oh I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm supposed to do this part um we're going to have a invocation by Pastor Derek McGee from bible-based Church Tallahassee commissioner Proctor uh I don't see him he's going to do our Pledge of
Allegiance um you got it yeah commissioner Maddox introduce our do you want to introduce our uh thank you uh today we have with us Pastor Derek McGee he be giving our invocation Pastor m yes sir you let us
pray oh Lord our Lord how excellent is thy name in all the Earth we come today to handle important business necessary business so we pray for today's meeting we invoke your presence and your power I pray for this County Commission pray that you would be with them that you would endow them with wisdom knowledge
understanding and peace we pray for the citizenry of our County oh God that everything that is discussed today and decided upon would be for the benefit and the blessing of this community thank you for this service thank you for the people who've made it here safely let all that be done be done for your glory and your glory alone we thank you once
again it's in your name that we do pray amen amen and amen thank you Pastor McGee would you please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one
nation under God indivisible with liy and justice for all thank you commissioner Maddox and thank you Pastor McGee for being here we appreciate you blessing us today um all right so uh I think now we're going to
move into Awards and presentations um Mr county commissioner do you want to recognize those or you want me to do it I forget if it's you or me okay so uh commissioner Maddox uh are you ready to do the proclamation for Mr Hollinger yes sir okay floor is yours
[Music] M come on on Pastor B about all the big dolls out today I'll let you introduce him when it's your turn everybody come on up all right Mr chair the proclamation reads
whereas the later J holler has been a historic preservationist uh a community activist in his in his native Tallahassee Florida since he was 13 years of age ultimately leading him to serve at the age of 24 in the role of the president of the Tallahassee branch
of the NAACP the youngest president in the Branch's history it does deser man [Applause] absolutely whereas at age 17 years old La Hollinger was named curator of the tah of the Taylor House Museum of
historic French Town by the Tallahassee Urban League Incorporated due to hollingers subsequential subsequent research and persistence he succeeded in having the century old house listed on the National Registry of historic places
by United States Department of the Interior on April the 6th 2015 and whereas in 2013 theat Tre Hollinger founded the nonprofit National Association of the preservation of African-American history and culture Incorporated which is committed to
serving endangered African-American historic landmarks educating American communities about the contribution of African-American P pioneers and exists to support and protect the artifacts that remain to tell the story trials
triumphs and pres preserve a pres perseverance of African-Americans and whereas the L stre hollers many initiatives as founder and president of Na a ah C and that is all
of it uh includes the designation of a major State thoroughfare in in honor of late Civil Right luminary Reverend CK steel involvement CK Steel's involvement in the renaming I'm
sorry uh honor of the late civil rights luminary C Reverend CK steel involvement in the renaming of the late Hera Park tanita L Davis pres Preserve at Lake Henrietta Park and most significantly the efforts to save the
old County Jail building in tallahassee's historic Cascade Park and whereas the most prominent and successful preservation initiative led by Hollander in in the na paa HC uh was UN was to
uncover lost Graves of formerly enslaved persons on the grounds of the Capitol City Country Club in Tallahassee Florida the story was covered by many national news outlets including us today NBC News New York York Daily News The Roots the
root and Newsweek and whereas as a Civic leader dely Hollander has participated in numerous voter uh registration efforts and has planned to organize many rallies and protests to promote various civil rights causes and whereas the lry
hinger is a champion for historic preservation is M and is making significant contributions to raise awareness of the pressing need to save protect and interpret American amica's black past America's black past through
advocacy activism names of facilities and streets for prominent African-Americans and the founding of the affiliate organizations and museums now therefore be a Proclaim that the board of County Commissioners in Leon County FL Florida hereby recognized the lat J Hollinger for his many
contributions as a historic preservation preservationist uh and Community activist in Leon County this is assigned by the chair as well as rest of commissioner stitute by the County Administrator congratulations thank you commissioner Maddox um and and the entire commission
um I'd like to recognize uh my pastor the Reverend Dr Chris a Bernie I'd like to recognize my my mom dois Hollinger my aunt blondelle Hollinger the greatest um partner um and co-executive director on
planet Earth Miss Jackie Perkins um my big brother Brent Hartsfield of 20 years my my friend lenia Bennett who's here um and um two two two I'm I miss miss where
Patrice Patrice Patrice Patrice Fields my Greater St Mark PR the Baptist Church family tshi Martin and um Darren Cobert um who is Our IT person for the uh Florida Civil Rights Museum um just want to thank the commission for this
recognition um I thank God um and I pray that um he will continue to give me the strength um to continue to serve thank [Applause] you Mr chairman can I make a quick comment
uh sure go ahead while you're taking pictures I just want to acknowledge dri's work and thank you for doing this work at a time when um knowing our history is uh more important than ever thank
you commissioner Cummings uh thank you Mr chair I I just want to deto um what has been said about uh Mr Hollinger and just conr congratulate him on all his hard work along with Miss Miss Perkins and what
what they do to preserve important history African-American history is all of our history so I appreciate them very well deserved Proclamation and thank uh commissioner Maddox for uh presenting
and thinking enough of him to provide that Proclamation thank you Mr chair yes ma'am all right [Music] all right commissioner Cummings I think you are up for thank you thank you uh
thank you Mr chair uh Commissioners and members of the audience we are certainly honored and pleased to have with us today um members of The Marching 100 accompanied by their band director Mr
Shelby Shipman and they are going to entertain us for a minute so at this point before I present the proclamation I'm going to ask Dr Shelby Shipman if he will come to the podium to the microphone absolutely
and he might want to just do a little introduction before the band comes in thank you Doctor go ahead good afternoon everybody how's it going good afternoon oh y'all can could do better than that how's it going up in here good afternoon I know you're going to feel better after the March comes in here but let me first
of all say good afternoon to each and every one of you on behalf of our University interim president Dr Timothy beard of course all the administration and our Dean Dr Valencia Matthews and our chairman of the music department Mr Lindsey B Sergeant I present to you I'm not Joe bullet but ladies and gentlemen
the Florida ANM University marching band woo all right [Music] turn around oh who the war say and one two
[Music] [Music] water water [Music] a
[Music]
la
[Music]
[Applause] okay and so the next selection that we like to perform is entitled you've heard it a lot of times at the football games one of the staple pieces go way way way back s o in the house say one two 3
[Music]
hey hey hey hey hey hey hey hey hey hey a [Music]
he [Music] he [Music]
[Music] and and our final selection I think all of you going to know this if you don't know this one something is not right here we go say [Music]
a
[Music]
he he [Music] oh [Music]
what
[Music]
and so as we pause for a second again I'd like to say good afternoon to each and every one of you my name is Dr Shelby Chipman and I serve as director band here at Florida andam University in Tallahassee and I tell you I don't know if I can have a better job in these United States of America than be the
leader of this fantastic incomparable Marching 100 and I bring you greetings on behalf of all of our 285 students that March in the band this year assembled before you of course are about 30 students who saw it not robbery and they had free time to come down here
today and we're very blessed and of course very pleased and honored and thankful to commissioner Cummings and all of you for uh this opportunity we have and of course I'd like to ask for any of the administration that may be here in the house as well as I know our chair Mr lindsy B Sergeant standing to
my right and he's been the chief arranger at Florida and University now for a few years and of course he's our Dynamic uh Department of music cheer if there any other administrators that are here I don't want to overlook anyone if you would please join us at this time and so I thought it would be fitting to
bring the actual Trophy and so that you know there were uh six bands invited to the band of the year uh there were two high schools and four colleges and of course there were two divisions there was oh hey sister Cummings is here and of course uh we had two in the division
two category and of course Florida an University and another HBCU was in the division one category and so there were 12 panelists on a uh judging panel that is evalua in the different areas of Music March and precision uh Dynamic
contrast uh the creativity and of course floridaa and University from the uh polls that were given throughout the fall semester Rose to the one of those two groups and of course we were presented uh this thank you presented this particular trophy uh for
winning the ban of the year and of course came with that not only the state but the honorarium that they provided for scholarships for our current students as we move forward and ban operations so if you could please give it up for our students and staff the ban
ESPN ban of the year Dr Chipman we still got to give you a proclamation man that's okay thank you Mr County Administrator and you know I don't think these Chambers will ever be the same Mr count
administrator oh Lord I think this is the first it's kind to have this renowned band entertain us here today and we're certainly grateful for that but now for the moment we are here to present a proclamation to this great band and this
great leadership and what I will do is pres present it if you'll just hold it Dr Shipman while I while I read it and I'm going to try to be cute and read it without my glasses but I might I might
have to put them on okay and it goes like this whereas the Florida NM University here in after FAMU Marching 100 has been nationally acclaimed as one of the most dynamic and Innovative Collegiate marching bands that has set
the standards for musical Excellence precision and Showmanship and whereas the family Marching 100 began to flourish in 1946 under the Visionary leadership of Dr William P F and over the years has continued to
bring pride and Prestige to the university to Leon County to the city of Tallahasse and to the State of Florida and whereas under the leadership of great band directors over the years who include Dr Julian E White Dr sevesta
Young and present Lake Dr Shelby Shipman the family Martin 100 introduced over 30 groundbreaking breaking marching techniques that have become standard across Collegiate and high school band
programs and have continue to influence marching bands throughout the nation and whereas in 1965 the family Marching 100 became the first historically black college and
university band to receive the subtler trophy from the John Phillips SU Foundation which is the highest honor awarded to college marching bands and where is the family Marching 100
continues to Captivate audiences on National and international platforms and their historic appearances include performances at several Super Bowls Grammy Awards and the Rose Bowl
selection in 1989 as the official US representative in the bicentennial celebration of the French Revolution in Paris France performances at the Louis Vuitton fashion show for men during
Paris fashion week in June 2022 participation in the inaugural parade for both Presidents Obama and Clinton and so many more these
appearances highlight the global impact and cultural significance of the Marching 100 and their performances have continued to inspire generations of students supporters and Spectators and
whereas ESPN selected the FAMU Marching 100 as the 2024 historically back college and university ban of the year and recognize the outstanding musical skill and meticulous choreography the
band displays this award reflects the dedication discipline and Artistry of the directors student musicians and support staff and CS the band status as a
cultural and musical Powerhouse and whereas the Florida NM University Marching 100 exemplifies excellence in musicianship excellence in academic achievement and excellence in community
engagement thereby reinforcing the legacy of greatness that Florida ANM University represents and now therefore be it proclaimed by the board of County
Commission of Leon County Florida that the Florida A&M University Marching 100 under the leadership of Dr Shelby Chipman is hereby recognized and
congratulated for being named the 2024 historically black college and university band of the Year by ESPN and we extend our sincerest
gratitude for the outstanding contributions to music education and culture that the Marching 100 exemplifies dated this 11th day of February
2025 and is signed by our commission chair Mr Brian Welch all the other Commissioners and attested to by County Administrator Mr Vince long thank you we love you guys we are proud of you
congratulations and okay and I understand that Mr chip I understand that the president of the University might very well be here today if he is if he would join us at the podium is he here Dr
Beard okay I heard that he's not here okay he's on a meeting okay okay I heard that he was here uh but anyway we would like to take a got something Mr chair I don't know if we
going I don't know if we going let we'll take pictures and then we'll I know Commissioners want to say something Mr chair Mr chair I don't know if we gonna let commissioner Pro be in that picture with that tie on commission we goingon to need that tie off of you brother you got to hide that Howard bison come
out yeah he think he's slick that tie color is innocent not all off brother all right Commissioners would you like to say anything commissioner Proctor you want to say something yes sir I know you do chairman you know me I
I am told the the the trumpet um guys down there that I was actually a trumpet player uh back in the sixth grade or something like that and um we're so excited B we're so excited and this is
probably the only band in America where people who purchase tickets for a football game as many people buy a ticket to see the halftime show is actually see the athletic contest for four quarters I don't know if there's
firm research on that but certainly in terms of Economic Development and the attraction and appeal around the United States when this band travels uh people want to see the 100 Dr Chipman you know
how proud I am of you uh uh Professor sergeant over the years and uh we were on the elevator some of the members uh to state that in the Southside in District One um generation after
generation uh has heard the 100 practice into the we hours of the morning uh they're just a public nuisance and then they get up early I mean like pred Baptist with uh uh moderator uh uh Bernie I mean early you
know that kind of early k in the morning and out there disturbing the peace of all but one thing the community has always done is yield it no complaints it's a welcome and we know when it's football season because round
about F early August Late July uh we're going to hear that sound it's a sound you won't ever hear Joe bullet would say they're often imitated but never duplicate and it's so true now finally uh I'm going show it to you I'm
get on my phone so Bishop AJ Richardson comments about you know Kendrick Lamar and I get a picture during the Super Bowl after halftime of Bishop Richardson is Head drum major at Super Bowl
3 and uh I told him that this was very interesting but this ain't today and from um Super Bowl 3 Vince you'd appreciate the Jets versus Baltimore coachs Joe Willie neth predicted he was going to win he did and
the 100 was there uh I didn't hear the rose bow mention in that recital it it was in there it was in all right everybody heard it super yeah yeah that was a lot of money raised for that one you know and uh we going to continue to support and love y'all thank you all love you all 100 God be the
glory uh thank you commissioner procer commissioner Miner thank you Mr chair commissioner Proctor I didn't know you were a trumpet player you know in high school I was a trumpet player too but uh I I really kind of joined because it kind of fit my high
school schedule at the time um but but so I was uh I was not the best trumpet player but what I what I found was that bands really work hard non-stop practice
as you all said marching in hot humidity for hours on end um just the the Non-Stop dedication and work I saw in my high school band which W Awards but in spite of me being on the on the in the
band um so I I you know I've seen it I've I've been along with people that have really put in the hard work the long hours to do what you do and then to have you all put the work in and to get the recognition that you deserve at the national level yes really says a lot
about each and every one of you um every single one of you as well as the univ University as well as this community because there are good things great things happening in leyon county in Tallahassee you all are a great example of it thank you for everything that you do thank you for representing this
community to the rest of the country thank you Mr chair yes sir commissioner minor commissioner o'keef I haven't seen you move like that uh ever you haven't been paying attention that's true that's true um I just want to thank you it's an honor to
to to have you here for me truly um y'all are welcome anytime everybody would rather hear from you than from us and uh if there's anything I can do y'all are so amazing and so skilled if we can get you some nil money for these band members you let me know how I can help thank you commissioner o'keef
commissioner Maddox I think uh commissioner M took the words out of my mouth the hard work that it takes to to to perform at this level and to do what you're doing uh needs to be applauded Championship happened for you guys a bon year happened far before you actually presented the trophy probably happen
somewhere around the summer uh I know people who have been a part of of The Marching 100 and I can I can say as a former athlete football player they probably work harder than we do out there on the field so um don't think that your hard work goes unnoticed and congratulations thank you commissioner
Maddox commissioner uh command you got or no my heart my heart rate is still about 140 beats per minute from that bass drum but um I just want to say you guys sounded uh incredible and um hats off to the hard work that you guys do day in
and day out and hopefully I can catch a football game this season and watch you guys perform at halftime so cheers thanks thank you Mr Vice chair Dr Chipman I'll I'll close out the commentary by saying thank you thank you to all your band members for being here um that was pretty unprecedented commissioner Cummings I think that was
awesome uh I would I would let you guys know that we meet again on March 18th and every second Tuesday of the month uh thereafter so we fully expect y slide back in and hit us with a couple jams before we start our next few meetings all right commissioner Cummings uh thank
you uh uh Mr chair we have uh with us the Provost from the University uh Dr Watson and she might want to come and say Dr Watson by all means okay thank you for being
here well good afternoon it is a pleasure to be before you I'm wearing red because it's Valentine's it's Black History Month and I also have such love for the Marching 100 Dr Chipman and his team uh you all have made an indelible
impression on the city and so we feel that it is um our honor to do that same uh for you so having us here recognizing the work and contributions that our leaders do but more importantly that our students do every single day when they
show up and they earn excellent grades and will go on to hopefully live in in this state um and be employed in this state we are so proud We Appreciate The Continuous support of our commissioners they are there every step of the way uh
leading us uh commissioner Proctor of course has invited me to his classroom and I look forward to um joining him but on behalf of our esteemed interim president Dr Timothy beard our entire senior leadership team uh we are very
proud and thankful and humbled to be a part of this day thank you so much thank you thank you [Music] thank I got one last thing to say you got something yes ma'am Mr chair I just want
to add unlike commissioner Proctor I was actually a member of an HBCU marching Bank B okay and symphonic band so I know all of the hard work uh
musicians that goes into preparation getting up early getting out of class going straight to the practice field and then taking those long trips to support the sports to support the basketball team and the football team uh taking your
your books and your computers on the on the buses to study so I know that you all are very highly motivated very highly intelligent and we just congratulate you student musicians
for all that you do you make good grades but you still contribute to the band tremendously so we thank you congratulations to all of you and I think Dr Shipman uh Shipman has something else he wants to say I would first like to ask one of the students leaders to come up front and provide
some inspirational marks remarks on behalf of our students and he'll introduce himself one of our assistant Head drum Majors good afternoon everyone my name is hasim Smith I'm a senior music industry student from Atlanta Georgia and I serve as the assistant Head drum
major of The Marching 100 uh we want to say thank you for having us today and for celebrating us um this achievement did take a lot of work it took sacrifice on the part of our students in the band our staff who is the best staff in the country and many many more and uh it's a
it's a blessing to be honored and celebrated as the ESPN 2024 band of the year but it's an even greater honor to be celebrated by those who contributed to your success and so for that on behalf of the students the staff the incomparable Marching 100 and family
we'd all like to say thank you we we'll increase your scholarship uh those fine remarks no so that was a joke all righty so before we uh play our last selection I would again like to express appreciation on behalf of everybody uh if you want to see the
incomparable March 100 we are going to present at the uh not this Thursday's basketball game but on Saturday uh Arena floor show so if you want to come to the game and check us out you can probably have all 280 students there for that performance and then on the 22nd of this
month the following Saturday we will present a floor show but it's going to be very much so A celebratory uh kind of presentation in that uh we're ordering of course uh ban of the Year shirts for all of the students and we're also going to indulge for the community support as
we're going to order a historic classic ring for every s single student that participated and so we'll need the support of the community and acknowledging our students with the band of the Year rings but more importantly you'll get a chance to see the 100 live if you haven't seen us at a basketball
game so we're very excited about this Saturday and certainly next Saturday the 22nd at the uh out Lawson Arena on campus so we look forward to seeing each and every one of you and again uh thank you I'm going to ask for all students if this is your first year your first year
student raise your hand second year students third year students fourth year students so again we have 280 students but what we always try and do with a lot of the many we call them virtual performances is break them up so we're not asking the same students all of the
time to participate in some of these type of events and activities and certainly we thank you for this opportunity uh to be here today and we of course wish God speed on each and every one of you and look forward to seeing you in the future and of course there's another amazing event that's going to take place later on in April
and it's not announced announced yet but don't tell anybody yet okay but the FAMU wi Symphony uh will be performing in Washington DC at the Kennedy Center on April 15th and it hasn't been announced officially yet but uh we will be uh
giving the county and the city and of course universe is very aware of what's going on with the whole logistical piece with that but again that's an honor for us to be able to perform in that venue 2015 we perform at carnegi Hall in New York City and so we're always trying to provide the students with a very
balanced um kind of opportunities our choir has went performed in Austria a couple of years ago and of course our jazz band has also performed on the national level and so we're just very proud of all the students in the department of music as they serve all aspects of our campus uh in terms of
Colleges and Schools so finally we present to you you know the old sitcom Good Times and we're going to try and find a way for the tubers and the percussion to bring it on home so if you haven't seen this you're going to see it for the first time so drum Maes good times and we'll see you guys when we see
it Mark time B a [Music]
[Music] a e [Music] [Music]
w [Music] [Music]
[Music] [Music] thank you thank you everybody thank you
again all right right wow I've never gotten so much cardio sitting still [Music] um oh my goodness all right well I almost feel
bad for the Florida State University SGA but if I have anybody here from FSU SGA please join me at the podium please yeah what do you got Andy come on up wow that is an incredibly tough act to follow good afternoon my name is Jackson
B and I have the honor of serving as Florida State University's student body president I'd like to begin today by taking a moment to thank our faculty and staff that are here with us today including Dr uiu and Dr Williams uh as well as our incredible advising team with the student government offices Mr
Andy Johnson and Miss Kiana Austin we wouldn't be able to do half of the work that we get done without you all so thank you all for your support we created our version of a budget game just about a year ago and since then we've used it as a tool to train our students how to be effective stewards of
public funds and we have also had the unique opportunity of being able to share it with different Universities at several State and national conferences this past year including at the University of Florida's Student Government Institute back in May the regional conference for the National Association for student affairs
Administration and most recently at the ACC leadership Symposium hosted here at FSU which was attended by over 90 student leaders from across the different ACC universities I'd like to thank you all for this incredible recognition and this honor uh and as
always go NS thank you all right all right thank youall y'all see these young uh fsus SGA guys they just grab that microphone they don't hesitate at all all right well uh I'm going to read you guys a proclamation congratulations
on all your successes I assume most of y'all are is SGA are y'all political science Majors or anything like that yeah yeah I got uh I got a master's degree and a bachelor's degree in political science at FSU so look how high you can go right you can follow the uh you can follow the Marching 100 um so
uh whereas the Florida State University student government Association is committed to Innovation and excellence and training its student leaders to serve as effective stewards of the FSU Student body and the campus community and whereas FSU sgaa recently adapted leyon County's let's balance budget
simulation game a board game originally developed by Leon County government to engage and educate citizens regarding the complexities of balancing County budget into a training tool tailored to the needs of student government leaders and whereas through the development of its own version of Let's balance FSU SGA
has equipped student Leaders with valuable skills and insights into the realities challenges and responsibilities associated with managing a student government budget thereby enhancing students ability to make informed financial decisions and better serve the FSU Student body and
whereas FSU sga's Innovative adaptation of let's balance has garnered significant recognition in the field of higher education and student affairs resulting in sga's recent invitation to present this training tool at State Regional and national conferences elevating FSU students as national leaders in the field of student
government Administration and whereas fsus sga's efforts in adapting and presenting let's balance have set a high standard for student leadership training and will enable FSU students now and in the future to serve as thought leaders and sharing best practices with student governments and University staff across
the United States contributing to a culture of collaboration fiscal stewardship and Civic engagement on campuses Nationwide now therefore be it proclaimed that the board of County commissioners of Leon County Florida hereby recognizes and commends the Florida State University government Student Government Association for its
contributions to both the university and the broader Community through its dedication leadership and innovation in student training and its commitment to advancing fiscal stewardship and responsible budget management among future Le leaders dated this 11th day of February 2025 signed by uh the chairman
myself and all the all the Commissioners and uh congratulations you guys good job thank you for coming out and thank you for adopting you know like I know that Leon County sets the standard High here for balancing budgets and uh being fiscally responsible so you know if you
guys can mirror that at at FS USGA you know you'll be on the track to great success all right so thank you all uh Andy did you want to say anything come on man thank you Mr chairman Commissioners esteemed staff as well uh good to see y'all again Andy Johnson
program director for student governance and advoc see at FSU uh as you all probably remember uh a time ago I was a Leon County employee for nine almost 10 years under the guidance and direction of uh commissioner Proctor the greatest County Administrator in the
Galaxy these days uh I'm honored to have the privilege of advising what I consider to be the greatest student government in the Galaxy uh and as you heard today they're doing amazing work um you'd be surprised to know they are responsible for allocating a budget totaling wait for it $14 million a year
of student activity fee revenues uh and they're doing amazing things with that um they they support our campus recreation activities they support the Student Union uh they send students to conferences they send uh you know they they support student events and activities across campus as a matter of
fact they're also getting uh into the world of Emergency Management you all may remember we had a little bit of a tornado last spring uh it impacted the the FSU campus significantly uh but these students just jumped right out of their seat wanted to help um and we found an opportunity for them to to
actually use some some of their funding to restock the the food pantry that we have on campus um while they were in a little bit of a tough bind they had lost all their perishable food because of power outages so they're doing amazing things y'all um I know you can be proud of them now and I and you'll be you'll continue to be proud of the student
government uh for a long long time to come and uh and it's an honor to work with all these amazing students every day so Mr chairman Commissioners thank you all so very much awesome all right looking wait you got we got ours and yours all right you guys got your Mr Vice chairman with $14 million
every Junior must be running for student [Laughter] president Mr Vice chairman if I may sorry got it all right thank you guys I was going to say 14 million it's only a
little bit less than our General Revenue budget commissioner o'keef yeah I just want to say um I have experienced my with their tightness on that budget uh the FSU sgaa was my first experience submitting a budget and getting it
soundly rejected um so I'll keep keep the strings tight Mr County Administrator just a real quick plug I couldn't miss the opportunity uh Commissioners as you know we're so happy that that FSU took this lens balance game and and and ran with
it and as they said it's been replicated now with through with universities throughout the country which is just really great and but as you all know again we created this let's balance budget game as a way to promote transparency and citizens engagement in
our process uh and since that time it's been adopted by and as the the County Attorney just reminded me it's trademarked still never s still I've still never seen a dollar from it yet but uh but we've we've had hundreds of of cities and counties throughout the
USA adopt this in addition to um uh organizations like Florida Tax watch adopted the game and created their own for the Florida uh for the State of Florida budget and that sort of thing so we're just so happy uh to see uh when when this sort of thing happens and and
just to to see Andy uh go back to school and and relive his his youth is just so nice uh to see it but anyway uh but with that I just wanted to thank fishu they're doing a great job Mr chairman thank you Mr County Administrator Andy like Rodney Dangerfield man that's an
y'all ain't going to get that joke that's a back to school joke um yes ma'am commissioner Cummings I just want to just congratulate the students and our former count employee of want to congratulate uh our County Administrator as well I know he uh his arm reaches has
a has a wide reach but students we we are very proud of you all and we know that each one of you will have a very very bright future just continue your hard work continue to study sky is the limit so thank you PA you all contribute
to the university you make Florida State University very proud of you and you make Leon County look real good as well so thank you thank you commissioner Cummings all right uh Mr County Administrator do we have any sit
on consent and non-agenda items thank you Mr chairman we do have uh name and address for the record Mr Mont Leon uh yes my name is Simon Alexander Mont Leon uh I am originally from Cape Coral Florida but my current address is Brian Hall so that's 147
convocation way apartment number 147 thank you sir thank you just give me one second all right hello honored ladies and gentlemen of the board uh my name is Simon monleon I am a student at Florida State University go Nos and thank you to
our sgaa that's leaving uh I'm also a member of Leon County I am here to ask you as a single declaration that we declare a state of emergency in the state in the county of Leon County due to the alarming rate of leyon County
citizens without health insurance during leyon County's La last Health Report socioeconomic status was listed as a public health risk since then the socioeconomic divide in leyon county has significantly worsened as it stands today 10.7% of Leon County Citizens do
not have health insurance significantly hindering uh their ability to access Quality Health Care on a timely basis with inflation predicted to rise consistently in the coming year this number is also continued expected to continue to grow as someone who has dealt with seeing a close friend go
through the hardships of being uninsured it is heartbreaking to see such a high rate of community in the same state especially with the national average being only 8% it breaks my heart knowing that they are unable to go to the doctor's office with the risk without the risk of bankruptcy and that compared to the national average our
County average is considerably higher we the people of leyon County as well as myself and as a the membership chair of sunis Tah passy ask you to declare a state of emergency to pressure the state to rep prioritize Public Health in Lee County and throughout the
state in the upcoming budget thank you honorable members of this chair I yield my time go ahead Mr administrator vandon R Jones Jr to be followed by Allan Ballas I can first say good afternoon to
everyone my name is Major vandon R Jones Jr United States Army I I am a resident of the J neighborhood but also the vice president my address is 3307 Wheatley Road Tass Florida
32305 Mr chair with water control coming through our neighborhood as you noted last year we had a lot of flooding that was going on the reason why I'm here to talk to you as well is because a part of
our community also sits and lies in the county when you on Ridge Road you're actually on the west side that part of the uh County starts where the ditch is
that goes into Lake Henrietta problem that we're having is that we have 25% of the water that comes from downtown tasse and it goes through the community of J Gaither it goes from the city down through J the golf
course it connects into what we call Silver Lake East Silver Lake East connects into what you call Lake Henrietta Lake Henrietta connects into mson slooh mson Lake which connects into our aquafor at the
wcolor uh Springs area the problem that we're having is is that when we had the national news uh to show the flooding that happened in our neighborhood it happened on both the county and the city
Side you had eight cars that were underwater that was right off of Ridge Road we had two cars that were on the city side which was in the uh trail park that was on the east side of the golf course the golf course stayed shut down
for over 2 and 1/2 weeks because we couldn't get the water out the idea of having that ditch which was built in 1933 was to be able to connect that ditch to all of the water systems that
we all share here in the county but also we share that with W color County as well that is our drinking water the water that you use to take baths we also are concerned because there was a ditch
that was reinforced with what we call Steel skirts Gab beond that was on the bridge by brag Greenville excuse me Greenwood as well as brag Drive is where the ditch
fails it does not have skirts Gabon it connects that ditch into what we call Silver Lake East skirts behind silver Rich those houses had to be reinforced houses that were on what we
call uh the dishes on the side of the county are too shallow not wide enough same thing enough same thing that's happening on the city side and the county side so we're asking that everybody gets together so we're able to move that water from downtown you have
25% of that water could you wrap up your time's up okay sorry again appreciate your time um for listening to me yes sir and wish you can help us out thank you yeah please feel free to email all of our offices the time and dates and stuff
that you are asking folks to attend thank you yes sir and Commissioners let me take a point of personal privilege I I I skipped a couple of proclamations on the uh agenda those have been postponed till later uh our sheriff is out of town
and I did want to uh ask us to include him in our prayers um as his his granddaughter you know experienced uh a medical emergency out west so please pray for our our good sheriff and uh we'll go back to the agenda thank you Mr administrator thank you Mr chairman Alan
Ballas to be followed by Kenneth White yes uh me and and and Kenneth White are asking toh speak at the end so we can be addressed with questions I've been working with commissioner Proctor on what I'm here to speak on and I do have to drive back to Panama City after
this so I would appreciate your your ever thank you very much uh are you here Mr ball are you speaking on the previous issue and uh the Water issue no sir I'm talk separate issue okay totally separate and you want to
wait till but you got to get to Panama City but you want to wait this thing could go to late I've driven all the way over here and I want to be able to be questioned by by we don't question uh like we don't do question and answer in this citizens to be heard section so um
you can say what you need to say and then you can speak to Commission is individually off the dis yeah I don't even know what commissioner Proctor seems to know what it is so yeah you're good with him all right yeah I mean whenever we finish
whenever we get to the next time but it could be a while okay Mr chairman final speaker on this section Frank Williams good afternoon to the chair the board count Commissioners thank you very much for having us we're honored to be here
did not expect to get entertainment this afternoon but it was certainly a delightful time to hear the 100 word today I'm here to speak on behalf of uh the Henry Hill Foundation which I am chaired and uh my address is uh 1704
hillgate Court tah Florida uh ZIP code 32304 standing next to me who will speak on behalf of our foundation is my first cousin Henry Hill he is our family historian and he's going to share some
information with you about our emancipation day which we have been celebrating at H Hill Park located 1835 Cent Road for over 100 years uh we ourselves our family uh have been
financially uh carrying this burden of uh keeping this event going for many many years and we appreciate the support from the county that you all have given us well and we come asking that you will perhaps help us again this year and Hunter is going to give you a brief
history on our emancipation day and he's going to do his best to stay CL good afternoon it's good to be here this afternoon I the first time I've been here in my lifetimes and so I don't know
all this was going on but on the behalf of our emancipation day Proclamation celebration we are asking to help us out if you can now we have been doing this
since 1887 and we never came before the Commissioners to ask for anything but we are asking you at this time if you could give us some help in our
efforts what we normally do we uh have a program and we feed as we fed as many of 300 people and we never ask for anything along those lines however as time have gotten hard
and we are come before you this afternoon to ask you to help us out if in in any way you can I thank you thank you Mr Hill this is an issue that you may want to discuss in commission time the Henry Hill
Foundation you guys have a a big fish fry cookout thing right every year is it right on cille road correct so it's kind of over near the hospital in that area um and and you did I don't know if we've given any funding in the past we have we
have yes sir uh commissioner Proctor you may know more on it but it may be something to discuss in commissioner time so um if you guys want to talk to commissioner Proctor on the side and maybe get him to let him know what you're asking for specifically and then he can bring it up in commission time okay perfect thank you very much thank you very much thank you all for
coming all right Mr County Administrator any other speakers that concludes our speakers Mr chairman all right Commissioners we are on our consent agenda we've had one item pulled so I would like to entertain a motion for the other items second okay I got a motion from commissioner Maddox and a second from commissioner Miner for the consent
agenda minus item number nine which has been pulled uh is there any discussion seeing none all those in favor signify by saying I I I all opposed passes unanimously we are now on item number nine commissioner I'm sorry
uh Mr County Administrator thank you Mr chairman item number nine Commissioners provides a status report um at the request of the board it covers ongoing Investments initiatives and strategic programming along both the Road Street as well as Pensacola Street corridors uh
again you've got a a lot of information provided here and we're happy to answer any questions you might have I would note that uh I believe that Ry white is on deck and again ready to answer any questions board may have thank you Mr chairman we have no speakers on this
side um thank you Mr administrator uh Vice chair thank you Mr chair um to begin discussion I'd like to move staff recommendation option one so second I got a motion in a second um we're in discussion commissioner command Vice
chair thank you Mr chair so I try to be fair and give credit to uh where it's du um especially with staff and then also when I'm a little disappointment um when I'm disappointed I think it's important also to bring it um to the board's
attention and with this particular item um I'm feeling more on the disappointed side uh partially because I know this has been a the Pensacola Street and this Corridor has been a topic of discussion um particularly um from our office since
I was elected in 2022 and last time this came up the the motion that was passed unanimously amongst the board was and this is from the record accept the report on the crime analysis for the
32304 in West Pensacola Street uh Corridor and bring an agenda item with all possible op options for improvements to include a potential master plan for Pensacola Street Corridor in North mono Street um and what we have here in this
opt in this agenda item was a status report uh with basically a plan that was implemented in 2004 with no new uh direction for us to discuss or discuss amongst the board
um why this is frustrating for me is because the reason why we wanted to bring it up was because in my opinion what's going on this this Corridor has changed significantly from 2004 to now um the Carney Center wasn't even on Pensacola Street until
2016 um the agenda item just talks about development which is occurring east of Okala Road I think there's a lot of good student housing projects there's a lot of development going on along that Corridor but when you drive on Pensacola Street there's two different Pensacola
streets there's East on um on pens there's East from Okala road to the stadium to west of Okala road to Capital Circle uh Southwest and um I think what's going on here the the crime stats here from
2004 um if you ask reading this agenda item it kind of implicates that you know things are going well we talk about you know businesses that have moved into the shopping plaza um on oala road and Pensacola Street um but it's not really discussing the businesses that are
struggling um it's not talking about the businesses that have been robbed um such as the The Scooter Store on Pensacola Street that was robbed I think two times in one month and decided to you know pack up and leave the corridor um it's not discussing the act of crime um this
agenda item talks about plans for pedestrian safety but it's not talking about the pedestrians that have been hit by vehicles um and so I I do appreciate the effort but I I don't like the direction that this is going um so I I don't plan in this I
I don't plan at this time to propose any action I I do know that the Pensacola Street Corridor based on our map is part of the Southside action plan and I believe Mr administrator we have a workshop coming up we do um so my plan is to go into
this into more further detail um but I did want to just bring it to the board's attention that know this is a very important Corridor um there are a lot of our human services and Health Services in this Corridor and this is a a a part of our community um this is a huge
artery for district 2 that folks in our community travel day in and day out and I lived on this Corridor um through college in 2011 and I think the DraStic change from 2011 to to now is something
that um should be alarming for our community commity and uh based on this agenda item it just kind of seems like hey we have a plan and things are going well but what's on paper and what's actual Visual and going on in my opinion are two different things thank you Mr
chair thank you Mr Vice chair Arty um I is shington the right person to talk to or Arty I mean we're talking about okay Arty can you clarify for us from a planning perspective what's happening along there and then I would like to hear from shington to tell us about those crime stats and
the sort of you know implications of what we're what we're doing and how that might impact change thank you absolutely uh thank you commissioner when we look at the West Pensacola uh sector plan area the West Pensacola Corridor specifically there's a number of things
that are uh kind of ongoing things that have been planned and are currently kind of in the process of being implemented uh and things just kind of organically happening along the corridor uh especially when we look at things like Master planning we usually look at a couple of key specific areas and
topics uh one of those being Transportation uh the things coming up with Transportation uh the Department of Transportation is currently doing a planning and Engineering study a PD and project development environment uh for the area between Apple Yard drive and
Capital Circle Southeast uh this is a project that overlaps and kind of consistent with the blueprint project the Westside student Gateway and staff is actively engaging dot on that looking at what the PDN will include providing comments and trying to to leverage that
project to the extent possible to kind of maximize what the intent of the Westside student Gateway is which is kind of like our other gateways trying to like really look at uh the corridor coming into the community uh they also have a resurfacing project we've worked very closely with the Department of
Transportation uh kind of going back quite a bit looking at uh the way dot identifies what they consider the context of Pensacola streets uh they were looking at it as being more of a a rural and Suburban Corridor and we actually kind of went through the
process did the analysis uh coordinated with them to make sure that they classified as an urban Corridor which allows wider sidewalks and bicycle facilities and things like that so uh we'll continue working with them as they go through the resurfacing project to see uh can we make improvements to
intersections things like that uh we often coordinate with do on these kind of things uh and then blueprint has the university Greenway looking at multimodal connection connectivity between Florida State University tallas State College Innovation Park those
things um so we see a lot of things that are upcoming uh they haven't happened yet uh but we're working very closely because the Department of Transportation does have jurisdiction over this road so this is not a County Road this is not a city road this is a state road so we have to coordinate with them uh on their
efforts there another things that we thing that we look at when we look at Master planning an area or just kind of planning in general are the land uses and kind of going back to that plan from 2005 the the West Pensacola sector plan it
identified a number of uh opportunities for the corridor and pretty much immediately after that uh plan was adopted uh we started moving into doing comprehensive plan amendments and res zonings and since that time there have been over a thousand resoning in the
propert in that area and you kind of see that it does take time from going from comprehensive plan amendment to rezoning to site plan development to uh actually seeing the change happen uh sometimes I wish it a little faster but planning is
a a fairly slow process and uh but we're starting to see the changes so you know we took a lot of properties from lower density residential to what we call University transition mixed use land use category allows up to 50 units breaker and kind of more recently we've seen
local we've seen Rive or re 85 not exactly sure how they pronounce that um and so we've seen a lot of changes along the corridor in fact when I was at Florida State University basically when this plan was adopted uh it looks very different today than it did then and
that's because those land use changes are now really seeing the effect of those uh we've worked with Steve Leone who owns the um uh the the shopping Center there with the Aldi and worked with him to amend his PUD and almost immediately after that you saw the
Starbucks go in and some changes there so uh we're starting to see new businesses we're starting to see changes in terms of the types of housing we're starting to see more density uh it's just kind of been a process that has been underway for quite a while U but we see those changes happening now uh and
also we have a in-house design studio uh like to boast design works as much as possible in the plan Department and uh over the um since 2017 at least I know that we've had over 40 uh uh site
assistance that have been provided in that location in that area uh 68% of those have happened since 2020 so we've been providing site assistance to uh developers along the uh the corridor for a number of years uh but we've seen a lot more interest just within the past
okay Ry I think I hate to cut you off with you're fer bustering us a little bit commissioner um caban has some questions for you okay yeah uh I don't Mr chair I don't know if it's a it's it's a question just just a more of a follow-up statement already I appreciate I appreciate the insight and um but I
think like that exact Testament that you're giving publicly is what's very very frustrating because what you're sitting here saying about Pensacola Street is that everything's okay it just takes time what I'm saying is since 2004 and particularly since I lived on that
Corridor in 2011 it is declining and shington you were there in the community meeting that we had with with Pensacola Street families and businesses and they are very very upset with what we are
doing as a government and they made it very well known that they are not happy and so um what I what I what I I don't want us as a board and then this is just my opinion I mean but I I don't think it's um appropriate just to sit here and
say that everything's going fine it just needs more time right um I would say time has not been on our side thus far on Pensacola Street and again this is very very important um to our
constituents and um shton um looks like you want to speak Mr chairman yeah um already thank you what I would like to hear is shon's you know perspective on how the human services aspect it the side of it inter meshes with all the planning improvements that R says are on
the way in terms of just generally improving and don't need a five minute speech just generally improving the quality of life along that Corridor to address commissioner command's concerns I understand that it's there's challenges it's a state road it's not in it's in the city limits I get all that
but like what can we do to put some traction underneath this boat all right I mean underneath this car so I I think that's General the idea right absolutely commissioner so um one of the things that's happening as you adopted as part of your strategic
initiative we are actively working with the Big B Continuum of court to adopt a corridor plan for Pensacola Street as well as nor R Street and downtown um to actually address specifically issues regarding homelessness because I know that's a significant issue in those
specific areas to see how do we better address homelessness through better engagement with unsheltered homeless business as well as engaging those neighborhoods um so that way they're aware of how we can um reduce the impacts of homelessness in those areas
the other thing though is in addition to that when you talking about um issues regarding crime um as part of that process um there's also been active utilization of installing cameras that the city has done that's connected to the real time Center that the county
fund um assisted in funding the realtime Center so that way it can help um addressing and looking at issues of um any crimes in those areas also being able to get um license plates so that way that information can be then utilized Real Time by um law enforcement
be at lcso or TBD to address um the issues of um of crime the other thing is going back to some the businesses um the county in partnership with the city invested at the C the establishment of a community outreach coordinator at the CC
that person has worked like for example when you businesses like the um Colombian restaurant that opened on Pensacola Street came on the first thing that that individual did is meet with the new um owners when the owners mooved from being a a a um Mobile Food Truck to
an actual um uh installed in institution on pensac coost Street met with them to talk about hey how can we better address any issues you may have regarding homelessness um the host deputies as you all know the County funds also have met with businesses in those areas consistently to also be able to address
um those issues that that they may have the last thing I'll add is that um commissioner is that in preparing the corridor plans something that's critical and we've been working with the team here at planning or the CLC has is to actually hold events later this spring
in which they will um bring um they will invite invite members of Pensacola Street be businesses and residents to actually do a of like where's that Abby like a shetes almost so that way they can talk about okay let's go line by line about everything that's happening
by the county the city through through blueprint through the state regarding improvements in those areas but as well is where are some of those deficits so that way we can identify in addressing homelessness and other Human Services needs on Pensacola Street thank you um Mr Vice chair do you
have any questions or comments yeah thank you Mr chair so uh shankton with the is there the cour plan in this pays on this agenda item says was was established in 2004 2005 what is um I guess what I would like to see personally is as we Implement these
change I think we need to adapt our our master plan for Pensacola Street to reflect the current issues that are ongoing with Pensacola Street um Pensacola Street in 2004 when when this was established was a primary a primary
hub for student housing and that has shifted Ed East to college town and all that development going on East Tennessee Street and so I just think it's important for our planning is to make sure we're updating our master plan for Pensacola Street to reflect the state of
it now and also the ongoing issues which I believe have changed since then so thank you thank you Mr chair shington thank you and and thank you Ry as well thank you Mr Vice chair commissioner MX thank you Mr Proctor you're next and commissioner o'keef I think um commissioner command does have
a point but already I believe too that that what you're saying if if I could put in my own words is that we are it is not the greatest situation on Pensacola Street but some progress is being made
and I can tell you 2004 2005 is when I decided to come back and finish my degree actually 2005 in Florida State and you're right um Pensacola Street was much different than there was student housing the homeless chter wasn't there I think hope might have been there um but you on the other end I mean you went
went down Pensacola Street it it basically looked the same quarter looked the same right um I remember a day commissioner prer and and others who were older who who've been here shanked in as well where you could drive straight through campus on Pensacola Street can't do that anymore but you could
um the point that you make commissioner caban is valid in that when we move the shelter Cy Center to Pensacola Street it basically made Pensacola Street a corridor uh for those that are homeless
if I if I can say it that way I mean you have hope uh who is the family shelter you have um the Curr Center who is for adults and not too far from it you have ccys which is just around the corner so that whole Corridor in 32304 Pensacola
Street that's where you're going to see the majority of our homeless of our homeless neighbors um and and in what you've seen brought this up too development happening from the University out so all the student
housing that used to be on that side of Pensacola Street has um on on the side closer to TCC from Okala of Pensacola Street is now going towards the stadium uh and you see all the development there and it's coming down what's encouraging
for me is the fact that you do see of the Colombian restaurant you see Starbucks you see those things start to come into that shopping center which means that something good is going on there but you brought up the point of time it took us time to get to the point
that we're on that we are on Pensacola Street it's going to take us time to move away from it too uh that the the issue of trying to figure out how we how we deal with homelessness in in in the unhoused on Pensacola Street is not one that's going to be easily solved is not
one is going to be solved tomorrow unless unless we're able to find land and money to build more beds and rooms for those who are homeless because that that are coming towards Pensacola Street and
so could we update the plan and already I I just want called your name just say I understand where you're coming from you can sit if you want to should we should we talk about in that in that Master Plan the evolution of Pensacola Street and how now what we
were dealing with in 2004 and 2005 is much different because of the look in in the in the folks who are on pacult absolutely have we updated and this might be a shin in question have we updated that Master Plan cuz it's 20 years ago have you
updated the master plan to include the issues that we're having now in the way and the services that are provided on Pensacola Street cuz as I remember it I don't even think Goodwill was on Pensacola Street at the time that the the the center that was there wasn't there in 2004 so have we updated the master plan to include some of those
things and how we plan to De with those things in the future uh commissioner um no we've not updated the master plan formally um but also note that it's not really within the jurisdiction of this board to do so uh any kind of master plan that looks at things like
Transportation would need to look at who has jurisdiction over the that Corridor which would be the Department of Transportation uh any jurisdiction over things like land uses uh whether something like a Goodwill can be there or not completely within the city of
tallah jurisdiction uh they are the only ones who vote on comprehensive plan amendments rezonings or Land Development code regulations for this area because within City Limits the original master plan was created by the city it was yes so I I think I'm you guys know me well
enough to know I'm all about jurisdictional you know respect so you know if if anything if if there's a if there's a a inquiry here or or thought here that we should in update that Master Plan maybe we should reach out to the city to ask that they would consider re updating the master plan as far as
the road's concerned uh maybe even reaching out to uh the state to see what their thoughts are there but I think uh gain Street as we when we did an improvements there was that a county is gain Street a County Road or State Road State Road uh but it was acquired
by the city to be able to make those changes right and and because we're able to do that of course we can remember long ago what was on gain street because we were able to acquire that road and then do all the transportation changes that we made the multimodal and all that kind of stuff get the land ready um that
we were able to have more control to to to to move faster but even even once blueprint did what it did and the C did what it did it still took what five six years before real development started to come so even with that when you say it takes time it does take time and I and I
can understand the urgency of the folks who are in uh 32304 to say we need to move faster but if we don't have control there's there there's not a faster we could we again we can ask the city to be more aggressive we can ask the state and transportation to be more aggressive our my my my brothers and sisters on the
ctpa we can push the issue a little more uh but but when it comes down to this board and what we can do um we most we can do right now and I hate to say it this way is is is talk uh and and Advocate on behalf of the folks who live in that Corridor to say that they want more and they like to see more thank you
Mr chair thank you commissioner Maddox commissioner Proctor thank you Mr chairman um I feel the frustration of commissioner kaban um first of all I'm I'm Blown Away by R's statement that uh the state did
not view Pensacola uh well I'm sorry that the state views Pensacola as a as a rural uh quor uh that's amazing um what state does the state recognize Pensacola
Street is something something rural so from the starting point if that's their premise um y'all we we in big trouble um if that's and so that our staff has to go work with the state to uh alter their
perspective uh that that ain't no Rural Road uh we starting behind zero so that's a problem that we're trying to reconcile uh this Crossroad thing uh which you already remember uh we we were
dealing with the legal enforcement against vagrancy and the challenge was whether to criminalize homelessness Sheriff U we about to drop an ordinance hammer and Sheriff mcneel
uh Avail uh our senses of uh humanitarian empathy and uh this board I believe we funded positions for outreach to uh take an inventory of um who they the homeless
were um as much information is could be gathered and I guess it's put in a database we um paused and we thought and we waited for and thought that uh this working with population would
somehow uh slow the deterioration I'll use your word commissioner uh of that quor down and what seems to me uh right now where we are is that notwithstanding the sheriff's Outreach officers and taking sort of a
social work approach and not a criminal enforcement there is that we have not yet shington um come up with a plan that graduates people who are um we've got two institutions feeding into
tributaries into pensac we got the jail with people getting out and we've got the homeless Center and those two uh different institutions each dump people out every day uh over Pensacola Street
and it's a cycle that does not stop but what we have not identified commissioner madx is a u is a uh a graduated or graduating plan uh that meets people on day one com
out of jail and where do they go next so the transition from uh jail to uh homes is what um we've tried to do with the pscc money um we have I don't
know where uh but that's what we've been trying to do and right there is the beginning point but what is needed to add value is we we've got to graduate people and meeting them in that Corridor
with the next steps so when we say affordable housing blah blah it it starts with a job or something um and that that's where I think there's a breakdown so um commissioner feeling your pain uh but when the state is
saying they see a rural uh we got a lot of work to do and we have put um some some money to meet folk there into housing that it won't be U
saturated with uh human um Decay thank you commissioner Proctor commissioner o if you want to bring it home thank you Mr chairman um and thank you commissioner command for for bringing this up this is important um and as I'll EO I think my colleagues um
I'm ready to support as we go forward anything that we can do to help um so I uh 04 is a long time ago for for having a plan now if that was done by the city and that's not our Authority then um I
think it's for for um some advocacy to the city to reach out in fact in 2004 I lived in student housing directly it was Villa Del Lago at the time directly across from where the Cy Center is now it's very different um and so it's
definitely something we need to be working towards uh like everything up to our Authority and then collaborating with our partners um where where it calls for them one thing I think that we can do and might be a helpful update is
part of the issue is the um folks who hang around um during the day when uh when they're not staying at the Cy Center or someone else around there and we have put in new funding and initiatives I believe last year to to
help address that when I was out and if I remember correctly um let the record show shon's nodding from the audience um if I remember correctly the idea of that new funding was day services so that people had places to go um at KY Center
but also I believe the intention was to try to find partners that do day services and activity like uh casework and connect with jobs and stuff in other areas of town to sort of spread people out um I don't know that's happening yet but we're coming up on a year um and so
I think it would be time to get a report on how that is going how effective it is um uh as we go forth because uh I've been out um to uh meet with people who are unhoused um recently
and um in the past and one thing that I was hearing repeatedly is that they're not getting day services that they're not able um with a few uh people that when I was out there recently um where they were told well go back to the
center and to get your phone or to get in a mailbox and they said oh well it's been it's closed they stopped doing day Services uh because this and that and so I think if we're funding that um and our goal is to have day services and to expand services to other places perhaps
an update which we may already be getting uh this spring as a year passes from when we Implement that plan might help because that seems to be a core issue that is part of what we are um trying to get influenced so point of order um the
chair had to step out of the chambers so I I cannot U hold the gavel and U make the make the motion so I'm going to withdraw my motion and look for a motion uh to accept staff recommendation Mr chair I'll make a motion to accept accept staff recommendation and also to
I have a letter from the chair sent to the city to ask to inquire about an update of the Court or uh plan is in place I second motion Mr chair and I'd like to make a comment commissioner Cummings I second did you say you have
comment uh yes just just for clarification I appreciate the discussion about that particular court and and just I understand and just recognize the issue of Madam counter attorney with that I guess with the Dual jurisdiction with the county and and the
city as far as that c is concerned but uh shington mentioned when when he was discussing that there were planning some I believe upcoming meetings to have a coordinated plan did I hear that correct with the city and and the county
representatives to address some of those issues that commissioner command rais well that's correct except it's not the master plan so it's not the plan that the city has it's it's a plan that the that the COC has been working on for the last couple years now to actually
establish um plans in those corridors in our community that has high concentration of homelessness especially unshed homelessness and so they've been working with the county the City Sheriff's Office to actually look to see how we can better engage those homelessness individuals there so we can
reduce the homelessness but as well as Engage The Neighbors and the um businesses in those areas so that way we have a plan in place to say how do we do that in those specific areas in partnership with those neighborhood awesome and just a followup so if the
city is at the table and the Count's at the table and all those service providers and a commission cand is correct many of those have their you know house their headquarters are on that quarter so to speak that means we do have to sit at the table does that
have the potential of uh maybe positively affecting the overall master plan which I understand we don't have any any control over or is that part is that part of the goal to get all of the interested parties together so we can look at it
holistically it may we do have like I said before our planning team that's also been um part of in helping assist exactly with the c of how to um how to better engage those neighborhoods um with the issues in the area but really
the primary focus again of those plans is specifically in the area of homelessness and how do we improve those areas and good quality of life but but from your just from your your standpoint and working there do you feel that we from a county standpoint we're doing
really all we can to the extent that we can as far as jurisdiction is concerned because I know our hands are tied in in certain areas yes for the county I think we're doing um quite a bit as as the commissioner um O'Keefe mentioned we do
have day servic that we we are funding Commissioners when you um establish line item funding for the shelters part of it was the continu continuation of day Services because we we had provided previously was one-time um funding federal dollars but then with the
establishment of um line item funding we those were one of the requirements that they continue to provide those Services right and I just want to Mr Vice chair just thanks staff for this you know for the for the report giving us an analysis
the reality of really where we are and then for you all explaining you know from the jurisdictional standpoint what we can cannot do but I think you're doing a great job pulling all the interested parties together that's all we can do and I think every uh the
interested party specifically the city uh probably has the same sentiment that we have and I think in the long run and hopefully in the short short run we'll start seeing some improvements and the needle will just start moving from a positive standpoint we got to we got to
work together thank you Mr Vice chair thank you commissioner uh commissioner P you have any last comment you said yeah yes sir uh I don't think there's not an unwillingness to work together I think that we not identify the question what what do we want uh F
Street to be to become to look like what is our goal uh I'm not heard one yet do we want to reduce by 20% people lauding uh we want to get rid of that entirely uh I don't know what the goal is and I don't think that this body has set a
policy objetive as to what would be an acceptable um level of um just human Meandering um I don't know so that's probably something we need to to look at what what we want
that area to be um is it true that you um no one has access to the home shelter during the day except mothers with children is that accurate so does anyone know how do you gain access
and have somewhere to go during the day you're talking about for the um Carney Center the Carney cent no um adults can go so people come from Hope shelter can go to Carney Center for day Services during the day okay we need uh
additional day Services um during the day yes on point on point actually I think what what we need to know how many people actually using those day Services yes M be honest with you like this is this is my thing um we pay for those day
services but and and and they are at KY and folks from our shelter at Hope can go over to Cy to use those day services but how many of the folks who are actually I'm going to Kerney going to Hope coming in and using those day Services I think are the number that that we need to look at because I think
if we look at that number we find out is there's not as many as we would hope for well it the continuity of tightening up giving people somewhere to go I'm sure the County Attorney would tell us that we can't mandate people you know what
what daycare um service they had to go to um but we might consider uh which services are more attractive than others and um we got to keep working with it yeah so one of the things that we do
continue to do though as part of Services though is that you do have Car Center again dollars that the county has invested in bus going around certain concentrated areas and those areas include Downtown North Monroe Street the tmh hospital to actually encourage and
get folks to come from those areas and into the Caring center for day services with the primary goal of hoping hopefully that they will not stay on in those unsheltered areas and those camps and actually come and not just utilize the day services but actually utilize
the beds overnight that in those areas so that way then when you talk about the a plan Commissioners um if they're not from our community getting them back to their um place of origin okay I I I thank you for mentioning that that um bad word that the legisl Florida hate
and I'm not talking about global warming but um I am talking about mental health and I'm not qualified commissioner Gan um nor certified to know who's mentally unhealthy but just from a Layman's observation of
uh that area driving that area uh mental health uh is condensed and um thriving in the area and I don't know how we inject uh or intervene in that way too
and I think that it adds to the um chronic festering of people in the area and um unable to um find a road map accompass to leave it to get out of that
that stagnant space and um that's a problem and I encourage y not letting it go but we're standing with you commissioner caban you're not alone on that Pensacola Street it's a great quarter and none of us want to see it uh
deteriorate further thank you commissioner Proctor uh we got a motion from commissioner caban second from commissioner Maddox um m a motion oh oh I'm sorry okay so sorry so commissioner Maddox had the motion and commissioner Cummings had the second um seeing no
further discussion all those in favor signify by saying I I All oppos Passes unanimously um Commissioners we got General business coming up we only got four items um I would like to take a 30 minute recess and come back at 5:15 we
don't have a public hearing at 6 so we can go ahead and take our break now come back and start general business or if you would rather we can go to item number 10 I just don't know if we're going to get mired down on that because it's the ratification skip it I'm trying to be collegial man okay we're going to
take a 30 minute recess we'll be back at 5 uh 5:15 we'll call it 5:15
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Administrator I think we are on General business item number 10 thank you Mr chairman Commissioners item number 10 seeks the board's ratification of actions taken at your January 27th board retreat uh Commissioners all the materials before you again it reflects all the action taken by the board and we
have no speakers on this item Mr chairman happy to answer any questions you might have all right um well I only got two Commissioners up here would you either one of you like to make a motion okay we've got a we've got a motion on item number 10
and a second by commissioner Proctor for staff recommendation uh we are in discussion anybody want to discuss I don't do we four enough four can vote right okay all right we got a motion in a second any discussion on item 10 the ratification of of uh Retreat
items anybody no okay oh Mr chair I I just want to just echo my sentiments for a great Retreat um I think you you ched a great Retreat and we had some great
information from all of our um employees and the various uh heads of various department so it was just it was very uh very enlightening and then we were able to address other and and add
to our plan other um add to our strategic plan other areas of concern so it was just a great Retreat so those are just my positive comments thank you Mr County ad minist yes there yes thank you commissioner Cummings I agree and want
to Echo that uh staff did an amazing job uh great time at Bradley's Country Store thank you all for making the trip out there um beautiful setting good group pick and I think we did a lot of good business uh on this item any other discussion okay seeing none uh we've got
a motion by commissioner second by commissioner Proctor uh for staff recommendation on item number 10 all those in favor signify by saying I I I all opposed passes unanimously Mr County Administrator next item thank you Mr chairman commissioner item number 11 seeks your approval to award next
Generation 911s system Services um the uh the item before you uh seeks to award the contract uh to NGA 911 LLC for the implementation of Next Generation 911 to enhance emergency
communication capabilities and to assure stability effective and efficient response to communities needs you've got a lot of information here here Commissioners this is a a large transition uh and and an upgrade uh on our 911 system happy to answer any questions you have we have no speakers
on this item and I'll turn it back to you Mr chairman thank you Mr County Administrator okay we got a motion from commissioner Maddox second from commissioner Miner commissioner Proctor thank you Mr chairman uh it's I'm I'm just interested to know that does this
system integrate uh with all of the agencies uh is it compatible to have we left uh FAMU and TS uh TSU on the sideline and um I'm mindful of when we uh back in those 900
megahertz days I'm going back to that reference uh how uh Universal uh and Universal pluged are the different agencies that utilize uh Emergency Services commissioner Proctor I Mr chair I just I've seldom do this but I just
have to correct you commissioner Proctor you go back to the UA HF days but uh but uh Mr Peters uh can answer the question uh yes sir yes commissioner yes this will include our our our uh University uh police dispatch centers and Capitol police's Dispatch
Center secondary uh primary or secondary answering points for 911 uh calls primarily are answered by the CDA if they are calls about services on those campuses the system they will have terminals at those places where those calls can add automatically be on those call takers terminals
I I I I um know that our chairman is the U uh in the emergency situations is a triggering voice uh pivotal uh for certain decisions in our community uh but in terms of the agencies themselves
uh now that FEMA uh may u may not be around uh what are the ranks of who's calling the shots uh is it the states in an emergency situation uh is it uh well is it FEMA or is it us and I I've seen
some um jockeying if you will uh uh seemingly not from our County but from other agencies which want the flex to show and say that they're in charge uh is is has there been any critical
movement with in respect to the rankings of who has what charge in an emergency situation yeah yes sir um when it comes to a disaster uh you know there is a saying that all disasters are local uh Leon County does maintain command and control of our resources here locally we request
assistance from the state of Florida during disasters and they can provide assistance uh to Leon County they provide assistance to the other counties of the State of Florida when it comes to Federal Aid uh that that's a request for federal Disaster Assistance and currently as things stand you know the
the way that the law is written that that has to come from the governor of a state to request federal assistance uh I think at this time we we've heard and seen that there's a committee to assess the effectiveness of FEMA and at this point they've not convened and made any recommendations so as of this moment
uh that process to request federal assistance hasn't changed uh that we've been been been notified of so that's it's still going to be the process Leon County has command and control of our of our local response we can request assistance for State response assistance and mutual Aid Federal Disaster
Assistance would require a request from the governor to the president of the United States I I had mentioned this at The Retreat um Commissioners youve heard me ask um I don't think it was premature but um an exercise for us uh in the
whatif category of what if there is no FEMA or what if uh our community like like California just can't get a call back from the feds um FEMA uh what if we
don't have federal assistance and the um sense of um federal aid support which existed stuff that's articulated in the constitution is just not adhered to um and I know that that's somewhat
rhetorical but at the same time it's something that's um uh if you look at California U their experiences uh in terms of receiving Federal support um I mean it's real and
I would think that we ought to at some point in the near future look at our emergency uh processes uh as if we had to go it along thank you very much Mr chairman yes sir commissioner Proctor all right we've got a a motion and a
second can you'all remind me I think commissioner madx was my motion commissioner Miner was a second on item 11 all those in favor signify by saying I I all opposed passes unanimously Mr County Administrator next item thank you Mr chairman Commissioners it number 12
uh seeks the board's uh consideration of an appointment of a nominated citizen to the advisory committee on quality growth and an eligible applicant to the affordable housing advisory committee as a reminder Commissioners um I know that commissioner Proctor commissioner o'keef
um brought this up at the January meeting uh but the applicant for the affordable housing advisory committee meets the qualification for the new membership category recently adopted by the board to ensure that the committee membership includes a person that has benefited from affordable housing and or experienced eviction and uh the
applicant uh Miss James um is a recent client of the County's Housing Services Program and so we're recommending options one and two happy to answer any questions we have no speakers on this item uh missioner Cummings uh yes Mr chair I move option one for the
appointment of aludra Fier to the advisory committee for Quality growth and I move option two for kishia James to be appointed to the affordable housing advisory committee
all right we got a motion and second by Vice chair caban we're in discussion uh commissioner Cummings would you like to discuss no discussion um seeing no discussion we've got a motion in a second a motion by commissioner second by Vice chair caban all those in favor signify
by saying I I and it passes unanimously uh Mr County Administrator we're on to our last item on General business thank you Mr chairman item number 13 uh your final item on the agenda is a state and federal legislative update which the board requested at your last meeting uh to to receive an update on the
legislation recently passed by the Florida legislature related to Illegal immigration uh in addition we have our federal lobbyist from Squire patent bogs here miss Karen Street uh she's with us today to provide an update on the various Federal Executive actions uh that have been issued over the past few
weeks and at this point I'll hand it off to Nikki to introduce the item and Miss Street Nikki go ahead good afternoon Commissioners as requested at your last meeting this item provides a legislative legislative update including an overview of the Trump act recently passed by the
Florida legislature which is now likely moot given that the special another special session has been convened this afternoon to pass a new package of bills related to Illegal immigration we will continue to monit monitor the development of these bills which are anticipated to be considered by the
House and Senate on the floor later this week in addition this item provides an overview of the Federal Executive actions recently taken by the new Administration as outlined in the item president Trump has issued over 75 executive actions since his inauguration
less than a month ago these executive actions have been wide ranging directing actions in areas such as immigration government reform and international trade and tariffs the item before you outlines select actions that will or anticipated to have an impact at the
local level we also have our new federal lobbyist miss Karen Street from Squire patent bogs here with us today to provide a brief presentation on those executive actions as well as a federal outlook on what to expect up in Washington Washington DC in the coming weeks so with that Commissioners I'd
like to hand it over to Karen to introduce herself and provide an update thank you good afternoon um thank you for the opportunity to introduce myself um and I have to say as a proud graduate of Howard University I'm so glad that I
came the day that the Marching 100 was recognized it's uh hard to hard to follow but I'll I'll try um Squire Patton bogs is very pleased to continue our representation of leyon County uh I personally have been with the firm since 2021 uh before that I spent about 14
years on Capitol Hill uh the first 10 was spent uh largely with the Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid uh doing a lot of work towards Economic Development with state and local governments particularly as the 2008 credit crisis hit uh and then ironically at the onset
of the first Trump Administration I uh transitioned to the house side to work uh for the Congressional Black Caucus uh I was also Chief of Staff to rep Karen bass who went on to become mayor of Los Angeles um so I I and another kind of
point of personal privilege uh I have an aunt that lived here um almost all of her adult life uh in Tallahassee she also worked for the Florida Lottery for over 30 years so I I have many fond memories of um of uh uh Tallahasse and
so this really is a full circle moment and I have an affinity to local governments in general and this one in particular um so I'd like to mention a couple of the uh actions coming out of Washington um it's important to to note obviously the
the the Trump Administration has really hit the ground running with the second term um it's um we're going to talk about the executive orders but it's important to highlight two caveats um one is that an
executive order May hold the force of law uh if it is um directed under the powers enumerated for the president under Article 2 of The Constitution or congress's uh implicit or explicit uh
delegation of powers to the president um it is not unusual for presidential executive action to be challenged legally but it is worth noting that this Administration in particular is really trying to push the envelope and kind of stretch Presidential Power as much as
possible uh to advance uh uh the the the agenda before us um that necessarily means that there's a lot of litigation and that means there's a lot of uncertainty so there are some murky Waters that we have to navigate in the coming weeks and months but what is very
certain is that these executive actions are a very clear demonstration of the administration's priorities and uh what cannot be done strictly through executive action is certainly fair game for um congressional action particularly as Republicans control uh both chambers
of Congress um so I'm going to discuss a couple um of executive orders particular particularly um obviously there have been so many but we wanted to highlight uh some that are particularly relevant uh to state and local governments um and I would start more broadly with the
federal funding freeze which still has a lot of um uh uncertainty around it so on day one president Trump issued seven executive orders uh pausing Federal funding but around certain specific
areas that you can imagine abortion immigration foreign aid Aid energy and environment Dei initiatives uh and gender Ideology Now that was day one a week later uh the Office of Management and budget followed up with a memo that
broadened uh the funding freeze to all federal government Aid um quite frankly that created a lot of consternation in Washington both Republicans and Democrats and within 2 days uh
litigation uh uh issued litigation resulted in an injunction um halting both the OM memo as well as uh the initial uh uh freeze the the challenge here is that uh
while the White House has rescinded the OM memo they have also given directions to agencies that they can still temporarily pause funding if it does not adhere to the administration's priorities so there is a lot of um uh uh
uh differences in terms of how funding is flowing through different agencies depending upon you know Department of uh energy versus Housing and Urban Development there's no consistency at this point um and so uh even just recently as yesterday the federal judge
in Rhode Island uh has has called on the administration for not actually adhering to uh the temporary restraining order and calling on the Department of Justice to investigate which agencies are and are not complying with that uh with that
ex that uh temporary restraining order we're ultimately headed towards appeals that will likely go to the Supreme Court there could be some very serious constitutional questions in order I don't think anyone can read the te leaves to tell you exactly how this is going to shake out but I I do um uh want
to recognize commissioner Proctor we were discussing earlier kind of the importance of recognizing what federal funding the county relies upon um and starting to think strategically about what happens if that funding is not available and how to prioritize that Federal funding in the coming weeks and
months um other executive orders uh the unleashing American Energy was one of the orders that was issued on day one um obviously it it uh it's a shift in the administration's policy around uh energy priorities environmental regulations Etc
um but the main thrust here is that was it's attacking two of President Biden's kind of Hallmark uh legislative accomplishment uh the inflation reduction Act and the um investment in infrastructure uh and jobs act which both had several uh points focused on energy and
environmental justice issues um this funding is subject to pauses not necessarily through executive action and um om memos but based on Strictly agency perspect or perspective as to
whether or not specific funding streams adhere to the administration's priorities so again a lot of uncertainty here there's also been some uh executive actions against diversity equity and inclusion uh just recently as a couple
of hours ago a federal court was uh requiring the administration to um uh put back uh Public Health uh uh information on government websites related to Health Equity issues um there's currently a a lawsuit in in
Maryland challenging the the issues around Dei obviously this is a huge priority for this Administration as well as Congress so even if um there is a limit to what can be done around Dei particularly around agencies and Government Contracting certainly this is
something that's R for um uh congressional action uh in in in the house and the Senate um we mentioned Emergency Management there's there have been some interesting um discussions around the elimination of FEMA but again this gets
back to what I said at the the top the caveat that executive orders do not always have the force of law and the president cannot unilaterally um eliminate an agency that was created by Congress um certainly he can uh redirect
uh priorities and um uh uh conduct certain oversight Etc particularly as it relates to his concern about uh political bias in the uh uh application of emergency assistance uh but it's um
uh we have some interesting thoughts around the idea of the elimination of FEMA because if there is a disaster and the president wants to stand in in the wake of that disaster and say I'm here to help save the day how do you do that if you don't actually have an agency that has a direct role um it seeds a lot
of power to uh state and local governments that this particular president might not want to give up um we have also seen obviously a lot of executive actions on immigration um
particularly uh something of note here is the the requirement for state and local governments to Halt any funding um that could be going to unlawfully or unauthorized Provisions going to illegal aliens um some of the challenges that
we've seen with these executive actions is that they're just arbitrarily broad um if you if you don't give uh Federal go or uh state and local governments sufficient um guidance in terms of what is and is not unlawful uh then it's difficult to
hold them accountable um and this is one of those cases where it's unclear what is and is not U authorized assistance uh and accordingly it is subject to two lawsuits uh and we will see how this plays out in the court system we are not surprised to see uh
lots of action on tariffs um there are currently uh two two major uh uh countries at play here uh Mexico and Canada um and while the tariffs that have been announced have been temporarily halted for a month it's important to kind of pull back and
recognize the art of the deal here um president Trump does not think about tariffs in the context of um uh pure Economic Policy but as a lever to pull in negotiations around other policies
like uh uh illegal immigration and the flow of illegal drugs uh we are anticipating a number of actions that could be um uh targeted towards the European Union um uh certainly uh uh
China um and that's all leverage for this Administration to engage with those governments um to exact a pound of Flesh for for his priorities um not included in this uh uh slide but certainly relevant um and impactful on number of
businesses ultimately consumers are tariffs related to steel and aluminum and it's important to recognize that these tariffs are compounding so there is no offset one for the other you could see items coming into to the US with you
know as much as a 75% tariff uh which will certainly flow to um consumers um I want to provide a brief update on Government funding um currently Government funding runs out on March 14th um there
are varying viewpoints on how we'll move forward with Government funding at this stage and it's because despite the fact that Republicans control both the house and the Senate they have very different viewpoints on how to move forward that agenda so as it relates to Government funding uh the the Senate Republicans
are interested in moving forward with the traditional uh method of going through each of the 12 appropriation bills marking them up and moving to uh full year Appropriations through the end of September um the house which has a
very slim vote of essentially one vote uh for the majority um is concerned that um they won't actually have the votes to move forward with all of those Appropriations bills so in the coming or in the most recent days the the
conversation looks like we're moving towards a full-year continuing resolution that's important because it means that funding Lev are flat um there there's also this element of sequestration which hit in April which means that there's also an automatic hit
to Government funding Appropriations uh which is kind of meant to force uh uh Republicans and and Democrats to the table to actually engage and negotiate on Appropriations but if you're interested in cutting government spending anyway um you you
might not be concerned about sequestration um so it's it's possible that we could have a full year CR but um they're very far apart at this point and there are also concerns about possibly a temporary government shutdown the last point I'll uh mention
is reconciliation uh reconciliation is this process whereby through a simple majority in both the house and the Senate one party can pass um their agenda uh Republicans again are not on the same page as to how to advance that
agenda it's not just tax reform which uh the the tax cuts and jobs Act expires at the end of 2025 uh it's not just tax reform that they want to get done they also want to do a big uh uh a a big one big beautiful Bill potentially that
touches on border security and energy permitting um and whatever else they want to roll up into a a spending package um the Senate thinks that it's uh uh smarter to go with a two-step
approach to uh take some of those uh items and get them out of the way and then come to tax reform the house with that one seat majority is concerned that they can't take multiple votes um and it's important to recognize that there is significant pressure in Washington to
address the debt and deficit um that is coupled with the reality that if you were to have a clean passage of TC the the tax cuts from 2017 it's a net cost of about $4.7 trillion
that doesn't include the campaign promises from president Trump that they're going to need to consider um if they want the president to actually pass or or sign the bill into law so there there are uh extraordinary Revenue pressures on this Congress and it's
certainly relevant to leyon County because there is a chance that uh tax reform um uh becomes uh uh a a victim of congress's in action I don't think it's a high likelihood but it's a possibility
if that were to happen uh tax uh uh rates would increase on almost every resident of of this County and that's certainly relevant it's also relevant because of the massive spending cuts that might be required uh either in reconciliation or in tax reform it could
certainly impact residents immediately um things like Medicaid which temporarily or or or uh uh historically has has not been on the table but now is um or SNAP benefits it could also impact long-term projects like infrastructure
funding um that there are certainly a number of uh uh Federal uh bills that have to be reauthorized in the next two or three years that could get caught up in these uh spending fights um so a lot to to consume uh a lot of uncertainty a
lot of challenges uh but that's why you have representatives in DC I I I want to mention I'm one of many uh Squire patent box really Prides itself on being uh very bipartisan so that we have you covered on both sides of the aisle and both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue from Congress to the White House um so I'm
happy to answer any questions thank you uh Commissioners do we need a motion and a second and then we can get in discussion uh thank you Mr chairman I'll move a staff recommendation for the report okay got a motion I second Mr second uh commissioner O'Keefe and we
are in discussion uh feel free to ask questions and whatever thank you very much Mr chairman thank you very much for being here um and uh and I'm glad you got a chance to to see The Marching 100 uh two questions for you and and I'm not expecting you to have solid
responses to either one of these just because of the volatile nature of what we're dealing with at the moment but the first question I had is regarding the US Department of Transportation Safe Streets for all program the grant program that um was passed in 2021 as part of the bipartisan infrastructure
law and then allocated for the I think five fiscal years I think that allocation ends in 2020 fiscal year 2026 um we have some some some projects here as well as the city of Tallahassee has some projects that already been awarded we want to apply for one this
coming year um in the hopes of getting a grant award under Safe Streets for all uh for a major Corridor do you have any guess or hint where what's going to happen to that funding I've I've spoken to some of our um staff and the uh ctpa
and they basically said well they would have to change the law Congress would have to basically change that buzz that that budget allocation for the allocations already been made but can you shed any light on that and if you have any best guess on what the future of that program is going to be so I
think that there um there there are some guess estimations that we can make um for example there was a raiseed grant funding opportunity that was open under the prior Administration that actually
expired under this Administration so it it opened up in November and it closed I think January 30th there was a conversation about whether or not this Administration would um poorly view applications under that
grant program that was administered under the prior Administration I think that um the reality is the new Administration in its uh uh in carrying out and executing the funding that's
already been allocated under iig uh will have an opportunity to reprioritize what it considers um uh important and quite frankly if the prior notice of funding opportunity under that
program kind of highlighted Equity inclusion accessibility I would not expect that in this uh uh in this new iteration um so so there might be a way to craft a narrative that sounds um uh not not to have a pun intended but
more inclusive and less partisan uh that could be successful but that's certainly something that we can track um I think uh we could also be looking at other communities um uh with varying political
leanings that might have an an interest and priority around that program to determine how the administration would would approach it yeah some some of our staff have have said that uh with Safe Streets for all we we might have the specific criteria within the application
process coming up to be to be changed differently and so the responses that our applications should have in terms of the content and those applications might change in order to satisfy or or optimize the chances of our application being selected exactly okay thank you the second question I had is is very
similar regarding um Broadband access under n C and uh the bead funding and the digital uh capacity Grant programs um same same questions for those you know actually a little bit different because my understanding is that the federal government has
basically designated the the bead funding and digital capacity funding to the States because Florida commerce is managing the the grant distribution for the State of Florida um is is my understanding of that correct has the funding already been allocated to the
states and the states is now um the distributor of those funds uh or is that subject to the same volatility we see in DC right now regarding the bead program and the the digital access digital capacity grants so two things um I
believe the bead funding was allocated in several tranches so it could be that the latest tranch was allocated to the state government there could be subsequent trones that have not been um however when we received the F the uh after Jan uary 27th the OM memo halting
all federal funding there was an exercise around how that impacted beat funding and the analysis was that that program would be held harmless and from our experience with other local governments it was I think the other caveat here is that ultimately that is
funding that goes to the benefit of the private sector uh and in terms of uh being able to to to purchase services and from the providers exactly and I think that um cre creates a caveat that is different from say something like
Snap funding got it great thank you Mr thank you very much for your time and for coming here and uh thank you Mr chairman thank you commissioner Miner M commissioner O'Keefe thank you Mr chair and thank you um for very comprehensive report uh on
what is a to understate it fast-moving uh environment um I wanted to ask about the tax what you talk about what you call it as the tax reform mhm it is am I understanding correctly that if you set aside campaign promises
and nothing is done basically we get to the end of the the changes that were enacted in 2017 so we're not we're not reforming we are just deciding to continue what we reformed in 2017 by
Design By Design and it's by Design because of the significant budget impact it was trillions in 2017 and so you couldn't go longer because you'd have to offset those there there are always
going to be um uh Revenue constraints there are questions about how you actually pay for it or if you pay for it for example Senator kpo would say that because this is current law then this is the Baseline and it doesn't actually
cost anything else to continue current law um not everyone agrees with that the reason it's by Design is because the corporate tax cuts in tcja were made permanent the individual tax cuts were
not um I don't know how many people would agree with this publicly but you would assume that neither uh you know a very Progressive Democrat nor a very conservative Republican in Congress would want to have to go home to their individual constituents and explain to
them why they allowed their tax uh rates to increase particularly as we're fighting back inflationary concerns gotcha and so separate from conceptually um you mentioned a renewing the tax reform
would an estimated impact of 4 trillion 4.7 because there there there are um tax raisers things that raise revenue in that provision and then there also substantial tax cuts and if unless we
run deficits that would have that would be less funding for government outflow and services it would it would actually um raise more say this the the the impact would
actually be a greater uh uh hit to taxpayers as opposed to the the revenue that it raises for the government so it's it's not necessarily about how much um the government is taking in it's more about the impact to individual taxpayers
there are also some nuances like for family-owned businesses for example if you're a pass through there's a deduction that helps a lot of family-owned businesses there are um uh there's a lower rate on estate taxes if you're trying to pass down businesses
Etc all of those benefits would would would expire um thank you for explaining that for everyone uh and then last time they did some tax reform stuff it may not have been the 2017 if I remember right they actually waited
until the end of the tax year to get it done just before you have to file like the next year is that possible are we likely to see that again for this so what will happen is reconciliation is is used based off of a budget it's
possible short answer it's possible okay reconciliation is based off of a budget resolution you can have one budget resolution per fiscal year so right now we're in FY 2025 we can have that's why there's a two Bill strategy you could have one budget reconciliation between
now and September 31st to do one bill and then you could have a second bite at the Apple uh between September 31st and the end of the year when the taxes hit politically though I think it would be a lot it would be very challenging for Republicans to have to go home in August
during August recess having not addressed this issue um Congress is very reactionary and a lot of times you do wait until the very end to put pressure but these um this impact is so high I don't see them waiting and running out
the clock on this especially if you've got competing issues around government spending thank you very much thank you commissioner O'Keefe commissioner Proctor thank you very much Mr chairman uh sister bison uh sister Street you uh these
people don't see see us bison a lot down in this area so if we're looking at you screen and you know it's real bison right there I see it uh that's what's going on uh we thank you for coming in these parts and I want you to know that the fam you van is real that's real what
you saw but uh believe it but they don't have our o la la dances they don't have the o la la dances so trust and believe um Commissioners until you see Howard University's oo laa dancers uh fam you can't touch that at all um would an
idiot um request at this time um even an idiot elected as a county commissioner uh make requests of the federal government for its properties inside of Lyon County uh especially looking at the
transactional um approach to acquisition expansion imperialism of United States and when um this Administration was in power before um this potential if you say idiot commissioner noted the president's
desire to unload Federal lands you know unload unload and we have um massive issues and though we're not going outside of the continental United States we just want inside of our our Geographic bound to have control over
more federal land uh I'll just leave this alone if you think that it's just dumb to try and secure the lands inside of Leon County sister bison what are your thoughts on that well I would never call a commissioner of this esteemed body an idiot so that we'll start um no
I I actually think that um historically Republican administrations have been more amenable to relinquishing federal land to to state and local governments um it it is a part of this
whole overarching concept of reducing uh the role and the reach of the federal government um and so I certainly think that under this Administration um particularly because um uh that type of land transfer usually
doesn't happen as a one-off it's usually packaged together with a with a massive lands Bill where everyone gets a little piece of the pie um and that's something that uh for someone who wants to have you know to be able to tout
bipartisanship and have both Republicans and Democrats you know standing behind him as he as he signs uh that land package into law it could certainly be um uh something of Interest particularly in an even numbered year um and and
certainly an opportunity that this County could could explore I'm pleased to hear those comments um should um in his tentative we I of us attend na uh I would love for um uh patent bogs to
allow um the seeds of that idea uh in our pursuit of of um securing our federal government's relinquishment of its properties here in leyon county and um if we get Canada as the 51st state um
I could support that um speak no French I mean um Greenland I speak no Greenland I speak you know Pama none of those things I want to ask what what programs uh in terms of spending usually when a
new Administration comes in uh we find they come in with new exciting uh programs and new monies hit the street uh it seems that the opposite is occurring under this Administration that monies are being cut off but my ask of
you is um what are the um New spending opportunities that are coming to DC at the end of the month uh point want us in the directions of places and spaces where money remains there's a trickle and we might be able to get
some I appreciate that question I think that we can pull together a team of Specialists that can actually identify a full list for you but off the top of my head I would look at um funding streams that have traditionally been bipartisan
because um something that was very um interesting to me was how quickly this Administration pivoted once they started hearing from their own members particularly in the Senate um I would be looking at things like anything related
to infrastructure funding Highway funding um the farm bill anything agriculture related um uh certainly anything defense related those are spaces that have traditionally been very bipartisan uh but we can certainly look
to to find others and I I think no is a great opportunity um to kind of see what other priorities other counties are putting forward and where we can um uh kind of find some overlapping synergies very good my final question Mr
chairman um you've heard it said that uh Florida and in which is in my District Florida state is in my district um but the anti- Dei sentiment uh there's a hell of a lot of concern
uh about FAMU uh its future uh there's a hell of a lot of concern about Howard and it's funding future from federal government um we have the number one public HBCU in
America in Leon County we're very proud of it uh it is as fascinating academically as it is musically um but I ask you the health the life uh the vitality of our
HBCU uh specifically the one here in in Leon County in district one uh but even wider uh the other uh HBCU in mostly in the southeastern United States what is what is the uh uh your um your um uh
view of their health and well-being in particular ju oppose against the anti- Dei sentiment these are challenging times but HBCU have LGH held by partisan
support there's a an HBCU caucus in Congress that is uh helmed by a Republican and a Democrat there are a lot of HBCU in Republican districts and uh seeing funding pulled from those uh
from those institutions harm them uh just as much as any other County I think think that um a lot of the backlash around Dei quite frankly is in response to
2020 you know every action has an equal and opposite reaction so there are a lot of um uh initiatives that were spurred by 2020 the the summer of of George Floy Etc and
I think a lot of the Dei push back is related to that as opposed to institutions organizations initiatives that have a long held standing particularly the establishment of historically black
colleges and universities so so while overarching certainly Dei you know that the attack on Dei is not going away I think that um uh hpcu are held in a different light thank you um finally going back to my question
previous uh we would appreciate if your your your company is able to amass uh that list of U pools of money that continue to exist that have not evaporated are on pause uh I heard you
say that defense spending is one of those by partisan but we're not a uh we're not Walton County or or um um scambia we don't have a base here um but we would love to know uh those areas
which would make uh more profitable our time um if we come to Washington at the end of the month of n absolutely and I would just say I would think of Defense more broadly not just in terms of physical structure but also investment in in uh Tech and Innovation so to the
extent there are opportunities there certainly um with universities that's that's something to consider in that sense I'll make this this plug um you know I know our board is a list uh our ROTC building at FAMU looks like hell
and um we have about 25 27 Old air conditioned units you know in the Howard Hall it's called and um it's been funded with u believe $13 million from the legislature last year but $13 million
barely pay the the the the uh the technical stuff the um kinds of computers that the military uh they they they not dealing with um Best Buy Stuff m that's a different grade and brand is very expensive and I would be curious at in
terms of the continuing um monies that pour in the military that um you look at the track record of FAMU the number of um Colonels um generals um major vandon Jones was here he spoke to us today
Majors those kind of folk um ounce for ounce and pound for pound measure for measure um US Army gets a hell of a lot bang for the dollar and I would ask um um Miss Street your interest in our our
OTC funding uh we need a new complex that brings Navy uh Army and all of them into a central something like that so we've appreciated your presence here and um you represented the
mecca quite well thank you well thank you and I'm happy to work with you on that as well yes ma'am all right all right thank you commissioner parer commissioner Cummings oh thank you thank you Mr chair and thank you uh for being here uh we appreciate your your thorough
analysis of all the executive orders and I appreciate your your presentation to us um to us this afternoon here but I I want to um just ask you a couple of questions uh we know one of the things
that um well let me back up about four or five years ago we were all across the country uh suffering from the devastation of of of covid uh businesses
closed as a result individuals lost their jobs created more uh more homelessness people um mortgages um were foreclosed bankruptcies and what have you but in
the midst of that um we had what ARA the American Recovery protection act and some federal funding came down to the local levels to assist
and to try to jumpstart uh the economy needless to say our local governments are suffered uh you know just like our business community and individuals so we had some federal assistance uh that came down
and I think thank God here in Leon County we you know we recovered for the most part we're on the up stream now as far have as far as having a a very thriving uh economy but right
now with the turf wars with the president the Tariff Wars uh with the president and I think we we hear him uh we've heard him the last couple of days say if they put a 25% tariff on our Goods we
going to do the same thing you know back and forth and the potential is from a reality standpoint is is higher you know higher prices um we haven't seen a reduction in prices um goods or services uh in the
grocery store I think everybody's looking at the price of eggs but I think overall if we have the Tariff Wars I understand even the cost for um manufacturing the cost for um
parts to even repair our automobiles all of that going to go up which in the final analysis should um might very well uh be in inflation at a at an all-time high business is
closing um people use losing their jobs from individual uh standpoint so I said all that to say this is there anything or any Rumblings that you hear I know this might be premature but if we get
into an economic situation like that and especially from the local government standpoint uh do you do you foresee any type rescue similar to what we experience with with Co when we had our
local economies even on the state and the local levels suffering um from an economic standpoint from the financial Devastation and I think clearly here from a county standpoint sitting as Commissioners we
would be concerned if our local economy you know fell into disarray because of of you know what's happening on the national International level as far as tarf Wars are concerned if if you see any foresight from from Congress to
provide some type of overall assistance like we experienced with Co I appreciate that question I and I think um most folks sincerely hope it doesn't come to that uh in terms of the the devastation that we saw under
covid-19 I do think that uh we can never underestimate the need for bipartisanship to get things done in Congress that there is a scenario where even related to tax reform Democrats have to be called on because Republicans
are unable to move forward in their own party with their own votes and if and when that happens and it will happen particularly on Government funding there's there's a several members of of the Republican party in the house who have never and will never vote for a
government spending Bill there will need Democratic uh support and Democrats will um have their priorities and you I I would guarantee you if um we see the economic impact of tariff and trade Wars
if we see uh inflationary pressures and and ultimately the the kind of kitchen table costs are not being resolved um Democrats will have the same vested interest as Republicans in coming together to put forward at least
narrowly tailored economic policies that try to relieve some pressure on all levels whether it's providing State assistance local government assistance and certainly individual assistance um it likely will not be to the level of of
the cares act and and um you know the American Recovery rescue plan but there are certainly um certain Provisions that you could see coming up again um maybe more temporarily maybe a you know a shorter term um maybe um kind
of a narrower qualification but but it's certainly possible okay thank thank you for for that for that response and just one one brief followup um Mr chair because because what we are dealing with now is executive orders M from uh from the
president as opposed to uh Congressional you know congressional action and I know that there are some attorney generals that have 30 3540 have filed a lawsuit several lawsuits uh against some of the
impending um uh exe executive orders but from a local standpoint as far as as we're concerned here I know we have our our state delegation we we have you guys but is
there is there anything you can tell us as far as our hands pretty much being tired sitting back just waiting to see what happens is that anything proactive you can you can advise us or
recommend just based on your 15 17 years uh on the federal level certainly I yeah I would never advise you to sit back and and and wait I think there's always something that can be done even if it is
um perhaps not uh legislative action or uh litigation if there's no standing but perhaps political pressure you know identifying the impacts of the trade Wars on your constit constituents and help to lift up those uh realities um
certainly partnering with other similarly situated counties um who who understand how this is playing out and impacting their communities as well uh particularly if it's if it can be done in a bipartisan way um and you know uh
presidential elections are four years but we can never forget the midterms um a lot of people are thinking in two-year increments instead of four there's certainly a possibility that um uh this uh that Washington DC looks very different with a a potential
speaker Jeff in the house in 2027 and I would be laying the groundwork towards that potential outcome and identifying what are their priorities what what is the the equal and opposite reaction to this Administration um such that you can
um uh be held harmless thank you thank you for that response thank you Mr Mr chair thank thank you commissioner Cummings commissioner Proctor you want yes sir that was um an excellent excellent response um by Miss re to your question
uh commissioner Cummings U an Exquisite U answer um one of the things about these executive orders is that the legislative process uh Congress is out the um the legislature the Congress
doesn't deliberate and the conversation of public policy only moves forward from The Stroke of the president's pin and the only deliberation of the policy is with the courts so all of America is excluded from the conversation whether
it goes forward or it doesn't but the only people in the conversation is a court and you got to take the the the the uh executive order to a court and the Court's posture is that we don't legislate I mean we don't we're not leg we just decide the issues of Law and we
adjudicate we don't legislate and that's a problem because if there is no issue of law you know besides preemption usurpation um you know overreach uh and they're deciding weak questions but not
the sub substantive things with Which democracy has policy that is deliberated whether use the dominant parties Republican whoever but our policymaking include Del
Liberation and when you exclude that deliberative process and that kind of um bread making and in the bowl and stirring it up and the way we do things um it's going to be a shout shell s h e l l and very Hollow
because the court is not in the business of the liberating and duking it out and back and forth uh the way we anticipate and if the president was was was getting legislation proposed it would get that deliberative treatment uh it would go
through the halls of the house and the Senate it would get you know and we respect we would just accept and respect the outcome because it's gone through that but by Fiat an executive order without any input from America's elected
representatives of 50 states um is a is a is a constitutional crisis uh it um it um stagnates democracy and it certainly is out of character with
the scope and the substantive nature of the uh policy directives uh they are so substantial that it almost uh shouldn't be uh a executive order but the scope of
these things um elimination of a Department of Education um elimination of a FEMA uh many of these things you've shown us today uh just warned by the sheer nature of the size of the impact on America's
people to be in a um you know but you've given us hope um that last answer and that is that these days won't last I think we have about 45 weeks um Monday Begins the third 45 weeks left and um
but to build toward uh The Changing of the Guard in uh what year you said when we what's the next after 400 weeks whenever that is uh midterms yeah yeah and uh midterms and when uh four years
pass we build toward that so that that's encouraging and this has been the nature of the Seesaw of uh Democratic Society thank you very much uh Mr chairman I'm very very um typically uh patent bog sends down to us uh two
members three um but when you have a bison on the case you only need one bison are exponentially better um all right seeing no further question oh I'm sorry commissioner Maddox there you are go ahead I'll be I'll be quick uh you you've done an
excellent job today um your representation of your firm has been outstanding the presentation you had the questions and the way you've answered our questions and even uh the perspective that you've given us on uh how the pendulum swings back and forth
has been one that that gives us a good indication of what's going on in Washington and what we can expect my question to you is more of a uh because it seems like you've been there for a while and you may have perspective on this uh it's more I guess academical
than it is political or historic uh with a historic reference do you do you see because I do agree I think as a nation we watch the pendulum swing from one one side to the other I was Bill if you remember back in 2010 when
when I was elected the tea party was a thing and then after the tea party thing happened then it was a far a far left movement um and then it was you know when it was there now we're in the Trump era um do you ever think that we we
we'll foresee a um a time when the pendulum doesn't swing so far cuz it seems to me where those days those days where um Centrist or um
bipartisanship was was was the norm are far gone I I remember I was a child then but the the conversations between um Reagan and his Democratic counterpart of power I forget who it was tip O'Neal and
how they would fight on the floor would be able to have after M those times just don't exist anymore not as much um you're up in Washington mhm do you is it getting any better in that way
cuz I I I I I happen to believe that the problem that we have as a nation is not as much I mean policy and the people we elect elections matter um but I think it's the cor it's the decorum that happens amongst the parties and the people who are elected that's the
biggest problem that we got the fact that you can't sit down at the table and negotiate and it's got to be my way and not yours there is no negotiation um do you see that art form coming back to to politics yes because I'm hopeful I I try
to always remain hopeful um and and kind of two two things in response I think commissioner Proctor touched on kind of this overarching um frustration around you know exec Fiat and that is shared
quietly by a lot of republicans in Congress if for no other reason then that they want the opportunity to cast the vote in in favor of the very thing that they are are are railing against the administration doing um there is
certainly a potential for this Administration in this time to overplay their hand and go too far um some can I don't want to be too political but you know some can say that uh you know the
the the Democratic party last you know leading up to the election went too far the other way and and and this is what we end up with but um it doesn't end up being on the news every night um but there is a lot of bipartisanship that actually happens in Congress uh it was a
wonderful thing when we got past covid and we could get back to Congressional codels because they are required to be bipartisan um and so you have members of Congress going all over the world um you know learning about other countries and and traveling together and and getting
to know each other personally um and you also have the requirement to fund the government which is often done in a bipartisan way um there are a lot of things that we are doing in a bipartisan way it's just not sexy enough to end up on the Nightly News and I think that
this pendulum swinging has created more and more and more moderates up and down the Spectrum in both parties uh who are looking to get together um and and and not stay in the extremes right M Mr chair question uh one thing I can I can
say about our staff throughout the years is that they've while we've come up with all kinds of ideas up here U great ideas of things we can do in the county uh and sometimes in the city even though we don't have jurisdiction over the city
staff often times will be the oh call it the adult room um that that does the research comes back to us with the with what the facts are and what the unintended consequences of some of the ideas that we may have are and
how that may affect us longterm uh because most of us are here a term or two uh some are here three four those others are here you know as long as they want to be um but we try to make the most impact and the most change change
in the time that we're here staff often times have seen those ideas time and time again and have watched them not work or has um watched them work or or or or analyzed those same ideas over and
over again because one thing I figured out in politics there's nothing original everybody's had that idea before everybody's thought to try it and you you're not coming to tell anything new um I I say all that to to get to this question some of the things that I see thus far
coming down from the federal government and I'm no I'm no policy head but it strikes me as as irresponsible um and not really considering the long-term effects of the policies or executive orders that could
put in be put in place how much we as a board tend to listen to our staff and if we if we don't listen to our staff we push back with questions ask for justifications um and most times we end
up in the place of being reasonable right um how much is staff at the federal level analyzing and also having input into some of these executive orders and and policies that's being written or is it just like you
know this I think that you have the right to remain I think that there there are are two different sides to that that question one is the staff of the administration versus staff in Congress I think this
Administration in its second term has been very diligent about surrounding itself with loyalists okay who put forward an agenda that matches that of the president um so I I I I don't know you know the the staff of the White
House personally we don't you know we don't uh have brunch or anything together but but from what I've heard from folks who have worked in the administration and are closely related they have certainly seen a shift towards greater loyalty um so I think the the um
the adult in the room for the administration is quite frankly the American people uh who have a voice of their own through their their representation the right to redress Congress and certainly through their their members of Congress as it relates
to congress not all congressional offices are created equal but I will say there are committees that have jurisdiction over every piece of legislation that moves forward and very rarely do you see a piece of legislation move without having gone through a
committee that is staffed with experts on the house on the uh Republican it's not even considered Republican or Democratic it's majority or minority and and those are career folks who have been there 20 30 years they know what they're
talking about and certainly um committee staff as well as Congressional leadership look to um uh uh they they look to them for for guidance because you know we talked about the tax reform most of the members of Congress who are
on the tax writing Committee in the house were not there in 2017 so they they're not only uh uh you know don't have a a a precedent to follow they don't a lot of them don't even know the issues uh well enough uh to to have a
conversation about it and there's a lot of Education happening and that is happening from the staff so so um yes and no is the short answer Mr final comment I will say thank you for those answers um one word that you said is you
have a lot of loyalties right and um that can be a problem sometimes especially when we need to be checked and I I'll I'll just speak on our staff here I want Mr administrator you and your your staff along with Madam attorney those times that we may need to be checked I
appreciate the fact that you do it uh that we don't quote unquote have a lot of loyalties because I think that that creates problems and unintended consequences that we don't want to deal with and so um that's not anything that you can do anything about but it gives it gives me perspective into what's
going on there and what to expect in in the in the four years that that that we're looking at but I do think midterms are are so important uh key thing to remember here for anybody that's watching is that elections have consequences um and and dire
consequences and we should all be be excited about the opportunity to to participate in the process uh of of choosing our Representatives so as that um we cannot so we can we can avoid some of the things that we're dealing right
now so thank you m Mr chair thank you commissioner Maddox all right um we've got a motion by by commissioner Maddox I think it was seconded by commissioner O'Keefe is that right I'm not sure okay uh for staff recommendation on item 13
all those in favor signify by saying I I I All oppos Passes unanimously thank you ma'am we appreciate you uh making it down to Tallahassee go bison um Mr administrator we're on citizens to be heard on non-agenda items thank you Mr chairman we've got two
speakers uh Allan Ballas to be followed by Kenneth White Mr Ballas your name and address for the record please and I remind you we don't have a back and forth you just tell us what you need to tell us and then we can ask
staff to work with you or whatever Alan Ballas 6323 Thomas Drive Unit 603 Panama City Beach Florida thank you you have three minutes I'm here at the request and after my discussion with the honorable Bill Proctor I need to just
take a second of my valuable time to tell him thank you I called two different Commissioners only one of them responded commissioner Proctor responded immediately met me the next day and asked that I come and and bring this to you we have two issues going on one is
both of them deal with the homeless in Tallahassee um on off a Crossway Road Crawfordville Road and Capitol Circle um there's there's it it I was taught in civics class that a break and transport ation creates economy well the homeless
people are are setting up where there's a break in transportation where they can beg it's creating a safety hazard I know that there's a lot of laws that conflict both ways um as far as freedom of speech and and stuff such as that but you can't
even put a political sign on it right away and yet people are standing there begging for money I am begging our commissioners to look at a proposal like they have in simol County that prohibits pan handling this
was um one of my neighbors and he posted a new trespass a issued with the sheriff it took them over a month and a half to go out there excuse me m can can we put that on the overhead um Vince is that possible that picture I've got I've got
a couple of them if I can hand them to possible that we can miss ball we want to show it so that your efforts and taking those photos everybody can see m Mr the Comm honorable Proctor was so afraid when we got by these properties he wouldn't even get out to look you know to see man you ain't supposed to
tell that it's the truth my wife won't stay with me at my Tallahassee house because of of of the fear of the homeless and and the U the crime that's going on there I I'm from Leon High my father's got a brick that's out here in
front of this courthous um courthouse I'm I'm the retired postmaster from woodv this is my home and I've got eight properties here um it was disgusting it is disgusting this here it's sideways but this is where a homeless tapped into
the power on Crossway shops and I was told by um detective Neely with this Leon County that that there was no power hook in uh how do we go to the next okay next this this is off of Crawfordville
high off of um uh cap Circle this is Mr prior where there's a no trespassing warrant it took them over a month to go out there and do anything about it they moved them out um Wednesday and commissioner Proctor went out with me
Thursday and um the cost to clean this is going to be between 35 was was all estimated between 5,000 and 12,000 to clean it up now the property owner is paying for it to be cleaned up we got a church group doing it for 3,500
I'm a commissioner not a sheriff that's why I didn't go back in those that area this is this is the one off of Crossway shops here where the sheriff has told me that they um can't do anything about it because it's on private property and they won't contact the the property owner to let them know that this exists
and they said it would be the same thing detective braon McMullan did as if they didn't like the color of my house um you know and I just Why Don't We Tell the owner ERS that this is happening on their property instead of using code enforcement for law
enforcement this is that same property so we can go to the next one they they they remov the the property from Mr prior one on Capital Circle on Wednesday six people moved back on on Saturday
this is a mattress that was on fire on Saturday they keep doing fire after fire I reported at the fire department repeatedly and it's it's an issue um I know I'm out of time but you know there was two of us that were supposed to be
there um Mr B your time is up you've worked with commissioner Proctor um and our staff is glad to work with you on trying to figure out what Solutions are available to you I'm begging you to to work on a proposal to stop pandering um
thank you very much yes sir thank you for your time appreciate it next speaker next speaker is Kenneth White that was my neighbor that had to leave he okay so he's all right thank you sir that concludes your speakers uh Mr chairman all right William excuse me
Commissioners um all right commissioner I think Mr Williams um have y'all spoke y'all spoke already they spoke already commissioner Proctor we're going to talk about that in commissioner time I think we're on uh discussion items Madam County attorney thank you Mr chairman I have nothing for the board thank you thank
you madam County attorney Mr County Administrator I just have one quick item uh Mr chairman I just wanted to um wish um my much older twin brother commissioner Proctor happy birthday this this coming weekend yes sir uh commissioner Proctor and I wanted to
give you a gift it's kind of a visual gift in the spirit of the Marching 100 if you'll look at the the the the overhead here that's a young shank and Lamy head of the uh symbol Squad at Miami Central uh and um
again that's a that's a visual gift for you commissioner Pro but I want to apologize to everyone else who had to see it looks pretty good to me Mr administrator looks like a guy with a lot of style yeah that's me all right Commissioners we're on to um discussion
time yeah yeah we had a great shot of young shington out there solving problems even back as a kid man you ever seen a black man R face uh all right um so we're on discussion items uh commissioner Proctor will'll
start with you and work our way down the dis M Mr chairman a great place to start uh Commissioners uh I'm telling you uh commissioner Caroline cumins just open up and stole the show uh I've not seen a opening presentation uh her a chomy said
I bet you can't top that you can't top that I said I think we brought the boys choir here one time I and they made a little noise uh but I'll be working on something to top that opening commissioner that was fabulous um they did give us a mini uh concert and we're
very proud of a family band Commissioners um uh my ask tonight is for review on the ordinance on solicitation uh which M the Mr um Mr U Ballas uh has brought to my awareness uh
he tried to well he did drive me all around up in the woods and stuff I had never seen um is is is is is is worse than what the pictures suggest uh what you saw uh was only visually but
um you got no um sense of smell of um anything that we smell down there uh it was scary and no I was not going back up to meet nobody um I remember uh going up under the bridges uh down in Miami with
govern the child to uh go down and see some homeless people under the bridges and uh I don't know why we had to go back there it was just a smell that you just you just can't even describe um I'd like to see us do something about this
condition and uh in terms of people begging on the streets of Crawfordville Road um Capital Circle um Madam County attorney do we have an ordinance that addresses uh
solicitation um and what can we do to get people out out of the mediums the roads is intimidating um it's um it's it's a hazard uh sometimes people look as if uh they're not in good health they could fall they could fall in the front of
somebody's car and a driver needlessly has a issues going on that they really shouldn't have encountered because it was not expecting people to clown around dance around uh and all of that is there where are we in terms of our posture of
ordinances that address um um the issues of uh Laing on private property the notices that are given to owners in particular when um code enforcement is writing the owners if they live out of town and they are
unaware um where are we in some of the issues that were presented with Mr Ballas and solicitation out of the median Mr chairman yes ma'am you can go right ahead thank you uh so uh you may recall that the commission used to have
uh a provision on the books but um it was problematic because while it prohibited certain activities on streets there were exceptions and under the case law that's not permissible so that was
repealed and then a couple of years ago maybe three two or three times a little fluid uh the board was considering whether to adopt an ordinance regarding solicitation but pulled back as you
mentioned earlier commissioner Proctor when um sheriff mcneel came and spoke and then the board instead decided to fund host deputies so the board County Commissioners currently has nothing on
the books related to uh solicitation uh you mentioned loitering particularly on private property uh again maybe this is a year to a year and a half ago the board adopted an ordinance that uh
provides a mechanism for private property owners to post signage and for law enforcement to um enforce uh loitering and trespass violations on private property so so there actually is
something on the books for that already okay now I know commissioner caban uh his issues with penac Cola but we're talking about standing in the road uh begging at the at the red light in the median we don't have anything that's
against standing in the middle of the of intersection commissioner proor Madam Conor wasn't there case law recently at the Supreme Court or or ruling at the Supreme Court that dealt with this or was that no you're thinking of Grants Pass it deals with homelessness okay that has nothing to do with solicitation
or panhandling as it's sometimes called got so that is not a change in law based on the recent US Supreme Court decision um happy to bring back an analysis uh as you can see using Grants Pass as a perfect example case law and precedent
can change there are some limitations on what you can do to regulate solicitation and panhandling along roads be happy to bring something back the board would like that if we had something before uh people like the fireman with the hat the boots uh the goody goodie uh
organizations recognize 501 c3s I think that we had exemptions W for them uh but what we but what we have uh prohibited was um stragglers individuals persons who are not with the
fire department are good goody cause um cause him have it and I'd like to see um um I've seen that it's it it's been normalized in my mind I've seen it so much I'm desensitized but for the ride with Mr BS
and to see it through his frustration his eyes um it does prick uh my awareness and Consciousness we need to do something I know people staying in the uh North uh wall walart in your area
uh I know people are staying over there with sunnies they cleared out the woods but that other Walmart you got over there in a false Chase over there but we go around every m not in your District Mr chairman you don't have those issues yes we have some okay but I was
exempting your area but the rest of us we got some problems and I think Madam uh attorney asked the board uh uh for permission um to for us to look at something that begins to modify commissioner Pro let's hear from commissioner I got minor O'Keefe and
then Maddox okay I think you're going to maybe find some commonality there chairman got a question for our County attorney Madam attorney didn't we uh I thought we passed an ordinance after much debate prohibiting uh panhandling
or or any solicitation in the actual medians for safety reasons I thought we passed that about a year and a half ago we did we no in I think no we put up signs no no no no I I I could be wrong but um this is your wheelhouse but I
thought we actually did pass an ordinance that prohibited for safety reasons any solicitation of any type without specifying type uh prohibiting solicitation in the mediums themselves for safety I I was I thought so too that was my own point is there any kind of
way that maybe we can you can review that and send us exactly what we did do Madam attorney because we had this exact conversation this exact conversation and and yeah yes I I'll be happy to look at
it and bring back a status report to the board um it's my recollection that solicitation public urination and defecation and and one other topic were all included in a proposed ordinance
that again the the board opted not to proceed with uh after Sheriff Walt mcneel came to the meeting and wanted to talk about other ways to address it um
you you may also be uh thinking of um the efforts that staff made by putting up the signs requesting that people not solicit but that was not a mandate it did not make anything uh illegal under
our code that was uh just an initiative of staff that uh the board approved but again I'll be happy with after with board direction to bring something back to the board on this topic sure thank youkee I've got M
commissioner Miner thank youne I thought the signs were in addition to what we what commissioner madx and I were believed to be but we'll we'll we'll read the update thank you very much thank you Mr that too um I think uh well what we're going to hear from commissioner O'Keefe and then whoever
else wants to talk but I do I distinctly remember the the ordinance that did not get any love cuz I motioned for it didn't get a second um and it would have handled this issue and I think it was crafted in a way that would have made it legal um but at that time we weren't
interested but and I do feel like there was something else to the sign thing yeah I think a status update from the county attorney would be best but um commissioner o'keef you're up next Bud um since this is comment time if there's not going to be a motion I'll just won't comment if there's going to be no the
chairman stopped me to allow your comments before I made a motion okay then um I also uh remember something like that but um so but an update on that would be the case you know we we did also um we've had this conversation
and um maybe we didn't go as far as maybe we decided not to go as far as legally allowed but I feel like I'm um a broken record but we are within certain limits of our Authority based on cas law um and on this you know um I've als I've actually been out and spent a good bit
of time in those camps I don't hang out there but going out and Outreach and visiting and talking to people and talking with the host deputies at the Sheriff's Office and seeing what's working and I will say progress is slow but they are their one-on-one
relationships are moving things along they are getting people uh bus passes to where their family is they are doing all these things that a lot of us had talked about wanting to do that I didn't you know initially think was a good idea so I don't want to undermine their efforts or acknowledge not acknowledge their
efforts and then we do have an ordinance for private property that we created where all a private property owner has to do is put up a sign that we have an example of in our agenda meeting from that last year and then a law
enforcement officer can trespass somebody without written if they don't have a written approval and there's that sign on the wall they don't even have to call the owner they is is that right they can just trespass them based on commercial that was commercial posting on private property well these are this
is not a commercial situation this is land that's not a private but we would speaking specifically to commercial settings and putting in those lenders I'm just distinguishing Madam County attorney yes so again this is all
dealing with private property the board did adopt that ordinance uh it did not address any sort of solicitation on public property or rights of way uh and I just did a quick
look at our munic code we have no current ordinance related to solicitation on public property at all okay um commissioner uh I think Maddox has some comment then we come back to you commissioner Pro can finish
up no we're still on me oh you're still on me okay commissioner o'keef thank you um uh thank you Mr chair then I just just wanted to emphasize that and if if the board's Wills to come back and consider a ordinance that is specific then you know we'll take that up when we
do um I will say the um uh so a private property owner can put up the sign and can if they wish to um have people you know eject it if you will and as far as asking law enforcement if they're not willing to contact private property
owner that's all public information there's no reason anyone else can't contact a private property owner who does not seem interested in dealing with people on their private property um and that seems like something that can totally be done currently and if that owner wants law enforcement to get
involved they can um and then I also um just would hope that we uh as far as criminal or civil enforcement if our law enforcement agents genes are recommending a course of action on what they enforce or what
they do I think having their input on any changes uh would be good okay commissioner Maddox thank you well um M sh if I might on directly on point we got to keep a little bit of order commissioner Proctor let me do commissioner madx then we'll come back to you and you can comment on
commissioner o'keef and commissioner Maddox and commissioner Miner and anybody else and you can carry on with your time I just Mr chair thank you um we had you brought it up Mr here we had a conversation just like this 3 years ago 3 years ago and um we had folks who
come came in here and spoke about specifically um what about organizations like he talked about the firemen or children who want to solicit uh on the side of the road and I believe Madame attorney if I'm and this is three years ago so but one of the things that we
talked about was I think even discrimination of some sort because of you know being able to Pi it's First Amendment and you can't pick and choose and exclude certain right speech but allow other speech in certain public
areas that's a problem exactly but then I I do remember that we did get into a conversation about the safety issue of people being in the median and I think I don't I don't know if if we went as far as as as saying as prohibiting the
median but for some reason I feel like there was something that that we talked about to where it should have been prohibited in the medum from a safety perspective that's why I was asking that that maybe maybe we get the the information come back first cuz I'm not really interested in having that
conversation again and having the folks in we had last time uh if we don't have to now if if if the information comes back and it says that we didn't address that median piece then then maybe we need to have a conversation about it but
commissioner PR what I'm wondering is you know can we get a status report back or maybe even um rather than agenda item on status report you know analysis of what we did there U policy-wise from the county attorney and if it if it doesn't speak to this these pieces that we're
talking about then we bring it back at the next meeting because if it if if we've already addressed it then you know maybe we should let it sit where it is now Madam attorney on the um on the median piece of it we could create we could create an
ordinance that prohibited solicitation in the median for for anyone soliciting yes ma'am okay so what case law and I haven't looked at this since the last time it came to the board which is why
if it's board Direction I'd be happy to take another look because again case law evolves you know as as we've seen on different issues um but the last last time I looked
uh Banning certain solicitation or other activities in your Ro roadway uh cannot be a pretext for uh trying to prohibit panhandling that's that's what it was uh so if
you're going to say it's for safety you need to have data M and other things to support it so that when you are sued you can defend it legally and the judge doesn't determine that the whole point of your ordinance wasn't a ruse to
prohibit panhandling right M mam Madam attorney Mr chair that now now it's jogging my memory because you said that exact exact same thing during during the item um commissioner P if we if we could if if if the if Madam attorney
could send us some information about what we did do and then what it would take for us to get to that median piece before we go down that road I I would like for us to do that rather than have an agenda meet agenda item or even even a status report and have the chambers
packed out with folks speaking against like we because I mean we had a lot of people come last time and we we it did it did bring about a good conversation I just I just want to know before we go down that road what we can can't do um and and what we did last time well
commissioner uh Cummings hold on one second let's let commissioner M commissioner paror hadn't even told us what he wants to do yet guys go ahead and you got it back I wanted to make a motion to that we look at ordinance prohibiting uh paning from the median middle of the street uh I
disagree with the county attorney's assessment and I don't think a court would hold us suspect is suppressing First Amendment rights because we're trying to keep people out of the median asking for money and what we're wanted to prohibit very narrowly is folks
standing up soliciting money in the middle of the street that's not the same as Rick Miner and o'keef standing up there vote for me and all like that they got that free speech on the side and honk if you love me uh those people in front of the capital what they do but standing in front of the media and
getting asking for money such as the nature of folk who um they're dangerous you know and they they they place a chilling effect hell I will run through a red light not to stop at certain points and I don't think a cord and Leon
County would have a problem with us understanding is a lot of folk run red lights so they don't have to be stopped and harassed at the medium so I'm trying to i' like to make the motion that we bring back an ordinance to prohibit uh solicitation in mediums uh in Le County
we have a motion from commissioner pner second we're in discussion commissioner Cummings U thank you Mr chair uh we came to this discussion because if it's my understanding because of the presentation and the pictures and the
vagrancy on property I I'm not sure if the motion addresses that maybe maybe it does but I do remember this coming up before I remember the County Attorney given us case law that says there's a First Amendment right in certain areas
on sidewalks what have you bringing an item back dealing with the median does that have a far re would that have a far reaching effect Madam County attorney to address the issue that the speaker uh brought to us today
about individuals just vandalizing uh uh personal property I don't see how we two are the same um I I can't speak for this speaker uh I think the speaker was trying to
correlate places where people are camping with areas near where they are soliciting again don't know if that's the case but but the analysis would not address that because
whe where they are residing would have absolutely nothing to do with the legality of whether this board can adopt legally an ordinance to prohibit panhandling an a median oh thank you oh thank you
M Mr chair can I can I ask commissioner Proctor then uh is his motion I mean I I'll support the motion but are we trying to address what you said you went out and Visually saw with your eyes are we trying to
address that through bringing back an ordinance of of the one that you mentioned is is that your goal absolutely it's very narrow just prohibit people standing in the road got nothing to do where you slept last night night before just don't stand in the
road begging oh I see for money I support the motion I was just trying to get clarification commissioner command for discussion thank you Mr chair um kind of following and listening to the conversation
um I understand what uh the the County Attorney saying I understand what you're saying commissioner Proctor and um I think I think when you take a step back and look at what we're discussing panhandling in a median in my opinion is
a road safety concern and is a pedestrian safety concern so U I think if we're looking at the reason why we're looking at banding panhandling if we're saying that it's because of and we have you know case law says it's permissible um Madam
attorney correct me if I was trying to follow what I think you were saying case law has to show that it's for road safety or pedestrian safety was was that Mr chair uh Madam attorney yes you can speak freely thank you uh so so based on
the case law that IG and I reviewed about a year and a half ago uh courts have expressed skepti skepticism over just blanket assertions that that is a safety issue so in other words courts have required
data MH proof that there was a dangerous condition in the community resulting from this specific activity that required that that body adopt an
ordinance to address a safety issue so your personal belief that it's dangerous is not helpful in the legal context if your ordinance gets challenged so you would need experts in this field to somehow
quantify or demonstrate the hazard such that it would support safety as a basis for the regulation yes ma'am thank you for that uh clarification I think that's very helpful I think you know we've talked about as a board often times you know we
have um data showing you know pedestrians being you know hit by Vehicles I'm sure we have uh maybe if this does come back if this passes along with the ordinance we could have
staff include uh data and and points showing you know pedestrians being hit by vehicles um to support this but um list I I I think this is a problem in the Young County I know this is a problem in my district um commissioner
Maddox you know I I I uh was listening to where you were going about like having a status report come back um for me I kind of like just having an ordinance if we're going to go with an ordinance let's just bring it back to kind of speed the process up and either we're going to support it or not that's
kind of my viewpoint on it um but so thank you Mr chair uh thank you commissioner Maddox thank you I I understand everybody's urgency to want to get this done but I'm also listening to my attorneys say that we need data uh that that that justifies what we're trying to do and though we're trying to
rush down this road I mean I'm I'm I'm as concerned as everybody else and I like to see it happen but why not take the time to see what it takes to actually make it happen um the status report I was asking for was an analysis of what we did last time and
what it would actually take for us to implement what we're trying to do this time so then by way of looking at that we can actually start to build whatever we have to build to create the ordinance or put it in place staff could uh come
back with Madam attorney Mr chair if staff let's say an analysis staff does an analysis of um those who were um hit by cars or uh those who were injured by a car while while solic while
soliciting in the median would that stand up to be enough proof for us to then approve uh that that ordinance in the moment I don't even know what what does that look like that is exactly the sort of data generalized pedestrian
uh issues is not sufficient to specifically Target solicitation in a median as data sufficient to support that type of Regulation you would have to correlate pedestrian
incidences directly relating from panhandling or soliciting an amedian to to support legally such an ordinance generalized pedestrian safety is is not sufficient at least it wasn't under the case law from a year and a
half ago maybe the case law has changed so so what I'm what I'm saying is we brought this forward one time it failed we're about to try to bring It Forward again without actually have an understanding of what it takes to get
there and it may fail because we can't it may fail because we got 75 people in in the chambers that say we shouldn't but what I would like to see is for us to to have all the information on what it would take for it to make it for us to make it happen so then we can we can
actually vote for it if we want to vote for it and say that we're standing on good ground and we're not going to be challenged in court to say that it's going to go away cuz I guarantee you this there will be some group that will be here that will speak against it that will say we will challenge this in court because you don't have enough proof
given the the threshold that you have to satisfied to do this so what I'm going to do is I'm going to make a substitute motion that a sub a stash report comes back with an analysis of what we did prior along in
that also in that stashus report I would like for you County Madam County attorney to explain to us exactly what we would have to do to start to go down this road of creating this ordinance and it be uh legally permissible by by law
and Analysis so do we have to um do a survey or what whatever we have to do what do we have to do in order to do that now I've heard that there's other counties and cities that have may have implemented this type of thing but my guess is that they probably went down
the road of doing everything that they needed to do to to to be able to enforce it before they actually brought it forward so uh that would be my substitute motion that we start to really look at how do we begin to implement it along with analysis of what we did before I do think there could be
a small Corr there between between uh spots where there there is camps and also where pen handling is happening so you know it's it's a short walk from my Camp to that corner where most of the people are given so I'm I'm I'm going
camp out there I I I believe that I do believe there's a safety concern that we have to consider by which that commissioner kaban and commissioner partner are talking about I just don't I just don't know right now as I'm sitting here that if I want to vote for it that that it's going to stand up so that'd be my substitute motion Mr chair I'll
second that all right so we've got a a substitute motion for a status report to come back with information on what we've done previously and seconded by commissioner Miner we're still in discussion Mr County Administrator I saw you in the queue did you want to okay um okay commissioner Miner thank you Mr
chairman you know while uh commissioner Maddox was talking I did a quick search and and I I think I found why we're conflating the two issues we did talk at extensive and the County Attorney LED this discussion in terms of informing us what we could and could not do and and we met
during a briefing before that County Commission meeting and talked at length about it uh about needing that data the safety data that shows the the danger of people soliciting in medians um and we didn't have that data at at our disposal so we couldn't move forward at that time
um and we didn't know that we could collect that data to make that case strong enough to have it with uh with stand up in court what we did do at that meeting this is February 21st to 2024 actually Ariana wrote the story in the Democrat uh we did pass an
ordinance prohibiting solicitation on private property uh when the private property owner had not given an express permission for that solicitation to take place um and that was because of our ordinance that is now deemed you know an offense uh so that was something that we
did do as a result of those discussions um so I'm supporting commissioner maddox's sub motion because I'd like to have a a refresher on that that same discussion we had a year ago with any update of the evolution of case law which might put in a different context
what we might want to go going forward but um I I understand what you're saying commissioner Proctor with the motion I mean I think all of us are frustrated I think the community has been frustrated with some of the some of the um uh solicitation that's out there but I think this is the best approach because maybe nothing has changed from a year
from just a year ago and hate to have us go through that whole discussion again with having you know 30 people come and speak to us when we come to the same conclusion from a year ago so that's why I'm supporting the substitute motion um and uh um I like to take a look at that
figure out what changes have taken place in the last year if any and then go from there thank you Mr chairman thank you commissioner Proctor it's back to you then commissioner Vice chair caban after that thank Mr chairman um um County attorney may remember I can't I can't
excuse me for not being able to remember um I believe it was the 1960s and they were trying Supreme Court your Supreme Court was trying to Define obscenity obscenity what is obscene and one of the justices said uh I don't know but I know it when I see
it and uh to the extent that that's an instinct or intuition uh our job is to provide for the health safety and Welfare of citizens and part of what we do is intuitive and we know danger when we see
it and looking at the medium situation there um um you all need to come down there and see it um you might know it if you saw it I've seen it and I think that you feel it in other
instances uh I just want to say to us that uh our job is to legislate and if we legislate that Our intention have not been to affect First Amendment rights and all of that I believe our County attorney would rep or
should represent our view of what is our legislative uh uh discretion and what we believe is in the interest of the health and safety and Welfare of citizens of Leon County and standing in the median begging up on money uh has no and I'm
not biased against people sleeping on the ground I'm not against people sleeping on the ground I am against people standing in the medium creating Havoc for drivers creating fear for drivers and only G hes
you know if they if I had money laying on the seat or had something on my um Dash that they saw I don't know what would happen if somebody looked down and saw I had a $20 by to go into Zach um those are issues at a gut level and um
we're living in an era where I mean we can't be soft and this has been going on for 3 years but honestly I think commissioner Welch brought us to the point to act and truthfully we were not soft it was the sheriff who ask us to
consider and and to give a 6mon 10mon reprieve uh and allow him to try uh those that social Outreach method we've not had a conversation to see if he's been effective but to sit here and know that we're allowing dangerous situation
we can't wimp out like that we we we're in a moment where people's are we we we're acting in Swift and critical times uh Mr chairman and uh I say to you that uh in the last two weeks we've seen
decisive and Swift acts of a federal government and moving at the speed of sound uh in all kinds of directions uh and we are sitting here crippling around taking 3 years and can't come to whether
or not it's dangerous in the medium to be in you know you can have guts to govern in in in this era this is a new new moment we're in and I believe that we are uh certainly uh underacting uh when we know there's
critical critical need and um but um to commissioner Mattis and commissioner uh miners uh their approach to wanting us to determine the information uh along the lines of County attorney the problem
there is uh how do you objectify uh and make uh concrete uh the notion of danger what is it how do you define it you know so it's it's she gives us illution that does not have an objective uh
measurable um um um application you can't so it's going nowhere but we're kicking the ball down the street this County attorney should respect what we set as legislators and
then argue our position if someone wants to take us to court for trying to provide for the health and safety of our community that's her job legislating is our job uh hold on commissioner minor commissioner command and then I'll come
back to you and then I've got a few things things to say and then we can vote on The Substitute are you in the que thank you Mr chair um commissioner Proctor I will say that uh I don't think the the County Attorney is coming this from a position to try to prohibit us from going one one way or the other um I
appreciate your Insight Madam attorney um I just think we interpret what she's saying and how we can go about it differently um I stand with you on this in regards to the fact that I think this is a road safety and life safety issue right I think anyone um who drives on
Pensacola Street West Tennessee Street or the North Monro Corridor pretty much at any time of day will see that this is a life safety issue um what I would hate for us to do and the reason why I am going to respect the vote no on the substitute motion is I agree with your
position commissioner Proctor what if tomorrow someone panhandling in the median steps in steps in the right away and gets hit by a vehicle right where we as policy makers had the decision to sit here and say hey we're
going to bring back an ordinance um to prohibit that and give law enforcement the opportunity to stop that from happening um for me I know that if we have the opportunity right now to bring back a um an ordinance for us to review
I I want to give law enforcement all the tools that they have to be able to do their job and sometime that job is to actually protect folks um in the medians and those who may not think they're breaking the law but is dangerous no
different than a seat Bel law right um we there's state law to have you have to have your seat belt buckled right well that gives law enforcement the tool for Life Safety um so that's that's where I'm at commissioner Proctor and thank you Mr chair commissioner Miner and then
I'm going to say a few words and we'll vote on The Substitute thank you Mr chairman um listen I think we've all seen this over the years I know a lot of constituents have because I hear about it I'm sure you all have too I've taken pictures of people walking into
the road during a a red traffic light uh panhandling walking straight in the road I've taken pictures of that because I've concerned about it and trying to figure out what we can do about it we've been talking about it before I mean I'm looking at an article from a year ago where we had the same discussion um so I you know to say that
we need we're being soft because we're not governing from our gut I think is inaccurate so I have no problem with people governing with their gut but I also want us to govern with our head and the County Attorney has told us as she did a year ago that we
need hard data to bolster and and support what we might do as an ordinance I don't want us to have have an ordinance where we we go through with this and then we get sued it costs tens of thousands of taxpayer dollars where we're called into court and we're asked
why did you pass this ordinance well we can't say I was governing from my gut I had a feeling on my gut it's not safe we know it's not safe we know it's not safe we don't have the data to back it up I've not seen data to back it up yet when we do the county attorney will tell us whether or not we have a strong
enough case to move forward with it I'll be the first one to make the motion because I know in my gut it's not safe unfortunately though we have to also govern with our head and the County Attorney is telling us we don't have the data to back that up so she is the attorney I'm not I'm going by what our
County attorney highly talented highly capable is telling us so I know what you're saying I'm frustrated just like you are uh I want to put a stop to it for the safety of the people that are walking in the road uh jeopardizing their lives as well as driver's lives but we also have to govern with our head
and so that's why I'm supporting the substitute motion I think it's the responsible thing for us to do let's remind ourselves of what we talked about a year ago what discussion we had about the need for hard dat to support an ordinance for this and then we decide where we go from there thank you Mr chairman thank you
commissioner Miner I'll say just a few things and then we'll vote on The Substitute motion I'm going to be consistent in my position on this which I have been for three years I cannot support the substitute motion I think
that this is a imminent Public Safety threat and issue not just to drivers but to the people in the road I think that we have a significant problem here we can say it's not statistically proven but anecdotally
we've had pedestrians clipped by cars and killed who are in fact homeless uh the director of lively technical school hit and killed somebody on Apple Yard Drive 2 years ago that was walking across the street in 4 in the morning um I think that I I appreciate
commissioner maddox's attempt at being deliberate I just feel like our County attorney we know as a Savvy smart and capable person if we direct her to bring back an ordinance she won't bring back an ordinance until it has been fine-tuned and heavily crafted and if it is in fact
in if she is incapable of producing an ordinance that would pass legal muster she will come back to us and say I could not draft an ordinance that passes legal muster if she brings us back an ordinance whenever that at some point in the future we must assume that it just
like the one 3 years ago will pass legal muster and then in that in that question then we just have a decision to make but we will see the ordinance we will have time to debate it on the dis it has to have multiple public hearings before it's adopted so it's got a process
involved and I don't know a status report is going to all it does is prolong that process um if that ordinance looks anything like the one three years ago which it probably will excluding some of the other elements we've already seen it and as case law
has evolved maybe her analysis will change but I I see that coming back in the draft ordinance the first time and then if we have a robust debate we can't do anything with it then we move on from there but um I will support the original motion by commissioner Proctor to bring
it back I tell you what commissioner Maddox I've listened to you guys speak and I don't think you understand what I'm saying it's not that don't
support it the lady just said my County attorney just said you said that if she could come up with something that passed legal muster she will or she'll tell us that she can't she literally just said that she did not and I could be putting
words this way I interpreted it that given the fact that we don't have the data that we need to pass an ordance that that could be defensible that that's the reason that we didn't move forward
before and she said that she gave that advice last time that you don't have the data she she you created an ordinance but you don't have the data to make this ordinance legally enforceable now if you had the data if you took the time to get the data then yes we could put something
together we can be like every other city and then we can enforce it because we have data that can't be challenged but I'm I'm frustrated I'm frustrated to the point that you I'm trying to make sure that we can vote on something that we can then because I
want I want to vote for it too I do but I'm trying to make sure that we can vote on something that we can keep and enforce and give her all the tools she needs to enforce it but all I'm hearing is that well you're just prolonging and kicking it down the road no if it come
if you if if you ask to bring back the ordinance and it comes back and we vote for it it's legally indefensible then it it goes away then we have to bring it back again what's the what's I resent my motion I resent my motion and I'll vote for the motion on the floor thank you commissioner Maddox um
commissioner Cummings thank you Mr chair in light of commissioner madx resending his motion I think it makes my comments moved okay thank you commissioner Cummings um I do want to say on point to Commish maddox's
uh comments I I sincerely understand where he's coming from with that I just feel like if the County Attorney brings back an ordinance that she says is patently unenforcable or unconstitutional we just vote against it I think we're directing her to go find
the evidence and this data and all the things that y'all are talking about to justify an ordinance we're directing her to do that she's tell where I'm coming from on it so um Mr Cummings now you have the floor yeah and then commissioner Miner if you want to go after that thank you Mr chair I think we
just s a mining I guess mix mining words mixing word legally enforcable withstand challenge I I I think if we if we pass an ordinance as as
suggested uh regulating uh individuals from being in the median being in the road pan handling or or what have you I I don't think it's a matter whether or not it's legally enforceable I think the issue is whether
or not it could be challenged I think if we pass it as a commission it is a it is a legal ordinance now we can look at How likely is it that that ordinance uh would be challenged and I think our primary
concern here is the health safety and Welfare of our citizens we know that it that it's a challenge we know that is a a major Hazard but whether or
not it would be challenged is another that's a step that would be taken after we passed the ordinance legally enforcable once we pass it I believe it's legally
enforcable whether or not we get to that step we've got to pass it first and so at at this this point uh I would support I guess the motion that that's on the floor because we know it's an issue we know it's a problem and and
I think it becomes a major a bigger problem when we do nothing when we when we take no action to address the problem and I think as elected officials that's what we need to do address protecting the health safety and Weare of our
citizens thank you Mr thank you commissioner Cummins I would just add on Point again if if the if the County Attorney comes back in an analysis and tells us it is completely indefensible and it will be challenged that will impact whether I support the ordinance we're not passing an ordinance right now
we're asking her to bring back some language that we can consider and if it's on our agenda I promise you we still haven't heard from the sheriff we haven't heard from tpd we have they're going to come and they're going to tell us we think this is a good idea we think this is a bad idea all of that will
shape our judgment this is not a presumption that we will pass and ordinance it depends on the language we're asking her to write and create and I trust that she will create something that is at least superficially on board for us to consider but she may her
advice may be don't adopt this ordinance it's indefensible right so that's a consideration I we're just moving to that step um commissioner Miner can you close us out so we can vote on this I'll close out so as a second of commissioner maddox's substitute motion I would need to resend that second and the stubborn
streaking me had me think for a moment I was going to stick to my guns but but I'll I'll resend that second so that we're back to the original motion on the floor um listen the main difference between what commissioner mdx's motion was and commissioner Proctor's motion was was
creating the ordinance right and and having the ordinance come to us for review um because we we both we all want the same thing which is to reduce licitation for safety reasons and and and all of that so um
I'm going to vote in favor of the motion but I don't believe this is the best way for us to proceed and I think commissioner Maddox probably agrees with me we had the same discussion a year ago according to the news reports um I I'm happy to see people come and speak to us you know it's just something that we do
but to have 20 30 people come and talk to us about this um this ordinance again to have the sheriff possibly come over here and take his time and talk to speak to us again I'm fine with all that but we just had this discussion a while ago I would prefer to have a stash report come back and refresh our memory of
exactly what happened and what the County Attorney has said back then because I suspect that we re we review this agenda item when it comes back and go back to the same decision I'm hoping that case law has has evolved or that we have new data that allows us to be
more um more uh basically have some ordinance that allows us to get what we need to go but I I don't think that's happened and I don't think the County Attorney I think the County Attorney if she knew of something something would say so but I'll support the motion I don't think it's the right way for us to go but um I
think in the end result will be the same whether we have this motion or commissioner mdx's substitute motion thank you Mr chairman ready to vote Yes sir thank you commissioner Miner we got commissioner Proctor's motion um and seconded by commissioner caban to have the County Attorney bring back some
language draft language on an ordinance dealing with uh median panhandling uh all those in favor signify by saying I I all opposed opposed okay so passes uh 61 with commissioner o uh commissioner
Maddox with 52 commissioner Maddox and commissioner O'Keefe in opposition uh thank you commissioner uh Proctor we're back to your commissioner time m m chairman I want to ask is the blueprint meeting was it cancelled is it on for Thursday what is the final I haven't
heard you hav't either is it I haven't gotten that email who knows anyone knows R is here already I think it's just happened since we've been in a meeting I answered the email determination uh I haven't had chance to
speak to her um she was going to take into account all of the feedback she got uh that I'll convey to her uh from polling polling you so we'll be I'll call her after this meeting and we'll make the call and I'll send out a notice as soon as I know thank you Arty very good thank you
than you uh for for that Commissioners um I asked Mr Williams and M Mr Hill to to come forward earlier you heard them about five hours ago um and they did a good job I just don't remember what they said last year we supported the um
emancipation day uh Hill Family to the tune about $7,000 uh in the U millu of celebrating uh our Bicentennial uh it was um an exceptional
year with which um we gave thought to the meaning of um The Hills family celebration uh which has been paid for uh and lifted up for 138 continuous
years uh I asked um uh this family uh their permission and something in the 200e celebration and I don't know um I think Carrie uh car post we uh had tagged this as one of the 200-year uh
highlights of some of the activities with which we celebrated in the 200th year the Emancipation uh Day celebration uh quickly I wanted to say and I wanted to make sure that they were here uh to
answer questions that you may have had but I'd like for the county to adopt and I've asked this family uh would they lend to us uh a shared uh participatory uh platform uh that Leon
County um and the hill family um would host and co-host this event uh with us uh being Financial supporters but also uh with the uh recognition that for our
support would have to be open uh not just to their families and friends but I think that this County um we we owe it to history we owe it to everything that the legacy of uh a38 year uh since
1887 uh celebration of emancipation I also note Commissioners that um in the tenous moment of now that um I hope that celebrating the Emancipation doesn't get outlawed or rule out of order something
like that um I hope not but while we have this opportunity and moment um I did not want to represent uh and say that this family is open to a partnership this year and
going forward without this family being here to speak for themselves and make sure that I'm not misrepresented y'all's um willingness to share and open the ground to whomsoever uh uh to the county and Hills family celebration of
emancipation uh that's specifically uh in ask and I'd like to make the motion Mr chairman uh for us to ask staff to bring back um some something responsible uh that would show uh our adding our
signage our brand and all of that to probably one of the oldest ongoing historical events uh in the county I imagine I can't think of anything older than 138 years other than church services that have gone on so that's my
motion commissioner proor can you are you asking for an agenda item to come back with an analysis of of a donation or or I'm not a little unclear in what you're asking exactly I don't know the dollar
amount or you're asking for the county do it analyze a sponsorship no no no I'm I'm asking something bigger the hill hill Henry Hill Family for emancipation day emancipation celebration right there on Centerville Road next to oh oh I
don't know it's in May yeah May 20th yeah can we maybe get an item come back and tell us that's what I'm asking for an item to come back uh the heel family is sitting here uh for for them to receive all of the county being able to
come out to an emancipation for what it means what it means to the school children uh what it means to the church uh Sunday school children and even adults who uh might prize uh our celebration uh with a family that has uh
owned that property for since Moses uh I believe was a little boy Mr chair I second a motion okay so uh staff are all clear on that all right we got a motion from commissioner Proctor and second from commissioner Cummings to uh bring back an item about the uh Henry Hill uh
day uh emancipation day fish FR um any discussion want to hear from Mr Hill would you like to say anything I'm sorry I i' just like that's on his motion was there a dollar amount or is that something staff is going to get to
look St do that okay uh all those in favor signify by saying I I I I'll oppose passes unanimously uh staff will get with specifics thank youall Leon was completely left unfunded by the federal government or by the
state of Florida um that's that's more than a rhetorical question uh to approaching hurricane season may or may not be there uh have we thought uh our position uh if we had to go it
along and uh I just like to uh tease that out and to ask our staff have to begin to think about that uh with no specific uh um uh but if we had no federal dollars and they were frozen as
many federal dollars have been they're in the hands of the Court not legislature we don't know what dollars will come what will not but what happened if we lost all of our funding uh I would love to see that contemplated
in the U contemplated in the upending uh budget Cycles in in rehearsals okay um Commissioners you heard today that uh uh from sister uh
sister bison uh um sister street that this is an excellent time uh for us to pursue uh federal land acquisition I don't want Greenland nor
the Canada but I do want us to own the land which the federal government designates and as they're off shopping for Gaza um I just want the dirt in Leon County and I want to continue to say how
important it is that with a um um a governing uh team that we have in place this is an optimal moment for us to get that dirt into gther uh lift that up the
J G the neighborhood association which um major vand and Jones came before us today uh commission I would just ask if U your um willingness to allow uh staff to attend that meeting on Monday at 2:
p.m. uh at J the park uh attended a meeting on yesterday there's going to be a part two on Monday and unless there's some objection I would ask uh if our staff could go for the list in and with respect to the flooding of the J G the
Park Lake Henrietta flows um Eastward into uh Little Silver Lake and um the ditch along Orange Avenue is coming uh going Westward uh around the back of the golf
course and and and creating a mess but we have two governments who whose Waters okay thank you very much thank you very much and then uh Commissioners I'm requesting a town hall for Woodville um Community uh ratio what when is the time
on that relle okay I'm asking for Town Hall uh for Woodville uh community and I note that we have uh coming up on the
25th uh the Southside action plan Workshop but uh commissioner gan um I think we touched on this at The Retreat that we want to specifically ask our staff to present some of the updates um
in particular long u what's the date on that oh okay all right well Rael said we haven't gotten to the date but it is to uh for the format for the idea of a U of
A uh what I just said so Commission that's what we want to do um in Woodville and I'm asking staff support and participation so is that a motion in the form of a motion proor second commissioner command you want to talk about it quick quick Point um
commissioner Proctor um could uh could I defer to the County Administrator for a second sure Mr administrator I know we talked about this um because I think originally at one point commissioner Proctor and I wanted to do like a joint public meeting um in in Woodville what what would be
the procedure if you know I kind of wanted to or we both kind of wanted to bring different presentations or items to discuss like publicly what is that do we work we work with you individually like how would that work Mr chairman commission it would U
sort of depend generally speaking when we when we've done these public or or or I'm sorry I think it's a second issue command second okay so um generally speaking when we've done these
Town Halls it's been a um a county event a county Leon County town hall meeting uh and but we would still you know advertise that uh that more than one commissioner May attend in and in which case we would seek direction from Commissioners to say hey we'd like the
following things to be on the agenda and then we would produce materials have staff available if this is a little bit different than if this is a little different than that we're very flexible there too if Commissioners again sort of on their own wanted to do this and you're asking for some staff support on
that then we would take that direction as well so that it would just be a matter of U uh if that's the direction that the board uh wants to to authorize then we would we again we would we would accept whatever Direction uh came from from the board in terms of I'll defer to
commissioner Proctor since his motion I just want would like to have some input as far as you know the uh the presentation and some of the dialogue Etc absolutely we want make sure we had the uh imprator of the county itself and all of the bells and whistles that come
with Leon County uh there to hear um lingering some of it we've heard before um yeah we've heard probably all of it before but to make sure that we get a fresh uh wish list uh from the citizens in that area that they don't feel
neglected from Leon County so that's the motion all right so we got a motion in a second for a town hall in Woodville Commission Proctor commissioner Vice chair caban all those any discussion all those in favor signify by saying I I I'll oppose excuse me sorry Mr that's
okay just uh because I heard some discussion about a date at this point if it's a county event obviously we would work on establishing a date and we would notify offices and do all that coordination and and again reach out to you to make sure all your issues are addressed and the the presentations that
that you're interested in we'll we'll follow up on that too so Rael told me that was great that was at a date to be determined all right thank you Rich all right thank you back to you commissioner pro thank you very much uh Commissioners the CR PTA will meet can I get that overhead please on the crpa y'all
meeting on the 18th and I just wanted to uh to uh ask staff if they can put that Matt can you put the CR Matt was zoning out we'll have to do a community meeting
planning um so what was the ctpa slide on the overhead we'll I'll put on the I know that we have um several of you representing us on the um and I noted that um
uh oh man this right here is the uh as a proposal from the uh Florida Department of Transportation to create a one-way pairings
of South Adams Street uh that turns into Crawfordville and uh South Monroe Street that turns into Woodville Highway and that actually has a dual a pairing of um streets one is proposed by
the citizens and uh I think the one on the which one is the one on on the bottom Matt yep on the bottom okay that's that's floor Department of Transportation uh continues to propose a uh this circle which is extremely
dangerous uh that is rejected soundly by the people when we had Town Hall years ago and I'm asking uh crpa members uh for status and for uh we've heard no
Communications uh in recent weeks months about this and uh I wanted to share and to say that um with the activity occurring the U widening of uh the Road Southwest this
has never been Dumber uh it get Dumber every week and can you put the other one mat the other side in the cter proposal idea coming from citizens uh which I honestly can't um it does not trm Road does not come across
the street and uh run into that building and all of that but they keep it like that that there I want to make sure uh crpa members that we get copies of this tomorrow I want to uh make sure the County Attorney is clear that on behalf
of constituents using Woodville constituents who are going down Crawfordville that we're praying that uh fdot does not impose a pairing of one-way streets uh there and I will get
copies but I wanted to present it to clear it and that the County Attorney would know that I'm not trying to stack the debt for the crpa just making sure uh the people voice was carried forward and I think thank you all for all that
has been reported with respect to Crawfordville Road uh and all like that being high priority and finally happy birthday to my twin brother Vince long we've been together a
long time but we got a long way to go don't you want the theme on those Longs and uh Vince I thank you for the years in which you've uh afforded uh your friendship as well as your leadership uh to me and to our County and um I'm
completely thrilled to be working alongside the world's greatest I mean the greatest County Administrator in the world and then uh my final my final final commissioner madx is that I had the joy of being with
uh chairman Welch and um our uh immediate past chairman Cummings on Friday before our legislative day delegation and commissioner minor and we had a strong House of we had a majority uh there over over we had
a forum and um I did ask uh our delegation uh members that you might know I feel it's important to report uh the sentiments of those present all of those people uh the absence of there
being uh Miss car post uh you would be proud because Russell Russell dolls was there as well on the front row but you would be proud as well to know my ask of our legislative delegation for a
conference center uh for our community while universities be shared by our state governments be shared by local government and that we all leave Tallahassee to go to conferences and go
meet somewhere we rarely invite people people to Tallahassee to gather to meet to conference to Convention cuz we have not a facility and there was um there was
um there was no disagreement I believe Mr chairman in the house that everyone understood that our state capital is the only one in the United States and as we
acquire Greenland and Canada and on and own Gaza we don't have a conference center and I'm asking uh independent of uh our board I know you know what I'm talking about but as the vice chairman
of the tourist Development Council I ask for their consideration that our Capital won't be the only one in the southeastern United States that don't have one Happy Valentine's Day to each of you much love
I love you all thank you thank you commissioner Proctor um commissioner Miner I know you had wanted to I'm sorry Mr chair commissioner point for clarification the mo the motion was passed a doing commissioner Pro this time in reference to the Town Hall in
Woodville and it specifically mentioned commissioner caban and commissioner a proctor well I'm at large commissioner madx are at large okay and um I'm not I'm not sure if that's exclusion area I
think we just declared it a county why okay what county it's a county run countywide event put on by the county what we can go oh okay yes we can all go we can go it's publicly noted okay awesome okay thank you yes ma'am uh commissioner
Miner you had one to comment on ctpa and it's your time so have at it thank you Mr chairman I appreciate it and uh commissioner Proctor I just put a reminder in my calendar for the ctpa meeting to ask for and uh provide that update to yourself and the other uh County Commissioners so we'll get that on the on the agenda I'm
going to give you that on that thing Matt got we get some okay uh thank you um Commissioners I'd like to start off with a motion or recognize Miss gigg Rini for being selected as the next president of the National Association for uh women
lawyers um G thank you uh Gigi Rini is a managing partner of Florida government law Partners PLC here in Tallahassee she's president of the Florida Association of women lawyers has been named one of Florida's top 50 women lawyers by Super Lawyers and one of the best lawyers in America for administrative and Regulatory law uh
tomorrow she'll be installed as president of the National Association of women lawyers um in this role she'll be taken the national stage as she and other members of the association tackle some of the country's most pressing issues related to law Justice and civil rights um as you all know we've got some
incredible women leaders here in this community and G is an outstanding example of that so very proud to be presenting a proclamation uh well after voting for The County Commission very proud that we'll be uh supporting her in that uh in that new role all right we've got a motion in a second uh for a
proclamation for GG rolini all those in favor signify by saying I I I passes unanimously thank you yes sir thanks everybody um two weeks ago uh commissioner O'Keefe and I uh participated in app Point time count and uh that was an effort that's done every
year by the bigman Big Ben continue of care uh managed by them but also has a whole host of community volunteers as well as the three host deputies from the Sheriff's Office really good exercise um just going throughout the community interviewing people that are on the street uh about why they're homeless uh
because we do that for two reasons number one it helps us draw down federal dollars uh to assist them and it also helps us understand why they're homeless how long they've been homeless and it helps us with that data to help us figure out how to address their needs so uh big shout out to Jonna Coleman of the
Big Ben Co C Lova all the volunteers the host deputies and commissioner o'keef um next thing I wanted to just uh compliment the the leyon county libraries for having the spring seed Library kickoff on February 8th um I didn't go to that but my wife and kids
went and they came back raving about it um really good turnout if you saw the pictures you'll know what I'm talking about but just an incredible thing that that our libraries do I mean handing out seeds and and uh um training in on how
to take care of of of plants and and and it's really just terrific so shout out to um Leon County Library director pamelo Monroe and our whole team and to everybody who came um next thing I wanted to I wanted to thank our staff um in a
general sense you know sometimes we're up here for hours and sometimes our comments can seem a little flippant um but I tell you and I I I I think I'm sure I know all the my colleagues feel the same way we really do appreciate you
um you're talented you're you you do the job that you're required to do when we disagree with you we tell you um but we are very thankful for what you do and and I know sometimes you might hear comments from us that that can be flipping but but we
appreciate you um don't go anywhere we need you here uh because if we didn't have you we'd be in a whole mess of trouble so I just I just wanted to say that uh and and and thank you for everything you do because you're appreciated um and then finally um I
wanted to U again thank Leon County thank our staff and and the commission here for the priority they put and recognizing and celebrating Black History Month uh the programing the library and other ways um you know recognizing and
learning from history is important it matters it matters now now more than it has in the past so I just wanted to congratulate or just want to thank all of us and Leon County government for recognizing something that is very important to Tallahassee to
leyon County and the nation thank you Mr chairman that's all I have thank you commissioner Miner commissioner o'keef thank you Mr chairman um I just want to um thank everyone for a good long meeting I wouldn't spend my Tuesdays with anyone
else thank you commissioner o'keef commissioner Cummings uh thank you m Mr chair I first of all want to uh just thank everyone uh thank the um the staff and everyone that had a
hand in welcoming and bringing uh The Marching 100 to our meeting uh today of so many people involved Leon County uh Sheriff uh the courthouse BFF units I
mean the just coordinated all under the direction of of my chief of staff uh ch ch haes who is the the best Aid on planet Earth he's not in he's not in here but um the facility staff here at
the courthouse it was just so coordinated the bus drivers from FAMU um this the chair and my fellow Commissioners for your patience and your Indulgence with the band today and certainly um Marching 100
ESPN ban of the year in uh director uh Chapman so it was just a great event and I just I think everybody enjoyed it and I just thank all of you all for for your um for your attention and accolades that
you gave uh to the band I I also want to ask for a resolution move for a resolution to pres to be presented for women's history month thank you all right uh
Proclamation or resolution I'm sorry Proclamation Proclamation right so we got a motion for proclam uh motion for Proclamation for women's history month and a second from commissioner O'Keefe all those in favor signify by saying I I I passes unanimous uh thank you Mr chair
uh happy birthday maybe early for um our County Administrator Vince long and is as well as uh our County Commissioner um Bill Proctor and I also want to ditto uh
commissioner minor shout out for our librarian our librarian um Miss Miss Pamela Monroe they just do a great job but we had a great event at the library last Saturday
and if those of you might not know uh is housing the Heisman Trophy of Charlie Warden he's the FSU uh grad but he was the Heisman Trophy recipient some years ago and it's on long to our
library from Thomasville library but it was a great it was a a great event and I think you all saw some of the pictures uh up there I also um want to recognize one of our County
Employees uh Alex M Kennon who was awarded the Florida emergency preparedness Association uh award so he's one of our own um well let's see what they call it
the Gary honor Emergency Management Service award yeah I think that deserves a round of applause uh we're proud of all of our County Employees like commissioner a
miner mentioned and I mean it's just two or three times a month or sometimes more often than that we have County employees that are awarded for for their great service and then we have sections of the county that are receive receiving awards
for uh for their service and um we just appre appreciate you all and and we commend you this Saturday at the County Library we have the uh the the readin for another way of commemorating uh
black history monthy some of us will be um reading some books to the children that would come to the library so I just applaud again uh Miss Monroe and the county staff under the leadership of the County Administrator um for
emphasizing Black History Month because black history is all about is history that relates to all of us so I I certainly appreciate that um I believe Mr County I mean Mr uh
Mr chair I believe that's all that I have uh thank you for for a great meeting I appreciate it thank you and Happy Valentine's to All of You special thanks to commissioner
Proctor for for thanking about all of us for for Valentine's Day thank you commissioner coming is commissioner Maddox thank you Mr chair first of all that wasn't commissioner PR was that was relle relle thank you never bought us another Valenti was
roelle thank you as I was taking my bow here that nothing bun cake it's good stuff man on a serious note um thank you to commissioner part office for that appreciate it I was I was presently surpris when I got my bunk cake today um happy birthday to our County
Administrator but also happy birthday to commissioner Bill Proctor you getting a little to too Ain't You Vince is trying to catch me you know me yeah I think y'all are a day apart I believe right so yeah same day that's right happy birthday to you both happy birthday to
you both um Mr chair I got two proclamations the first one is for my homeboy from Gastonia Gast County North Carolina Leonard Hamilton is retiring and uh he is more deserving or is deserving of a proclamation from us than anybody else so I'd like to uh as for a
proclamation from Leonard Hamilton that's my I got a proclamation and a second from commissioner Miner for Leonard Hamilton all those the favor signify by saying I I passes unanimously and if I may make a a quick plug uh to our athletic director over at FSU coach
Gates out in Missouri would be a a awesome awesome guy to bring back to us to to to lead our basketball program he's doing some great things in Missouri he left under coach Hamilton to go out there to be the head coach and uh he had another stop before but anyway I'm putting my plug in he beat the guy well
is that a motion second you know I'm not sure what matter but full weight of the county commissioner yeah I'm sure matter uh second proclamations for multiple sclerosis aare multiple sclerosis awareness Mo second I got a motion in a second all those in favor signify by
saying I I pass thank you uh Mr chair you've led a great meeting tonight I want to Echo commissioner Miner's words and the staff and that um we do appreciate the hard work that you do and as I said earlier uh when we had M was Miss tra right presenting to us and she
talked a lot about that loyalty pieace that is happening in the executive branch of government uh we we take pride and we appreciate the fact that uh you that you uh put your expertise in the things that you know to be correct over
what may be being loyal to us as board members it means a lot it helps keep the balance in place it helps us keep help it helps keep us in line when we need to be in line um but to this board I do believe that we are the best County Commission in the State of Florida if
not Nationwide and there is a way that we work with our staff that I appreciate too I think as much as we appreciate our staff I think our staff appreciates us um there are examples across the state Across the Nation of of boards and aren't as staff
friendly as we are or as appreciative as we are to our staff and so um no matter how it may look publicly uh which I don't think anybody thinks anything less than our staff loves us and we we love our staff I think it's it's good
commissioner Miner to put on record that uh we have a good relationship between Leon County Commission and their staff here in Leon County so I wanted to make that make that statement to make that known uh same thing to your staff Madam County attorney uh and and the job that
you do for us up here too um you you will not tell us what we want to hear you will tell us what's right and that is what you need out of attorne so again we we appreciate you as well thank you Mr chair thank you commissioner madx good luck to my to my baby girls well
actually not babies anymore they teenagers uh one is participating in in a dance competition on Saturday the other one is at her first first flag football game for a senior year number 20 Nyla Maddox uh you recognize the number um Good Luck to them as they participate this weekend in their
athletic Ventures thank you awesome Mr Vice chair Mr chairman I have no business to discuss so thank you for thank you for a great meeting and I'll pass it back to you thank you Mr Vice chair and um Commissioners I have I have nothing else
other than I just want to congratulate Vince also on his uh uh induction into the uh distinguished alumni of the College of social sciences that we've seen a couple times up there pretty pretty awesome uh recognition uh we're probably going to need a motion for another bookshelf in the county ad
Minister's office for all the sh for all the awards um and things like that uh but uh did want to say thank you all for making the most of a short agenda tonight uh think we squeezed every ounce out of that one uh and uh thank you and
hope you guys have a a great rest of February and uh well I guess I'll see we'll see everybody on the 25th so uh thank you for a good meeting thank good night we're [Music]
ajour for