Hey, thank you. All right, we're going to call this meeting to order. Can we get a roll call vote, please? I need a roll call. >> Committee member >> here. >> Committee member,
>> present. Committee member Craig Mcb >> here. Committee member Joe Roth >> here. >> Committee member Ron, excuse me, Roger Young >> here. >> Vice Chair Susan Raphanella >> here. >> And chair Ty Harris >> here. >> We have a quorum. >> All right. Next thing we have on the
agenda is approval of the minutes from January 26. >> Do I hear a motion? >> Motion to approve. >> Second. Right over. >> Marty, do you need a a roll call vote on that as well or can we just
>> uh unanimous excuse me, unanimous consent is fine? >> Anybody against the approval of the minutes? >> Yeah. >> No. >> All right. We are now on item four items for
discussion, but my understanding is that this agenda has been changed somewhat and we're going to have a presentation um on charters in general by a member of the Florida League of Cities. Where'd you get that?
Good evening, Mr. Chairman and members of the committee and members of the committee and members of the committee and members of the committee and members of the committee and members of the All right, let's see if this is better on the sound. All right, let's see if this is better on the sound. All right,
let's see if this is better on the sound. All right, let's see if >> Frank, I only have one >> the microphone on my computer, so I don't know where that's coming from. >> I don't know where that's coming from.
My understanding is you've reviewed my materials. I'm basically here for questions. I'm basically here for questions. >> Does anybody have a question? I'm afraid to talk back into this microphone.
There it goes. All right. At this point, we'd like to take public comment. So, if you want to speak, please get up and you've got three minutes at the podium. Thank you. We didn't do we didn't do speaker cards.
We're a little less formal. Sue Sue Miller lower Madakumbi. I just have one comment. Since the um public is so important, why are we skipping the presentation so that the public doesn't have an
opportunity to see it? Thank you. >> Well, I mean we can show the slides. I think it was more because of the technical difficulty that she skipped to the end of questions only because we as a committee received it. But you make a good point. Um can we go through the
slides so that the public can see all the information that we received? >> Does that work for you, Ty? >> That that's fine. and then we can continue public comment afterwards. >> If Lynn turns her speakers all the way down and just speaks, that may eliminate
the echo. Okay. So, if we slow down, I'll for those that are not watching the screen or can't properly see the screen on uh whatever device they may be listening in on tonight, and I'm not sure how many we have out there. I'm happy to to go
through and read um the PowerPoint with apologies to Lynn because I don't know probably a lot of the information she may have had ready in her mind as filler. Um but and if she gets the technical difficulties worked out, I'm
happy to be cut off at any time. So, uh, this is from, uh, Lynn Tipton and she is with, uh, FLC University and a director of I'm not quite sure,
Ron, do you know? >> League of Cities. >> League of Cities. Thank you. I thought so, but then it didn't say so on here. Uh, the municipal charters in Florida, all charters are unique. They have not found any two that are identical. There's 411 cities, towns, and villages.
All have a charter. And the goal for today is to discuss the charter review roles, municipal characteristics in Florida, and compare is Marada using data collected. Like a constitution, charters are broadly framed. They have a broad
framework. They explain the vision, mission, and structure of the municipality. Explain how the representatives will be elected, the chain of command and fiscal authority. The details are by ordinance which are laws of the village and
policies. They are typically short, 8 to 10 pages in length. And we have Lynn who has indicated she is retired and working for the Florida League of Cities. If I could read if I read that correctly. Um, charter review committees. Some are created by charter
with a specific appointment terms. Some are created by ordinance or at the request of a city council. Varies widely across Florida's municipalities committees. The committee is usually tasked with a time-specific review assisted by council and to bring back
recommendations to the council. Some CRC have limited scope of work as well. The council may choose to place items directly on the ballot based upon recommendations of the council that is attorney and committee. The role is citizens in this process is crucial.
Representation of the public, ability to weigh issues and to understand the charter's importance as a city's governing foundation. Common charter elements include a preamble, boundaries, legislative body, form of government, charter officers
with positions defined, fiscal and fiduciary authorities and responsibilities, and an amendment process. Comparable charter characteristics. Uh legislative, you have the size of council or commission. Five members is the most common. Some seven member
councils and some six where the mayor is non- voting. Length of term typically two and four-year terms are fairly evenly spread across the 411 cities, towns, and villages. A smaller percentage use the three-year term. Type
of election per council seat include single member district, elected seat with at large voting, and at large. Some councils are a mix of atlarge and single member district. Selection of the mayor. There's three
options. Elected at large, elected from within the council, and rotational. The forms of municipal government in Florida. Council week mayor is an original form of government brought over from England.
The council shares all powers. About 80 Florida cities with populations less than 25,000 have a council weak mayor uh government system. Council strong mayor. An elected executive implements council actions and administers the city. About
43 cities in all populations uh have a council strong mayor form of government commission. Each elected official oversees one or more departments autonomously and they come together as a legislative body. About two Florida cities have this council
manager or commission manager. A professional manager is appointed by the mayor and council to administer the city, prepare agenda and recommend actions to council and present a budget each year. About 285 Florida cities across all populations have this type of
model and a hybrid has elements of the above. So to compare is Marada comparisons using populations uh from it's not easy to compare an island municipality even in Florida.
They found five comparisons. Geography. All are coastal with most being on a barrier island. All are impacted by seasonal population, hurricanes, and coastal issues like erosion, flooding, and sea level rise. All are council manager or commission
manager. None are council strong mayor. None are commission only. And none is council week mayor. None are hybrid. Number of elected seats including mayor. All five of the five comparisons of
which Almarada is one of the five all have five council members should all comp also compare the scope of services if any charter elements are compared more deeply. And here's the chart of comparisons with the municipality
uh population and the number of seats. Oh gosh, I'm horrible at pronunciation. Fernandina Beach, Nassau, third Nassau County, 13,950 people with a council or commission manager, all of which are going to be
that, as we just heard, five seats. Marathon Monroe, population at 10,163. Indian Harbor Beach, Breard County, 8,998. Al Marada, Monroe County, obviously 7,379
people. Neptune Beach and Duval County 7,241. The best practices in charter review or the staff and committee will work well together. Always an aspiration for a best practice. Sorry, that was my commentary. Holding several public
forums for discussion, especially if referendum is scheduled. Use of website for an agenda. Minutes of meetings. Display of current and proposed language. uh which can help engage the citizens. If a referendum is scheduled, develop a frequently asked question
sheet for the website and consider partnering with other civic organizations to help with forums and public discussions. Reach out and include these groups. More best practices for a charter review committee. Charter powers and authority are granted to more than one entity.
Confusing language in elections section usually in qualifications. Writing too much less is better. Charter trends in Florida form of government. The trend since the 1950s toward council manager and commission
manager form of government including new incorporations. Charter review time periods is not required and has leapt up to the discretion of council. Also has a petition provision. When specified, there are 10 to 20 year periods. New cities use five years starter charter
review. Are we able to get Lynn back on? >> She just entered into chat saying she'd logged back on and she thought maybe her issues were resolved. I'm happy to turn the floor over to her if that's the case. >> We're going to give Susan >> Let me try and see if there's still that echo. Can you hear me?
>> Yeah, it sounds good. Thank you, Susan, for taking that on. >> Yes. Thank you, Susan, for stepping in and covering all of that for this. These are the most popular questions used from the model city charter. Teddy Roosevelt helped create this group in order to
take on Tamonn Hall in New York in the 1890s. about every decade they update the model. We don't recommend ever using the model's language. However, they put very good questions in place for each article. And so the questions you see
posed here about being reflective of population, both residents and businesses. Does the council have a good mix of people? Does the charter address responsible professionalism and do it adequately? Has the city provided
opportunities for citizen participation in the process of the charter review? And is the city engaged in civic education about the charter? For example, being able to share it at websites, referring to the charter regularly when conducting workshops,
etc. I share these so that you can get a feel for what other cities go through around not just Florida but the United States when they conduct charter reviews. Next slide, please. This is just a couple of websites that I share. The first being the model city
charter. The uh second one is a library of over a hundred municipal charters in Florida as well as a handful of the county charters that are in existence. There is no fee to look at any other city's charter. If you cannot find it in
the MUN code library, most cities, anyone a city that I'm just going to say is larger than about a thousand population, they have their charters on their websites. And then through the league's off um office in Tallahassee, we can provide peer city comparisons at
the slide a couple slides back where you saw the list of other cities. Isa Marada and Marathon and Key West are definitely island cities. It's not very easy to just reach out and find true comparisons that way. The ones I selected were
similar in scope of work and they are on barrier islands if in fact not exactly island cities. So that's this slide. Next slide please. And here we are at questions and discussion. And again Susan thank you
for going through the earlier material. I would be glad to uh engage with anyone who's got a question about charters in general or the charter review process. So, at this point, we have this opportunity for anybody in the public
that has a question on the presentation or wants to ask Lynn, who is the resident expert on charters, any questions. And you can do so from the podium if you would like. And if I don't hear anybody, then we'll get back to public comment.
Anybody online? >> No. >> We We've got one. We've got a live one. >> My name is Pam Martin, Plantation Key, and I'd like to talk about I guess this
is time now for um chapter five and eight. uh the charter uh review uh with uh an eye on what's going on in Tallahassee, especially US as members looking about what they're talking to do about
property taxes. And right now, um basically the state of Florida is sucking up power from the villages, cities, and municipalities, and the feds are sucking it up from the states. So, you've got the state with that property tax. They're going to be cutting a lot of the budget money a out of what's
going on. And Florida has its own doge committee which is uh kind of um a tisk a lot of uh villages, cities and municipalities in in the Keys. I would like to ask that we leave our election
process alone. Um the uh voters have voted down all these changes that have been going on for it seems like every election recently and I think mostly it's coming from the village commissioners themselves and not to
disparage the current crew but the voters of uh village of iron want to keep the option of throwing the bums out. Okay. And until we see enough of the commissioners um with enough of a a
repertoire of um paying attention uh learning uh government, you know, if you're going to run for office, watch the TV meetings, uh read the land development regulations. You'll learn a lot just from that. Parliamentary
procedure for dummies. uh I mean uh on the political forums we should be asking our candidates what have you done to get to know how I am government works and the role of a a village commissioner um uh so uh uh and I think that most of
these changes are want to be done really for the village commissioner and themselves and I'm going to say tough twinkies folks you know if you want to run for that job learn and and um even though you're going to have to have maybe a rough learning process. That's
part of the process of the jobs and the voters in the village of Marada want that option if we need to to get somebody out that may say they're one kind of person and as we watch the legislation going on we find out they're
a whole different kind of person. Um and also uh during the races there's usually one sometimes two races that get the most attention. And what would you would do if you did ranked voters? We'd get two losers. Okay? And all the village people who came out to vote for the
winners would get screwed again by getting stuck with the losers. So of four commissioners, we could have the top two races get the winners and the losers and then whatever we we get from the end. If you're a candidate, you're running for an office, pick a number,
run. And if other people want to run against you, uh do that. Uh, also, uh, we used to have where I paid a a $250 deposit for the local, uh, party, and that would cover all of the party's candidates in the office. I went to do
that again, and they knew nothing about it, and I had just shredded my old political records uh, when the village was still in with my uh, uh, check and my signed letter. Um, and also, um, I like the, uh, rotating uh, the village
mayor. I would like to see him paid a little bit more for that because there's a lot of expense in in just even the gas money for the ver and I like the village manager uh the members meet need more uh money but mara population voters is not going to vote for that uh uh and and I
would like to see more working stiffs actually on the commission um and uh I think we'd like one of the things we can help our village residents to learn is have did you know uh on the website and also between the the TV show. Did you
know the year when uh the village of Maramada uh came into force? Uh did you know uh how many village matters or just little population or even thing did you know how the village government runs? You know commissioners when can you run
just that did you know helps educate the voters and we've had a lot of shift in population here in Marada also. So, um I think those are all of mine, but leave the terms of office like they are. Um um
also the deposit for the political signs because the president of the United States is not coming down to moral to pay the the deposit to put his political signs out. Neither are our congressional and and senates whether it's state well uh federal senators. So, um those are
some important issues that uh in the past. Any questions? Thank you. Thank you for your comments. Do we have any other public comments at this time? Okay. Then what I'd like to do is go
through each section of section five and see if anybody sees something for instance in number one that we need to discuss. And if nobody sees that, we move on to two and we move on to three. And we'll see how much we can get done.
But I would really like to have a hard a hard stop at seven. Uh this is a volunteer group. Um we'll get through as much as we can. And um if anybody has, you know, an objection to that, then let me know. But I think I think we can get
an hour a good hours worth of work done. We've done pretty well tonight. Any anybody want to go past seven? Okay. hearing nobody then we'll we'll have Mari we'll have a hard stop at 7:00 >> and one thing uh Lynn is still
graciously staying on I think there was some confusion as to whether the questions were going to be directed to her we were moving to public comment do do we need >> would we like Lynn to Lyn to stay I don't want to take up her time if >> if uh if her role is if her role is done
>> well I would like for Lynn to be to be available as we're working working our way through. Um, Lynn, are you okay with that? >> Absolutely. >> Thank you very much. Like I said, we're going to wrap this thing up by 7, so we
won't try to keep you much longer. Now, I will put my glasses on so I can actually see what's going on. Um so if if we follow what the procedure we discussed section five village council
sub one uh starts with village council composition qualifications of council members and under a it's lays out that it's a five member uh village council. I don't does anybody have a problem with
the five? Well, I suggest that we do a little bit more of a clarification. And so I came up with a little um modified statement. Car, I'll read it. It says um the village council shall consist of five members elected at large by the qualified electors of the village. All
qualified electors may vote for each council seat. Just a little more clarifying. I >> I think that's a good change. Does anybody else have a comment about that? >> You want me to reread it? Okay. The
village council shall consist of five members elected at large by the qualified electors of the village. All qualified electors may vote for each council seat. Uh only if I know that some people in the the public have questioned whether
or not, as we just heard, we're sticking with the seat designation. If we do stick with the seats as a nation, I think that's a wonderful addition. If we end up deciding, for example, for subsection B to go to the top five vote getters like Marathon does, for example,
then it does then it would lead to confusion. >> I think I disagree with you in that it's saying qualified electors may vote for each council seat. So, it's not everyone can vote for each seat, >> right? that presupposes we have seats as
opposed to voting for five people. >> Correct. But we're actually only reviewing this particular clause and if we make a modification later on then we'll have to come back and revisit this clause. >> So this is a good segue. Why don't we maybe we're taking these out of order.
Why don't we talk about part B about whether it's going to be the top five or if we keep it like it is and then circle back if we don't change this back to um Lor's language. Yeah, I I like Lor's language. If we keep things the way it is, if we decide
not to, then I think there's tweaks made again that could be made, but instead of maybe saying council seats, saying each can vote for five or whatever it may be, council members. >> I understand. I understand what you're saying. But we're going to encounter that issue as we go through because we're going to have conflicting,
>> right? So with big picture, maybe we start big picture policy and then drill down on language. Yeah, I'm kind of thinking that too. Kind of know obviously whether how we elect is one thing and then terms. These are some big kind of conversations that we need to have and you know kind of hear from the
public and and whether or not Lynn um can you know kind of offer up some uh advice on pros and cons. Yeah, that might be kind of the the larger items that we kind of have a discussion if we kind of come to an agreement. All right, we want to go two, three, four, 20 year
terms or whatever. And then then, you know, then we decide kind of how how it needs to fall into the uh into the charter or exactly how we word things. I don't know if that's the way to look at it. I know that's I think something we're going to be talking about.
Yeah. So, we could start there. I'd certainly like to start with Richard, whatever what comments you have and then work our way Joe, Lori, and Craig and and Roger and then Susan and myself.
>> So, for right now, just clarification on what we're discussing. We're just discussing section 5B. Is that what we're we're talking about? Well, I mean to to be and I guess I'm a little get confused too, but to piggyback on what I said and Craig
clarified in a way that is very helpful. I thought do we want to just say okay as a general matter do we believe that five is a good number and then if we all say yes we move on and say okay how should elections be conducted five top seat
getters stay how it is what should we identify the big picture issues and then drill down. Yeah, I I I like that. It's just will be a matter of us trying to to keep up with with the big picture items because going off of this. So, yeah, I
think that's a good >> big picture in five. >> Yeah, let's let's start with that. Um, >> okay. So, how many agree with five? >> Oh, section five, but >> five five council members >> consensus at five. >> Consensus at five. >> I don't really think we have the
population to support seven anyway. >> No. Well, well, if you look when we got the slide presentation, everybody that's our size kind of in the five range and same kind of form of government. So, it seems to be working. >> Um, so that's good. We've got one big
big picture. >> Two, form of government. >> Form of government. >> Okay. >> Um, >> go sorry, I didn't mean to cut you off, Richard. going back to you. Um, you know, big picture item which does kind of lend itself now to be >> to be
so are we do we want to have a discussion about switching this to the top five vote getters or is everybody fine with the council seats? >> Um, I I mean personally I I don't like the idea of having the f top five vote
getters get elected. I I think for our our municipality, I mean, kind of stands out for some others because certain people are more popular than others. Um whether they're qualified for the job or not, that's a question. So here, popular
vote can really run a full election, but you know, you could if you had an idea or something that you wanted to get passed through village council, you could put the right five people up for vote and they all get elected because they're all popular. So, I I don't I
don't like the idea of just having, you know, top five people get elected. I think we need to run for individual seats. If there wants to be five people running for that seat, great. You know, whatever that is. But I I disagree. >> Keep it the way it is. >> Yes, >> Joe.
>> So, I would just say I would just quite frankly start with a question. What do the five seats mean? Does anybody here really know what the five seats mean? >> Do you have a definition for it? What's the reason for it? >> No, I I
>> all the questions all the I think five is a great number for us. I don't I think seven is too many to be on a council. I think >> I'm not talking about the number. I'm talking about the seats. >> What does seat one mean? What does seat would you like to use? >> I mean because look, if you read this and you look go back up under section
two and it talks about how there's unique characteristics, distinct characteristics in individual communities. And then we drop down to 1B and we talk about seats. Well, how are those seats tied to these unique and individualistic communities within the boundaries of Marada?
>> I don't see how they are. >> I don't think they are. I think they represent that chair, this chair, this chair, and you know, all five chairs. >> Well, what does that mean? What is a place on the education key? Is chair 2 upper mount cumbi? Is chair three lower mounti? Are those distinct communities
that should have distinct representation? Because when you read this, it seems like that's the spirit of the document. I'm not advocating that that's the way this should be. I'm just saying that it's ambiguous and unclear. And to speak to your point about the top
five vote getters, I the way that I see it right now, I don't understand how I could qualify or say I'm running in seat one and then arbitrarily I don't like who's running in seat one or I feel I'm not going to compete with seat one, so I'm just going to arbitrarily go to seat
two or seat three or seat four. And doesn't that seem like that's a disparity or or a inongruity with regards to, you know, how the election could could f could take place and how it could play out. I I just think that
this whole seat thing is confusing, ambiguous, and means nothing in my mind because there's no definition of it. So I think I think you got to first start by saying do we really even understand what we have
and then where do we go from there? >> So you're suggesting that a definition of the term seat needs to be um clarified and defined. >> I I I just don't think that there's a definition of I mean I understand seat
but what does that correspond to? >> So in your mind in your mind how do you visualize it? How would you define it? >> I I don't because I don't I don't see the seat tied to a geographic zone. >> I don't think I don't think you can define. It's not tied to anything.
>> Other municipalities do correct tie seats with correct and our community I I don't think is the right size 25,000 plus. >> We have at large voting with five different seats. And I'm sorry I'm skipping over but to address Richard
your concern I see it. I have the same concern but the exact opposite I guess conclusion um which is you can put up once you see who's running for which seat if you want to get you know five people in to control a council let's say
for whatever agenda it may be you wait you see who put in on that seat and then at the last day you come in and say this is going to be the strongest opposition to our point so we're going to put our strongest person against that person and on down the line to ensure a sweep.
Whereas with the five top vote getters, if you've got it's seat one with two very strong candidates running against each other one and may probably because they have different, you know, viewpoints. one only one is going to win instead of
both of them getting in and then having representation of differing viewpoints on council which I I personally think leads to the best result most of the times >> to have differing differing views hashed out >> and be able to be hashed out I I mean I
can see the point you were making and I think it's a well well grounded thought process I just view it as >> same concern with the exact opposite reaction as far as >> what you describe happens most elections that we have I mean year after year
>> and and I also agree with Joe that I don't think it makes sense to have the have seats when you have atlarge elections that because those seats aren't tied to anything other than the order of the chairs to Lori >> Lor's point anyway
>> I I do um I know this is a slight different topic in that but it kind of ties in with all of this if you change over and have a split election. It would eliminate some of that, you know, the issues of
>> Not really. Well, I also have a my concern with having um not having since they're taking the top the top five vote getters is that um I think as a a particular candidate, you take into consideration,
am I going to be concentrating on um a a campaign where I'm campaigning against one person or am I campaigning against four others, right? Or even 10 others, right? that is going to really take a
lot of consideration for a particular candidate to make a decision. Do I really want to put my name in the hat and go through this process if I have to campaign against you know nine other people or is it better for me to um
select a specific seat and concentrate on who that particular opponent is, what our differences is, what our commonalities are. And this begs a related question that we should consider as we're discussing this. How do we get back to staggered
seats? And do we even want to go back to staggered seats? Because I can tell you from a staff perspective, having been on staff for 3 years, when you have a new council, it takes a while to have a
working relationship. So that their priorities are not going to be the same as the priorities of the previous council. And so to have some continuity, having two or three existing council members makes it easier to transition um for staff because when you get all
five at the same time um it makes it incredibly difficult to divine what what priorities have changed. Um, and because we used to have a strategic plan that flowed from from council to council to council, and there were items that were
on a 10-year plan, and those those items would sometimes go up in importance depending on the council, and sometimes they went down. Here's an example of one. Remember when we were talking about the Marauder Arts District? That was that was a hot topic in 2018 until we
started talking about that you need to have a um special taxing district to actually fund the type of improvements that you needed and people heard taxing and that kind of squashed it. So it it actually came off the list. So from a staff point of view when we're talking
about seats we're talking about, you know, the top five. I really think we should also be talking about is there a possible way to stagger this back to three and two um so that we don't do that to staff again. That that's my
comment and I'd like to hear I'd like to hear from everybody but I'd like to hear from this side of the table some too. Um yeah, so I've got, you know, obviously a lot of sort of same thoughts and concerns, you know, everybody just talked about. The way I've been kind of looking at this is I kind of came up
with sort of problems that I've been seeing, you know, with the council and elections over the past however many years and figure out what the concerns are. Then how do we come up with solutions and, you know, obviously make changes what we're talking about? Um the one concern I have is the 100% turnover
he just talked about. You know, that is a problem for staff. It's a problem for the residents when every two years, like you said, they're moving along with something. You know, Kate just got approved and then new council comes in, it gets thrown in the garbage, staff
changes direction. It's hard to keep, you know, I think it's really taxing on everybody. I think having a little more continuity. Um, you know, having a new council, you know, try to, you know, kind of carry on, at least respect what past councils have, you know, uh, agreed
to do, I think, um, makes a lot of sense. Um, you know, the short terms affect continuity and stability. Um, you know, I'm wondering if having the longer four-year terms allows people, you know, to kind of get a little more comfortable, but then the staff managers
know that they're going to have the same people for a little while longer. Um, I call it electioneering. I don't know if that's the right term, but what you know, Joe talked about the switching of seats, the last minute, the pulling out. You know, we've seen a lot of this in a
lot of elections, you know, where people are making these, you know, I know it's a shell game. It's it's, you know, it's politics. It's how it is. But if there's any changes we could make to try to limit that a little bit, it might also help us get some better candidates. Not
that we don't have great candidates and great council right now, but if it's a less of a political game, maybe it'll help bring other people kind of out of the out of the community who say, you know what, I want to do that. Um, you know, I know we get some pretty
nasty campaigns, you know, that can be run down here. Um, I don't know if we do the pool v voting where you're doing everybody running together if that's if we don't get as much of that. So, if instead of all right, it's not me and Richard, you know, slinging mud at each other. It's all of us. You know, I I
think campaigns are run a little differently and we might be able to get some information from like a marathon or other areas. Does it actually happen that way or am I is this just wishful thinking? Um, and the longer terms you might keep I
know sometimes I hear some candidates they get into the race just because I got a problem with you so I'm going to run against you or whatever it is. They know they're going to get in for two years and you know probably move on for your commitment might say you know what okay I don't want to do this for the
wrong reasons. I want to get into this for the right reasons. So, there's a lot of concerns and changes and how I would like to see things be better. Um, and I don't know with what we're talking about how we can make that happen. I think the staggered terms will help. I think I
think longer terms is something to seriously look at and and the pool voting. I think those are all, you know, things we should be looking at because there's I know there's pros and cons. Um, and I don't I know it's hard to use a crystal ball and say whatever decision we come up with it's going to work out
that way. Um, you know, but I think again those are problems that I see and you know I try to find some solutions to them. I think that's what we should be trying to do. >> Sorry, Roger. Yeah, I I tend to agree with Richard on the seat thing because
addressing Joey as I remember before we had a village and talking to Ron Levy and those guys that Ron was one of the biggest push of the whole village concept in the first place and I think in its infancy everybody was talking
about five separate seats you know north end middle all the way down and the biggest problem became what if somebody doesn't run for that seat. That was one of the issues there. But um I'm I'm personally I'm not a big fan of
the whole popular vote. I think the seat thing which which you all brought up last minute we see it especially the last three or four elections last minute everybody's throwing the battle in this one can beat that one. But I don't know if you're going to change that anyway. I mean I don't even know if popular vote
will change that enough. I know what you're saying. It could because it's popular vote, but depends on how much money gets spent. I mean, we've seen crazy money get spent in election and somebody doesn't get elected. >> I mean, we're not talking about that right now, but you know what I'm saying.
The money thing can be a big issue. >> And I'm going to keep going back around because I know everybody has some more thoughts. Um, Susan, you want to add something at this point or do you want >> I mean other I' I've said a lot of I've said I've said a lot of what um um you
know I wanted to say I I do think I'm a I'm a proponent of keeping a shorter term um because I think it provides more uh power in the electorate and the residents. I understand your point about maybe getting some more continuity, but
I think people, as we heard before, want the ability to be like, listen, we don't get a lot in this village, and this isn't for this committee either, but as a factual matter, we don't get a lot of real debate to find out the differences of people, right? When people run for
council here, they all say exactly the same thing. And when they actually get on council, you realize what the big differences may have been from what everybody says the same thing versus what they actually vote for in practice.
So, I do think we two-year terms holds people more accountable to the electorate and and the residents of village of Al Marada. Um, I agree with you on the pool voting, hopefully taking some staying out of that and making it
such that, you know, right now we have a lot of people that that say all the same thing, but they can then instead of focusing on an individual race, say what they're going to do to help Al Marada as opposed to why so and so is not the right person to help Al Marada. Um, and
I and I think it would help, you know, lessen the political gang. Uh the staggering of elections I'm right now not all that much in favor of but I'm I can't say that my mind's made up. My only thought process in the
questions become is you know US Congress turns over 400 and some seats every two years. Um and it's rare that you don't obviously have one that is completely new. And I know that in recent history we had one
council that was completely new, but that's been rare for 20 years. Usually you do have some overlap because people get reelected or nobody runs against them or for whatever reason you you have some overlap built in. Um but it's possible you have an all new um council
and I don't necessarily think that's a bad thing for Al Marada. Um although again I I could I also don't really want to see election signs on stagger terms which would mean what if you did every if you did stagger terms it would
be every year you'd be having an election and I'm just that that to me as a resident seems exhausting >> to see those signs every year. I mean >> that that's a a point well taken. Um, remember we used to have them staggered
and then we had a resignation and a death and that's how we ended up with everybody on the same ballot. But up until that point, we had three and two and three and two. And as much as I would love to see a three-year term, cuz I'm an oddball, I I don't think it's
going to pass with the voters, the voters have rejected that once before. So I I think that we have to make res recommendations that actually will our time isn't wasted. Um, so I
don't see that moving on from two-year terms is is really something that's gonna pass, but I I am I we don't have to make a decision tonight, but I'd like for everybody to kind of think about and do a little research on getting back to
staggered cuz I get I get Susan's point. Nobody wants to see all the signs, but I also don't remember the elections being so hot um when we had them staggered because frankly they have you a lot of people just don't
want to run because you see how nasty some of these elections have gotten at the local level and it's really disheartening. I mean as a small community to see people tearing each other down like that for a seat for two years. I I I'd like to see something
that fosters more of a community. Um I do think we can talk about, you know, the seats and whether it should be cuz you could do some a model like this. You've got three seats that are that are, you know, lower mat, upper mat, and then basically Windley Key and
Plantation Key or however the population would divide up and then have two at large. Um, you know, we've talked about in the comp plan recently that there's nothing wrong with recognizing that lower mat ain't the same as upper mat and that there's some policies that
maybe are good for lower mat that may not be what we want for upper mat cuz it's two different islands. So, I don't know that we have to make a decision about it, but I tonight, but and I also like to see people have different views
and it not being the Miss Coral Shores pageant. No offense. Um, >> what you saying there, Todd? But I want to hear the difference between two people that are running if they're willing and have the courage to say this is kind of what I stand for and this is
different than my opponent and this is how and it's okay that we're different. Let's just at the end of the day still be friends and still be a community. And I I just feel like if if one of the reasons I wanted to be on this committee
was to see if we could foster some of that through some of our recommendations to kind of bring us back together a little bit. Anyway, enough talking for me. >> So, maybe we could do a combination of things. something. I I actually kind of like the idea of a three-year term because I think that especially for
people who have never actually participated in um maybe like the land planning authority or they really been involved in any of these um um community committees don't have a really great understanding and sometimes they get elected and they're like a deer in
headlights, right? and it takes them a while to um come up to speed, right, with understanding the comp plan, which is very complicated if you aren't aren't working with it or haven't read it and spend some time in it, it can be very complicated to understand. And then there's other issues where, you know, history comes into play too, right? So
when you when you when you remove everybody off the dis and replace it with a whole new set of five people, you lose a set of history, you lose some consistency. Currently right now we're lucky because we've got Deb on the on the on the dis and she does have an
extensive history of what has transpired in in the village in you know in the past. So she is actually a really great source of hey how did this come about? you know, why is this taken so long to to move forward or why did it end up
being dropped off, right? She's got that history. But Paso could come up with a uh a solution where we stagger the terms and we stagger the the year. So, basically, if we do two, you serve for two years. If you're on uh the one of the three, it's a three-year term. Maybe
that's a combination, right? >> That's >> Sorry, that's one way to get it staggered the for the first jump. I don't know. We would be able to work it after. But that's the nice thing about being up here. We're kind of spitballing ideas and they're all thoughtful and
they all have some merit. It's just a matter of kind of trying to pick the best course for the village. And you know, the good thing about all this, we don't have to make the final decision. We just make recommendations and the village council will figure out whether these are good recommendations or not.
>> Does Does Lynn want to jump in here? >> Mr. Mr. Chairman, I just had two points I thought would help. There are roughly 2,270 council and mayor seats across the state of Florida. 700 turnover every year.
Some of that is turn limits. Some of that is people who either pass away in office or resign. The rest of them do not get reelected through the electoral process. The vast majority though, and I'm going to say 90%, it is staggered seats for the very
reasons you all have discussed. And I know I didn't get to cover that when we were going through the earlier slides. So, I just wanted to offer that up as food for thought. If you want to move towards staggered, it would mean giving people in this current council longer
lengths to their terms for a one-time deal until their seat would come up again. I'm also going to say the main pro for three years is it helps financially because you're always in the year that you are in fiscally. You are in the year
that you are auditing the prior year and you're in the year for which you are planning. That's three fiscal years in play all at one time for a city council. In a 2-year term, nobody ever finishes the three-year cycle. In a four-year
term, they do even more of that. That's how most people discuss the pros and cons. However, you all have mentioned what you think the voters will or will not tolerate. I am not endorsing any one of those. I just want you to know that that's some food for thought about a three-year term and about how you would
get to a staggered process. I'll finish by just saying a mixed council that would be three at large seats uh or three district seats. what you mentioned lower and upper and middle key and then
two at large. There are cities that have had tremendous success by blending a council that way. One of the two at large seats can be a directly elected mayor or you continue to do the mayor in a rotating fashion among the five seats.
I just wanted to cover those points. Thank you. >> Lynn, could could you do could you explain a little bit more about the three-year cycle? I I've seen some confused looks and honestly I'm not sure I'm understand completely the three-year
cycle of how that fits into a budgetary process >> in in a fiscal year which is October 1 to September 30. your city council worked on the budget or the the council in place had to have adop a budget
adopted with public hearings in August and September and then the brand new fiscal year starts in October. Within a month, everybody begins their audits and the audit team comes in and audits the prior year. for a council to review a
prior year if they've not been in place. It's kind of like um reading the minutes to a committee and you never went to any of the meetings. You don't really know the context of a lot of what you read. It's just a report. You're also then in
the following spring going to begin the third of these jobs, which is the budget for the year ahead. By state law in Florida, we budget in one-year increments. even if you plan in longer increments, but by law your budget has
to be 101 to 9:30 every year. So having adopted it, you then audit the year before and then within a few months less than six, you start the plan process for the brand new budget.
Juggling three fiscal years at one time is kind of the mindset. Am I looking at an audit? Am I looking at the current budget? or am I looking at the budget for the year that is yet to come? So, that's the juggling of the three fiscal years at one time.
>> See, I'm glad we didn't let you go because that was really informative and I wasn't really um aware of that three-year cycle like that. And I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one that wasn't aware of how that works. So, thank you very much for that. >> And it really kind of explains what
happened this year during the budgeting cycle. You think about it, we had a whole new we had a whole new dis and they were, you know, tossed this budget that they had to figure out where they were and how they were and how they were
going to handle it. And were there some mistakes made? Maybe. Well, I guess every time we talk about it, we we go a little bit further down the rabbit hole as far as do we, you know, there's some merit to the three-year term, but would the voters accept it? Would they understand would
that very well presented um three-year budget cycle as an as a reason why you would want that continuity in a three-year cycle um versus two. Even though like kind of like Susan's um point that you know with a two-year
cycle, you can excuse my language, throw the bastards out if you don't like them. You only have them for 24 months. So it's something that, you know, obviously we don't have to make any decisions tonight. But I these are all really good things that we should be considering.
>> I think the quote from public comment is you want to keep the option of throwing the bums out. I wrote that down. Um, >> I almost had it right. >> Almost had it right. >> My ears aren't good. I can hardly see anymore. >> Now, well, I have a question because a
lot of what was was just suggested is actually work that has to be done within an 8-month period if I understood Lynn correctly. Right. So, you have the budget from the prior year that would
come in and then there's an auditing process. I'm not sure that we've ever partaken in an auditing process for the budget uh for the next approximately five or 6 months before you start working on the new budget. Um and at a council level, I'm not sure I've ever
start seen a new budget being started to be worked on it prior to summertime. Um but that is all condensed within really an eight-month period. So, if I understand Lynn correctly, and she'll correct me if I'm wrong, the three-year cycle is really what it would take to
see the budget that you initially adopted yourself all the way through to the end. Um, and and while Okay. And while um certainly something to think about, I'm not sure that that is, >> you know, a critical factor, but it's
>> Excuse me if I may. Um, John Quick has his hand raised and would like to offer something when you have an opportunity. >> Good, good time. Everybody, John, would we please please >> Sure. I just I wanted to just share
remind everybody um in terms of uh three-year terms, which is fine, you know, fine going either way. I just want to make sure that when you're considering uh financial issues that there's also obviously the impact of a potential special election um every
other um uh every other term. So you would be on our regular elections are every two years. We piggyback on the county uh or I'm sorry national and state and county elections. So we don't pay right now but in the special election we would. Marathon obviously
does um and uh that's not an issue but I just wanted to make sure that you all are aware of that. Um uh so you have that information. Also in terms of districts, um I you all hadn't talked about how that might set up and I know it's a little early, but I don't want to
I'm trying not to chime in, you know, interrupt too much. Um but I wanted to make sure you're aware depending on how you set that up. So if if you have districts like say you have three districts uh and and a mayor and a a vice mayor, if those district seats are
only elected within by people within that district as opposed to villagewide, you every 10 years you would uh likely have to go through the redistricting process to ensure that you have to uh that you have the proper makeup in terms
of uh equal representation. racial uh racial makeup, all of those things. So, I just want to make sure uh that you all have that information. Again, that's this is just information. I'm not advocating one way or another. Just making sure you have that. And and even if there's not really a change, I
mean, we've been pretty consistent for the most part in terms of our uh our makeup. But even if there's not a change, you do still have to go through that process to confirm that your lines are uh are where they are or or whether
or not they would have to be redrawn by each district. I don't believe you would you would not have to do that if you had the seats, but they are elected villagewide because at that point everybody's got this you you have the equal representation because they're they're voted on villagewide. So, uh, I
I hope that, um, uh, gave you guys just a little bit additional information, uh, for you to chew on. >> Thanks, John. I I think part of the frustration that I heard from from our group is that nobody wants to see a seat jumping at the end. Um, I I know one
election it cost Sue Miller a seat because somebody jumped into her seat. You know, that's just being honest. And if you pick a seat, pick a seat. And I can't keep you for we can't keep you from dropping out of the race. There's some gamemanship that goes on there,
too. We've seen that. But when you pick a seat, maybe there's a way to make sure you you stay in that seat. You stay for that seat and you don't see a weaker opponent and try to jump at the last minute or want to quote take somebody out because your views aren't exactly
the same. Um maybe that's where some of that frustration comes in. But it sounds like to me it sounds like either you're you're sticking with the same model of five seats or you're going to the five
with the most votes. That's because it sounds like we we're going to trigger all kinds of other exotic problems if we if we move away from one of those two models. Does anybody else have a take on that? >> I I agree with you. Uh, and and and
quite frankly, population-wise, Plantation Key is the most largely populated um island out of out of the three. And it's actually I'm actually kind of wondering like how many candidates have we had from the lower Matcomi area in past elections. Probably
not nearly as many as from the Plantation Key. >> Henry, Sue, David, um, Web. >> I'm just saying in comparison to the Plantation Key. >> Yeah. Um, is there any way of um I know
probably nobody here will know how much it costs to have an off-year election. I don't know um John if you have an answer. >> The the staff information said between I think 31 and 35,000 or somewhere in that range. >> That's what Marathon um Okay. >> budgets for theirs.
>> Okay. Thank you, >> Richard. Uh I I think less is more. Um you know, try to keep this somewhat simple. We we've definitely gone down many different routes here, but my personal thing is keep it two years and alternate
seats. Uh city of Pinerest, they jumped back into alternation. So there's like a full breakdown of how they did that. Um it's a great model that we could follow to get back into that alternation of seats. And um you know I I think that
would just be the smartest way without spending money and reszoning and just or redistricting all that stuff. I just keep it simple. So um that's my two cents for that. >> Joe, I think staggering is something that we
really really need to come out of this group with. Um, I think there just needs to be some carryover of institutional knowledge. And I think right now the the prospect of what happened in the last election where you can lose all five at the same time and be sitting there with
brand new people that are totally green. Um, just doesn't make any sense at all. And >> not when you only have 24 months to learn on the job, >> right? And then they only have 24 months to learn everything. I I I would advocate for a three-year term. I would
advocate for a staggered term. I just think from from an institutional standpoint, from an education standpoint, from a knowledge standpoint, I just it just seems to make more sense. >> Lori, >> I'm in total agreement with Joe.
Staggered terms and a three-year term. >> Craig, >> uh, yeah, I I agree. I think that's um I think that's going to help um, you know, with things. So I think uh yeah I think three year and and staggered.
>> Roger. >> I kind of like where he I'd like to see what Pine Cres did how they figured out how to stagger him like that. But >> it's they actually it goes by year. It shows how they break it into the election. It's under their uh under their charter. Pull it up and and read.
>> No, but to get there now we'd have to do like Lynn said, we'd have to do it all in one shot and then somebody's going to carry over. How do you do that with two-year instead of three year? >> One way you could do it is to take the three highest vote getters and they stay
the longest and the two that have the lowest votes would be the ones that are draw the short end of the stick and have to run again in a year. I mean I that's one way of doing it with not familiar with the Pinerest model, but I'm certainly going to look into it.
You could also have the them instead of doing a year, they could do two years also because it it would be staggered and then they'd be getting the the same two-year term that they would be otherwise getting. Um, and then that way you you stagger it that way, too. >> Can you repeat that, John, please?
>> Yeah. Yeah. I was just piggybacking off what Tai said. Instead of doing three in one year, you could do three three years and two years. And then the the benefit of that is that you don't have an election immediately the next year. And also the people that are coming in are at a minimum at least getting the the
current two-year term that they have now. So, um that would still stagger it. It wouldn't have to be one and three. You could also do it two and three. And um you know, we we could build this out. It's um you know, we we helped the Pinerest folks actually with theirs and and I've done this with some other cities, too, where they move from from
standard to staggered. And um uh you know, obviously that's something that that we could build into the uh uh the ballot language and the uh uh the charter the the charter change. >> Susan, >> um I like I said, I'm I'm not entirely
sold, but I'm not not sold on staggered terms. Um I am I do think we should keep him at two years. I agree with Richard on that. Um and and Robert keeping it at two years if for for numerous reasons. Number one, I
think accountability to the public. Number two, it is unusual. Last election we didn't have a full turnover of council. I think it was four years ago that we did. Um and historically that's been pretty rare um that that you had a complete turnover. Uh and number three,
going through the special election process um with the um staff uh the extra burden on the staff because it would be the staff that would need to run the election every other cycle as
opposed to the supervisor of elections I think is an extra expense and a burden. And I know that in the staff's uh indications it would require potentially hiring on additional um part-time staff for those years. Uh, so I think that keeping it at two makes a lot of sense.
>> Um, I I could live with two and I could live with three because I like the idea of accountability going through an entire budget cycle as it was explained and I and having been on staff and watching how hard it is to get new folks up to speed cuz almost everybody that
that sits on our village council has has another job. So they're not, you know, their time with staff is very limited and their time with the manager is very limited. I I like the staggered. Whatever we decide about the two or the three, I can live with, but I really um
feel that for continuity, I agree with Joe that we should we should get back to staggered like we were. >> Well, I think we have a majority there with the staggered. I I don't know if we need to necessarily take a vote, but does anybody have an
objection to a recommendation to to village council that staggered would be the preferred option? Okay. I hearing hearing nobody objecting to that. We make recommendation for staggered. I don't necessarily feel that
we have to, you know, make the decision tonight on two recommendation of two and three. I'd like to do a little bit more research myself. I there valid reasons for going in in either one of those directions. So, um if everybody's good with kicking that can down the
proverbial road to the next meeting, um I would that's the way I would go. Yeah, that's fine. >> So, what kind of information would you want to get prior to the next meeting with regards to us being able to make a
decision about terms? >> I I would like to >> because because Susan had mentioned some cost figures and some things of that nature and I think if that's the case, we really need to understand what those are. >> And we also need to understand the converse of those. What does it cost to
put somebody in one of these seats and keep them in one of those seats? What kind of continue education's going on? >> What are those costs? >> And those are all fair points because if you're having to to retrain somebody every two years, those costs are going to be offset by what a special election
would cost that you've heard is a little bit over $30,000 to to run. Um, I I would like to talk to somebody like Lynn a little bit more and get a little bit more feedback from, you know, her
experiences with different different governments and what seems to have worked and what hasn't. I'm just looking at it from, you know, it would be nice to if you're staffed to be able to work with somebody a little bit longer and I think we'd see a little bit more get done up here. And that's not a
that's not a slam on anybody that's been up here, but when you only have two years, you don't have a lot of time to to move anything on agenda forward. >> Um, we've got a question, I guess, more about the the process and, you know, maybe I don't know Ron um might be able
to answer this. So, you know, we just talked you' mentioned um that if we have the off-year election, it might be more pressure on staff. Is there any way if we have, you know, some sort of suggestion, okay, well, we're looking at
this, what that potential real world um what it's going to could potentially do to staff, what the outcome would be, you know what I mean? And get a a report back at the next meeting, if you know what I'm saying. If we say, "All right, we want to do a, what could the effects be?" You know, or so that's just one
question. Another question I have again kind of for Ron um at the end of this whatever it is we come up with and if it is something that's going to go out for referendum what sort of um support or information gets put out to the public
like how like I'm assuming there's not necessarily going to be a big massive campaign like you see with you know vote yes on whatever vote no you see other groups coming in how does all the information get out to the public and we say okay these are the decisions we made these our rationale. How does h how does
it get into people's hands or on their devices so the information can get out there? So as opposed to showing up the ballot box going what the heck is this? So that's question. >> I can answer that question to to some degree if you like
>> please. >> Yeah. So the village is not going to be able to advocate. The village itself is not going to be able to advocate for any one position one way or another. all they're going to be able to do is they can do anformational campaign as to what the proposed changes are. Um, in terms
of getting into what the rationale was behind it, that's I it's a little bit of a I feel like it's a little bit slipping into the could could slip into the advocacy. It would depend. We'd have to take a look at it, but um the village could could if they if they wanted to and and you know we would and we had the
budgeted funds for it do anformational campaign to educate people as to what the uh ballot information is that they're also the the supervisor of elections usually does uh you have sample ballots as well. Um but that's really just going to have the ballot
questions which are different than the ballot questions are different than the actual um the substantive changes that will be uh built out in the ordinances. So you know we can we can doformational campaigns um can advocate obviously individuals outside of the village could
advocate one way or another. So um you know there there's a possibility that there may be advocating um outside the village. >> I have a question. When when was the last time because I do know and and you've referenced it that the longer
term came up for a referendum or um change to the charter and was voted down. How how long ago was that again? >> I can't remember, but it it it went down pretty hard. I don't think there was a lot of support for going to the to a longer term than the two-year term. I
mean, we're always going to be safe with if we don't if we don't recommend a change, we're safe. It's the risk is always making the change. >> Well, and also how you how how do you bucket the changes because what I wouldn't want to see is you know other
than myself a large consensus for for staggered terms um is if you lump it all together then it all goes down. So part of it is trying to understand how how to how to um package it >> package how to separate how to because
some things have to go together. >> Yes. this doesn't have to go together. Um, and we need to be and that that's a conversation certainly for another day. >> But, you know, there's one thing that we have that's an opportunity in this election cycle is that none of the the
citizen sponsored referendums, all 20some of them, none of them got enough signatures to be on the ballot. So, so it would be a pretty centric village ccentric ballot other than the the other races. you know, you're not going to see
I always think about when somebody gets their ballot and they're, you know, a hundred questions on there. We're not going to have that. Um, but I I agree with Susan that there's logic logical groupings that need to be made. Um, and
you don't want everything to go down because somebody doesn't like one thing, >> right? I I think we would have to separate sections, right? they would have a a a ballot for for section five for any of the changes in section five. You either
agree to those or you don't agree to them. >> And see that's the packaging that >> that's the packaging there. >> For examp just just a for example if we go to a three-year term and have a staggered term and that's all in I think section five >> and it's an up or down vote and it goes
down it means we don't have staggered elections. But >> well, I think that we would do it this way. We do section section 51. We had any changes there to number of seats and that would be a vote. If we had a change for the term of office,
that'd be another another um vote for section 5, section two, subsection two, which is the term of office. >> So based on subsections, which we get back to separating, which is >> right, which is what we would have to do. >> Different than packaging, >> right? Packaging is not going to work cuz it's going to say no all day long.
No, I agree. >> Yeah. So, John, I don't know if you have any input like whatever again we come up with goes to council. How does it go to to ballot? Is it what what is it going to look like? You hear what we're saying? So, don't know if you have any input on kind of what it uh what it
looks like on the end. >> Yeah. So, it depending on how you all group it. So, just one thing to remember there are very strict rules and you all may not be aware of this. There's very strict rules in terms of how a uh proposed charter change can appear on the ballot. There's word limitations. Um
and it it it has to so there it'll depend on what's being proposed. But as how we've drafted them in the past is most of them we have done as standalone questions. I believe the last time we
did a 4-year one. I'm trying to remember if that also included a staggered term. I I feel like it did, but I'd have to go back and look. And I think those were grouped together because they naturally flowed together. Um, but but again, it
would really depend on it really depend on the on the amount of words that we have. Um, my preference is really to to separate them unless there is some reason why uh you wouldn't want to separate them. Say, you know, you
guys are talking about doing staggered terms. If you say, "We really want three-year terms and we really want staggering and and and I'm just throwing this out there. I'm not not that I've heard this, but say somebody says, but the majority of you say or the council says, but under no circumstances do we
want staggered terms with two-year um you know, with two-year terms, then you would naturally group those together because um you don't want to run the risk of one being approved and the other one not being approved. So, uh you you can do you can combine them if they
naturally would go together and something like that, but otherwise I would I would separate them um for uh um ease of reading, ensure that we're in compliance with the laws on ballot questions um and uh and the like.
Did that answer your question? I hope. >> Uh yeah, I think so. Thank you. Are we tackling another big issue? I see it's 650. >> Um, we >> we're deferring. It's up to you. >> Listen, what do you all want to do? Do you want to start another big issue with 10
minutes to go or do you want to call it 10 minutes early? >> I guess I kind of have a question for John. So, Joe, John, I can understand where we would need to to take this um to a vote if we were going to change term limits or seat limits. If we're
just making a modification or a clarification to some of the language, would that also require a a vote from the electoral? >> Yeah. Any any change would have to be uh approved by the electorate. >> Okay. >> I mean, it's it's not like a scrier's
issue. I mean, this is a change that even if it's just a clarification um uh or or you feel like you're strengthening something, it it's still added substantive language. We would it would need to be uh go to the >> Okay. And so then I I I think that it would be pretty important for us to know
what the word limitation is for us for these changes because we wouldn't want to go over >> well the the actual language of of what you're ch like the the actual language in the charter is not um you're not limited. So if you want to put in a
whole new section and it's it's really lengthy, that's not the issue. It's it's it's really incumbent on on me as the village attorney to draft it. It's the ballot question and the ballot summary that those are the things that that have the word limit. So if you all want to,
like I said, you put something on that's five words, no problem. If you put something on that's 250 words that's being added to the charter, I need to condense that down into, if my recollection is correct, I think it's 15 words for the ballot question and 75
words. Um, and uh so so you're what you're proposing is not a big deal. what's really on on me and what what's going to be on the ballot. >> All right. Thank you for the clarification. And and while you're on the hot I was going to ask
>> Okay. While you're on the hot seat, John, we have been having some question about the resolution. Um because the resolution itself um does not reflect that this committee
was to have a facilitator. But I knew I had heard that being discussed. And so I did go back and review cuz it was odd for me to pull something like that out of thin air cuz it's not something I would have thought about on my own. Um, I went back and reviewed the village
council meeting where uh on Tuesday where you had um phrased the motion and then there was about 10 minutes of discussion, but about an hour 38 into it, you said that this resolution only passed subject to two things. one being
a review such as the the the League of um Florida Cities and the other being a facilitator that may or may not be a local facilitator and hopefully a volunteer facilitator. That part of course was not in the motion, but the motion and this entire resolution in our
body was subject to those things. I just want to make sure that we're complying with the 50-0 vote of the council in our meetings and and being, you know, procedurally legitimate as we work through the substance as well.
>> Yeah, I think I think you all are fine. Now, that was brought to my attention um this afternoon and what I had suggested to the the village manager uh to Ron was that we bring this up with the council tomorrow uh to get, you know, to get clarification since it didn't make it
into the resolution. That way, we can confirm and uh and and get it taken, you know, get that taken care of whichever way they want to go. But since it wasn't in there, I suggested let's deal with it tomorrow since we have a council meeting anyway and then we can get that taken care of for for you all, whichever way
the council wants to go. But I do recall that same conversation. I I remember it as well. Yes. >> Yeah. And and so my concern I I don't know why it didn't make it into the resolution given the clarity. Obviously, the council always has the ability to amend their resolutions however they wish. So I'm glad that they're going to
address it tomorrow. Um, but that that struck me as as something that was a hotly debated topic and I just want to make sure that we are complying with the direction of the city of the village council. >> So, I appreciate you bringing it up to them tomorrow. >> And by the way, Suz, I didn't know I was not I didn't know there was a time I
wasn't on the hot seat. So, >> fair enough. >> Well, I'd like to thank everybody for participating tonight. Um, we we got we we made some progress. Um, we've got a couple things to think about before I'm
assuming next Monday, same time, same bat channel. >> Okay. And we'll wait with baited breath to see what the village council does tomorrow with our with our facilitator. Um, thank you for coming. >> One thing, next Monday's President's Day, so I
>> Yeah, sorry about that. So, it'll be two weeks. >> It'll be L >> L >> Darn it. Um what's what's the group's uh pleasure as far as meeting
meeting dates? >> Well, we're on a short >> we're on a short time table. >> Yeah. >> Um very short timetable. So, >> what about uh Tuesday the 17th? Just not Monday the 16th. New Year.
>> Yeah, I'm good. >> Wait, I thought that was a Chinese New Year. Year of the horse on the 17th. Okay. >> Ash Wednesday. >> We have Ash Wednesday. Yeah. >> Um I'm fine. Tuesday.
>> Wednesday. Wednesday. >> I will make Wednesday work. I can I could do Wednesday. >> Okay. >> Is everybody good for Wednesday >> the 18th >> at 5:30 again? >> Sure.
>> I think I forgot my phone in the car. >> Yeah. Well, let me know. Or don't let me know. Let Let Jennifer know or Martney know. Marne. Um, I think that that wraps us up for tonight
to Lynn, too. She's very much >> two things. Thank you very much to Lynn. >> Mhm. >> Um, and the second thing is we've made some progress on five and eight. Obviously, we're not done with five and eight yet, but do we want to tack something else on or just keep next week
at five and eight so public knows? >> No, I think we need to keep five and eight finish. I know you think I'm a glutton for punishment, but I think we need to finish up 5 and 8. And I can I can see that going a whole another meeting. >> Okay. >> But at least we we've kind of framed the issues. >> I just didn't want to be precluded if
all of a sudden we come in here in a half an hour, we get five and eight done, not moving on to the next thing to try to shorten things. That would >> If we if we get that done, we're going to happy hour. >> You're buying. >> Okay, I'll buy that. Okay. >> Thank you everybody.