proclaimed that the
board of county commissioners of Escambia County urges all of our residents to celebrate the long and successful life and legacy of Civil Line Major as she reaches the milestone of 100 years board of County Commissioners Maher Chairman Ashley Homeberger Vice Chair Steve Stroberger District 1 Lumin May District 3 Steven Barry District 5 Civil Congratulations and God bless you this is her family by the way welcome family i've been a fellow church member for 50 years
commissioner Thank you very much thank you L congratulations on your on your birthday ma'am all right uh Todd Humble is Todd out there oh okay there he is todd's recognized in the employee of the month chris and everybody else from the library friends
family we got a board member here have everybody from the library come up come on up so I'd like to introduce uh Mr chris Patterson uh he came to work with the library system 17 years ago and uh 19 19 it's been 19 years 19 somebody told me wrong start well sorry i'm glad I'm here
to clarify you started the computer how many days sir i'm not in a computer lab 2006 okay um so then when they merged with the county um he went from the computer lab to being a what we now call a customer service technician sorry customer service technician which is our frontline people so he's working with patrons day in day out um if you ever get a book on hold he's the voice you hear uh most of the time he's making those calls letting you know you got in what you asked for
so any other years I don't know about no no how many years you been in Pensacola 52 okay whereas Escambia County has established the employee of the month program to recognize one employee represent various departments and whereas Chris became began his employment with the library system 19 years ago as a part-time employee in the computer lab and was promoted to
full-time position when the library transitioned under Escambia County whereas Chris J patterson library service technician library services um joined the county in October 7th 2013 has been selected the employee of the month for May 2025 for the standards of excellence he displays in the performance of his duties whereas in his role as a library service technician Chris works with the circulation department providing exceptional service to library patrons to find
and use library resources whereas both staff and library patrons consistently speak of his genuine warmth and knowledgeable work ethic in adding positive value to our library atmosphere whereas in a recent example several months ago an elderly gentleman spoke highly uh to the assistant branch manager for the gratitude of West Public Libraries had done to help serve as a touchstone in his life the gentleman specifically cited Chris as someone of customer service consistency that went above
and beyond now therefore let it be proclaimed the Bord of County Commissioners Scambi County Florida hereby commends and congratulates Mr chris J patterson in his selection as employee of the month for May 2025 border County Commissioners of Scampi County Florida Michael Michael S kohler chair District 2 ashley Hoffberger vice chair District 4 steve Stroberger District 1 Lumen J may District 3 and Steven Barry District 5 thank you
Mr patterson you You have anything you'd like to share yes i would just like to thank um the county employees um my um co-workers at the library and I can't top what just happened earlier that was very touching and moving i I was back there stating that I how could anyone top what just happened between the 75 years of being married and 100 years of
living but I can do is strive all I can do is strive for those things and and keep on giving the library all that I have well thank you for your service to the county oh nice thank you thank y'all so much he He was probably dreading if I was going to go hear ye hear ye when I did the announcement at the library i just want to
Hey everybody thank you well actually thank you Commissioner May um would you like to read the Rosemont Beach uh okay proclamation thank you
oh I didn't know the family was here tammy just told me uh Mr chairman that she'll tell me the story about the mullet toss and so uh but it's hard to toss fried mullet so be careful you live in my district and we took care of your road you know there you go i mean I love mullet i don't like to toss them i like to eat them um Mr chairman it's a it's an honor to be able to present this proclamation we've talked enough about Roseman Johnson uh who is an American war hero uh and we're going to present this proclamation on tonight uh as well as on Saturday whereas the life of Private Rose Johnson
Jr an African-American hero and the first resident of Escami County Florida to die in the Korean War is commemorated every May to remember his service and his sacrifice whereas this marks the 15th year anniversary of this meaningful event honoring Private Johnson's legacy in the site known as Rosemont Johnson Beach would hold an immense cultural and historical value whereas at the young age of 17 Private Johnson carried two wounded men to safety under enemy fire while returning
for the third soldier in need and was killed on July 26th 1950 whereas while Pensacola beaches were racially segregated when Private Johnson joined the army the eastern end of Purito Ki became a popular destination for African-American residents to enjoy the natural beauty of the beach and engage in recreational activities that golf has to offer whereas after the Korean conflict the county-owned recreation area was renamed the Rosemont Johnson Beach in honor of the fallen hero
in a part of the Gulf Islands National Seashore in 1973 a monument in Wayside by Private Johnson was erected in 1996 now therefore be it proclaimed that the board of county commissioners of Escamia County Florida hereby proclaims Saturday May 3rd 2025 as the Rosemont Johnson Beach Day in Escambia County Florida in honor in memory of Private Rose Johnson Jr who made the ultimate
sacrifice of losing his life for the freedom of all board of County Commissioners Michael Colola chair Ashley Halberger vice chair Steve Schroberger District 1 Lum J may District 3 Steven Bry District 5 thank you both in the chamber for all you do thank you so much okay let's see
thanks On behalf of the Purto Key Area Chamber of Commerce we are proud to honor Rosemont Johnson uh this is always a special day for us every year and we invite everyone to come out it's it is free entrance to Johnson Beach until noon and the ceremony starts at 10:00 so we hope that everyone will join us thank you very much all right um did the clerk's office receive proof of publication for the public hearings on the
agenda mr chairman the clerk's office received all proofs okay i have a motion to So move Mr chairman second okay please vote motion passes 5 to zero we're at public hearing uh 5.31 which is the request for exemption for the Scambia Children's Trust we have several speakers would we like to listen to speakers first i think it's 5.3 is this the 531 Mr chairman that's correct so our first speaker is Meredith Bush would Meredith like to come up and Stevenson I promise you you were going
to get out early but I don't think it's going to happen just go back to Kristen Fairchild's on deck thank you so much Meredith Bush 125 East Tendencia attorney with Clark Partington i believe you all understand our position um so I'm here happy to take any questions lindseay Cannon the executive director is also present happy to take any questions we would just ask that you grant the exemption and enter into an interlocal agreement with the trust thank you Meredith kristen Fairchild is Oh and then uh Taiwan Moss is the way it's written here are are you Mrs fairchild i
am thank you ma'am please welcome and do I state my name address and all that uh we you had Yeah I think we're good okay hi I'm Kristen Fairchild i'm the founder and executive director of chain reaction um thank you for this opportunity to speak today I'm talking about the ECT money um and the impact of giving that to CRAAS and getting an inter agency agreement with the trust i've sat in this chamber for 21 years when we would do outside agency funding and I would fight for our $20,000
and commissioners like yourself would always say "Should we use taxpayer dollars for it?" Next would be "How in the world do we make sure that they're spending the money the right way?" So what do we do and I'll get emotional because I'm passionate um we went and campaigned for the trust we passed it taxpayer dollar said "Let's use this money to fill gaps in services." And now we might get $450,000 taken away um I know that it has been proposed to possibly use the money for
sidewalks or cameras for the sheriff's department and I apologize if that has changed um my teens in my program that you'll hear from later are some of those kids that will end up on that camera so I would ask you to think about your constituents and would they rather have their child caught on camera or would they like a program that can make sure they never c get on camera um I know that the sheriff's budget is 96,000 the county commission's budget is 396 this is 450,000 my entire operating
budget is $250,000 i serve 240 kids to put a number to what that means 450,000 and I speak for Chain Reaction as an example but Big Brothers Big Sisters G Coast Kids House all the partners in our community that I partner with to impact kids um that would be 700 kids 700 faces that can make a difference i beg you to please think of an inter agency agreement that gives us the opportunity to compete for those dollars um the hardest thing in nonprofit is fundraising um today I met with a
young man who is at PHS and a senior he currently has two Fs we are working with him to pass because they're required for graduation we went over called recruiters because he is thinking of the Air Force or the Navy he is also thinking about going to PSC we are working with him to do that um every single day but I had a choice take an hour and a half to work with him which I have dedicated to do for the next four weeks or send out five invoices for pledges we're $12,000
short in budget of course I pick the kid so what happens if we don't meet budget i will like I've done in the past take a pay cut or eliminate a position i know it seems like 450,000 and I am passionate because I've served alongside you for 21 years fighting for these kids in this community i drive them home i see what their life is like and it matters children's trust is tough they will make a difference and please consider it thank you so much thank you Miss Fairchild and thank
you for what you do i don't think we we appreciate what you do our next speaker was Taiwan Moss is is that do I have that right okay raymond uh Evil's on deck good morning good afternoon sorry um my name is Taiwan Moss i attend PHS um in the chain reaction program do you mind pulling the speaker up just so we can hear thank you Taiwan in the chain reaction program um I started two one year
ago a year ago yeah um it feels like a long time we do a lot we hang out we talk to each other um but when I first started chain reaction I had a 1.0 GPA um I was leaving West Florida because I was struggling in math once I started struggling in math I gave up on everything i was just like you know what it's just not for me um I didn't really have a plan i didn't know what I wanted to do um my only plan was just like get out of school and then just live life get a job and
live off that job for the rest of my life um but I met Kristen and she was telling me "Hey you can do way more you can do things that that actually you like." Um I was just like I don't know what I like to do um I started finding my um my ketchups that's what we call it we call it ketchups because it's something that we use every day something that's natural to us and I figured out that I like giving back to my community i like um helping out children i know that when I was in elementary
school I wasn't good at reading i wasn't good at writing and I still struggle with that today but um that's things that we go over we talk about we help each other we work with each other to fix um this these aren't things like just here to there situations these are things that we use like throughout our lives um I put on my resume every time I go to apply for a job chain reaction and as soon as they see chain reaction they ask me "What do you do in chain reaction?" I tell them what we
do i tell them how we help out our community we go out and help out our community and I always get the job so that's that's something I'll be using for a while but um this isn't just a small thing i feel like a lot of people would think it's a small thing because you haven't really been there to see how it is but once you actually see how big it is how much they help us how much like we actually go through on a daily basis how hard school can get and how overwhelming it gets and how we go home
and we feel like hey we're not going to be able to do this and Kristen will call you and say "Hey I just looked at your grades i see that you're struggling in this situation or this area what can I do to help?" She will come to the school even if she's busy with her her regular life and she'll come to the school and she'll actually talk to us and help us with our work she'll sit down she'll have a big group of people who are struggling in school and she'll help us with any topic math reading and if she doesn't know it I'm pretty sure she'll go to Miss Gordon and say "Hey Miss Gordon
can I borrow one of your teachers to help um my students with this topic?" But yeah thank y'all thank you for your comments and coming up and having the courage to speak thank you Raymond Evil and Lucy Adams Stevens on deck my name is Rayu and I'm in the 10th grade i go to PHS High School Pensacola i play for the basketball team and I'm with Cherry Reaction Group
cherry Action has helped me out so much with my work my grades self-confidence and motivation and I really appreciate them they always on my back about my grades being good in school no disrespect and I thank them a lot for that and I'm now starting to do better in school for it and Christian right here she helps me so much she always makes
sure I'm okay and that I'm doing right in school so I will not do bad at all and and out of school and And you're just a sophomore yeah I'm just a sophomore you're gonna be my big leader yes ma'am and thank you thank you thank you for coming up and speaking Raymond all right is did Is Lucy out there luc okay come on up Lucy jacob Kirkland is on deck
jacobe Kirkland as I was hi uh I'm Lucy Adam Stevenson i'm a senior uh in the IB program at Pensacola High School um for the past seven years my family has been involved at PHS between me and my brother uh who went there before me and we've seen a lot of changes but I think that the most meaningful change at PHS has been the addition of chain reaction um last year we had 18 students uh at chain reaction at PHS but this year we have 70 um and we expect that this will happen
at Escambia High School as well uh we work with many students a lot who may struggle with soft skills that will help them after graduation um a lot who are not even sure if they're going to graduate um they may not have large support systems or know that someone cares about them enough to uh change their future but Kristen does this um our program at PHS changes this i've heard everyone on the JV basketball team who comes to chain reaction before practice asking Kristen when she's coming to their next game uh asking about the snacks that
we're having at our next meeting uh lots of my friends in Chain Reaction were struggling with their grades before but Chain Reaction helps them uh stay focused and work on projects and their grades improve and their GPA go above what they could even imagine um not only does CR help with our grades and improving our soft skills but it helps us to meet new people uh there's kind of a gap between IB and nonIB at PHS uh and to me Chain Reaction has bridged the gap i've met so
many people including Taiwan and everyone else who have become really good friends of mine um and I would not know them if it weren't for Chain Reaction uh we help the community through all of our service but we also make a community for ourselves and I would not be the same person I am without chain reaction uh it means a lot to me but I know it will mean even more to the future students at Pensacola High School so thank you thank you for your comments uh Jacob McCirkland do I have Oh I'm sorry commissioner May Lucy congratulations on going to Swany
um come on up are you Jacobe yes sir okay Haley Bingham is on deck come on up good afternoon my name Jacobe Kirkland i'm in 10th grade at Pensac High School i play for the basketball team and CR has helped me with a lot with my grades and before I had some D's in some classes and I had extra time after school to work on them cr I like CR because it it helps children's and funds and we donate toys and projects and stuff like that to children who need and we it also like helps other
people motivate them to want to do something better it helps me find something to do after school cuz sometimes I be at home and I don't want to be at home bored so it helps me like it helped me make new friends and help me understand why like children actually need help and what we need to do to help them out i enjoy chain reaction chain reaction is like something like a hobby like something I like doing when I'm not home or on the game or something like that i chain reaction
helped me it put me through a lot you know like sometimes I can't always make chain reaction time but I always be there the most I can to help them out ch reactions like it's fun for a lot of people and I enjoy being there so that's all I have thank you thank you for coming and speaking mr chairman Commissioner May I I promise you that it'll be the last coming but I kind of get emotional with kids that I've watched like Kobe uh that I've seen his development on and off the court and Kobe I'll
tell you Coach Harris told me on his retirement uh the hardest decision of retiring and turning over coach Williams was you Kobe because you were there your on the court and off the court leadership uh is commendable man so keep doing what you do man god got a lot of great things for you Kobe keep working hard congratulations Haley Bing Bingham okay and Gabriel Austin is up next good evening my name is Haley Bingham and I attend Escambia High School i'm a part of
the class of 25 2025 and I will be graduating in less than a month um this January January Chain Reactions started a location at Escambia High School so unlike our other locations at uh PHS and the center we started as a very small group of like five to six a week but as word of mouth and as we started growing our club we grew up to like 12 people a week which doesn't sound like a lot but as a very new thing at our school and it's very hard to
get stuff around the school it is definitely a good amount of people um chain reaction allows the teen to lead we get to choose how we serve our community every day whether that be doing other art projects or helping out other people we get to choose how we decide to help out our community um we also are able to develop our soft skills sorry uh our soft skills and mindset of chain reactions these skills have allowed me to f retain focus during school lessons
and keep me motivated during homework ultimately leading to me getting better grades during class not only has Chain Reactions improved my school ethic it has also improved my mindset on life allowing me to care for my community my classmates and as well myself chain Reactions has allowed a safe space for me to be open learn and serve even though I've only been a part of Chain Reactions for a mere five months it has grown to be one of my favorite activities as I leave my high school career I hope the underclassmen I leave behind are able to find safe and enjoying like help here at
Chain Reactions just like I did as we grow it at a scam high school thank you thank you for your comments um Gabriel Austin is Gabriel okay come on up Gabriel and then Payton Pton Sims is on deck i'm Gabrielle Oen i'm a junior at Escambia High at chain reaction well actually let me start before so before sorry I don't public speak but before I never thought I could make a change of my
It's okay i already cried first so you don't have to be embarrassed oh this is so hard so how does it help you well I can boo my boost my self-confidence way easier like right now I would have been crying in the seat not even up here hang in there you're doing great you're doing great you know public speaking is very hard and you're advocating for yourself you're doing great i would have never thought I could make a change i thought what am I going to do like an hour after school or five minutes after school I just go to school go home sleep in my bed do my homework
but when they came to my school to like talk about this program and re like getting it to the school I was like "Well maybe I can make a change." And then Christian she was so excited about it and so passionate about it i was like "Oh I actually do something i don't have to just sit in my home and like draw like I can just actually make a change." And I have made a change every single day I go on Mondays after school the ones that I can cuz I am busy with school but I go there and I don't just make crafts i talk to my friends that I make like Haley and Payton i would have
never known them i would have never talked to them until Chain Reaction and even if I'm just like "Oh hey can I borrow that?" It's still building a relationship with my community and even not just in school but I built a community outside of school even if I'm not talking to the kids I make crafts for it's so amazing knowing that I can make the change and oh my gosh you did great i just I really am passionate about this project because it's so interesting i don't just sit at home i can actually do something for a change and cool people cry yes yes cool people cry but it's just not even
just helping my self-confidence even it's helping my grades in school as a junior it's kind of hard to just keep pushing on this last year moved by so fast it felt like the first day yesterday but now I'm graduating junior year in like 3 weeks and it's just so hard to keep doing my work i go to math class i do go to English class i read a book like I just it's so boring sometimes and just with this like going to every Monday and talking about oh I hate this teacher so much she gave me this bad grade like it's just it's good to open up about it it really is because I don't just
have my frustration with the teacher i can go to my friendly like oh yeah I don't like this teacher be like "It's okay just do the work it's fine i'll help you." And I don't I get help i get you know a mentor almost in Haley especially because I talk to her more but it's just it's so amazing knowing that I have a support group after school even if it is just an hour or so on Mondays but thank you so much thank you for your comments payton Sims I you're you're up how are you Payton hi my name is Payton Sims and I a senior at Escambia High School and attend CR at the Escambia location and at the
center cr has helped me grow tremendously as a student and as a person it has brought me and many other students together and together that before CR I never even knew I went to school with i started off as a very shy person who refused to speak if I did not have to and now thanks to CR and the confidence my peers have given me I can speak confidently in front of big groups chain reaction has helped me build a resume that has now gotten me a job into college and scholarships for college i'm a student who has a great pride for my school and seeing all of
the students express themselves and bring more and more friends each week and volunteer their time to help our community is something truly special to me i have realized from listening to this meeting that everyone's common goal is to do what's best for the community chain Reaction gives students like me a voice it gives students who are struggling with their grades the help they need it helps them build resumes for kids who may not have those resources that they may have at other schools and it just gives us the ch the same chances as the rest of students
at other schools while getting service hours by making reading packets for students who need the extra push for that motivation we are the future generation of our community and chain reactions are students who do this not because we have to but because we want to we want to help and better our future and the futures of others while being ourselves this doesn't make sense let me do it for myself okay um so pretty much we are helping the younger generations of students um we build
reading packets for them for the students who may not want to read they may not want to have they don't have the same their teachers may not push them like they should they they may feel down about themselves so we make them feel better about themselves and we are also feeling better about ourselves i want to be a teacher one day um I'm going to I'm going to college to help younger students and I just hope that chain reaction is still a thing when I'm a teacher because it's so amazing to see and yeah that's okay thank you Payton and Kristen i think it says a lot about you
um bringing these students out to share their stories and how your programs helped them and I um it's not that well what we're further future discussion has nothing to do what you're doing you're doing a great job it's obvious and and each one of you students should be happy with what you're doing in that school and I'm proud that you came down and shared your comments with us tonight thank you for just having them here to see it thank you for letting them yeah a big deal for them i know it is yeah i'm a teacher i have a masters in education and earth so I
get it um board I guess this is do we have any discuss Allison yeah I just want to make sure we don't get too far off the rails so you e you have two choices uh they have the children's trust has requested a waiver as allowed under the state statute it is only a request for the most recent tax cycle so this will not affect next year's this is just for the one year you have two choices you can either grant their request for the waiver if you do that your
motion needs to include direction that the staff negotiate with the children's trust an interlocal agreement as to how those funds are going to be spent there is in your backup a proposed interlocal that came from them having to do with funding the summer youth employment program um if you Well I'd like to if if before we get there can we have some discussion yeah and then the only other thing I would say is if you're going to deny the waiver there are factual findings by your staff in the backup those are statutoily driven you need to adopt
those as part of your motion i understand we Mr chairman yes Commissioner before we engage in in in in in debate here on the dis I need to disclose in which council has uh told me that there is not a conflict of interest uh but obviously I'm a children's advocate uh and I serve on the children's trust board of directors uh and so I just want to fully disclose that before we enter into any debate okay i'll open up the discussion because I think it's important no one's against
student programs here we're 100% in support and Lindsay under your leadership I think you've listened to me on some things that the board requested last year with the Naval Flight Academy but I do want I it's important that I highlight a few things i had a meeting with um Lindsay and one of your board members I think is her i'm sorry ma'am i don't remember your name but I remember you in my office and your beautiful smile and with our with our attorney uh Kristen and our our legal
advice was that the county has the authorization under statute to to put the some of these funds into the CRA and and obviously you Meredith you did that last year so I think you may agree with that the board has not went after even though we requested it the 22 and 23 funds which I believe is around 700,000 correct 2021 and 2022 have not been paid they played in full for 2023 right okay
so a couple things I'd like to highlight is and I believe this is from your website Lindsay your budget is $25,580,000 according to your website as of March 31st 2025 the 495,000 would be 1.96% of the budget the reason I'm passionate about this is because I love the programs but there's things and I know you and I've had a difference on this that you
can't do you can't do infrastructure we can and when I brought up the basketball court over or the basketball program on Navy that I'm going downtown we could have funded that we're going to vote later today for $25 million in turfs and I don't know where that's going to go you know how many multi-use fields I have in Bay Davenport Warrington Edgewater i don't have one the poorest communities in our in our district commissioner May and I have we could
put lights and safety and some of those small things that as a nurse I look at holistically that can change a kid's life for safety safety is the second ring in a person's life that they before they can get even to self-actualization and I appreciate what what the programs do but I honestly think you guys could help the CRAAS in some of our poorest communities with some of the stuff that we could do and I'm just passionate about it because I I I it's not
that I'm against programs but I just think if you looked at Warrington Prep and I know you recently put a program out there and the only failing school in the district they've had to call the sheriff's department out there 66 times they've had 300 assaults i mean they they don't have a lighted field when President Clinton said "Hey basketball helps with lighted basketball." It actually does we we can pay for lights but we can't get there now because we don't have any of that but we do have the sheriff's department going 66 times a year to Warrington Prep so for
me I you know it's not that I'm against programs but I honestly think that we could do a lot more with what neighborhood services said and I know people say "Well it's only lights." When you are scared in your community or elderly people or kids don't think they can get there or kids don't even go to school my wife taught there for five years because they can't get there it doesn't matter how many programs you have it doesn't matter the program doesn't matter it's like me if I if you have a heart attack I can teach cholesterol management every day but
if you come in and I never gave you cholesterol management you're still dead and that's the same with the kid that doesn't feel safe and secure and that's where the CRAAS can help so I I wish we had a more holistic partnership to look at things that we could do outside of programs that could help but this is such a small amount that goes to the lowest income kids in the county i just can't believe for $495,000 we haven't even asked for the other two years out of a $25,580,000 well this is what's on your website that's not annual that's cumulative so that's
what you have on the books now well encumbered in contract right but from the beginning so what's your annual budget this is this is what I pulled off your website sorry uh annual budgets around 10 million okay so we're still under 5% but there was those are all encumbered in contracts that we have 42 contracts now okay just so you know well I I am in it i'm in favor of this only because I believe that we should we should have and not that I'm against programs i I love programs but if you want
to look at the situation holistically neighborhood services could do some things on infrastructure that could help these poor communities and last year this board voted 5 the sheriff supports this clause um I hope we do the same thing i I'd be willing to give you guys if the board was is to wave off the 21 and 22 um if we could move forward with this but I'm in favor of denying the waiver and moving forward commissioner May do you have any comments thank you Mr chairman and and so um
and certainly we'll be supportive uh where you know the majority of this board wants to go um if I ever error I'll er on the side of helping children uh but I will say clearly uh the tax was for children uh and let's you know start the conversation uh because I support chain reaction i've supported them personally i've supported them throughout the years uh not one child will be affected by whatever decision make whether we grant it or whether we don't grant it is not going to reduce or increase the services of of chain reaction of any or any of the agencies that have
been encumbered as Lindsay just said of the 25 million of the three-year contract that they have um this started with a conversation uh with the sheriff because children were getting shot and getting killed uh by guns at a park in Mont Care and the sheriff requested a shot spotter and in and cameras uh to make sure that children were safe and went to the children trust to ask for the money uh and it ended up kind of in a political dilemma uh that
caused the sheriff to uh take other options and we funded that out of our CRA candidly we funded uh that because children have to be able to go to parks they have to have cameras uh I mean I don't care what kind of program you have if children are not safe walking out of their house then they're not going to go to any program it can be the best program in the in the world so I understand the infrastructure but I do understand the different funding mechanisms uh and so me and you may not be completely on the same page uh um Mr chairman as it relates to that uh we are on the same page
as it relates to that but exactly on how we're going to end up tonight uh but I do believe uh that it's a children trust that should go to children but I believe that we do a great job here at Scammy County of helping children we had 1300 children apply for a job that's the greatest impact you can do you can come here and tell me all day about the kids in chain reaction tell me about about Cadel tell me about all these kids but when they still don't have money to buy their school clothes when they still don't have money to eat all the great programs and the only people get paid are the people that that's staffing it and the poor children that you think that you're
feeding them a cheeseburger and a hot dog go back home hungry and can't buy underwear then those it doesn't help uh and so I've been supportive i've told Lindsay you know if we can take this money and I think quite frankly I'm on the board and I think it should be funded uh out of all of this we have 1300 young people between the ages of 16 uh to 21 24 years old 1300 children who need a job in Escambia County who have applied who want a job we should not only be using this money that we have CRA the children trust should be funding more money because a person that wants to work
we should be funding them um you we we're funding a lot of salaries and a lot of other programs and so where I'm going to fall you know I'm going to fall uh that we are able to keep this money into our summer employment program our summer youth program and employ those uh instead of employing 175 kids maybe we need to employ 275 kids and so I I agree with you Mr chairman uh we need lights we need sidewalks we need cameras that's important uh but we have a critical need today to fund these jobs uh for these young people uh we don't have to switch money exchange money give money back
to the trust and they give it to us as long as we leave it for children to me that's what it's intended for and so if we can fund these children today uh without switching I'm not interested in switching money with children trust i'm interested in providing these children and these are children from all over county they red yellow they're black they're white they're Democrats they're Republicans they're from district 1 2 three four and five who are looking for a job and quite frankly we were giving out signing bonuses for $2,000 to get people to become correction officers EMS paramedics all type of jobs uh and we had to go out and recruit them our summer
employment program we are training them we're evaluating them we're creating them and we're placing them in jobs and quite frankly we have 30 plus children now who are gainfully employed who are making money so I'm not I would like to see this I'd like to see every dime that's been allocated for the CRAAS be moved to enhance our summer employment program because quite frankly we ended up after about six or seven weeks it could be a year- round program if it was funded properly so Mike that's where I stand and that's what I'm going to support well I don't have a problem with programs but what you said earlier on cameras I I'll just to give you example two years ago Mike
Rhodess was here we had an event at Lexon Terrace and it was a complete and utter unsafe situation kids were out there it It was just a disaster last Easter weekend we had the sheriff put up put up a camera we had to change the whole thing and we had kids out there doing Easter egg hunt it was a beautiful thing we had hundreds of people out there so when people say cameras don't matter it sure does because it changed the whole event and that Mike Rhodess knows this he's sitting in the back um and we tried to make it better at Lexon Terrace for some of the people there that just
want to use the park and feel safe so Mike Mike Mike Mike Mike let let me just say cuz me and you on the same page belleview football field we had a shooting and a killing i know those kids i this past year we had and where we've had to deploy you know thousands of dollars for safety of children i I I Montlair Park where kids go to Montlair Elementary School i don't care what program Boys and Girls Club run children are afraid to go they can't go after dark they got to be home before so don't think that I'm not agreeing with you i mean I think that there is a great need i don't think that there's anything wrong in the direction in which you're going i could be supportive i just
know that there's a current need right now for giving those kids that are coming up here for chain reaction a job the kids are coming from all of our neighborhoods a job uh if it's the desire of this board football cameras I get it who wants to go to school warrington Middle we we the trust has um had multiple of our organizations put money into Warrington which is school that's near and dear to your heart how the heck can you learn when children are bringing guns to school how the heck can you learn when kids are bringing vapes inside the classroom you can't so the cameras security is important and so if we don't foster a a a a culture of safety I don't give a dang what
program you have the children's still not going to learn so I say that to say Mike as long as we're doing something to enhance the life of children I'm on board whether it's the direction of where you want to go whether is that direction I I know what my preference is my preference is to fund uh summer employment program uh but I certainly will yield uh to my colleagues of what you want to do and say again you know we had over 1300 kids to apply for a summer job uh and with the funding and and thank you Wes for getting that funding and Stephan for working we can only employ
uh 175 children out of 1300 children who are trying to get a job in Escambia County commissioner Stroberg I see your light on and so I I think everybody here can appreciate the mission of the Escambia Children's Trust i think one of the criticisms for you Lindsay was that we weren't spending the money that's why we got $25 million unencumbered i don't know if it all is how much is actually encumbered how much is it all of it all $25 million is encumbered well I
don't think this half a million dollars is going to affect chain reaction i just don't think it will and I I don't think that when the Escambia Children's Trust was established it was expecting um a half a million dollars in tax breaks as part of their operating budget i don't think so we could debate how we would spend the money but I Belleview Park is in my district i know about that and it's we still have an unsafe situation there um it's not
like all the other parks it's different and I I can find ways to spend the money over there too to make it safer because I I agree with my colleagues that it's uh making it safe for kids is important it that is probably it's the number one it is it really is the number one goal of government is it's the mission is to to to keep us all safe and uh to keep kids safe
commissioner Hoffber are you ever light on thank you so I will say when I was campaigning one of the things that I didn't understand that I have came to understand over the last eight months is not all the money goes to the same pot money is collected for specific reasons and that money can only be spent for specific reasons when I look at the Children's Trust and how it came to be I look at why people voted yes to give Children Trust the money and I can say I don't think most people voted for that to put sidewalks in i think most people voted for that to provide a
better future for our children and to make sure that they have access to things that they need such as better education and someone to tutor them and someone to encourage them and someone to let them know they can be something um for all the people that came here tonight thank you for advocating for yourself that is a huge life skill and something that some people never learn so you are ahead of many adults so be proud of yourself for that reason I would be a proponent for providing the tax break and not collecting that money because I think that what the community
voted on is for the children's trust to invest that money in our kids not in infrastructure point of clarification point of clarification Commissioner so are are are you being supportive of us taking that funding other funding and putting it from the summer employment program or are you just saying put it back not collecting the money at all you can still fund the summer program whether we take the tax money or not correct yes so Commissioner if you take the money then you
take it into the CRAAS and you'd be limited to spending it on CRA purposes and I would um have you look to your attorney as to whether or not the summer youth employment program would qualify under the CRA um I would think it would not but I would have you ask your attorney okay thank you alison can you speak up i heard Yeah I'm sorry i was trying to make sure to This is All right so to boil it down I see it as you have two choices tonight you can grant the requested waiver and
if you do that you should direct that your staff bring back at your next board meeting a finalized interlocal agreement with the children's trust they are proposing that that interlocal addresses paying for the summer youth employment program and I think that would be allowable and you have to have an interlocal if you're granting them the waiver under the statute so that's choice A or choice B is you deny the waiver and then it gets spent for CRA purposes that means it's going to
be geographically bound to those CRAAS that would have collected that money and you're not going to be able to pay for summer youth employment program with that monies it's going to have to be spent according to the CRA statutory constrictions which is going to be mostly infrastructure like you've talked about so those are the two choices that I see that you have well I would Okay okay go ahead Commissioner Mike okay so I mean and here's a good point it's CRA money so it it it certainly
could be geographically constricted to the purpose in which it was collected that's one two uh the children trust collateral material and how the vote was yielded was off the backs of poor children and black and brown children period and so I mean when we're talking about dist distributing this money you know holistically that could be a problem i mean I'm my here's where my support is and that's and the vote can fall wherever it falls uh that we take those funds that came into the CRA and we help afford afford these disadvantaged children a job opportunity and
so how do we get there from here i mean that's the legal part for me or then it forces me to be in a position that you know I'm going to vote another way that's the intended purpose the trust has sent forth that how do we work that out i mean I how do we eliminate with government money staff money lawyers money staffing money that we create another payment plan of how the people who deserve the money don't get 100% of it how do we put 100% of that money back in the hands of the children is my question al well I'll just say this i voted for the Children's Trust i voted
for it too and I'll tell you what I I didn't think about programs only i thought about kids is when I voted for it that's why I thought about kids as a kid that had to start at 12 going to car park and playing schools because my mom and dad wasn't home it affected my life and there's a lot of kids that can't get to a program but can get to a park and play with people and it changes their life i guess that's why I'm so vocal about this be because for me I don't think I'd be here if I didn't go to car parks starting at 12 years old you know and playing with other kids that
didn't have their parents home because they were working like my dad was on the swing shift so for me if it's all about programs then it's all about programs for me it's all about kids and so that's where I stand the board voted 50 last year if the board doesn't want to do it I'll be by myself but um I I ain't worried about the money from the first two years that you didn't pay i'm willing to wave that off but um I would I would say that the Children's Trust paid it last year
and here's the other problem i'm going to just say this and I've told this to you Lindsay you don't have one person on the board from District 2 not one person not one i can't control that i know but how do people that don't even live around poor communities can fairly represent them i mean come on man i mean you're treating like a Democrat i think we're waiting on the governor to go through our list correct like that's that's legit not Lindsay's fault i know but it does i get it but
it's a point to be noted that if you if you're not even have some of the poorest communities that are represented it's just human bias it's natural and I think it I it I guess look I know where I see mike I see where you I'll tell you from my personal experience you have a personal experience on last Saturday I was coaching a basketball team a lady came up she has two kids who are great athletes and she said "Commission we don't have anywhere to stay my kids go to Global Learning Academy." I got evicted i work at Red Roof in and I don't have any money we have anywhere to stay
it's Saturday well we can't get any assistance for her you give She has four children so you give her some money and say "Can she get a night and she's back Sunday because we still can't get help on Monday." And and you give her some money and the kids are hungry and we're feeding those children and they're staying in a car they're not the ones that you see on the street and so that's Sunday then Monday we're trying to facilitate and then there are two other children with her that I said "Where did these young children come from why aren't they going to school at Global?" It was two young girls one girl in the fourth grade one girl in the fifth grade about 8:30 that night their mom come down to Legion Field they're looking for her well she's homeschooled and she had ran away she
had been away from home in the fourth grade uh that's why it's important that we find services for those kids and you know the most ideal program unfortunately these driveby mentoring programs these programs don't see that and so I respect where you're going because you know what they say they stayed in a car in a park at Legion Field they needed lights they needed safety they need somebody to give them food so I don't think that there's a one solution for anything that relates to poverty or delinquency i think we have to all work together and I've said you know from the
beginning we're having this conversation over one year and there's yet to be a decision at the city of Pensacola we don't even know where the city is going with their CRA dollar well I'm not so sure about that in their budget you have 517,000 that Well they they were funded for their their after school programs i listen I I'm with you on that uh but still the CRA dollars the mayor hadn't made a decision i think that it's in my opinion 561 actually 561 whatever they were the city after school programs were funded and I think we run some of the finest after school programs around uh
Leroy and Clara and their staff does that but how do we figure out how do we work with the city the trust and the county and the deliverables I mean so we are way ahead of this because quite frankly I mean it's politically easier to come beat the county up than it is to go beat anybody else up and so we're having this discussion tonight and we're not we had even had it at city council hadn't even made a decision about what they're going to do i mean the mayor is talking about daycare and those critical needs uh they have not even got a memorandum of understanding uh they got even more CRA dollars and we're not even having that conversation so for me I want to find
the happy medium of how we can work together and that's why I was supportive when Lindsay bought of of spending that money uh on a summer employment program because we know where that money goes we know that that money is going it's not any administrative it's not going to anybody's pocket it's not anybody's salary it goes to those children but I respect you i was on the side with with Sheriff Simmons uh that he needed cameras so you're not off because I understand how these neighborhoods are i understand that children in Montlair can't go outside and I understand are you
making a motion i have not made a motion yet i'm just want to figure out where you are gabble if no one wants to make a motion how much money are we looking at for cameras like do you do we really need just half a million dollars for cameras i I think the number was about a half commissioner we're going to vote for $25 million potentially tonight for turf fields i have the only failing school in Warrington that doesn't even have a multi-use park within five miles the baseball
field which is in Commissioner May's district they walk down Navy Boulevard to play football at the baseball field i mean there's some point we got to say are we going to take care of kids in poor communities i mean it's just it's just a fact it's just a fact if we don't like it let's just admit it but I'm going to take care of Mike i don't even have a middle school in district three so I mean I get what you're saying so if you want to know where my vote is Mike you know um if that's not the wishes of majority of the board you know I'll be supportive uh you know I'm not interested in
in switching money uh and if it just can't work uh legally or logistically I mean whatever was in the parameters of how we can do it to make sure that money is spent on our children that's important to me and I agree the city the city has been double funded they were funded for their after school programs and you know we don't even know where they're going to land in terms of what they're going to do with their CRA dollars well we had that same issue last year Commissioner May that was it was the same issue so I mean well if no one wants to make a motion I'll pass the gavl and and
I'll make a motion i mean I'm not afraid to make a motion hold on commissioner Barry or Commissioner Stroberger mr chairman so uh you know this is you know tonight as well as previous discussions I kind of let y'all you know kind of take the lead it's been you know something that you and Commissioner May you know certainly him serving on there have been very passionate about but um you know I supported not granting the waiver as you mentioned last year you know 550 you know clearly that had a lot of board support um and you know I have Personally I've been concerned you
know as I think uh a lot of folks in our community have been with going on at the Children's Trust just generally um you know with some you know some decisions as well as some things that have been funded some things that have not been funded um but it seems like the way the item has come back to us this evening is framed in the in the context of if you grant the exemption it's coming with a pairing of more or less dollar for dollar is going to fund our summer youth employment program which
is a program not infrastructure but it is a program that directly benefits uh the youth as well as it benefits the county and we have a lot of successes out of that summer youth program it's been uh you know one of the passions of my of my dear friend and my left over these years that we've served together um so it's not granting a waiver tonight I wouldn't feel like is just basically alleviating the pressure from the trust and having more funds go to their control
um as long as it's paired with the partnership that they're going to fund our summer youth employment program then that seems like a I'm not sure who negotiated that maybe maybe No I'm not going No that that outcome seems like a reasonable outcome whoever whoever had the conversations that uh you know kind of brought that idea with the possible exemption that seems like a a reasonable uh you know a reasonable avenue to me um it's not a perpetual exemption if uh you know if we
were you know if we were to grant the exemption and have an interlocal agreement for them to fund the summer youth employment program and then that doesn't go especially well then I think I'll be right back where I was last year when I voted to not grant the exemption um you know well I appreciate that and but I'll be by myself i I think Mike Mike and you know I'm I'm trying to you know get to consensus because I think they should pay for the summer youth program anyways and I still think we should get infrastructure i would I would agree with you and I'm poor here that I
think they should have i mean we we should have applied i mean I think our human resources human services did and they were denied from what Clare has told me you know Mike I'm with you you're waving the first two years of exemption i'm saying we need all the money we need more money i can't say I was I was there that's up to the board i mean I So if if if if they were willing to pull all the money you know for those three years into the summer employment Mike that's where I would be and I get where you're saying that we need it for the infrastructure but I'm saying we do needed help for human capital and we do need it for the jobs and so you know if there's a happy
medium Commissioner Barry uh Commissioner Hullberg Commissioner Colola Stroer that's what I would be i would I would want to make sure that we get all of those funds allison would we get it dollar for dollar and I guess Linds I would ask you would that be administrative cost to that or is it or are if we were seeking all of the dollars that went to CRA for our summer employment program and Mike you know if you don't want to put it off for summer youth I mean would would it be foreigners i mean I'm not against summer youth we're talking 1.9% out of a budget that can
help safety i understand i mean it's a holistic approach i I I don't want to I'm the only one who's a nurse only one as a teacher i just can't believe that we can't think that safety in the poorest communities out of a $25 million budget that we can't get there but if we can't No no Mike mike Mike listen i don't think for me I'm saying I don't disagree with you brother i I don't disagree i'm trying to in good negotiation find that happy medium like you said you were willing to forgive the you know the other two years i Why don't Hey why don't we do this ask them to pay for the CH
uh youth program out of the 700,000 they owe us and then the CRA for this year can you do because paid us for that that'd be Yeah say that again allison I didn't understand certainly well you still owe us $700,000 that you haven't paid for the first two years couldn't you put that forward to youth program and then we could still do the CRA i mean there's a lot of money that the statute says that we can have that we're not getting i I would say that
decision would be from our board i couldn't speak to that but I think that anything is possible if you are willing to work collaboratively which is what we've been asking from the beginning so a lot of the problems that you guys are talking about I know I've met with most of you we're were here before me i mean and and I think I've done a pretty good job of mitigating a lot of that and getting this ball rolling and getting those dollars out the door so they're not sitting in a bank account but currently all this is encumbered in a bank account because we can't come to a partnership agreement here and and meanwhile I'm seeing these kids over here that
I think could work in your county offices and it would be awesome they're not the only ones though so that was something unique clara reached out to me and said "We have a shortfall." And I'm concerned because if we don't do this we'll only be able to serve 75 kids so it sounds like there's been some conversation you guys were able to pull some more dollars in there so what does that look like if we can put our dollars towards that well kids would you be willing to pay the 21 and 22 the 700,000 into the youth program and then we use the 24 budget for CRAAS i mean we're I mean we we are
owed a lot of money that we're not getting i would say they would probably be and this is just me saying this we have a board meeting coming up so I can bring it up um and speak to them about it they would probably prefer to do a multi-year contract essentially with the youth employment program or expanding it sort of like you were talking about Commissioner May um and use those dollars back dollars for that um but I have no problem i mean here's where our numbers would be if we not even all 1300 I mean we would be at about a $1.2 million you know if we were employing
you know 80% of of the summer youth so I guess and Lindsay I know you can't speak for the board because I sit on the board exactly and so but I think we're I think the board would follow your guidance i think the chairman is trying to find a resolution that we can all go forward and I mean I guess if this needs to be pushed to a further negotiation it can I my vote is going to be a good faith measure from the children's trust for the two years that didn't pay the county to put
that in the youth program and then for the 24 year we get the 495,000 for the CRAAS for the safety so can I make a motion for that Alison or we'll do you mind just one more if that's what you want to do Mr chairman but I would say that we would still have a shortfall even if you just took those two years and didn't take the third year but I in the compromise I I'm listen I'm I'm I'm here i can't have it all my weight so if I had my weight I'd put it off for summer employment for me but it's
okay i mean I'm not going to bicker with you on it i mean you know you you've been very passionate about it and I will respect mr barry you have your light on but I know I'm sorry i thought you were done Commissioner no you're fine i mean it it's fine i mean I've kind of stated stated my piece and uh I get the opportunity to see the young people that get a job and they dress up and you know Larry D's talking about taking off a belt i mean and our kids don't even know that you have to wear a belt to go to work and and young people who've worked in the attorney's office engineering
i mean we've had heard the testimonials i mean it that program makes a difference when we want to keep we want people to live work and play in Escambia County we want to recruit them i mean what better way uh to create diversity what what better way to uh give people a a door our intern program is a successful program in a summer employment program to give them a job uh I agree with you on everything you said the kids got to be safe uh but at the same time they do need money uh and you know this would you know probably be unprecedented if we could get all three years
for the summer employment program uh it would quite frankly it would affect all of the partner agencies who are working with the trust uh and you know quite frankly we probably wouldn't be able to sustain it because we'd only be getting you know four or $500,000 in in future years but in this uh tough economic time that we're facing right now I mean I can just tell you there are a ton of kids that left Florida State that are in all of our district that came home early because of the shooting and the gun violence that are looking for jobs or that are trying to get jobs and if we could create a lot of jobs um with this money uh that's what I'd be supportive of but
obviously if Lindsay can't give an answer she have to go back to her board it's going to be a tough decision and if we have Well we've already voted for that so I think we could redirect that but I I hear Commissioner Barry yeah I was just going to say that's seems like a reasonable outcome i mean this is a public hearing tonight it could I mean it's not a land use public hearing so it doesn't have to be in the evening madam council we could bring back a I mean if there's it you know the the collaboration and and and you know Miss Kennon made a comment about the collaboration i think some of the uh some of the angst that our board has had the last few years has been
um that you know and it may have been prior to you but you know the county did take what we felt like was a very worthwhile request to the board and was denied and you know another municipality in in our area took a request that I don't know had any more merit but was uh you know more readily accepted for whatever reason um so that collaboration is uh you know it's one thing to give a narrative of collaboration it's another thing to have a uh put that into human practice and that's not uh you
know that's not been that was not our experience when we took the one proposal to the board so it sounds like there's more of that just the um just the initiative of or the open-mindedness to allow for the funds that would come from the exemption to go towards the summer youth program I think is uh somewhat an indication of an attempt to collaborate so it sounds like there's been some progress made tonight maybe we bring it back to a public hearing at the next uh you know we can have that at a morning meeting and pair it pair it with something that's maybe a a longer term approach
whether it and you know the $700,000 we're owed in and back that's that is a lot of money they you know they they do have it so that I don't think that's you know in question um and maybe you can uh you know maybe you can work with uh with Miss Cannon or uh or someone else to bring back something that does encompass uh maybe a three-year plan but also addresses the funds that are in a rears that I you know our board has consistently voted that we do consider those funds
owed and um uh but I think there's been some progress made tonight so I think that's a good thing well I'm willing to make a motion but I if no one wants to do it you know did Oh I'm sorry i I had a question because there was two things that were proposed and I just want to make sure that I'm clear commissioner May were you saying take the two years back pay and this year and roll that into the summer youth program would you would So nothing for CRAAS and my proposal is the 2021 for the summer youth program and 24 for the CRA i think that's a fair fair trade-off so
And that's probably where and you're going to benefit from that too you know that absolutely and so Commissioner Cole I don't think we disagree i think Commissioner Barry said we've made some progress and we come back i mean Mike I'll tell you where I'll be here's the public if we got those two years and this year for the summer employment program and we came to negotiation and she takes it back to her board and they wouldn't make a three-year commitment like they've done every other organization it's going I'm going to be hardressed not to be supportive of sending all the money back to the CRA because as Commissioner Barry said that's not a collaborative spirit and if they have that collaborative spirit I'm going to be willing to work with them and the
only reason I would say I I have reservations to go with Commissioner Barry there's a lot of pressure that they're putting on us to make a quick decision tonight well the city has not even made a decision no we have to make we they have to do it right Alison we don't have to do it tonight it's the first public hearing in May correct isn't that what No it's the first public hearing i I'm I'm not sure exactly what you're wanting to do are we trying to So there is a statutory timeline that goes along with their request for a waiver of the 2020 when does it expire it's already gone
i mean we've It's already passed i think it was 40 days or something i mean we're already past that so so in 14 days what would be the difference if we came back on May 15th if we can get them to agree that we're going to schedule another public hearing on their request for a waiver for 2024 for the May 15th agenda and they're okay with that then I think well the only option is if they'll be okay with it or we going to make a vote and it may not be as favorable as we want no I believe we we are okay with um coming back in two weeks and in the meantime discussing with you use of
all three years funds do you guys have a board meeting between now and then that you'll be able to discuss on Tuesday you do we do we do and we always have a legal Meredith gives an update so we can and I'm pretty sure they're all watching so um we can have some discussion i do and I will just say this i I do think they would be um willing and and and I can have individual conversations as well to look at utilizing what we have from back and what's current for that youth summer
youth program i I do i I think it's a great just so you know I mean I used to refer kids to it all the time it is an amazing life-changing program and so when Clara connected with me of course I wanted to jump on board with that because I know it's a great program so I will ask my board i I I'm comfortable with it so um but but I cannot I cannot speak for them but I And Lindsay I think the board's watching and I I serve on the board i think they see the direction of where this is probably going to land i mean because I think all of us are concerned with safety um and so that's
hopefully that's up to you hopefully hopefully hopefully it'll go to help children heads up that that's a weird meeting may the 15th is a one:00 public form and a 1:30 start time so just you know I mean depending on what audience but the children are important people come at one two three four i mean the kids are important just strawber i I just want to say it seems like we got away from last year the reasons why you wanted the money before both of you i mean I I think Mike is still on board with that and and now we're turning we're just making a jobs program out of this money now
a jobs program but a youth employment program is I mean and and you're absolutely right i mean I was way on board with the sheriff and where I'm just wondering what the law you know once we the money's gone have we built anything i want to build something well you'll be you'll still have kids over at Lexon Terrace in the dark wondering why they don't have a multi-use field but that's that's okay i'll go back and tell them that you know when you're poor you just have to suck it up no not Mike you You know that's not me i believe we got to have lights and parks for all hey you
you people's actions are determined by Steve and I because I'm not going to be someone that flakes on what we've said and I initially came out with cameras and lights in support of Commissioner Kohler and that's where I have a lot of hesitation because I believe in exactly what he said you got to have cameras you got to have lights have a safety and the sheriff told us that we had to have that i think that there's a compromise that if we could get that programming and if the trust would make a commitment of this money and a multi-year what they've done with every other
organization if they if the trust comes back and said "Oh we're going to give you a rear and this money and it's one year and we're not going to uh do this employment program." I think I would have a different position on the 15th uh if they came back and said you know we're going to give you this but we're going to put you as part of the multi- three-year commitment that they made to everybody else to fund that i think that that's another conversation Steve because then if they do that we can reallocate economic development money for lights and cameras that we are currently using for summer employment if they did that so I mean I'm not I don't I don't want to waver or
get an indication uh that I'm not supporting the chairman uh because I am supporting the chairman uh and his ideology of where he is allison do we need to make a motion or You need a motion and a vote to schedule a public hearing for the May 15th board meeting and they might even be able to give us the specifics public hearing time um on May the 15th but we can get that from Jose if he doesn't have one of I would like to make a motion that we schedule a second public meeting for May 15th at the meeting starting at 1:30 p.m i'll second it please vote motion passes 4 to one
with the chair voting no all right let's please move on clerk and controllers report thank you we have two items on the consent agenda for your approval one is going to be documents for filing the other is minutes prepared um there's one information item which is the clerk's reporter and discretionary fund expenditures thank you sir thank you uh Horus wrote for GMR thank you yes sir um I'm sorry about that is there a second commissioner Barry did you say yes i move I
move the clerk all right is there a second second all right please vote motion passes 5-0 all right Horse you're up for GMR yes sir for the first 5:45 public hearing to to to review and adopt a small scale map amendment 2025 01 to review and adopt is there a motion to approve GMR 545 i make a motion to approve so moved okay vote i second them i second Commissioner Halber's motion motion
passes 5 thank you uh horse yes the next item to review and adopt an amendment amending the coastal um management element chapter 11 of the comprehensive plan as required okay do we have a motion to make all right and Commissioner second please vote okay motion passes 5 thank you everybody we're at GMR action item uh 21 yes sir the final plat um recommendation for approval follow commercial pathstone okay commercial subdivision so move speakers okay
is there a second all right please vote did you get Commissioner May second i think Commissioner May was a second with his hand okay commissioner Stroberger made the motion and Commissioner May second got it okay thank All right motion passes 5 Z if I remember correctly all right horse number two it's a the next item is a final plat approval for sanctuary subdivision phase three okay there's no speakers so moved second all right please vote motion passes 5-0 then we have our consent agenda
so moved all right is there a second okay please vote all right thank you all motion passes 5-0 uh thank you horse uh Westworth the county administrative report thank you Mr chairman there are six items on the technical public service consent agenda there are no changes there are no speakers i'm moving Mr chair okay all right uh please vote motion passes uh 5-0 thank you Wes let's go to car budget and finance there are 26 items on the budget finance consent agenda please drop card 2-22 the recommendation concerning purchase order for Jacob's Engineering
for Transportation Project Support please hold card 2-7 for discussion and you also have a speaker for 2-7 okay does anyone want to move the balance i move the balance Mr chairman all right second okay please vote motion passes 5-0 um our first speaker on 2-7 is Tom Jardine is Tom here how many speakers do we have on this item Mr chair uh just one on on car 2 we have some we the next we have an item with several speakers coming up all right good afternoon everybody tom Jardine
i live on Pensacola Beach i've lived there 30 years um this is a kind of an interesting um item $25 million I believe and it may be a good idea in fact I think we spend way too much of our uh citizens tourism money on advertising that we don't need all that advertising and this is not advertising for a ch for once but this thing's moving kind of quickly which scares me i have an oldfashioned no notion that $25 million is a lot of money and uh first of all can we have
some kind of when we have these huge allocations like that i know that uh like we need $30 million for the Bay Center which I agree with we need to do something about that Bay Center uh but somehow it's turned into we're we're thinking about a hundred million million dollar project around the city um and you know we may have a good idea about the $7 million gateway project as well we were just talking about $60 million project for for volleyball courts or whatever in you know in in in district 5 uh can we bundle all this stuff and get some uh you know maybe a
referendum or something for for this uh I don't think the citizens you need some buyin for the citizens when we're thinking about taking a loan for $25 million um it's moving really fast the TSC only talked about this item uh last meeting which was the April 15th is already you guys are thinking about voting on this thing I I assume um the TDC they were 5 to three by the way they weren't fully on board with this thing either but it went so quickly i mean like we know we needed
uh sand replenishment for the public beaches on Pensacola Beach the TDC I mean the you know our tourist money all come a lot of that tourist money comes from our from the public beaches at uh on Pensacola Beach the TDC knew for 10 years that we were going to have to do that project but at that same April 15th meeting they were all you know ringing their hands and you know and biting their pencils and wondering how they're going to come up with uh with with some money for the for the beaches but suddenly they vote for a $25 million project where we're going to take a loan
um I don't know if you looked at the backup but all those uh it looks like all of our looks like we're late to the party um all there's there's a we have a bunch of competition uh everybody else has all the neighboring communities already have these ball fields and everything uh I don't know why we're coming in late um if it's such a great idea why isn't private enterprise coming in here to to to I mean I don't know just fully vet this thing out please it may be a good idea but but it makes me very uncomfortable it's moving very quickly thank you thank you Tom uh Commissioner
may you have some conversation on this or is your light just on for I I apolog okay i I'll just make a comment after what we just discussed i I'm going to support this Commissioner Barry but it's hard for me to support 20 turf fields when there's not one multi-use field in district two well it's not in district five either for what it's worth but Well but I know you're supportive of it it's a Commissioner May's district but I know you butt up to it but I got it you You're supportive of it get
in y'all's argument it's like you taking You got more people in your district than I got than CO no no i just It's a lot of money i mean $25 million and I can't even get 200,000 so I I just It's sad man but I'm going to support it i'm gonna support it because you know what i believe you know and I know some people on the city council had some issues with the number and and I do think it's important that I talked to Stfan that we mentioned uh there was some concern if it would affect uh the Bay Center project and um indirectly it could a little bit we got to be honest about that but um
but Stfan gave us some numbers that shared that uh we still could probably do a very robust project at the basin as we move forward with that as well so I'm going to support this um and my because I think the county needs things all over the county and and I appreciate that tremendously and I and I you know I I I do hope it's it's recognized there was uh you know there was another item that the TDC supported um about nine months ago related to a project at Ashton Brazzam oh yeah that was
that was much more expensive than this and um you know these the you know these these seats you know a couple of us have been here for a little while you know you for a you know a little while shorter and then you know a couple a little while shorter than that i mean the the seats are challenging as uh you know a room full of folks might attest to this evening the seats are challenging sometimes and and you know we can have uh you know we can have the best ideas um and if we
can't cobble together some support among colleagues then it's uh it's it's it's kind of mood it doesn't it doesn't matter you know we can have you know the the the best ideas on an island don't produce for your constituents and I will just it doesn't matter now i mean you know you you you don't want perfect to be the enemy of good this is a I think this is a great project but the uh the idea for the indoor basketball and volleyball at Ashadham was also a
tremendous project and like I said the TDC I don't remember the vote but I I think it might have been unanimous uh when they voted to support that project bring that project forward to our board and in light of some other things that happened around that time I you know um you know kind of uh asked the administrator that that let's let's not do that let's hold off and have different discussions and and this is the manifestation of those different discussions that you know have begun uh that did begin a long time ago think the uh I'm very committed for the remaining portion of
our capacity for our debt placement capacity to uh to go to the Bay Center project i've uh you know uh stated that in you know some in some private meetings and and we'll say that here publicly and we'll uh certainly help with that as much as uh you know as much as I'm asked to um the ROI on this is uh this is something we can deploy relatively quickly and the ROI and it's going to be uh you know it's going to be quick and I think we're going to see the impact of it relatively uh relatively soon as soon as things are deployed um it's something that I think is tremendous for
our community for many many years it would have been in District 5 as as as you noted is very close it is very close um but it's a it's a great thing and I know the Bay Center is important to uh you know to uh to a number of you and um you know I'm I'm I'm hopeful we can move forward with this but uh with this you you know I you know on on on video as uh you know we might not like some of the videos that you know from 10 or 12 years ago that do still exist uh uh on demand looming
some uh some some colorful exchanges uh you know my support for your uh for the for the remaining bonding capacity um is being is being memorialized tonight so I I will certainly help with that and uh I will work with Stefan and and you know and and whatever is needed to uh make sure we have the funds to put a uh to put a transformational project on that property as well so uh but I I do appreciate the support Mike and and the trust and I think a lot of that uh also comes from the
uh trust and support that many of us have with uh parks and rec director Mike Rhodess as well as Adam Reid who I know the two of them are in the audience uh Pensacola Sports Association Ray Palmer is not here but they did do uh I think they helped put together a lot of the presentation that was done for the TDC meeting which I'm sure many of us watched and thought Michael did a great job in that meeting advocating on uh on our behalf on our cumulative county behalf i thought he did a great job at TDC so I want to I want to specifically uh state that but I do appreciate your support and uh I'm happy to talk about this as much as y'all would like to i would move the
item if that's if y'all are Well there's a few more discussion items but I think you're going to get a win commissioner Stroberger do you have a comment yeah I'm in support of this too whoever's district this is um appreciate that i I at first was kind of hesitant about 20 fields but um but I understand the ROI will be good i agree i agree with that and and there won't be anything like this in the area with this many right we'll be very very very competitive there just won't be any any place else with this kind of capacity i like that i would have liked to see Lumen um at
the at the mullet toss though at least if he was going to if this is for him oh my god commissioner I mean and I I certainly support my colleague uh and Commissioner Barry and cross he probably spends more time at that park i mean I probably spend more time at your park at at Belleview than there but I I I support the project um those citizens from the north end come down uh within the urban core inner city we just don't do a lot of baseball uh but doesn't mean I don't support
it i see this as something that will create bed tax uh and uh bring people into town uh but it'll be something that that everyone can use um it's I've not been close to it uh at all um I've never grabbed a a mullet to throw i mean I've grabbed many of them to eat and I like them filleted and in nuggets so I mean if you get those I'd be happy to have them but I do have a question Commissioner Perry i mean I mean obviously you know we're going to to support the project uh but what about the
Miracle League uh will that still be included or is it just the John R jones fields what What is that i don't even know what the miracle it's for the children with disabilities who play baseball on Nine Mile Road yeah so that that's not going to be affected they're they're going to continue operations we have three fields that that they're playing on there and we have you know two I don't know 250 300 kids that or young people young you know children and young adults that are playing there and it's uh it's going to continue we're not going to we're certainly not going to impact that um they're celebrating their 20th 20th year as an organization this year and and I believe
next year will be the 20th year of uh of playing it took a couple years to raise the money to get the first field built but and it's just the baseball fields it's not the football field in soccer field it's the the the project itself it no it will cover the football field as well as the practice football field to the to the west where we uh where lacrosse was was played some this year so it's it's going to be the full footprint which I think is going to give us opportunities to uh uh you know to host even more uh you know to host even more young people and that's what we're you know and and that's obviously what the hope is well thank you oh I'm sorry i was going
to say when whenever is the point I'm happy to move it commissioner Hoffber do you have a comment awesome i I'm excited to support this as well because it does diversify our tourism economy so it adds another spoke in the will of everything that makes this Cambia County great um and it it's great to have a win for the community and the economy so I'm happy to support it for that i also want to be clear that we're all aware that we have the bonding capacity of about a hundred million dollars from the LOST this is taking $25 million so we have $75 million left for the Bay Center just want to be upfront that we all are aware of that um
but excited to support this project thank you i I just want to say this because obviously the price tag looked large and and then but then you look hopefully it'll be transformational but I think it's important to share this when Commissioner Bender was on the board him and I went to a fat conference and I think it was in Semino County and they took us on a field trip um at a park that had several of these turf um fields and they had did a presentation and the number of um uh team leagues that came in to use the fields actually after they put them in just shot through the roof and so
um and I also think it's good to diversify in the county different things so we spread that out and um so I'm happy Mr chairman Steve one one last question for you may for Mike we're going to deploy $25 million most of our parks are ran by parent organizations which turf is very expensive and I mean obviously you know there are a lot of other parks throughout uh this will be controlled by our parks and recck department correct i mean I mean as to have a a central park that uh everyone can use not just this one parent association uh we're not going to turn this
over to a parent organization this will be a tag team approach where it will not affect the current recreation leagues uh we've we've got full support with the existing Ensley Football League with the existing Northeast Pensacola Baseball League with the Miracle League along with our adult and I appreciate their support but I appreciate that we will we will be coordinating all events out there so if someone from someone else wants to use that park we're not going to go through a association that's ran by parents it will be the county control that is correct and a byproduct for your
support of this tonight um would be a thousand youth are playing recreation sports currently at that facility this season a combination of spring baseball at NEP Miracle League as well as lacrosse and with football picking up with registration right now the local youth are going to be the benefactors as well for this as you as I can say I could have filled the room up tonight with youth recreation players but they're on the fields practicing so but there's a lot of wearing lot we thousand that want to use aim like Oh go ahead no so I'm long as we have that clarity Mike
i'm I'm good i'm going to support my colleague but I just want to be clear that you know when we want to host the football championship there on turf field or people have games I want you to bring the soul ball down there hey Mike come on you come on now how about that hey Mike since you came to the mic I'd like to you know because we're taking out tourist development i looked at rays but I you firmly believe it'll expand outside local stuff to the tourism in the regional area absolutely and that I read that and I thought the same thing but I think it's good to
have that on record since it's coming out of TDC money and I think it will too but I just that's the whole competition but I'm pretty confident that uh Pensacola Beach and the tourism here is no offense to Dothan Alabama but uh those towns alike but I'm pretty sure we can compete very well against th those those competition and I won't make the TDC do a host study if they didn't but um I'm going to support it without it yeah there there's there was a lot I don't know if you read
all the backup i know Commissioner Hoffberger was you know was was part of the lengthy meeting but they you know there was a lot of support from national you know from the national organizations that uh that that would love to come here i mean you know we we're all familiar with folks and especially if you were had a reason to ask you would know people that are going to uh Laurel Mississippi and and other areas to play weekend baseball when they would love to they would love to be here yeah no I think so too i I believe we have a a great community to bring people in so uh hopefully it brings in a lot of tourism dollars for our community and um
and it's a beautiful place for us to be proud of as a commission so uh who wants to make the motion on this or is there any further conversation i move the item okay uh Commissioner May it's in your district do you want to Do you want to second or do you want to someone else to help you out i'm sick of y'all playing about my district when y'all know all the people from your district when using the park okay commissioner Stroberger would you like to second or second okay please vote motion passes 5-0 thank you all all right Wes where we at car three discussion items i would Mr chairman I
would ask that we move uh item two ahead of item one since item one to be a long discussion okay is the board I'm fine with that let's do that uh just for clarification this is on your discussion agenda solely because we need to memorialize four votes it it takes four votes to do this so hazard mitigation grant by program okay we don't have any speakers is there a motion
to move it forward i make a motion we move forward okay is there a second second okay please vote okay uh car uh three car 2 or has uh voted pass 5-0 okay now we're at Okay this ought to be a lengthy one um the MSBU we have we have uh several speakers here probably 15 at least 19 okay uh let's start with Gus Tikeke is Gus Tikeke in the audience tyke
am I saying that right titkkey maybe is Is it Titki okay we'll go to Gabe Diani is Gabe here okay all right this is your chance to talk about the MSBU that we're going to discuss tonight okay i'll move on is Jeb Maynard here well we'll find out where we land is Jeb Maynard still here okay I'm going to keep
pushing on is Rhonda Dorfman here yes all right thanks Rhonda come on up june Guerrera's on deck first of all I'd like to ask all of our beach residents and beach businesses who have been sitting through this meeting would you please stand while I read my statement thank you my name is Rhonda Dorfman and I am president of the Pensacola Beach Advocates we are a leaseholder and residents organization that represents 200 families about 400 voters the
Pensacola Beach residents support our fire department we want everyone in the city to have a professional fire department just like we have on Pensacola Beach what we don't understand is why the beach residents must pay a higher MSBU than the mainland residents all good budgets are activity or resource base it seems to me that the major cost drivers for firefighting are number of firehouses and their upkeep number of employees the distance to serve cost of materials and cost
of labor with the county committed to have a firehouse every 5 miles to keep insurance cost for residents at a reasonable level there is no reason for differentiating the beach residents and fire services from any other fire service in the county before you consider an increase in our MSPU to fund the growth needs and the other parts of the county you need to reduce the MSPU on Pensacola Beach to the same rate that all of the mainland residents receive it
is appalling that the budget is actually even split up between mainland and beach residents we are all citizens in Escambia County we are all residents in Escambia County furthermore the inequity and the inequality of the rates you charge beach businesses per square foot versus what mainland businesses is an egregious action the beach generates so much revenue and income for this county yet all you want to do is to stick it to the people who live out there and to the
businesses who serve out there enough is enough reduce reduce the beach MSPU so that all residents are paying the same price be the responsible county commissioners you want your voters to think you are thank you thank you thank you let's have order please june Guerrera you're up next thank you for having this forum for us i also want it's been a long time since I've been a
part of commissioner meetings or island authority meetings i was at the beach for 40 years 40 years we started uh year-round business on Pensacola Beach and we went to the beach in 1980 when no one was open after Labor Day i want to thank y'all for your service to us citizens of Escambia County i am June Gara i live at 23 Arthur Lane in Pensacola but I was at the beach for many many years and this MSBU is is not fair i'm asking y'all to really consider that the people that live
on the beach are citizens of Escambia County you serve them just the same as you serve the people in Escambia County on the mainland think about it and I want you to also realize that you want to be fair to all of the people in our county i I I really was a pioneer on Pensacola Beach it was very difficult out there so when this MSBU first hit me on Pensacola Beach it was over $17,000 for
Jubilee Restaurant and Captain Fund i I felt like I don't know how I'm going to do it i've got to change all my menu prices because that's a large amount of money we did not You do not make money on Pensacola Beach in your off season pensacola Beach does pay more MSVU than in anybody in Escambia County it should be the same we They pay more fees for um taxes to put bands on the beach
this is a community that is serving Pensacola in many many ways your your taxes that you're getting from TDC uh the tourists it is supplying many things for Escambia County don't mistreat the people on Pensacola Beach i'm not there anymore i was there those 40 years and it was not real easy but you have that opportunity now to really think how you're coming across and treating
these people think about the neighborhoods in Pensacola that are not well-kept when there is a storm on Pensacola Beach those people out there get their businesses cleaned up they clean their houses they make it a nice neighborhood they make it really nice for when our tourists come it is pleasant it's it's an asset don't mistreat them the number one question I am in business in Pensacola the number one question that's asked after how much does it cost me to live in your
park is how far are you from the beach consider that the beach is important to Escambia County don't mistreat the people out there they're hardworking i'm out i'm off the beach why am I off the beach up your thoughts i'm off the beach because it's hard to live out there and you have to constantly overcome difficulties thank you thank you for sharing your comments we appreciate them craig Ferris if you could come up next and Jeremy Johnson's on deck hey
Jeremy thank you for the opportunity my name is Craig Ferris i'm representing Lagonas on Pensacola Beach uh my employer we're a a small uh individually owned business and we've invested significantly in Pensacola the Pensacola Beach area to bring family-friendly activities to the people that work live and vacation here in the Pensacola area um for years we now we've grown
our revenues which increases taxes we pay uh we pay uh increased we're increasing in our support to the county by by growing revenue and paying those taxes and as you know insurance is higher um the cost of capital is higher the the main thing labor is a lot higher so to add one more thing on top of that the only thing we control in our control of all those is labor right so what does that mean we hire a lot of youth in the summer we're a we're a summer employer I've
heard a lot of talk about jobs programs and things like that being important well we hire people for the summer we hire year round so we're out there hiring and that means the more taxes we pay or the more that this this impacts our business the less people we can hire the less people we can employ um we're not opposed to the to the uh MSBU what we're opposed to is inequitable increases right so the numbers I saw was a 10 times greater increase for Pensacola Beach and a one-time increase for
everyone else in the county 10 times versus one time so think about that that's egregious um we ask that the increase is the same percentage for everybody e even though we even pay a little more already if the percentage increase is is the same then that that would I think would be fair and equitable and that's our main uh concern that we'd like you to hear tonight 10 times thank you Craig i appreciate you coming down uh Jeremy Johnson you're up and Stephanie Pals on deck
thank you Mr chairman i'm Jeremy Johnson uh chairman and elected member of the Santa Rosa Island Authority Board i'm here to express my concern about the proposed MSBU increase for fire protection services specifically the disproportionate burden placed on Pensacola Beach we are all citizens of Escambia County and as such should shoulder the responsibility equally i support our first responders and the MSBU rate should be the same countywide we're not
asking to avoid responsibility we're asking for a balance i urge the board to consider how this burden is shared and ensure that any increase is distributed fairly across all benefited areas thank you thank you Jeremy uh Stephanie Pal and Arthur Larry's on deck good evening my name is Stephanie Powell a more than one 1,000% increase in MSBU on
Pensacola Beach would present devastating impacts on Pensacola Beach businesses i work on Pensacola Beach as the marketing director for Premier Island Management Group several businesses managed by Premier would be directly impacted by this increase several of these businesses have representatives here this evening these businesses would be forced to pass the majority of their of this burden on to their customers and cut their marketing budgets a loss of revenue and added expenses would certainly impact their ability to compete with other local
businesses keep their staff employed and reach new customers the reality is most certain that many businesses will be forced to close i do not oppose an increase but I believe that the increase should be equal to what is being assessed inland thank you thank you ma'am and I appreciate your comments arthur Larry is up and then Steve Loopert is on deck thank you uh Arthur Liry and uh glad to be here i won't take up a lot of time but just to add to what's already been said I just
think that this you know not against the increase not against uh uh supporting the firefighters we need to have all that but this increase should be equitable and I think to do anything otherwise is just unconscionable and I urge you to reconsider it to make it equitable thank you very much thank you Arthur steve Loopert uh are you here okay thank you and Christine Cooks on deck uh good evening i'm Steve Loopert i'm a resident of Pensacola Beach 806 Rio
Vista Drive and I'm going to read to you here um I live in a lowdensity single family dwelling residential neighborhood on Pensacola Beach uh I wanted to be clear up front that I am not against an increase to support emergency services i understand the value of those services and I support funding them properly but that increase must be fair fair to all taxpayers across Escambia County right
now residential properties on Pensagold Beach many owned by LLC's are being used as full-time short-term rental businesses these are not occasional vacation homes they are commercial properties generating significant revenue using residential infrastructure and services and paying residential rates if you're operating a business especially one that generates income from lodging you should be paying the commercial rate i believe that's how it works in the rest
of the county and it should work the same way on Pensacola Beach the current system gives a financial advantage to commercial operations masking as residential homes and that's not fair to the residents or to the rest of the county this imbalance means residents like me are being asked to carry the same MSBU burden as the businesses which place far greater demands on public services that's not sustainable and frankly it's not responsible governing
meanwhile the leases that are intended to be regulated pro the property needs to regulate use um I'm getting off track here on the island are not being enforced oversight is lacking the Santa Rosa Island Authority and the county must do more to uphold those agreements the system is being abused and the county is losing revenue because of it so asking businesses and residents to pay more make sure everyone is paying their fair share and that includes commercial operations currently
hiding behind residential leases um I also want to thank the local fire department out at uh station 13 on Pensacola Beach on Easter weekend uh they gave a tour to my granddaughter and it was pretty good she enjoyed it and I enjoyed it too those folks do a good job out there and I hope you have it in your budget because the last thing that she asked that fireman was to come to her birthday party and she lives in New Orleans and they said yes so I hope you have that in your budget
to attend her birthday party uh well thank you very much Christine Cook and Ryan Frzy's on deck i'm Christine Cook and I'm a resident on Pensacola Beach and I want to say that I am not opposed to an increase and I strongly support our firefighters on the beach they've come to my assistance with my sick husband many times and they're fabulous but I think that the
disparity in the rate increases are prejuditial and unfair and it was earlier mentioned by some of the commissioners how we're all one county and we're all Escambia County residents and we all deserve deserve to be treated fairly thank you thank you ma'am uh Ryan Frzy and then Marsha Shennard's on deck hi my name is Ryan Frisier and I operate Radical Rides wersport business
on Pensacola Beach thank you guys for the opportunity to speak to you today about the proposed MSBU increase and how it may affect a small business uh like the one I operate running a water sports business is a high-risisk high overhead operation we spend a lot of money into boats jet skis safety equipment and staffing it's a high capital business uh and that just meets the baseline expectations for safety and service on top of that we're facing a sharp rise
in insurance premiums year after year especially in a hurricane prone region like ours these costs aren't optional they're required for us to operate safe safely and reg uh legally um as far as the MSPU increase I am firm supporter of Escambia Fire Department i work very closely with a lot of these guys with water safety running we ran drills with them this morning in Pensacola Pass doing multiple trainings so I do support excuse me the increase um we just want you to revisit it and look at it
to be more proportional because operating a a business with uh line item increase of a,000% is just not a option so um for me to keep doing something that I'm passionate about doing and uh creating memorable experiences for many of the vacationers here on Pensacola Beach operating water sports were one of the highlights for many people um we want to be able to afford it and be able to keep offering those services so we ask you to revisit that and uh look at something that's
going to be sustainable amongst small businesses and the Scambia fire budget thanks thank you marshia Shannard you're next and then Mike Pone you're on deck hi I'm Marcia Shernard i operate a small women's and men's boutique called Envy on the boardwalk in Pensacola Beach i've been there since 2011 every year the the profit margins get a little thinner the cost of doing business gets a little steeper um I don't oppose the tax
i certainly support the firefighters but I would ask that you consider being more um that we would pay the same type increase that any other part of Escambia County would pay that we not would not be singled out i do think paying a,58% increase that's not something that we can pass on to our customers that's something we have to absorb it's going to cost jobs i mean I employ probably six or seven high school and college girls to work during season we have two
full-time employees and myself so it could impact all of our jobs we could lose our jobs we have to close the store if we're not profitable we won't be in business and on the boardwalk there's many small businesses that are owned by individuals and like I just hope that you will consider that and know that we I mean I've been there for a long time 2011 was a long time ago so just you know I love my job i love I love Pensacola Beach but at some point if you can't make money then you won't stay in business so I would ask that you consider um the um the tax being more equitable
for for the beach as it is for other areas of Escambia County thank you very much for your time thank you Marcia appreciate your comments michael Penzone and uh Reed Kesler's on deck thank you so much guys listen the more I come here the more I feel that you guys are very reasonable very heartfelt stories that I've heard i think that you're very reasonable men and women and and the idea is basically this i've been on Pensacola Beach almost three decades i've worked uh at Papa's Pizza we we've we've built a business we built our family there we built our life there
my wife's working right now a 14- hour shift as I speak the thing is is we bring $2 billion $2 billion tourism brings $2 billion to this community and it's spread out between all you guys all you guys get part of this money for your districts and and and you need it right any given weekend do you know that there's 50 people that have been pulled out of the Gulf saved rescued from drowning any given weekend 50 people most of these are kids can you imagine if
we didn't do that don't Don't we feel like this is our community and we should do that don't you think that that's something that has to be done we wouldn't have tourism if we didn't do that next year we Nobody would come if we lost 50 kids in the Gulf on one weekend nobody would come back to the Pensacola Beach it it would be over for all of us so what I'm saying is is basically safety is the most important thing everybody's got neighborhoods that have problems everybody knows that and safety is the most important thing but you have to be reasonable we're paying property
taxes now when used to we didn't it was MSBU taxes and and and fees authority fees well now we're paying property taxes as well and so to give us punish us for working 12 14 hour days trying to build a community and give us all the burden is is is not fair it's not reasonable it's not sustainable like some of these other people said our businesses can't can't take it i've been there almost three decades i've been through hurricanes oil spills i've been shut down 19 months while the
beach was being rebuilt barely survived it and I know for sure if I don't get up and I speak about this I know if you give us this increase I know it's going to put me out of business and it's not going to just put me out of business it's going to put you know there's 8,000 people that work on Pensacola Beach every year 8,000 people do you know that and half of those people are probably part- timerrs and if they're part- timerrs then most of them are probably paying for their college
so our community is is all in one and we we have a a a natural resource that people come here for it besides the military and and the beach there's no other reason to come here pretty much and so to punish us for trying to build our community and all our communities and do you also know that I I Googled it just because I was curious i Googled it to find out that there was 3,000 uh
uh short-term rentals in Gulp Breeze and over 5,000 short-term rentals on Pens in Pensacola you know that's Airbnbs right michael you got to wrap it up i appreciate it i just I just want y'all to reconsider and look at things as a reasonable people we thank you for your comments ray Castler please come up and uh Sharon Reagan oh I didn't see Sharon but is Sharon still here okay she's on okay then Charlie Rottenberry but Ray you're up okay good evening commissioners my
name is Ray Kessler i am chairman of the board for the Pensacola Beach Chamber of Commerce and I'm speaking today on behalf of 300 businesses we represent we are deeply concerned about the proposed fire MSBU rate increase for Pensacola Beach from 7 cents to 83 cents per square foot which is a one 1,58% jump and for many businesses this would take their assessment from under $1,000
a year to more than $11,000 a year and that's not just an increase that's a breaking point pensacola Beach already operates under uniquely high cost insurance premiums building code compliance weather vulnerabilities and seasonal revenue swings this proposal adds another crushing layer and it doesn't just threaten profit margins it threatens survival for some this could mean layoffs for others it may mean cutting back on food quality hours or service and for too many
it may mean closing their doors altogether there's a real and dangerous irony here this county values Pensacola Beach for its beauty for its tourism and for its contribution to the local economy but the very businesses that keep that image alive our restaurants shops hotels attractions are now being priced out of existence you cannot pro promote a worldclass beach experience while
forcing out the businesses that make it one this is not how we protect a pristine welcoming beach community and it's not fair or sustainable a sustainable way to fund the essential ser services services we need we do fully support fire safety and emergency responses but we ask that this proposal be re-evaluated with equity sustainability and the economic health on of the island in mind thank you thank you ma'am i I think Sharon left i heard Charlie Rottenberry and
uh Beverly Campbell's up after Charlie Charlie Roenberry here sorry sir uh born and raised around Pensacola Beach spent a lot of time there i'm a realtor on the beach earn a lot of my income there and I will uh I don't have any more thing more to say that you haven't already heard except that the beach is our c your cash cow and many many many times we feel like a stepchild that you guys just don't even love and you're really showing that you don't love us on this the way
you kill the the the golden goose on the beach is you mess with the tourism the tourist business our beach our beach is a is a brutal beach to live on during the winter for the businesses we are your business as a tourism it doesn't take care of the uh overhead that the businesses have so I would ask that you uh do something that's going to be going to make sense to everybody and everybody in Escambia County enjoys our beach too so we should all pay the same amount what
you're trying to do to the businesses now you know they have a hard time enough i asked about how we're going to how you're going to earmark this so that we can look in the budget and see how we're how how we're accounting for our money as you in case you haven't noticed in Washington we're starting to want to account for everything i was told we don't even have an accounting for a line item for the uh for the employees of the fire station i'd like to
see accounting type that may not be true but I'd like to see accounting that me as a citizen can look at and see a line item out of whack and uh you you guys just need to leave us alone on the beach enjoy the money that we send you thank you Charlie i think if you stick around we'll have some discussions on line items that would if you're interested uh Beverly Campbell are you up hi um I'm Beverly Campbell i live on the beach with my husband at 232 Sabine Drive we own the
Sand Shaker on Pensacola Beach which may you may or may not know of it's been there is that sunny back there yeah yes you still dance on that bar but we just celebrated our 50th year uh anniversary for the Sand Shaker uh very proud of that we've owned the Sand Shaker for a little over 20 years so we bought it after Hurricane Ivan and did a lot of work to bring it back so very proud of that uh we have a great business there we have a lot of locals uh we have a lot of tourists uh we worked really hard to make it a fun place to be a lot of good entertainment um when I first looked
at the information on the increase um you know we're not you know opposed to increases we see them all the time out especially out there with insurance and maintenance and all kinds of things but the thing that really caught my attention was the difference between the beach and the mainland and so being a bar you know I'm thinking well gee I'm paying a lot more than my friend Buck Mitchell you know who owns Seville so you know how can that be so I just you know would like you to take
another look at uh the percentage uh which for us it ends up being like over 100% I'm I'm sorry a th000% more um and for whatever reason the bars over in town are you know didn't have that much of an increase so that's that's really the part that I don't understand i am a CPA i've worked in that industry for a long time until we bought the bar so when I look at the numbers you know I do try to look at it and try to make some sense of it but I just couldn't wrap my arms around why
the beach was so much higher than you know in Pensacola the mainland so you know I just ask you to take a look at that um I know your job is very difficult i appreciate everything you do for us uh we're part of the county i agree with what has been said tonight and uh we appreciate all your help and hopefully you take another look and so do something uh that's a little a little more reasonable for the beach people thank you so much thank you Miss Campbell tom Jardy is Tom here hey
Tom and Eric Sharpton's on deck eric's in the back okay go ahead Tom all right Tom Jordine i've been on the beach for 30 years now and uh it's great to see how you know our turnout is really fantastic i didn't know there was that many of us still on the beach it's a lot of Airbnbs nowadays but uh I think a lot of our problems are we're too stoic on the beach we put up with a lot of nonsense um I don't know if people know the history of the beach but initially that island was thought thought to
be worthless and we lured people on that beach for decades uh with no tax-free uh living out on the beach and then we added a tax for the for the um for the houses and then we added a tax for the land and we pay it without hardly a complaint and I've been I watched you guys probably if you know me you know I watch these meetings and I repeatedly hear some of these commissioners badmouthing the lease holders i mean literally bad ma mouthing the lease holders um when we were
talking about this uh this rate increase uh it wasn't justified due to higher costs on the beach it wasn't justified for greater you know expanded services on the beach the justification of the of the rate increase was that we are paying for sand replenishment of the public beaches that's incredible rationale for a rate increase for fire and I see an underlying animosity from some of our
uh county commissioners for lease holders uh Mr barry smiling uh I hear things like the Bible says that uh that we shouldn't be building on the barrier island and you commissioners keep building on the barrier island uh you commissioners are the ones who came who championed the tax policy on Pensacola Beach mr barry's been in in the citizen's chair for 12 years now and he makes tax policy and his tax policy the the the result is that we are losing $10 million every year from
from adorum taxes on Pensacola Beach due to Mr barry's tax policy but somehow he continues to scapegoat the lease holders i don't make tax policy Mr barry you make tax policy uh so the the the extra money for the uh for that rate increase is is really to me a small issue i I've fed up with being uh maligned and scapegoed for your tax policy Mr barry uh in my
opinion you misappropriated a $3.355 million FEMA grant on 25 March 2021 uh let's have an end to your irresponsible rhetoric please thank you all right thank you Tom eric Sharpen you're up next good evening Mr chairman i was wanted to say on this tax policy I know that everybody's screaming for equalization but it sounds like to me you're you're buying the pie
you're giving the other side 25% and saying I'm taking 75 and you got to pay for it how is that fair mr barry over here he's got the largest land district he he will never see the fire services that the beaches got so I just don't see where it's fair to be making the other districts pay the equal amount when they're not getting the services and uh I don't know whose phone this is somebody but that was very nice Eric yeah uh and and it it's like right now I'm paying 50 bucks a
month for Ubers i'm getting 50 megabytes a month other people are getting uh 300 megs paying 55 a month and I I've already filed complaint for the PSC service commission about that why won't they run a fiber over over there but there it's still copper so I just think that you know those who get the most services should be the ones paying just a little bit more or maybe the maybe the other districts could pay a little bit more but I don't think they should be on the
same rate because some of these districts like McDavid where you're at out there they probably won't ever see the fire protection that the other parts of the countyy's going to see and I just think we should be very careful because it's it's always nice when you have a stacked deck down here and maybe we could hold up a hearing to let other people from the county come in and get and give their side on it before we make this type of big decision thank you for your time Mr chairman
thank you board that concludes um our speakers i guess we'll move into discussion if there's any discussion if um if there's no discussion I can't believe that okay I'll I'll start off so oh boy here we go um I have a lot of friends on the beach i think the business business side uh probably is getting a little taxed a little bit much but when you say equity um I think I need to
put some numbers out there for everyone okay the SR pays $17,000 a month for the beach that comes out to about $26,000 with your current MSPU you bring in around let's just say a million dollars maybe a little bit more the beach operation costs $2.3 million out there unlike other areas of the community you have a paramedic a lot of places don't you have a hospital across um uh the bridge
that has you got better healthcare than a lot of areas of the county especially in the rural parts or even out by where Commissioner Bard or Commissioner Hoffberger what am I saying commissioner Stroberger and myself have i hear the unfairness but the county is currently paying $1.3 million to subsidize beach services on the beach that's that's where we're at it's just a fact the current rate for residential would go to $1.20 a day and when you say equity as
a nurse being with hundreds of people when they died in the emergency room and in the ICU there's no amount of money when you're dying you have one wish to stay alive one of the ladies said that her family had basically been utilized that service before time to treat if I knew that I could have a firefighter at my house within five minutes I'd pay a little bit more what would happen to the businesses i agree i think that's too high but I still think we should shoot for trying to
be equitable across the board so I sat down with Mr burns last week because I don't think he knew the deficit of just that beach uh firehouse cost the county and he committed to me he was and I know Jeremy you're on the board that he was going to bring it up to the next board to look at some options outside of what the board may do with MSPU which I I applaud him for doing that i think there's some things there that we could look at um I heard what everyone said i agree with some of it
but I also know from my standpoint um I know I'd pay for a higher service if I knew I could have a firefighter that could maybe save my wife's life within five minutes i would I would be one to pay a$120 cents a day and a lot of people I mean that may seem like a lot for residential but to me it'd be worth every dog penny but that's my take i don't know where the board's going to go but um I hope we can get to a resolution where the residents uh feel that it's fair and I don't know
um I think the commercial rates are probably too high i agree with that i don't think that's fair to the business owners but um but I think if I I think you should know that you're not even able to fund your fire department with the MSBU and what San Rose Island Authority puts in to it you're $1.3 million short a year that's a big deficit so anyways Commissioner Barry um I'm happy to have Commissioner Hoffber to speak and then I'm allowed to speak after her since her lights on
thank you so sorry right before the meeting we were handed a spreadsheet with a 10-year deficit on what the county has been subsidizing the beach it's just over $3 million what we were not handed was a spreadsheet on how much the county has been subsidizing the mainland fire department which is about $10 million a year true so I'm not sure how this is relevant or why we were not provided documents um for everyone who thinks the beach receives a superior service I encourage you
to ask what the response time would be from the mainland if they had to call in a second fire engine and then I would encourage you to look at the fires that happen in your districts and in your communities and ask "How long does it take the second station to get there?" And I don't think that you're going to be able to prove that the beach is receiving superior service from the Escambia County Professional Firefighters wow commissioner Barry I guess we'll just go down
the line commissioner Barry do you want to go next sure Mr chairman so um yeah I mean the we are having to subsidize the mainland you know considerably as well the big change when you look at the when you look at the spreadsheet that's not necessarily you know articulated on here uh when Commissioner Bender was on the board we added a second crew out there and we never changed we never asked for any more money from the island authority nor did we change any uh any funding methods uh any funding methods on the you know within the county budget to to
cover that additional crew that we put out there and that's uh you know the the board's mistake what uh you know or a combination of the boards and the island authorities mistake perhaps but regardless that's what happened um you know as as I mentioned last time fair you know fairness does is not necessarily equal um you know there is there there is a there is a higher level of service on the on the beach and um but that that being said um it must be used by you know
by nature are a regressive tax um that's just the the the analytical the math part of it when you have any kind of assessment that is the same whether the property is $100,000 property or $500,000 property that represents a regressive tax and it has more of an impact on a lower on a lower value uh a lower value property or a lower socioeconomic area than uh than a higher socioeconomic area so the fact that the MSBU for the residential on the island has been higher uh
I don't know that that I I know there were some speakers that mentioned that everything should be the same but I don't know that if there was uh a lot of genuine sentiment I don't know that that many would disagree with the way that it has been where it has been higher on the island than it has been on the mainland because I think generally most residents would accept that they do have a higher level of service than most areas in the county but that's related to the residential
mike I'm going to agree i I agree with what you said the the impact on the commercial side is um you know is tremendous um and I think that's what's going to take you know you mentioned having a conversation with you know executive director Burns and and uh they have a board meeting I believe on the 14th and then we're together uh you know the next day but I do expect that uh that we're probably going to uh you know have some some degree of increased partnership from
uh from our our agent you know which is you know I mean Commissioner Hoffberger gets tasked with representing that area but in truth it's also the only area that the county has an agent to represent the area that's made that we all have representation on so the island authority is our agent for the island and and I think they're going to uh they're going to meet and I think that there's going to be uh some substantive and and uh I would uh suspect genuine conversation there about um how to mitigate the increases that that may be being looked at to subsidize
to subsidize that side of the equation i'm very opt I'm very optimistic about that um so I'm going to you know kind of move forward in the anticipation that's something uh that we're going to get positive news out of uh out of him and out of the board and I know Mr johnson's in the audience um but I think we will get I think we're going to get some good news out of them to to help with the other side of this equation um but especially the commercial side we we've you know going from 7 cents to you know to 83 cents a square foot is
uh is a is obviously a substantial increase and that's you know that is a that is a difficult um it's a difficult dynamic to budget you know for and I and I and I certainly do understand that and I think that's the that's the primary uh pause that's that's the primary pause that I would have in moving forward and and hopefully we're going to get some good news there and um something that will will bring that bring everything down on the island some um while it
may not end up equal I think it can be much more fair i would agree with that commissioner May thank you Mr chairman and Commissioner Hoffer i'm always sensitive to issues as it affects uh those constituents so I certainly have a a a a a deep empathy sympathy uh for representing uh I always say either you're going to reduce resources or reduce revenue you wanted added resources you
got to have added revenue i mean we talked about creating firehouses today and we need extra income uh but I certainly recognize equity and and fairness uh I think Commissioner Cole and I will probably be faced uh with something similar and that's why I always believe when you begin to have attacks like this that we can't rush into it i mean it has to be the town hall meetings it has to be communication with the constituents because I can assure you uh if we do a blanket tax um on
on next week and what you represent a portion of it i represent I represent people in the city of Pensacola that we're taking a blanket tax that we don't even provide fire tax for we don't provide EA we we we don't provide many of the other resources i have people who pay uh the mill rate for the county they pay the city millage and they pay DIIB i mean because they live in the DIB uh so where's the fairness in that i mean and so I think that this needs to be you know thought out we we can't rush into it we got to hear from all parties concerned as you said you just got a spreadsheet
i mean you can't make a decision and get in a spreadsheet 30 40 minutes ahead of time i mean but we got to be thoughtful to all of our citizens the beach residents which I'm I'm sympathetic to but I'm also sympathetic to the people who live right down here on Pelifog Street that pay extra millage uh to be a part of the DIIB i I live very close to downtown uh and you know I pay downtown taxes and I pay county taxes uh and you know tax after tax uh and some of those I receive services for some of those I don't receive services but you know to have a blanket tax I mean that's going to be
a challenge i think that we can get there i don't think we're nearly ready uh to get there tonight i mean I think it just needs to be more dialogue and to be you know sympathetic to you know our largest uh public park which is which is the beach but also you know people pay you know a DIIB tax which is our downtown which is another tourist attraction which is a jewel uh that people also pay those taxes too so for me you know as we look at how we build fire stations how are we going to tax uh what are we going to do with the the millillage i mean I all of us have been
tasked probably next week people be asking for us to put forth a a housing trust they want to add another tax with a children's trust i mean uh just Pensacola wants to add a another tax and another tax and no one wants to be taxed but everybody wants to get the services i mean so it's a delicate balance and I think in a good negotiation in which it is a negotiation among the citizens uh the staff and we as policy makers uh no one gets everything that they want but it has to be a fair compromise so I look forward to getting more information doing more evaluations and figuring
out what's fair to the residents of the beach but also what's fair to the residents of downtown Pensacola as well as every other district that I represent uh from a CRA uh to a DIB uh to someone who lives uh within the boundaries of the city and figure out exactly how can we get as close uh to equity as we can possibly get thank you Mr jam thank you Commissioner May commissioner Strober the problem with these discussions is we all have good points we're all making good
points it needs to be equitable but I also believe that there is a higher level of service out at the beach and we do run a deficit out at the beach of 1 point I don't know my numbers say 1.2 million in my district District One there are folks out there that haven't had a firehouse in seven years the closest one is 10 miles away and uh their insurance rates are really high 350% higher
than they were 70 seven years ago and their MSBU is the same one that I pay and I and I've said I live three miles away from one so my I'm I'm experienced a high level too just by proximity you know because where where I live and they're paying the same MSBU I'm paying i didn't hear anyone tonight say that they oppose an increase in in the MSBU and nobody here said that they don't
support firefighters so I think that's good i we all we all do that um I also today talked to Mike Burns and I've been doing some startup math turns out he's been doing the same math as I've been doing and I think that we can and I think this is what you were alluding to too Commissioner Kohler is that we can put some of this burden on hotel stays um in talking to Mike he thinks
that we could probably get the board at at the San Rose Island Authority to approve something like this two or $3 more a night i guess you know the uh average stay is $375 a night uh during the high season it's 800 bucks a night and if you add if you tack two or three dollars to that I don't know if you're What did I say did I say something wrong no I just That's a mortgage payment yeah
well but yeah so the point is I don't think any someone who's willing to spend that kind of money to stay at the beach to enjoy being at Pensacola Beach probably is not going to say I'm going to stay in Crest View instead you know they'll pay the extra two or three dollars um so I think there there I think there is more to follow on this and I think it's going to just the math that I was doing based and is Stefan here he's in the back yeah do you want I ran this through by Stefon and
and we'd be able to reduce the uh the commercial rate by almost 20 cents is that right Stefan don't keep hiding back there i can see you you don't want to get get any arrows from the back come on Stefan good evening commissioners um yes so we are looking at some other options uh to provide
some additional funding to basically subsidize or or pay down the increase of the MSB for the beach residences um it looks very promising at this time i know uh working with our our partners with the island authority um you know I think I think we need a little bit more time to work through that and and ensure that uh this is a a good path forward but it definitely sounds very promising thank you Stephan yes sir and Steve and and and and that's what I agree with Stephan i'm
glad you said that it has to be thought out and we need more time i mean you can't this is going to impact lives uh and you know although we need money for fire but we have to take time to make sure we get it right i can just tell you if you live downtown Pensacola I mean you're paying six points military higher i guarantee your mill rate you know downtown Pensacola is higher than on the beach and so we got to be very cautious as we move forward to all of our residents of Well well I'm on the DIB and I hear it loud and clear too so I mean yeah i mean you're paying almost 6.2%
2% on top of what every other county resident is paying to live in the city and when quite frankly uh it's not just affordable housing i mean God bless those who can afford $800 a night but I'm I'm seeing people in my district that grandmother left them a house and because of the appreciation in the high millillage uh rate that they're losing their homes due to taxes i mean every week every month their tax certificates being sold uh so we just got to be cognitive of whatever decision we
make and we're not going to please everyone uh but this is not a knee-jerk this is something that's going to definitely impact lives some people just don't want their taxes to go up and they can't afford it some people when their taxes go up they lose their home and so that's why it's important to think this out and that's why I'm not going to make a a a quick decision u because we don't want people losing their homes our affordable housing program is not affordable mainly due to taxes and interest rates i mean we can't we just give those houses people cannot go into those homes i mean I'm talking about people who work for us that make 40 $50,000 a year
between insurance and taxes there's no such thing as affordable housing so we got to be very you know I mean it's great to be able to put the fire out but if they never have a home they'll have a never have a fire to put out and so that's just you know Steve you know I agree with you if we can pass it on uh or if we can figure out a way that that's equitable i mean as I think Commissioner Barry said it'll never be fair because it's not fair to everybody because everybody didn't have the same level of income everybody didn't have the same level of resources uh but if we can bring it to as equitable as we possibly can I think that's smart but I certainly think we should take our
time and do the proper analysis before we do it i mean we discussed MSBU MSTUS uh we talked about you know fire taxes on the beach we've talked about no additional taxes here but we really want to think that out because I can assure you um the downtown businesses will will fill this place up just as quick as any other group um as soon as we assess those taxes or talk about assessing taxes to them thank you Commissioner uh Commissioner Hoffberger do you have a comment i do it is absolutely true there are areas in Escambia County on the mainland that are too far from
a fire department and you've your citizens have been dealing with that for over seven years this morning I think we made huge strides in moving forward with that with that being said one of the legal requirements for an MSBU that is higher than the mainland is that the burden is on the county to prove that they receive a service over and beyond what people in Escambia County receive most people in Escambia County live within five miles of a fire station so they are receiving the exact same service that the people on the beach are receiving so everyone keeps
saying they receive a superior service that station covers a four mile radius the last major fire that Portoino experienced it took 25 minutes for someone to respond because this fire department was already on a call and we had to pull in other crews so I would like someone to explain to this group what service that they're receiving that people who live within a 5 mile radius of a fire department on the mainland are not receiving i'll I'll help with that so like I said as a tenure ER and ICU nurse there's nothing more important than time to
treat the beach has a paramedic if you have respiratory failure if you have anaphylactic shock if you have any of those things that require intubation immediately there's very few firehouses in the county that have a paramedic i agree with you last weekend we saved nine people out of the Gulf we have to do that but that is above and beyond the majority of the firehouses in the county we and the tourists and the tour I I get it hey we're going to have order here cuz
I I agree with you and that's why there's things but it's just not true that there's not a higher level of service that's just not the case i mean if you could have a paramedic come to your house instead of an EMT and you're dying or your loved one's dying you get a higher level of care that's just basic medicine the people in Molino have that and so do the people in Purto K beach Haven i don't know a lot of firehouses that I have have paramedics and and as they said this morning very few do but that's not my issue my issue is I agree that commercial taxes are too high i didn't know
Commissioner Stroberger was going to let the cat out of the bag because I do think San Rose Island Authority can maybe have a huge part in resolving this for the for the homeowners as well as the commercial businesses out there but it's it's irresponsible if this board doesn't take an action there hasn't been a raise in the MSB since 2003 on the beach in 2015 in the county there is no way we can continue to fund fire services across the county with 334,000 people living in the county
now which is 100,000 more than were here before we have to take some action now whatever that action is I definitely want to respect the people on the beach and try to get to the right right solution for everyone that's I think that's that I think we all want that um I'm absolutely opposed to an MSTU if we were to do it based on um your property value I can assure you it'd be a lot higher than $440 and everyone should look at that i don't I I the people in district 2 couldn't afford that they
just could not afford an MSTU it wouldn't even be reasonable a lot of counties in the United States use an MSTU you know why because they don't have to do this every year every 10 years because it's a progressive tax um but we have to do something i'm not in favor of MSTU but it's unfortunate that you know this board has to deal with something that obviously probably should have been taken care of a while ago so I but I will say this i appreciate it when they came from the beach and most folks out at the beach were businesses and I totally agree with them but what I didn't
see and I think it's important there wasn't one person from district 2 District 3 District 1 or District 5 and all those taxes are going to go up too and they subsidize a lot of the county's firehouses and there's it's going to hurt me i can tell you some of the poor communities I represent it's going to hurt like what Commissioner May said someone may lose their house they may lose their house how many people are going to lose their house in this audience tonight if it goes up 150 or $180 okay on commercial okay well I respect that sir i respect that my business
well I agree with the commercial taxes way too high but I just think that we need to get to a happy medium where we where uh everyone feels like they get a a fair service for the price m m chairman I I think that you know as you just said you know for all five districts you know and thank um all those who are in the audience I mean we should be doing town hall and information meetings and analysis throughout the entire county explain to people what it is because if you're right if you want to give me a blanket MSTU for all of my district uh and I'm
representing somebody that already pays a fire tax within the city they're p they're already a city resident pays a fire tax already now we're going to blanket raise their taxes and they're paying DIIB then they're paying a 6.2 higher millage rate than everybody else in the county i mean you're almost talking double taxation and you're taxing people they're paying double services if you're saying that you're paying for your fire and if if I live in the city you Commissioner Hberg live in the city we're paying a fire tax period and so now you're going to blank it for me to pay another tax
to uh enhance fire i mean that's that's going to be a challenge it's certainly going to be a challenge for me to support it i mean because I have to be fair uh to the constituents that I represent as well and so I agree with you and and and what you've just said but I think that it has to be more information and we may not get there as quick as we want to get there i mean because we have to make sure that not just you know any district out of the five uh has any preferential treatment that it's all as fair as we can possibly get it and I can just tell you right now looking
at it to do a blanket tax for all citizens in the city and the county and downtown I mean you know that's going to be tough but if we do it we got to just do it for everybody and so I get what you're I get what you're saying commissioner if I can help with that so this is only in the unincorporated area it is not we we we don't have the authority to do that in the city okay so uh just to to clarify that to help help out a little bit thank you well I think at this point obviously
the board doesn't feel comfortable and I I agree with the board not to make a decision until we see what Santa Rosa Island Authority comes up with i think that would be the responsible decision but I do think that there I I I know for me if if we look at the budget we cannot continue to run millions of dollars deficit in the fire assessment across Escambia County we just can't do it um it would be irresponsible if we didn't come to the taxpayers and explain the problem i appreciate the
beach people being the uh the most vocal about it and I'd listened and I hear what you're saying and I respect it but um my my suggestion would be and I don't know I think the board's in there is to see what Santa Rosa Island Authority comes up with and hopefully Jeremy you're on the board you you can guide that in a way that maybe the residents that you represent out there can feel confident that it's a fair decision and and maybe we can get to regular MSBU for everyone and then do something with the hotels or something i don't want to I don't know what your board's going to decide but
I hope you come back with something to at least offset some of the costs that's that's being taken out of the MSBU across the county and I know it's not actually just what Commissioner Hoffberger said because we're running a $10 million deficit as it is across the county so it's it's a problem everywhere it's not just on the beach i don't have anything else Commissioner Hoffberger i do so a few of us campaigned on reducing the number of lawsuits for the county um so with that I want to really make sure that if you guys are considering moving forward with a uneven MSBU
that you really look at what benefits you believe the beach is getting over the mainland because no one has provided those so I want to put that out there i want to make sure everybody's aware i do foresee that being an issue i've had several people tell me that already so just passing on the information I have been provided by the businesses and the constituents on the beach okay if there's not any further comments I don't think we're ready to make a decision tonight is the board willing to see what SRRA does on the 14th and bring it back on the 15th i is that reasonable
well here's you know we only have uh one meeting in June hey is it can uh is there a timeline on this for us that's what I need to know because I thought originally there was and if there's not it's not a big a deal but Alison can you respond in my opinion if we're doing anything that involves any MSTU you absolutely would need to have that finalized before July i don't think anyone on this board has an appetite for an MSTU so forget that the way it is currently being thought of is that we would be adjusting the two rate resolutions and I would recommend that you
schedule public hearing to address each of those two rate resolutions preferably I would say before you go into your budget workshops because it's a major stressor for not just your your budget office for preparing the budget for the next fiscal year but the SRIA actually has its own uh special act legal obligation for when its budget is due to you all and they're going to need to know what impact they're dealing with so I guess what I'm saying is if you're Alison would
it be against the law or against protocol if they were different town hall meetings in which which staff Stefan and staff and the commissioner could go out and explain the options to the citizens i mean before we come to another meeting you there must be a direct nexus between the benefit to the real estate and the amount that that particular property owner is being charged so based on that it is possible that you have a formula where things are different and in fact
they currently are different on the beach than the mainland as I understand it so I mean in fact the the mainland MSBU was amended in like 2016 the beach MSBU hasn't been amended since 2003 so there already have been some differentials but the nexus is the most important thing all right the most you have of another so they can be somewhat different but you have to have No I was just saying I mean we could go out and have a town hall where you and Stephen and Wes was there explaining it to
the citizens so people in the north end would understand it as well as the people in the west we certainly have the right i just think you have a practical issue if you're trying to do it for this upcoming fiscal year well we're trying to do it right and we're trying to inform citizens so absolutely you can't raise taxes without taking it to I mean we shouldn't we should take it to the people instead of making the people come to us i'm not holding this hard and fast but we can put as a placeholder on the 15th just to see and then we'd have the meeting in June and if it didn't work it falls apart right and then we just we'll have to come up with a different budget process but I I just want the people from the beach to know I'd like to have one MSBU and SR to come
up with some sort of supplement to support the the firehouse on the beach that that would be the best solution for me and Mike I'm not disagreeing with you but I mean it's just going to be hard to inform citizens by the 15th i mean we we got things tonight that we didn't know about i mean and that's I mean even if we we brought it forth I mean and did something on the 15th I mean the next meeting in June you there won't be a place to sit because people will feel as we impose something if we didn't at least take it to them to properly educate people for what we're doing i'm not saying they can you know influence your decision i think it's in in fairness uh people should be you know
informed i think I think you've got a good idea let's let's put a placeholder on there for the 15th and see how the 14th goes and then if it and I agree Commissioner May if it doesn't go well but this came up in 21 the board couldn't get to a decision we're now four years later and we keep running deficits and I mean this is this is these are why you sit in these seats man these are tough jobs man oh well we we're going to make a decision that best represents our constituents i'll make a decision make a motion tonight and I'll vote well I'm not I'm
not ready to do that i I mean I think that we have a little time here but Commissioner Hoffberger you have you had something as well yeah so earlier I had mentioned one of the things that I was ignorant to campaigning was the pots of money one of the other things that I didn't know before a very informative meeting at Ronda Dorfin's house for Pensacola Beach Advocates was and some of you might know this but I feel like it's worth an educational moment for those of you who don't the SRIA board is comprised of individuals that we appoint so those individuals are to represent
the Scambia County districts and make decisions based on the money that they have from the SRIA lease fees so I just want that out there that we're deferring to a board to make a decision that we appoint but I the beach is for everyone not just the people that live on the beach so we should all be sharing in that tax i No one No one didn't agree with that so Mr may you have anything else oh no i I was about to clap to go home you you you just may want to you just may
want to clarify for the folks who are here that if you're using May 15th as a placeholder that we would not be voting on May the 15th to adjust the rate resolutions we would just be touching base right we'll see what we'll see what SRRA comes up and then we'll have to have a difficult conversation potentially or maybe not at all so I think that's where we land tonight and for the folks on the beach I appreciate the passion and the and um thank you for coming out and enduring this i know it's been a long night um but thank you very much nothing's going to happen tonight so
uh we'll see where we are in a couple weeks thank you without that let's move on to the county attorney report allison there are five action items i can answer any questions second okay did we have a motion okay please vote motion passes 5-0 that concludes my report thank you okay our next meeting obviously I think everyone knows will be on May 15th it'll be at 1:30 after we do the sheriff's uh foundation fund thanks everyone a very productive meeting