that's it good morning the Tuesday April 8th 2025 regular Board of County Commissions meeting will now be called to order we'll begin with a moment of silent reflection for the first responders and members of the armed forces followed by an invocation by none other than
Commissioner Daryl Law Vice Chairman and then I'll be having the honor of leading us in the pledge of allegiance to the greatest nation on earth please rise please pray with me our heavenly father we woke this morning to wonderful spring
showers we know that you provided that much needed shower father we're also reminded in Mark 4 that you do in fact calm the sto calm the storms of a stormy life that the agency
and others perhaps are endeavoring father we ask for prayer today not only for our children our seniors in the VNA but as well as our first responders and our 911 operators father always in
service with you amen ladies and gentlemen please join me in the pledge of allegiance to the greatest nation on earth the United States of America home of the free because of the brave 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 all so first item on the agenda will be uh any additions or deletions to the agenda
uh I will say that uh item 15A1 under uh my matters was the schedule for the uh time certain which will be at 10:00 so that that item will
be at 10:00 and I'll make the announcement uh we will then go to a shade meeting which will not be here in this room and it will be dark the other item is item
12A1 which is the uh we're moving that to 11:05 11:115 when we return from the shade meeting and that will be the med medical examiner's salary increase request to approximately half a million
dollars uh per year any other changes move to approve as amended second we have a motion by Commissioner Moore seconded by Commissioner Adams any further
discussion all in favor i opposed motion carries unanimously we'll move on to proclamations and presentations a presentation of proclamation honoring the Moonshot community and this will be presented by
Commissioner Susan Adams thank you great all right um if all the Moonshot representatives would like to come up it's my pleasure to read a proclamation honoring the Moonshot community and their contribution to literacy whereas literacy is the
cornerstone of individual success and community prosperity and we aspire to contribute to making Indian County a national leader in literacy and whereas children are a most valuable resource early years are crucial for building the foundation for lifelong learning and
success and whereas children transition from learning to reading to reading to learn children who are not proficient readers by the end of third grade face significant academic challenges and whereas the Moonshot Community Action
Network has demonstrated remarkable commitment to improving childhood literacy and achieving our moonshot goal of 90% of students reading on grade level by the end of third grade and whereas achieving the moonshot goal requires a communitywide effort as
approximately 45% of children enter kindergarten unprepared we must support families as their children's first teachers providing them with the necessary tools and resources and whereas March is National Reading Month providing an opportunity to emphasize
the importance of literacy for all ages now therefore be it proclaimed by the Board of County Commissioners of Indian County Florida that we recognize the vital contributions of the Moonshot community within Indian River County and its commitment for ensuring children's success and literacy adopted this 8th
day of April 2025 and signed by all five county commissioners marie thank you thank you Commissioner Adams um so I'm Maria O'Brien i'm with the Learning Alliance um we're the managing partner of what's called our Moonshot Community
Action Network and I've got some of our Moonshot Community Action Network members here and I see some more in the audience but you know whenever you have a problem as complex as literacy it takes we know schools can't do it alone so it really takes an entire community being together so we want to thank each
of you for being literacy leaders on this journey for the support you've given us um we know that you know this really it starts we say from birth but um Megan's helped us understand it starts prenatally um and because it is a a group effort I just I asked Megan if
she would share a few words too and then we'll share a um a short video because there's been so much national attention coming to our county because of the work that's being done here good morning everyone thank you so much so imagine a world where every child has
the opportunity to unlock their potential through the power of literacy where neighborhoods and families flourish because reading and writing is not just skills but shared values that that uplift us all by prior prioritizing literacy we are not only investing in
the future of our children but also in the strength and resiliency of our community together we are part of a movement that transforms lives and fosters culture and living and growth thank you for embarking on this moonshot journey with us your commitment to the
catalyst for change is paving the way for generations to come thank you very much um did you want to show the movie and then we'll do All right thanks it's no longer hidden literacy is a huge problem in America
throwing money at it hasn't solved it and expecting the schools to do it alone has only made it worse only 35% of our nation's third graders are proficient at reading we're leaving a whole lot of kids behind the system really wasn't designed to look after all kids when we
don't get them at the right time society pays it's easy to point out the failures but who is out there doing something about it there's a county in Florida that's taking the literacy crisis head on indian River County's kids were
struggling and their families and schools were stuck in a harmful cycle too many of their kids weren't thriving we can no longer as a country expect American dream to be available for those kids in today's economy we all want our community to thrive we want our country
to thrive but it all starts with literate children and these two moms could not get their kids reading we both had boys who were struggling in school and having it be so hard for them and nobody to help me was awful and with money you can go get tutors you can bend
over backwards but it's not fun and without money God saved them in response the learning alliance was started we were just two crazy moms and a philanthropist looking for a place to bring money and solutions and they set a goal for their community because Liz
said they said "Well the research will point to 95% of our our population can be proficient readers let's set an easy goal let's dial it back a little bit and go with 90%." With their county around 45% and the wealth disparity this was an
ambitious goal they probably think we're nuts right we are but they were inspired by JFK's call to reach the moon with no known path so they called it their moonshot moment we choose to go to the moon not because they are easy but because they are hard
because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills it's a big ambitious goal nobody knows how to get there but the community adopted the learning alliance's vision so to have this moonshot goal it's all hands on deck a major movement in our
community it's unified everyone we break barriers we want to have 90% literacy by third grade it could be life-changing if we crack the code we'll change everything it'll change a child a family the community businesses everything they bet
on the idea that pouring tons of resources into the prenatal to third grade development of their kids would trickle up through their families and schools ultimately transforming their community and so we've been advocating what do we need to do in our homes what do we need to do in our community and what do we need to do in our schools
they scoured the country for best practices liz completed her masters in learning disabilities and they started piloting in school after school summer school and teacher development programs it wasn't let's just do a program that moves you know 20 kids we wanted
something bigger and more they made progress with the support of school district but were having a hard time scaling enough to reach their goal it's scary it's scary to say 90% right you don't know how many times people have thrown mud in our face and said "Oh you're not there you've failed." And you have to
persevere through that and say that the vision and the goal is worthy of us failing multiple times until we figure it out and then the school district made a big change they hired Dr david Moore as their superintendent we will truly act in the best interest
of children can the torpedoes go ahead and fire me we have to change we're not going to lower our expectation and the day that I have to sacrifice that is the day I'm out he was drawn to the district because of the community's effort and
was aligned with the learning allianc's mission i'm going to invest in K 1 and two so by the time they get to third and beyond I can change the experience by making sure they never get behind he brought his system change skills and a new culture to the district and the
school system bought in it's all about what is best for students we're not going to worry about adult comfort we're not going to worry about whether we like it public education many times has failed our communities because we have been adult centered they put their kids at the center of everything
they do if we all have this collective goal of everyone being literate by the end of third grade you know what are we waiting for like let's go now and the collective effort is really starting to pay off in the last four years their district grade has increased 29 state rankings
their performance showed the most improvement in the state of Florida over the last 3 years and have been a grade A school district the last 2 years with a 96% high school graduation rate since 2015 their Title 1 elementary schools have improved dramatically and while the state's non-charter third grade reading
scores have dropped three percentage points their scores have risen five points over that same time the last 13 years this community has been recognized as a national pace setter by the campaign for grade level reading this is still a story in progress and they're not to their goal yet but something
special is happening here we can do hard things we can do hard things it's a story of a unique and multifaceted public private partnership that has put years of effort and money into finding solutions that make real impact with even the most challenging elementary
students and schools and now they want to share everything they've learned in hopes that other communities with less resources can use their hard-earned lessons to take this crisis headon themselves something unique is happening here in the Indiana River school system but it doesn't have
to be unique everyone can do this work everyone can engage in these kinds of conversations to experience this community success that Indian River County is experiencing um so that's a um the teaser video for the documentary series it's going to be
out this summer um but you know as you can see we've been getting a lot of national attention um we want to thank the county commissioners and staff i mean this is because of your leadership because you've been um so supportive of this um you know we're really excited i think next week April 15th is uh we're
celebrating Children's Week here um everything that you know we see what's happening here you show um we we're a community that cares about children cares about literacy uh we're really working together to make this a literacy capital of the nation so thank you very much
thank you Marie you want to bring everybody up thank you for all you guys do um throughout the community throughout the year did you bother you want to take it off i'll keep you talking wow how you going to Well the short one always has to be in front of me anyway
so put him in the middle and we all disappear awesome thank you guys thank you for all you do thank you next item is a presentation proclamation uh recognizing
2025 in April as the 50th anniversary of the visiting nurses association of the Treasure Coast and that'll be presented by Commissioner Joe Airman commissioner we have Where's the VNA folks we got Come on uh yeah
i'm going to read the proclamation and then y'all just say whatever you need to say this a proclamation recognizing April 2025 is the 50th anniversary of the visiting nurses association of the
treasure coast whereas the visiting nurses association VNA of the treasure coast is celebrating 50 years of providing excellent homebased care in our community providing patients with the highest quality care regardless of their
ability to pay and whereas the VNA provides compassionate innovative care of the highest quality setting the standard for patients and caregivers needing home health hospice private care and community health services and
extends this care to the uninsured and underinsured in our community ensuring health care equality for all and whereas through the generosity of donors the VNA and Hospice Foundation is able to
support the programs and services of the VNA of the Treasure Coast including the VNA Hospice House VNA Mobile Health Clinic charitable care music therapy and Camp Chrysalis and whereas the VNA's
core values are integrity in all our actions collaboration with our community accountability to those we trust respect for all people and excellence in all we do and whereas the VNA's Y statement is
collaborating collaborating as a team to provide excellent care to patients and families with integrity compassion knowledge and love so that patients experience optimal quality of life at all times now therefore be it proclaimed
by the board of county commissioners of any river county Florida we recognize the 50th anniversary of the visiting nurses association of the treasure coast and their significant accomplishments and impact to the residents of Indian River County adopted this 8th day of
April 2025 and signed by all five county commissioners it's outstanding 50 years for all y'all have done and everything it's just outstanding and these are some of the true leaders of of our community also that that have taken this on for many years and they've just done a great
job you can never uh help enough and you can never have never heard anybody ever say anything other than how great BNA is so we thank you for what you do we thank you we thank you very much i know everybody knows an Marie Mcrist i don't
think she needs an introduction i'm Carol Canarak sue Rogers and we are so happy to be here and share the news and I you've said it so eloquently i'm not quite sure what else I can add to that other than we are here to serve in this community we have just celebrated and
are celebrating this year 50 years which is really remarkable for any health care agency and we continue we hope to be here another 50 years and as I stand here today with Ann Marie who was really one of the founders so she was here 50
years ago ask how old I am do not ask how old she is but she was here 50 years ago and and has continued you know unlike a lot of board members who may come and go she has continued to be on
the board on any board that we have whether it is the foundation which is what I represent Treasure Coast or any part of this organization she has continued to make it her very very best she is as bright as she was the day she
started and um we are very fortunate to have her and really the community benefits by having the VNA and hospice in this community and that's really why we're here so we thank you again from the bottom of our hearts and um if
there's anything that you ever need from us call call we are here and we are here to help you can also call me if you want faster service they all know and thank you very much thank you hey you got me
no probably not thank you ladies thank you next item is a proclamation recognizing National Public Safety Telecommunications Week that'll be presented by Vice Chairman Law and I believe we have a few recipients i see
most of the team why don't you come all come on down good morning come on down good morning Sheriff good morning thank you Mr chair it's an honor and a pleasure for me to read this proclamation as uh I think this body
realizes that uh the training that all law enforcement and fire has uh starts and includes situational awareness and the situational awareness begins with a 911 call when our dedicated men men and
women recognize and realize the nature of the call perhaps they've had that call before from that same individual but they friends are the preamble to the law enforcement and firefighters arriving on the scene so for that I say
thank you yes this proclamation recognizes National Public Safety Telecom tele Telecommunications Week whereas emergencies can occur at any time that require police fire EMS and whereas when an emergency occurs the prompt response
of local police officers firefighters and paramedics is critical to the protection of the safety of life and property within our county whereas the safety of our police officers and firefighters dependent upon the quality and accuracy of information obtained
from the beginning of the call when those telephone calls come into the Indian River County Sheriff's Office Dispatch Center and whereas the public safety dispatchers are a vital link for our police officers and firefighters by monitoring their activities providing
them with information and ensuring their safety during their duration of their shift whereas the public safety dispatchers of Indian River County Sheriff's Office has contributed substantially to the apprehension of criminals suppression of crime and treatment of patients they are
knowledgeable and highly trained individuals who work closely with police fire and the medical personnel whereas each dispatcher has exhibited compassion understanding and professionalism during the performance of their duties this past year and whereas now listen to this
the Iny River County Sheriff's Office public safety dispatch dispatched over 161,000 calls for service for law enforcement and an additional 36,000 calls for
fire 63 almost 64,000 911 calls and well over 100,000 administrative calls that are answered after the normal Business office hours are closed now therefore be it
proclaimed by this board of county commissioners of Indian River County Florida that the week of April 13th through April 19th 2025 be designated as National Public Safety Telecommunications Week in Indian River County in honor of the men and women who
chose the diligence and professionalism to keep our county and citizens safe signed this 8th day of April 2025 and signed very proudly by all five county commissioners thank you Sharon
thank you guys for taking time out of your busy schedule to uh acknowledge our folks in dispatch uh normally I come here every year and have a conversation about getting these folks recognized as first responders and I'm proud to say that this year Senator Gro has uh taken it upon oursel to run that bill and uh
things are moving i'm not sure where we're going to end up by the end of session but um I think that we're making a lot of good progress on that people are starting to really take notice that our dispatch team um are first responders they're the first first responders they're the ones who pick up that phone call who never get closure
who don't know what happens many times on on the other end and they move on to the next event and so uh it's it's incredible the stress and the things that happen in that room every single day and our team is just firing on all cylinders they don't miss a beat they're
always uh punched in and uh they just do an incredible job so thank you for taking time to recognize them uh we have a few of them with us unfortunately uh Robin our our dispatch team lead over there is is not with us today but I know Lou is here do you guys have anything you want to say today lou I think Lou is
gonna speak for just a moment good morning and thank you um as the sheriff said Robin isn't here so I get to fill in for her some big shoes to fill there um on behalf of the dispatchers we thank you for recognizing us this week this year we're going to do
something a little bit different i'm going to give you some quick statistics um an average citizen will experience approximately six traumatic events in a lifetime whether it's a death of a loved one an illness an injury etc an average
deputy in any River County will handle between 10 and 20 calls for service every day a dispatcher will handle a hundred not all of these calls will be traumatic events however when looking at the big picture if just one traumatic
call a week 52 weeks a year over a 20-year career that dispatcher has handled 1,040 traumatic calls let's stop and think about that for just a minute the average person six traumatic calls in a
lifetime a dispatcher 140 in just a 20-year career not all of these traumatic I'm sorry not all of these traumatic calls are of our own however we're still invested in the
event we are the ones that are talking them through calming them down listening to them cry while at the same time getting them the help that they need whether that's an ambulance a fire truck
a deputy or providing life-saving skills once a unit arrives on scene our part may be over however the effects that it has on us is not it's not a light switch that you turn off some of these calls will last with us
forever in order to help the next caller we push it down we suppress our feelings and we swallow our tears and we move on as mentioned every year and as if the sheriff has already mentioned we continue to fight to get the recognition
that we deserve as the true first responder with the 911 Saves Act bill although strides have been made in the House and the Senate we're still waiting for that reclassification please consider
continuing to help us fight this fight and as always we thank you and you're more than welcome to come and sit and be with us and see what a day in the life of a dispatcher truly is like thank you thank you for that invitation um I I
think that the citizens should take you up on that it's an experience that you'll never forget the calm controlled delivery of information taking and
getting it to where it's needed to get to the people through our law enforcement officers and through our paramedics and through our firefighters to get the job done to get
people to make lives whole again but more importantly is I want to thank I see one of our uh dispatchers in the back there um you don't want to take your sister up to the I told up here
uh ladies and gentlemen these are two individuals that uh got me home safe and got many of us home safe and got you the citizens the help you needed in
uh a just a a perfect manner and uh very supportive of the legislation as it goes forward as you truly are the first responders we again it's kind of like we
we recognize the visiting nurses and a lot of people look at the doctors as the rock stars a lot of people look at the cops the law enforcement officers the the paramedics
the firefighters as the rock stars it's the It's the nurses it's the communication expert that is getting the job done we may be there but you get us
there and get us back i I just want to say thank you from the bottom of my heart for the many long and arduous nights and days that you served and that you served the public and got us where
we needed to be gotten to with accurate information thank you Mr chair if I could also add and we we talk a lot about the sheriff's office but uh Sheriff Flowers and his team also for the public uh handles all Felsmere
police calls Indian River Shores uh public safety fire and police as well as something that sometime is overlooked our animal control our dog catchers so to speak and they do a fine job at that so thank you chair thank you awesome
thank you guys thank you sheriff Sheriff Charlie i know you never retired thank you they can be in front thank you covered a lot of positive ground and uh
speaking of ground uh we do have uh a flood awareness week presentation last week uh last meeting we presented a proclamation and we promised that we would have a presentation today good
morning Adi Jave good morning honorable chair and commissioners ari Javit your public works director and flood plane administrator and with me I have Kerry Kanddef our flood plane coordinator and also joined by Denise she represents
Florida Flood Plane Managers Association and is also our consultant for floodplane management what we wanted to do this morning is to give you a quick overview of the initiatives that county is working on and for that I'm going to
have Carrie give you a quick overview of our CRS rating of class 5 and then Denise will go into our quick presentation with an overview of what county has been up to and some key concepts that as it relates to flood
plane management krie thank you good morning kerry Kundiff Indie River County flood plane coordinator and CRS coordinator um I'm just going to describe a little bit of what we do so I know you guys know we work behind these walls a lot um but what we really do is
um is is really specific so Indian River County is um an active participant in the National Flood Insurance Program in order to participate we have a group of activities in the CRS program the CRS program is how they rate us it's the community rating system um that system
is a group of activities that's what we do all day so in order to um in order to get the discount in this county that we want for insurance we have to do really really well in those activities um and we're graded so we are currently a class
five indie River County gets a 25% um we're 25% um discount now um that's huge for us so if we slack or don't enforce what we um what we have in our land development regulations um we will
lose that credit so it's really important that we keep we keep that enforcement on a role so that's what we do um I'm going to turn it over to Denise she's gonna um she has a presentation she's going to give and she's going to dive into really what CRS program is and why we work so hard to
keep it a class five or better thank you guys good morning uh thank you for um allowing us to present this morning again my name is Denise Boning i'm a certified flood plan manager i'm also an associate in the National Flood Insurance Program and first off I would
like to congratulate all of you for um having proclaimed flood awareness week as the first week in March as a um uh executive committee member of the state chapter of the association of state
flood plane managers we always enjoy when we hear that our communities are proclaiming flood awareness week uh because that really promotes what we do which is flood awareness educating our residents and showing them um what
flooding is all about and how we can mitigate for it so I would like to just present briefly what specifically Indian River County does um to promote flood awareness what we do in our flood plane
to regulate and protect our citizens and our properties from flooding so let me first start off with what is the National Flood Insurance Program i think most of you know it is a voluntary program that most of the communities in
the state of Florida participate in and with by participation we um agree to abide or comply with certain minimum standards these minimum standards are regulated in the code of federal
regulations and by participating in it in turn all residents are able to purchase flood insurance they get hazard mitigation funding they get disaster assistance after a storm so that's really the NFIP in a nutshell it's a
minimum standard now a lot of communities also participate in the community rating system program which is also voluntary however the CRS program um requires communities to comply with
higher standards why do we do this why do we regulate flood plan we all know where we live we're surrounded by water we want to protect our people we want to protect our properties we want to make sure our residents can have disaster assistance can purchase flood insurance
we want to save on our tax dollars and we want to become a more resilient community in case there is a storm we want to be able to bounce back so CRS is a higher standards as I say NFIP National Flood Insurance Program lower
standards minimum standards just about anything you just can get get by crs is a higher standards so let me give you an example minimum standard under the NFIP is you have to adopt and enforce flood
maps you have to and adopt a flood ordinance you have to have new homes elevated above the base flood elevation and I can explain what that is in a in a bit higher standards specifically what
we here in Indian var county are doing is all new homes and substantially improved and substantially damaged homes have to be elevated at base flood elevation plus 1 ft some municipalities including in Indian River
County have a higher standard of elevating base flood elevation plus two feet there's other communities in the state of Florida who require a three-foot or freeboard as they call it indian River County also tracks
cumulative substantial improvement that means any house that is being modified altered remodel you're adding your another floor to your existing house anything like that if that remodel
exceeds 50% of the market value of the home then you are required to comply with the current flood ordinance now remember market value under FEMA is not what the realtor is selling your home
for this is the market value the replacement cost value as it is before any modifications have been made so if that exceeds 50% and you exclude land any landscaping pool that kind of thing
it's only specifically that improvement indian River County does accumulative substantial improvement tracking it over a 10-year period also we regulate new development so any new development that is being
done in Indian River County is regulated there are rules and regulations in force that we have to abide by so that we can continue participating in the CRS program we as Carrie had said we are a
class 5 community class 10 is being the there's no discount uh class one being the top tier the best of the best that's where you get the most discount in the state of Florida there's not a single community that is a class one there's
one community that is a class 2 which is Pinealis County and funny enough they're going through a lot of trouble right now rebuilding their um their neighborhoods because of the storms and they're a class 2 community so you can imagine how
hard it is for them um we are a class 5 we get a 25% discount on all our flood insurance policies now the most important thing is that uh we need to know is when we enforce our regulations
our flood plan regulations we have them written out in our flood ordinance in our local flood ordinance we need to comply with those we cannot be issuing variances or not enforcing them the moment you don't you
lose your CRS discount and what that means if you lose your CRS discount your insurance is going to go up by 5% let's say you went from a class 5 to a class 6 suddenly your 25% discount on flood
insurance is going to go down to 20% great but add to that your max 18% of regular flood insurance increase so your increase becomes a lot for the residents i just want to briefly define our flood
maps the purple is a flood zone in this case AE zone the yellow is zone X the purple zone AE is moderate to high risk of flooding the yellow is low to moderate risk of flooding
just because you are in a for example yellow area low to moderate risk of flooding does not mean that your house will never flood as we have seen historically um properties can flood that are in a
zone or in a low to moderate risk of flooding um just briefly what is a base flood elevation base flood elevation is the defined on your flood maps as the 1% chance of flooding uh on your home at
any given year so that can happen sometimes people call it the hundred-year flood well that it doesn't mean that it floods every hundred years it can happen once a year twice a year five times a year um do you have any questions i just ran through this really
really quickly but I wanted to impart what Indian River County is doing to become more flood resilient and maybe I should also mention uh in the future coming up over the next year um I am working with
Carrie and her team we are planning on implementing a multi-jurisdictional program for public information that is going to be part of the LMS program in it we want to create develop a substantial man damage management plan
which will give us a exact plan of what to do in case a hurricane should hit and we have a lot of substantial properties it will give us a stepby-step guide it will also involve the public and provide more education and outreach to our
residents so that they are becoming more informed of the peril of flood denise thank you very much for the presentation i believe that the information uh should be well received it's not only
when people are rebuilding but daytoday be getting insured and getting their property protected and wondering how this mechanism happens and how they get assigned because after all at the
end of the day it's about the check they have to write to have what they've worked hard for yes so thank you very much for the presentation and the continued work uh for the citizens
you're welcome is there any questions okay thank you Denise you're welcome we get them every day and we hope you address some of them today thank you commissioners thank you thank you very much getting close to that time folks it's 9:45
uh will cover the any in information we have uh approval of we don't have any approval of minutes we have the information items uh for staff uh not requiring any
action and I I would say that there is a great list of events i urge everyone to go to the website as our staff has worked hard to ensure that there are
many things to do in any river county so it's all displayed on the website um we can open up uh the time for anybody who wishes to speak on any
agenda related items with the exception of any public hearings uh again this may be brief as we have to gear up for the shade meeting well my name is Brent Wenberg
but I'll comment on the ladies that uh they're doing the teaching and when they send their kids home and uh to a family that's got 4,000 a month bills and
they're only making 3,000 a month they're stressed out and then a little kid comes in it's hard to learn but u for parents the best thing you can do is set an example
uh hopefully they and for law enforcement I'm all need your help when I get done speaking and thank you um well in the flood uh when you see a slowmoving hurricane coming
uh you can mechanically pump the retention ponds beforehand to keep them from to when it does hit it's like a buffer everybody won't flood and that's important and okay I'm going to say a little what
needs to be said and this is for Bvard county and it affects everybody uh right here in Bvard we used to have the and it's Indian River County too the most productive ecos ecosystem on the planet
president Nixon said "Don't listen to what we are saying watch what we are doing." In an effort to buy votes Governor DeSantis swooped down from Tallahassee days before the election and gives 400 million to build storm water treatment plants to remove all the
nitrogen and phosphorus from the lagoon nitrogen and phosphorus are essential for life they say they are trying to save the lagoon but their actions say they are trying to kill the lagoon
ronald Reagan had a saying "The scariest words on earth are," we are with the government and we have come to help my dad had a saying "When you mix all the people together," now this is about for Bar County Mailing two groups will always rise to
the top the cream and the crap we have been getting the crap they leave nothing but a mess that taxpayers will have to pay for immediately after B votes before election the budget workshop in Bvard
County had a meeting to to launder all the money the 400 million four it took they their meeting was four hours and before you can make a comment and people are asleep and then you make your three
minute comment and nobody's listening so like I I say our government's been hijacked you like I say thanks for listening and the best thing on earth we have that public has I wish more public was here thank you for
your input anyone else at this point we'll move on and we'll begin the process to enter into our shade meeting um this is a security plan closed shade
meeting uh which will be commencing today and the board of county commissioners of any river county Florida will conduct a close meeting for security planning at 10:00 a.m on
today's date Tuesday April 8th 2025 at this regular scheduled meeting this meeting is exempt from the Sunshine Law pursuant to Florida State Statute 286.0113 sub one and is closed to the
public because it involves discussion with the Indie River County Sheriff regarding threat response planning the closed shade meeting will be attended by the board of county commissioners all five of your commissioners Sheriff
Eric Flowers the county attorney the county administrator and the department including but not limited to emergency services public works utilities IT and building and facilities the estimated
time for this shade meeting will be 1 hour the entire closed shade meeting will be recorded by a certified court reporter and the county staff will move to room B501 at the conclusion of the shade
meeting the board of county commissioners will return to the board chambers to resume its regularly scheduled agenda and meeting once again this will not be televised but it will
be duly recorded by a certified court reporter we thank you for your attendance and we will now proceed to that other office across the way and if
you choose to remain here that's fine otherwise we will see you in a little while thank you we've all returned and the shade meeting has been concluded and as covered by our
certified court reporter thank you uh with that we'll be moving on with the regularly scheduled agenda and uh the next item before we get to the consent agenda uh I I think uh we need to move forward
uh with the discussion uh on the ME's matters and we'll turn that over to the county administrator yes Mr chairman members of the board uh
in early February I was contacted by the county administer for St lucy County George Landry uh informing me of uh Dr aronica's intent to resign for another opportunity as been a medical examiner for another
district within the state uh after like a couple conversations received a letter formal letter uh at the end of February uh and uh it was not in time for the last agenda so uh we or the previous agenda to that so we did put on the
budget amendment uh per the board's direction this item is being brought back as a separate agenda item uh with the additional information that that that's been uh that we were able to obtain uh we did provide information related to the based on the medical
examiner's commission 2023 annual report in terms of the case load uh the number of deaths the the autopsies and uh and then we also provided the information as it relates to uh the ILA in terms of
that in order for the uh the request and the request is an increase of $127,857 7 uh with a current base salary of 367,143 which would raise the salary of 495
$495,000 uh as I indicated in in our conversations uh the the ILA requires that the count any budget in proposed budget may not be increased without the consent of all four counties so in order for this to occur all four counties must agree to it
and the last thing that that I would share that I I I've shared with each of you before uh when asked well why am I recommending support for this and I realize that the the annual fiscal impact to Indian River County because
it's split uh is $43,734 uh for this fiscal year salary only is $14,528 uh the four counties split the expenses and the budget the costs related to the the office of medical examiner
um and so that's that would be our impact for annual basis and the reason why I I did recommend you know that supporting it is I I think you know and I'll let Dr aronica talk about you know her her reasons and her and why but if
Dr veronica was to leave i I I believe that you know based on the established salary of the the district in which she's being courted or she's interviewed with uh that would be the new benchmark or or the the starting point you were and somebody else coming in looking for
a salary and we would have a a decreased level of service in that you'd have only three you'd have the deputy medical examiner and the two associates not the chief medical examiner if the deputies made the interim you'd still only have three with the case load that they currently have and so I think with that
timing and then the fact that it might start to establish the base for where the negotiations would be it could be counterproductive um for the county and in the forcount area as well but uh so that would be the
reasons why I recommended that you support the request and with that I know Dr veronica's here and uh so can turn it over to her sir she have any other questions for me mr quest Mr m did you speak with the I
haven't spoke with him but did you speak with the the the uh public defender in the state so uh Mike Zitto spoke with uh state attorney Bagenol and I spoke with the public defender and I'm Litty and uh and asked uh because just it's in the some of it's
in the agenda item but by way of background in January of 23 a survey is sent out which is at the end of the first appointment three years of three-year appointments that goes to the state attorney public defender it goes to the sheriffs and the in the
respective counties the commissioners actually the funeral uh directors many of him and then uh the medical society and the survey indicated that you know everybody was supportive so she's currently in an interim status waiting reappointment you know but it's it's
there there's about 87 of them that are waiting reappoint from the governor but they have been recommended a reappoint so but I we did speak with those two also spoke with the sheriff our sheriff and um and I did speak with St lucy County administrator again and he
indicated their sheriff was supportive our sheriff was you know was you know everybody I understand that you know $495,000 is a is a big nut to crack or a raise of $127,000 but I think you know Dr ronica
mentioned to me yesterday on some of the other opportunities that exist around the country based on her qualifications and the number of years of experience that she has doing this well I'm kind of grateful that uh Dr
veronica has some office uh after all the opportunity was here and that's how she is serving our public uh by an opportunity that was going to exist with Dr middleman retiring
rest thank you for his hard work and uh we served on uh sheriff and I served on as members of the board uh in the selection process
and I I think extremely highly of Dr aronica and I I understand she's the subject matter of today's discussion um and me um I I think she's doing amazing work
i I think that she's a a dedicated professional the one that she committed to um at the discussion time as the interview so that that's not in in in play in the discussion u and Dr ronica knows how I
personally feel about her as well uh I think we've expressed that i think the the challenge and the reason why we're here today is because of the mechanism uh I believe that uh I had some questions uh I know that some of my
colleagues had similar questions as to the salary study who initiated the salary study uh when you presented it you said that it was uh it was done and St lucy's recommending
this and I said no St lucy doesn't recommend this and now I've discovered that they haven't voted on this okay so it wasn't voted on by St lucy who
initiated the salary study and as the job offers came in the doctor has every right to seek higher ground seek a more uh positive environment although we are
building a facility that is state-of-the-art I believe at the previous uh meeting where we saw the plans uh well touted well needed uh the environment that uh the uh the medical
examin and has worked under for many years has been uh a challenge um I I have been in the facility um I don't know I believe uh at least one of my
colleagues has been in the facility uh in in the rough conditions with the way the appearances are but more importantly where the operating procedures uh are being able to be implemented so that
that's not in question uh we're going with a state-of-the-art building and uh the the workload I don't know if if that has changed but uh again the conversation it was the
delivery you were aware of something you got correspondence and we did not get that correspondence and when I asked you said I thought I gave it to I thought I gave it to you these are
five county commissioners making a decision that was purported as a decision that was already suggested approved and recommended by another county okay the hosting county as we
deliberated uh during the selection process that they would run that operation but no information in addition I mean the state college is there we're very grateful
that we have the opportunity to have a facility there but was this a St lucy decision and when I asked you said uh yeah they they're just recommending it we had no backup uh now we have an
abundance of backup and I want to thank all the constitutionals and the other related individuals who have stepped up to the plate and and gave their opinion as well as the state organization as
well and I'm very grateful that Dr veronica is here but I just want you to know that there was grave qu question as to whose decision this was where the decision was made and how we achieved
that number and salary studies which salary studies to me are are not that important you can make a salary study do anything you wish okay i don't want to uh talk about a
uh facility in Orlando for entertainment but uh you can throw their magic right into this and do anything you wish you can make anything statistical
data you can make anything you wish appear to what you wish to have it appear to be so uh salary studies to me as we learned with our own organization uh it's it's what they recommend that is not
enough and also the fact that we were told that this was decided upon and it it it it felt too engineered to not to be broken down and have a discussion as we're having today
so I just would like to clarify um I did mention at the last meeting is that the county administrator contacted me because yes by the ILA that we're supposed to receive public notice any correspondence it all happened by by virtue of a phone call but the county
administrator for St lucy had indicated to me that they had he had the support of the other county administrators and they were seeking whether or not I would support you know in moving forward and bringing it to the board and after reviewing and kind of seeing how the county had done this in the past or
really hadn't been done and so we it was identified on the budget amendment it was a single line item and it was discussed with each commissioner you know a lot of what we just talked about and yes I I do realize guys that uh that
what I thought I did I did not do i did not send provide a copy to you all in advance of the letter from George Landry i understand that and and I apologize for that but all the information that that is being conveyed today generally was being conveyed back then the the
only difference from three weeks ago is we did the research we contacted the medical examiners just to validate everything that was being said the the one differentiation is the belief that there were seven uh openings they were actually seven interim appointments
there's really only one opening the reason why there's seven interims is because there's a a waiting list or another waiting list but there's a they're waiting on the governor to do the reappoints so there really is only district 8 that's open because that me uh took a position and was re was
appointed by the governor to district two but you do realize that this was not the customary approach to deliver the information and the fact that the
administrators determined where this was going and there was a salary study that that was all done without knowledge of the commissions that the doctor serves so and that's so
I'm not sure there is a customary way this would have been done because again I did seek the guidance on how we did it in the past and there wasn't there wasn't much there so then we looked at the statute and then we discussed whether it could be done by virtue of budget amendment or a separate agenda
item and then you know again I apologize to the board that I didn't provide the letter that I had that's all I had and there was the the the salary data was you know mined by St lucy County uh we Sheila's been trying to verify the
salary data we've not gotten the full response yet but we do know that the what the established salary is uh for the district 8 medical examiner position that's currently open mr chair thank you Mr vice thank you Mr
chair i just want to bifurcate two things real quick one is separate distinct is the the new building that this body has approved uh and Dr veronica was involved in uh a lot of that um for the administrator
uh again nothing to do with our contract but does to do with our working conditions how much has been budgeted how much have we paid into that so far so we have budgeted uh $5.5 million and we share in the expenses of that based
on the formula uh but ours is $5.5 million right so that'll be state-of-the-art probably the nicest in the state of Florida is my guess it it's not going to have certain things i mean we're not going to do a CT scanner which is what would be
considered top like certain offices do have those but we will have exactly what is needed for this this district so it will be going in very it will be a very very good facility understood doctor and I appreciate that which would lead me to
think that uh upon completion of that would be probably attractive um you know to other doctors including your your uh subordinate doctors um one thing I just found out today this morning u the administrator said he received a call
from the county administrator of St lucy in early February first week february 24th no he said early February it was like it was like and then 3 weeks he followed back up with me with with a formal letter because he was having continuing as my it said early February
is what he just said then February 24th is this letter we find out February 28th we start digging for information and then we have a follow-up correspondence um with March 28th and then we have uh others call us from the state attorney's
office public defender and John what you weren't clear when you said what the Indian River County Sheriff's thoughts were on this so he uh he was going to reach out and talk to some of his uh he actually wanted to talk to the medical director
uh he didn't respond but he did say he felt the salary was high you know and he provided me a table uh I think I've talked to each of you about that one of the tables like the senior medical examiner with eight plus years I think nationally the average is 406 uh Dr
veronica has 23 years so so when we came on board in in the summer of 2020 amidst COVID and and other things and then uh since then I I think we can agree this body can agree
there's been incremental uh adjustments to the medical examiner's budget um district 19 of the 25 districts in the medical examiner's community and I don't think there's been a lot of reluctance by any of these uh commissioners
particularly Indian in River County to um agree to these incremental in increases also in um 2023 uh the composition of this board was all given
a survey on the recognition of uh the doctor's performance and I think unanimously we approved that um one thing that was not uh brought to our attention in as far as I know 22 23 24
was any type of uh major adjustment uh to the chief medical examiner's salary so to be quite frank with this board when I received uh this notification in late February I was rather shocked i was rather shocked and I start look looking
into things and then today I hear the county administrator talk about uh courting and interviewing now courting and interviewing w with whichever district and the doctor will talk about this I
suppose makes me wonder um on this entire timeline now the timeline in my mind is a is a is a little mixed up because we don't know when the conversation started with her St lucy administrator we know for a fact when
these five county commissioners were informed of this so the question is was there this drastic increase of uh 35% uh with a proposal of her of her salary
of of almost a half a million dollars was that during the courting process after the courting process after she was perhaps offered a job um we didn't hear about a significant increase in 23 when
we agreed and it went to the governor's office in fact in the budget hearings of 24 um there was no uh and by the way we kindly obliged to the incremental increases and I I see this year's an 8%
uh so I'm confused on how we go uh from everything's uh relatively calm uh forget about the you know $20 million building that is going to be nice because any of our doctors would
would work there i I just don't understand the leap and furthermore my philosophy is if you have and I don't know about the other board if we have an employee that comes to us with a specialty no doubt about it uh we were on the interview board
qualified certain qualifications other medical examiners do not have but board if we can think about uh the doctor's accomplishments what she does it's not a it's not a you know
kittens and and puppies job we agree with that but if we put that position over here and we think about any other profession not related to the specifics that she does and look at this as the
constitution officers that we are commissioned with policy formulation and as important overall budget for the county now we may hear and I just heard the administrator a minute ago it sounded almost like he was mitigating our cost
because it's you know it's split with four people with us having a significant burden and that doesn't diminish the overall cost i'm confused on how we can have um a professional ask for over
$125,000 a year pay raise um kind of blindsided to be quite frank with you and if you include the timeline as well and if we have an employee that's going to say you know either pay me or or I'm leaving um we're putting
kind of putting in a tight spot you know um and do we sit back and say well you know if she gets this other job uh good for her good for her perhaps less work don't know for sure one
correspondence we have said that you conducted over 900 autopsies well the next correspondent says a little over 600 so we're having these disparities not only in the in the product but the volume and then somebody wants to
compare other areas of the state to what we have on the Treasure Coast and say "Well this person can make more money at a certain area." Well if we're chasing the dollar friends um maybe that's not exactly what we're what we're looking
for because incrementally we haven't heard anything now myself and the chairman sat on the on the um on the on the selection committee and trust me we know how hard it is to find a medical examiner in the United States
of America we know that and the doctor knows that and I can tell you the interview process that we went through uh was truly eyeopening um she clearly stood out uh from the other candidates we had candidates that were nationally
recognized on television and had done incredible things and if they walked in the room you'd probably recognize them but at the end of the day we are tasked with looking at every position that we have some type of influence
on and wonder how we can have a 35% increase over $125,000 um in my research uh albe it short with the time frame that I had when we look
at similarly situated even if they're perhaps not uh let's say an orthopedic surgeon for example he or she has overhead he or she may or may not have employees he and she has
certain insurance that they must maintain uh they have a variety of expenses just so the body knows with respect to medical examiners yes highly trained very very
important position one of the most important probably in the United States they have zero overhead they have zero insurance we are paying for that we are paying for their personnel we're offsetting their health care unlike the
private sector we are offsetting their workers comp unlike the private sector we are doing all of these things essentially commissioners this is a it's turnkey operation in other words uh from cellular phones to automobile allowance
to the like so we can't compare we can't compare the private to the public that's one thing but what we can look at is are we making a huge leap to a half a million
dollars that's what this body has to has to decide i uh I don't think that the other county commissioners have even heard this i haven't and I don't know the administrators heard have there been any contract negotiations or is it just
go before four board of county commissioners this is what it is this is from George this is what he says let's go along with George i I don't think it's transparent on how the negotiations even occur i don't how do we even get to this number oh well we looked at this number and this number and we said "Well what the heck let's throw that number."
It doesn't make sense and I'm confused with respect to that so with that Mr chair I'll yield to the to the doctor thank you Mr vice Chair so I was asked to be here to you know discuss with you any questions that you
might have um I have been here for five years i've taken that office from not having any accreditation to a scale never having been calibrated to a national association of medical examiners accredited institution even in
the building that we're in um I have taken care of the employees and their health and that we just had mold remediation in this building we have ceilings coming down i know we're getting a new building that building is for all of you it is for the
constituents of the four counties and whoever gets to run it will really benefit because it is going to be a very nice and safe place but for the last five years that's where we've been working on it in at least the next two years because we won't be moving in for
at least two years um I have done all of Dr middleman's work besides my work picked up for him i've found things in that office that I have taken care of properly one thing I can say about what
I do is I am passionate about being a medical examiner i love being a forensic pathologist and I will do an amazing job wherever I wind up it is an honor to work here i love working here i'm a resident of Indian River County and I
love it here and I understand that this is a lot uh I didn't ask for all of this i merely was calling and stating that I had seen that one of the medical examiners in district one who has six
years experience was uh making $417,000 so I was concerned about that amount and my amount and how I was making considerably less than she was given my experience not only did I have the 18 years experience prior to coming
here I had it in Maryland working for the entire state i don't know if you realize but that's 25 to 30 bodies a day and we did morning rounds afternoon rounds and the amount of knowledge that I have gained during
those years is incredible and I would like to say that you know right now I consider myself one of the top medical examiners in this country and I'm scheduled to be teaching uh for all of the law enforcement agents a three-hour
course and you wounds caused by firearms i have a lot of other things that I'm doing um that I'm doing is just part of this i understand it's a it's a large increase in whether or not there needs to be more negotiation into the actual
amount i'm willing to do that i certainly am um and I I just I'm kind of like here because I was asked to be here but there was no other discussion with me as to any other amount or that type of
thing i I I certainly appreciate that and I and and appreciate the the teaching that you do and with respect to Maryland and and we were briefed on that as you well know and we certainly appreciate uh what
you've done there um and having the flexibility to um you know testify all over the all over the country uh for what you do is remarkable and the body here probably doesn't know but uh that's one thing that the doctor does and is
fantastic at um so I'm hearing that um Mr chair I'm hearing that um doesn't sound like there's a whole lot of discussion going on with her salary um fact that appears that she may
not even have picked a 495 well initially I had said the 500 because I knew that's what district 8 was offering and actually they're offering 510 uh they haven't come out yet i've been there i've I've worked up there three different times doing locom
tenants taking my own personal time off and working up there to see what the what the workload is like there it's very different than our workload they have a lot less cases there um it's a smaller office they do have a newer
facility it's very nice there but it's also not where I consider my home right now and that is the only thing that would really hold me here is that I really love it here i've made a lot of great friends here and I've made that office that medical examiner's
office so wellrun right now and I have employees who are just they're they're happy they like where they are they enjoy the teaching every day it's a it's a very good office and I would hate to
have to do that at another place i appreciate that doctor so so they haven't offered you they haven't offered you a position yet no no no w with with your relationship with the other four counties
um have has there been any hesitation when you present your your annual proposed budget you heard any feedback so I haven't heard the feedback yet but we always have the 4ount meeting in April and that is coming up so that is
there and the only reason you know I put that number in there into that is cuz I didn't know what to do as far as what number to put in for for my salary cuz um they did come back and say would you consider you know doing a little bit less and then with your 5% increase with
your cola it would bring you up and I said I would but discussing other amounts you we hadn't discussed that right you mentioned something about What I here 416 416,000 that's Danna Oleski I have
her budget here we're very comparable that's um district one and her budget in what she's getting and again she's she's got seven years experience right um her budget is a is a total of almost a
million dollars more than ours overall and most of that is salary Um so she has more employees i mean she has victims advocate on staff she has epidemiologists on staff we don't have
any of that and I don't believe we need it to be honest i'm trying to run it the way I think is best for us and the most fiscally responsible for them and and uh there was some clarification that the uh county administrator was working on for me with respect
to this agreement that we have with respect to um you know some would call it a contract negotiations or what have you but you're also part of the Florida retirement system is that right and that other district as
well or the one is but the one isn't right well one district 8 is going with the option correct of of picking or not picking and then district one that's a not forprofit and right but there's you
know I I have her benefit list too what she does I got I got so district one's probably not it's really not advantageous for you you know I mean long term I mean let's let's be realistic she right now does have a dis a deputy chief position right deputy
chief which is right now more than what I'm making currently right i've I heard about that are they Have she uh somebody offer you that position i've talked to her about it but I have not um gone any further i mean I think we know each other very well and it would
be a good match for me to go there again I I know what I want to do i want to stay i just Yeah i just want it to be you know an amount that I feel comfortable with and right now I'm just making less and I understand the the the
Florida retirement but I'm not even invested right well you're getting close you've got five years in what um you know we want you to stay you want to stay is what what what I'm hearing you know you established in Indian River County which
we all know is the best county in the circuit and in your district and we'd like for you to stay um we have stuck our neck out and you're going to have a a fantastic workplace within 36 months or so state of the
art live in the graduate county i've already said that you've got great subordinates you have very little turnover which is healthy for your organization i think you've got some of the finest sheriff's offices in the in
the state that work with you work with you um I think that um just because a number is is is thrown around and tossed around and and a particular administrator puts it in
writing that gives a lot of a sticker shock in fact I think you mentioned doc that there hasn't been really any any negotiations And I I think we could work together and probably
um considering all the affformentioned things probably work something out for you know significantly less than than the 495 just to keep the harmony uh and please know that this body has been uh
non uh argumentative with your annual budgets uh essentially we agree rubber stamp them stamp them and see them because we know what you do we know the talent that you have we do appreciate that uh so Mr chair I I think that the
other uh administrators I don't know the other three uh or do they have a plan to maybe negotiate i I think this is coming back before St lucy maybe in two weeks that's correct is can we firm up a number um and and be quite frank doc no
hard feelings but if you don't agree and you know you you think it's in your best interest to chase the dollar we can't blame you sure we can't we do know that you have outstanding doctors that are your subordinates and we appreciate you you know you didn't have that when you got
here 5 years ago you have groomed them up i know that the chairman knows that uh so if anything your legacy is having you changed it you know two backups right three to that extent so and we do appreciate that so I don't know the
direction this board wants to go um but but I don't think we're in a position today to vote on a dollar amount that's just me and I think Commissioner Adams has some Yeah I'd I'd like to kind of follow up on some of the comments and I won't belabor the concerns I have with
with the way this has been handled um mainly between St st lucy administrator and and the doctor i heard that there is a budget committee that's meeting in April i assume that is comprised of a
representative from each commission i haven't heard that well there's the the um No we have the full county meeting correct it's it's staff and they view the budgets together the staff is there a commissioner no what it's not include
who's on the four county committee that's the budget yeah it's the budget Jennifer Hill and um Kristen Kristen so it's the budget directors for each county yeah they review the budget and then they meet with the office medical
examiners and then they come back with a recommendation so they become the negotiator or the contributor of the decision making without the commission it's the recommendation is brought back to the
commission just like we do with every other state agency the chief judge you know everybody else that submits their budget i mean that's the way it's my understanding has been happening as long as budget increases we I'm sorry no go ahead budget increases we
do with the me annually at our budget cycle correct and it also includes salaries correct well I guess where I was going is that right now the only person that's had a
discussion on this seems to be George that's it and the medical examiner and this is a 4count collaboration and I I'm as a side note a little aggravated that we've been frozen out of that well I feel like we've been frozen out of that process and George
just decided a number and then sent it to us um without even having his own commission weigh in on it what I would like to see happen is that there is some kind of joint county negotiation including the doctor to come up with a
number that's something that we can all well that we can afford and that you can agree on or cannot agree or whatever but you know I'm I'm looking at the survey
and you you know talking about district one and yes there's more autopsies and there's more staff and then you have district 8 um which is less autopsies and less staff but you know that's a whole different those of us that are
commissioners understand the differences in the counties and the areas and that's a whole different political ical and budgetary focused world up there than where we are so I don't think it's apples to apples um I I don't I just I I think this is very
rushed and it's a lot of money i can't personally go to my constituents and say you know we approved a 30% salary increase um without any kind of justification on top of the huge
facility that we're that we are you know obligated to pay for and that's a lot of money i appreciate everything that you do and I appreciate how you have brought that that organization to the point where it is but I'm not I'm not at a
point where I feel like we've even been heard in this process or actually engaged in this process so my suggestion is there's some committee I don't know if it's a budget committee with the budget um directors if it's something
similar to um you know a commissioner or whatever but everybody needs to be at the same table at the table together and this can't be just George leading the charge and then sending out because he actually if you read the letter he specifically is the one that made the
recommendation and he says that in there i recommend I don't think that that's appropriate i think this whole thing has been handled very inappropriately and in order to get it back together one person from each county and the medical examiner need to sit down and be at the
table having the same conversation at the same time i agree doc you're not a widget but I just I just want to say you know you go to the orange store and you find the product and then you go
to the blue store and you find the product and you say "Wow the orange store had it for $70 less." Ask the person at the register to price match
it that's what happens here that's what's happening here we're price matching and when we do ask them they say "I'm not authorized to do that i need to go to the
manager the manager needs to go to the store manager." That's the commission we have an obligation to our taxpayers our citizens over 170,000 albeit they they're only uh 25% of of
the load but they're ours we're responsible to them accountable to them this cost we will see over and over and over again and up the road it may increase you get another
job offer or talk of a job offer we may be back at the table again and then someone will be making a decision or doing a a a salary study and then we're going to be back at
the table again again getting back to the widgets till the store manager says okay we can price match that you're not going to save that 70,000 and I don't think to in today we're in that
position because we have the possibility of a job offer uh in greener pastures with less workload that a case study a salary study should compel us to burden the taxpayer
additionally with no justification other than you're probably one of the finest medical examiners that we could have ever selected and I mean that sincerely you're you're great
Doc but I don't I don't think we're at that juncture i think that we need to have a session on that where all parties are involved and again as it's been
stated not one county administrator suggesting it and then it be interpreted as they're recommending well and it does say recommend But now it comes to us to approve that
recommendation without any background research assessment discussion and we're very honored today that you're here today i realize that you have some concerns and a workload and you are already dealing with cases this morning
and you know Mr chair one thing is that it's kind of like our regional crime lab uh and St lucy County itself is the facilitator and and doc I believe that it could be that she has a better relationship with St lucy County by
virtue of where she's at and talks to the administrator probably more than she talks to the other administrators and they also are the conduit for your essentially your human resources and your payroll and the like and and that's probably why George uh feels a little
more compelled to to speak on on her behalf is my only guess i I don't know but that they have a relationship with the county of St lucy well they are the provider of our you know benefits and those types of things so we do talk
with them they provide us our IT i mean we pay back right you know in in our funds we have to pay for the IT so they charge us and then we pay for it out of our budget but you we do work with them closely they provide us with our
paychecks and those types of things so they're our fiscal agent yes ma'am we were we were all provided your budget yesterday so thank you we we understand that it's kind of like the regional crime lab yeah we do appreciate that do we need some kind of do we need just
an expeditious of trying to wrap this up and I know you're busy and you probably don't want to hang out with us all day although I'm sure this is very entertaining this might be better than what you're going back to the office to do but how do we wrap this up do we need a motion do we need
to to direct something or do we need to choose a I mean we're also talking about coordinating with three other counties that aren't in the room to try to put something together quicker and sooner rather than later so because I know you want the agenda is to approve or not
approve the u the portion that's been calculated uh by the assessment of what Dr ironic is requesting a salary or what's being recommended as salary so we either have
to approve or not approve and then we'll be happy to accept uh uh an additional recommendation and we can vote on that to ensure that the issue is addressed by
virtue of either a group meeting or an individual meeting and something that's amenable uh for the impediment of the good doc but not necessarily what's being
presented now so again we have to approve or not approve what's presented because other counties will be able to do that as well i understand St lucy is about to have that discussion um
I've uh I believe Martin County as well um there are some same concerns that we had I've heard from other jurisdictions so I I think we need to do
is say yes or no on the salary request and then make further recommendation okay if that is what we need to do then at this point I would like to make the motion to
not I don't know not approve the current salary request second so let's vote on that that I've had any discussion no sir any further discussion sir Mr chairman the only discussion I
have is is I we're on the right track here because when we did the building and we worked with Doc Ronica on the foundations of the building all the counties were present we had a meeting together we decided what you know what we were going to do how we're going to
do it how much we were going to you know how much we would come back to each county to to budget i think we we absolutely need to do the same here we need more information as to as to what we're doing as a whole here not individ this is not going to work well
individually you know trying one county do it one county do it one county do it we they may totally disagree somebody may have another opinion so yeah so I'm I'm with you okay do we have a motion by Commissioner Adams seconded by myself uh
not to approve the medical examiner's salary request any further discussion all in favor opposed motion carried unanimously mr chair Mr vice Chairman I I would like
to bring this up and and see if we can and I know doctor's business got a lot of things to do and I know we have another I'm hearing of a meeting in April um and you know Doug I hate to downplay this but we all want to get this over
with you have work to do we have work to do you want to move forward we've heard all of these numbers uh going around and I will I will throw out a number and and it's about 12% more which would
bring you uh to around 415 um and I think that would calm the nerves and that's something that we can talk about we can talk about it but I will tell you right now that that's I
will not accept that only because I I'm I do have an offer for another position in uh a different county as an associate which I would be taking a step down and um I'm considering that very much
because I So you've got that offer earlier No this is for not a chief position this is for an associate earlier you said you didn't have the offer for completely different position completely different office completely
different it's not eight it's not one and um and it's okay i mean like I said I understand it's a lot of money and I get that um I just have to feel that what I'm being paid is appropriate to my level of expertise and and I understand
that i but I can't accept anything that's less than what somebody who has seven years experience is getting it it just doesn't sit right with me so it would have to at least be more than that let me just add that last year your
budget sub your budget submitt was incrementally and it was not 35% increase it was not 130 do $30,000 so something's changed in a year that
would make you want another $125,000 because that was not included in your in your budget proposal of last year so uh maybe I'm missing something but something has happened and I don't
want to say something's happened in the ME world because we were involved in 2020 with the with the salaries but last year at this time you didn't ask for $125,000 pay raise so it sounds like if you want to
go then that's your your obligation and and we appreciate that absolutely and I appreciate all of you i truly do so thank you very much for everything that you've done in the past years so um we'll see what happens um and I I I
don't know what else to say but that amount would not work for me i don't say that the 495 is where we need to be either but that to me is not something that I would accept but I do appreciate um you thinking about it and discussing
it with me and I just for as an aside the you know you do have excellent medical examiners that are there right now um they do not have the experience level there's just no way and I do oversee a lot of what happens in there and I have been training them to the
best of my ability um so you know it I I'm not sure what would happen and it might be all fine and I'm just saying that I know what I bring to the table and I'm sorry that you know I I have to say it that way but I do so thank you
very much and I hope you all have great rest of your day thank you doctor thank you there will not be a second motion as we continue uh we did pause and not go to
the consent agenda have you all looked at the consent agenda is there anything that anybody I realize it was uh it is now afternoon i don't load the agenda i just have to work it um is there anything on the consent
agenda that anybody wishes to discuss poll everybody's got their own microphone mr chair there are is a lot of good stuff happening on the consent agenda um but in the that I think we're all very happy about but in the uh uh thought of
moving this along I will happily move the consent agenda second that's a motion by Commissioner Adams seconded by myself any further discussion all in favor opposed motion carries unanimously
next item is a public on public items is a public hearing and that's 11 A1 which is the second public hearing proposed developers agreement between DRP bookbinder multistate LLC and Indie River County this is legislative in
nature good afternoon councelor good afternoon commissioners susan Praau deputy county attorney on behalf of the county attorney's office yes this is the second public hearing for the proposed developers agreement between DRP Bookbinder multi-state LLC and ourselves Indian River County um the last the
first public hearing took place at our last board meeting um at which time I explained that this is the same exact developers agreement we saw before for Harmony Isle just that the owner has changed and therefore we need to swap out the owner and have the um the board
agree to to that so if there's any other questions I'm ready and able to answer once again same scenario different entity correct same level of commitment okay yes we have a community development director here as
well approve second you have to open the public hearing for Sorry hold on any other questions this is a public hearing yes sir we'll now have open up the public hearing
thank you ask anyone that wishes to speak to state your name and address for the record my audience having given fair and equal opportunity to speak we'll now close the
public hearing council you have anything further just that we ask that the board approve the um developers agreement between ourselves and DRP Booker thank you and I earlier I'll try it again Mr
chair second so we have a motion by Vice Chairman Law seconded by myself any further discussion all in favor opposed opposed nay and I'll state for the record that I had opposed this um in its previous
iteration and stated all the reasons at that time so I will not believe bird here thank you thank you commissioners have a great afternoon motion carries 4 to one with Commissioner Moss dissenting thank you all right
oh that was uh 11 11 A2 which is the second hearing concerning the special assessment provided for the replacement of Covert's W's Edge phase 2 subdivision this is legislative in nature good afternoon
councelor good afternoon commissioners chris Six with the county attorney's office this is as you stated the second hearing excuse me this is where the commission will sit as an equalizing board to hear any challenges to the assessment or ask for somebody to have a different levy than somebody else and
the public has a chance to be here they've all been notified again we are asking for the county the board to as you did in the original resolution to assess each property individually and in in the same level so there's no ratios it's just
there's a flat amount they each pay the equal amount and it's paid for the next 15 years after this hearing if it is approved then we'll have a third hearing when the project is completed so we can come back and find out exactly what the total is and hopefully less than that amount that both the county had to pay in that the residents have to pay as
well but I we're a little over halfway done with the project i don't have the exact completion date with me i Mr jvid is here in case we need that um but that will come back in a couple months so we can hopefully lessen those bills and so far everything's moving pretty smoothly
so just to recap we're uh approving today if approved the assessment without a dollar amount but will be fair and commensurate of the work being performed individually
yes we're asking for it to be a one to one so each lot pays the same percentage and so we're not asking for a specific but it will come down we have an an estimate that was provided in the first thing which is approximately $6,200 um a lot we're hoping that's going to come down by a few hundred or maybe more
but that's up to how progress goes and they don't have any unforeseen problems there was actually a built-in reserve fund into that to make sure it all got done and there was no problems in the future so that's what we're asking for today at or about that level or Yes sir perhaps less hopefully but no promises
thank you counselor any further questions from uh regarding the topic with counselor mr chair I'll just say that uh thank you to Chris he shephered this project it was a leftover project and uh he has
monitored and kept me informed of it the process and it's a successful operation with the u partnership with the community and the county so thank you Chris yes sir thank you we'd ask you open the public hearing and take any comments at this point we will
open up the public hearing please state your name and address for the record once again counselor you did uh send notice to all of the affected parties yes yes sir and they were not it was
also advertised in the paper at two times as required to under our code and it was sent by public works to each end each lot they were also they were with us in the beginning when we set this up we negotiated with them for the terms and the other things that's how we got to the years and so they've been well
aware of it since the beginning of the project thank you i've been giving Baron ample opportunity now close the public hearing move approval second i have a motion by
Vice Chairman Law seconded by Commissioner Adams any further discussion all in favor i opposed motion carries unanimously thank you sir uh with that uh break is being
requested we'll honor that and we'll resume in just a few moments i've got the board recommendation just take it you don't need it okay all right
is our presentation ready you ready to proceed yes sir we'll now resume the meeting and the next item is item H is parks recreation conservation the draft coastal technology corporation boat ramp
sighting study work order number one and there are attachments which we all had the opportunity to review good afternoon good afternoon commissioners appreciate being here today uh today we are bringing you a report slideshow uh with Tim Fontaine
who's going to uh review the uh results from the boat sighting study that was conducted if you recall uh when we had the joint meetings with the city of Vero Beach there was some concern about boating access along the Indian River Lagoon and the uh stressors that were
placed on some of their boating facilities and we were directed to look into uh opportunities within uh the county to uh potentially place uh uh boat ramps or other boating access
points i think that over the course of many years we uh understood that there were probably limited locations for that due to a series of different uh conditions within the Indian River Lagoon and I will let uh Tim here
present to you the findings from this boat sighting study i think one of the things that's important to note is that this study only covered uh the landward side of the mainland and it covered from the south part of the county up to uh
Wabaso Causeway yes Wabaso Causeway so uh we did limit that study area uh to in consideration for the southern portion of the county and it did not extend beyond Wabaso Causeway uh and then you'll have an opportunity to provide some guidance uh to us with your
direction about how you want to proceed if you want to close the study or if you wanted to extend the study to a different uh area further north but I'll let Tim present his findings as just as a nexus uh this uh all began
when uh it was determined that the Oslo boat ramp would not be considered as a viable expansion that it was to be left alone and there was also concerns by the city of Bur Beach of their facilities
and the burden and cost of concern for repair and expansion in the lower region that's why the study went south instead of north yes I think that is is true as well as
the fact that uh landward boat uh ramps are not occurring in the south part of the county to the same degree that they are for instance at the city of Sebastian and north of the Wabaso causeway there may still be some areas that you want to uh take a look at and
and certainly Tim could uh provide us some guidance in that regard as well uh however the the lack of uh boat sighting uh or boat ramp facilities in the south part of the county was the primary focus yes sir thank you
thank you again tim Fontaine with Coastal Tech i'm one of the owners and an engineer there and I'm here to talk to you about the boat ramp sighting study with our scope of work we had two tasks this was mostly a desktop analysis and
task one uh was a reg regulatory criteria and mapping exercise basically we looked at what available information we have that we can include into a GIS map to better understand what sites may or may not be feasible for a boat ramp
uh we looked at the the area of the land that's available so for the storm water system the parking etc all the upland site civil improvements we looked at the environmental consu uh considerations including how close we are to the inter coastal waterway the existing uh water
depths the existing seaggrasses and mangroves and then the regulatory criteria of what their regulatory agencies are going to look at in reviewing a potential boat ramp site then task two was screening of those potential boat ramp sites and ranking
them from kind of the best site um the uh site where we're most available to get a most likely to get a permit for the site and then kind of our worst case scenario where we're the least likely to get a boat ramp uh permit i like to say kind of the obvious
things out loud why did we approach the work this way why did we do this um this exercise this report is really the first step of obtaining a permit for a new boat ramp facility we're using the alternative analysis uh that's
identified on the Army Corps website on their regulatory website uh that's posted on this slide it has four different steps and that last step this again verbatim from the Army Corps guidance the guidelines require that the least environmentally damaging
practicable alternative is the one we select so we're essentially looking at an alternatives analysis on all the potential sites we could build a boat ramp and we're going to find the one that is the uh least environmentally damaging but is also practicable that we
could actually build a boat ramp there so if someone owns the land they're not willing to sell us the land then that's not a practicable site with our study area as Beth mentioned it's Wabaso Causeway south uh to the county line to the St lucy County line it includes uh just the west bank
of the lagoon and it includes three uh two aquatic uh preserves so again very challenging site for a boat ramp and looking at the county's existing boat ramp facilities uh this is from your website we're going to zoom in to
just what we care about our study area and I'm going to speak to those that are not boers they they don't really pay attention to the boat ramps um this map looks great we have a lot of different boat ramps but if you are more familiar with the site we have the Wabaso Causeway boat ramp which is site 10 it's
fairly far north from a lot of county residents sites three and four those are city facilities they're on Central Vo Beach it's the Mc Williams and Riverside area again limited parking and and pretty far from most county residents the next two sites the 16 and 18 those
are really not feasible for a standard center console motorboat and then finally site nine uh that's again pretty far south in the county pretty far away from a lot of our residents and it's on the Verar Island uh that's your Round Island uh boat ramp facility so there is
a a large area of the county really from that Waso causeway south where there's not a boat ramp on the uh mainland of of the county the county has a 2007 manatee protection plan which gives guidance on sighting boat ramp and boating
facilities uh in general the northern half approximate half of our study area north of the Barber bridge includes zones five and seven uh which does not identify a shoreline ratio and boat density then south of that uh south of
that uh Barber bridge is zone nine that does identify a maximum power boat to shoreline density and that's because of the use of manatees in that area the uh environmental resources seaggrasses and mangroves along that
shoreline so we went parcel by parcel from the Wabaso Causeway south and we ranked these different sites um the and used a point system so for example on seaggrass if it had almost no seaggrass
it was assigned a point of zero if there was abundance of seaggrass assigned a point of five so then this let us relatively rank the sites on what's the easiest or lowest scoring to get a boat ramp permit and then what's the most challenging if you look at this table
that's in the report you'll see kind of three different categories or groupings it's kind of like a um red light yellow light green light you know that that top grouping they're all pretty close to each other and points that's where I think we could get a permit for a boat
ramp facility the yellow light would be pretty challenging that kind of center grouping that bottom grouping you know no one's going to say "Well you cannot get a permit for a boat ramp there." But if we're able to I'd say it'd be a pretty miserable process for all parties
involved that would be uh nearly impossible if not impossible to get a permit there on the mapping that's also included in the report I'm just going to look at two different sites one site in terms of environmental resources that would be a good candidate for a boat
ramp facility is immediately north of the Barber Bridge you can see the inter coastal waterway is close by there's not documented historical seagrasses in the area there's there's mangroves north south and west of the site but really there's just a fine mangrove fringe
along the shoreline so you wouldn't be uh impacting a lot of mangroves for a site here so now land ownership is a challenge it's not owned and controlled by the county but in terms of the environmental resources this is a great site for a boat ramp facility
now kind of on the opposite end of the spectrum um we have u this is pretty far south in the county it's in the uh manage protection zone nine so this is an area used by manatees there's a lot of seaggrass and there's a lot of um uh
mangrove habitat so this is not a good site this would be very challenging for a boat ramp facility and I would expect all of the upland parking and storm water and all where you'd have to keep your boat all of that would be really far west really far away from any actual
boat ramp facility uh which I can tell you I'm I'm local i live here we have a boat we take it out with our three kids it's pretty tricky to deal with wife kids boat and moving all that around so if you could build a facility here it would not be very user
friendly that's all I had thank you chairman yes um okay let me start this out i'm a boat owner and all my life on any I know all these I know every parcel
out here every location very well sebastian definitely has more boat ramps on the west side than we do south of Wabaso so your study area is going to be very is very good with
that this has been brought up for years i don't know if Commissioner Fleer was on the board then but I think he did get hit with the Oslo boat ramp i was yes sir a while back thank you sir that there was people that wanted to turn that into a boat ramp and and if if you
know anything about the river that's that's not a good location that's too much seaggrass it's too shallow it's it's too it's too mangrovy if that that's a better word around the the dock areas there's just not enough it's just
not room it's just it was just a bad choice from from the beginning but it had been brought up numerous times obviously I didn't see anything but one property that really stood out to me i mean it would love to be have someone
some further in the South County say down there between 8 Street and 12th Street but that is that is very highly a mangrove area and there's a lot of seaggrass and and that's what we're desperately trying to keep so to be
labor a longer speech my favorite one was the one owned by the land trust which is the one which is the par drive location which is um if you ever been on the river go back just north of the
Barber Bridge on the left is that area can you pull that slide up real quick on the 17 site number 17 the power drive the first one you put up I think make that one that one black there you
go because first of all that's that's just there there is road access to that and I remember the conversations and I don't think John you were had already started talking with Monty Falls of the city when they were talking about boat ramp this was the location that they
liked also because the bridge is just to the just to the south of that you can see it off the bridge but if you were going just under the the the the Barber bridge and to the left you would see this what's nice about this is that the
ground is technically hard enough am I correct instead I mean it's it's not mangroves i don't know how big is that piece of property do you know that what we're looking at on the screen do you have I don't have a Do you have
an idea i'd have to I don't have the cool computer thing to get me the the area do we know Beth do we know how I believe the entire parcel 17 is uh 27.35 acres then you have the small 17
the three part got 17 but I I think for what we're what our purpose of a boat ramp we're probably going to need more of that well we're going to need the most of the area not just the red 17 but where the white 17 is up on the top correct you know which looks like a sand
trap or something but it's really not but that that is the most that is the best spot in in my opinion as just a a guy that's been out there a lot on the river and been passed out a lot and seen a lot been on it even many many years
ago everything else is everything else on the and it's probably a good thing but everything else on the west side of the river is a heavy mangroves from from north county to border from the south north county border to the south county
border from Bard to St lucy everything is heavily heavily mangrove this one is not quas is got a lot of mangroves on it 69th Street which you think would be a good location is highly mangroved and it would be difficult to put a road in it
would be difficult to put a parking in for say a 20 23 foot boat which is I have a 23 foot boat and uh you know that trailer space takes up a lot of room the difficulty is you pointed out in your thing and that's owned by the
land trust if we're serious about this i don't know if if the land trust would be interested in negotiating or something i mean we're going through a process now with the environmental land bond if they would you know if they would be
interested in doing something or if they're dead set on saving it and I and and it's fine if they want to save it for posterity that's fine but it really to me is the only spot that would be conducive for a boat ramp on the western
shore of the Any River Lagoon in the county everything else is again is too sensitive it's it's got a lot of mangroves and a lot of seaggrass that doesn't it's within the city limits of Bureau Beach but that's we can work
around that maybe too i don't know that that's that's just my thought is a guy that's been out there a lot wow so I mean I I just I don't I don't know that I didn't see I didn't see a lot of options i mean I looked at like the
Gford Dock area it's just really not big enough it's highly mangrove the road the road is extremely low going in area where in this location you have a you have a fairly high road a higher road than you do going into the Gford Dock area and
it's really Gford docks are really not big enough 69th Street just heavily mangrove a lot of seaggrass quay do is is if Quaid do road i was it was weird i I was just down there the other day after the after we did the um the thing
of the church at the Winterbe Cemetery i had my wife with me and she I said you know we're looking at this and we're looking at this she said I never been down qued road so we drove down Quaidok Road quedok road's about as big about as wide as this das up here if if you don't know it's a one laid road all the way
down and it would be highly difficult to put something to put something down there especially in a nature sensitive area in my opinion even though the water's probably deeper there than a lot of spots because that's what they used it for you know 100 years ago was to
bring boats in and dump stuff off so it's just my opinion that the the PAR drive number 17 is the is the is the best option that I see i mean I'm open for discussion for suggestion if somebody's got a better idea shoot it at me but I think that
that's you know it's worth at least talking to the land trust and maybe talking to the to the city uh but again I remember our conversations that they like that spot too um it'd be worth talking maybe there's
something we can do in the long run to benefit the land trust you know would benefit el benefit boat ramps because I know you could probably there's a lot of some funding that's available through find and others
through boat ramps with the permitting I didn't see but let me see if I'm reading that right with the permitting let's say everything went well and we could build on 17 is the permitting easy in that area or no so I wouldn't use easy with boat ramps for anything but on looking
at the different sites I agree with you the site 17 is one of the more readily sites where you could get a permit um based on this analysis you know we ranked a few sites that are kind of grouped together on if the county is going to seriously pursue a boat ramp
they should start with these sites and I I would expect with the uh regatory review process you would need to eliminate those sites because they're not practicable before moving on to the next sites i didn't see anything else
that was really practical you're not going to get the Hobart homeowners to allow houses in there to allow Boers in there you're not going to get the three corners area to put a boat ramp in unless you can find a way to stick it
under the 17th Street Bridge um I I've looked at every one of I looked at this for two hours last night trying to come up with something and I just I kept coming back to the to that particular location yes and it's careful or I was careful not to put county
policy in my study um so I didn't want to say well this site we're we're not going to be able to get this site so we I tried to remove that type of language from the study sure i just had a question and looking at the uh Coastal Tech assessment this
is page three of 10 it says that the recommended level of service is a minimum of one boat lane per 10,000 residents uh while Indian River County has approximately one boat lane for every
5,823 residents so the level of service is is adequate it does say that that does not take into account seasonal traffic or visitors to the county but that's only it's basically looking at you know
60% of what it could be like you could add another 40% to that and you would still have a proper level of service so if that's correct and I'm just looking for confirmation here that that's I understand it correctly then it's it's not a level of service issue
the issue is the location itself and if that's the case if I understand that correctly then we don't need to bother with the inverand trust because you have the two boat ramps basically right across the lagoon um you know you have have them at the base of the Barber
Bridge on both the north and the south side um and that's on the east this would just be adjacent on the west so if it's a location issue that with all its you know with all the other problems attached to it the land trust that would
not solve the problem if it's a level of service problem then I'm curious about that that we have you know that that that 40% is taken up is it taken up by seasonal uh changes in residents uh
andor visitors if you know that language is from the county's comp plan um which I believe the last update was 2018 um I I can't speak towards the growth of the county or if that number is still adequate to today well do you think it
has changed since that time i mean in terms of level of service that's all um I just overall my understanding the growth of the community has um expanded since 2018 i think we have taken on more residents since 2018 but I didn't develop the comp
plan so I couldn't really speak towards that because I I agreed with uh Commissioner Man i didn't really didn't see any that looked appropriate um thank you for for listing them all and I I did I did review the list i didn't see any that I thought were appropriate
no um and thank you for pointing that out because it is historical data and we have grown we can just uh go and check at the uh tax collector's office to see how many registrations we have not being Mr
chairman I got I was looking the the size is on your sheet drive sort it's basically see that's half almost 30 acres that whole site the big part's 27
and a half the others are 38 the three small ones are 38 um right one to four to seaggrass because there's there's not much seaggrass there um to four
seaggrass permitting permitting challenge one to five that's good or bad that's good okay yeah um I just honestly commissioners I I I again I looked at this pretty thoroughly
and and I didn't see anything else that that was really that could I don't think really could be if you had to do it you'd have to jump through hoops with the with the mangroves and the and all this stuff and you'd spend a heck of a lot of money
raising the road and putting a and putting and putting enough area to put a boat ramp on when here you've got almost 30 acres of property right there yeah and we'll agree and uh again thank you Captain uh appreciate your your input
being a longtime boat boat owner and having navigated the the river uh and access accessibility is uh where I I think that's where what we're pointing out it's not about serviceability to the
population as although it has grown i believe boat ownership has grown substantially uh like I said we'd have to make the phone call across the way to get the actual numbers of boats that are
growing in Indian River County and one would have to look at uh in in Sebastian on a weekend okay probably the most popular uh boat ramp uh in the entire Treasure
Coast it it is very popular why because a parking lot was built and able to park their trailers and the draft is enough again I'm not a boat owner not pretending to be one
never owned a boat but I see a lot of them and a lot of the larger craft 24 and 26 and 28 uh I think that's considered larger now Joe um they are going to Sebastian because of the depth
and scope of the ramp and uh they are well attended on the weekend well attended and I think that uh the original discussion was not only uh not only to be able to look at developing a
south county access because we had determined that Oslo boat ramp was not going to have any changes um and most of it was environmental and rightfully so
uh we looked at somewhere prior to go up north and uh quite frankly uh Sebastian's got two great boat ramps so somewhere in between was the thought process at the time doesn't appear that
there's too many viable spots for somewhere in between is that correct yes yeah I agree with that statement and looking at the data that we appreciate it but I I don't think and there was a
point where along Grand Harbor uh we were going to consider uh there was a point where um again the the GIF dock but now we've encumbered some of that with the city of Vero Beach with their
reclamation project correct I don't think there's any plans in the You're talking about the three corners project no no north of that yeah we were talking about uh going over to the barrier
island to develop area and they were going to improve it as a facility uh in return for the ability to be able to stage their pumping and other process is that correct sir sir if you're talking about that Oh the
Gford dot dot we're talking rivers okay yeah that's But they're not improving that to make it a boat they just put a pavilion there but it also is not a favorable site because of the distance and the low lowlying area yeah they ruled that they looked at that that's
already being sorry in in approved beach so uh and again it was pointed out about the conservation area uh yeah there are some areas that uh could be improved uh
but uh again that's probably one of the more likely sites but that doesn't come out in the mix does it well what I like about this site is it's high it's It's fairly high ground already it's not
mangroves it's fairly tight the road can be improved but the site of 30 acres is actually fairly solid it's actually rated number three in
your report and um and I don't think we're going to get the number one rating which you said take off the list was the three corners property and then the second one was Hobart Landing i don't think very viable uh one question the uh
question isn't this site owned by the land trust it is we'd have to talk to them and I think the report says that really we should be removing it from further consideration because they don't expect a land trust to approve construction i
agree that's the only option that I see that's so if that's the only option and it's really not an option then it sounds like we don't have any options and there we don't need to move forward because there's nothing to move forward on i would at least ask so uh if I could jump
in really quick I've heard two different things that we might be able to provide some more information so next uh board meeting we'll be bringing the master plan i will note uh that in the draft master plan parks and recreation master plan that is a 10-year guiding document
for our department that we currently do not have any uh data or information to support uh additional boat ramps in that report and so you won't be hearing that however I would uh suggest that uh staff
could look at the number of current voter registrations uh another thing that I'm not hearing uh is uh so for instance when we get uh park impact fees there's pressure for us to use those funds uh to uh meet the new levels of
service based on uh new developments etc that are coming in i don't have that same pressure uh when it comes to the voter uh funds that we uh sometimes use for improvements so there's a couple considerations there and additionally I would mention that uh a few uh meetings
ago you approved the Wabaso Causeway Grant that we got from Florida Inland Navigation District which is looking at uh expansion of uh the loes there that we have to protect them from further erosion doing some conceptual site
planning for that if in fact we found that a level of service was not being met and I can certainly uh come back with some more information after talking to planning and development services about what do those numbers look like do we need to uh uh uh change those you
know what are the current numbers etc one of the things that we might want to look at is on property that we already own and manage where we already have boating uh facilities uh that may be a better location for an expansion of
services as opposed to a new location that we don't own that also sits within a municipal boundary which could create some uh uh difficulties in which funding sources that we use and I think that's why we wanted to bring the uh results of
the study to you today because we were kind of at a place where we needed a little bit of direction to move forward uh whether or not to continue to proceed uh with uh funding an ex an expansion of the current uh study that we have now
whether we should just bring you more information whether we should fold that into the parks and recreation master plan etc and uh I I would agree that I think that the uh current issue to date but we have not done any statistically
valid surveys of boating use in Indian River County so that would be interesting it would cost some money to do that type of survey but uh I think the question is we're looking only at the sighting of potential locations but
we really haven't looked into the expressed need of the residents and again getting back down to whether or not these are residents using the boat boating facilities or whether they're visitors guests that are driving tourism that would be important to know as well
as uh whether or not they're uh coming from uh you know St lucy County or Bvard County to use our facilities there are data uh points that we can access through um things like placer AI and
other uh software that basically uh use cellular data that can tell you predominantly who's using facilities so for instance we know that the fairgrounds is about 80% uh county residents when you have events at the fairgrounds and that can frame the
decisions that we make moving forward because we know exactly who's benefiting from the expansion of services at this current time we don't have that information because we don't subscribe to that uh software platform or any other platform like it so uh we've only
been able to glean some of that information from demos that we've done so there's a couple different uh questions is who's using the facilities what is the demand uh as opposed to what is the sighting and this uh ex this uh study was framed only from the sighting
and I think it was I don't think there was anything that was surprising staff i think that anecdotally we knew that our shoreline is uh quite a distance from for instance the major thoroughares like US1 uh that there's a lot of homes uh
built along uh the Indian River Lagoon area and so getting public access to the river was going to be uh a constraint as well as the fact that we have uh environmental resources in the south part of the county particularly so people that are using the south part of the county are doing that for
recreational fishing uh and they probably have a different mindset than the folks who are using uh the Sebastian area where you have a lot of spoil islands and a lot more recreational use in that area or you have commercial fishermen who are using those areas to get out to the Sebastian inlet so I don't think that we have a
really good handle at this point in time of what the need is from the user groups uh that's certainly something we could consider and look into but I can tell you from the cursory review that we have coming out of the master plan and again we'll be presenting that at the next meeting that there was uh not an
expressed need for additional boat ramps that was ranking super high it might be in that list and tiered but it's not ranking as like the top three four or five uh needs in the county so to kind of I mean we've already
looked at this many several years ago and there was no options then and unsurprisingly there hasn't magically you know manifested an option so here we are personally I think a boat ramp is a recreation amenity this should
be included in the master plan and then put in some kind of CIP and and worked that way but this sighting study was basically at the request of the city of Vero Beach who apparently didn't believe what we told them based on the sighting study we did several years ago so now we
can say that here's a new study we've done what they've asked it's not there's not a location it's not necessarily a priority because there's more information that needs to be found out include it in the master plan and work it like you would any other recreation amenity is what I I mean that's where
I'm at mhm i I agree with you and Mr chair i would also uh amongst Beth's studies and I think the captain can verify if you're basically 12th Street or South in Indian River County you're
going to North Fort Pierce uh that's where you're going to launch your boats you've got the inlet there access to the ocean so that's been my experience i'm not a you know like him going around island or you're going to the right you're probably going
to Fort that should be in the study as well and how many bureau people are going there they have great boat ramps in North County at Fort Pierce well like for me for instance if we're going out we we'll go to Round Island and put in we'll go south you know the Fort Pierce
Hamlet down there just because it's closer there is a little different type spoil islands and stuff down there i I agree with everything you've said i agree with everything Commissioner Adams said it's just that yeah we we got this study that we did it
uh to look at it that's just my opinion that the PAR drive site is the the best one it just happens to be owned by the land trust i say it doesn't hurt to ask them you know i mean I can call Ken myself ken will you be interested in
doing something with this or whatever y'all talking to I didn't legal says no then we're we're where we're at today which I completely understand because that was just you asked me as a commissioner to review this and give you my opinion
that's my opinion that's the only site there is it happens to be owned by the land trust this is why I stick to boats that you can launch from the side of the road like airboats so or a kayak could do that too so I say I that's a good speed
with a kayak at least we ask the land trust hey are you interested in doing something they can say heck no so I would ask staff to do that however interesting this this is
and how much time that was performed or the results that were performed uh I I want to say thank you uh this was something that was reinitiated at that
joint meeting and uh I I guess you know have the same results we might be at the end of the dock so sometimes that happens would have been nice if he came up with seven different opportunities
u which would make it more difficult for us to have to decide should we be investing in one of those seven uh however there's no viable option uh which again is a the same good
result but unfortunately doesn't provide a dock um I I I mean a a boat ramp and and I see like I said uh there's a lot of activity in Vero there's a lot of activity in
Sebastian um have have you you all seen what what happens on Sebastian on the weekend during the during the summer there's no reason there's no uh mistake why most of these uh fishing tournaments
are geared uh in in Sebastian it's because of the accessibility parkability and functionality of access is always going to be a little better to the area that you have an inlet nearby remember that because you don't only have access
to the ocean but you have the place you can go party whether so you put in at Sebastian you're right there at Sebastian Inlet you put in at little you know Little Gym Bridge or the municipal on the north bridge side of St lucy you ought to go down there on a Saturday or
Sunday they're really full you know down there because you're close to an inlet the problem we have here is for local people is for fishermen we don't have anything on in the south part of the county on the western side of the Indian River except for the Oslo boat ramp
which is not good everything else is on the Mc William the Riverside is all on that side and it was really a bad situation when the Riverside one was down for what a year pretty much i don't even know was it back up i haven't been
over there i think they finally got it done but the city had that one down that was a that was the voting community on social media was all when's the city going to get that fixed we have to go a long ways away to get in there so to sum it all up I agree with everything that
you said that Susan said that you said that everybody said you asked us to look at this you most I don't see any of them viable the only one I see that has any that has good potential would be the PAR drive when the site 17 that they looked
at i just think it's worth asking the land trust hey we talked about it we're looking at it would you be willing to work with us or do something with the property or sell it or something that because it is 30 acres on pretty hard
ground just to the base of the Barber Bridge which is basically going to be across from the Mc William boat ramp but it's on the west side instead of the east side i just think it's worth asking if not then we're no further worse off than we are right this minute
that's just chairman we can move this item along and have uh Beth and her team inquire about 17 uh and then close this study uh we've checked the box uh as we were asked this belongs as Commissioner
Adams said in our parks and wreck plan we can always keep this tickler file or whatever in case a piece of property comes open that we think might be advantageous for a boat ramp but as it stands today it doesn't appear that we'll be having one on the
main so uh is that a form of a motion yes sir second and that means that uh that's going to check and if there's any
viability you'll let us know yes sir is that your attention was my intention too just any further discussion all in favor opposed motion carried
unanimously see that that's success when you get a unanimous decision certainly thank you very much you're quite welcome and thank you for your all your hard work too next item is 13H2 and that's the park and
conservation division's standard operating procedures good afternoon Beth Powell once again hello sir and commissioners uh today we just want to uh provide you with an opportunity to uh comment and
approve our uh standard operating procedures for both parks and conservation areas uh I'm going to just quickly uh run through uh a couple slides here uh because I know it's been a long day and uh really wanted to
mainly open up the floor for any uh discussion concerns the reason we bring the standard operating procedures to you is because uh we operate uh with the public and oftent times are enforcing chapter 205 of the county code and
because of that uh convergence it's important for us to understand uh your uh wishes in in regard to how we enforce and and how we manage our parks and conservation areas and conservation areas are included in the way that we
manage uh through uh chapter 205 uh so here just briefly uh you have two documents that were attached um they help to establish the departmentwide standards uh we're doing this for all of our divisions so uh in the coming months you'll be seeing them for uh beach
operations aquatics recreation the intergenerational recreation center etc uh they uh are provided to both our existing employees as we uh get board approval on them as well as uh to our new employees so they serve as
onboarding documents that help to align our staff with uh our operating procedures but also uh with the level of service and the expectations that we have uh when our employees are coming into contact with the public in their performance of their duties you
previously approved the uh department uh standard operating procedures so these division standard operating procedures help to uh navigate specifically to the division uh for from which they're coming from so just a brief overview we have uh
31 parks two campgrounds uh our parks division also manages uh the areas around the fairgrounds uh they help with conservation areas the shooting range aquatics and the IG center there are three uh main divisions of the standard operating procedures which include
operating standards guest services and emergency preparedness and risk management the same is true for uh all of the divisions and you'll start to see a common theme where we've aligned uh the format of each of the SOPs so conservation lands is under that same
format uh and this is for uh the application to the 38 different conservation area tracks approximately 2,300 acres and growing that we are managing and uh also will help to align with the management plans that you have
approved or uh the commissioners prior to you uh for all of our conservation areas most of them have management plans and we find that these are very helpful uh in being able to act out uh the wish that you had for those conservation areas as well as uh meeting our grant
requirements today our uh request is that you will um approve the standard operating procedures for both the parks and the conservation lands division uh subject to any modifications identified by the teamsters union which have been these
have been provided to the teamsters uh and then allow me to make any uh minor non-substantive updates as needed to the SOPs and I'll open it up for any questions i have a few other slides but only if they're pertinent because it's
been a long day commissioners you can vote my question I think you've done a great job with all the operating procedures and uh approve of all of those uh my question is in regard I believe it's the second document and it's appendix 18
which is Florida friendly best management practice and it's nothing that you did it's just included cyus and it's the protection of water resources by green industries so my question is I'm not
sure how relevant this is i looked at it and it was initially uh the first edition was published in the summer of 2002 and it was reprinted in 2009 and it didn't say that there was anything really new added at that time
but reprinted in 2020 and it said that there was some new information added at that time but in looking at the references I didn't see any and you can please point them out if you're aware of some but I didn't see anything that was you know relative relatively recent i mean even within you know the last five
or 10 years I mean most of the references were were very dated and in looking at the the topics that were covered I didn't see any um emphasis on conserving water conservation for example I'll choose that because we were
told by St johns River Water Management District several years ago now that that has to be done that we you know we need to move in that direction of water conservation and I I didn't see that emphasized here um so I I hate to adopt
it and then you know if I understand it correctly we'll be telling new employees to look to this as as some kind of guide and it it didn't seem um that it was you know relevant enough to current concerns you know within the last say two to
three years right that's so that you that's my question you know is there something better than than you know or is that is that all you is that all you've got to work with i think I can address that so I was uh I received the
um green industries best management u practices certification uh a number of years ago i don't remember how long it I don't think it was during the 2002 but it might been it might have been around the 2009 time frame uh this um the green industries
basically is a training that's provided to commercial landscapers so when they say get green industries it's really referring to landscapers uh lawn businesses and companies uh that are operating tools or equipment in the
performance of some sort of landscaping management i find that the training will be helpful for our staff though it's not required so even though we have about uh six to eight people who have who hold
pesticide herbicide uh applicator licenses uh we're not required to have this uh certification or training but I do think that there are best management practices that are relevant to our parks division in in particular less so the
conservation and so uh I do think that including it as a training and as a guide will be helpful but to your point I don't think that that speaks to the owners so for instance if you're a landscaper you're not controlling the um uh the irrigation system for a private
home and we may be able to include in our SOPs some guidelines around water conservation uh how often we're running our irrigation systems for the most part our parks themselves are not irrigated ball fields and athletic fields do have
irrigation and we're very conservative when it comes to the application of uh all of the different um measures that we need to do to maintain those fields including irrigation but I do think that that's something that we could include is what is our standard when it comes to
water conservation and that would be a relatively easy thing for us to add to our SOPs for parks division that would be wonderful thank you yes we have because some of the um workshops that I've attended out in the community it's it's been stated you know not by you or
by me but the the groups uh you know coordinating the workshops tell people to look to their landscaping professionals you know for advice and this is not the kind of advice you'd want to give so thank you yeah you're welcome you will give a lot better
advice we we will include that make a motion approve staff recommendation second we have a motion by Commissioner by Commissioner Moss any further
discussion all in favor i opposed unanimous thank you thank you oh may I um jump in one really quick moment beat me to it the floor is yours ma'am uh I'd like to um thank Brad Ducen
for his I believe 18 years of service within 19 years with Indian River County um Brad is retiring at the end of this month and we're very happy for him um but we want to thank him for his leadership and his service for all these
many years and wish him the best and hopefully he won't go very far because we all have his cell phone number but uh I'd just like to take a second to thank Brad and thank you for mentioning that we tried to prevent it as best we could with every element of encouragement as
he's been a a a bright and energetic force in your division and uh we we tried to discourage but when Brad made the statement of the reasoning behind it it's got to be
admired so thank you we appreciate everything you're you're doing and if if you change your mind it'll be okay too no but you have to answer to a higher authority on that mr chairman if I may u the former county administrator used to say there's
a whole cemetery full of indispensable employees uh and somehow we keep going but I can tell you uh in my career I I will I can't recall uh a separation that will have as much impact
on me personally and um our citizen services team um selfless um just just a tremendous employee and just two quick anecdotes here are one is that the boat ramps we discussed today two of them
when we had no money and and very little path to getting them repaired after the storms were personally built on the weekends with his two hands and and some help from the parks division um and things like that you would never know
and then just very uniquely transitioned from skill work outside to very sophisticated computer work inside purchasing guidelines everything that we can ask from a superintendent is right here and um I'm going to keep trying to
uh keep them somehow some way but I do want to publicly thank him and the commission for your support now this is not in lie of the separation certificate or the the key to the building uh that may very well come or maybe not
be needed right i'm sorry i tried it again thank you and thank you you want to You want to keep rolling keep rolling all right well
we have the same team up again um not quite oh well we'll switch there we're going to bring them down next item is uh regarding the San Ridge Golf Club and that's item 13K1 which is the award of
the bid of the 2020 20225026 for San Ridge golf clubhouse new clubhouse thank you Mr chairman michael Zto deputy county administrator with me is Bella Naggi our director of golf um back in 1985 or so
um a county owned and operated Premium Golf Course was just a twinkle in Commissioner Dick Bird's eye um and then got the momentum for it and said "How are we going to do it?" And uh we borrowed the money we borrowed revenue
bonds we had no income at the time we had to build the course um seven years later uh we built a second course on a second pledge of revenue bonds um to date we have fully paid off all our debts our funding sources because we're
an enterprise fund are limited um to certain bonding elements um plus the tool of the interfund loan from our reserves the county holds um many time every time we interfund loan we pay the county interest rate higher than what
they're receiving from their bank of choice our bank of choice um so with that um as you know um it's been quite a long time since 85 and '92 um of course enjoys a tremendous reputation and
success um one glaring deficiency is our amenities and so we've been proposing to build the clubhouse for few years now as you recall prior uh solicitation resulted in a close to $15 million project we thought although the course
could support it in the long run it was just too much for a public course and too many dollars um to engage and ultimately borrow um so we uh sharpened the pencils took us about a year um Bella and I had a pretty unique idea
that if we could somehow get water to our fire suppression system from our chain of lakes which has an abundance of reclaimed water in fact I think we supply water to other golf courses uh that we get that water into the fire suppression system that would save a lot of money running um a 4-in pipe from
58th Avenue all the way to the site along what's known as 73rd Street which is just our very long driveway but it was a tremendous cost that and and taking out the portica share and some other bells and whistles have resulted in a value engineered proposal for you today so I'll let Bella start off and
give you some details about the project uh thank you for uh having me here today and really excited to be here about this project i've been at Sanders now for 30 years and I've done a lot of different projects including our irrigation systems and uh many different things around the golf course and this is kind
of my my baby here for the last six years I've been working on this this project um you know the since co uh rounds of golf have skyrocketed at the course so of revenues you know we've got we had last year for instance we did
129,000 rounds we did 43 outside events as well as our normal leagues and just regular play so it's a it's a busy place um our current clubhouse situation is uh wasn't wasn't built for what we we need
it for today for sure it has just basically a snack bar when we have an event with over 100 people which we have a number of those every year uh they're kind of filtering in between inside and outside if it's a hot day then that's not not a great situation um you know
we've hosted the American Junior Golf Association last year they're coming back this year which is a kind of the PGA tour for junior golf we've got uh 90 participants last year 30 international from as far as Australia and England and
New Zealand and China um plus from around the country so um as well as we received a number 10 ranking for uh public golf courses in the state of Florida last year which I think is remarkable uh especially uh in the
company that we're in including uh places such as Stream Song which is a very high-end resort over in the west coast of Florida uh we did beat Trump Derell I think by one uh so that was kind of a cool thing um and we're also a certified Ottabbon uh cooperative
sanctuary which we have been for over 20 years uh the uh development of the clubhouse was based on our needs um you know we our current uh clubhouse has a pro shop that's about 900 square ft so and no storage space michael comes over
for meetings we're usually meeting between boxes in my office and uh all kinds of different merchandise uh and their current snack bar seats about 60 people inside 70 outside so the new facility will have its own commercial kitchen which we do not have currently
um it will also have a restaurant and bar and event space um outside and uh the biggest feature of the building would be a 200 person uh banquet facility which could be divided into two 100 person rooms uh for a lot of our events as well as uh events such as
weddings and parties and and different things that uh we currently do not offer that we will be able to offer in addition to our golf ter golf tournaments so picture that you see here is a site plan um in that dark shaded area just south of just in the northern
part of that picture is our current clubhouse this new clubhouse will go will be built just to the west of that so it's overlooking the 10th and 18th holes of the lakes course uh with a beautiful view the sunset uh the event lawn will be out there as well um and
they'll have its own kind of u entrance uh driveway up to the clubhouse and part of the the large part of the cost last year uh when we went out to bid initially was the site plan uh we currently only have 85 paved parking
spots so people are parking in trees and wherever they can find spots now and and even on a day like today where it's inclement we still have a full parking lot uh so that's going to run from 85 to 210 pave sp uh parking spots which will hopefully be enough for the new facility
uh picture you see here is a artist rendering of the front of the clubhouse that's uh the entrance right there to the right of it will be the uh pro shop and uh the next picture here is the back of the clubhouse that's
the event lawn uh which will hold up to 300 people uh for um different events as well outside um really excited about this project you know our financial position um you know like Michael was
saying we we paid off the uh the original bonds for the golf course back in 2016 so the golf course has virtually been pretty much debtree except for the irrigation system we did interfu 17 and then the lakes course in 2021 uh and as well as our uh cart
fleets we just actually paid our uh current cart fleet off in cash so we didn't have to take out an infront loan because our cash position of the golf course so we're trending up next slide please and as you know uh numbers have been good um this shows
you a brief snapshot of the last uh five years six years um it continues to go in the same direction uh 65% increase in revenue since 2019 and 36% increase in rounds with that does come some additional expenses for
maintenance and fertilizer and all the things that we need to run the golf course uh but our uh next slide please our net revenue is is still increasing um and we're in a very strong financial position and virtually debtree so one more and so how would we propose this is
not a funding meeting by the way this is just an award of bid normally Jennifer's here and it's a much quicker process but because of the volume of this project we want to slow down and present it to you and get the approval to award the bid however we have to pay for it so what
how are we going to do that and that's going to come from a combination of cash um potentially an inter fund loan and then a another bond so that would be done through a resolution that comes back before you through the county attorney and budget office um but today we're just seeking
your approval as you can see each year we're adding to our cash position um Sand Ridge is a one of the only public golf courses that turns a profit so we've been depositing about over a million dollars a year that's conservative number but we've been depositing about a million dollars a
year budget office will u control the and John of course the county administrator will control the risk assessment of how much of our cash position we want to invest in this uh endeavor and then add the an inter fund loan and potential in the bond to get
there and so the the cost is currently 11.2 million is the bid there's another approximately 1.7 in furniture fixtures and equipment um our strategy is to purchase that directly to save the sales tax and we
wanted to use u the cash for that maybe some additional cash into the formula but that's something that our financial folks will will um recommend after further analysis so with that we just seek your approval to award the bid um to Quest
Construction at 11.2 million and of course take any questions you may have you know you know I'm I'm looking back at the the cash position on that bar graph and I have to tell you that that that is
quite impressive Bella thank you thank you it it actually looks like uh the the the photo that's on the box of the program that you get to present a
model but the numbers on top are the actual numbers but uh it is quite impressive as to what you have developed over the years it's very unfortunate that the original plan fell a little
short um personally um I I I think a a club a club house of that magnitude would be u deserving and to be be fitted with a a port of cashier
uh an entryway a threshold in inclement weather uh specifically when as golf carts are pulling up and people are coming in and if we do have events at that venue uh it's what makes a place a
place and it is it does provide shelter as well in receiving and deploying individuals in and out of the building what could we do well first of all we don't allow carts in the parking lot so carts would be the carts the cart golf
carts this would be for the cars pulling in for events yes that was about a $600,000 line item uh in last year's uh bid that we took out with the value engineering that we did with the architect what was the total number that you were
able to pull out of the Again I remember the old numbers they were substantially higher but uh again with the the removal of with this fire suppression system being absorbed by the collection site as
opposed to running that rather costly pipe um what were the other key factors in uh reduction in in cost well that was probably the biggest one that was about $700,000 $700,000 line item is a 12in
pipe running about 3/4 of a mile with directional boring as well most of it with for and that was basically for the fire suppression system and a fire hydrant on site i mean the the plan is beautiful layout uh again to have the capacity to
be able to host something for several hundred individuals um in Midcounty area whereas we really don't have any other venue um and it it can turn quite lucrative especially
uh in in a site where it's probably one of the most coveted uh golf venues uh and look at him smile proud out of I I'm I'm serious i don't again I don't own a boat i don't hold
the golf club but I have attended events and I see the the anxiousness and hear the discussion about being able to get tea times because it is so coveted far
more coveted than some far more than I guess might have to do with the the pricing the price point is probably key there but the environment is beautiful uh while I don't play any kind of golf game uh have walked the site it's beautiful
and it's wellmaintained so I think this a tremendous asset uh to go forward uh the concern again just maybe it's a minor concern is that threshold you know that thing we see at some of the other
facilities so I guess it's a small sacrifice for such a big improvement on a great place to golf and experience and just keep in mind some of the numbers we discussed today are very round um but they do not include projecting uh
revenue through additional sources such as a county run and operated restaurant currently we have use a concessionire we take a topline percentage of revenue it's not as lucrative as it can be um we don't but we don't have the employee cost either so that's something we're
going to be analyzing but probably recommending at a later meeting that we take that operation inhouse and run it at a profit and additionally the banquet hall facilities a whole other business model that's going to generate separate revenue all um adding to toward that
cash position and that's a separate issue we currently have a contract we do uh you just renewed it for two years while we're building the facility and then we'll we'll go from there okay well uh does anybody else have any questions chairman
um I I just think this is a fabulous idea i wish we were already started and I wish it was built but but I'm like you know I do have a boat i do have golf clubs i do have a swimming pool all three cost me money i just want you to
know that so don't don't be too eager to go get your golf clubs and stuff like that we don't have any pool items on the agenda though but what I was going to say was is that this this is this whole sand I remember when Sandbridge was built in ' 92 it's just fabulous and
it's amazing how much it's grown and how how renowned it is how special it is with our residents and out oftowners the fact that it's one of the 10 you know pre primo public golf courses in the state with some of the ones you mentioned is just
absolutely is absolutely terrific i I see no wrong in this just as the movie said I think you build it they will come and um I I would move staff recommendation can I ask a question
what was the um the amount and the term of the bond that was paid off in 2016 just out of curiosity uh it was it was combined with the first bond that was issued in ' 86 i think it's eight around $8 million and as for the construction
included construction of both courses plus the current clubhouse that we're in right now i'm just trying to get an idea i know we're not discussing specific finances at this time so it would appear to be about the same amount or a similar amount depending on how we divvy up the
contributing financial resources yes okay at the time it was about a $700,000 a year uh payment between uh just interest and and uh the payment itself that the golf course at that time was able to to pretty much still survive and
and operate although our cash position wasn't as good back then so San Ridge pays for itself that's that's my understanding okay yeah so it would bond pay for itself over time yes is
that correct yes just want to be sure I understand thank you not not not as the building um and again we have to uh I think it'd be remiss if we don't uh uh also add to the if the maker of the
motion uh although we're approving the site to go forward I think we should also include the uh authorizing the uh county attorney to
set up a bond council and I so I I asked the the maker if we can include that so we can begin the process i heard the word I wish this was yesterday or expedite it i believe that
would expedite this process by beginning from today forward if we were to uh approve the project and authorize the county attorney to set up the bond council so we can move forward and that's primarily run with uh county
attorney but through our budget office at Kristen's taken a leadership role in doing the preliminary groundwork to find out what's feasible and we'll just have to re reconnect with bond counsel and our bond advisor um and and she'll be there through the whole process and
she's done it before we've had what three meetings with our financial advisor and uh on on the project so I mean it it'll be to Mike's point it would have to be a co-mingling of borrowed funds uh cash that they have
from revenue either an interf fund loan or a project contribution if you're doing an interfund loan it could be structured arguably based on the new facility you know and the revenue that's because you don't have any history right now as it would relate that would be
financable in terms of being able to go to an underwriter and say "Hey this is our history we have solid history of the golf numbers." So I mean so it is doable it just it requires some outside the box thinking so is there any any harm in
wanting to create the bond council now well I think this year already is recommended staff to secure sufficient construction bond fund bond financing or uh bond finance to complete the project part of that process and it starts us with meeting with the FA the financial
adviser getting with the bond council because you're asking us to for the the resolution so all that would come forward that's part of that process that you're approving the existing uh the existing recommendation mr chair thank you Mr chair just a
couple quick questions for Mike do you know if there was a uh a pre-bid meeting prior to this was there a pre-bid meeting with all uh No this year we did not do a pre-bid meeting we did it last year for the first the original one the original one not the value and engineered one one
that we pulled had it pulled back right and uh for the administrator would this be one of the first projects that our new uh project manager yes sir he would be the project manner on site reporting back not that he could create any value
adjustments but he could perhaps uh lessen any potential change orders is that correct and you can correct me if I'm wrong he's already our building facility services director has been involved and reviewed the plans to help right probably as our our our architect
as well yes yes right well thank you and for the board this is a fine example of us being a bank and seeing a dis displayed credit history internally uh so I think this is a it's a win-win would we rather the bids to
have come in less of course um but like I said if we're the bank they've got good credit with us and that's been displayed over years commissioner I might add that a lot of the cost of this project is tied up in site work which we had to do anyway just
to create the parking um and traffic flow to accommodate the volume of of people and vehicles that we're dealing with today so that's kind of blended into this project but would have had it been done anyway thank you
any further questions so we have a motion and a second any further discussion all in favor opposed motion carried unanimously
thank you much appreciated thank you come out any Saturday there's always an event for a commissioner to probably see a lot of people you know this week happens to be the United Ways golf tournament where you'll be there you'll be there thank you and uh we have about clubs maybe one open date the whole year
i mean we we are booked solid for tournaments from um now through the foreseeable future plus league play is super strong and and if we had a third golf course we could fill it but I don't want to give Commissioner Herman any ideas we already talked about that more years
thank you thank you thank you uh we're now moving on to special districts everybody wants to continue on as planned we'll keep going and this is uh item for special
districts is item 16B1 from the solid waste disposal district recommendation for award for operations and maintenance of Indie River County Landfill bid number 202528 is that Hamashu yes sir good
afternoon sir good afternoon thank you good afternoon commissioners at the managing director of the solid waste disposal district um I have two items for you today uh the thank you to commissioner man for passing out the
presentations to all of you uh we'll begin with the recommendation for award for operation maintenance of the Indian River County landfill this was invitation to bid number 2025028 um you'll recognize some of these slides um I came to the board on
March 11th with an update on the ITB so uh going to repeat uh some of the items again we we issued the ITB in January uh 10th of this year and here we are on April 8th for contract award um I feel proud of the process that we've gone
through the transparency of the process the involvement of the of the vendors and and and where we are today uh looking at the contract starting October 1 2025 again the objective was uh competitive procurement uh via invitation to bid process with
pre-qualifications uh we we did have a mandatory pre-bid meeting uh once we had pre-qualified the vendors again we want to maintain the quality of service for our residents increase efficiency increase recycling rates and manage our costs as best as we
can the landfill invitation to bid again this is the term is a 10-year term with an additional term of 10 years we're looking at a 20-year agreement the hours of operation uh was 7 days per week 7 to 5 we did have an option if we consider
closing the landfill on on Sundays and I'll I'll go over the the costs from that a little bit um scope of work was to operate the class one landfill and it's historically been done on a price per ton basis we had a base uh amount for all the biders about 220,000 uh tons
per year it's an average number for the last five years um we we did have in there and this is one of the other options a a cost reduction if if we were to have um uh us to continue to provide them uh cover material mulch and dirt
for for cover um otherwise all the items here from 2 to 9 are all the all the facilities at the landfill and the services that that we need to provide uh that were included in the invitation to bid a key one to mention I I think that
an enhancement here was was the off-site litter control we have the interchange uh on uh I95 and Oslo coming on board and we have litter control here because all the all the trucks you know uh that originate in the in the county all go to
the to the main landfill so we wanted to ensure that at least the those primary perimeter roads like Oslo basically from I95 all the way to 66th Avenue 74th Avenue all the way down from the prison all the way to 4th uh street uh to the
north same thing on 66 we're actually going all the way to 4th Street on 66 so we're trying to maintain sort of the litter control on all these vehicles uh that that you know come to the landfill um and here were the results we had uh three qualified bids from
Republic Services GFL Environmental and WM um as you can see the price ranges what you see on the screen right now is uh option one and two are for both 7-day per week operations next slide I'll show you the six day per week operations and
and in this case the option one is with the contractor providing soil and mulch option two was with solid waste providing uh cover or soil and mulch as you can see Republic Services I mean the the low range was about $5.6 million all
the way to high as $9.8 million um you know same thing on on option two there um comparing option one and two looking at Republic Services as as sort of the low bidder we were seeing about a $44,000 per saving if we continue to
provide dirt and mulch uh for cover this is option three and four this is for six days a week operation um what what you find here is um about a $99,000 per year savings offered by
Republic Services as as the as a low bidder so uh you know what we we were hoping for uh again a higher cost savings on both both items and and so with with that comparing option one and
two again as I mentioned SWID would save 44,000 per year uh for for us to provide cover materials and uh felt that you know we could further negotiate with Republic to see if we can optimize more savings there uh I I think for them to truck in dirt truck in mulch uh whatnot
or or purchase mulch from Atlas or from the county for that matter uh would would be would be more than $44,000 but but it it's something that maybe we want to uh talk to them a little bit more about but for right now u the initial recommendation was to just select option
one because there wasn't that much savings on the on the table um comparing option three and four we would save 99,000 per year if we close the landfill on Sundays uh staff recommends keeping the landfill open on Sundays again disruptions to a lot of the local folks in the area and also the negative impact
on on the customer convenience center so we're we're recommending um to keep the landfill open um so having all the four options staff is recommending option one um which is for to keep the landfill open seven days a week uh we would uh
have the vendor provide uh the cover material and uh so looking at the pricing there uh the tipping rate 1870 per ton is about 15% higher than the current tipping fee of $16.26 per ton overall the the costs are about 1.6
million per year higher or 40% higher than the current budgeted cost we do feel that COVID inflation u the cost for hiring qualified you know uh equipment operators and such uh was a was a big factor uh as you as you saw that again
this was a public you know procurement process the the range from republic to to WM uh was substantial and we feel that uh we're we're seeing what the the market is speaking the waist haulers are uh the companies are speaking in terms of what what they're looking to to
provide these services Um we're we're still wanting to look at some of these ancillary services and that that's kind of the breakout just for Republic services we're talking about $123,000 a month about one $ one.5 million per year and we think that uh we
could maybe do some further negotiations with the public to reduce some of these costs there were some capital items that we were looking to have them purchase in terms of a styrofoam machine a vertical balor uh maybe the county can purchase some of those items and and directly and
and maybe reduce some of their capital cost and and bring some of these uh you know costs down um so th those are the the things we want to look at the small load drop off facility as many of you that visited the the facility right after the scale house you have the small
load drop off area it's an unmanned area we did require in this uh uh in this ITB to have it manned uh to have somebody there to keep an eye on things um again that's a possibility if we want to save some money maybe you know we've done it for 30 years without it being manned uh
we just felt that you know there's a lot of traffic and and congestion in that area we we felt like it was an added benefit to have it manned but but again it's something that we could negotiate to try to reduce some some of these cost uh for our residents um overall uh we're recommending to the board award bid
number 2025028 to Republic Services of Florida uh as the lowest responsive responsible bidder for the operation maintenance of the Indian River County landfill to be operated 7 days per week uh vendor providing the cover material for a grand total amount of
5.591681.08 um we're al also recommending the county the board authorize the county administrator and his designated staff to negotiate on behalf of Squid Board with Republic Services to optimize the sample agreement uh for the overall benefit of county residents and appro and authorize
the approval and authorize the chairman to execute the sample agreement as presented pending receipt of required bonds insurance and final approval of a negotiated agreement by the county attorney's office uh with that if you have any questions about the landfill
award happy to answer any questions you must have a good presentation no questions questions okay i just I'll just comment that I agree with the uh seven days a week and the Sundays i think that was one of the hiccups that probably some of us got
phone calls on just a few and thank you for that okay anything else we're public services here wm is here if you have any questions for any of the vendors in terms of the process or whatnot well is there anybody from the public that wishes to come
forward of presenter of of such a fine work seeing none Mr chair I'll be happy to move approval second that's a motion by Commissioner Adams second by
myself any further discussion all in favor opposed thank you commissioners here we got one more motion approved unanimously thank you
all right and the next item is recommendation for the award for the operation of the maintenance of Indian River County customer convenience centers bid number 2025029 sample agreement is attached you'll again recognize these
slides um again the same timeline uh we're we're basically here at contract award April 8th uh for for this uh uh invitation to bid again same goals and objectives um the specifics again same
term it's a 10-year term with an additional 10 uh 10-year renewal term uh we're looking at hours of operations is five days per week from uh 7:00 a.m to 6 pm we in in sort of the base bid um we basically have the current hours of
operations that that you see so you have uh uh Gford Winter Beach and Rosland uh they're closed on Tuesdays and Wednesdays that schedule will remain you have Oslo and Felsmere that are closed on Wednesday and Thursdays so that will remain and that's that's what we uh you
know put put it out as the same hours of operation the we did have an optional bid on this one for uh driver's license requirement if we wanted to consider that uh as well and I'll go over some of the costs for that um again continued safe operations uh quality customer
service management and transportation of all the various materials that we receive at the convenience centers uh for all five of the convenience centers one of the things we did is that the current uh convenience center contract there were a lot of other ancillary services for example Blue Cyprus uh that
has been taken out of this agreement as as you may recall that is now part of the waste management franchise for for waste management to provide collection at Blue Cypress uh there were a lot of other ancillary services and and and whatnot it was a carryover from when when the county staff operated the
convenience centers so there were uh services that were providing other departments uh and those have been removed so specifically this is just to operate the five customer convenience centers um and we we did have in terms of uh this ITB uh we had a a requirement
for three employees one of the employees was to be at the entrance to check for driver's licenses to confirm IRC residency i think uh as I mentioned last time we feel that in Oslo and Rosland uh we do have folks that come out of county uh to to drop things off uh again our
costs are increasing and so we wanted to put in some measures to try to control and and eliminate possibly the out ofount uh materials coming in uh so I do have a cost for that option uh here in a minute um again having trained attendants at all the sites uh
residential materials only limited commercial uh recycling materials uh we have required them to provide all new containers and vehicles uh where we were uh you know this is a 15-year contract services purchased a lot of the
containers that that the county had uh prior to privatization and so we're requiring and that that's as you'll see the result of the of of the bids that uh the cost is higher due to the requirement for for all new vehicles and containers we're putting in uh new
compactors at Oslo uh we're looking at a new cardboard compactors at all of the 5 CCC's this is something we don't have now uh it will help uh reduce the number of trips for for cardboard containers and loads that that are coming to the landfill um and also uh new waste oil
containers at all the CCC's um and again continuing to provide services for for all the other materials that we receive at the communion centers we only uh had a responsive uh bid from Republic Services and WM uh on
this invitation of bid uh and uh what we did here was to I outline the cost per convenience center per month and per year uh as you can see the Republic services is the apparent low bidder with the total annual cost of 5.6 million uh
versus uh 10.1 million for WM these are costs with the residency uh verification that the third employee uh at the gate using so uh you know software to verify residency this next slide is without uh residency verification uh as you'll see
the total cost again for public services remains a low bidder at about 5.1 million versus 9.7 for WM uh it's about 535 $36,000 per year savings on the Republic services cost uh without the
residency verification so um given that given Republic Services the apparent low bidder uh for the options included uh and again mentioning that comparing the residency verification options SWID would save about
$536,000 per year we're recommending you know uh that we would take this cost-saving options and not require uh residency verification at the front gate uh they wouldn't require an employee to be at the front gate checking checking
IDs uh overall the costs are 1.1 million per year higher or 27% higher than the current budgeted cost um that again it's the the market uh speaking in terms of uh what it what it takes uh to operate these centers uh I have this comment in the
agenda item and I'll I'll repeat it here we do not recommend any changes uh at this time it is suggested that we continue to evaluate the impacts of and the future use of of of these convenience centers uh by our residents at 6 months 12 months 18 months after
universal collection uh is is incorporated uninccorporated into county um we feel when we're looking at the individual cost per center that you have Rosland and Winter Beach that could approximately save $1.4 million per year if you're looking at a 10 million 10y
year period $14 million in savings uh that we could utilize some of that money to upgrade the other three convenience centers uh again it's just an option depending on what we see as the impact of universal collection in unincorporated in county if uh we do
have in our sample agreement uh the option to negotiate with public services depending on what those future decisions would be so if we decide to close one or more centers we'd have to look at the tonnage impact you know is is the tonnage just basically going to another convenience center they may save on
labor there but is is a tonnage just going to another center for example uh or if we decide that unincorporated uh universal is doing so well that we do we don't need to have garbage containers at the convenience centers for example uh we would do that at all five convenience
centers and and that could provide a a cost savings for for them not to have to you know bring all that material to the landfill on a daily basis uh while they're open so so these are things for future just to to to kind of plant the to see that we would bring back data at a future meeting once universal is
implemented to see what kind of impact that we have and if there are cost savings in the future certainly uh you know it would be it'd be advantageous for us to look at that uh because we we do have universal collection that's going to be a a new fee for our residents and then again we have these
costs that are also going higher which is going to result in the overall assessment to our residents as you'll see later later in the year at our budget hearings uh be hired as a result of of these procurements so with that I'll be happy to answer any questions uh
and again recommendation award is for public services for this invitation of it for um without residency verification chair um well thank you um just a couple of things i I think that
u the verification of the residency requirements um ultimately would would cause another layer of u headache if you will i can only imagine u line backing up and there be a dispute over if you're
a resident or not sure so I don't my opinion is we don't need that option uh the second would be and you you articulated that with universal pickup starting on 101 um we may see of course a decrease at
our at our convenience centers um but at the same time uh it's by the by the time so that would be something that we would monitor as well um I think uh we've read a time or two dedicated to Indian River County through
customer service excellence uh and I think that would um in my mind people are used to uh Rosland Gford and other transfer stations so I I
cannot see inconvenience in anybody anytime soon now the statistics may prove differently uh but I think we're in the vein of customer service so overall I that would be my recommendations and that universal is is
huge we'll have to see 6 12 months we haven't seen the impact correct and uh if we know anything uh our citizens really appreciate their convenience it is and uh again what alternative do we have where
they can drop off motor oil and paint and and uh recycling that would not otherwise go or old gasoline sure uh propane tanks uh
that's where it's got to go we would have to come up with a a hybrid where that could be a drop off because We can't put them in the trucks right right so uh again it would be it behooves us to continue on the
process and we quite frankly don't have enough data yet as to what's going to be happening up the road so we might as well go forward and I know last meeting I brought up some policy you know changes at at this
time uh well you know we're we're tableabling that we will uh continue our discussion with public services on what we can do to optimize uh you know get get a policy update you know back to the board at some future meeting uh to to
always want to make sure that we have good customer service for residents but at the same time a safe environment for the employees that are there and that there rules of what's accepted and what's not accepted who's commercial who's not commercial you know we we we
don't want any altercations that occur uh as a result of that we want to provide good customer service but at the same time have a have a good uh sort of a baseline of of what the expectations are of our vendor and and and what you know what we will accept or not accept
from our residents there as well um and um and and that that's just to kind of make sure that that we're engaging with the public in a professional manner uh when when it comes to those things so we'll certainly continue to work with our public services they've uh again operated the landfill operated the
convenience centers for the last 15 years they do a great job uh we uh certainly are uh you know happy to recommend them uh I want to say for both um all the vendors uh we appreciated them and being involved in in the
process and uh we feel like this is um we put in some new things in here that will continue to to ensure that we have you know excellence and good customer service at our convenience centers and at the landfill thank you i just have a follow-up question um so the whole trailer size
issue is not it's not for discussion today it's not it's off the table at this point that's correct i just want that I just want to clarify and then um just to say that I would agree with Commissioner Lure i mean if the data
shows something once universal kicks in that's the time to have a discussion for sure um because we do need to be responsible but the best way to start a mutiny in North County is to start talking about closing convenience centers whether it's Spells or Rosland
they are passionate about the convenience centers i think that they're super fun time as well you never know what you're going to run into there um but let's not talk about that at this point like let's not even bring it up because you I'm going to already start
getting phone calls but I do agree that we need to revisit the data and make smart choices but to be clear to everybody out in the world on the other side of the camera we are not talking about closing convenience centers at this point that's correct get some phone calls so just to put that out there you
talked about talking about it i know well I did my best to walk it back mr chair anything else one thing that I did mention Himatsu a while back was oftentimes we get calls particularly in
South County um of different complaints that are kind of on the edge of a code enforcement or whatnot and Himatu has been kind enough to call and have others pick it up if there's any savings with Universal maybe one day we can look at
perhaps u some type of rover or roving person throughout the county because he helped me tremendously last month or month before with like three different things where you know for whatever reason these things were left in people's yards and it and it wasn't the
vendor's responsibility but they were kind enough to do that and if we save money in universal maybe that could be maybe not a county employee but something that they could absorb and we talked about that uh last cycle uh some
some an independent a clean team uh something to go out there with a small type of truck um I I think uh and the sheriff as well chimed in uh was doing last budget where he said uh he would
like to work with developing a uh a clean team but as far as uh classified inmates but uh I think we can do even more with
a clean team type a response vehicle uh you know I again I just saw a project that had a street sweeper uh an old Wayne broom just running down keeping it clean and I said you know what up the road we're going to see them
here too and it's it's a matter of progress growth expansion u numbers are there we do have a lot of uh debris that gets discarded in an inappropriate fashion and it would be nice to have an up the
road a a response team of of some sort maybe it's an individual you know I want to echo that road and bridge does a great job um I think Alexis has taken over the adopt a road program i think she's doing a great job with with getting that you know
energized again uh we're certainly here to help on our franchise agreement at least in unincorporated inenver county we do have a provision where we will be able to uh have WM go out and pick up some illegal dumping and uh and whatnot and we'll compensate them for that
through solid waste services so um so we'll have some flexibility there republic has done a great job over the years in helping uh to do that through through the current contract so um so again great partners that we have in the county and and and our goal is yeah if there's something out there that
shouldn't be out there we want to get it picked up and and disposed of in in the correct facility right away thank you anybody from the public wishes to speak in this matter additional Seeing none commissioners
motion to approve recommendation we have a motion by commission airman seconded by vice chairman law any further discussion all in favor opposed motion carried unanimously thank you
thank you so much thank you well seeing uh nothing else on the agenda other than the opportunity anybody wish to speak about any matter that's not on the agenda this is your opportunity having getting given ample opportunity commissioners anything else
for the greater good want to hide that meeting adjourned