25 to order. Um we will start with the invocation. And as we start with the invocation, of course, let's keep in our thoughts and prayers uh the victims of the school shooting in in Minneapolis. and um place uh excuse me, Councilman
Carol, if you can kindly take over the invocation. Town and its residents. We are grateful for all who work for the betterment of our community, work here, and those who serve here. Be ever mindful of the town's vision and
mission statement. Grant this council the wisdom to govern amid the conflicting interests and issues of our times, the ability to work together in harmony, even when there is honest disagreement, a sense of the welfare and true needs of our people, personal peace in our lives, and joy in our task. Amen.
Amen. Thank you. If you will, the pledge of allegiance. Okay. I'd like to know who imposed the cognitive test on council by moving the flag from this side to that side. So,
everybody passed. Everybody passed. All right. If you can kindly call the role, please. Mayor Foley, here. Vice Mayor Atwater, here. Council member Carroll here. Council member Dayne here. Let the record show all members are present with the exception of council member Alieri.
Thank you very much. And uh just to remind uh us up here in the deis that uh with our new system uh press the button when speaking and then depress it again when you're um when you're finished speaking. So item number two, are there any requests to reorder the agenda,
delete items from the agenda, or any emergency additions? If there are none, is there a motion to approve the agenda? Second. All in favor? I. Okay. Unanimous. Um, we have a presentation
NPDSMS-4 presentation uh which we have I think every year and uh we're looking forward to seeing what you have uh for us in store this year to update us on our efforts in compliance. Thank you.
That's okay. Actually, I'm going to go to item four, which is comments for the public regarding the agenda item since u I don't think we're going to have any uh any comments on that. So, we will do that. Uh, is there any objection to take item
five out of order on the consent agenda from council? There being none, is there a motion to approve the consent agenda? So move. Second. All in favor? I I All right. Terrific. And once once again, we didn't have to have a roll call vote because we didn't have any
resolutions. We do have a resolution. Right. Um All right. Let's do the mayor's report. M Mr. Mayor, resolution. There is a resolution where uh second B B. Okay. So, let's do a roll call vote on uh the consent agenda.
Mayor Foley, I vice Mayor Alwater. Hi, Council Member Carroll. Hi, Council Member Dayne. Hi. Let the record show. The motion passes unanimously. Yes. Apologies. I do see the resolution for the mailbox fees. All right. Let's do the uh the mayor's report at this
point. So, uh just relatively few items here. Uh we're going to have we had some comments from the public on the uh sewer connections that are mandated by state and um compared to other municipalities we're in very good shape because we have
relatively few that are out of compliance with the state statute. The town manager is going to u update us on the progress on that and how he sees that all shaking out. And Mr. Mr. Harping, I'd like to thank you for the work that you did with uh the city of Vero Beach in terms of um you know,
negotiating a uh reasonable and fair hopefully u process for this and uh a mechanism that won't impose too much economic hardship on our on our folks. So, um we'll we'll hear more from you on that when you do your um you do your
update. Um, no surprise we're hearing, at least I'm hearing some uh very positive feedback from our constituents appreciating the reduction in the mill rate. And uh if you don't get praise as an elected
official for reducing tax burdens, I don't know what what more you can possibly do. So, uh, thank thanks to council for working so hard on that and, uh, we will, uh, continue to do what we can to be fiscally responsible for our
our citizens. Uh, the last item, we'll have, we've had some comments. We'll have an update on um, a problem that occurs, it seems like every year, but I went back and looked at my, you know, mental notes, and I think it's pretty much either every year or every other
year on shark fishing and what we can do about it. Uh we're going to have the town attorney explain uh at at another point in today's meeting why we have uh limited jurisdictional ability to to do the things we'd like to do. Uh and then
uh the town attorney andor the town manager will tell you what we what we can do and uh what we do intend to do to even beef up that enforcement. Again, it happens from time to time. It's un unfortunate. It's beyond our control, but um we will we will continue to
monitor the situation and do everything within our jurisdictional power to handle that. Um all right. Uh any any questions from council on the mayor's report or items or questions for me? If not, we can move on to the presentation. Okay, good. Thank you. Let's uh are we
set to do the the presentation yet? Okay. And for the record, if you can just identify yourself by name and affiliation and then take it away. Good morning, Mr. Mayor, council
members. My name is Kevin Robertson. I'm with Kimley Horn and Associates, uh, civil engineer for for the town here. I've been working with y'all for about eight years, and we do a number of civil engineering projects for the for the town, and one of those is storm water
compliance, and my partner is on maternity leave. So, I've stepped up to to take this over for her. But once a year, as part of our um requirements for the MPDS, we have to do a public outreach and education. So, I believe you did one last year, and that's maybe
similar to that. Uh so, the purpose of this is just to educate the town and the public on um all about storm water, how your system works, and what are elicit discharges. So basically everything that when it rains, everything that hits an imperous
surface, pavement uh or your lawns all wash into the street and then all that all washes into your storm water system. And so what we're trying to do is eliminate things like pet waste and oils and greases and fertilizers, soap suds, and those sorts of things. All of that
goes to an intermediate storm water system, but then ultimately goes into the lagoon, which we're trying to prevent. So back in 1972, the Clean Water Act was passed and it created this uh National Pollution Discharge Elimination System. We call it
NPDES and that basically regulates everything about storm water. Um so during construction, if your site's over an acre, you have to apply to the general construction permit. Um that's something that you know the bigger properties here
in in town would do. The second and the fourth bullets don't really apply to you, but the the third one is really what we want to focus on today, which is called the municipal storm water separate stormwater system, MS4. And so the town has a system and they have
legal authority to implement that system and there's obligations through the state and federal requirements to to do that. So one of those is this uh public education that we're doing now. So what is an NPDS permit and what's an MS4 permit? So the NPDS basically is a it's
pollutant discharge elimination system and it aims to eliminate point discharges from storm water pollutants. So we go through things like this education um try to help you identify things that we want to keep out of the storm water system so that you and the
public are are aware of what should and shouldn't go down the drain. Again, this is required by federal and state statutes. Um, and then the specific municipal separate storm water system, the MS4 for the town.
There we go. Um, so this is uh basically your master drainage system. And this is something that the town regulates and again there's policies and and uh different things that we have to do every year, but essentially the the key word here is it's a separate storm
system. So, at one point sewer uh and storms were collected and jointly disposed. They've obviously eliminated that years and years ago, but it's separate from what happens in your wastewater stream from your house. So, your toilets and all that stuff goes to a wastewater treatment plant. storm is
everything that hits from a from a rainfall and basically it's um all of that's collected in a series of catch basins in the roadways goes to swailes or ponds or some sort of filtration device it settles out and then ultimately goes
to the lagoon. So again it's separate from the storm from storm and sewer are separated. You can see here the uh different slide. So the the everything from your house, the toilets, sinks,
etc., those go to a wastewater treatment plant. Everything in the roadway goes to a separate storm. So these are regulated through something called best management practices or BMPs. And these are basically just um things that management systems we can
implement to try to control the pollutant discharge. So, in the town specifically, there's um baffle or there's filter baskets. There's a couple of these placed along Old Winter Beach Road. And these are basically, you can see uh they're
baskets that fit in the storm grate in the roadway. And these can be picked up and maintained. Uh so, you see the little graphic here. Sediment and your hard debris uh get collected there. They get pulled out and
cleaned periodically. So that allows none of that stuff to go into the lagoon. Another one you have here is called a baffle box. And this was installed at Indian Lane. This is a larger um a larger system. Again, it's all underground, but the other one fit right
inside of a normal storm water catch basin. This is a larger system. Um but it has a series of baffles in the middle. So while the storm water comes in on the left side, the sediments go down to the bottom. They filter through these baffles and all of this is filled
with water. So as it goes out the right side, there's a weird that prevents the oils and greases from from floating out. Then there's also a basket that catches the hard debris. So this again gets maintained um regularly.
So the things we want to inform you and the public today is what are elicit discharges. So those are um anything again storm water hits the grasses in your in your road and everything washes into the storm drains. So if you've if
you have chemicals uh paint yard debris pet excrement all that stuff also goes in the storm drain and we want to prevent that. So, these are a couple things to keep an eye on. You know, don't don't deliberately sweep sand and debris into
the storm water system. Obviously, don't let your pets um go into them. Uh grass clippings, anything again that goes into that drain makes its way into the storm water system. We want to try to eliminate that. Pool cleaners on the
right. Um paint. This is something, this thing's been around since 1972. We still see this on a regular basis from contractors, especially at homes. Uh they've been taught they shouldn't be doing it, but on a regular basis, you'll
see them cleaning uh their paint brushes in the driveway. All that obviously goes right straight to the the roadway system, and that's really bad for the environment. So, that needs to be done separately. Same with waste uh concrete debris uh stucco clean out all that
stuff. Car wash. Um try to do this in your yard or in a grassy area where these suds can get trapped. Otherwise it goes straight into the lagoon. So keep an eye out for things on the left. Uh this is your an oily sheen on on the
water. This would be from you the oils and debris and stuff. on the right. If you see foam coming out of the out of the storm water pipes at the at the ponds, that's obviously suds and pool cleaner and other things that are reacting with the water.
So, lastly, if uh if there is any if you do see any of these elicit discharges, we'd ask that you contact the the building department or Mr. Brian and um just remind your contractors if you're a homeowner on a construction site, you know, only rain down the drain. Anything
that hits the storm water system ultimately is going to make its way into the lagoon. I appreciate your time. Um, happy to answer any questions if there are any. Thank you very much for enlightening presentation. Are there any questions or
comments from council starting from right to left? No, no com. It is a was a really good presentation. I thought uh there was I picked up a few things that uh I've probably be been guilty of in the past
some at some point and I know my neighbors have. So I'm I'm glad to become aware of it. So thank you very much. Thank you. Okay, Vice Mayor, Councilman Carol, nothing. Thank you very much. Really appreciate it. Um I
just it's not for you. I have one question. when when and I know Fred is a um our building inspector Fred Held is got a conflict today as part of our permitting process. Do we enlighten the contractors to all this remind them and
do we have an ongoing enforcement mechanism with spot inspections? Um uh yes and yes there are um uh there's information on on the documentation regarding the MS4 requirements and uh especially as it relates to um certain sizes of property
and the construction that's happening and what has to be done. Uh secondarily we have um our our field personnel to include uh our inspector uh Jake Mr. uh Max Wiltas, who's our public works employee, who regularly, you know,
either um uh monitor locations where our baffle boxes or the inlets are, uh or are actually going out to the excuse me, actually going out to the construction sites, uh to make sure that whatever NPDS requirements, MS4 requirements, um are on that particular site, uh whether
it's silt fences or screening around uh inlets and things like that are are taking place. All right. Terrific. Thank you. Anything else for Mr. Harpering on this from council? No. Okay. Um All right. We went out of order. Um and we now are at item
seven if I'm following correctly. And the vice mayor attended the uh League of Cities meeting. It was in Orlando this year. Yes. And uh has a report on the Florida League of Cities Doge presentation uh department of government efficiency. We
have one at the state level too uh and a general recap of the meeting. So, thank you, Vice Mayor. Okay. Uh, thank you, Mr. Mayor. So, there were two primary themes to this conference uh two weekends ago. I'll
handle property tax reform first. And, uh, realistically, you have the word reform, you have to sort of put it in quotes as to what reform really is. Uh, we've heard comments from the governor making comments to the effect that when you pay property taxes each year, it's
like paying rent on a house that you already own. Bit of a mystifying uh comment. I I will just say that uh in looking at our uh budget, if you look at our public safety department expenditures, operating expenditures and
capital expenditures as a percentage of that budget, they're pretty close to the roughly the same amount of revenues that we own that excuse me, that we raise from property taxes. So, if you eliminate property taxes or
substantially cut them, u somebody that's reasonably proficient in the third grade will tell you that the math just doesn't work. We can't we can't balance our budget. And one thing that I that I want to mention as well is compared to many municipalities in Florida
and uh particularly those in Indian River County, this town does not charge a utility franchise tax. that's not an insignificant savings that you know frankly uh at least sitting on council doesn't seem to come up. So our uh uh
residents get a get a break uh on that as well as to compare to other municipalities here. So there has been a committee which has been established. It has 38 people on a house uh select uh committee. uh and
state repres representative Brackett who used to be the mayor of Vero Beach is on the committee which I think is a is a good thing because he can bring his experience to that uh committee because unfortunately what you find is that many of the more recent class of state
legislators have never worked on a local government and don't really understand the challenges that we have to uh uh deal with. So I think it's good that somebody like him is uh on the uh committee. And so there have been uh
these concept proposals which you uh see up here uh on the on the screen. I'll take the the first one uh last. Uh essentially uh many of them uh the fir the next three the half a million dollar homestead exemption million dollar home
ex home homestead exemption just takes the current laws and raises the homestead exemption. The second one basically gives the authority to the legislature which I think they really have already to increase it to any value by general legislation.
And then there as as we know anybody who lives here is a full-time resident who doesn't rent their place uh out and it's a uh residential property. There is a homestead exemption you can apply for which basically limits any change in
your taxable value which is used for uh calculating your property tax can only go up a maximum of 3% or the value of the property. in some cases like after the great financial crisis uh those values actually went down. So the idea
would be on the one there that says modifying the assessment increase limitations uh 3% every 3 years rather than 3% uh each year. And then finally which the last one which wasn't discussed uh very much is eliminating foreclosures on homestead property due
to a tax lean. I'm I mean personally I'm sort of mystified by uh that one because well you basically you're going to have a squatter sitting in there not paying their taxes then how do you how do you get them out there? I mean there's a responsibility when you when you own a
uh property to pay your property taxes. That one was not really uh discussed too much. So what the uh and I haven't included the uh slides. So, what the Florida League of Cities done has looked at uh done
first of all a poll of people and surprisingly, you know, they they wouldn't mind having their taxes cut, but in terms of at least according to FLC, tax fairness beats tax cut. So, one thing that keeps coming up is uh
stopping seasonal resident uh fraud. In other words, people who come down here to claim that they're a resident and uh get the homestead exemption. You're really not going to get much money out of that. There were some other things. Uh what did come up was uh a senior
property tax reduction. 60% of the people thought that was a great idea and and some other things and so forth. Uh there um although interestingly enough that most voters believe local government's comparatively fiscal fiscally responsible. 74% said often or
sometimes uh local government performs duties efficiently and cost effectively. Certainly when you look at I think most municipalities in the state of Florida compared to the ones I'm familiar with in the Northeast and Pence Pennsylvania, I would think that's the case. So what what Florida League of Cities done is
they they've done an analysis of uh various uh cities around the state to show what the impact would be uh on revenues. And I'm not going to walk through all those. I mentioned to our our town manager, our assistant town
manager that uh we uh we could get that analysis done for our uh town as well. Basically looking at some of these ones here which are up on the screen. Hopefully they do it right, but if they're going to offer it for free, I
think that uh we should do it. Now in another uh part of the present uh uh presentation later on in the uh day in terms of these initial proposals they were not looked at very favorably by this uh select uh committee and very
interestingly is that a person who used to be on in the state legislature who's a former I believe Parkwood mayor uh she made the comment and she's up there all the time. She says she doesn't know who's driving the train on this, which is kind of interesting where this where
this whole thing is is going. You know, politically, is it the uh the governor pushing this? But is it getting down to the state legislature or is it all a public relations uh ploy? So, so before I move on to
Doge, if any gentlemen have comments or or questions before I move to Doge, I'd be happy to take them. Anything for the vice mayor? One one question. Uh how deep was the discussion about um if any of these proposals kind
of get worked their way through? Um it's just going to be you know tax and fee shifting you know like we we anticipate u enterprise funds in cities will just be increasing fees and costs and using those revenues to uh compensate for any
any loss of uh adalerum tax revenue. Well, you know, that's interesting that you bring that up because you and I have pushed this in at v various meetings. That's a very verboten topic that uh the Florida League of Cities what they do
each year. They have elections for their officers and there's they're basically self- selected. But I asked a couple people that were running the the question I'm know you've asked, well, what what's your attitude about charging a higher uh rate on a utility bill for
somebody that's outside your town that you service compared inside the town? And you get a lot of humming heming and hawing on that. and and uh to that point I applied to get on the uh the tax and
finance uh advisory committee and I did get on it. So uh they they will regret that but uh I I I intend to bring this up and make myself a royal pain in the neck about it because I think we we have to fix it particularly something like this goes on and I know you've been you
know fighting a good fight on that and getting beat up about it as well. But it's rather interesting uh on that uh you know what I what I said to those uh people who are running I said well consider a situation where you buy your
power from Florida Power and Light and uh the your neighbor the border between two municipalities runs between your yards. So uh they're in town A and you're in town B. said, "Would you feel
would you accept them you paying five or 10% more because you're in town P for getting the same exact power?" And of course, no. Then I bring it up about municipalities and it's like dead silence that occurs. I mean, so I I intend to bring that up uh when uh when
I get on that committee. So uh I might have uh somebody um start my car for me each time that I go out to the parking lot. Okay. So let let's go through Doge and I I'll try to go through this quick but I mean there was a lot of discussion. So there's these uh
big meeting rooms and they had a giant one for this presentation and it was filled and as as uh the gentleman uh from Doge went through that I heard more murmuring in the audience and outright outright complaining than my earshot
ever seen anything else. So the head of Doge is a gentleman named Eric J. Saskin. He has been in the state of Florida for a total of 5 months so far. He worked uh for uh Department of Justice and he primarily uh worked on
constitutional and administrative law and defended u orders on immigration, public charge uh actions, assert state secrets privilege, other executive privileges. and uh when he and then he
moved over to uh be the expectant inspector general for US Department of Transportation and he really uh worked on um just
um basically uh DEI stuff. So um all right, this is out of order here. Okay. So, let's Okay, let's go let's go to the that was the Doge manual that this uh references here. So, so this
this was the the uh the conference. So, these are Mr. Saskin's uh slides and what you will see through here is and it's not even hidden at all. They're going after what they believe is inappropriate expenditures on uh on on
DEI and So that's him on the left. He reports to the new chief financial officer and then the the other person helping out is Lita W. Kelly.
So he has a series of slides here about uh revenues going up and they can't they can't stop. Uh you know it can't go on uh forever. So I mean we all know that and we not only talk to talk here in the New River Shores, we walk the walk. So,
uh, you know, Florida was Doge before Doge was cool. Uh, so, and you know, this is an advertisement for the governor. And look, they've done good work that particularly as a guy that worked in the bond market for, you know, 36 years. The fact that 41% of Florida's
historic tax supported debt has been paid down. I mean, that's something to be proud of. There's no doubt about that. So another chart about government spending up uh from uh the Federal Reserve and and and more to show some some counties counties they happen to be
targeting as as well. So they point out why this this has has to be done. We're suffering frustrations on on efficiency and so forth. I mean we've we've looked at you know we we've handled all these. So, but uh
and then on the these series of charts, they went through like a flowchart of the building permit process and and other things about how slow government works in their opinion and I'm certainly sure that's true in a lot of areas of Florida. I don't feel that's the case uh
for us. And uh then we get to climate change, DEI, and so forth. Again, no attempt to hide this at all. So, I'm not editorializing. This gentleman, Mr.
Saskin, said that. So, Doge and Florida cities. So, interesting enough, there were a lot of uh towns and counties in uh the state of Florida passed resolutions saying that they were in support of
that. We did not. We live it every single uh day. Interestingly enough, a town just south of us on a barrier island passed one of those and the same town that doesn't have their audit done yet. Um, so this is the legal framework that he
put up. He really didn't go through much discussion there. So this is their core principles, advisory, lean, temporary and uh innovative I think things that we try to live every every day even in a small community uh like like ours. But
uh so what they will do is their their focus uh is in three spots. State agencies, higher ed. I think in particularly in higher ed they're looking at spending that supports uh DEI or has principles revolving around that.
So they are going to come in and uh basically uh look at your uh records and uh they will possibly go through your accounting systems and and
so forth to review uh contracts and so forth. Now, they're supposed to have auditors that are coming in, but what concerned me is they have legislative assistants that are going to be in there. Uh, I've dealt with a lot of legislative assistants either up in Tallahassee or most of the time on
Capitol Hill, and they can be very smart people. They don't have the dayto-day experience of managing a city or managing town or managing a county. And that that was somewhat troubling uh to me. Would they
want to have access to all the records? We're an open book and under the public records law, we have to give it to them anyway. Uh so what they are they they've sent these notices out. Uh Heather responded. Boy, she had a lot of work to do. I saw how much she had to uh pull
out pull up and she only had I think a week to do it if I recall correctly. So kudos to you and kudos to Jim for uh getting that put together. So they've started going through uh on-site visits. I find it highly unlikely they're going to show show up here given the size of
our town. And if they look and see that we're we're gonna cut our military by 4%. I don't think it's if you look at the jurisdictions they've gone to so far. Uh I believe most of those are run by the Democratic Party. Probably just a
coincidence. Uh so this is the layout of what they're going to do in terms of the material they're they're going to uh ask for you and as far as coming on site and do in two days they want to access systems. Now in my mind how can they
really access systems unless they know the systems. Everybody's is is different. They're going to have to rely upon staff doing it which is fine. we're going to be happy to do it and then they might have a a follow a followup uh take place. This sort of bothered me on the right.
Do not alter, destroy or falsify documents, expect state employees sign non-disclosure agreements, reprimand penalize or large retal against staff for buying true fun. I find that somewhat insulting that they they would think that people people would do that.
So uh any but and that that got a lot of response from the uh from the uh audience. So that's their enforcement authority. So look at item bullet point number three selective priorities activities in support of wrongful
unlawful anti scientific ideologies. Spending on activities that are trendy or low ROI. I don't know how they're going to calculate ROIs on that. unnecessary use of taxpayer funds to support NOS's. That goes back to the third bullet point. And they're going to
be looking at performance metrics as well. Performance metrics, I think we're in really good shape uh there. We've done a lot of things over the past several years. So again, another slide on DEI. You know, you feel like you got hit across the head with a baseball bat
going through going through this. So, climate change. Oops. uh and you know they they have things about climate change as to whether it's real or not. So what's the the road ahead? Uh you know there here's the
thing. They're going to come out with two reports to the governor. The first one is September 30th. It wasn't clear. I think it's probably going to be just a recap of what they've done. Here is the one that is more troubling that we're going to have to really potentially troubling that we're gonna have to pay
attention to on January 13th. The uh there's going to be a a set of potential legislative changes that are going to go to the state legislature. So, we're going to have to watch that very closely and be able to respond that. So, uh you
know, they they want to eliminate redundant outdated regulations. Now they brought up just very briefly about looking at at state mandates. I had a question which was not asked of the gentleman. I said uh that in your review of local government expenditures, are
you going to look at non-funded state mandates that result in higher expenditures by municipality or less less efficiency? Unfortunately, that one was not asked. So because I I had to fill it out on a card. So so DOA is good
government. And then um what I included and it was uh in the beginning of the slides is is the uh Doge uh manual. Actually, I didn't think it was a it was a bad summary of things. I'm not going to I'm not going to go through it. Uh the town manager and I uh talked about
it uh before and he actually went through it and gave some responses which I think basically we're doing what they asked us to do. So, uh uh with that uh I'm I'm done unless uh any other uh
comments or questions. No question. No question. Okay. Just um clarification. We we did not uh fail to adopt a resolution because we disagree with Doge and its goals. We we just don't have any uh really doesn't have
any relevance to us because we're we're yes, we file our paperwork on time. Our financial statements are always in order and uh our outside auditors have told me on more than one occasion our staff is the model of the client that they would like to see in terms of the uh
cooperation and and preparation. Um good good comment. I think that, you know, a lot of um the burden that we're we're forced to endure in this is because there's really no way for them to be selective and look
equinimous uh with all the other folks. So, these policies are really directed towards some very poorly managed municipal governments and a number of them were popped up there uh probably in the news. you've seen, you know, Orange County is
reported to have maybe $300 million that, you know, they're not quite sure, you know, where the expenditures went and how there's any accountability for that. So, I feel as if we're we're being um uh hauled into a a very widely cast net. And unfortunately, it's something
that we're going to have to endure as long as this uh as long as this lasts. and um um I guess it's a cost of doing business for our municipality. Fortunately, we don't have anything to really be concerned about in terms of the substance of uh of um of the Doge
enterprise. So, um I I share your skepticism that they're going to be able to come in and do spot checks on uh computer systems. I think that there probably will be a refinement to this as they go forward where the um uh it'll be
a more uh triage audit and if they see something then they'll say can we have access to your systems? So let's not get too worked up about that. But I know we have the great cooperation of our staff if if need be. Uh, as for the threats and intimidation, I know that would be offensive to us
because we would always cooperate, but there are some municipalities where there have been some incidents where staff was not treated appropriately. So, um, I think, uh, I think let's just hold on to our hats here. Um, circling back
to the uh and thank you for going to to the conference and uh representing the the town so aly and providing the information to us and I I don't I don't want to make this up but I think it was Senator Ever Dirkson who once said that select committees are where bad ideas go
to die hopefully. So the select committee on tax reform hopefully uh as the data percolates through you know they will see that all this is going to amount to is uh at best a shell game for uh taking revenue from taxpayers in different ways. I do think that there
are some some things that, you know, maybe ought to be looked at like um shifting some of the burden to one example uh out of state residents that claim that claim u homestead exemptions that really aren't entitled to it. And you know, given the burden that tourists
put on, you know, the Florida economy, maybe maybe we need to kind of rethink the uh the welcomeness of the tax tax structure for for tourism and um you know, cost shift some of that over and provide property relief to Florida residents. But excellent presentation.
Um it'll be interesting to see what happens, you know, by January. And I agree with you. We need to watch this very very carefully to make sure that uh this is done with a scalpel and not not an atomic bomb that creates unwarranted circumstances on a municipality like us.
So thank you very much. Um you know it just say that point the referendum could be if they come up with a referendum in language that could become a runaway train that uh everybody likes lower taxes you know and uh so
thank you. Um, all right. Let's move on to item eight, which is uh well 8, B, and C. We have um uh approval and ordinance. Why do we have B and C again instead of A and B? Uh cuz I made a mistake.
Okay. All right. Okay. Is there a uh let's have a retroactive motion to uh amend item A to reflect that item B is actually A and item C is actually B. Is there a motion
to approve? Second. All in favor? I. All right. So, we have an amended agenda now. Um that's on me for not picking that up before uh we got to item five. Excuse me, item four. Um
all right, approval. Item A, approval of ordinance number 580. solid waste, recycling, and yard waste since it is a first reading. Um, can you, Mr. Town attorney and Mr. Town Manager, provide the background for this and what we're being asked to approve? And then I will
ask to see if there's any public comment on this item since it is a first reading. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Regarding ordinance number 580, as the council knows, we have uh changed our franchise agreement relative to solid waste. Uh our previous ordinance uh as it exists
now um really is um is drafted and has language related to onetoone billing and service providing. And here what we're doing is we're just simply cleaning up our uh our solid waste garbage ordinance to uh accurately reflect the fact that we're now in a franchise agreement and
uh billing is done through the non-advorum uh assessment and it makes our ordinance consistent with um the franchise agreement and the actual operation. I noticed you said we're cleaning up. Yes. Yes, sir.
All right. I couldn't let that pass. No, it's it's quite all right. Um, after sitting through a Doge conference, you're entitled to whatever humor you want to interject. So, um, all right. Is there any discussion from council on item 8A?
Mr. Mayor, before vote, may I read? Yes, I I know. I just want to get discussion first and then Okay, now we can go to the formal approvement part. Do you want to kindly do the uh magic kabuki dance and uh you know read the title and Yes sir. Uh ordinance number 580 an
ordinance of the town of Indian River Shores Florida amending and repealing sections of the code of ordinances of the town of Indian shores chapter 54 garbage collection to reflect changes consistent with a new franchise agreement providing for a business impact estimate providing for severability providing for codification providing for conflicts providing for
scriveners errors and providing for an effective date. This is the first reading. Thank you mayor. Thank you. Is there before council uh moves to vote on this, is there any public comment? Okay, there being none, is there a motion to approve? So move. Second.
All right, so we have a motion by Councilman Carroll and a second by the vice mayor. Uh can we have a roll call vote, please? Mayor Foley, I. Vice Mayor Awart, I. Council member Carroll, I. Council member Dayne, I. Let the record show the motion passes unanimously.
All right. Thank you very much. And uh let's move to item 8B which is uh approval of ordinance number 581 a nonad valerum capital special assessment. First reading. I I will tell the public it sounds a lot worse than it really is. Uh special assessments especially for
homeowners association people carry a very bad connotation these days. Uh if you would kindly give some background for this uh Mr. Town Manager and uh we'll have town attorney do his his thing afterwards. Thank you Mr. Mayor Council. Um, in this
regard, ordinance 581 uh addresses the uh state law changes in 2023 regarding the septic to sewer requirements uh where any commercial or residential property in the town with an existing septic system has to convert to sanitary
sewer when available uh by um 2030. Uh it's July 1st, 2030. The first projects in this town uh to address that are going to be on Beach COMR and Pebble Lane. Uh in order to provide the residents with an opportunity to um uh
uh mitigate some of the immediate payment issues because they have to pay for the connection, uh we have negotiated with the city to allow uh any of our residents to pay either in a lump sum payment or through a uh 10-year um
assessment, a nonadalorm capital special assessment on the tax bill. so they could advertise their payments over a period of 10 years. Uh this analogous to the process we just went through for solid waste uh is the first step in authorizing um the the the property appraiser and
the tax collector to uh effectuate this uh non-advalorum capital assessment. Uh and this ordinance is required for that purpose again analogous to the process for solid waste. I just note two things from a foreshadowing standpoint as it were. Um we'll be seeing in our next
town council meeting on September 23rd uh the interlocal agreement between the town and the city uh which we have uh completed relative to some of the operations of the project because the city is installing the sewer. We're engaging in in road project and and
storm water uh updates. Uh also um we'll see a resolution and that resolution again is analogous to the one we did for solid waste on November 20th uh which identifies certain statutory requirements that we have to have um and then we'll continue the process uh throughout. But that's um uh the basic
background for this particular ordinance. Uh Mr. Mayor and Council, thank you uh Mr. Horring. And just just to put a finer point on it, the special assessment relates only to those people who are currently out of compliance, those properties and owners of those properties who are currently out of
compliance with the state statute requiring sewer um sewer connections. That's correct. All right. Um is there any any comment from council before we do the magic language? Yes, vice mayor. uh just on uh
doing the installment basis, do they charge an interest rate on that? Yes. Uh we're finalizing the details on that, but the interest rate will probably be um uh 6.3 something%. The rationale for that has
to do with um the fact that for the tax bill, if you pay early, you'll get a 4% discount. Okay. uh the uh city in regards to their contracts and their payment for you know the sewer installation has to account for the possibility that someone will uh pay
early. So they have to account for that relative to recoup their full investment. For those that um pay early then they receive those discounts for th those that don't then that'll um that'll be the interest rate. And keep in mind you can well then then the effective rate will be 2.3%.
Yes. Yeah. For the for those that pay early. Yeah. Okay. All right. That's that's sound reason. And also there is that uh uh one-time lumpsum payment that you could pay in advance or you could pay early and we have a process whereby if during that 10 years someone wants to pay off the
balance uh they can do so by August 1st of each year and then they will be removed from the roles for the following year. Okay. Thank you. Terrific. Thank you. Good question. Um Mr. Sweeney. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. This is ordinance number 581, an ordinance of the town of
Indian Resor, Florida, a municipal corporation relating to special assessments, creating a new chapter 103 in title 9 of the code of town of Indian shores, Florida, the code entitled special assessments, providing findings and procedures for leving special assessments, providing a business impact
estimate, providing for severability, providing for codification, providing for conflicts, providing for scribers errors, and providing for an effective date. This is the first reading. Thank you. Thank you. Uh any public comment on this item? Anybody wish to comment?
If there's no further comment from council, is there a motion to approve? Some move. Second. Okay. A motion by Councilman Carroll, a second by the vice mayor. And is there a roll call vote, please? Mayor Foley. I. Vice Mayor Alwater. I. Council member Carroll. I.
Council member Deanne. I. Let the record show. The motion passes unanimously. All right. Thank you. And just to just to reiterate that uh we're we're in relatively good shape as municipalities go here. Um some of our some of our
neighbors are really struggling to figure out how they're how the residents are going to do this because there are many many that are out of compliance with the state statute have a very short period of time to undertake some very expensive projects. So um you know we you know thank thanks be thankful for
small favors. So um there we are. All right. Staff updates. Uh, item 9A, building official report and statistics. I know Mr. Held was uh um in a conflict. So, do you wish to say anything in addition to the report that was provided
uh by Mr. Held's department? Um, I do not. I'm happy to answer any questions. And we also have uh uh Inspector Micanser who uh could answer any questions if uh if needed. Any anything on building report and statistics? No. No. All right, we'll move on. Uh, code
enforcement. Good morning. Good morning. Other than the items listed on the report, I have no updates. Like to answer any questions if you have any. Yeah, just one thing on the signs. We
continue to see repeat offenders, you know, like the Mosquito Joe and things like that. I mean, other than sending them a notice, is there anything that we can is there anything we can re realistically do? You know, got junk is another one I've seen time and time
again. Is there anything we can do other than, you know, monetarily on this? Um, so I have a log that I keep track of. Um, if it includes the name of the realtor, any contact information, I log
it all in. Um, and if they are a repeat offender, then I do implement a fine. Um, usually beginning at $50 and then each time they violate the ordinance, it does go up. Um, but other than that, that's pretty much the enforcement
process. Can Can we enforce those fines when I think like Mosquito Joe, if I recall correctly, uh, is up in Melbourne? I mean, we we we can go after them and Yes, sir.
Okay, great. Thank you. Just, you know, not to not to get too draconian about this, though, but for repeat offenders, and I agree with the vice mayor's comment, um, and this is I know we have enough lawyers up here to start a law firm, but, uh, you know,
this one's directed to Mr. Sweeney. Um is is it is it possible to issue a revocation of um right to do business in the jurisdiction or you know because having a special master that's a that's an expense for us and then $50 on a fine
not not really a great deterrent. So, and I know we don't want to be unbusiness friendly, um, or business unfriendly, rather. Um, but you know, for people who are gaming the system, it may be worth a $50 fine or know they're going to get a another warning from you.
So, it's not your fault. I'm not directing it to you, Inspector Mike. Um, so other than just thinking about being less forgiving on first offenses, increasing the fine, uh, maybe imposing the cost on the special master on the
violator and letting word get out that way, is there is there something more we could do? Because, you know, for a a larger entity, $50, $500, if they're if they're profiting off it by violating, it's probably not a deterrent. Uh, mayor, council, um, as far as issuance
of a business tax receipt, uh, I have not seen and I'd have to research whether or not you could co-mingle code enforcement, outstanding fines or leans versus the ability to renew it. Again, typically BTRs are relatively low as far
as a cost, somewhere between $50 and $100. So demenist when you're talking about that. I'll speak with town manager Harper about there might be more significant penalties but those border on criminal and although those are
reserved within our code for any code violation I'm not aware that it's ever been proceeded with at least in my knowledge and going back a long time that's not to say it's not an option. So we would need to talk about that figure out how that would work because that would require cooperation. Obviously, we
can't prosecute criminally the state and such and they have their hands full. I I understand. So, let's um why don't you report back to us? Um how about October meeting reasonable to have a proposal cuz uh um I know we we we have a little room
before we get to a criminal penalty. But remember 5 years ago or 6 years ago before we fixed it, the cost of a parking fine was $5, which is, you know, you had people parking overnight on Fred Turk and uh taking the fine because it made more sense to them trying to pay for a parking spot somewhere. So
you're exactly right. All right. Thanks. Any objection to that or we'll just have a report back in October. Um All right. Thanks very much. Um public works department. Um same if there's any other additional questions. I would just uh like to note and thanks
since Max here, thanks Max for his uh for his good work out in the field. Uh and you'll note some of the photos and some of the things that were you know continue to monitor uh that are in the report. Uh we've had a number of uh Zoom calls with the relevant people from FDOT and others. Uh so I think we have a very
good ongoing relationship with them um in regards to the maintenance of the roadways and and things like that. And just a very brief note, I uh got some cooperation from the city regarding the um uh vacant lots uh at the south end of town, north end of the city, and we're
working on those because I have um some concerns about uh concerns about life safety issues relative to the the untended debris, uh some cabling, and some other items in there. But we're getting some good cooperation from the city. I've spoken with uh some of their police personnel about uh you know,
about what they can do to to help us out uh uh down there. So, um, this is all sort of a a a totality of, uh, of actions that we're trying to work, uh, in this particular area. All right. Thank you. Anything for, uh, the town manager wearing the public
works hat? Nothing. Okay. I'll just say, um, and I know it's one of your favorite subjects. Uh, I do from time to time continue to get comments on the sidewalks. I know it's not our jurisdiction. uh everything from why can't we get the uh asphalt color to
match in a community like this which is probably not great in the constellation of issues we have to deal with um although I'm not saying it wouldn't be nice as an aesthetically challenged person um but uh also some uh dangerous conditions that you know some asphalt is
uneven and you know folks are um worried about tripping and falling etc. So, if we could just um put that put that on your load of bricks to kind of follow up with FDOT and see when they're going to uh you know look at that issue particularly at the south portion of town. So,
we'll do I'll I'll be able to report on the 23rd on that. Great. Thank you. Uh town treasurer, good morning. Um you have my report and do you have any questions that I can answer regarding that? Anything for
Heather now that you're breathing a little sigh of relief after audit season and budget season as we're going into it? Well, speaking of that, yeah, I'm about the auditors are going to be here September 15th to start planning. So, Right. Right. Well, hopefully you have all your work done. So, you know, uh, no
questions on Doge for her. Okay. All right. I appreciate that. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Uh, Chief Stone, Public Safety Department. Good morning. Just a couple of real quick things. Um, we did get our engines put back in
service yesterday. Um, after an extensive repair pump. Um, and uh, we'll be bringing another item to you for your consideration your next uh, next agenda meeting. Um, we have uh also started
working with uh John's Island on their setting the schedule for the holiday season for the uh crosswalks and those types of things and getting the additional manpower uh signed up for that. Um, but other than that, uh, if you got any questions on the report we've submitted, I'll be happy to answer
those for you. Anything? No. Okay. Uh, I know we'll be it it's arguably within your ambit, but we're going to let the town manager and the town attorney talk about the shark fishing and enforcement mechanisms things. We had some comment from the
public on that. So, uh, stay tuned. Okay. Thank you. Uh, town clerk, Miss Rutan. Good morning. Um, just a couple of things. The first is that there is a vacancy for the no bicycle advisory committee that we will be putting in the
newsletter that will go out tomorrow. But um that would be coming up on an agenda and if you had any recommendations that I could send an application to, I would be more than happy to do that. And secondly um and in the newsletter again tomorrow will be a press release from our supervisor of
elections. uh due to the real ID, many of our residents have had to get new IDs, new licenses, and that is a new license number that is being issued, which affects the um absentee ballot applications. So, they will have to
reapply. Even if they just reapplied, they're going to have to reapply. So, I will be putting that in the newsletter and kind of keeping up with that. So again, if any any questions, the best suggestion is when they're getting those Real IDs renewed that they say that they would like to update their voter
registration at that time. And then also just remind people that they can file the forms through my office as well. Terrific. Thank you. Anything for the town clerk? All right. Thanks very much and good luck telling people that they do not vote in the city of Vero Beach
elections. We get that confusion all the time. So, um, town attorney, I know you are going to do a a duet with our town manager on, uh, legal prescriptions involving fishing on the beach and what we can and cannot do. Thanks. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Yes, sir. Uh,
folks, today we'll be talking about that. So, let's just start with jurisdictionally who we have to work with and what we control. First, uh, Florida Fish and Wildlife FWC is the primary jurisdictional enforcement agency for a lot of shark fishing in Florida. and and let's just stay focused
on beach shark fishing. Uh anything in the waters probably would be very difficult if impossible for us to enforce uh even very close to the beach. So beach fishing starting with the prohibition statewide on chumming and this is directly from the FWC and I'll
work with Mr. Harping and our town clerk to maybe even have this information put in. This is the current regulations for shark fishing in Florida, but chumming is completely prohibited from any beach in Florida. So, starting from that, um, that should really limit the amount of
people that would be doing shark fishing. Following on from that, FWC requires a permit that you would have to have to be able to do it. There are restrictions on uh the the length of the leader, the type of gear that you can use, all of those types of things. Those
again are all FWC state uh legislative requirements. Locally here within the town, um we allow people to be on the beach. Um but we have two important things. One, we have our own unlawful
baiting, chumming, blood baiting, uh and section 102.01. Um that would, you know, again, it's a belt and suspenders to the state's prohibition on chumming from beaches. Additionally, we have the ability and and control essentially the access to
and from the beach under our chapter 91, I'm sorry, section 91.05. Um, which again prevents access to the beach through our dune crossovers from 9:00 p.m. to 6:00 a.m. So, people are allowed to be on the beach. Uh, that's
allowed, but they're not allowed to necessarily cross back and forth. And in speaking with Mr. for Harper. That's where we would have some jurisdictional input and enforcement aspect. Um, again, and and I'll let Mr. Harper and our public safety director talk about it. But really, our residents need to feel
comfortable and be able to to let us know if they suspect this is going on and we have enforcement mechanisms. So, um, with that, I'll let Mr. Harping kind of segue into how that could happen if we have that come up. Okay. Just to just to put it in sea spot run. Um Yes, sir. We have no ability to prevent people
from lawfully fishing off the beach, including sharks, if they're on the beach lawfully. That's true. We do have a state prohibition against chumming, and we even have a town ordinance against that. Yes, sir. We can control how people use the town access to the beach, but we cannot
control how others uh other access to the beaches. And um so if they wander down through the city of Vero Beach or south, you know, through I guess that's unincorporated county down there or even start all the way down in Orcward and
Orchid and move their way up. Um we um uh we have we have limited ability to control that access. Yes, sir. Or even Turtle Trail. Or even Turtle Trail, right? That's a county access, but I think that's locked at night, isn't it? So I believe so. Okay. So the county accesses, they're they're pretty good working with us on
locking that access. So we don't have any access in in in the town lawfully after dark. That's correct. So we we do control that. Yes sir. Okay. So now the fun part goes to Mr. Harprain. He's going to tell us what we can do because it's long-standing been
the policy of um of the town to impose the maximum restrictions on u on shark fishing and creating dangerous conditions on our beach, you know, within within the purview of state statutes. So, thank you, Mr. Harper. Uh, thank you, Mr. Mayor, Council. Uh,
so just a couple of additional things from a day-to-day operational standpoint, I guess. Um, our public safety personnel when called do go down to the beach and, uh, will make contact with individuals that are down there. I know of at least one situation where, uh, one of our public safety officers
asked for a permit and somebody did have a permit. U one of the other things that's going to be significant I think in this area that we're going to do which was planned alongside the Beach Comr and Pebble Lane septic to sewer project but which we're going to accelerate which will not have any adverse effect at all on the on the
septic to sewer project uh is essentially tightening up the access point. Um we're going to do two things. one. Uh we are going to gate the um the stairway um access uh from uh 9:00 p.m. to 6:00 a.m. Uh it'll be locked. You
won't be able to walk down that. Uh there'll also be uh a gate. Right now we have u what are sort of euphemistically referred to as Jersey barriers. They are not filled with water or sand uh because we we do move them for access. But we're going to install um a gate on a slide uh
on a rail and some other um uh things to certainly uh add to that um both uh actual and and and visual uh perception that first you're not supposed to be going over the dune at all. And that's a big thing for people carrying a lot of fishing equipment. Uh secondly, uh at
9:00 p.m. or thereabouts, we're going to come down. Public safety is going to close that door. It's going to be locked. Uh so if you're down on the beach at that point in time and you've accessed uh and clearly we're not going to look at our watch and you know wait for the second hand to hit
12 right at 9:00. But you know if we see people down there we're going to as as I've mentioned many before we're going to educate people. We're going to encourage them. Uh and then we're going to go to uh to the enforcement piece. Um so those are some of the things that we're going to do. Um uh secondarily, we've already started with some signage
uh down there uh about not going over the dunes and other signage uh related to the access being closed from 9 to 6. Uh so those are some of the other things uh that we're able to do both within uh state law, our town ordinance, and within our own administrative discretion.
Okay. And and you know, obviously a few years ago when this last came up, we we clamped down on the parking on Fred Turk, and if people don't have a place to park, it's naturally going to restrict where they're going to be able to carry all that equipment. Um, one question, do we have the power to does
our public safety department have the power to affffectuate an arrest for violation of the state statute if there's illegal chumming in the water? If it's criminal, yes, of course, we can enforce any state statute. Yeah, I I knew the answer to that. But I just wanted everybody else to have the benefit of that. So,
and Mr. Mayor, to follow that, uh, Mr. Harping and I spoke about this this morning. We have an excellent relationship, and I'll defer to Chief Stone with FWC. Uh, I know that we regularly interact with them, particularly on the Riverside as well related to that. So, certainly, we would work belers with them.
Terrific. Thank you very much. Um, all right. Um, Vice Mayor, you have a comment or question? So, where where are they parking? Well, that's a very good question. Um there obviously any parking around here is going to be obvious and apparent to
our public safety personnel. We've uh got the signage out here. Uh and we we prohibit parking from 1 to six because we have events a little later on at community center and so on. Uh but it's an awful long walk with shark fishing gear if you uh are coming up from really anywhere to get here
that's not a private access. Is it possible that you know people are um you know entering places and parking at places and and trespassing essentially in um areas where there's no um you know no gates or so on in terms of uh it's
it's possible but um we're we're pretty attentive to uh you know to those stray cars out and about. So we're we're just not sure in that regard. All right. Anything else from council on that? Okay. All right. Um, so we're
being as responsive as we can to um to citizen input on this and uh u we'll continue to monitor it and Chief Stone will have his people and the um uh even the auxiliary folks out there um writing. Ma'am, did you want to make your comment now? I I suspect you're the
person that wrote one of the emails. So, I just wanted to say please, you have to come up to the podium and say who you are and where you're from and all that preliminary stuff. Thank you. I'm sorry.
Thank you. Haven't done this for a while. Charlotte Terry. I live on Beach Comr Lane and have for over 30 years. Um, and I have been in contact with the police here because we had I have grandchildren. You know, we have a lot of people that go
swimming down there, and you all know what Chumming does. Sharks have memories. And so, I've many times seen these guys down there. I know you all have um sort of gotten the laws a little tighter, which is great, but it's still
it's a it's a huge concern. I've been down there before where they have tents and they're like eight or 10 guys fishing from the beach, but they take a little boat out and they chum. Um, which is according to your police staff says that that's totally legal. I don't know
if there's any way to try to um change that. I mean, this this is a public beach and people can anybody can walk down there. We live on the street, but anybody in the neighborhood that wants to can walk down there. park shores. A lot of people utilize that. Um these
guys are what they're doing is they come down and they drop everything off at the end of the street. I live two doors, three doors from the access and um then they come over and park, but they have massive, you know, equipment that they drop off there. So, I think what you're
proposing sounds like a reasonable thing, although it's not. I like to go down to the beach at night sometimes and uh you know visit the neighbors. We go down there and if you lock it at nine o'clock at night that means none of us will be able to go down on the beach
between 9 and 6 the residents. That's correct. If you're going to access through um the beach comr lane access. Yes ma'am. Um, is there any way you could do it on the lock system where the local people that live on that street could actually go out because, you know,
a lot of us walk the beats early in the morning or late at night. Yeah, in my opinion, that would be that would be very very challenging um to to do that to distribute a code. Um, uh, so I I just think that's that's challenging and I know that that might be an imposition. Um, though uh
notwithstanding uh time changes, it's going to be dark at 9:00 and it's really not going to be light until about 6:00. And I I appreciate that people do go down at different hours, but I don't think that would effectively assist us to distribute a code to allow people to to access. I I also I don't think you can restrict
it to uh members of the town only and not uh practically the code numbers would get out, but you can't you can't restrict it only to town residents. So, the plan is then to put a a fence from the property line, the private property
of the vacant lot over to um the gate or to the to the crosswalk. And um so, and that that would only be open for when you all do your little turtle things andor sand dumping,
just another thing we love on our street. Um okay, but there's nothing else. Is there any other way we could legally try to stop them from being able to chum from a boat? You said that. Is that a state law?
Uh yes. Those those uh issues are all preempted by the state. So that would be a state legislative issue. Um we could not we could not do anything that we could enforce. Right. Okay. All right. Thank you very much. You're welcome. But, you know, just just to clarify for my understanding has
always been that our public access is closed after a certain a certain amount of time anyway. What we're doing is we're just uh we're putting teeth behind the ability to people to access it in violation of the ordinance. Right. So, yeah. So, we're not changing anything there. Your your your ability to access
the beach, you know, from the public access points has always been restricted under ordinance in the town. We're just now um imposing uh gates to put teeth in that. So, Mr. Mayor, to follow that that the ordinance restricting the time has been in place since 2002.
Yeah. Mhm. So, in effect, if I'm down there on the beach floor sitting after that time, that's illegal. Interesting. Okay. Well, I'm sure one of our officers would come up and chat with you for a while and tell you that he's going to lock the
gate and it's probably time to go. No, that's good. That's good to know. I'll let our street know. Thank you very much. You're welcome. Thank you. Thank you for your comments. Uh all right. Uh now that we've taken a bite out of that issue, um Mr. Town Manager,
thank you, Mr. Mayor, Council, uh very briefly, if you have been down to the uh beach access, we have coordinated with the Rotary Club. They have a drown zero project. So, we have a throw don't go uh philosophy down there, which is take the throw ring. Someone's has a problem in
the water, throw it, call 911, don't try to go in and and save yourself. We unfortunately see uh many times uh that that that's an issue uh where the the rescuer either has to be rescued or uh you know, or meets a meets a worse meets a worse fate. Uh so, we're we're happy
to have that down there. Um, I want to thank Lucy and Janice, of course, and we had a um a Treasure Coast Waterways beach cleanup. And, uh, there's just a couple of pictures. Uh, we got, um, about 4 pounds of trash, uh, from our beach here. And we're greatly appreciative, uh, for folks coming out
helping the, uh, the Treasure Coast Waterway Cleanup. Um, I'd like to, uh, turn to the, uh, uh, just generally our website, um, and our domain name change. Just very briefly, we are uh involved in or have been involved in reviewing
uh different uh providers, vendors for uh website services. Uh I want to in particular thank Janice who did a lot of work uh both preparatory and throughout the process um here. She's great knowledge in this area. Um, and we are uh looking at a uh remodel of the
website uh at this point in time associated with the domain name change. And I'll get you some more details as as things come up on that. But just wanted to let you know that um uh we're continuing looking to improve that experience for um you know for our residents uh and those that use our
services and council. That's all I have right now unless I have uh unless there's any questions I can answer. Anything for the town manager? Starting with uh Councilman Dayne. I have no questions. Vice Mayor, our friends at Republic,
I'm sorry. Our our friends at uh Republic Services, we continue to have billing problems and they say they're going to cut the bills out and they're going to manually reduce them so forth. I keep getting calls from residents as as recently as uh Monday uh
afternoon of of this week where they left a message on this gentleman's uh phone. They had done the same thing to me saying that I was in a rears not paying September uh amount and you know you know poor poor Lucy and Janice are
being subjected to this by Republic Services. Uh my my suggestion would be to send out a separate email similar to what we did on the uh on the um uh waste can uh and and just give them republic
and say we've tried everything. Give them republic services number and let let them have to uh deal with but this is incredibly annoying. They're Republic Services they're a huge organization. They lose and gain contracts all the
time by by town. And the fact that they don't they have been monkeying around this process since January. I mean, you know, having done coding myself for databases, it's something called a structure query language change in a table. It's as simple as anything
because it's all in Indian River Shores. But that would be my suggestion to try to take the heat off of uh our town clerk and your executive assistant and also let people know to where we're the problem and you know we've been trying to do things on this so we haven't been
sitting there. So we'll take care of that. Okay. Thank you. Thank you Mr. Harper. Nothing. Mr. Mayor, I just had actually one um thing that I neglected to say if I may briefly. Sure. Um, I just want to note and again, um, thank the team here, uh, for if the
if you kind of look around the chambers and I don't know if you've noticed, um, we have the sound dampening, uh, equipment on the walls. Uh, we've got our system in, we continue to fine-tune it, but, um, got a lot of just great in input from staff. Uh the one biggest
thing that a lot of these changes reflect uh are the ability to actually watch and listen to the meeting at a either live uh or at a later date with with excellent sound. And I just uh can't uh thank again our staff enough for for the input uh due to I guess our
collective um aesthetic challenges. So I'm just very grateful for uh color and shape and all that kind of input. Um so I just want to mention that. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Likewise. And u you know, thank you from council as well. So, uh, you know, good job. Uh, call to the audience. Is there
anything on anybody's mind having absolutely nothing to do with anything that hasn't already been discussed? Yes. I would just like to thank you all for your time, for running this town so well. I really
appreciate it. It's a pleasure. Thank you so much. Great. Thank you. We We appreciate that. Um, anything else? Council committee reports. I don't think anybody had any um committee reports to report on that wasn't the Florida League
of Cities. So, we're good, right? Okay. So, we are adjourned until our September budget meeting, which is what date? September 16th of 50:01 p.m. 501, not 5:00, but 501 by statute. Yes. Okay. have a special call at
Yes, we have a special call meeting uh following this, but uh that's not open to the public. So, all right. Thank you very much. Thank you. We Get back down.