--------- Good evening. I'd like to call to order the board of commissioners regular workshop meeting. Today is Wednesday, September 24th, 2025. It is 6 p.m. City Clerk, would you call the role, please? Mayor Brooks here. Vice Mayor Kerr here.
Commissioner Taglerini here. Commissioner McGee here. Commissioner Gabayi here. All are present. Next on the agenda is public comment. Public participation is encouraged. If you are addressing the
commission, step to the podium and state your name and address for the record and the organization or group you represent. Please limit your comments to 5 minutes and do not include any topic on the agenda. Public comment on agenda items will be allowed when they come up. If
you would like someone at the city to follow up on a comment or question made at the meeting, you may fill out a comment card with the contact information and give it to the city manager. Comment cards are available at the back table in the commission chambers. Completing a comment card is
not mandatory. Do we have any public comments for items that are not on the agenda? With no public comment, first item is under board of con commissioners presentation. Shoeacher advisors.
Good evening. Jim Taylor, so people don't think I'm a race car driver. Uh but happy to see you all again. Uh it's I think it's been about six months. Uh and this every session has its own flavor, has its own tone and
for me at least in my 14 15 collective years of uh being a part of the process. I think this one takes the cake. Uh we needed additional 45 days for the budget to finally land. Uh but our friends in Tallahassee finally did that. Uh they
finally balanced 117 billion dollar budget. And again, our lawmakers, they only have one one mandatory thing they have to do, which is pass a balanced budget. Uh, obviously, there was a lot of public discussion between our leaders
and the governor about what what should be considered, what not. Uh, and they finally uh landed the plane there and we have about 117 billion dollar budget. Uh, and because of the delay and because this is the short off season, committee weeks start in two weeks. So, we will be
right back in Tallahassee uh on your behalf up in Tallahassee hitting hitting the pavement. And I'll I'll get more into that in a second. Uh and again, just as a reminder to everyone, uh myself, Jim Taylor, uh born and raised just right over that bridge in Tampa,
Florida. uh worked for uh several uh lawmakers, worked for Hillsboro County, worked for a county commissioner, um and then before coming to Shoemaker Adviserss, was the government relations director for Hillsboro County. I am very sympathetic, empathetic uh to the plight
of local government and everything that you guys have to navigate. And again, we'll get into that because there's going to be some uh fun, interesting uh discussions that are going to be have in Tallahassee uh over the next uh 60 days. Uh and again uh then Allan Sesi is the
other one uh uh on the team. He has been doing this for over 25 years. Uh appropriations has been his baywick. Um before coming to Shoemaker Advisors, he actually had Susky Consulting and then was acquired a couple years ago um uh
under the Shoemaker Advisor umbrella. And he actually runs our Tallahassee office. Uh so he is a wealth of knowledge and he's got a huge um uh book where he has proven his wealth especially when it comes to appropriations.
So uh this past these are several of our successes. Uh this past legislative session we were able to get the $100,000 for the seaw wall uh project. Uh I believe in total about 4 million um instate funding that our firm has
provided for the city since we have represented the city. This past year, our firm was able to deliver about 46 million uh to our clients. Uh and again, uh my colleague Allan couldn't be here. He's out of the state. Um but he deserves credit uh because he probably
has his hand in a supermajority of that 46 million brought to our clients. Um we wish we wish there could have been more than $100,000, but we were uh a bit limited in our ability um to do more than that. Um, but that is what we
provided this past year for your city. Again, as we start committee weeks in a couple of weeks, leadership stays the same. Um, we have the approp Senate appropriations chair, uh, Mr. Hooper, who just lives,
um, just a couple miles north of here. He is very, um, he understands, uh, the coastal community, especially in Penllis County. Um, House, same thing, same same leadership uh as we had this past
legislative session. And as you know, there's your delegation members. Um, in particular, Senator Diggley and Representative Linda Cheney. We worked tightly uh with them on your behalf on the appropriations uh and will continue to do so. Uh in fact, this
morning uh they had the Penllis County delegation meeting uh up in Clearwater. uh they I think that was from about 9 to 2:00 p.m. So, as mentioned, so we got committee week starting October the 6th. We've got
six of them. They're not concurrent. Um and these they'll be starting uh committees and probably midway through they'll be taking up actual bills, actual policies that have been filed. And then Tuesday, January 13th, that's
the sprint. That's the 60-day legislative sprint. And I pray our lawmakers stick to 60 days and not 105 days as the previous uh and we will be there uh on your behalf. Uh not only during those committee weeks um but the
60-day sprint and as well. I may live in Tampa, but every Monday morning I get in my car, drive up to Tallahassee, uh do my work on behalf of the clients, and then I come right back to my wife and my four boys. Rinse and repeat until um
session is done. and Alan Susky and my colleagues, they are based in Tallahassee. They live in Tallahassee. So, session expectations, what again we would be doing, you know, for the city is working with staff uh and the board to identify appropriations. We
understand we want to try to get as much money from the state. We we think this year will be a bit better um for Madira Beach to draw down dollars. Uh and so working with your professional staff, working with you guys to identify those
appropriations and helping roadmap those projects. How do we get to success? Uh it's our job to tell you the good, bad, and the ugly. Um but um that is what we would be doing for you. And again, once we get bills filed, that's when we work
with Senator Sigley, Representative Cheney, um work with committee staff, work with other uh legislative leaders as well. Uh and then we'll hit budget conference to where we'll align those budget offerings. Um and then through
that um be sending updates um to your city manager um just so you guys are absolutely in the know of what's going on, what we're doing uh during that 60-day sprint. Um we'll obviously be monitoring policy. This is going to be a
big year for for local government. Uh they just had their first select committee on property tax. um two days ago. Two days ago and yesterday it was a two-day um uh committee meeting and they're going to be looking at what does it look like to get rid of advalorum taxes? What are going to be the impacts
to cities to counties? Um that is actually posted on the Florida channel. It is worth uh a watch. You will be getting analysis from our office tomorrow morning. Um, but you had the uh Florida League of Cities, you had Florida Association of Counties, as well
as of course House members breaking down local government, breaking down the budget, how it actually works. Uh, I wish our lawmakers would have done this decades ago um to actually understand how your budget, how advalorum works and
how advalorum doesn't work. Uh, and so they're going to be looking at at what it looks like to be getting rid of advalorum. a partial amount of that. The Senate does not have a standup committee. Um so they're going to be watching the work um of their House members. Uh and then the intent would be
to put an item on the 2026 ballot for the voters to approve whatever the lawmakers um put forward. Um and so that is going to be leaning on on this board probably Mr. Laughlin getting numbers to
say, "Hey, what is going to be the impact specific to MadiRaa Beach?" Cuz y'all are the subject matter experts. Tallahassee, they don't know what they don't know. We don't know what we don't know without getting that direct access data uh of the impact. So again, we can
be lobbying and advocating specific to Madira Beach and what those impacts would be. So once regular session ends, yes, our lawmakers, as you know, are part-time. Our work on your behalf does not end. We will continue to be working
with the state because um uh there are grants that that pop up. In fact, uh two months ago, um I uh inquired about a D resiliency grant if your city would be interested in learning more about it. So, uh, we got your former city manager,
our staff on a Zoom to say, "Hey, this is going to drop from D for resilience. Here are the criteria. Here's the dollar amounts." Um, again, so you guys know those opportunities because I know grants is a is a big area of
opportunity. I know that firsthand experience back when I was with Hillsboro County. You're not just looking at our friends in Tallahassee or DC or even uh in the county. You're looking at a slew of other grants that are out there. Uh and
so it's interfacing with D department of commerce um the Florida job growth growth grant funds. So your uh you guys know what makes sense to go after uh and so we will we will help uh with that just like we did several months ago uh
with your team. I am praying we're not going to have a repeat uh of this past of this September like we did last year at this point. But God forbid something happens, a big hurricane or two comes through like we
did last year on behalf of Madiraa and any other of our city clients to say, "Hey, how can we run traps for you with emergency management up in um Tallahassee? how can we run traps with you and your uh state electeds? Um just
getting that communication across knowing you guys this was a big triage center of all uh water and supplies. How can we get that information out on behalf of the city? Um so again, our work doesn't end just because our
lawmakers uh their work uh ends at the end of session. It's a full year round. Um, and we tell you, your city manager and any of y'all if you have any questions uh regarding any any interfacing with the state or or even
the county that you may have questions with, by all means, please call us. We have relationships. We might not have the answer, but we hap happily will run traps on whatever issues um you may have. Um
so I will stop right there like always. Thank you so much. Um I take great joy and pride in what I do and uh it is been a privilege this past year to be an extension uh of the city of Madira Beach and look forward to doing so um this next coming up uh legislative session.
So thank you. Do we have any public comment commissioners comments? Questions? Um thank you Jim. Uh, I assume I hate to use that word. Yes. That uh you're in uh communication with
acting city manager um uh Chief Bel. Well, I I I will be now. You will be now? Yes. I've been I've been communicating with your mayor um since um since the replacement, but yes, I will be interfacing with your acting city manager of course. Great. Because one of the tasks that we
were asked to do is put down basically a wish list and we will share that um with the chief and have him share that with you so that we make sure that we all have our uh ideas honed together to try to get um the best
we can. We did it last year. Legislative session. Yep. We did it last year with your city manager. Uh and of course we will be doing it um with your acting city manager as well. Great. Thank you. Absolutely. Jim, have you have you been work have
you been working I mean has MadiRaa Beach been assigned to you for for just how long have you been our specific? I've been I've been a part of uh the Madira Beach contract for about a year. Alan Suski, uh, my colleague who runs again the state practice. He's been with
it from the very, very beginning. Is there no other team members? Is it is it is it just the two of you? It's just the two of us, you know, but like is the normal practice with our firm, you have access to the whole team, should another teammate of ours have a
really good relationship or subject matter expert that we need to lean in on. Uh, but Alan Susky and myself are QB1, QB2 for for Medier Beach. So you you've been with us since the hurricane. Since the hurricane. Yes. I don't even need to name it.
Yeah. Yeah. We sat right right over there when I saw everyone, you know, loading again water and supply and and all that. Thank you. Absolutely. So Jim, um, are you are lobbyist only in Tallahassee or do
you also lobby for us in let's say federal government and some of the other municipalities like county? Sure, great question. Our contract is a state contract, so it would be specific to interfacing with our lawmakers in
Tallahassee. uh you know but again especially when it comes to the county and it comes to you know adjacent surrounding cities and towns we are happy to run traps on an issue. Um you know DC of course is a is a much
different lift. Um you know but yes we are your state lobbying uh firm. So if there are monies available let's say in Tallahassee would you be would you be like researching figuring out how much money is available and how
much money is available to the state and also possibly to our city would would you be researching to see for instance how much money is out there and because what I'm what I'm thinking
is I'm trying to come up with ideas where we can um utilize some of the state dollars um to improve our city and and variety of ways. Um just I'm trying to just uh get a pretty good understanding of of
how to figure out where to tap into. Absolutely. And so that's what we would be doing. Uh, and that's what we do when we meet with staff is to sit down, go over as best we can, you know, what we think the climate is going to be. I
think we're going to see another year where we're going to see cutting of cutting of the fat. This past legislative year was the first year we did not have federal co dollars in the budget. That's also why we have seen our budget in the p the state budget over the past five years. I I think it's been
up about $20 billion. A lot of that was the federal COVID dollars. Uh and so it would be help road mapping. Um you know, we don't we won't know specific dollar amounts in each bucket. Um but we do know um you know, great
projects to look into whether it's um septic to sewer infrastructure. um whether it's a uh you know fire station, first responder facility, uh especially something that may have a a nexus with the impacts of a hurricane or
economic driver. Those are things that our state lawmakers, they love to see. They want to see, okay, why where's the public use and what's how is this a a good benefit and partnership um with the state. So that's what we would do and walk through with staff and of course
this board right here and to also say h maybe we shouldn't go down you know this avenue or if you're if you're trying to ask 1012 million for a project that might not be the wisest move. Perhaps we see if we can um you know
work with staff to say hey if we you know break that project down into two phases so that it is way more palatable um for our lawmakers when they're crafting their individual budgets because the house has a much different process than the Senate does uh in terms
of crafting their individual budgets. Uh and so it is our job to navigate the client through that and to understand hey this is why we're asking this dollar amount over here um because of the certain limitations that the house rules
have. Uh so it's working with staff to say hey okay I recognize this project is project number one you know it's what what the citizens want uh and we need to go after it and we have we have local dollars that we're going to put towards
it which is very important. Um, and if we can, you know, again, if we can break that down into like two phases. Um, and this board is is good with that approach, then then that's what we do. And of course, we're working with Representative Cheney and and Diggley
and others who, you know, they, you know, Senator Diggley is the TED chair. that's huge for our part of the state transportation uh and economic development, you know, so he's the one crafting that particular budget and he
knows the plight of coastal communities in Penllis. My parents have a place in Treasure Island. Um we're not back we're not back up and ready. We still got a ways to go um with cleanup and development, redevelopment. Um so uh
it's our job to help navigate that. So, if you were to give, let's say, a number as far as number of senators and state representatives that you may know in Tallahassee, just just a number off the cuff. How many senators and how many
state representatives do you know in Tallahassee? Well, there'sund 160 state lawmakers, 120 house, 40 in the Senate. Um I mean I know uh I know our all the be appropriate. When I say appropriate
Senator Hooper, Senator Sigley, um well these are local. How about like you know some of the other senators and that are Yes. Yes, sir. Absolutely. Our myself and our firm uh has tentacles that touch
the majority of senators. Um the house, you know, there's 120 of them. Uh uh but we know we know the speaker, we know his team, uh we know the chairs of all the committees. Uh I mean it I'm not going to go through all the names just because
there's so many of them, but that's our job is to have relationships and access to our lawmakers. Respect. Yes. Yeah. I mean, you can only really help us if you have a lot of respect in Tallahassee and um you can basically put
some um uh requests out there for some dollars. So, you know, there has to be trust and respect so that they can approve a certain amount of dollars for our town. Absolutely. Absolutely. Thank you.
Um, real quick, um, thanks Jim. Um, last year, this last present year, um, you lobbyed for Madira Beach and the total was $100,000 that we received. Mhm.
Why wasn't Why wasn't that more? We would have loved for that to have been more. So, there was only one project uh that was filed. Um uh it was determined by your state representative um that there wasn't enough movement uh
on previous projects um uh that our firm helped get that funding for. Um and so um it it was going to be no projects that were going to be funded. Um uh but through the efforts of your mayor um in particular, we were at least able to get
that one project filed. If you don't get them filed, you're not in play. Um and you know it was it was something that you know we didn't want that to be the case because we had been working on about three projects that we were going to be f you know filing on behalf of the
city and that's what that was going to be our roadmap and that was going to be our marching orders. Um and then um through a series of conversations uh with uh the state representative uh she she made a judgment call to say, you know, I'm going to hold off uh until I
see additional progress um from previous uh uh monies that were drawn down from the state for uh MadiRaa Beach. Um, and then hopefully uh this time right now we'll be in a much better place. And I think we are in a much better place to
again uh ask for way more than one project totaling $100,000. But uh my frustration was right there with you. Um but um I could clarify or expand on that. I
begged Linda Cheney for that $100,000 and that's why we got it. She was very disappointed and rightfully so in the way that we handled the money that we got for the dredging. We received the final permit for the dredging last week
week last week and we got that final permit because Representative Cheney made the phone calls on our behalf to push that along. um without her assistance because
we had taken such a laxidasial approach, it's the word I'll use to the permitting process and we gave so much misinformation that she was very um I would use the word unhappy and I had several phone
conversations with her where I promised her I would make sure she got updates which is why I came here. so often and asked the city manager to provide us an update on dredging every single meeting of which was pulling teeth to get. And
when we finally got to where we were like at the end, she went to bat for us on her calls with D to get that permit pushed through. Um, and I assured her that if she would just give us a $100,000
because we had over a million dollars we were going to ask for for a public works building. And there was no way she was pushing that through, not with the way that we had managed that the city had managed the project we had. And she got us the 100,000 signed. And so that's for
valves for public works. And Megan has been tasked to provide extremely detailed updates on a weekly basis for where she's at, what she's doing, so that we can show the representative that we do um we do appreciate all that she
does for us and that we will be responsible for the monies that she gives us. So, thank you. Thank you. Any more questions? Okay, thank you. Next on the agenda is the flood insurance letter.
Mayor Commission, this is for the NFIP, the National Flood Insurance Program. Uh Vice Mayor Kerr has drafted a letter that he would like to discuss. So, I'll turn it over to Vice Mayor Kerr. Um yeah, I just wanted to keep keep
things moving in this direction. Um um I drafted this very quickly uh as a starting point so we can add to it, we can modify it, but I want to be able to take this from from the city and send it
to our federal uh representatives, but bigger than that, I want to share it with uh the other cities throughout Florida, the coastal cities and um especially and have them either use this as a template or what we provide as a
template. Um because I don't believe it's on the radar at um you know Rick Scott's office or um our other federal representatives. I don't think it's until the cities really start pushing
it. I don't I don't know that they're really on it's on, you know, it's it's a hot item and it's going to be a hot item coming in the next few months where people are starting to rebuild and as they rebuild, they're going to be
assessed a huge value on that property and it's going to help it's going to constrain their ability to to rebuild because where they may have been paying much less. It's going to be assessed on a
much on a higher value piece of property and now you don't get the discounts. So, and they're elevated. So, I and they're going to have to do that through their construction. They're not going to even have to wait until it's constructed. I I
know our SBA loan officer has told me, you know, once you have a any any part of a building out of the ground, then you have to insure it. even though it's you're not really insuring it for much. So anything anyway I've this is very
timely and I think we need to um keep pushing do we have any public comment commissioners? U Mr. Vice Mayor this is just going to state senator Rick Scott but what about
some of the other senators? Exactly. act can Mooney um Moody Moody. Yeah. Um they're the only two senators we have obviously but you know obviously we need a lot more votes in federal government.
Yeah. Okay. But if if we have all the all the cities, you know, in concert doing this, um I think it's going to be higher on their chain of, you know, higher on their stack of things that they they need to push for. also our congressmen. We have
a lot more congressmen than we do senators. So, it's if that's what you're trying to push, which is commendable. Every one of them. Yes. Thank you. No comment. Thank you, Commissioner Kerr. I think
it's a great letter and I agree with Commissioner Wahi. We need to send it to senators, congressman, state, and federal. just make as much noise as we can and encourage our adjacent cities who are in the same situation, let them have access to it as well. Thank you.
With the with the mayor's help, hopefully we can get this at a big C uh agenda. So, if if definitely if that's what the commission wants, I will tell you this in conversations that I've had over the last couple of weeks, um if anyone just if if 200 people take this letter and
photocopy it and sign it and put their name on it, nobody's going to read it. Letters need to be personalized. You can use it. It should be used as an idea, but I mean that comes from elected the higher up elected officials that when they get these
copied letters, they don't pay attention to them. If you want your letter to be read, it needs to be a personalized letter. That's understandable. I mean, we we get the same thing. So, um I can I can take this to the big C
and present it if that's what you'd like. I would I would like I'd like I'd like to get the cons, you know, and you can bring that up to the big C, you know, create your own letter, but here's, you know, some here's some topics, you
know, we need to if I'm sure um we could have that same presentation that we had on our last workshop brought to the big C if they'd like. Have you done any research for who at the Washington level is in a voting position to make a difference for the
NFIP for insurance? I wouldn't be I wouldn't know how to do that. Yeah. I mean, that would I would think that um finding the person that can make affect the most change would be the place to start if you want to try to affect
you have you'd have to you'd have to have a a bill written, I would imagine. And that's why I wanted to go to our state um our federal representatives and someone to create a bill to to get it out for discussion.
It all starts with the bill. Okay, I can take it. Thank you. Thank you. Next on the agenda is the purple heart ceremony. Uh yes, we are still currently working on that uh purple heart ceremony right
now. Have you been able a able to identify um if we have Purple Heart recipients that live within the city limits of Madira Beach? We are currently working with the uh American Legion on that right now. So,
uh definitely um uh it's going to be a Madar Beach resident, uh a Purple Heart, um soldier, and uh we're still working on that right now. Do we have any public comment,
commissioners? carry on. Yeah. Madame Mayor, if I may, um there um there is pastor, there's a father Bob in Dun Eden that is a like the co-founder
of Purple Heart. I would like to ask Commissioner McGee to reach out to him. Yeah. And uh have him facilitate. He is pretty far into, you know, the Purple Heart. Oh, definitely
he is. So, um if if you can get some advice from him, I think uh we can take this a lot further. Sure. Thank you. Y if there's nothing additional, next on the agenda is strategic planning. All right. Mayor and commission, this is
the from the Florida Institute of Government. They made a proposal for the city of Madiraa Beach uh facilitated session for the city clerk. And I will let Miss Van Bargain speak on this. Yes, the mayor and I met with them
and she gave us a lot of good ideas and the mayor explained what the most need was for the city and what we were looking for. And she would like to have a strategic plan after the new city
manager is hired. and the mayor can explain more about the ideas that she has which are very beneficial and I think it would be great for the city. So we talked about this in in the previous meeting about doing some
strategic planning. We haven't done any in the city since I believe 2017 which is a really long time. And what got it, the thought in my head and in me thinking about it was having conversations with other communities who
do strategic planning on a regular basis. And this past year, several of the communities around us did strategic planning and they went out and they looked at what what they wanted for their city and growth. And where it
really drove home to me was seeing all of the projects over the last two and a half years that I've sat on the commission that have come before us and gone away where we've spent money to get designs done on something and then it
just nothing nothing happened with it. So there's no real plan for the city. And I I believe we need a plan. I believe we need to understand what it is that we want to do. If you look at some of the projects that have been presented
to us recently, they're presented with different ways of how they're going to pay for it. So, when we get later in the packet, we're going to see that we have for to submit for appropriations road projects. The road projects are
depending on the lost fund to help pay for the road project. So, we've looked at other projects that are proposing to do their projects with the road or with the lost fund. You can't use the lost fund for
everything because there's only so much money in the lost fund and we only get so much money a year from the state towards that fund for us. So I believe that we need to look at and decide as a commission for the long term what projects are we wanting to do, how would
we fund those projects, and then set a have a plan, a strategic plan for where we want to grow the city, what we want to do with the city, and set that in motion so that in the case of the the lost fund, if public works were to get
appropriations, they may not need that lost fund. fund. They might be able to fund the road project without that money and then that money could be allocated to something else. But you can't start allocating money that's being allocated in multiple places. So I feel strongly
that the the strategic planning will be beneficial for all of us up here as well as for city staff because the way that it it plays out is the commission would be involved in the beginning of the strategic planning and then the city manager and the staff do it. When we
first started talking about it, um I did think that waiting until we got a new city manager would be appropriate. That's now I don't know that that's my opinion. And the reason I I say that is because we might not hire a city manager
for four to six months. So are we going to wait four to 6 months to decide how we're going to be spending the money that we have and what projects we're going to focus on and what we're going to do. City staff has heard me say and I've said it multiple times. when they put in all the effort to bring a project
to us and then that project doesn't go anywhere, it's a waste of their time and energy and effort and we shouldn't be doing that to them. If we're going to get to the point that a plan is going to be submitted to us, the plan should be
submitted with how I'm going to pay for it, how in in an appropriate manner, where are the grants, where are the the funding from the public or what have you. So, I'd be interested to know how the commission feels about moving forward with doing some strategic
planning prior to a city manager and getting it started. Thank you, mayor. I have some some thoughts and questions about this. I I looked at the documents provided and actually there was a 2017 and a 2018 uh
and however the the items were nearly identical. Such things as undergrounding will be completed. Uh, of course they said till 2027, so we still got two more years. We'll see. Uh, there will be a younger population. I'm not sure how we're going to accomplish that. Right
now, we have like half the population. Uh, the city will look like Naples. Just curious. I wonder if that's Italy or Florida. Do you know? I'm sure they meant Naples, Florida. Oh, okay. I just I I I make a joke, but
I I think we should be very specific and clarify such things. Storm water system will be improved. The city center will be developed. There will be improved aesthetics in the building. Aesthetics is kind of subjective, but I'm I'm about aesthetics, redevelopment of properties, the library, Windixie, etc. Well,
Windixie is going to change, that's for sure, whether we want it to or not. Uh the city will not be overdeveloped. Again, pretty subjective. We need to have specific definition of what's overdeveloped, right? Uh increased mobility, not autodependent. There's
there's just a few here will be better communication with citizens. I'm certainly all about that. Uh but when I look at the master plan, starting on page 27 of the current master plan that we have a draft for coming up, most of these goals have actually been outlined and addressed. And starting on page 49,
the implementation of these goals have been addressed with short-term, midterm, and long-term strategy. So my and mind you, I I love strategic planning. I love the concept of it. But how is strategic planning different from the master plan
that we're already uh ready to submit? Because this master plan has town hall meetings, it has discussions, it has resident input, it has short, mid, and long-term strategies. just clarify with me how it's different than the master plan if you could.
So I think that the master plan is more of an overview and not specific. So just for example, we have road projects that are on our on our agenda tonight to discuss for appropriations. Road projects have to be done. The
undergrounding that in neighborhoods, we know that that has to be self-funded. If that was a direction that the city wanted to take to do undergrounding in neighborhoods, that's not funded by the state. That's going to be funded by our money. Is that what we want to do? How
do we want to pay for that? We had a presentation for the rec center to do a basketball court and a concession stand. Do we want to do that? Is that how we want to expand parks and wreck? And how are we going to pay for that? You can't have all of these items.
They're here in the in the master plan, but how and when are you going to implement those things and move them forward? The strategic part of it is taking out what you're going to do and making a plan to make it happen. When they did this previous strategic
planning, the way that I view that is it didn't really strategically plan what they were going to do. They said this is what we should do, but there was no the list of hopeful outcomes, right? There was no real this is how
we're going to do it. This is the way that we're going to get to it. Um, and I think that to dig in deeper and to provide something to the residents that says this is what we're this is the plan and this is how it's going to be
implemented. Not just here's my here's my wish list. This is what I want for Christmas. So would you could could I say that the strategic planning uh concept is going to look at the master plan, extract specific things and very
specifically implement strategies to make them happen based on input from city employees, residents and board of commissioners. Is that a fair that that would be So they work they work together. Got it. Yes. Yes. I think that's a great idea. Thank you.
Great discussion. Um I agree 100%. Um yeah, the master plan is okay, this is what every this is what the community would like our our home to look like in 10 years or in 20 years or whatever that might be. But the strategic plan is
just that how do we prioritize and how do we fund it and um all the all the nitty-gritty correct on getting to it. I I applaud that. As far as waiting until we have a city manager, absolutely not. It's our
our responsibility to um prioritize. It's the city manager's responsibility to implement it in my opinion. I agree. I agree. Sorry, I forgot to include. I think we
should not wait. Yeah, I believe we should move forward. Definitely. So, um, do we need to hire consultants for that or can our staff address that for us
since the master plan's already done and we already know what to expect and we're extracting from the master plan? It just seems to me it's a simpler. So, I think we need a professional to
guide us. Um there now we have a proposal from USF. There are other places and I would I would recommend that we reach out to at least two other of the companies that do this and let
the city manager and the city clerk work together on bringing us back. They're all a little different. Uh St. Pete College has a forum that they do strategic planning in and the strategic planning includes the community. So it is it is a public meeting. It is open.
The difference between it and this is we're all sitting here and in strategic planning you're sitting together. You're having a roundt discussion but it is inclusive of the community. I would highly suggest that Kimley Horn be one of those that we speak to.
They're they're very familiar with the master plan and um they have their own uh grant uh division. they'd be able to give a lot of input on uh where we could fund some
of these projects. Um you know, you don't get your you don't know until you request it, but they have a pretty good track record on knowing what can be uh funded and what can't be. you know. So, um, so,
city manager, would you and Clara work on that to bring back to us some other options so that we can discuss uh, a different viewpoint and maybe who would be the best fit for what we're looking to accomplish. Absolutely.
Do we have any public comment? Any additional comments? None. Thank you. Then next on the agenda is public works state appropriation request. City attorney.
I got this. Um um I sent the mayor commission. I sent everybody the five-year capital improvement plan. Um the public work state appropriation request. In my opinion, the request should be from the
public works department because those that department will benefit the entire city versus something the fire department does or rec center does. And yes, public safety and community events, but it could go a long way with improving roads or what have you. So,
what we'd like to do is have have the entire board go over that 5-year capital improvement plan and rank those in the top one to five, one to three, whatever it may be. And that's what we push our lobbyists for. Do we have any public comment
commissioners? I I reached out to city employees for this and uh I I strongly agree with uh acting city manager Bel.
Can I just call you Chief Bel? Uh Chief Belulk's recommendation to make prioritize public works. In addition, I received uh a couple pretty good and I've actually they're on they're in front of you now. This is from the marina department continuation of the
marina seaw wall project. This would include where you can read it uh 240 ft of seaw wall from the fuel dock, gang way to the cell tower and addition of public docks at ROC park. These also would benefit uh residents as well as uh tourists. I don't know if Krabby is here
if he wants to would you do you want to do you feel like I didn't mean to put you on the spot. Would you address these a little more in detail for us? Good evening. Um, so the seaw wall is pretty straightforward. That's going to finish our seaw wall project around the
marina from the fuel dock around close in the old boat ramp that's kind of an eyesore. It's kind of falling down a little bit to the uh where the cell phone tower is. And then we can take that and make that into a more proper environmentally friendly wash down station that doesn't have as much
runoff, captures a lot of the, you know, chemicals and things like that that people use. Uh, as far as the docks and all that go, I have a presentation kind of later tonight for that, so we can cover that then. But as far as the Marina Seaw wall goes, that's what that is. Thank you.
You're welcome. That was my pitch. Okay. So, I have a comment. Um, in going over the appropriation request and conversations with city staff,
I had a lot I had a lot of conversation um with multiple people, not on staff, but on staff and off staff in regards to our appropriations and how we get them and the relationships in Tallahassee. And I'd like the commission to entertain
changing our lobbyist. Um, our previous lobbyist that we had, R.J. was number one, he lives local. I I've had coffee with him over the two and a half years multiple times while he was
with um, Shoemaker. And I feel like he did a lot more for us on a personnel level. The staff knows him and has and calls on him. The staff doesn't know our
current lobbyist, which is a shame. and that um I feel like from the conversations I've had with people in Tallahassee, he has relationships that would be better
utilized for us and I think he would be so I'd like for us to entertain it. I know that our contract I had the chief bel to get the um contract out and we looked at what our contract is. It has a I believe a
30-day clause. There is a 30-day clause and it automatically renews after 12 months. But the in the termination uh clause that states if we give 30 days written notice that we can cancel the contract. But the um in the event client
terminates, Shoemaker Advisors shall be entitled to the compensation specified in paragraph 3 for the remaining initial term of the agreement. So, if it's if it's only for 12 months, I would assume that if you entered into or sent them the 30-day notice, we would
have maybe two months a month to left to pay on this. If I'm understanding it, I think we could negotiate that back with R.J. So, can I just clarify R.J. So, Jim Taylor just said he was our lobbyist for
the last year. So, R.J. was before Jim Taylor. Yes. For do you know how long? uh several years. I can tell you that while he was our lobby, and now he's got his own business. Is that he opened his own firm? So, he's a smaller firm, more personal one-on-one
service. Um he if you don't know him, is he breaking any rules? No, he is not. He's not breaking any rules. He doesn't have any non-compete. No, he does not have a nonete. Okay. He does not. Um I mean, I just know what he's done. And what I did was I reached out to the elected our elected officials
and asked How what do you think? How do you feel? Um if you don't know him, I would um ask you to give him a call, have a coffee, and sit down with him and have a conversation. Form your own opinion. I'm not trying to impose my opinion. I'm just telling you what my
opinion is. And I think everybody should uh if you don't mind, take the time to have the discussion. At the end of the day, I want the best person lobbying for us that is going to not only have a relationship with our city staff to
guide our city staff in the best way to obtain the most money for us as well as the person who has the best relationships in Tallahassee. And those relationships aren't just with the elected official. It's also with the offices like the budget office. And
there's different offices that it matters that they know those people that they can walk in and say, "Where are you at? Where are you really going to write money to?" And it is my opinion he has those very strongly. Right. If you can provide contact information, I'll reach out to
I will uh chief has it. He can share that with everybody. Great. Yes. Great. Sorry. I would I would agree. I've I've had coffee with R.J. before, you know, when he when he was our lobbyist and actually talks or talked or emailed or whatever
after he didn't wasn't selling his firm. He was just wanted to see how we were doing. Yep. And um no, I I like R.J. a lot. um where I was going and I couldn't
couldn't put it to words yet was uh over the last two days. I don't know who was able to take some time to watch the real the special meetings on the on the on the property tax. Most of it we already know. Um but it did break
some things down and I I learned some things. Um, so I wasn't listening word for word, but I had it running right next to me while I was working the the two days. Um, but the reason I bring that up is
there was one they they had some city officials and some county officials come in to talk on uh on their finances. And one of them, it was a lady, I can't remember if she was from Hillsboro or
what city or but going through her budget the previous year they got $40 million in grants. We're missing the boat big time. So whether that means as um
Commissioner Kabahi had mentioned, do you how does that work? Do you first try to download an understanding of where federal dollars are coming to the state for grant money that's going to be
funneled from the federal through the state? Um maybe that's in resiliency projects that weren't even on the table the last 20 years. But with the current hurricanes that we've had,
are those resiliency projects now something that the state would consider because they can be funded from the federal? I don't I don't know, but you have to have the discussion. Um, as far as the you mentioned the D
grant, was that what you had brought up that we didn't apply for? No, that was we didn't there's several grants that we didn't apply for. Um what I brought up was the um mitigation money that we just we didn't we did not apply for it. That's not the
correct name, but it was a block of money that all we had to do LMS LMS grant that we just I wasn't familiar with that. But but regardless regardless um I don't believe we're maximizing our grant opportunities. So when earlier
this meeting um the mayor suggested that she wanted to have a discussion on a HR person um believe me I don't want to I don't want to grow the staff that's not it's not anything I want to do but I I would
consider the needs for that versus a grant writer that's some you know we can't these directors they can't be spending their time trying to find grants And I don't, you know, maybe they can, maybe they can't, but they're not going to do
well at it. So, you remember we contracted with Grant Works. I haven't heard a thing back since. I actually requested from uh Megan Powers today. I had requested maybe the other day, but we anyhow got in a conversation and she forwarded me the
invoices that they sent. It's the first I've seen. So, we've engaged we've engaged with what I believe could be a good company or could move us forward along with a good lobbyist to help us or I shouldn't say good because
I'm not saying who we have is bad, right? I don't want to imply that. But the the biggest issue that I see is you've got to have somebody at the head of the city who is the city the top
currently chief that's got to manage that and drive it and prioritize it. That's the person that does it. So if Grant Works is going out and doing that for us, which is who we voted to use, we just need somebody who's managing that
and pushing it. And I don't feel like that's been the case. But admittedly, we had just started it. So is grant work sitting there saying, "Okay, we'll we'll look for any any grants you're, you know, just just come to us."
The first one, are we not going to them? Well, the first one that's here, and I don't know, maybe we really I mean, in my opinion, we should have Do they have a copy of our capital budget? We should have them come and have that conversation with us. They should be invited to a meeting for an update. This first one that they did, uh, Vice Mayor
Kerr, is the FT resilient Florida grant. So, they've been paid to go to try to obtain that grant. Not to interrupt, but that's the one that Jim had mentioned that. Well, we're paying Grant Works to do it to do it and
not our lobbyist. Okay. Are they being successful? I don't know. We just got the invoice or or it was just entered in into on August the 19th. Okay. Well, um yeah, but to grants, I will say this, there
was a grant that came through one of the grant watches we get and when I got it, I forwarded it to the city manager. The city manager then forwarded it to the appropriate department head and this was our
previous city manager. And just this week or maybe last week, I think it was this week, um the department head was speaking with the city manager in regards to the grant and at this time we don't have a project that would qualify.
However, that grant they give it every year or it comes up every year. So now the in my my mind's eye it would be okay what can we do as a project that we
could utilize that money right oh I mean well it comes up it's a mindset I think director hatch brought it up we had a 30-day window but we had to have on some some grant um I don't know if it had to do for the rec center the I'm not
quite Sure, but it you had a 30-day window to apply and you had to have all these things done that would take 6 months to do to qual to have it already qualified for that. So, it's a lot of it is a lot of work.
It's a lot of work. So, whether that's an employee or works that we would hand that to. Yeah, we we need to have that discussion and yeah, I'd love to have them come to a workshop, but you know that's another
month which is are we paying them on a monthly basis or we paying them on a commission basis? Um the uh we wouldn't have they wouldn't have to wait till a workshop to come. Grant works can come and give us a discussion at a meeting. So I mean if we wanted to invite them they possibly could come next Wednesday and have a
discussion with us to give you an idea all of us an idea and a better understanding of what they are going to do for us and what they can't do for us. I mean the city manager can invite them. I already have it written down. Yep. We'll reach out. And you know, if that
if that's if those meetings were were uh videoed, which I'm imagine they were, maybe Megan could find out. Um I would encourage go back. You know, I'll do it if I if I can get a link to the videos to find out who that was. Let's see how they're $40 million in
grants on a single year. I want to find out. You have to have a plan. If you have a plan and that's then you know what you're looking for and you're prepared. and that's why we spent the money with Kimley Horn to build this grant, but I agree with this the strategic planning part of it. So,
good discussion. Thank you. Thank you. Any additional Did I ask for public comment? We agree with you, Mayor. I I understand how all that does relate to the public works appropriation request, but I'm still not clear what our direction is with specific requests.
Are we going to prior are who are we or who is going to prioritize the public works or and are and or are they going to include the marina requests? So the I think that correct me if I'm wrong. It is that the
public works roadway projects are most important. Um my understanding from my conversation with Representative Cheny's office is that um between her office and our lobbyist, we can have the discussion on what'll really get through which leads to our decision about the
lobbyist. Got it. Okay. Because here's what I would tell you. If if she buys into it or if it it's an area of dollars that is not her but Representative Diggley, right? whoever is it's in there because they have different roads that they travel for
monies, right? Um if they buy into it, they're going to fight for it. If they see the need and the value, then they'll fight for it. If they don't, they're not going to. So, if she doesn't, you know, if she's not going to fight for something, he's not going to fight for something that they don't believe we need or is
valid. I do know from my conversations that the uh the tone in Tallahassee is going to be more towards um infrastructure storm recovery. So can we so we can can I can I my understanding be that that we will prioritize the public works request as
well as the marina request since they're all uh infrastructure type issues. Okay. I think so that's what I just wanted to know where we were headed. Yeah. Thank you. Comments. Um, Madame Mayor, I'm looking at the
at at a couple of lines there as far as, let's say, area number nine. And we're looking at, let's say, start design services for $250,000 and then complete design and potential start. I don't really understand this terminology. Um, can someone, whoever
was the author, kind of explain? So these are from um director WebR and what the start design that's when you're getting the design you're getting the the plans and whatnot and then once the plans are approved then you'll go into
the complete design and begin construction phase of it. So when you go you have to time it pretty pretty good because if you're if you get these appropriations and they expect you to break ground in six months but you're only in in the design phase that could
be an issue. So my understanding is that's these are the kind of priorities that our lobbyist uh and and representative will which see decide what we can possibly get right is that right?
Yeah. So based off the direction of the board, we could figure out what the top three are and what are the top three for FY26 where what projects are ready to go and then if there is one that you would like to champion then we can look if
it's FY28 we have even more time to prepare for that. If I may recommend, I would probably try to I would probably request to and I know there are different years and so forth and so on, but I I would like to
maybe combine them all because once you put it out there that the design, the first phase of design is going to be $250,000 and the second part $2.5 million, then the consultants will automatically say, well, let's go for the, you know, let's just raise the
value of their uh design. But if you combine it all, let's say design and construction, then then you know, you're not encouraging the uh consultants to raise their fees
to match whatever was budgeted. I I like to recommend that. So in my conversation um that I've had over the last couple weeks has been you need to put it in bytes for the state.
So which is so like when if you just look at Bayoint there's for fiscal year 26 is $250,000 right and then 27 so it would take all
of 26 to do the design services portion of it and then the complete design and potential start would be in 27 which is 2.5 million and then in 28 the construction for 4.5 million If you combined
all of that together, that number's too big. You've got to put it in byes. Also, um just texting with director Wetford, you you cannot combine different road areas for projects. Area 9 is one project, area three is another.
Yes. No, I agree with you there. I wouldn't I mean, I would keep I know what you're saying. Like if you can combine design and the plans and then construction, all of that into one. Yes, but I also understand what our mayor is stating now. If if we can if we
can have a different language to to to to go after the the funds and yet not encourage the consultants to charge us two $2.5 million for design,
you know, then then I would say I would agree with that. But but as it's written, you're telling the the consultants, "Oh, yeah, we have three three million uh two Yeah. two $2.7 million just for your for consultant fees."
So I don't think that's what this is. That's that's where they're just budgeting for that. So it's just budgeted. Um we still have to go out to bid. Yeah. For Right. So So it's just a budget and bas
if you don't mind. Um, Commissioner, I you know, you you have to have the budget out there and I understand what you're I understand exactly what you're saying. However, that's where it's a it's a fine line, you know, where
we have the pre we you know, we've we've already um allocated certain engineering firms to do certain types of projects at an hourly rate. I I get it. They could they could run that out. Y so anything
this large I don't this would have to go out to bid. So the the $250,000 for um for the start design services that would have to go out to bid and that's where the that's where you start getting the constraining. No, no one's looking at a
budget. They're actually looking at what's it going to cost to to meet everything. I mean you do it all the time. You're in this field. you know what what what do I have to do to staff to to get that project done for that
lump sum fee um if that's the way it it it bids out. So you're going to have at least three different firms, hopefully more that would compete on that and that's where your market pressures would would keep
it below your budget. And if it if it's not below your budget or if you decide it's all too much, you go out to bid again because you know just because you went out to bid doesn't mean it's going to be awarded. So um but I understand what you're saying, but I'm you know that's that's
the only way to that I understand how to do it. I'm okay with it as long as you're not encouraging the consultants to charge massive amount of dollars. That's all. I think if Megan was here, she would say that the her numbers are based off of
experience. That's a lot of money right there. Yeah. It's It's a big project. Yeah. So, are we is this something we're preparing for a vote for a future meeting or is this something that we're just putting out there for discussion? Putting out for discussion. I don't
believe we have to vote on it. You You don't have to vote. But I would it'd be easier for staff if we had a consensus of everybody's top three and then we can we can prioritize them with those three who who voted for area 9 who you know what I'm saying so we can move
forward with that. We just need to know what the commission wants from us moving forward and I I believe some of this can be discussed in the strategic plan. Well, this this is actually due ASAP because we h what we have to do is submit to Representative Cheny's
office what we want to ask for and I believe the date was November 1st if I'm not mistaken or 21st I think it's the 21st. Okay. And my my goal was to get it in sooner than later. I think we've in the past we've been at the 11th hour and it would
be um respectful of her and her staff's time if we did it in a timely fashion. So the ask was that we would talk about it. We would get it so that staff would because staff has to go in and enter all this.
Yeah. But you're only looking for what Representative Cheney needs is for FY26. She's the only person who we have the portal open to to submit for currently. So that's what I'm saying. So really what she's only looking at are the
are is $500,000. That is correct. The 26. Yeah. Yep. Yeah. Does she see the future years? I'm not sure. I've never I haven't ever done this, so I'm not sure. I I just
know that um when you it must be actually and if Megan was here she would be able because she's done it before but it must be because they do look at the project of how long it goes out so they understand that there's bites of it. So in in the one road project it would be
$250,000 is the first year and then the next year is 3 million you know as that I'm looking at what's up there and then the Bay or area 9 is 250 the first year 2.5 million the next and then 4 and a.5 million the third year right I mean it basically is 526
and then we're up to 6 million the following year I mean that's not you're not going to get all that but you want to get as much Marcy do you have some input on Matt, yeah. So, I was just going to say um first of all, with the project and the costing you're seeing, this is our first
um swing at the elevating the roads, trying to get them up a little bit. So, with that, we're touching a lot more than we ever have on just your typical roadway project. So, you are going to see an increased cost with that. Um, typically with these projects, and I can't speak intimately to to this, but
having done some stuff like this before, typically you would create like a critical path method for the entirety of the project through which you would communicate with with the grant provider, your project milestones, and provided you were meeting those project milestones and giving those reports, it
the funding just continues along with that. So, you would be able to take care of the project in that capacity. Okay. So, and not to belabor this, but I think it's very important. We're not just talking about infrastructure. We're talking about resiliency. We're talking
about changing the map. It could be projects, marina, seaw wall, community development. We're talking about water, storm water changes in our storm water process, elevating the roads, and having a
10-year, you know, maybe it maybe that's what it comes down to, sitting down with uh Representative Cheney and saying, "This is how, you know, this is this is our goal. This is where we want to be in 2035. This is where we want to be in
2045. Getting this city elevated." Exactly. And and this kind of plays into like what you guys have been talking about tonight holistically, right? We have the master plan which is coming to fruition. You're talking about strategic planning is where you get to pull all of these projects together and
start giving them definition and timelines and goals and it creates that long-term plan like you're talking about in 2530 years. What is this? What does the city start to look like? How are we becoming resilient? How are we improving our storm water? This is all tying into each other. So, it's a it's a great time
to be talking about all of these together. Great. Okay. I don't know if that helps, but it's a great discussion. Any more comments? Next on the agenda is rebid information
technology concrete contract network people integras. We can still talk about it, but I thought we were going to pull this item. So, yeah, this um this item when it got brought up and the city manager said
that we could we would put it on the agenda and discuss putting it out to bid, we just went under contract two years ago. The contract states that we would have to buy it out and pay the three years. For the record,
my issue with this was that 3 years ago when we went to bid for this contract, there was a $250,000 grant available with the state that we didn't even apply for because th this company wouldn't use, my understanding, the software. And
so it is a huge example of where we missed a big boat which is now $750,000 because 3 years of 250 is 750. And um we subsequently entered into a
contract for $60,000 that we didn't approve that was signed at $5,000 a month for policy. and I would like for us to get a better understanding of what they're giving us for $5,000 additional dollars a month if
you could get that for us to help us understand. Um when I did the uh investigating on it and reading into what they were doing, the majority of what they are doing in this additional contract was included in
our original original bid package. So Mr. Trask ever had an opinion on that? I don't think we asked him. And and specifically, what are you asking? They are charging an additional $60,000
to be comp state compliant. The way I understand, which the question is whether that was part of our bid package that they bid to and then subsequently said, um, no, that's an additional fee. Although
It's our Yeah, I don't know the answer to that question. I haven't been asked that. I haven't been provided with the documents and so I don't have an answer because that that may be a way to terminate the contract right there. Well, the contract um should have
we can't go back. But well, you can if they violate. So if the city manager at the time signed a contract for $60,000 and he only had the authority to sign a contract for 30, is the contract valid?
So there's a good argument that it's not valid, the $60,000 contract, because he didn't have the legal authority to enter into it. Was it brought up at any of our meetings? Yes. Did we discuss it? Did we? You were the first person who ever brought it up when we were asked to
approve the $5,000 and we started digging in, which is how I found out that it was not a $5,000 contract. It's a $60,000 contract. It was 5,000 a month with a 12-month minimum. But did we ever vote on it? Which would
I don't believe we did. It was in It came to It came to us. I I would have to go back and I don't recall how it was handled. It came to us as an amendment to the budget. The contract was signed in November and the amendment to the budget came to us in March.
Right. But what I'm saying is did did this did it come to us as okay we need to sign this because I this is my recollection the states requiring this additional compliance feature that was not included
in the original contract. Was it was it included in the original bid package? I don't know. But regardless they brought it to us and it was one of those items that we said well we don't have any choice. we have to approve it. Does that
circumvent the city manager's approving the $60,000 change order? It ratifies it. So you if that's what happened, you may have ratified it and so it would be a valid contract then you're ratifying
that's my question. The execution by the city manager. Yeah. But the bigger question is should it have been included? Have we been paying all this time for something that was part of the bid package? I don't believe that it was a service
that was required based off what I learned from it, but that's it was very misleading. How's that in my opinion? Agreed 100%. Very misleading. Mayor, I'm happy to research that question.
Okay. Do we have any public comment? Next on the agenda is selection of a recruiting firm for the city manager and other senior vacant positions. Mayor Commission Commissioner Tagleini represented the board and along with uh executive
assistant to the city manager Megan Powers. They interviewed three uh candidates and I believe the all three of them are presented to you now and up for discussion is a direction on which firm to go with and remember you're not voting on
anything tonight. This is a workshop. Hello. So, I had the pleasure to sit with Commissioner Taglerini uh while we interviewed three recruitment firms. I think we I did a bulletoint procon list.
I felt like that was the easiest way to figure out who's the best. Um I know I think Renee Norlock is probably going to be the best. I feel like we're going to get the most personalized um responses and just help with it.
She's the president. Renee and she's going to be our recruiter. So, I felt really good about that. Uh, St. Pete Beach actually used them and something that I thought was interesting was I and I totally forgot this. Um, when they were recruiting a city manager, they
lost four of their commissioners because of the form six stuff. So, she was able to find a city manager without four commissioners, which I think is pretty good. So, uh, being in the climate that we're at, I think it'll be a little bit easier to find a city manager since we do have
a sitting board. Um, and everybody's very cordial. So, that's my recommendation is to go with Renee. Mayor, I had I had the honor of working with uh, Miss Powers, and we we agree on this. Uh I I I just want to point out a
couple things that uh the cost for the first Well, first let me say I I although they were all really positive interviews, the the four the final one Goodwin recruiting I just didn't feel like had enough experience in this type
of recruiting. Um they're a very power very strong business come but I just don't think they were the best fit for us based on the experience. Uh but if we look at the cost, one thing it looks on surface that SG strategic is less
expensive but what's there's things that are like add-ons like that are included in the uh the first one in in Narlock. So as far as price one and two are about to me are a wash. They're they're the
same. Uh the success rate of Narlock was 95%, the success rate of SGR is 100%. But what uh I felt like Narlock was more honest because she has a 100% fill rate,
but she did not include a couple of cases where they filled it. The city was happy, the city count city manager was happy, and then unforeseen circumstances happened in the city manager's life that forced him to resign within the first
year. But everybody was happy with each other. if it hadn't been for those family emergencies where one had to go back across the country. Uh so I feel like 100% could apply to her as well. Uh again, she's she's going to be doing the
work. Uh she was very interested in having town meetings. She was very interested in meeting with us one-on-one. Uh and uh I liked I liked uh I liked her presentation. So we we're in agreement about about that one and two. Um, I guess at this point we'd have to
decide through a vote which we're going to go with, but I I would I would be very comfortable with uh Renee Narlock and Associates. Do we have any public comment? Um, commissioners, any comments? Madame Mayor, one of the um residents
had asked me if we could reach out to ICMA. Have we done that as far as trying to find a city manager? No, it was my recommendation to go through recruitment firm. Um, and that's what you guys voted on on the last
meeting. So, that's what we did. I have not advertised anything yet. I have not gone to anybody but recruitment firms to get their pricing. Megan, we have advertised on ICMA though for other positions and we have not been successful in even receiving
applications, have we? Not to my knowledge. Yeah. I don't think it precludes doing that. If we go through a recruiter, I would think that I think if we got a strong candidate that we all agreed on, we could include that in the final discussion.
Absolutely. We don't have to use candidates just from the recruiter. If someone fills out an application just from the website, we can certainly add those into the the mix as well. Right. So, I got that same letter. I think we should I mean, I don't think it precludes that. We could include that as well. Could
we share with public what the cost is for with the recruitment companies? Uh for the one that we're interested in, the cost is going to be 265 for a lump sum um plus expenses not to exceed
$5,450. And that would be for Rene's time coming down here because she is from Tallahassee. Um it would include ads, town hall meetings, and stuff like that. the expenses. So, uh, how do these recruitment
companies actually look for potential city managers? Obviously, they can all advertise. Yes. And all those folks out there that are potential city managers, you know, can can apply. So, I don't I
don't really understand, you know, as a as a typical um private business ownership, you know, I just advertise out there that we're looking for this and that. So, couldn't we just
put some hypothetically ads in a paper? Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. Something that the recruitment firm is going to help us is a nationwide surge. Not only are they going to look for people who are actually in the search for a job, they're going to reach out to people that have previously told them,
"Hey, if there's a good opportunity, let me know." So, that is the advantage of using a recruiter because they have more stuff in their back pocket than we do, more people to reach out to. Okay? And and and more connections. We're we're going to have a hard I I
think that finding someone who's unemployed looking for the job one is going to be rare and two maybe there's a reason they're unemployed. So they're going to be reaching out to people who already have jobs, right? We're poaching. We're and so we're interested in these
recruiters connections, their and and their their ability to go across the the state and the country to find positions that or worker potential candidates that most best suit our needs. And that's part of what uh
Narlock wants to do is they want to meet with the city, they want to meet with residents. What are our needs specifically? And then they match those needs. And and while I'm saying that, we we may also need to consider uh salary. We're we're on the low side.
We are compared to adjacent. Yes. All of them have told us that we would have to up our salary. just I just want to throw we're not going to we're not going to attract somebody a good candidate from another job unless we can entice them in some way. It's not
just the good weather some of them that we have to offer. So I I I I feel like the recruitment uh entity is is a good plan good direction to head. It's a good investment. Did any of the firms indicate they have
a staff that does call around? Oh, yeah. All All of them do. So, they're they're making these head these calls all day long. Um calls, job boards, ads, all of it. Okay.
I agree on this firm. I did my own independent research and this is who I rated number one when I did the research. So, I personally think you picked the right one. Um, I also think that, you know, posting the jobs local and if anyone local wants to apply,
that's fantastic, but to limit us to local, I'm not interested in ending up with a city manager who's not the best choice we could possibly pick. Not just for the citizens, but for the first and
foremost for the citizens. and then for the staff, for the commission. Um, and I think that we we are where we are. Let's make sure that we do the best job filling that role with the best person that we can possibly find.
I think you guys did a great job with the information on on all these recruiting firms. Thank you. And by the way, I I shared with the commission uh the questions that we presented just to clarify it. Uh I didn't ask all the questions. The ones
that were highlighted in yellow, it was an active document. So actually as I was typing, you could see the responses, but if you say, "Oh, they didn't answer that question." If it was not highlighted, I didn't ask the question because, you know, I had a bunch of things and sometimes they answered the question without me asking. So just for
clarification, if you go back to that document, it's in your one drive. Uh highlighted questions and answers were uh the ones I asked. Any other questions? Any more questions? Thank you. Next on the agenda is roles and
responsibilities for the city manager to be advertised. So mayor and commission, this is essentially the job description. Do you do you want to look at the previous one and update it? Are we I don't know if the Garing Group is going to provide a U
job description for the city manager. Usually comes from the board if I'm not mistaken. So I guess by the regular meeting, we'd like to have the job description ironed
out and then be able to vote on it um by October 1st. By next week, that's when our next meet our vote. I forgot that it got moved up. Yeah, it might be tough. So, I'd be curious to understand I mean I I I want us to start searching as soon
as possible, but I'd be curious to understand if we if we end up voting next week to to contract with this firm that was chosen. Uh would we not want their input on writing that job description? We could. I'm I would think that
is that something they would assist us with, Megan? I can answer that, Megan, for sure. Yes, we asked that question. Yeah. So, I think that um I mean my my thought would be if we contract with them, we would then have a meeting with them where we
could share and have an open dialogue. They would of course bring their professional input on a job description. I mean, this one says preferably Florida coastal. Um what's wrong with California or
Louisiana or the Alabama coast or Texas? I mean, there are many other coastal communities besides just Florida that experience the same things we do, hurricanes, natural natural disasters. The ideal candidate, in my opinion,
would not come from Idaho or, you know, someplace in the middle of the country that knows absolutely nothing about living on the beach. Uh, but um, so I I would like to withhold my thoughts on that until we contract with someone and have that conversation with them.
Agreed. There there is one item on the uh on the rules and possibilities that I'd like to just say out loud. It says uh candidates are prohibited from lobbying, contacting, and engaging in conversations with elected officials outside of the executive recruitment
process. Candidates who engage in these activities should be eliminated from consideration. All questions and comments should be directed to the human resources staff. This is for people who may have connections with our current board. They should not be
lobbying with us. And if they have, they should not be considered. I'd like that to make sure that that is said out loud and that it stays in the uh responsibilities. I expressly did not return a phone call this week for that very reason.
Thank you. There you go. Do we have any public comment? Any additional comments? Uh yes. Um related but unrelated. I do want to have
the discussion whether it this meeting or a future one to um reduce the spending authority of the city manager. So if that need I didn't read it in in here, but I'd like to do that. any any
major purchase should be discussed here. So, I love that you brought that up because I'm not as so concerned with the $30,000 spending limit as I am the way that the
purchasing policy has been used in the past. And I'll give you a I I'm not going to give a specific example, but I'll give you a hypothetical. you you purchase something and you come in under the $30,000 threshold, but it's
just one component. You purchase that from company A, but then there's another component to that that you purchase from company B and it's $5,000. And then there's a
third component to it you purchase from another company. That's $10,000. Collectively, that job should have been approved by the commission because it's one job, but because they piece it out or it gets pieced out, it's considered under the 30,000. So, I think that our
purchasing policy could be better written, right? And I had just to follow up on that from a concern that I had in a conversation was well if we went into the project and it was you know say $28,000
but then something happens and there's an overage. Okay. My opinion if you're that close to 30 you should have brought it before the commission. It's not an emergency. But if it did go over, then the um transparent thing to do would be to
then bring it to the commission and in transparency say we started on this road with this project. This is how much it was going to cost and we ran into these complications and it's taking us over the $30,000 threshold. Anything that's being done that's not
being done frivolously, I don't think the commission is going to have an issue with. But having that transparent direction within the city I think is important for the commission and for the community. So,
and when if this is agreed upon that it should be gone back to what it was at 15 regardless, that could be written in that way that if a purchase is made independently of the board and future
expenses on that same purchase were to to uh exceed that amount that it should be brought to the board. that that would be easy. Yeah, I think so. And I think in the past the um when when it got changed to 30, if and correct me if I'm wrong, I
believe it was had to do with CO and getting things done and moving things along. There was some I think that you remember that there was some I don't remember it being I feel like it was before any of this board. Yeah, it was before us. Yes. You you think I think the 30,000 changed during
I thought it was during mine and and I feel like it was it was just a discussion about um being efficient. Yeah. Getting it done more efficiently. It's I'd rather give up a little efficiency. Yeah. No, I I'm in agreement with both of you. And it protects It protects the city.
Exactly. It's in the spirit of trans transparency all the way through. Totally. Totally. I I totally agree with you on that. All right. Thank you. Um so if we can put that on a line item for future. Yes. Um a discussion um last week came to mind
that again I I'm to be known as the grant person but um that's who we call you behind my back. No sometimes right in front of my face. That's fine. Um,
prior city managers, I'm saying we could go back many years, were very experienced, very good at getting grants, at being focused on grants. Um, and that was a
uh criticism of the of the I won't say just the the most recent city manager, but the last probably last couple of city managers that that all went away. Now, I didn't experience
what they were talking about, but I don't know if that's one of these roles and responsibility synopsis that we wanted to word smmith into into this um to me, commissioner, it's that's a perfect example of something that we
would give to the recruitment and say we're looking for someone who has grant writing experience and successes that into the recruitment, but should it be added to the roles and responsibilities synopsis that um this is one of your mandates. We can certainly is is to work with grant works to work
with our you know grants are your I mean that was definitely a criticism of the grand writing is a special specialty. Yes. Not saying that they have to do it. They have to be responsible for it. You want someone that's mindful of it.
So like we get these emails all the time for grants that are coming up. You want someone that's gonna you want someone that's going to sit down in their office at their desk and be mindful to read through what's available. Choose not necessarily that they're going to write the grant, but choose what would be a good avenue for the city to pursue and
then send it out accordingly to where it should go. Whether it is grant works, whether it is um leveraging our leveraging our elected officials, whether it is leveraging the Florida League of Cities, there are so many
avenues to us that are at no charge and we have not utilized them. And again, they're all relationships that are required of this city manager. So that's what I'm saying that that somehow needs to be written into those roles and responsibilities. I agree. Yes.
these relationships with, you know, visit St. Pete Clearwater, the relationships with with um our state representatives. It's very important to have those um and that if you're not meeting that, you're not doing your job. I would agree with that.
So um and um just financial accountability. I don't I have that written down here. I don't have that fully thought out, but I'll just I'll just put So, anyway, there's some ideas for that section. That's good ideas.
Yes. Anything additional? I do. We will move on to the city manager restricted swim area discussion. All right, mayor and commission. Um, recently there's been a lot of discussion regarding the swim zones and
what is allowed versus what is not allowed in these swim zones per ordinance. Um, the ordinance is right here in front of you and we feel like uh maybe there should be some discussion on the board whether we
can better clearly define the ordinance, make any changes, leave it as is, but there's been enough discussion that we should probably look into this. So, we'll open for public comment.
Do we have any public comment? Good evening, Madame Mayor, commissioners, and city staff. Oh, yes, sir. Thank you. Can you hear me better now? Yes. Okay. My name is Hannah Nyigrin. I am the owner of Fruit Float and Fruit Float
Cafe located at 13050 Golf Boulevard. Tonight, I'm here to ask the commission to consider allowing carefully regulated, safe commercial activity inside posted swim zones. Fruit Float is a 100% women-owned, locally grown small business that
started right here in Madiraa Beach. We sell freshcut fruit from our small canoike boats. And in just a few years, we've become a part of the MadiRaa Beach experience for both tourists and local residents. Fruit Flow is more than just a small business. It's a beloved beach amenity.
We bring hydration, fun, and character to the shoreline. Fruit Float boosts the local economy, showcases women led entrepreneurship and can provide an extra layer of safety for beachgoers if done correctly. As a lifelong resident
and a lover of our beaches, I know the biggest concern about swim zone operations is safety. And believe me, safety is our number one priority as well. Our boats use the smallest available 2.5 horsepower engines, each fully enclosed in protective propeller
guards. If allowed to enter swim zones, we would paddle into the beach under our own power. That means no motors would be running near swimmers. Every employee at Fruit Float spends months in training to learn how to safely operate before running a fruit
float on their own. As a team, we have thousands of hours on the water. And throughout the years, we have served tens of thousands of people safely on MadiRaa Beach. Additionally, I have personally helped four people on Madiraa Beach from
drowning while operating a fruit float. And we agree high-powered, reckless, unregulated boats and swim zones are at risk. But that is simply not us. With strict city regulation and responsible operation, we're confident our model can
continue to add value to the safe and fun environment of MadiRaa Beach. The second concern I often hear is that it might be opening the floodgates to too many other businesses wanting to do the same. That's why we're proposing clear limits from the very beginning. Only
allowing boats under 16 feet, requiring a million-doll comprehensive insurance policy to mitigate city risk. Capping permits and issuing only to establish MadiRaa Beach Madiraa Beachbased businesses with proven safe records.
Each vessel displaying a city issued sticker similar to the St. Pete beach's process so unregulated boats are easy to identify. This way, the city maintains full control over who operates, how many vessels are out there, and under what standards.
The city of Madiraa Beach has the legal ability to regulate swim zones under Florida statute 327.46, working in coordination with the FWC. That means the commission has the authority to create a fair, safe, and enforcable permitting system for
commercial swim zone operation. Tonight is the first step. By directing staff to review and amend the municipal code, we can move toward a pilot program that ensures safety while bringing fresh energy and economic benefit to our beach. In closing, Fruit Flow is
offering a responsible, safe, and community-minded way to enhance the Madiraa Beach experience. We are committed to meeting every concern with a practical solution, and we are eager to work in partnership with the city. Thank you for your time, your consideration, and for supporting small
businesses like ours that bring joy, health, and character to Madiraa Beach. Thank you. Thank you. Do we have any additional public comment? Hello everybody. My name is Amanda Lee and I am one of the very lucky flow girls. Fruit Flow is all about spreading
joy and positivity and creating a space to encourage girls to get involved in an industry that is very male-dominated. Since joining this amazing team, I have gained so much confidence in the most incredible group of friends. The support we have received from the community has been endless. Each and every day, we
have beautiful, wholesome interactions with our customers. The excitement they share when we pull up with our fresh fruit is contagious. I've had multiple people from across the country tell me that fruitful float was the highlight of their trip or it was a bucket list item to see the fruit float while visiting because they had seen us on social media
or heard about us while planning their vacation to Madiraa Beach. Unfortunately, many of these excited tourists will use the main parking lots and they'll find a spot on the beach which falls inside one of the swim zones so we won't be able to serve them how they would wish. In addition to being a fruit float girl,
I also happen to have my US Coast Guard master captain's license. At my other job, we do operate safely in the swim zones on St. Pete Beach and we are issued St. Pete Beach per her permits like we are proposing here in Madiraa. Um, safety is always our priority and we
sound a horn while approaching similar to our signature conch shells that we call attention to the fruit float with on our beaches here. The Frooflow girls are trained to be very mindful when pelling up to the shore, choosing a clear open spot and watching the swimmers in the area, staying cautious
of what they are doing and prioritizing safety. Granting properly trained commercial boers access to the swim zones opens the door for beachgoers to enjoy a unique and memorable experience, leaving an even better impression of beautiful Madiraa Beach. We would love to continue
to bring this joyful, unique, and positive experience to all of the beaches in this community. So, we thank you for your time and your consideration. Thank you. Do we have any additional public comment? Hi everyone. My name is Erica Hartman
and I lived in MadiRaa Beach since 2018 and worked in John's Pass since 2015. Uh most recently, well up until recently, I was working at Florida Tiki Tours um in John's Pass and that's where I met Hannah. And also I did prepare
notes and they did not save and I lost them about five minutes ago. So bear with me as I'm kind of winging it right now. Um, I just wanted to point out that when you work in John's Pass and in the boardwalk that there's a lot of
water-based operations in that area, as you know, but what you may not know is in those amongst those businesses, there's a small community of people who are on the water every day and looking out for the people and visitors in our community. They're highly trained. Many
of them have to have special certifications. They go under rigorous safety training and operations. And um I don't have the exact numbers from the time that I worked at Florida Tiki Tours how many um times that we were able to
save somebody that was in distress in the water, but I know just one part-time captain within 18 months had um saved three different people. So, it's significant as far as having these operations um on the water. Specifically, John's
Pass is a very busy area with a lot of people um standing around on the sandbar, a lot of different kind kinds of residential and commercial boat traffic. And my understanding is they're asking for a spe special permit to
operate on MadiRaa Beach where they would be coming in at a 90 under their own power. And based on what I've personally seen in John's past, even under, you know, a much busier area, that businesses like these um actually
kind of enhance the safety in the area to our our visitors. And and it being such a unique area with rip currents, the fast waters through John's Pass, people come to this area from all over the country and they don't really
have an understanding of it. So, I really see that this business adds value as far as their safety because um both Amanda and Hannah worked at Florida Tiki Tours and so they're very well respected amongst that community of operators out
on the water and um they can also bring that onto MadiRaa Beach. If you look at Treasure Island and even St. Kate Beach, those um beaches have other businesses on on their beaches and so it's a lot of
fun to go to those areas and Madira Beach has um a few places like Caddies and um I'm sorry the the park that has that facility there. But Fruit Float is very unique at what they offer. They do offer fruit and hydration. And I just
would like um to point out one other thing that last year, you know, even though Hannah and I worked together, we weren't really that close because we didn't work that closely together. But the week after um the week before the
Helen Helen and Milton came and devastated our community. She had invited me over to the place she had just acquired to where Fruit Float Cafe now stands in my house um that I was renting, just a little beach cottage behind um Bamboo Beer God Garden and
Tyne. Uh so it was just easy for me to go over there and check it out and hear about her business plan and what she wanted to do moving forward. Well, then we got hit with the flood and Milton. But Hannah was on the beach, back on the beach almost immediately with her crew
of girls. And even though her boats were missing, her newly acquired place was damaged. She came over to check on me. And she didn't go back to her place. She stayed. She stayed with her crew. And they helped me go through the muck of my
belongings. And they didn't just help me, they helped the neighbors every day. They came back and not just for me, they brought sandwiches, water, and of course, fruit to the people in the surrounding area. And so I just wanted to point out that Hannah not only has a
really cool business that she can help expand with your help to MadiRaa Beach specifically to that area on the beach, but she has a heart for service and she embraces a lot of people in the community with that heart for service and I just wanted to speak to her
character. Um, thank you everyone. Thank you. Do we have any additional public comment? Hi everyone, my name's Amelia and I'm a newer resident here at MadiRaa. I just moved here from Tampa last year after the hurricane and so far I'm absolutely
loving it. Since being at the beach every single day, I've noticed the cutest little boat on the water and one day I let my curiosity get the best of me and I'm so glad that I did. I now know that that little boat was the fruit float and it's ran by the sweetest group of girls that get to live the dream of
just selling fresh produce on the water every day. Not just that, it's a woman-owned business by Miss Hannah Nigran and it's amazing. What started as a single kayak offering fresh pineapple and coconuts has grown into a small fleet of boats that safely bring
healthy, refreshing fruit to beachgoers and boers. I believe that it's more than just a business. It's a community stable that brings together and promotes wellness and a cheerful tropical charm that to our beautiful beaches. Have a great night. Thank you. Do we have any
additional public comment? Hello everyone. My name is Steve. I live on Bulkasa Drive. I'm just here to support the small business in Madera Beach. And I think that if we can learn from this, we can become more unique as a tourist destination. I mean, I you
want people to come here and enjoy it, take that experience home and they can do that through little companies and I just support the local companies, the local entrepreneurship and I hope that they can see through that to open up parts of the beach where they can do that. I mean, presently, you can rent
chairs, you can rent stand up paddle boards, you know, but they come from the sand. Why can't we come in from the sea and and get some fresh fruit? We I love what Hannah is doing. They have energy. Their excitement is is overwhelming and
I just stand with them in support. Thank you. Thank you. Do we have any additional public comment? Good afternoon everyone. My name is Sedona. I'm also one of the Fruit Float girls. I want to take a moment to express my gratitude for the impact that Fruit Float has had on not only me
personally, but also on the broader community. Since joining, I've never felt so welcomed and uplifted by a group of positive, supported women. Fruit Float has created a safe and inspiring space where people can connect, encourage one another, and celebrate our shared love for being on the water. What
makes this group so special is the way it fosters belonging and builds a community. Fruit Flow isn't just about floating together. It's about creating friendships, improving mental and physical well-being, and encouraging resident residents and visitors alike to enjoy the beauty of our area in a safe,
positive way. Granting a permit for us to gather in swim zones would greatly expand the reach of this positive impact. It would allow more people to experience the joy and connection that Fruit Float provides while bringing even more vibrancy, inclusivity,
and community engagement to our city. I truly believe that supporting Fruit Flow is an investment in the well-being of our community. It's a simple, uplifting activity that continues to leave a lasting impact on those who participate in the spirit of the city as a whole. Thank you for your time and
consideration. Thank you. Do we have any additional public comment? Hey guys, how we doing? My name is Terry Anderson. I'm a boat captain on John's Pass. I've been for going on five years now. I've known Hannah. I've known the
girls around the area. They also go to the sandbar uh as well as periodically the beaches before the sand buoys were put up. A few things that I've noticed since I've come to the area. Number one, I have not seen a business create the
type of impact that Fruit Float has done with the tourist. Pretty much every tourist that gets on my boat, once they see the fruit floats, they hear the stories and whatnot, they are amazed. It's probably the best part of their vacation here. It promotes
tourism. It's something that can only be found in the Philippines or Taiwan or something. I mean, I know that they're doing it up north in Destin. Uh, but it's very special to this area. It's very unique to this area. Would also attract more tourism to this area.
The other thing that benefits me being out there with these girls is that they do know the water. They understand the currents, they understand the tides, and they do rip through John's Pass. Just having that extra education out there for our tourists is just a wonderful
thing to have. uh anything that we could do to try to come up with permitting or something to keep these girls out there and doing what they do is going to be a benefit to our city. Thank you. Thank you. Do we have any additional public comment?
Uh good evening. My name is Matthew Staley. I reside at 500 129th Avenue John's Pass right there. Uh just wanted to show support for the fruit float. uh come with 21 years of professional maritime experience with the Coast Guard. Uh I know Hannah, I know the
girls, I have my seven-year-old daughter here with me. She gets more excited than anybody else when we see the floats. Um I just don't want you guys to shut down an operation that really does bring a lot of people here. So, in my 21 years, I've been all over the country, the Midwest. Uh don't don't count those
people out. They do have high water experience and they know how to take care of some uh bad situations. But in my travels, I have met a lot of people. I've met a lot of people since I've been here operating my own small business and operating on the water. Everybody I've met knows of the fruit float. They all
get excited. So ultimately when we shut them down and we don't allow them into these swim zones, you're kind of going to force people or you're going to force the fruit float to operate elsewhere. Those tourists that are coming here to specifically see them, interact, have that experience are going to go to those other areas. So not only are we're
sending them out of town, we're losing that business. We're going to lose those hotel stayers. you're going to lose that extra little bit of income that we get to see. I mean, we all know this year was not the greatest with all the aftermath storms. This this company is is doing great
things. Uh just recently, I listened to a podcast, I'm not a big podcast guy, coined coolest business in Penelis County right now. And I just I feel like if we're going to shut down an all female ran business and push them out of town, that's not going to send the right
message out. We're gonna I know you're not sending them out, but we're going to shut down one of their main operating areas, and that's going to limit their business, and it's going to limit the interaction they have with with the public. So, I just wanted to come in, share my support. Um, I think operating
by manpower, woman power kind of alleviates that whole fear of serious incidents happening. Um, they're not asking to, you know, come racing in. and they're asking to pull their engine up and paddle in by paddle just the same as you would if you launched a kayak from
the beach. There really is no difference. So, if we're not going to allow registered vessels into that space, I think we need to look at shutting it down for everybody else. And I don't think that's what we want to do, right? We want to make the beach enjoyable. We want to have these great interactions. We want to bring more tourism. And this is something that
nobody else has in this area that everybody that I know from the Midwest, everybody that I've met asks about. They all get excited about it. And same as me, I was gone for 21 years, a penelis county resident my whole life before I joined the military. And I come, you
know, back and visit for vacation, whatever it is with my family, and I saw their floats out there. And it became more and more intriguing. And I was just fortunate enough to get to know Hannah. And I think they're doing a great thing. I just I don't want to see them lose business and have to kind of shift their
focus elsewhere. And ultimately, that's what's going to have to happen. So, please uh consider that that permit at least. I don't think that's asking too much. That's just kind of finding a good solution to a problem that really doesn't need to be a problem. Thank you.
Thank you. Do we have any additional public comment? With no additional public comment, commissioners, questions, comments? Uh, I'll start. So, I've received numerous emails, all positive, no no
negative. And uh I was looking over the ordinance and it says uh no vessel of any kind with the exception of surfboards, paddle boards, sailboats shall be allowed to operate with a swim area. So, anything without a a motor can already get in there. Is that right? I
don't know who to ask. I don't I know if I can ask that. City attorney. That that is correct. Surfboards, paddle boats, and sailboats are allowed, but no other vessels. Okay. And and it so I one email caught
my attention, which was was news to me. It said that they want uh fruit floats to continue to operate. What caused fruit floats to stop operating if they've already been working here? Can Can I Can I They have not been legally able to
operate in the swim zones. They cannot be in there with 2.5 horsepower engines. So, if they've been doing it, they've been doing it in violation of the code. Okay. Okay. Uh I think we didn't we didn't have swim
buoys up so there was no design it wasn't designated in that manner. We've been without those for a while, but they have been in there in the past. That was a big issue. Right. Right. Right. Um, I mean I on the surface I thought I think it's a great idea. I
love the idea. I love the concept. But either either they we are going to have to change the wording of the ordinance or or it can't be allowed. I don't know how else to say it except uh take the engine off, paddle in and paddle out. Uh
I just I just want to say I' I I love the idea. I love the concept. I think it's it sounds great, but we have to change something for it to be allowed. I received emails, also received a phone call that was against
um I guess my concerns are a couple of things. Um, we're not only discussing fruit float, we're re we're discussing any business.
So, it's more of a business question in in my mind other than um other than this um the sandbars as I was my recollection is having business out at the sandbars was not permitted. I
don't know, but it was happening. I don't know if that's that's something that needs to be looked into. Um, so if you open it up to
a very qualified business, you're also opening up for anyone that can mimic that, whether it's they're qualified or not. I would refer to the chief as far as small boats going in and out of the pass
as being safety hazard. Um I know that that's that's a high high area that you do have water rescues. I mean they're having a heck of a time trying to get through the passive with two and a half horsepower. But if
they're doing it and according to the one gentleman, they're very knowledgeable about the water and waterways there, but nobody's preventing them from being in John's Pass. So, no, I'm I'm just it's a discussion. Are we is it something we want to encourage
is the first time one of these young ladies were to be caught in her, you know, well, we really need to get out there today, but it is a little choppy, but I think we can do it. And then they get themselves in in trouble. I mean, you can and someone and someone gets hurt or worse
playing devil's advocate. What if they were going to one of the nonswim zone areas, you know? So, six in one hand, half dozen in another. And um the third item is the swim zones
they're not that how Tom could. So, you know, to your point, if they were to navigate just to the outside of the swim zone, there's no restriction. Mhm. Correct.
So, I'm not sure. And the area stretches from I believe 131st all the way up to 149th. So, I I mean I Great presentation. The the young ladies are I'm sure they're wonderful. I I'm I'm concerned about
safety and I'm concerned about, you know, opening it up to once you open it up, you you open it up to everyone, not just not just uh very nice business. Um,
so they're they're my concerns. Commissioners comments. I do also uh receive a lot of the emails, you know, in support of Fruit Float. I think it's a great uh femal organization, a business, small business
that um is supported by many residents here in MadiRaa Beach. Um, you know, I was looking over the my main concern was the uh the engine that would come in into
the swim zone. Okay. Now that um Hannah cleared that up saying that the 2.5 engine would be shut down before you actually entered the swim zone. So now you're just using female power to come
into the the swim area. Um, so I'm I'm I'm all for it. I think it's a great idea and uh I mean we're going to still talk about this, but um as long as we're discussing it, I I think we can
change the ordinance to allow this uh company to uh to uh float and uh be successful. I think it's a great idea. So, as long as those engines aren't being ran inside the the
swim area and also I think it should only be allowed for Madir Beach owned businesses. We should we can we can actually um have them permitted here at city hall
and then numbered and then if uh it's basically one of those things if you out there and you see someone that's not permitted then you just make a call and say there's people out here that are uh not allowed
to be here because they're not f following the rules basically. So, I think uh it's going to be a neat little feature and uh the tourists like it. So, leave it up to you. I'm I'm thinking that
we don't have any jurisdiction over the waters of the state. There's a state statute that allows you to do this and it specifically provides giving you the ability to create swim zones. You've done that since 1983.
you've had a swim zone out there. So, that is your legal authority to have the swim zones and the statutes. Um, there's one of them referenced in the actual code 327.40, but the actual one allowing for
restricted area is 327.46. So, the city is in has done what it's legally has the right to do by creating these swim zones. the swim zone. Would would that not be different than the the operations that
they're proposing that they're not going to be swimming? So, your code specifically allows for surfboards, paddle boats, and sailboats in the swim zone. Otherwise, no other vessels are allowed. And if you look
into the body of your ordinance when it was adopted, it specifically says that these areas are declared to be Madira Beach's restricted area exclus for exclusive use of swimmers. That's three or four different locations in your code
provision. So, but there are those exceptions. I'm not sure how long the exceptions have been in there, but this boat does not qualify. The fruit float vote does not qualify as one of the three that are allowed
and D will not be involved right in I'm sorry D will not be involved in permitting. No, this is your swim zone. So you're in control of that. Nobody else is in control of it. Right. Well, in order to allow for them
to operate in the swim zone, as u uh Commissioner Tegler, I think alluded to, we would have to modify our code. Can I can I ask a followup question? So, I don't I So, am I to understand that
even if they rode in on a surfboard, they couldn't conduct business? I didn't say that. Oh, yeah. Okay. I want to make That's why I asked. So they just, you know, hypothetically, they they rode in on a in a kayak or a surfboard. They could self fruit.
It doesn't allow for kayaks. Oh, sorry. Surfboards, paddle boats, and sailboats and they they could come in on a sailboat and ev evidently. It doesn't make any sense, but evidently working out the working this out here. And uh so also
I I don't I guess I I should have asked for a we should have a picture of this. I don't I don't know what they look like, but so they're on they're on Instagram. I I have I have a fruit fluts. All right, I might look at
one right now. But the next question I have one more question. So am I to understand that even if the motor's not running if it's up that doesn't make it okay. It would not be okay whether the motor was running or not it cannot have a motor. Okay. It has to be a surfboard, a paddle
boat or a sailboat. And what's the what's the username? Fruit floats. Okay. Sorry. Thank you, mayor. So, I I took I have spent some time
researching and trying to understand. Um I did get a lot of positive feedback. I had one resident who was against the fruit float operating in the waterway and I received one email today from
someone who um was talking about if we allow it what they would go by and do. I did have exhaustive conversation on playing devil's advocate and coming up with well you know if we allow
the fruit float to come in what's going to keep a 20 foot skicraft from coming in and if we have the rule that it's you've
got to paddle in and paddle out that's going to dictate somewhat at what size boat you can have because a big boat can't paddle in. This boat can't. This can't this their boat can paddle in. They paddle in. They paddle. So, what I would
recommend is that regardless of what any of us believe, this code is poorly poorly written. It contradicts itself. It's it's not a well-ritten um code. And the city of St. Pete Beach does have a code that allows for and has rules for
what um this type of business can do within their waterway. I would like to recommend that we send this to our community development department and allow them to rewrite the ordinance or
code. And my recommendation would be to make a provision for the boat and to make the provision where it would be safe for the individuals that are in the water and there are other cities that are allowing
it. So look at how they wrote it, what they how they are policing that. Um when I watched them on the Instagram, I don't go to the beach very often, hardly ever. Um, it made me think of like when we're
in the islands and the little boats come up and they're selling the conch shells. And I mean there's not hundreds of them. My experience has been a few, but I think that there's a way to do it responsibly and to manage it. I don't
know what that is exactly, but I feel confident that we can come up with a solution that will um allow what the community supports and keep it safe at the same time
is my that's my opinion. That was what I was thinking. Let's let's look at what St. Pete has if if they're allowing it. I've already sent the ordinance to Marcy. Where are we? Well, so so I'd like to say we I think all in conformance and in support of
these wonderful people that are here tonight and we we as a city would have to initiate modifying or code to allow them to operate their facility. Commissioner Kerr, Vice Mayor.
Yeah. I I want someone to dig in onto the business side of it as well because it's my understanding that even though it may be operating on the sandbar, not not allowed to be. I don't think we regulate the sandbar though. I don't I don't know, but I'd like to
have someone dig into that. Um, if uh you're going to rent beach chairs on the sand, I believe it has to come through the through the city because we regulate that.
Um, you know, who who's actually has a area on the sand and they contract with the city to do that. Um, how does how does this differ? So, I think St. Pete Beaches. Um I I do think that their ordinance addresses
getting a permit to be in the water selling. I'm I'm not an expert on it, but they have something. So that's where I think that our community development department could uh take into account how other communities and bring us back a recommendation whatever. And I'm not
trying to put a recommendation in your head, Marcy, by any stretch, but let the professional look at it and bring it back to us with a recommendation of what they would recommend. Okay. Also, she's uh the fruit float will be considered a food truck and we don't
regulate food trucks as through the state. So, we would have no oversight, I guess. Yeah. I don't I don't know. These are just I want to make sure we think of everything. you know, it'd be real easy to say, "Oh, yeah, this is a great idea. Let's let's allow it." But there, you know,
there that wouldn't be you have to have a full conversation. So, would you be in agreement to hand it over to Community Development to further investigate, not just to write a Well, there I mean, that's part of whatever they would bring back to us
and come back with a recommendation. Yeah. No, I'm I'm all for that. Yeah. Well, I'm all for that except for the I'm looking at this boat here. The safety part of it concerns me and I
don't know that I want to be part of something that somebody's going to get hurt. So, that's the other thing I Yeah, I haven't made a decision. So what I would recommend of all of us is if you haven't visited
and seen the fruit float, go look at it and have an opinion. Watch watch them work. Um I have seen that I went I went to the cafe when there was a boat there and I got to see the boat actually out
of the water in person. Um do our own homework and then along with that and what community development recommends. I mean this this is the most dangerous part of our waterway. So I'm just Yep. No, I understand. So thank you.
Okay, Marcy. Yeah, just and just to be clear, um this isn't like a simple thing to touch our code. Uh so be you acknowledge that our code's kind of cluji right now and that's because historically in the past
they've made one-off corrections here to do this and consequently didn't look at the code as a whole or consider the entirety of the scope of what you're looking at. So that will be part of it. Um I got to work with Hannah on getting her brick and mortar opened and I think she knows our commitment to helping
businesses get open and we definitely help you know helped her with that. So we will look at this and I would like to come back with a reasonable expectation of what we think a good approach would be a timeline in addition to we have several projects on our plate right now that also have deadlines that have to be
met. So we'll have to work it in just just to set realistic expectations so that she has operating ability. It's just not in our swim zones right now. So I just want to make sure when we leave here everybody's clear and you know there's no miscommunication around that.
But we'll we definitely know we have some jumping off points with other municipalities. We have close relationships with people at St. Pete Beach and Treasure Island. So, those are phone calls I get to make. It's not just me digesting their code. I get to actually talk to them and we can kind of work together. Um, so we can definitely take that into consideration and then
come back with, like I said, some time frames, options, and bring it up to discussion. Thank you. Okay. Next on the agenda is project update. city manager. Um, mayor, commission, what I wanted to
do was get some transparency to the commission on where all the status of all the projects that we've been working on are mostly Megan Powers. She's she does a great job, has a lot going on. And obviously the big items, John's pass
dredging, the jetty, uh, snack shack. I'll give you updates on those. So, we had a meeting with Aptum and we have received all the permits for the dredging. We are waiting on whether or not a turbidity curtain is required and when we get that information, we'll be
able to go out to bid. Um, on the flip side of that is we have 1.55 million in state appropriations to spend on this. So, when we go out to bid, if it does, if the bids come in over the 1.55, where does that overage come from?
So, we just need to figure that part out. And then, who knows what where the bids will come in at, but if they come in at 3 million, we should figure out where the those funds are coming from. Um,
the jetty we uh me, Megan, Al, we met with Army Corps. Uh, Megan did a great job getting all the Army Corps representatives on the same screen. So, that's a big task in and of itself. Um, so we will have to make the new sidewalk
ADA compliant. Uh, per this project will be well over half a million dollars. Um, and so I just wanted to present to the board that, you know, the sidewalk was was great, but maybe we should look at other options that aren't over half a
million dollars. What else could we do down there? It's, you know, I've been down there three day, three times over the last week, and there's fishermen all over the jetty, enjoying it more than they ever have, at least accessing more of it than they ever have. And talked to
one and he he said it was, it was great. He, you know, he's got all the room in the world. But that's just one person. And I know it was a hot ticket item. So, we should we can move forward with the half million dollar sidewalk or or over the
jetty or let's really think about other options that we could have down there and still have a nice jetty in a nice area extending moy maps or what have you. And then the last one, uh, Snack Shack, the current contract will be terminated
on November 1st. We sent them a certified letter and they have 90 days to res to uh get their stuff out and respond and what have you. But at on November 1st, the contract will be terminated. We'll be able to go out to bid for a new client. And the current client will be eligible to bid on that
again as well. And then all 36 swim buoys have been installed. So all the poles are gone. All new swim buoys, all 36 of them throughout the beach. And I just if you have any other questions on the other projects that were in there, you know, feel free to ask, but the you
know, these are the top ones that the community wanted updates on. Do we have any public comment? Commissioners, well, there's one person sitting in the audience. How were the uh swim buoys uh secured?
Concrete and chain, I believe. Concrete and chain. Yeah, maybe rope. I'm not sure. It's chain. Shane, half half a million for the sidewalk. Wait, it has to be ADA compliant. So, you're going to have railing 300 ft up
one side and 300 ft on the other side. It's not going to look like it did before. No. And according to Army Corps, they even if you had to repair it in the state it was in before, you would have to bring it up to current code. So either way, it would look the same as it is whether it was torn out or not. It just has to be
code compliant. whenever it was damaged like that. Are we are we going to discuss whether or not we'll we'll do this then? That seems like a lot. We will discuss it. Um I I would think um we need to get the full information,
right? And then we probably want to have a community workshop to that's an item all by itself. The whole right because the whole taking out of the jetty was done without any consideration of the of the um commission or the you mean the sidewalk cuz the the jetty
still there the side right the jetty sidewalk. Yes. Okay. Um, when it was taken out, there was no conversation. And I think that arguably some people believe that it could have been repaired without being made ADA compliant and it we could have
kept what we had. And what I said to Chief the other day is what's done is done. We can't put it back. We can't change the decision that was made. So, let's not talk about that cuz I have a hard time letting go. I'm trying to let
go, but just let it go and move on and let's do what we can do, but be mindful to let the community be involved in the conversation. Agreed. Yes. So, my next question, my next big concern was I didn't realize that it the
dredging could go over what we have appropriated and has uh we don't have any kind of budget for that. I don't believe so. If we do, it would be under public works and uh that that dredging is, as I
understand it, not in city property. Is that right? It is uh right along the seaw wall on the north end of John's Pass. And it is it's not a lot of people have a misconception that the dredging is going to go right down the middle of the pass. It's not just over on that side to get
rid of all the sand that's been built up over the years. So, this is really to make some deep water for the businesses there. Do the businesses have any interest in this? Um, I know they want it. I don't know if they have any financial interest. I mean, if how are we going to pay for
it if if it goes over the appropriations? I think that I think that's a conversation when we get the bids. So, the the um we got hard dates when we had the meeting the other day and the the Aptum committed to having the
construction plans and tech specs and docs to us ready to go to bid by October 2nd and that then we would have the bid out by October 8th. Has to be out for 45 days. The bid open would be um November
21st. So, November 21st is when we will find out how much it's going to cost. Maybe we should have a discussion with the business owners that would that are directly going to be benefit from this. City's done what they can. We've got our appropriations. We're uh we've made it
happen finally. Uh I don't know. It just that overage I would hate for all this to happen to all this work to have been done and now we can't afford the overage. Well, there's less sand there now than there was when we actually started the project is my understanding.
That's I mean that was part of the conversation. Um so I mean we can we can hypothetically talk about it but we're not going to really have a talking point until we get the bids. Right. I mean it could come in well under the appropriations. We don't we don't know.
Yeah. We just don't know. So, I just wanted to make sure that nobody was surprised in case it did come in over. So, regarding Sorry, regarding the snack, we bounced around a little bit there. The current uh vendor, is there stuff that was
damaged, is that out of there? No. Last I heard, um, Megan asked me what we should do about it because their stuff is still in there. and um a letter was sent to them, certified letter saying they had until November 1st to remove their stuff and that's when the
the current lease will end. So even if they do want to bid and they win it again, they're going to have to put new stuff in there anyway. Whoever it the new client is. Okay, so here's what I don't understand about Snack Shack. When we sat here that night
and had the conversation, the conversation was the city manager had told them they did not have to pay rent from the storm. So, they had not paid any rent from the storm. It specifically said in their contract that they had to pay rent. Even in the event of a storm, they had to pay rent that they had to
get insurance. And the discussion we had that night was that if they would vacate their lease then that we wouldn't require them to pay the back rent. So, if they didn't vacate their lease that day or that week, why
are we allowing them to stay till November 1st and not pay rent? Shouldn't they owe us the rent according to their contract? They still owe the rent according to the contract. We've declared the contract to be in breach or in defaults because they
didn't pay it. Um, and therefore, under the terms of the agreement, we have to give him a 90-day notice. We gave him that 90-day notice. So when that expires, they're supposed to have their items out of there.
So then can we because they didn't do what was offered to them and they're keeping it us from moving forward with doing anything there. Can we make them pay the back rent? Because they owe it. They didn't. the the compromise was if
you walk away now, we'll let you rebid it and we'll forgive all the back rent, but if you don't walk away, then you owe the rent, right? I think they got they've got until November 1st to make that decision. I mean, it wasn't they had to do it that day. It was is that that this is the process that we're
going to go through. We're going to, you know, end it as of November the 1st. And if they if they wanted to continue to make an argument that they have a right to be there, well then of course then they need to pay all the back rent um you know to come to cure the default
say it. But um the the attorney is making a strong argument that well the city manager said we didn't have to pay it so we didn't pay it and so we're going to rely upon that. Well that's a terrible legal argument right? um because the city manager didn't have the authority to make that
decision without getting that approved by the commission. In addition to that, we have a legal binding contract with the concessionire. Um and that requires the payment. So, I'm not I don't buy that argument that the lawyer is making,
but he's he's making the arguments that he thinks that may sway you um in your decision-m process. I did talk to them on the phone by the way and um and I can talk to each one of you individually about that conversation doesn't need to
be done in the public but um they should be out by November the 1st. You should you do your RFP for the concession air agreement they can apply just like they've done in the past and other companies or people may apply too. You're going to make that decision once
all those responses are in. Sounds cut and dry. Yeah. It's a shame as far as the um sidewalk replacement. I suggest that we turn that over to Grant Works and to uh Linda Cheney and
put that on the wish list. Doesn't have to be done within the next six months. just has to be, you know, where does it fall in the priority of this of the city uh capital improvement budget. We need to understand what the cost is
going to be, what the scope of work. I think that's one of the things that um Chief, aren't you working on that internally with our in-house engineer and regards to what that build would look like and the changes in Yeah. Um Al Carrier he in that meeting
he said that he would work up the design and of course there'll be a cost associated with that and when he's done with the design then we'll have a better idea of the actual cost but just with the railings alone that's going to increase the price quite a bit. But I'm but I'm thinking that you know
the main reason we would want this is more for handicap access. Um and um I'm this is just me talking. I'm thinking that given what it is uh with the handicap access that grant
funds are available for for this possibly. Yeah. And and the relatively Yeah, it's a big number, but it's a relatively small number as price-wise as far as grants are concerned. Right. I agree. I I'm sorry. I have to say that as far
as appropriations, I think this would at the bottom at the bottom. I I mean, I think our road works, our road our all the other things, I think they have to rise to the top. Again, there's a lot of other sources for grants, right?
Grant plays for it. Great. Great. Comments? Any comments? Nope. Okay, then we will move on to legal advice. All right. Um again we you the
commission approved the FY26 or yeah approved the FY26 budget and just before that we made a few changes and made sure that the commission was presented a clean legal budget. Um, in speaking with
our labor attorney, Rob Ashenfelder, going back and forth forth with him over a couple days, we felt that there were some employees that were going to that exempt status that were not eligible to be exempt. And there's, in attorney's
words, quote unquote, there's severe consequences when you do that. And we just wanted, it was a 23rd hour. Um, I didn't want to delay the process. So what we did is just you know made the ch I made took it upon myself to make the changes and have three of the 12
recommended employees actually that I thought were eligible to be exempt. We only moved three over and this is just cleaner this way because now we have an entire fiscal year to review it and see who truly is eligible based on the FLSA or the Fair Labor Standards Act because
there's requirements in there and you have to hit every single one of them. It's not just this one or that one. you have to hit every single one and in my opinion they most did not. So I took it upon myself and speaking with finance and what have you and we all agreed to
make these changes. So either way is is you guys were presented a a clean legal budget. So but that's just the quick update for that. Do we have any public comment commissioners?
comment from me. Good comments. Um I I have more of a question. Um when we're talking about um the permitting process and reviewing drawings, um a lot of the staff had been moved over to exempt. Is that correct?
We did have staff that was exempt. Yes. And that had a negative impact on the amount of work we could get done because of overtime. Correct. So when you're on exempt status, I know exempt employees
um often work more than 40 hours a week. Um and it's expected. It's part of the part of the roles and responsibilities. So how are those employees exempted?
It's just not part of their roles and responsibilities. it's not what they agreed to when they how does that work? So, today was really the first opportunity for me to kind of get brought into this conversation that we were addressing exempt and non-exempt. Um, and I did have a few questions about
it today. So, I need to sus that out a little bit better with the chief and with HR so I better understand that because I I would like to make sure that our staff that it was already I think what she was referring to is people who were proposed to be moved from one
According to the Gearing Group, they recommended 12 employees be mo moved from non-exempt, which you're you're eligible for overtime to exempt where you are exempt from collecting overtime. There was 12 recommendations in my going
down the rabbit hole on this. Again, in the 23rd hour, there was only three. The um marina manager, parking supervisor, and the fire marshal were the only three that fit that. And attorney agreed. He
said this is the best way to kind of go forward with this because even all right if we want to put them into exempt status and we can kind of walk twist this into a gray area. It's only a one fiscal year delay but at least we're doing it right. We're doing it clean.
This is this is why I want to just say this. This is why we need a HR because when I started having this conversation, I had done some research on the exempt and non-exempt. It didn't make sense to
me. Why would Marcy's got an employee who was exempt from overtime that does not manage anyone, is not responsible for anyone other than themselves. Why would they? And the title is completely irrelevant as well. Some people are are grounds
maintenance supervisor. Don't get hung up on the supervisor word because that's completely irrelevant. It's all about their actual job duties and then we still don't even have the job duties to make that determination. Correct. So, I went to Andrew and was asking Andrew some questions and it and
the conversation back and forth was this is the kind of question an HR director should be able to answer for you, but we don't really have that role in our city, right? We don't have a HR director. I I think Megan Powers does that work,
doesn't it? She is not a certified HR director. She doesn't have to clarify. She does. So, currently HR duties are divided out in the city on multiple different people. And so in a city that has as many
employees as we have, my my thought and looking at what we have, we need somebody who's qualified to answer those questions to handle when an accident comes up what to do. A person that can do that. What does that person look like? I don't know. But to
be going down a road where we're going to make all of these people not able to have overtime who should have never been put in that role. We should have a professional work for us that does that. And to tie into the Garing Group, where are they?
I mean, um, they can't possibly do what we paid them for because they didn't do the interviews to make it possible. An email was sent to them asking where they made these recommendations and they said that
they're just recommendations that we are entitled to do whatever we would like. So, but what about the job descriptions that they were supposed to write? Um, Megan Powers did have a conversation with them yesterday and they're supposed to be done by the end of this week. So, how can they write write a job
description for someone that they have not sat with and understood what they put them into an exempt status when they don't even know their they don't even know their job, right? Very first day I was like, what what did I get myself into here? Trust me.
So, because the staff member you're asking about was already exempt prior to the study, there was no changes to previously assigned people. He only made a changes to what the recommendations were. So I think now he's saying that we have the year. Chief is saying we have the year to go back and look at maybe
some of the other way people are classified and maybe see if there's things that had to be corrected. Is that kind of Yeah, absolutely. And there in the in the agenda packet there's attorney broke down the uh penalties for
knowingly placing somebody in an exempt status when they don't meet the qualifications and we knowingly did that. And I mean they're they're very costly. So they are pretty hefty fines. Yes. And a bunch of back pay and you
know I mean there Yeah, there's just a lot. And again, I could be completely wrong, but at least we have a year to make sure that we're going to get it right. You know, I agree with the mayor. We definitely
need a qualified HR. Definitely because we're Do you have something? Well, we're we're not discussing that whether we need a HR right now, right? That's going to agree. I agree with Well, I know. I'm just saying that's going to be in a future workshop.
Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's a that's a future. I don't want to get start getting in a debate about that. Okay. No. Um, no. I I agree that what you did was was proper, but I want to get to the root cause of this. I mean, I know
or I believe with my past experience, if you're setting a role to do a job, you do the job until it's done. And if that took you 60 hours a week, that you knew that going in. So, but just
because of some changes, you don't start clocking out at 40 hours a week. So, if that if that role needs to be an hourly role to to be adjusted by demand, then please take that into consideration
that you have these discussions. I mean, I don't want to I'm not trying to take from anyone, but I'm not trying to, you know, if if it's salary set based on working overtime, you don't get to go back go home at 4:00 or 4:30.
You get the job done and that's when you go home. Exactly. So, okay. Okay. Next on the agenda is city purchasing. All right. This is regarding um purchasing of a of land for the public
works building for the public works fire training facility. Um any other aspect of it that you know the city could use but um I know comm or vice mayor Kerr has brought up a couple properties. I know Mayor Brooks has brought up a
couple properties. So having a a city purchasing property kind of blank agenda item will allow the board to just have a discussion on what properties they've looked at, what they think, and we'll hand it over to the DAC
first. I'll start. Okay. Um it goes back to the public works building. We need a public works building. Um, I was privy to go over to the blue barn
and and see that and um talk with um director uh web for a bit uh during the week to kind of get her feeling on what she needs. Um we've had the discussion and the board had approved to do
engineering at the marina. It's not a surprise that I want the marine. I I see much bigger visions for the marina than to have a public works building there. I'm passionate about that, but I'm only one
vote. Um, so I don't have the email. I could look it up in front of me that I sent to uh the chief, but I kind of listed some different properties. If there's other properties out there, wonderful. Uh the church property was
overbudget. I I I concur. It's was based on um um best value uh highest and best value. I liked that property a lot because of the location even though there was push
back that it's too close to the beach. That's why I liked it. It was very close to city hall and very close to the beach. Um is it a little small? Yeah. But, um, Director Webford herself said she was very excited about that property
and could make it work. Um, but for now it's it's off the table. Um, I looked at uh well, one of the things I I asked the chief, I don't know if he's had any conversations with anyone that would
know, but the um um what's the property next to the um elementary school? STEM center. STEM center. Yeah. Okay. And yeah, you probably have the email in front of you. No, I just I
personally I think that's the that's a a great location. It's already elevated. We would have to do an elevated. So I am partial to it. The STEM center. It's with that elevated concrete property. You never see any cars in there. Is there nothing there?
It's STC, but I feel like they've given up on that right now. Conversations with the um previous with the with Robin He h he has contacts there and
it was so quick think yeah he was going to get me a meeting with the college um to discuss whether they're even would consider selling that property. But as
far as an emergency operation center, if we ever go through what we just went through, it's it's perfect. As far as um public works, it was it's plenty of property. It is it is lower, but the whole the whole property is elevated.
So, if a hurricane were predicted, they would have to move equipment offsite, but that's already accounted for. They have a place in Seol to do that. I'd love to get a conversation. I I say me, I was just reaching out in
independently, right? um but for the city to to uh have a conversation regarding that. Um there are some properties plural that are next door to each other
behind the uh fish or the fish store the the um across the street from the elementary school behind the what's it the I know the former order. There you go. Navajo drive. Um, I did take an opportunity to go look at that
property. It's uh um it's great if you need um office space, but I don't you'd still have to build something there for the um repair of the
uh waste trucks. It's possible, but director Webford believes it's too small. I don't think she's looked at that. Um, so but the property next to that again, it's has some small homes on it. It would have to
be and you have probably a zoning set's probably not a good option, but I'm just telling you everything that's in my head. Um, I know that we all were able to go look at the property that um,
uh, John Hendricks, former mayor John Hendricks, uh, had talked to us about. That checks a lot of boxes, but personally, I think it might be a little too far out away from the city. It's I think it was, what did I say in the email? Two and a half miles, mile and a
half from the city limits. Sorry. Um the one on Navajo by Fish looking at I'm not sure it's going to be zoned for public work. It could be zoned for an office. It's zoned for general now. General I don't remember. He told me the second part of that didn't stick in my head.
Um, I could have a conversation with them, but it's not it's not it's it's about a 7,000 foot air conditioned space with another,000 square foot garage on it where they could put a lot of their trailered
equipment, but something bigger for larger trucks would have to be added. Um, it's a I mean, it could it could work. It could definitely work. I looked at it just depending on the zoning is just it has potential.
It has I'm happy to um take you over, you know, if that's something that's would be considered. Um, I I don't know if um that would help as far as um Marcy's staff, if we needed
overflow staff to be able to do work there because I know, you know, she's a bit constrained with her staff. Again, it's it's out of the city limits, but not far. Um, there's there's a lot of possibilities for that. You know, my
priorities would be the STEM center and then probably this. As far as what I know, I I think we could make it work, but um right now it's not on the market yet, but it will be within next week or so, week or two. Um they made us an an
offer I or made it, you know, given us a number. I won't pay it say it publicly right now. um that could fit in the budget. We we would see. But if there's any interest um I don't know
of any other properties. I heard rumor there was another property. I do. I know of one. And I I'm anxious to hear. So you want to kind of tandem on this? Sure. Um, we have the opportunity, we have a signed contract, um, which is
what the city manager is allowed to do, is to go out and begin a negotiation on a property contingent on the commission approving it. And he has negotiated a contract. We have received back. They've lined it. There's still some looking at it to do
for the Holton property. And that, you know what I'm talking about, right? um for $18 million. It appraised at well above $18 million. We have two appraisals already on it. The contract is contingent on us voting
to purchase it at our meeting next week. The reason that they are I mean I I won't give you all the details of the contract but the the the part of why that timeline is so short um we have been in talks with them for quite some
time and the city has been extremely slow to respond to them but um we were able to negotiate the they are giving the lower price for a fast and quick
close to be done. Um, I am 100,000% in favor of purchasing it when $18 million is a lot of money. Andrew can speak to the financial side of that, but
the conversation within the halls of the city have been that a public works building could be built on the south side of that piece of land where you wouldn't see anything and we could green space the property. Um, there's lots of things to me. I don't I don't really
have a care what we do, but when we sit here and talk about changing the landscape of the community when you drive in, this is the only opportunity we're ever going to have to purchase it. And I went out and spent some time speaking with other communities on
buying property so that you can own the look that property currently. if if we don't buy it, somebody else is going to and they're going to build hotels, condos, restaurants. Um we could build the boat slips that are already approved for it, which would be revenue
generating. We could have a restaurant put there if we wanted to. We could have parks where would allow us dollars for grants to help fund it. There's so many things that we could do. We could plant grass and leave it green and it
would just be a beautiful piece of land instead of an ugly junked up piece of land that's got ugly um dirt. And I think I I feel like it is a um purchase that the community could rally behind
because of what it will save us long term. So, just to just to be clear, this is the the the plot of land as you're coming into the island on the left. On the left. Yep. Where they put all the boats. I could not agree more. Yep.
That's what I was hoping to hear. Yes. Now, I mean, we I'd have had discussions with Robin before and he mentioned that. That's wonderful. That's great. Let's get a financial statement. There's a lot of discussions to have
regardless. I'm I'm going to I'm going to I agree 100%. But, you know, I believe we could make it um revenue generating. Um how how that would all look, that's a whole different discussion. Yeah.
I don't know what restrictions we have being a city versus just a business. Um but um yeah, no, it's great news. Comments? I couldn't agree more. I think it's a great investment for the city long term.
So, we still have a lot of time to talk about it and discuss it, but that's agree. I mean, we really don't have a lot of time to talk about it. We have to vote. We have to vote on it
next week and then it's a 15-day close is the contract. So, they have a lot of data that they have um that they have that will convey with the property test that they've already done studies and things like that, but um I mean
I I just I'm in favor of it. It's probably not going to be possible to close in 15 days. Okay? I'm just telling you that it's probably not even possible uh because of the title search has to be done. the title commitment has
to be prepared. Um we the contract currently provides for environmental studies to be done u due diligence relative to the submerged land leases. We don't even know we haven't we don't have copies of the
leases. We don't know when they expire. You know what other obligations are on the property. We don't know what incumbrances are on the property at this point. I just am telling you I don't think it's possible
to do it within 15 days. But something that you know once I know a little bit more information about the property and the things that they're saying that they'll provide then we'll get it with the real estate the real estate attorney handling it and we'll
know a little bit more. But I understand that there was a counter proposal today. I've not read it yet. It came in late today. Yeah. Yeah. Well, if we have a consensus here though to move forward so that we could vote
next week on whatever that final contract is, we could do that. Absolutely. I mean, it's it's just like any other workshop meeting. We're we're getting some type of direction from you as to when we're going to put it on a future agenda. Yeah. Yep.
Anything else? Anything else? So on the two things I would want to say to you on the stem property is that an evac that's an evacuation a right it is it is it's just elevated.
Yeah. So here here is the only challenge to purchasing property. I'm not talking about that one in particular, but any property off is that if we if we move uh if we move our public works department off the island,
every piece of equipment that they use every day, they will have to trailer and drive to the city. And they use that backhoe and the street sweeper and all of that daily. So, we would have to incur the cost of
buying a trailer, possibly even a truck to be able to pull that equipment, drive it from wherever we're housing it off the island over to the city to do its work, and then driving it back. Just something to think about when we talk
about off island property. And um just as a reminder, public works didn't lose any equipment during the hurricane. They evacuated everything with the exception of the
street sweeper and the K Cabota. And the street sweeper wasn't operational, which is why it didn't get taken off of the island. just for a reference of if when we look at other properties and I thought that was in I mean I would not have thought
about having to bring that equipment every day over to the city. So now I'm more mindful of how often I see them out on the beach with it or out using different things, right? I'm like, "Oh, well they would that's like every day." Well, that's why I like the church property so much. But yeah,
I don't I don't think Yeah, but I don't think it's a big lift to have a trailer. I mean, we have vehicles to be able to pull the trailers. Um, but regardless, the STEM center would be a great property to have. I mean the Holton property I you know there's if we can if
we can swing that one then we can as far as I'm concerned go ahead and put public works building where it was proposed in the beginning and and just develop the Holton property as the new marina
or I mean the option the options are endless we could sit here for hours and talk about it different ideas. Okay, next on the agenda is community development noise ordinance in Senate Bill 180 compliance.
Um, so Hannah from Kimley Horn has has has been here for a bit. I Tom, am I am I able to request to move an item or do we have to or is it locked in at this point?
Go ahead. That's a question for the mayor. Mayor, you want to take uh item 6B out of out of order so that we can allow the Kimley Horn representative to leave. I'm not opposed to that. Thank you.
Okay, there we go. Thank you, Hannah. Sorry, I knew she looked familiar. I was like, I probably should have done that sooner. So um okay so we've obviously we've discussed impact fees uh
for quite some time and we've discussed about the spaces and how we apply it for instance when somebody's converting their garage to living space should we really be applying impact fees to that kind of stuff. We also recently learned um through meetings with uh Ford Penllis
that we have a mobility charge in our impact fees and they have of course the mobility in theirs and so there may be concern over charging twice. So, there's a few things we wanted to address with looking back into our our impact fees,
how how we're assessed them, how we calculate them, and then the staff's ability to make changes such that we don't have to always go back to Kimley Horn and do um a full reassessment and stuff like that. So, I have Hannah here
to talk a little bit more about the proposal that they've given us. It's a draft proposal to help us work through some of those questions that we've had. We don't believe depending on where their study would take us that would drive
whether or not this has any impact on SB 180 and what that looks like, but it would all be dependent on what their their study shows. So, if I've missed anything, please correct me. Other than that, I'll turn it over to Hannah to talk a little bit more about what this proposal will do for the city.
Yeah, thanks Marcy. I think you captured most of it. So, I'll just kind of give a brief summary. I think you'll see in the proposal, we do have an hourly task that is looking at specifically the mobility fee and then the county how that
interacts with the county's multimodal fee. Um, based on our conversations with the city staff, um, it is kind of our understanding is that you pro you don't need both. And what we'll probably end up recommending is you go with the county's fee. And to save you all time,
money, we just have an hourly task in there to just give our professional understanding and opinion of what we would recommend you all to do. So that fee is hourly because we don't anticipate it taking that long. Um and then we have a lump sum fee for
specifically looking at the impact um fee study updates to the parks and recreation impact fee. So that's where the bulk of our work will go. And like Marcy said is our plan is to set set this up in a way so that city staff can
continue to update it in the future without having to hire outside help. Um based on what we know right now, it's not set up that way. So that's part of this project and then of course community engagement to um engage you
all um stakeholders in the community to also educate and get feedback from them as well. So that's kind of a summary of what the project will entail and can definitely go a little bit more in depth um if you have any more questions. And
um at Kimley Horn I am more the um local representation here. You know, we have our local office and our local staff will be working on this, but we do have a impact fee expert. She is in our Tallahassee office. Her name is Hadley Peterson. She will be our expert
guidance in this um directing our local staff. So, we can provide even more in-depth information um if you have more questions. questions. I've been Oops. I've been in I've been involved in this
from the beginning. When I say from the beginning when the planning commission was looking at impact fees and not the board the commission but just to I asked many times whether this could be just focused on commercial development
and I was told no. Um that it had to be everyone or no one. Later we were told that well we could have planned it a different way and it could
not have had residential impact. Um basically in a nutshell my belief it's heads and beds. If I'm going to build a hotel that's a 100 room hotel that's an impact.
If I'm gonna add a bedroom to my home, I'm gonna build a bigger home and make it a a threebedroom instead of a twobedroom. Okay, I'll go for that. That could be an impact. But just because I'm adding square footage on, you know, I'm have to
rebuild my home because the hurricane took it out. And to elevate it, I'm going to bring my laundry in and I'm going to have a nice pantry and my my instead of a um small small kitchen. I'm going to have a nice kitchen with an island in the middle of it and so the
footprint grows. That in my opinion is not an impact to the community. It's not an impact to to anybody and I shouldn't be charged for that or anyone shouldn't be charged for that. We're getting ready to if if we way
understand this is a $55,000 to advise us and and to change the impact fee ordinance what we currently have what I'm addressing here residential being a part or not a part or having it
instead of based on square footage but based on I'll just say beds um just seems a better more fair
way to do this and I believe um is what the community wanted many many years ago when they started complaining that um develop development was coming in and we're we're we're putting in more condos and you know who's going to pay for that
for the infrastructure for that and and and the residents are are being imposed by these burdens by expansion into our community. So, the community is built out. It's just how
many beds can you put on a square, you know, an acre of property? That's what we're discussing and that's that's the impact in my opinion. Um, so I don't know if you are, you know,
expertise in that or if that's been considered in any of this because it's at the end of the day that's that's my passion. Yeah. And I can't speak specifically to the balance of, you know, residential versus commercial or what type of um,
you know, legal impacts that might have, but the study would be looking at what those calculations would be and engaging with you all, the city staff to ensure we're developing something that is supported by you all, supported by the community, and is reflective of, you
know, what's needed today and in what is supported. So that's where the engagement component comes in and will help us as we determine a new calculation. So, just so I get my mind around this,
um, when we originally did this, I believe, and I don't know if your recollection, we got a grant and it was over $100,000 or was it roughly $100,000 to do the initial study, which was very I think the scope is a lot more than
what you're looking at since we already have an impact fee and we went through how many weeks just reviewing ordinances and changing existing ordinances in their um
in the in the city so that we could eventually get to this point. It was months many many months of meetings in that regard. Um but I I I'd like to know more about that
before I would want to com make a vote on committing this. Yeah, I can certainly get you more detailed information about that balance and we can provide you that um before yeah what options that we would have. I mean if we could Okay, thank you. Great.
Uh so you said that if we did this it would be written in such a way that staff could adjust it and we would not have to go back out to pay another firm to do this. Can you elaborate on that a little bit? What would make that different? Yeah. So, the way the from my
understanding of the impact fees and the way they're calculated, the parks and recreation impact fee calculations are more relatively straightforward. So, we can set up a way where the city just has to input new data when you ever you choose to update it and it should
recalculate those for you. Um, and that's where the benefit of going with the county's multimodal transportation fee is nicer because the transportation fees are a lot more complicated to calculate, which is why we're recommending um right now um based on
our initial conversations is that the city would not want to do that because that is way more time consuming. So setting up the parks and wreck um in a way that they can update in the future will be much more beneficial.
Um, Marcy, can we pay for this out of impact fees that we've already collected? We asked that question. What was I know that Jenny had broached. Tom said no. Uh, we emailed Tom about it and Tom being Mr. Tras said no.
Uh, excuse me. Sorry. Yeah. So, the answer No, I wasn't scolding you. I wasn't doing that because you called him Tom. I was There's two Toms. There's another one in the room back there. He was talking about me. The answer is no. No, no, you can't. Well, that does that doesn't seem quite fair.
Uh, I don't control that. So, can So, can we pay for it out of the building fund or does it have to come out of the general fund? I'm not sure that it qualifies under the building fund either. I'm just asking. I'm thinking probably not, but
come out of the general fund. Yep. Okay. The easy way to settle it is to get a grant, right? heard something about grand. So I think I think that the I think that we got where we are
because of wanting to separate residential from commercial. We disagree on that. But that's okay. We're allowed to um like each other. Yeah. Somewhat. Yeah. Kind sometimes. So, um, will this
study and and it's separating it because like Vice Mayor Kerr said, when we were on the planning commission, we were told we couldn't not do commercial. We were told if we were doing impact fees, it had to I mean that we couldn't not do residential. That if we were doing impact fees, we had to do both in stop.
That was what we were told. So, I'm curious if we're going to spend the the 50 because the first 5,000 we need to spend because we need to get right with the county. Correct. So, that we need to do regardless. But if we're going to spend the additional
$50,000, can we have some assurance or maybe you can't and that's okay too. But I think this some assurance that there would be the option to separate them or do you've got have you got to dig into it to understand whether or not
that can be separated? I obviously have to dig into it. I think one of the things and Hannah can correct me but some if you look at how the county assesses their impact fees. Ours is done a bit differently. We do it per square foot.
Y whereas the county and other municipalities will often say okay if you're between 1,500 and 2200 and so you end up in this block which inherently lowers what you pay. So I think I'm I I envision this study will take us down
that path that inherently doesn't doesn't calculate it the way our code does is what I would foresee happening. And so I think it would inherently be part of their study at for us to become more mainline and mainstream with how we do our calculations would inherently have have some sort of that impact. Now
up down that's all part of the backend study with all the other parts and pieces. So, you know, I don't want to speak to that, but I think by design it would lump it differently than we are than we're doing now. So, do you know whether or not there's a
a grant that would fund this? Um, in my experience, I haven't heard of any specific grants funding impact fees. It could be lumped into a larger project. Um, I'd have to do some more digging, but
not that any come to mind right away. So then it's really just the decision of whether or not we want to spend $55,000. And if there was a way to loop it into some other work that we're doing in ordinances or or what have you, then even though we had already paid for it,
we could still include it in that correct. So wouldn't that work? I mean, yes, we could work we're working with him Kimley Horn obviously on the master plan and some other initiatives. So if there's an opportunity there, we could definitely especially I think we can easil we could separate out probably the
five grand for the mobility work and then figure out maybe the next step and do we tie that into something else to your point. I'd have to really maybe after tonight's discussion Hannah have a better feel of the direction what we're kind of thinking and be able to talk to
talk about some opportunities with grants or um maybe I know that we did have a phone call with Haley right from Tallahassee. Yep. badly. So, um yeah, so we can So, it's not just parks and wreck. What other um still have to
All right, the mobility be taken care of. Wouldn't it like four sections? There's three buckets that the parks and wreck and then public safety. The way that one is um we don't anticipate having to make
changes to it. And then what? There was just a three or was it another one? I believe there's three. Just the three. Give me one second here. You got me doubting my what I'm remembering now.
Okay. Well, while you're looking for that, I mean, that was one of the wish listes wish lists for Representative Cheney was to be able to fund our public safety through bed tax. But that's a whole another discussion.
But it's and I believe that already is being um collected today. So that's existing in your ordinance as is the public safety. Um yeah, as far as impact fees. Yes. Yeah. Um saying we couldn't double dip if we can
get the get the state to make it basically. Yeah. The state should let us have our own bed tax. That's what I'm saying. They should for public safety if nothing else. Okay. So sorry, I have all these papers. Um, so we have culture and recreation, mobility, public safety, and then you
have the line item that totals all that. So that's probably why you're thinking the four. The parks and wreck wasn't it line item on? It's culture and recreation, mobility, and public safety. So it beure and recreation. It would be parks and wreck and public safety. Basically those two line items,
right? And public safety, as she said, probably foresee not not needing to be changing. Mobility will fall to the county. So, it'll be the culture and recreation aspect of this. Well, public safety would change all the time as far as our costs.
The the calculation um the numbers will change, but the way it's being calculated from our initial review of way the way it's being calculated now is not anticipated change. Okay. Whereas the the parks and culture we
anticipate changing to a more format. One of the big stumbling blocks in my head was when we initially set up the impact fees, we were told we'd had to come back periodically and we would have to determine what periodically meant every 5 years, every
10 years to update the cost associated with the to cover the cost from the impact fees. Correct. Um, so you're saying you have an algorithm or a spreadsheet or some way we could self-calculate. Correct. It it really is just determining a level of service. And so
the city staff should be able to pull pretty readily available data to input into a spreadsheet or whatever form this ends up being that they could update in the future. And we do have to use data within the last four years. Um, so I
know y'all did a study in 2021, so we will be needing to pull more recent data and and would that is that acceptable to the state? Yes, that is per state statute. Okay. Because that was that was I think that's what we were being Yeah,
I'll use the word sold that they needed to do it, right? Okay. Thank you. Thanks, Al. Yeah. Thanks. So, do we have a consensus that we should vote at our meeting for the $5,000 um mobility for the county because we
need to become compliant? Yes. So, we should at least vote on that so that that can be done. And then the other if you could get if we could just figure out whether or not there's any opportunity to roll it in with something that would make it grant fund available.
Okay. I can definitely get I'll get with you tomorrow follow up or this week and discuss discuss some of the options that we may have with this. Yeah, that sounds good. And we can separate out the the mobility task. Um so that way it's easier for you to approve um in a couple weeks.
Excellent. Thank you. Thank Yeah. Thank you. Thank you so much for staying around. Yeah. Thanks for staying so late. Stay in. Should have ra raised your hand back there. I'm here. Next on the agenda is noise ordinance
and Senate Bill 180 compliance at At the request of the board of commissioners. City staff researched recent noise ordinances and how adjacent communities have been addressing noise related issues. Attached to this memo are two articles related to local governments and challenges with regulating noise. St. Pete Beach had a
discussion during a recent city commission meeting about noise complaints and potentially amending their noise ordinances, but they decided to focus on enforcement of their existing noise rules and to track the results before proposing to amend their noise ordinance. Hillsboro County recently discussed regulating pickle
ball courts and restricting how close they can be to residential properties. Senate Bill 180 would prohibit Hillsboro County from putting a hold onto the approval of new pickle ball courts or restricting pickle ball courts from being near residential properties. County staff was directed to research about ongoing pickle ball court noise
related lawsuits. Senate Bill 180 restricts cities and counties from being able to amend regulations related to development if the proposed land development regulation amendment or comprehensive plan amendment are considered more restrictive or burdensome. If a city wanted to reduce their maximum temporary lodging density bonus in their comprehensive plan,
Senate Bill 180 would pro prohibit them. Adopting a land development regulation amendment to create design standards and guidelines for commercial and mixeduse developments would also be prohibited by Senate Bill 180. Until Senate Bill 180 is amended, amending our land development regulations and conference of plan will be difficult, including for
adopting recommendations from the Madar Beach master plan. Um, relate to the noise potentially if you went with the direction with more increased enforcement, it could require additional staff and equipment. Under
our re uh recommendations, uh city staff has proposed two recommendations. Code enforcement, the Penelis County Sheriff's Office and the city manager's office should coordinate and provide regular updates about noise code enforcement to the board of commissioners. These updates should
include specific examples and complaints that we received and the action taken to respond, including any enforcement actions. And then number two was coordinate through the barrier island governmental council big sea to advocate for Senate Bill 182 be amended to remove the restrictions on local governments
related to amending their land development regulations and conference of plans. Attached is uh the St. Pete Beach noise ordinance article, the Hillsbor County Pickleball court article, our our current noise ordinance, St. Pete Beach's noise
ordinance. um uh Thousand Friends of Florida um it's a nonprofit did a did a nice summary of the the issues with Senate Bill 180 and its impact on on communities right being able to regulate development and uh the
adopted version of Senate Bill 180. So with with the Senate Bill 180 and obviously touching on our noise, it's it's been a topic in the city for quite some time. It goes through its cycles where it gets brought up. We just kind of wanted to acknowledge that SB80 first
of all is kind of is limiting city's abilities to make more strict ordinances at this point in time. But what we do feel like with our noise ordinance is reviewing our enforcement and how we can support the enforcement. I spoke with
with Corey today and he was showing me how the reports come through and they do get a nice list of reports for the noise complaints. What I would propose is we start tracking those and I can probably get with him and see if I can go back a month or two and go ahead and get
the complaints, where they're coming from, what action was taken, what time are they coming in from, are we having, you know, music after 11, and are we leveraging the fines that we're able to levy pretty regularly to start kind of in more coming up with more enforcable
or more enforcement of what we already have? So that would be my first goal is to really look at some data and see what's driving it because Cory will tell you during the day they're not dealing with many noise complaints. It's in it's in the evening. So I think that would be my first approach is to really assess
that and see if there's some changes we can make there and maybe having better messaging to the community to Penelis County Sheriff's Office who are doing the enforcement on what we would like to see from those interactions. As of now, I don't foresee a path that
we can do anything that's more stringent in our code. Um, as of right now, thanks, uh, Marcy. So, is there any discussion of whether these complaints are coming from residences or commercial
properties? It was, it's seemed to be a little bit of a mix. Corey described sometimes getting called to like the hotels or the balconies of the condos where people are making noise. um some of the local venues um are making noise and so he has said he's had success coming up to the
owners and saying hey we got a complaint you need to lower it or even said he'll go up to the band who or the music and say you DJ you need to lower that we're getting complaints and I didn't feel like do they have clear guidance about what is allowed and and uh I think most of
the commercial businesses follow the rule after a certain amount of time after certain hours correct Right. It's before that that it's I in in my opinion I don't think you should have to hear uh
a business's music from four blocks away regardless if it's uh and that's the question is there any clarity and guidance for enforcement about what is and what isn't allowed. So the code has the 50 the 50 foot reference which Corey
said he he he will measure and so my understanding is if he's if he measures his 50 feet and he hears the noise no matter what time it is if it's in violation he will approach them and say okay you need to lower it you're exceeding that Cy please feel free to correct me if I'm misstating any of our
conversation from earlier. So that's the the guidance that he has and and what they use, but the the decibel readings and all that stuff is kind of become hard. I get that. I get that. To me, the 50 ft was very clear, right? Exactly. Take a tape measure or big laser. So, but yeah.
Uh and and if it's if if you can hear it farther than 50 feet, they got to turn it down. Simple as that. Yep. And and so I would think what I think the confusion was sorry I'm sorry to mean is that there were hours listed but it only tells the hours that it's uh not allowed. It doesn't say hey
you still can't do more than 50 ft during these hours. That's what's not clear is there is there no way to just provide clarity in our current or without changing anything. Correct. Just some clarity during these hours.
You still can't go 50 ft beyond 50 ft. We could definitely do I could definitely look sit down with Andrew and we could look at just maybe reversing how it is worded because you're right, it's it's worded. Interestingly, we can also do an effort to create a handout for the sheriffs and code enforcements
to hand out to the local venues to better clarify that. It was never my intention to change our or the content, okay, of our ordinance. My intention when I brought this to the board was to clarify what was there. I think we have the right ordinance. I
just think it's unclear. And if I I like both of those ideas just maybe instead of showing the hours not and show the hours that you can but that you still can't do this. Exactly. And of course uh a a pamphlet to our
businesses. We want them to be successful, but we also want to respect, you know, everyone's uh quality of life and help help this will help our law enforcement to enforce it. And and that was one of the frustrations, too, is they definitely would like to have much clearer rules
that they can enforce and they're not just out there spinning their wheels. I'm I don't even know that we need to refer to other cities. We have, I think, a good uh sound ordinance. It's just not clear. We can definitely um I'll sit down with Andrew and we can look through the text
change and see what's possible there. But in the meantime, we can definitely get the handouts for clarification. Thank you. Comments, commissioners. You know this might be funny but I was just thinking some people are hard hearing and you know beyond 50 feet even
20 feet you may not hear or you know or some people are have more sensitive ears you know and 200 feet they can hear the same noise. though, but 50 ft is 50 ft. That's not subjective. But some people can't hear.
That is subjective. And that was one of the common themes in noise ordinances is it says a reasonable person with reasonable hearing with reasonable, you know, and so it it lends to that that area that you're talking about.
So, I'm curious how many I I once you get the information, I'll be curious to know how many actual complaints we get. Um I mean, I live at the beach. When I moved to the beach, I knew there was going to be music.
I sit on my balcony and I can hear the music from the Elks Lodge because I live on the water. It carries and that's way farther than 50 feet. But I would I would never complain about that because it's I don't know. I live
at the beach and so I with all due respect no due respect people who purchase property for residential have a have a right to a reasonable amount of of of peace and and I understand that we want to support our
businesses, but I think a reasonable expectation and and if we just enforce what we've got, I think I'd be pleased. I'd be thrilled. So, I'd be interested to know the numbers because 50 feet is not very far. I mean, 50 ft is
just right over there. It's not It's not very far at all. It is all. So, my curious would be how many actual noise ordinance calls do we get? And where are they at? Are they in um commercial areas
where one would expect that you're going to hear music because you live in a commercial area with with um restaurants that have music and what have you or you know that's all well there's a difference from living on
Pelican Lane and living on 135th Street. That's why I said that's why that's a neighborhood where they come from and West Events who have we've worked with and they've made a lot of improvements. Uh they built their property and they legitimately to do
what they want in the middle of a of a residential neighborhood. So compromises, but there's been a bar right at that location for years and it's never been a problem. Never been a problem. Yeah, it's but I mean they've always had a bar there well before West. I understand. I understand. I don't disagree with you Dave
Commissioner. I'm just saying I'd like to understand the data because sometimes people complain about something but then when you go look at the data there was one issue in a year right it's not a
problem it was once in a year so and if it is then we know where to focus at or what issue is regardless I think that we can clarify our our current ordinance so that is understood and enforceable I'd like to see that study also you
know, I mean, you might have two or three residents in a in a certain location that might call numerous times, you know, and that way we'll be able to break down exactly what time they're
calling, who's calling, you know, and and give us more of an idea, you know. That's a great idea. Agreed. Yeah, I was excited when he showed me that he kind of already had it when I started talking to him. say yes, we'll just pull it and um review it. Great. If we don't do if we don't make
no changes, do we have to worry about Senate Bill 180? Um we we do. Um it impacts a large. So in November, we're g we're bringing a resolution to adopt the master plan
within concept and and within the mass master master plan, there's proposed ch changes to our land development regulations and and potentially comp plan amendments and and the problem is it the way Senate Bill 180 is currently,
a lot of those things we can't do. like we just can't do it because if it's more burdensome and restrictive which they didn't define like they some we just can't do it and look at this way other cities and counties have been having their comp
plan amendments rejected by the state the state doesn't want to I I actually emailed Florida Commerce and they didn't want to give us any guidance so um it it's not it's not a good situation related to that so so we either have to change our comprehensive plan
or to comply with what or or or get on board with the other jurisdictions to try to have it Senate Bill 180 amended. I I mean we don't am I understanding correctly? We don't need to like what I'm saying
like so for example in Mader Beach Town Center the way that special area plan was adopted has the maximum amount temporary lodging density of 125 units per acre. That's which is very high. And if we wanted to reduce that to bring it
more in line with what we adopted like in John's pass, we can't do that currently unless the bills amended. Yeah. So our code as it sits is fine. But if we were to do anything that made it more restrictive or gave the appearance of
being more burdensome in any way to development and construction, that is what Senate Bill 180 is trying to prohibit is more restrictive rules than what we already have. I'm I'm hearing two different two different things. I asked if we don't make any changes. We
don't have any issue. Correct. That is correct. If we do Yes. But from feedback from from the the the board, from our plan commission, and from residents, they they want to regulate development, and we would like to write ordinances to implement that,
but we can't. And that that's that's the issue. Okay. For my little mind, I I'm going to have to have more information to understand exactly. You're talking specifically about the noise ordinance. I'm No, I'm talking about the Senate bill in total.
Can't change anything that makes it stricter. Anything? Okay. Is that fair? Yes. Can't change anything. If you change anything and make it stricter, you can't do that. That's what that bill did when they passed it. If you wanted to change
the ordinance, change the the ordinance and say you can build a 40s story building and it's okay and it used to be 60. No, no, no. It used to be 10. You can Right. You can go You can do that. I'm saying it backwards. You can allow more. Say it backwards. You can allow more,
but you can't you can't do less. Right. You can't do anything less. You can do more. That's what I'm saying. So everything we have on the books now is fine. Yep. Can't change it. But you just can't say no, we don't want a we we don't want to reduce we can't reduce the density,
right? You can increase it, but you can't reduce it. Yeah. It just didn't come with a lot of guidance, too, is the issue. So, a lot of municipalities are requesting clarification on it. I'm sure Tom's dealing with it too in other locations. So,
and we don't change as far as the noise is concerned, we don't change anything there, we're fine. Correct. Right. Okay, thank you everybody. Good. Next on the agenda is finance amendments to a clarion consult and software
agreements. Andrew, sure. So uh two amendments to uh the existing agreements with Clarion. So we have the consultant agreement for a clarion to provide finance director services to the
city. uh I have been performing in that function since summer of 2020. So going on a little we'll pass my 5-year anniversary now. Each year that has been a one-year agreement and then has come to the uh to the board uh to approve the
next year. So that's what that particular agreement is. Um and the agenda memo states kind of the history and the um the amount per month for my services. The second agreement, the amendment is just more to protect the
city. Relating to the software in our uh ERP software agreements for our our clients today, we include caps on the any annual uh fee increases that we that um Aquarian would charge for the
annual subscription. um since that was not in your contract to pro to protect the city uh that this amendment includes a 5% cap uh for these automatic one-year renewals. So in the event that there's new ownership uh with a clarion there
couldn't be a let's double the fees to to the city. So this protects you for the life of the agreement as long as the city is using the software software there would be a not to exceed on on any annual increases. Um so we um ultimately
would like to put this on the October 1 uh regular meeting agenda just to uh approve the amendment to extend um the finance consultant services performed by Aclarian which will still be me uh for
fiscal year 2026. and then the um amendment to the uh software agreement just to establish that limit on any fee increases for the life of the software as long as the city uses it. Take any questions if you have them.
Commissioners, no. I I think it's uh November the 1st to extend a clarion, right? So technically it' be October 1st. So you'll vote on October. October 1st. Yep. And it'll run October
1st through September 30th of of 2026. Yes. Okay. Definitely comments. No comments. Comments. I'm in support of expect accepting this proposal. Vice Mayor.
Not quite sure. So, we're we're paying 38,000 plus So, we're paying $140,000 or will be a year for the combination of the
software and consulting. Is that correct? Correct. And I remember back in the day talking about the software and that the cost of that versus other
types of other software com competition and I believe that was in in line or we wouldn't have agreed to it. Um, I don't know. It's we're starting to get to a point where I don't know if having a
direct employee or not would make sense. So, um, I'm still thinking about it, but I apprec I appreciate everything you do. No problem. And and also know in our in
the consultant agreement for one, these are not tied. So they're mutually exclusive. So yes, it's the same company. Um but you can choose to proceed with the ERP software. And if there's ever a time that you would like to discontinue my
ser the clearing services for finance consultant, you can do so. I believe there's a 30-day notice period or you can terminate the agreement for the uh consultant services. Now, we have do we have two people that assist you here on
staff? Is that correct? The finance department. Yeah. Consists of three individuals. Does that include you or not? I'm the I'm the fourth. Okay. What do we spend total on the fi finance department plus your services? Do you
have any idea? So for fiscal year 2025, that was the the uh $98,400 for my services. the uh finance department I can say let's see
to total personnel cost let me pull that up total personnel cost to date are423 $3,782. And that does not include you. That does not include me. So 423, is that what you said?
400. Yeah. 424,000. Uh might be processing one more payroll. So that could increase. Um that also includes, you know, benefits, FRS of almost 40,000, health insurance almost
$54,000. taxes 21,000 and then sal uh salaries and wages 309,000. That's actual fiscal year 2025. So the finance department including your services and software
is costing us upward of 560 570,000 to cover the finances of the city is that so does 98,000 for the declarance services 423 so it's
about 500 20ish and then the ERP software which is used not only by finance but by all departments okay it's not just accounting software okay so back to 520 530 something some let's
call 525 without the software somewhere in that range to do the finances for the city I don't know if that's good or Um, I I know the market pretty well. If you wanted to hire a full-time finance
director, usually that cost would be somewhere between Yeah, it says here 140 to 180 somewhere in that range according to the memo. Yes. Okay. Just trying to balance it all out
in my head. So, I mean, there's there's clear cost savings, so you just have to weigh the the value of the cost savings versus not. I mean, I'm just, you know, I don't know what the city staff looks like. There's
several pe you say three people helping you. Three full time. Three. Three full time. If an actual um finance director would get his hands dirty and be one of those three
basically which I don't know just thinking out loud. We can set up individual interviews if you'd like to interview them individually to get their perspective.
I think we're going to be voting on this next week. It's okay. But thanks. which of course I mean again yes you can vote on it or approve it and then if you all determine at any point next year that you like to discontinue you have that you have that out don't feel you're
obligated for for the entire year I understand wouldn't be doing my due diligence if I wouldn't if I just automatically would just say when we're done I'll go cry in the bathroom real quick okay thank you
I would tell you I spent time with Gigi Karen and Patrick with all three of them when I did my shadowing in the city. Um, and it was very pleasant. If you wanted to spend time with them, they will all give you a list of what
they do and they'll tell you what they think of many people in a kind way. No, I'm only kidding. But they did talk about I talked about what Andrew does for them and that kind of stuff. And it would probably be very um even if you just sat with Patrick
because he's like I think you would get a lot out of it. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Next on the agenda is Marina John's Pass Village and Rock Park Dark Dock discussion.
Hello. Hi, good evening. Still it's not in the morning yet. Um, so the basically what this what this is is to get a consensus from the board on where what we want to do, what types of docs, what kind of uses we have for
these docs in these three different locations. So, I'm going to kind of just go through it. Um, if we go down a little bit, these would be types of uses or uh more restrictions for the docks. These are the Keegan Clair docks. These are up in
Indian Shores or Indian Rocks, I'm sorry, Indian Rocks Beach. And they have things listed on there like uh so you have no overnight parking. They do not charge for these docks. These are just docks to come visit and go to the restaurants and
parts of their town. They're right there. If you're not familiar with where they're at on the water, they're up in the Narrows, but they're right where the road kind of forks right there by Villa Galachi, the restaurant there. So they're right there in that location if you wanted to go visit them. I got a picture of them here down at the the
very last thing. But it just kind of shows, you know, things they do. So no overnight parking dock should not be used for commercial purposes. Trash and garbage shall be placed in proper receptacles. No fueling of any kind, dispensing, pumped, transferred, whatever. No fishing, netting
prohibited, no swimming, uh birds. So you can make these um rules for your docks as is. There is plenty of grant opportunities for docks such as these. Um the problem is and I'll warn you about some grants
especially on with docks is that it allows for complete public recreational use of the docks which also includes charters. So renting charters things like that. So you got to be careful of what you get with some of these grants for docs. So, I just want to make that
plenty clear because there is a lot of grants out, but there is some stipulations with them where you don't have as strict enforcement and regulation. And what I don't want to see the docks turn into is a place where there's just five or six dingies tied up
to them for, you know, boats that are just mored out around the area. Cuz if you go to like Golfport, their docks, they're just all dingies. You can't even get to those docks most of the time. So I just want to make sure everybody's aware of that on the uses of a dock and things that you know I feel strongly
about sorry that uh we should really watch what we do and how we get this discussion going on you know just throwing grants around what we got to see look into these grants make sure that they are for the uses and the purposes of what we want these docs to be. So, that's for you guys to kind of
think about. This is going to be kind of an ongoing conversation. We'll keep it up. If you have questions, you can ask me about this tonight. You can put them in writing. We can get to them and I can answer them at the uh next uh meeting, next workshop.
Um, so if we keep going down and try to do this. All right. Right. Keep going down one more. All right. Right here. Keep just up a little bit. There we go. Um, this dock here. I brought my laser pointer. Check this out. Oh, it don't
show up real well. But this this is the corner right here. Like there's Don's dock. There's Walt's uh fish shack kind of right across the street there. That's on uh the end of East uh East End Lane. And that dock, the total length of that floating dock. Now, these are very
similar to the docks at the marina. They're um aluminum floating docks that are in these drawings. Uh the total length of that dock is 50 feet long by 12t wide. The total length from the seaw wall is 60 feet. So
there's a 10-ft gang way that walks or or 10t from the seaw wall to the dock. There's a 30 foot long gang way that's 4t wide that's ADA compliant to get to that dock. So that is an ADA compliant dock.
Now, I'm not sure what may have changed in some of these. You know, the way Don's dock is now, it's a little bit different, but I can't really Right in there. That's the wooden edge of Don's dock. So, they have other docks that come out this way, but you can see the
edge is real close to the other to the end of where that dock would be. Does that Does that restrict access to Don's dock? It does not. Um, it's within it's almost they they might say it will, but when
you look at it and you see how far and there's kind of an angle on it, too, it it gives them room to get into that area pretty well. Krabby, for that dock down there, um, with your knowledge of grants that would be tied to allowing charter boats and
all of that to go on it, um, how do you think that we would because I think having a dock down at John's Pass would be fantastic. I'm a voter. We would love it, right? It would be fantastic. Oh, everybody wants one down. Everybody wants one for years. But what
in in your mind, how do you how would that work for the public? How do you think it would work if we did it? Because obviously we'd want to do it with grant because it wouldn't be revenue generating, right? Correct. Um I mean like when we go up to the narrows and we go up to the docks that
you shown, those are super easy. Um I've never seen an issue with their issue up there with the boats coming and going. There's all which there are no transient boats up there either, but um I mean you get up there in the summertime and they're all full. There's
no place to Yeah. You've got to wait for somebody to leave to get in. What do you What do you think about putting a dock down at John's Pass and how that would work? So, parking's down there quite a bit. I don't want to speak for parking, but they're down there quite a bit. So, it's something that they could kind of
enforce to make sure there's not something that we don't want to go on down there. Um, like I said, there's several different kinds of grants. This could be a day dock, which they have a day dock grants, which grants the public public access to attractions or local
things like John's Pass Village. So, there's grants for that. So, you you'd have to look at each individual and find out what uses you want for each individual one of these projects and then go after a grant for that one. And then, you know, maybe for back here,
you'd go after a different grant that's much more widespread that pays a lot more money and will cover a larger project. But this is I mean, that's not a huge dock. So, you're looking at, you know, depending on boat sizes, you get two to three, maybe four with smaller
boats in there. So, it's not you're not going to bring a lot of boats down there, but you you know, it's something for the for people to get down to the pass in a different way. So what do what would you if you were just going to guess what a grant would cover?
Most of them are 50 most of them would be 50%. Yeah. Okay. Um now with that dock also that is ADA compliant. So that's got everything it needs to be ADA. The other one which is
next to it there that is off the bell tower. You can see the bell tower up in the picture. That little square there. And then as you come down, that one has two tiers to it. So there's one tier that comes off the boardwalk and then there's another lower tier that comes out from underneath like where the
bell tower is. So that dock as designed right here is not ADA compliant because of how the the steepness of the ramp and things like that. That could totally be changed by just putting a longer gang way in and making sure it's still four foot wide and you don't have such a a
slope that where you know it's too much of a grade for a wheelchair to get up and down. So that dock there is 100t long. The dock length is 100t long by 8t wide. Um and the total length out from the seaw wall of that one is 118 ft off the seaw
wall there. There is quite a bit of traffic right in that area. There's a jet ski rental and another rental right next to it. So, that dock might be a little more difficult actually than the one down at the corner there. Is there any concern with um current
with the floating docks? No, the docks will be fine in the current. There's there is floating docks down there now. um you just have to build them correctly, which Gator Dock builds a dock like what we have at the marina that you know it withtood the storms and everything else. So the key
is getting the pilings high enough. So a lot of people didn't like Bay Pines and a lot of the public ramps didn't have their pilings tall enough and the docks just floated away in the storms. So you got to make sure you put the pilings up high enough. Other than that, they'll ride it out pretty safe. You do have to
though before a storm, we remove the gangways, the walkways onto the dock. Otherwise, you get they'll pinch under the dock and then you'll just rip the seaw wall up. So, we do remove the gang ways to make sure they're safe. So, like I said, this is just kind of to
get a discussion going. You guys can just think about it, kind of look over this. It's a lot to take in because it's so many different little projects. Um, but those are the ones down in the past. uh the ones out back you keep seeing the
that's kind of like the overview there. You can see where it would come out by Dons. You notice though that when this picture was taken that there wasn't those slips out there from Don's dock that wasn't extended yet. So you got to take into mind but they
don't go past that wooden uh walkway. They're actually in from that a little bit about even with the boardwalk uh walkway there. So, if we keep going and there's now this is coming up to right out behind us here, the rec center in city
hall. These docks I feel would be great to have like that Keegan Clair style of dock where you have it's easy to have ADA access. You have several floating docks that boats can pull up in kind of
in that if you keep going down Yeah, keep going. You can see like right out there. This is a good example. This one here, that's where the uh the lower fixed dock that comes off the land there. That's where the city boat and the fire department boat are kept right now. And then the other dock is just
north of that, the little other little dock that's next to it, a little fixed dock. But those are all floating docks. They're long. There's quite a bit of width between them. I think some are 28,
some are 32 foot. Um, it would just depend on the size boat you can put in there. Um, you could really fit anything up in the in those docks. There's quite a bit of water back here. Um, it'd be out away from the seaw wall a little bit. We have the submerged landline. You
can see it there. And I think those Keegan Clair style docks would be perfect for there. where you have a place where during King of the Beach and all these other events and things like that, even softball tournaments and you know other concerts and things like that and even if
somebody wants to bring their kids by boat to a softball game or anything like that, baseball, you have another access, another place for people to go and park and enjoy the rec center, go across here to the downtown area.
Used to be able to go to a grocery store, but soon you will. Soon there'll be something there. So would you see though would you ever see those as being um transient slips that we could rent and have power? You definitely could, but yeah, exactly. You'd have to put power in there. There
is uh a grant for that. It's the boating improvement grant. Um which is a grant we use at the marina. Um that is for specifically transient boats though. You wouldn't be able to rent them out permanently. Now, although you could,
you just wouldn't get grant money for those slips. Those slips you ran out permanently, but you would have to to do transient voting. You would have to put power there, water, and then you'd have to have some kind of facilities, which we have those up here,
don't we have showers and bathrooms? Could you do you I mean, you do um as long as you know, elevator and everything's working. But there is also money available in those grants for bathroom and shower facilities. So it could be depending on what uses go on downstairs.
When I talked to Marcy, that could be a use for that downstairs also that we can't use anymore or maybe don't want to, you know, use for office space and things like that that we can put bathroom and shower facilities down there also. So, with transit slips and a
grant, what is the rule on how many nights you can have a transient boat there? It's 15. No. Yeah. No longer than 15. That could be a revenue generator. Absolutely. Yeah. We charge $210 per
foot per night. And we have a a basically it's an app that people use called Docwa. And there's another app called Snag a Slip that we use. we get our full uh you know all our money for it and they just collect a fee for
setting it up and you know you know it's a minimal fee they charge the boater. So do you charge 210 plus power or is 210 include power? 210 includes the power plus tax and then we charge additional tax after that. So, I mean, that's reasonable because
some places charge you so much per day to plug in plus the $2 a foot. That's reasonable. A lot of marinas will charge for power. Um, some marinas are actually getting away from it now because the actual meter that goes in the golf port had a
huge problem with it during the past storm where their meters and all their uh power pedestals went out or bad and there was no way to even you couldn't just fix the breaker. You had to order the meters, get the meters in, you know, so they couldn't get a lot of boats
powers or they had to just bypass the meter and figure it out that way. So meters when they, you know, some boats might only use 20 to 50 bucks a month maybe in power and the the replacement part for that meter is $45 $500.
Oh, I didn't mean meter. I meant like some sometimes you go in and stay for three or four days and you pay 30 bucks a day for 30 amps or or whatever for 50 amp that just Oh, yeah. You can create any fee you want it. You know, it might be easier to just have one generalized fee and this
is what it is per foot. This is what you pay. Here's your assigned slip. You know, you got 24 hours in that spot. You show up at 5, you got to be gone by 5. It's hard to get up and be gone by 11:00 a.m. Yeah. Don't show up that early.
Does this work like a park mobile where you just or we have to have an attendance? Yeah. So, no, it could it could work that way. You still would want somebody to check it, you know, to make sure that obviously the people are paying. Um, but it is very similar to that where you would have that app, you go on, it would
assign you a slip. We would confirm the reservation and say, "Okay, so and so's here for five nights and we would block that slip off for that five nights." You'd have the slips numbered and you go, you go into this slip, that's your slip, five nights. Here's your power. Here's your hookups. You know, if
there's any problems, call this number. You just call us and we'd figure it out. A fob for the bathrooms. Yeah, we use a we use a code code. So, yeah, because we, you know, like the key cards, all that stuff, they get
expensive. They get lost. They get they don't get returned. And yeah, so I mean, these are just ideas, things to think about. And then when you want to, you know, I if you're down that way and you want to go check those docs out, they're super nice. Um, I got a picture
down at the very bottom here if you want to scroll down. This is kind of the style right here where you have a long walkway going out and then you have all the little fingers that come out where you could put a boat on each side of that finger and then now you could put power
at the end of those. There's there's, you know, all kinds of possibilities of what you could do there. But I think this is a good basic design where you don't have to worry about too much storms. You don't have to worry about boats really tearing the dock up, not tying up properly. Floating docks, most
anybody can tie up to a floating dock. takes a lot more skill to tie up to a fixed dock, more lines, more things like that. So, I think this is the way to go. This would be my suggestion. Um, and you know, they make different kinds,
uh, different heights, different, you know, they design them custom, so you can do anything you wanted with those docks. Krabby, uh, if so I could make an informed decision on this, would you be available to if if I set up an appointment to maybe show show me, uh,
oneonone and have this discussion so I can grasp it a little better, what examples and where it would go and what your recommendations would be. Yeah. Yeah. We can go out back and kind of show you how it work and I can, you know, we go to the marina and I'll show you the docks that we have and it'd be very similar to those docks. We don't have to go. Would that be enough time?
Yeah, that's plenty of time. Okay. All right. I'll I'll reach out to you. Thank you. Yeah, no problem. Like I said, like anything, just gather some questions and then either you everybody has my email, most everybody have my phone number you can get with uh Chief and send them to him and I'll get
it together and answer you back. You know, any questions you got because I know not everybody is familiar with, you know, docks and the boating and all that, how that all works. So, I have a couple questions. Yes. You want to go ahead? You want to go ahead? Yeah.
So, um, let's see on this property here by the Rock Park, um, do we have repairarium rights? Reparium rights? Well, we have a what is a state submerged land out? I believe it's it's quite a ways out. When they when Al did this, he said we have it almost to the middle of the canal.
So, we own we own to the middle of the canal as far as I'm not sure what our state submerged land lease is like though out here. I'd have to read into it. I can get into that though and see if we do collect like there's a portion at the marina that we collect rent on and things like
that that at the at the first of the year first of every year I have to report what we made on those and then we pay them a percentage as a state submerged land lease. So if you know at the end it's usually around four grand for us but we it's a percentage. It's
not a fixed you know amount. So we won't have to pay like I mean we have to pay land lease in some areas where it's not retired. Some areas like where at the marina it's it's the very ends of the dock. Okay. You know um but here I don't know. I'd
have to look into it and probably get with All and figure out what is where's how far does our submerged land or how far does our state submerged land go if we have a submerged land lease or how that lease is written. Okay. And um do you have like pumpouts
or lockouts? So we have pumpouts at the marina. That's another grant you can get. I've done several of those. That's called a CVA grant, a clean vessel act grant. Um the big portion of that is not obtaining the pump out or any of that equipment.
It would be uh figuring out where we're going to pump it to because you pump directly into the sewer system. So you record how many gallons you have, things like that. Um it's not hard. There is meters on a lot of these pumps now. So you don't have to sit there and ask
everybody what it is. You would just say if you're going there and you're going to pump out, check the check, you know, check this box if you pump out. And then we just have a record piled up of who all pumped out there, you know, that we're staying as a transient boater.
And for overnighters, do you have parking? Well, that's the beautiful thing about most boats is that they don't have cars come with them. So they come there and they usually have their bicycles or they'll Uber or they'll walk or they'll
you know they they're coming by boat. They're usually traveling through traveling around. You get a lot of what we call the loopers which basically goes all around and through the United States through the Mississippi up the east coast and a lot of those people they're just that's what they're doing. They're traveling through. So they they're
usually walking. They're usually taking Ubers. They're usually you know they don't bring cars. They're on their boat. Okay, I think that was all my questions. Thank you. Okay. Do you have any co any questions? Great job. Thank you.
Thank you, Krabby. That was like I said, you got anything else? Just uh get it to me or chief and he'll relay it. Thank you very much. Thank you. Thank you, Krabby. I'm sorry my laser point work. I was really excited about that. Next on the agenda is recreation, mowing, and lawn maintenance service
contract renewal. Um good evening. Uh so in front of you I have the existing contract that actually wraps up here uh at the end of the month. Uh we are in the third year of a three-year agreement that has two
one-year renewal options with NDL. Uh NA natural design Landscaping LLC. Uh currently they maintain all the city property here with the exception of the library uh and do all of the landscaping, trimming, all that stuff.
And then um also the school which was just resawed. So we're that's another portion of that that we're getting them back on. But uh they cover all of that for us at a rate of $2,800 per month. They expressed their interest in renewing and we are happy with them now
too as well. So, we were going to renew at the same cost or same price uh expense and it is budgeted. So, just looking to get approval and we'll bring it back next week if that's the direction. Same same cost, no no upgrade, no
increase. Correct. They they they suggested an increase and then I explained to them that we would have to bid it back out and their response was never mind. We're happy with 2,800. So, Got it. Thank you. Thank you. Definitely. Great.
Are they the same people that maintain the landscaping indoors for us? No, they're different. They do not. So, um, how many times a week do they come on property? Once. So, the previous city manager and I had
a discussion about, um, the recreation department taking over the landscaping and not outsourcing it, but keeping it in house. What are your thoughts on that? Uh, it could not be done under current staffing conditions because I have two people that operate all of the
athletic fields and everything else, clean up the park, all that. And that's already understaffed in my opinion. We just hired the second person within the last year. So, the third person that does anything outside is me. So, some
days I do mow the fields or help with fertilizer or whatever else. So, I I would not recommend it. I think it's a Okay. Thank you. I don't have any further questions. No. Thank you, Jay. Thank you. Um, we don't have anything to respond to
on public comment. However, there was one thing I wanted to bring up um to put on our next workshop agenda, and that is to review the city clerk. We haven't done a review of the city clerk. And this year, uh, raises are based off of
performance and cost of living increase. and in conversation with city attorney. Um if we workshop at our next workshop, we workshop how we want to do that. We could have that on the agenda and then we can vote in the following meeting on
her performance. I mean I I feel like I've done an individual evaluation every year. So this is different than that. Um to this to give her to do this, we're supposed to do it public. Okay. Okay, got it.
Okay, that's all I have. You have anything further? I have one thing I just wanted to remind everybody. I I will be gone Thursday and Friday. I was pre-approved before sitting in this seat. So, I just wanted to remind everybody I will not be here.
Just is there an interim interim city? I can I can name one if you like. An acting acting mayor. Yes, ma'am. I'm off Friday to take my last um optional day and that
means we got we will be publishing that packet tomorrow for Okay. Oh, okay. Thank you. Then if that is all is 10:09 and we're adjourned. Part: 2
Good evening. I'd like to call to order the board of commissioners special meeting adopting fiscal year 2026 final millage rate and budget ordinances agenda. Today is Wednesday, September 24th, 2025. It is 5:45 p.m. City clerk,
would you call the role, please? >> Mayor Brooks, >> here. Vice Mayor Kerr >> here, >> Commissioner Tagarini >> here, >> Commissioner McInn >> here, >> Commissioner Kabayi >> here. >> All are present. >> Next on the agenda is public comment. Public participation is encouraged. If
you are addressing the commission, step to the podium and state your name and address for the record and the organization or group you represent. Please limit your comments to five minutes and do not include any topic on the agenda. Public comment on agenda
items will be allowed when they come up. If you would like someone at the city to follow up on a comment or question made at the meeting, you may fill out a comment card with your contact information and give it to the city manager. Comment cards are available at the back table in the
commission chambers. Completing a comment card is not mandatory. For any quasi judicial public hearings that might be on the agenda, an affected person may become a party to a quasi judicial proceeding and can be entitled to present evidence at the hearing,
including the sworn testimony of witnesses and relevant exhibits and other documentary evidence and to cross-examine all witnesses by filing a notice of intent to be a party with the community development director not less than 5 days prior to the hearing. Do we
have any public comment? With no public comment, the first item on the agenda is ordinance 2025-15. City attorney. >> Thank you, mayor. This is ordinance 2025-15. I'm going to read it in its entirety. An
ordinance of the city of Madira Beach, Florida, establishing the millage rate for the fiscal year 2026, providing and announcing the name of the taxing authority, the roll back millage rate, the percentage decrease below the roll back millage rate, and the millage
rate to be levied and providing for an effective date. Whereas Florida statute section 200.065 requires the adoption of the millage rate by separate vote and prior to the adoption of the budget. And whereas Florida statute section 200.065
requires that prior to the adoption of the millage levy ordinance, the following be publicly announced, the name of the taxing authority, the roll back millage rate, the percentage decrease below the roll back millage rate, and the millage rate to be levied.
And whereas in no event may the millage rate adopted exceed the millage rate tenatively adopted. Now therefore, be it ordained by the board of commissioners of the city of Madira Beach, Florida, that section one, the name of the taxing authority is the city of Madira Beach. Section two, the roll back millage rate
for fiscal year 2026 is 2.8581 per $1,000. Section three, the fiscal year 2026 proposed millage rate is 3.78% lower than the roll back rate. Section four, the millage rate to be levied for
the fiscal year 2026 shall be 2.75000 per $1,000. And section five, this ordinance shall become effective immediately upon its adoption. There was a second and final reading of ordinance 2025-15 in its entirety.
Andrew, did you want to address this? I know I talked about the first one, so I I have nothing else to add unless you want to discuss. >> Do we have any public comment? With no public comment, commissioners, any comments or questions? >> No, no further comments or questions for
me. >> I only have a clerical item. I'm in district two. >> We can we can make that change before we publish. >> That's fine. >> No comments, Madame Mayor. I have no
comments either. Do we have a motion? >> Uh uh I move that we approve the ordinance 2025-15. >> Second. >> Does it need to have the clerical on the record? City attorney. >> I didn't catch what the clerical change
was to it. >> What was the clerical change? I believe Vice Mayor Kerr >> just on the cover page it it signifies that I'm representing district one where it should be district two. That's all. >> We can make that typographical error. The motion doesn't need to reflect that.
>> City clerk, would you call the role, please? >> Yes. >> Commissioner Tagarini. >> Yes. >> Commissioner Gavayi. >> Yes. >> Vice Mayor Kerr. >> Yes. >> Commissioner Mcan? >> Yes. >> Mayor Brooks? >> Yes. >> The motion carry five to zero. Next on
the agenda is ordinance 2025-16, city attorney. >> Thank you, mayor. I'm going to read this in its entirety as well. This is ordinance 2025-16, an ordinance of the city of Madera Beach, Florida, adopting the budget for the fiscal year beginning October 1, 2025 and then ending
September 30th, 2026, and providing for an effective date. Whereas Florida statute section 166.241 requires the adoption of a budget each fiscal year. And whereas the amount available from taxation and other sources including balances brought forward from prior years must be equal to the total
appropriations for expenditures and reserves. And whereas at a minimum the adopted budget must show uh for each fund as required by law and sound financial practices budgeted revenues and expenditures by organizational unit which are at least at the level of
detail required for the annual financial report required under section 218.321 Florida statutes and whereas the adopted budget must regulate expenditures of the municipality and an officer of a
municipal government may not expend or contract act for expenditures in any fiscal year except as pursuant to the adopted budget. And whereas the city of Madira Beach fiscal year 2026 budget is balanced is presented at the level of detail required to file the annual financial report and shall regulate
expenditures of the city for the period beginning October 1, 2025 and ending September 30th, 2026. Now therefore, be it ordained by the board of commissioners of the city of Mader Beach, Florida, that section one, the budget for the fiscal year beginning October 1, 2025, and ending September
30th, 2026, attached here to his exhibit A is hereby adopted. And section two, this ordinance shall become effective immediately upon its adoption. That was the second final reading of ordinance 2025-16 in its entirety.
>> Nope. Do we have any public comment? With no public comment, commissioners comments. >> Madame Mayor, I would like to um make a motion to adopt uh ordinance 2025 uh 25-16, adopt a budget for fiscal year beginning
October 1st, 2025 and ending September 30th, 2026. >> So, does anyone have any discussion? >> I do not >> discussion. No second. No. Do we need a second to discuss? >> Yes. >> Okay. Do we have a second?
>> Okay. Thank you. >> Do we have any discussion? >> So, I have an item I'd like to bring up. Um, after and in our next meeting, we're going to have discussion on this, but after quite a bit of discussion, I think
that we need to approve this tonight, but we need to do an amendment for an HR position in our city. And just to respond to that, if that's the direction of the commission, we'll put that on October workshop meeting to workshop it and then it would go in
November regular meeting as a resolution for a budget amendment which we were going to do anyways for there any cleanup items related to fiscal year 2025 budget and then we can do any amendments such as that for the 2026 budget.
Agree. >> So, this is just a recommendation to discuss it. >> That is correct. >> Yeah, that I support that. >> Okay. City clerk, would you call the role, please? >> Commissioner Gabbay, >> yes. >> Commissioner Taglery, >> yes.
>> Commissioner McGee, >> yes. >> Vice Mayor Kerr, >> yes. >> Mayor Brooks, >> yes. >> The motion carried five to zero. Next on the agenda is ordinance 2025-18. >> Thank you, mayor. This is ordinance 2025-18, an ordinance of the city of
Madira Beach, Florida, adopting a revised appendix A, fees and collection procedures manual of the code of ordinances of the city of Mader Beach, Florida to provide for a change to the building permit fee waiver date repealing ordinance 2025-13 providing for conflict providing for
codification and severability and providing for an effective date. That was the first reading of ordinance 2025-18 by title only in the uh fees and collections procedures manual. The only change from your current manual is listed on page 147
uh at the very bottom of the page paragraph 2. We're changing the date from September 26, 2025 to the date of March 26, 2026 based upon the direction given to us by the city by the board of commissioners.
Do we have any public comment, commissioners? >> No comments or questions. Thank you. >> No comments. >> No comment. >> There's a mention in it in in there about the
putting in the um request prior to the 26th, September 26th, or is it just >> that language is still in there? >> Is it still in there? It talks about it the the property being sold or not sold before September 26, 2024. As for the
application, it it the language is still sufficient in that subp paragraph 2 to get across what you're doing. You're just extending the date to allow it to happen. Yeah. >> Okay. >> They won't need the letter. >> Well, they will need the letter or they
won't. They need the application. They need to apply >> by then. by Friday. This Friday that they plan to apply >> by the date set forth. Yes. And that's in that's in here. >> Okay.
>> And uh just so you guys know too, as of right now, we've received about 67 responses via email to extend it and approximately 53 have gone onto the website and applied that way. So >> that's great. >> So the message is out there. So that's that's really good. So I think that's
it's going really nice. >> Great. Fantastic. >> Do we have a motion? >> I make a motion to approve ordinance 2025-18, amendment to fees and collection procedures manual. >> Do we have a second? >> I'll second.
>> City clerk, would you call the role, please? >> Commissioner McGee, >> yes. >> Commissioner Taglerini, >> yes. >> Vice Mayor Kerr, >> yes. >> Commissioner Gabay, >> yes. >> Mayor Brooks, >> yes. The motion carried 5 to zero.
>> It is 556 and we are adjourned.