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is everybody good and now I local not his government no his government's great just local good morning everyone and welcome to the February 25th 2025 border County Commission meeting here in seol County we are going to have the invocation led
by Mr Ron Williams for paletto Avenue Baptist Church we also will have the pledge led by newly hire Joe ala Chief Information officer here at the county Pastor please lead us sir let us pray Lord we thank you for the
opportunity to be here today we thank you Lord that this Board of Commissioners has chosen to invite the faith-based community to come in and invoke your blessings they want you here and it's a blessing to be able to be a part of this great Community it really is a natural choice for us we've chosen
to live in simol county and our kids have and sometimes even to the third generation we thank you Lord that our community is thriving where others are dying and a lot of that has to do with those who lead us and so thank you for these Commissioners I pray for wisdom
for them today and the courage to make the right choices that the choices they make will be based on the principles of the word of God and not on popular opinion I pray Lord that you'd be with our First Responders today and watch over them keep them safe watch over their families watch over our military
thank you Lord that we have an opportunity to recognize one of our own today the senior master sergeant and so help her to know that we uh appreciate her service and help everyone in this building that has served under our flag to know that we appreciate it help the
younger generation to realize the sacrifices that have been made for 250 years so that they could enjoy the things that people are dying to get here to enjoy help us to realize how important this is and to be willing to fight for it we pray for Global Peace as
well Lord that you would uh stop the wars in Ukraine and Gaza and I pray Lord that level heads would prevail B thank you Lord for this commission board once again watch over them keep them safe and healthy and in your will watch over their families and I just pray that the
decisions that are made today would better our community and help them Lord to have a backbone of Steel no matter what decision they make today some people are not going to agree with it and so help them Lord to know in their heart of hearts they've made the right choice and uh Lord once again the
courage to maintain their convictions but in Christ's name we pray amen amen thank you Pastor Mr thank you Mr chairman please join me in the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge allegiance to to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic
for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all thank you thank you sir we sincerely appreciate it next we will move into our Proclamation for our senior master
sergeant Katherine Lee Hunt this will be read by commissioner lockart commissioner lockart good morning it is truly my honor to be able to move this proclamation to the bard of County Commissioners this morning um Katherine is one of our fabulous employees at seal
State College and at our trustee meeting last week we recognized her and so this is this is a double honor for me so thank you uh Commissioners I move the following proclamation of the seal County Board of County Commissioners recognizing United States Air Force senior master sergeant Katherine Lee
Hunt for her outstanding service to the United States and seminal County whereas the brave men and women of our army navy Marines Air Force Coast Guard and space force demonstrate a Resolute spirit and unmatched selflessness reminding us there are few things more American than
giving of ourselves to make a difference in the lives of others and whereas throughout our country's history generations of service members have answered the call to leave their fam their jobs and put their Futures and even their lives on the line to valiantly defend our nation and whereas
for many service members the sacrifice has ended in permanent injury or death yet their Spirit remains in the continued preservation of our freedoms and the promise of Liberty and whereas there are more than 30,000 living veterans in seminol County who served our nation in times of peace and War
through their service they kept America strong and whereas senior master sergeant Katherine Lee Hunt enlisted in the United States Air Force in 1980 and served honorably until her retirement in 2000 she was deployed to Saudi Arabia in support of Operation Desert Storm where
she earned the Southwest Asia service medal Air Force meritorious service medal Armed Forces Expeditionary Medal and the Kosovo campaign medal among others and whereas after her retirement senior master sergeant Katherine Lee Hunt returned to Sanford where she was
born and raised and now serves the veterans of seminal County as the staff adviser for the the United assistance for veterans a student veteran group at semal State College she has also worked with Pet Rescue by Judy and organized a veteran suicide awareness walk to remind
us that an average of 22 veterans commit suicide each day she was a generous contributor to the success of the 2024 seal County Veteran standown and remains an advocate for the seal County veteran services office and whereas senior master sergeant Katherine Lee Hunt has
brought great credit and distinction upon herself the United States of America the United States Air Force and seal County now therefore be it proclaimed that we the board of County commissioners of seol County Florida express our gratitude admiration and respect for senior master sergeant
Katherine Lee Hunt for her outstanding service to the United States Air Force and the residents of seol County be it further proclaimed that this Proclamation is presented to senior master sergeant Katherine Lee Hunt along with our sincere congratulations and recognition as County's veteran of the
month adopted this 25th day of February 2025 second motion second all those in favor I carries unanimous congratulations Miss hunt please join us for a photograph [Applause]
most um sure absolutely I SAR I wasn't going to say anything yeah um yeah but I truly appreciate this honor uh being a native
Floridian being a Sanford I because we used to be cites back in uh before my time um so it it really is an honor to be presented this uh by my home county by my home City and
I really and truly appreciate it thank you thank you thank you next up will be our County investment advisor report Mr Scott McIntyre will be here to give us that presentation I would also just ask each and every one of you in the audience
please silence your cell phones your other electronic devices so we don't have interruptions during today's hearing also recognize that commissioner delari was not able to attend today but we do have a quorum here at the board so Mr magy welcome good
morning okay let's see what we got this morning um major themes the FED held steady at the January meeting that was not a surprise there is a March meeting certainly don't expect the FED is going to resume their their R Cuts in March it's a May meeting that's probably the
earliest we would expect um we can't imagine that it would be before the June or the July meeting tariff discussion right now is probably one of the major reasons why they're going to be on hold they're waiting to see what's happening we've had a lot of trouble keeping up
with the tariffs um as a matter of fact we have an analyst who every day sort of puts in what's gone on and what's come off and it's uh it's it's very very unpredictable and frankly the markets right now are reacting to the Tariff discussion so we're all going to keep
our ears to the tracks to see what happens in the meantime inflation is still trending sideways uh when inflation starts to move lower the FED will be in a position where they can cut again but until that happens um the FED is going to be at hold and right now
that trade outcome is is going to determine what the direction ultimately is I changed up some of the usually I show you a different CPI graph this one gives you an idea as you can see there on the right hand side that we have been seeing a tick up in inflation when I talk about moving
sideways it's really more in the core issues energy is moving higher right now and as you can imagine food prices are moving higher so um in the January CPI report egg prices were at 15.2% that's still an issue it looks like dairy prices may be an issue in the coming
months and coffee prices may be an issue as well so we're not out of the uh all the good stuff energy or food concerns this is the Bloomberg survey that I try to share with you guys it came out on Friday there's a lot of information here I'm not going to
highlight all of the information I know the audience can't see that but you guys can and and one thing that I see amongst these 91 economists who are all weighing in on what they think is going to happen is that they've all kind of glommed around a Center Point um you look at CPI
everybody expects that for the next six quarters we're going to be roughly around 2% to me that's sort of a bail out we don't know 2% same thing in terms of um expectations for rate Cuts these are economists generally believe 25 basis points Sometime Late in the first
half or early second half of the year and then another quarter probably later in the year that's the same as the FED is thinking it's essentially the same as the market was thinking these economists if you look at the 2year and the fiveyear and the 10-year expectations
they believe that that the direction for yield is downward um between now and then there should be a lot of movement that probably cues this up for where we are now um I looked this morning Monday yields were down from here this morning
yields were down further from here right now the 2-year treasury is at about 410 the three-year treasury is at about 410 the one year is about 410 the pool rates uh kind of the bird in hand over there on the right hand side are still holding
up you know roughly in the 4 and 38 to to 4 and 1/2 rate until the FED actually cuts that's where those overnights are going to be so that's the Bird in Hand um upcoming maturities there aren't a whole lot the one I'm thinking about
or focusing on is that bank CD that matures and it doesn't mature until March 11th and the clerk's office will have the opportunity to talk to the bank my guess is the bank is willing to pay a little bit more than market so that they can keep that large deposit on so this
is going to be a wait and see we don't know where that's going to roll because we're not at March 11th yet but but my recommendation is going to be on these Securities that are maturing to check find out what the yields are see if it's a favorable rate to move up further and
if not hold on to it and keep that liquid the last two meetings we've had some significant Investments there was 120 invested last time there was 160 invested before so we've really pushed out your average maturity longer than it's been the idea behind that that was
the idea of keeping your your as much of this high yield as we could into 26 and 27 and really to a degree into 2028 and we we've done that so U my recommendations are to wait until these Securities that are coming up mature
check with the um check to see what the rates are and if if we can roll if not put them into the pool rates that are right now earning 4 and a half% for Florida Prime and I would expect that pool rate stays close to 42% fully
liquid until June or maybe even July so um the work has been done the work has been done the last couple meetings and my recommendation at this point we can come back to it uh portfolio stats um the average maturity is 428
days and I would guess that that in Years Gone by we've been at 120 days at times so that's that's pretty long the mix between fixed and floating 83% is locked in into fixed rates 177 is floating um if if nothing is is I assume
nothing will be done here the the yield would dip just a little bit during the month of February and a little bit during the month of March but for the most part um you have a Debt Service payment coming up in April so we'll take care of that as well my recommendation here is that we hold look at the role on
March 11th watch the market understand that yields are down significantly since the last couple times we bought you know thank our lucky stars that that uh the the purchases that were made were made when they were and that the portfolio is a little bit longer so we can we can sit
and watch and see what happens with inflation and the fed and uh the Trump Administration so I'm going to come back to the U motion and ask if you would for that motion commissioner lockart Mr chairman I make a motion to implement the recommendations of our financial
adviser based on the report submitted today and recommend that the clerk implement the changes second motion second all those in favor I oppose like sign Cena carries unanimous very good thank you Mr M thank you all very much have a wonderful
day all right our next item up is a presentation on destination marketing accreditation program known as dmap and distinction and tourism update Mr G C good morning for the record Gia
director of Economic Development and Tourism I just wanted to start off the presentation with giving everyone the uh Genesis of why did the tourism office pursue the uh destination marketing accreditation program during this
journey that's been this tourism improvement district one of the uh concerns that the hotel years had was ghee if we're looking at an extended term that can possibly go into decades how can we ensure the same quality that we're receiv receiving from the tourism
office so our tourism team came together and pursued the most difficult accreditation possible for the tourism office to obtain that has to be renewed every 5 years the accreditation program known as dmap requires a destination organization to successfully comply with
over 100 standards that span a variety of performance areas to gain this destination accreditation the standards cover nearly all aspects related to the manag marketing of a destination uh governance Finance Human
Resources sales Communications destination development and research so uh we partnered during this uh dmap Journey with uh Jack wart who some of you may know was one of the uh original leaders of a tourism in seminal
County we've worked with Jack when he was over at Naples and he helped guide us through this accreditation process so to give a little more info and to award the plaque for the first time ever in seminal County History I'd like to
introduce Jack W welcome Mr W thank you thank you G and uh Commissioners uh ladies and gentlemen in the audience this uh this is a great day here's an opportunity for me to come back to the
place where where I started my tourism career back in 1990 um we started the the tourism department at that time uh in the uh uh seminal chamber building uh down in the
um the alamont area and uh it was a very small place but it grew to over the years to about eight staffers before I moved on to uh the uh uh the Naples area to take on uh and actually start that
tourism Bureau there uh as well um early on WE branded uh our operation is the seal County uh um uh CVB which was uh uh the way that
we told the traveling world this is the place to come for visitor information for information on meetings and and and so forth and really became the trusted source for that but we always understood what we were really doing was Economic Development
because what we were doing was bringing people to the area to spend money in our community uh to spend money in our businesses and and and bring their diso disposable income to our area um that uh
uh Economic Development thought process really uh enabled us to pull together both tourism and economic development and uh in those early days we pulled it together actually in the audience Mr Bob Turk is right back here he represented
the economic development his later his his wife also was a part of that as part of the Orlando economic development that really put seal County on on a stage of playing with with the bigger boys if you
will uh we we found that collaboration worked well uh in uh in sports that's when we built the training center for US soccer out at Lake silven Park it enabled uh um us to be a part of the Redevelopment of the
sford airport which got us an intern as an international destination all of those things together really prove that tourism and economic development can can work together um the uh that tradition
ghee has continued and as you you've seen we're going to have a couple of opportunities here today not only to talk about a tourism award but also an award of uh a tourism improvement district which is a real step forward uh
really uh setting the stage for great growth in in the future so we're here today to talk about tourism uh G told you about the standards that they had to adhere to and give documentation that they were doing business like the
biggest uh and most uh uh professional uh tourism organizations in the world uh they met all those requirements uh and they then were recognized by destinations International at their annual meeting uh that they had done
that they become um really one of only 250 organizations worldwide that have attained this accreditation credential so that's really something for the seminal County to be proud of uh and uh
and I'm I'm really so happy I was able to to help them in that regard um the uh what I'd like to do is uh uh present this credential now uh um Mr chairman if
you'd like to come down maybe the other Commissioners come down and let's do this this is a big deal for for this organization a big deal for for seol County uh and uh I see that uh that logo up there we started that back in the
'90s for heaven's sakes Orlando's uh Florida's Natural Choice was absolutely the right thing then it still is today so if we could do that and a great tourism team of course man we need a bigger room this is great
[Music] to he and his staff it's my pleasure on behalf of destinations International accreditation board to present this credential for Destination Mark accreditation this is a this is a as I
said a big deal uh the plaque doesn't necessarily do it justice this was a lot of work I will tell you so this is uh [Applause]
everybody one step a little more the [Music] [Music] thanks all y'all good one it's all good well understood all right uh in the interest
of time we're going to speed through a a quick tourism presentation here utilizing uh Smith travel research our December Hotel demand report this gives us the calendar year uh indicators uh
occupancy average daily rate and of course our star indicator Revenue per available room so we'll start with present and then we'll look at what the forecast is telling us for the upcoming calendar year and Beyond so uh one of the clear
definitions that Str Str has told us Smith travel research and they've been doing research for seminal County for over 15 years our year-over-year Trends is to expect a plateau their Plateau is defined plusus 3% so when we look at
occupancy here we see year-over-year 3% increase so that would be just slightly above that Plateau at 3.3 ADR is declining 4% what usually happens in tourism is ADR follows occupancy so as occupancy
increases ADR will then Trail a couple of months and begin to increase when occupancy decreases in something that we saw this year when occupancy started to soften ADR was still high and then would begin to decrease so it usually runs
about 2 to 3 months behind now the key performance indicator that we associate with tourist development tax is your Revenue per available room your revar that's what's going to show you from the hotel standpoint the closest indicator
associated with tdt and that's where you're seeing that Plateau down 1.3% then you have your revenue and your demand that we closely track but again this is solely the hotel side this is not your vacation rental side so we took
a look at okay let's see day of the week comparison let's look now break down our Friday to Sunday versus Monday to Thursday Travelers and we see here that our weekend r runs at about 83% occupancy on average for an entire year
that is extremely strong uh and your weekday at about 10 percentage points below that so what usually triggers concern is if your occupancy is high are we wholesaling our rooms are we discounting our rooms so far down that we're increasing occupancy but
sacrificing Revenue per available room that is not the case for seol County we have our most expensive rates on the weekend at $14.19 which then leads us to have a revar that star indicator at
94.73% of Interest throughout the county and let's identify all our sports facilities and see where are these weekend Travelers going so the 42% uh uh table uh sell there that's the
big key indicator 42% of The Travelers that utilize the sports facilities stayed overnight that's 78% higher than any other point of
Interest throughout the 120 uh Supply that we provided with with that we're going to take a deeper dive into the sports facility visitor and I'd like to introduce Danny our new uh tourism division
manager all right welcome Mr TR and congratulations thank you very much uh this slide just represents um the sports complex actuals for last year as you can see last fiscal year 23 24 we hosted 89
events over 4600 teams 185,000 visitors over 29,000 track hotel rooms and over $58 million in economic impact and the chart right there below are this year's projections for 2425 um as G mentioned you know kind of
a plateau we're we're looking at about roughly the same amount of events and about a 2 to 3% increase across the board in room nights and economic impact so our projection for economic impact this year is just over $61 million so we uh decided to add a slide here
just so we all know what our vacation rental supply looks like in the breakdown of the platforms uh we are more Airbnb heavy than uh VRBO those are total listings the
1,347 the red dots on the screen there those are your airbnbs versus the blue dots that are your vrbos mainly concentrated on the Southwest uh portion of the County now the forecast forecast going to look a lot of
the same the plateau so plus minus 3% this is the latest forecast from Smith travel research as we look at the occupancy percent change we look at that row you see all the numbers there are within that Plateau range same thing can
be said with your average daily rate that's when you can see the trends as Plateau begins to fluctuate just a little bit ADR follows and then comes back down the seasonality component to it but the big key here is that Revenue per available room you are not seeing
large plus 3% greater than 3% increases all the way through uh the first quarter of 20126 and uh this slide represents just the the room nights the net increase we hired Hunden strategic Partners uh to do our uh perform for the indoor sports
complex as you can see in year one they're projecting that the indoor sports complex would generate 177,000 uh hotel rooms and by year five uh it reaches 29,000 hotel rooms so essentially this doubles our Sports tourism room Knight production uh
roughly currently we're doing about 29 30,000 hotel rooms so this takes us from 30,000 hotel rooms to 60,000 hotel rooms on an annual basis next slide and then this slide just represents the economic impact um as you can see see uh basically over the
course of 30 years economic impact will total nearly $1 billion from the indoor sports complex uh year one it's 11.8 Million by year five it reaches $22.5 million in economic impact so here are the key takeaways uh
as Smith travel research identified to us uh it's again seeing that plateau effect as the major travel has uh began to return to Major markets we are a submarket So eventually it will flow to us that eventually definition can be one
year two years it can take time as the economy softens so does the travel market so the big key here is to understand that a plateau effect is 18 months out is being seen at least for the next 18 months some of our top five
challenges that we've identified just within the state and for our tourism office of course we discussed the demand Plateau we know we have tourist development tax uh constraints we are collecting our five pennies that is the maximum that SEO County can collect
legislative uncertainty we don't know if there will be there's always discussion of expansion of that tdt increase competition it's no secret I think everyone has seen uh in the papers that uh building Sports Complex is not a new
idea um and second and lastly the risk due to our venue limitations everything we have is outdoor complex predominantly diamond and rectangular rectangular fields in order for us to mitigate risk
we have to look at expanding our venue offering with that I open up the floor for any question any questions from the board commissioner Constantine we'll start at your end and work our way down thank you very much for the new slide
because it does show the significance of what uh those vacation rental platforms are doing do you have a number in the past you have told us that it's been increasing by 100% a year where where are we right now I mean has it hit a
plateau or where are we that that 1,000 M yes we've seen uh the plateau effect uh there we saw a jump from 500 uh to about 1,200 um but it's been holding Stead steadily below that, 1500 and those are
listings so one property can have multiple listings on Airbnb they can even list rooms so one property can have X amount of rooms and have X amount of listings so that's the key definition there is it's not 1,500 properties
throughout the county it's 1500 listings and since they don't have the same regulations as hotels they can be anywhere I mean have uh you know has the hotel industry done and I know that they are concerned but have they done any um
studies on the effect of what that hap what that does to their um occupational percentages I can take a look on the regional or Statewide I'm I'm fairly confident the study has done from our
perspective we have not done that study that is something that if the board would like we we would be more than willing to facilitate that I I just think probably the central Florida hotel and Lodging Association probably has those numbers and and would be easy to
get um but this if if this was a hotel it would be by far the largest in some and they will not be talking about later are they going to be part of they're not going to be part of the ti no no uh
vacation rentals for the uh upcoming ordinance are not included their hotel properties uh one of the things Trends wise to look at uh vacation rentals and and we get more in depth in this during the tourist Development Council they
usually Trend anywhere from 20 to 40 at most perc occupancy yeah so it's not a it's not a major disruptor now vacation rentals are in other counties a major disruptor for seol County we haven't seen that but we are definitely willing
to do more research thank you commission lockart um I don't have any more questions for you we had a great briefing um I appreciate the time that you spent um going over won't won't take time now to do that um but
congratulations um to you all and the whole team for the work that that you've accomplished and what feels like an incredibly short period of time I think you were on a fast track to get this done and um just very impressed and excited so good work
her I have no questions I also got everything in briefing but I would say that I have I am absolutely not surprised that you came through that with flying colors everything that you do is really topnotch congratulations Danny on the promotion uh welld deserved and the team to the entire team just
really really really solid work we appreciate you thank you all very much uh I I appreciate you giving this presentation that way I have to zero briefing as sitting on this board to my fellow commissioners all did a great job but as
usual our economic development team and our tourism team is bar nun one of the best in in the central Florida area and you guys have done great work uh delivering good products and not only for the citizens the hotel years and all
the businesses here in our community um the one thing that that I would respond to commissioner Constantine's I've read quite a few research articles here in the last six months that the the vrbs and all those things are slowly
going by the wayside because what's occurred is the tax cost for some of these people to maintain multiple units and not have them occupied uh has become a burden on these owners uh to to maintain these uh Statewide so we're
seeing a big influx of of these coming on the market which many in the real estate market believe this is a good thing uh to get these back in the hands of our everyday citizens that live work and and uh go to school here so it' be interesting to know what some of those
numbers are but happy to share that with you commissioner constant and Mr chairman one of the things that I didn't bring up but is I think is important also is that so many of these are not individual homeowners that are renting their homes right they're corporate
correct and that obviously is I think a major indicator of the increase in the cost of rentals to single family homes and we've talked about that before but I would suggest to you that they're having a crisis in many other places about
corporate purchases of homes to the point that I I I saw one was an entire subdivision that was purchased before it went on the market right uh all for this type of platform right so it you know it has got to be a major indic uh a major
cause of the increase in um rental for individual citizens sure well thank commissioner lockart well I just have to say I love an Airbnb when you travel with adult kids and dogs and I mean 400 bucks a night at
the Aloft it gets expensive when you got two rooms and so airbnbs have their place and I'm glad that small business owners and large business owners have the opportunity to provide that service nobody I'm just putting it in there just so it doesn't look like we're bashing
anybody thank thank you all very much we sincerely appreciate youall being here today and the time you've invested to give us this presentation and congratulations good work thank you thank you all very much next up we're going to move to our consent agenda if there's anyone here that is going to
desire to speak on any of the items on the consent agenda please grab a form Miss Dominique here on the front will hold a form up you can grab those in the lobby put your name and information on the item which you wish to speak about bring it up to her give it to her and as
we get to these items we'll uh we'll call you up to speak if you desire to do so now I'll move to miss Kate Lor for the rules of public engagement on the consent agenda Miss Lor thank you chairman good morning Florida law provides that members of the public shall be given a reasonable opportunity
to be heard on propositions before the board of County Commissioners except when the board is acting on emergency or ministerial matters or conducting a meeting exempt from the requirements of the Sunshine Law individuals shall be permitted 3 minutes each for public comment or 6 minutes when the individual is an official
representative of a formal Association or group the chairman May modify the maximum time for public comment at his sole discretion when appropriate public comments on quasi judicial or other public hearing items will occur during the board's consideration of those items
this afternoon public comments on pending procurement matters or on non-agenda items shall not be permitted at this time members of the public Desiring to make public comment must fill out a speaker form and present the form to staff forms are available in the
lobby Mr chairman thank you Mr Lor uh County Manager are there any revisions deletions changes in the county managers agenda items 5 through 24 uh good morning um chairman and Commissioners I have no changes to the consent agenda
okay and there's been no request for constitutional officer change on agenda item number four correct correct okay okay we will move to board anyone on the board have a desire to pull any of the items on the consent agenda for separate consideration Mr chairman I have to pull
item six item six commissioner Constantine and forgive me sorry also there's a couple proclamations in here so once we're done with this we will come to the floor for any photographs that those who desire to have a photograph of the commission can
do so in their Proclamation okay commissioner lockart um item 14 number six for Constantine 14 for lockart and the only thing that you know I really don't need to pull it necessarily for separate consideration but just to make a clarification um the
agenda detail says that I voted against that item and my recollection is that I voted for it at the time that it came before us so if we could just ask the um County manager and County attorney to work with the clerk's staff and just figure out how to correct that record maybe do okay fair enough so we won't
pull 14 we've just clarified that that's okay with you commissioner yes I just wanted it to go on the record before we voted on it that I I have a different recollection okay very good commissioner her anything that you desire to pull no chairman I'd be happy to make a motion
for approval of item 4 five and 7 through 24 second motion a second all those in favor I I commissioner Constantine and and just wanted to make sure that motion included the consideration of the the vote yeah okay
good uh yes Mr chairman and I appreciate the fact that we have um reduced the the reading of the proclamations mostly just to the veterans and the rest of them go on consent and that is I appreciated but I've been called by a number of folks to
and they're here today about uh something I think that we're all you know familiar with and is very important and that is the recog nition of the uh International women's day and the recognition of the women's history month and so I would appreciate if we could
that we could have that in the record if you I it's I would acess to one of um commissioner her or commissioner Lockard if they would like to read that Proclamation um and uh you know U but
that's the only reason that I have pulled it sir and I do appreciate what you have done in reducing the amount of this this is not a precedent setting but I do believe that because they're here I just thought that it would be appropriate to allow them the
opportunity okay go ahead all right uh Commissioners I move the following proclamation of the seal County Board of County Commissioners recognizing women's History Month in seminal County Florida if you want larger font the young one thinks I need larger
font and I do whereas in March 1980 President Jimmy Carter issued the first presidential Proclamation declaring women's history weak to align with International women's day March 8th which has been recognized
across the world since March 1911 and whereas the following year on August 4th 1981 the US Congress established women's history week as a ferally recognized commemoration of the accomplishments perspectives and experiences of women in the United
States with a joint resolution and whereas throughout the next 5 years Congress continued to pass joint resolutions designating one week in March as women's history week authorizing the president to issue a proclamation urging people to celebrate
the contributions of women in US history and whereas the first women's history month was proclaimed in March 1987 been by President Ronald Reagan with Proclamation 5619 and States from the earliest times
women's women have helped shape our nation historians today stress all that women have meant to our national life but the rest of us too should remember with pride and gratitude the achievements of women throughout American history those achievements span
a wide range of human endeavor they have not been attained without the quiet courage and sacrifice of millions of women some famed most not and whereas President Reagan's Proclamation continued women have established
themselves in business and in professions and today women outnumber men as undergraduates at our colleges and universities women's have fought women have fought for moral and social reform and have taken part in and led many great social and political
movements of our land women have founded many philanthropic cultural educational and charitable institutions women have served our nation with Valor and distinction during wartime nursing the wounded piloting airplanes performing vital jobs in
defense plants women have forged a place for themselves in public life serving on the Supreme Court in Congress in and in cabinet post becoming ambassadors and holding Federal Executive post that affect the lives of every citizen and
some even become County Commissioners it doesn't say that but I thought I'd throw that in now therefore be it proclaimed that the seminal County Board of County Commissioners do pro do hereby Proclaim March 2025 as women's history month and
call upon All seino County residents to honor the sacrificial service and Leadership of women in our County who joyfully serve their fellow citizens families businesses Charities educational institutions and houses of worship be it proclaimed that the board
of County commissioners of some County Florida that the proclamation be spread upon the official minutes by the clerk of the Circuit Court in Seal County adopted this 25th day of February 2025 second motion second all those in favor
I I opposed like sign see none carries unanimous thank you very much commissioner you're welcome are both Commissioners we will U Dominique I want to make sure there is no public comment forms on any do a picture with the folks were here we will that's what he's doing
we're going to get to that all no sir I didn't think so very good so we will move on to anybody that desires to have a fo photograph taken on the proclamations please join us down the floor and that will conclude our consent
agenda thank you very much for revisit here now doent [Applause] okay all right next we'll move on to our regular agenda items this is item 25
this will be presented by Mr John slot Public Works director Mr slot thank you Mr chairman U Board of County Commissioners I'm John slot the director of public works for the county and I'd like to um
before we ask for your uh authorization we'd like to give you a brief presentation on Hillview and I'd like to introduce our project manager on this Joe lefaso Joe thank you Mr director welcome sir thank you Mr chairman and your name and address for the record my
name is Joseph lefaso my address is 100 East 1 Street Sanford Florida thank you good morning Mr chairman fellow Commissioners my name is Joseph lefaso I am a professional engineer working with seminal County Public Works today is my privilege to give this presentation on
the Hillview Drive drainage Improvement project resolution of necessity as an agenda for the presentation we will have a brief project overview a project timeline review uh discussion of the resolution of necessity and our requested action so this project began in 2016
with resident complaints about flooding along Hill viiew Drive when seminal County staff went out to investigate they concluded that the solution would be a CIP project to address these concerns the project would have three objectives roadway safety pedestrian connectivity and storm water control to
help pay for the funding of the construction of the project County staff secured a FEMA hmgp Grant in December of 202 to in order to accomplish its objectives the project would convert the roadway to a curb and gutter section add storm inlets and structures which would then
pipe the storm water to a new storm water Pond it would also install sidewalks for pedestrian connectivity these improvements would require between 50 and 60 ft of RightWay to date the project construction cost is at $4.8 million $3.9 million of that amount will
be covered by the hmgp grant to review the timeline in August of 2019 19 the work order for this project was approved immediately thereafter design and permitting began for this project by June of 2022 design and permitting had completed the project
was let for construction in September of 2022 on March 4th 2023 construction began the first part of the project to be constructed was the storm water Pond and that was actually completed in July of 2023 however in August of 2023 when construction moved to Hillview Drive
itself for those part of the improvements it was discovered that there was RightWay discrepancies on the corridor from that day in August of 2023 till now February 2025 County staff has reached out to the owners of the properties affected by these discrepancies in an attempt to negotiate
the purchase of the portions of the parcels that were impacted to create that 60ft RightWay Corridor although they met with some success there are 17 Parcels those that are listed here now in this item for which those negotiations unfortunately proved fruitless now the important thing to
remember at this point is that one year from now in February of 2026 the current grant funding timeline expires FEMA has indicated that they are willing to give one further extension for 6 months to the middle of July 2026 however after that point no further
extension would be granted and that 3.9 out of 4.8 million would be lost so where does that leave us at this point well the project in order to go forward requires property to be acquired to create the right right away necessary for the improvements we've had a year
and a half of negotiations which have stalled and now if we need to accomplish this project in a timely manner to keep that $3.8 million in funding we will have to proceed with a resolution of necessity in order to use the eminent
domain power to acquire that property without risk of losing the Grant in a timely fashion um the eminent domain power is entrusted by the people to the government in order to necessitate the public good but it's not a power that should be taken up lightly because of
the Grave implications of its use but in order to ensure that the product is for the public good there are five points which must be considered the first point is availability of an alternate route Hillview Drive is an existing road that
sits situated centered between the structures on either side of it moving Hillview Drive would not avoid any of the RightWay takings because the majority of the road is on private property and addition moving it would not actually increase the ability to address the concerns but rather would
cause additional impacts to those adjoining Parcels so there is no alternate route that's going to avoid these takings secondly the cost of the project we already discussed the amount of money that would be lost from the grant should we not be able to proceed forward in a timely manner with the acquisition but
the construction cost is based upon those Elements which are needed to address the objectives of the project if we're going to do what the project intends then we have to pay to construct the curb the gutter the sidewalks the storm pipes the ponds that's a fixed cost but as to the amount of money that would be spent to acquire additional
property this design has been made as narrow as possible to minimize the amount of property that would have to be acquired in order to house those improvements so it is the design that would most reduce the cost of property acquisition in order to make this
reality come to life the third is environmental factors currently the water just washes off the road into the road size causing flooding this project would be designed to keep that roadway runoff within the right of way and off of adjacent property in
addition by piping it to the storm water Pond that pond is going to provide some treatment where currently that water just sits untreated on the roadside so there is an environmental benefit to this Project's existence on this Corridor and all these improvements have been reviewed and permitted by the St John's River Water Management District
in order to ensure complies with all necessary regulations fourthly is longrange planning within the seal County comprehensive Plan update of 20123 there is an objective drg1 deficiency correction within that objective are two
policies Dr 1.2 deficiency correction and Dr 1.4 RightWay acquisition this Hillview Drive project aligns with both of those policies thus fulfilling seminal County's commitment in its long-range planning for infrastructure Improvement fifthly is safety again the entire basis of this project was a
safety Improvement to the corridor it was going to improve that safety by separating the vehicles from the pedestrians by adding sidewalks it was going to improve safety by reducing flooding and it was going to improve roadway safety by getting the storm water off of the road into the drainage system as efficiently as possible so
this Project's entire nature is safety driven so at this time given these considerations County staff would request the authorization to make binding written offers to property owners and to request to adopt an au authorized the chairman to execute a resolution of necessity for the Hillview
Drive drainage Improvement projects for the partiel so listed this concludes my remarks and I thank the board for its time thank you very much is there anyone here from the public that wishes to speak on this matter yes sir one speaker
Joseph lofaso and that was myself I was uh not that's why I was asking the question director slot it sent all who wish to speak without exception so I didn't wish a clerical error at the last moment now you know why I asked we love Engineers yeah I was going to say
typical engineer follows the instructions to oh great okay well I'll close public input on that item uh and move to board Direction This is commissioner Constantine's District or any questions by the board no questions
Mr chairman I I I just want to congratulate the project manager because also he was very judicious in his report very accurate very complete um but short and sweet thank you very much um this uh
I will move that we that we U allow the authorization to make a binding written offers to property owners and request to adopt and authorize the chairman to execute a resolution of necessity for the Hill
Drive Hillview Drive drainage Improvement project Parcels 101 102 104a 104 B and C 106 109 110 111 112 113 114
115 116 118 119 and 120 second motion second any further discussion all those in favor I carries unanimous thank you both very much we can sincerely appreciate your presentation this morning next item up is going to be our
work session this is going to be Mr Jose Gomez development service director and Eliza leano from Kimberly horn our consultant all right good morning Commissioners Jose Gomez development services director as you'll recall early last year we adopted Our Land
Development code based on our Envision 2045 comprehensive planning updates uh this is the continuation of that work that work has never really finished so we are uh continuing with our work sessions this year uh to continue to update Our Land Development code based on that Envision 2045 as well as input
from uh staff the commission and citizens on some other areas um so with that uh this is the work first work session and I'm going to turn over to Alisa Juliano to give you the presentation good morning everyone morning good morning welcome thank you
for having me um thank you for continuing to come back happy to I was going to say I'm not an engineer and I did not fill out a public comment form but I think my name is on the agenda so it's okay um uh so uh as as Mr Gomez mentioned we
are um working on your Land Development code again so the the question we want to make uh make clear that we answer is we just adopted adapted and adopted an update what are we doing back um so to describe the nature of that update there
were big changes and small changes um the biggest change was that everything was reorganized so the zoning chapter was reorganized to make it clearer and more understandable and we always Envision that essentially as a platform where now that the code is more understandable it might result in the
identification of more needed updates so that is that is one reason we're here um there were targeted and important updates that were made as part of that last um last Land Development code adoption which included the establishment of the County's first mixed use Zone um but those were fairly
narrow and much of the code was substantively not changed um so the some of of the um impetus for these particular updates are we adopted a or you adopted a um update to the comprehensive plan recently which
um happened after these updates were envisioned and adopted so the updates to the comprehensive plan then result in updates to the Land Development code there's also been issues identified by the community or by staff that need to be addressed some of those have been uh noted since the update and some of them
were were noted at the very end of the last update but too late to be included so this is the timeline we're here at the first board work session on this topic um we have not started drafting the code updates yet we wanted to get your input both on whether some of these
items should move forward and um for the for all of the items get guidance on the major issues before we start drafting the details so that starts with this work session we will come back with at least one more work session to um to deal with
issues that are also envisioned to be addressed during this update and potential more followup after that we expect to be doing the actual code drafting over the summer and then coming back to you in the fall with the adoption hearings So today we're going to talk
about five things uh fence permitting I4 signage General signage the PD approval process and the centers and corridors overlay there is a um an extensive list of topics that are going to be addressed in future work sessions so you see that
here from affordable housing to open space to um walls and fences uh and a number of other issues that have been identified having to do with adus resoning criteria impervious surface ratio among
others so I won't blab you with all of that you'll see it you'll see it again later so let's start with fence permits um so right now a permit is required for any fence or fence repair that goes that happens within seal
County the maximum height of uh rear fences is 6 1/2 ft for the side and the rear it's has to be lower in front yards there are a number of peer jurisdictions that don't require fence permits under certain conditions
primarily for um single family Properties or uh or duplex properties so for instance in Orlando pelis in Hillsboro County a permit is not required for fences that are 6 feet or less and made of a material other than Mason and block the reason for that Mason Mar block um issue is because it
is more structural and starts to starts to bring in building code and at that point you really do need a permit regardless of how wonderful the the wall is um Longwood you know within the county does not require permits under the same conditions um Walton County Palm Bay or other counties that don't
require fences under these conditions as well as Bradford and pulk um now it's not true of all jurisdictions we do have some neighboring jurisdictions that do require fences under these circumstances such as orange fusa fuchia and Lake are similar to where the county is now in terms of requiring Fen permits under all
conditions so the recommendation coming out of the review of these neighboring counties is to no longer require fence permits for single or two family Residential Properties of course that still means that that doesn't get them out of complying with the code they still have to comply with all of the elements of
the Land Development code and this again would only apply similar to the peer jurisdictions to um Fen is made of wood vinyl or PVC we've also had comments that we maybe should add aluminum to that list which is kind of the traditional rot iron fencing um that we
could consider adding as well uh permits would still be required under certain conditions for instance in corner Lots you're dealing with sight sight distance issues which have to do with traffic safety when you're next to a lake or a wetland there's obviously concerns there where um additional
review might be required um and certain types of easements there's also uh accompanying this as a recommendation I mentioned earlier that the current fence height for side and rear is 6 and 1/2 ft if we are going to go with this um eliminating the permit
requirement the recommendation is to make that six feet so that we don't put residents in the situation of having that ambiguity of if they're you know at 63 now they need a permit so uh easier just to make that that consistent with the the permit requirements because when
they go above 6 fet that again throws them into building code requirements so that's not something that the the county would be able to wave the fence permit on so if we keep if we keep the side and rear at 6 feet it's not really a significant difference um but it is going to keep them out of that building
code issue so what are the benefits why are we talking about this well it's essentially um reducing the burden on on the County's residents as well as um efficiency from a government standpoint to reduce staff time devoted to
processing these permits and we also see situations where residents are getting a code violation for not having a permit even if everything else is in compliance so um eliminating those code violations now one of the challenges could be that if they don't go through if residents don't don't go through the permit
process then they might um um unfort um incidentally have a code violation because they don't realize that they're violating the code however what we see is that's happening anyway um and in in in addition to those you have the violations that are merely not having the permit
um so that is um that's fence permits I'll keep moving um and hold questions to the end unless Mr chairman as we go through each one of them I don't know if it's going to be easy to go back to the fence so I'm just have a very quick question on fences okay why don't we is
that going to serve everybody the best just stop after each okay let's just have a short Q&A after each of these so go ahead commissioner Constantine well the only thing you mentioned it that there might be some problems when on if we don't do the permitting on fences
going into water bodies how do we I think that's the way you were trying to say it or going into yeah so how do we Rectify that or ensure that we're not having a problem there whether it be navigation or depending upon what it's
made of uh pollution you know so so um what we're what we're saying is that while permits for most fences for residences wouldn't be required if you are next to a water body or a wetland you would be required to get a fence permit so you would go through that permitting process and avoid any
environmental issues that might result um of not going through the process I didn't hear that I just wanted to clarify thank you Mr lockart that was one of the questions that I had during my briefing is that you know word will get out very simply seal County no longer requires
fence permits it will be it will be reduced that period and um while I agree frankly I mean I do agree with it cuz I I don't know very many people who actually pull the permits to begin with but um that's
true but I do worry about communicating what would be required for Corner lots and Lakeside and what we would have to I think be very diligent about
communicating what is required because someone's going to wind up very unintentionally violating code and and so is the building
permit at six feet or the building department permitting at six feet is that something that we just did or is that something that is building code across the state that's building code issue across the state right okay which I'm sorry which brings
up another question um um what about fences around swimming pools isn't there a requirement by the building codes that there has to be some sort of fencing around building codes what is screening yeah screen or screen or something like that but you know I'm
I'm just trying to make sure that we're not unintended missing something here in the whole process I think it all comes down to communication and making sure that we're diligently getting the word out and I'll add this is why we're here
so we haven't drafted it yet we we love more recommendations commissioner her so I actually think the commun the word for the communication plan is proactive diligent communication and that's the the GameChanger is that we can't be
communicating after the fact so we know who all the constituents are around this we need to get it out to them before they get it out to the rest of the market and it's not our message uh I'm the one that asked for the aluminum to be added because in uh at the risk of um getting called out by commissioner
lockart in the uh gated neighborhoods we're required to use the aluminum fencing and so it in essence is the same thing as a vinyl fence we just got to get it in there um but I thought the plan was great I think it gets us out of the bureaucracy that we're currently
stuck in and makes us friendlier to do business in so my take is as I shared with some of you during the briefing was it's got to be very clear what is actually going to trip a permit process
and be delineated very clear um and to the point of of commissioner lockart The public's only going to hear no longer need a permit to do offense um which then still includes our folks
from uh uh code enforcement to go out and verify etc etc etc so initially I don't know that you're going to cut back on that but I want to play The Devil's Advocate just one moment uh on on the made of wood vinyl and PVC um so chain link
fence I'm assuming would be a permitted at the right height require a permit me allowed allowed oh okay yeah no permit no permit correct which is a metal so what if I wanted to take old car hoods and doors
and build a fence out of it all the way down down both sides of my property out of that metal what prevents me from doing that under this code I have a neighbor who has done that by the way for the record um and they've integrated all of
those materials um into one structure it's it's quite a clck yeah so um you know under as written um we and we could add if we add chain link to this um to this list that would allow chain link
not metal so I do think it's important to be specific about what's allowed without a permit now of course if there's nothing in the Land Development code that prohibits that situation um then it would still be allowed with a permit it would just be go through that process so same question if I wanted to
go out to the landfill and scavenge a lot of plastic remnants and just build a fence out of leftover plastic debris that the citizens decided to get rid of in this community and build a fence out of it uh um those are the kinds of things of
course those are obscure rare events but we got to know it's going to happen I mean it's going to happen sooner or later that we could explicitly exclude salvage or require new materials I'm not sure if that would be the desire but I don't know because arguably you could
buy a used fence from somebody and re-erect a used fence or um it's just something I've contemplated since our briefing and going over how we make this is as as clear as possible and not have some poor citizen
that's next to somebody that says I don't need a permit and here's the reason why I can make it out of vinyl PVC wood you know whatever yeah and I would just uh request what is the flavor of the board in terms of is it that something that you don't want to see where somebody is using scavenged
material is that a concern so give us a little bit of feedback on whether this is something that you want to make sure that somebody would have to come in for a permit or whether it's something that you know if it's a material very similar to wood or vinyl or whether it's something that we could have some
discretion on so just want to get a little bit of on that sure for me I don't know that it's reused or recycled materials so much I have a a concern with it's what could likely happen and we've heard
commissioner lockard's point she's got a neighbor that's has something similar to that I mean beauty is in the the beholder some people like violation vinyl fences some people like metal fences some people like wood fences and maybe I'm a guy that says you know what
I like the appeal and arts of just going to get a bunch of old car parts and make a fence out of it uh it meets the criteria the materials but we have residents that are obviously not happy probably on three sides um with such a fence but and I
think that's the danger we get into so although I support this and I believe government should be less involved in these kind of matters I don't know that we are going to cure all these you know code calls building calls interpretations of what is allowed and
not allowed unless we get pretty darn specific and I'm not sure how we do that I mean our council could work with building department and so forth um you know maybe somebody wants to build a fence out of old guitar yeah I don't know yeah the athe the
aesthetic question comes into play what painting pictures on on on a fence hey I've got pictures on fences of my house be careful you know exactly what commissioner so I have one so the question is what's the
flavor I want fencing materials to be used for fences so we are here not to protect the person that wants to do that in a neighborhood but to protect the neighborhood it's for the greater good that I serve so I don't want to prevent
prohibit Salvage if you can find a decent fence somewhere in a trash pile go for it but if you're finding trash to build a fence out of that is a different situation and I can't imagine we can't find words that would put that more eloquently into the code okay um I I
just think we have a bigger issue in terms of property values for the surrounding neighbors and and I'm not willing to harm them yeah and and that's and that's a point exactly lockart and commissioner Constantine now go ahead commissioner Constantine's already got a thought okay
I I you know I think to add to that it's public safety and public health true those are the two things that I would if you find a way to incorporate that as to you you know you can't do that you know I think that's what we're all trying to get to correct that you know I mean I
don't care if they go in and Salvage something and build it as long as it's you know it's not public health problem and a public safety problem um and quite frankly I you know I hate to you know one eye you it's in the eye of Beholder
Beauty that's the scary part when you talk about Aesthetics sure so I don't really want and that's not there is nothing about Aesthetics in the building code so you know we're talking about public safety and public health well then you're getting into design standards to that point commissioner
lockart right um and I I think a lot of the neighborhoods that were talking about may already be in homeowners associations that would dictate that it has to be a certain material and fencing I hate to say that for me my answer is probably going to be it
depends um because I have seen some some really creative lovely fencing that's very artistic that's made out of materials that's not fencing and um and especially if you live on a lot that is not in a traditional
neighborhood and you're you know not offending a neighbor why shouldn't you be able to to do something artistic and creative on your own property if it's not you know harming life health safety issues so um so I'm going to be and it
depends and and I don't know from a from a code violation perspective that the neighbor that I'm referencing has a lot of other um issues right now in addition to the fencing material um that I believe is already an open code
violation I think what they have done is considered a violation currently so maybe that wording already exists and we just don't know it yeah right what what I was going to add before commissioner
lockart stated what she stated which I agree beauty is in the eye of the beholder um you know my recommendation would be normal commercially acceptable fencing materials etc etc however if you
want something built out of all car parts or recycled materials or something a process where they could come in but the problem with that is now you're developing design standards in my opinion um I'm not sure we want to be in the design standard business because that goes back to the beauty is in the
eye of the beholder some people like metal some people like Woods some people like Jane link some like vinyl um I would think something along commercially acceptable available in the marketplace fence products um I don't know that
somebody's going to develop a a recycled water bottle uh fencing product uh unless it's bolded into a PVC panel um just a thought so those are the concerns I have you I support it 100% we don't want to exchange one
problem for the other in my opinion yeah and just to clarify nothing that being proposed would allow any fences that are not allowed today it just changes the process and I think this all this conversation helps us in drafting it well with that said if we're going to
update the policy if there's anything else in the existing policy this would be the time to update it indeed yeah thank you okay okay U moving on to if for signage um so uh currently the sign code
does not allow for pole signs taller than 15 ft um there are some existing taller uh signs near I4 interchanges either due to grandfathering um or being measured off depends on where you measure it from or variances um our
understanding is that there have been variances granted to this in the past so the recommendation is to look at three intersections State Road 46 interchange Lake Mary Boulevard and 434 um interchanges with I4 to consider a
quarter mile around those intersections for allowing taller pole signs in the future um up to a maximum of 40 ft why consider this process um the intent would be to reduce variance requests and Associated staff and board time as well as to ensure that all
applicants are being treated consistently um who are requesting uh something different than the standard 15 ft is that it for yes sir any questions commissioner lockart um something that I brought up in my briefing was if I am
someone who does owns a property that does not happen to be at one of those identified interchanges what was the rationale that we used to select those and not select others and um the answer I got at the time didn't didn't
really make a a lot of sense to me so I want to make sure that if we are picking some and not others that we have a very clear rational reason for that and that it can be identified because I guarantee you somebody that has a property at another interchange is going to say well
you did it for these you know why not mine um so that if that's just something that we could make sure that we're on top of that' be helpful and we can certainly do an additional analysis before proceeding with this anyone else
my question was during the briefing what happens if fot comes along and erects a sign outside these specifications that blocks the existing sign for a retailer and we did follow up on that and the um the county doesn't have any
control over FD signage so um presumably this would provide those commercial entities with more visibility than the existing regulations but the county doesn't have any discretion to regulate fdot which I understood which we talked about in our briefing I think there's
got to be some way and make sure that there's the ability for our business that resides here by going by our guidelines to file some kind of grievance to be
considered and my business as a victim of this and this is why I know this so well is after I obeyed with not only the county and then the city codes to ere signage on one of my businesses I then
had fot come through nine months later and erect signs that block two-thirds of them which defeated the purpose of me spending tens of thousands of dollars to even erect the signs in the place that I did um and that's a concern that we don't always know but if there's some
kind of process uh maybe we check with f dot uh to really figure out if there's any collaboration I'm sure there's a book engineering book says this sign has to go at this height blah blah blah blah blah um I won't tell you how I cared the one
at my business but anyway um I think there needs to be some kind of appeal process or collaboration process with the other jurisdictions and rightfully so I mean f do and those need to put you know evacuation signs up you know directional
signs informational signs and so forth but I'd like to see something considered if we can in that realm okay next please okay um General sign code updates um so for the last two we were
really looking for direction on on where to move forward this is more of just a high level update on what we're doing with the sign code um the one of the substantive changes is or the major substantive change is taking The Pedestrian oriented um signage that's
now available in the Oxford overlay and making those available countywide Oxford overlay was one of the first areas in the county that really looked at more of a mixed use walkable environment and now that we've got mixed use zones elsewhere in the county it makes sense to extend those signage options to other areas of
the county um a lot of the other changes are really just language changes to make the the code more modern and understandable so right now the code refers to point of sale signs really they're just talking about commercial signage um and there's not necessar NE reason to to make that distinction um
there's also some seeming contradictions between prohibition on freestanding signs whereas ground and poll signs are committed are permitted and really technically those are the same thing um and then uh one other language change is right now the code refers to Billboards
as Outdoor Advertising Signs the really the common language that everyone uses to refer to those is Billboards so um our recommendation is to update that so that it's more understandable to the public um we also are um looking through the code to make sure that it's compliant uh with the the federal case
law um and that's about it in terms of the sign code any questions Zena thank you okay um PD approval process so I'm going to start here with an update actually on what happened in the in the last update
that was approved um last January so there were significant significant updates to the PD ordinance back um in the last process which were adopted in January of 2024 one of those for instance is the the PD section has always had a list of
benefits to the county but the language before said may include some of the following benefits now it says must include so the um the code now specifies it has more teeth in it in terms of what those benefits would be to the county
the list of benefits was also revised and updated there were also requirements added that um that PDS must meet or exceed Arbor ordinance so the PD can't be used to avoid Arbor ordinance um requirements as well as minimize
Transportation impacts there's a new requirment that applications have a justification narrative that says why they can't do what they're trying to do Under the existing code and why the benefits to the county can't be achieved under the existing code so again really putting more on the applicant to prove
why this is going to be beneficial to the county and they're not just using it to kind of skirt existing code requirements there are also new requirements specific for residential PDS to essentially um deal with address improved Design Within those including
that Lots less than 45 ft must be rear loaded uh as well as requ putting additional requirements on the uh types of open space that have to be provided within those uh residential PDS so with that we did identify um
collectively with staff a couple of changes that would be beneficial to add uh additional areas where we don't want the PD to provide flexibility to avoid existing standards essentially um so one of those is the buffer requirements the
buffer code already has a considerable amount of flexibility and um we believe that the that can really address the situations that would come up within a PD and so there's not a need to have additional waivers to buffer requirements within the PD process another addition there is that
the PD process can't be used to avoid overlay standards overlay standards are typically written to deal with a specific geographic area and we don't want people applying for PDS specifically to avoid those overlay standards and finally um that that as we
mentioned we updated that list of Greater benefits criteria um one of the proposals is to add to that list the native plants pollinators and Wildlife corridors as a greater benefit option so not that PDS have to do that but that it qualifies as one of the greater benefits
um if they choose to do that so with that um I'm going to I'm going to ask the question and then add additional context so um the question to you all is are there other other um additions that you see a need for to the PD process understanding that it was
recently updated and you may not have had that many chances to review projects under the new process um also the other context that that we want to add here is that in the next work session we will be talking about updates to zones that are allowed in the ldr that would
potentially push more projects away from the PD process and towards a more conventional process by allowing smaller Lots within ldr but with more requirements generally similar to what you would get out of the PD process so
um with those caveats the question to the board is are there other changes to the PD process that need to be considered as part of this I will start commissioner conin or work our way back down goad okay well maybe not specific
changes but on this Das I have heard conflicting sometimes uh discussion as to whether you know we want the staff to be negotiating some improvements with PD and then up here sometimes I hear others
wanting to say well this is not the appropriate place um and it should be staffed and some people say staff shouldn't be doing it this is the appropriate place but then it's not unseemly or that you know I've heard of that word or maybe I haven't but that's what I got out of it un seemly that we
are making yeah yeah that was the vibe that we're making um that we're making um you know changes up here and that's not really the place so maybe a I you know I I I don't want to be so specific
that we don't have flexibility but you know maybe some sort of process as to how we go about cuz I am big I believe strongly that if a development comes in and wants to do PD it's normally because they want obviously it's because they
want something that benefits them usually it's more density so there has to be a a a you know a real intent on our purposes to ensure that if they're getting that that the benefit to the
community imunity is greater than if they it was just straight zoning that we're getting something the citizens are getting something for that density and that density will be um valuable because of the other
things that we're getting so where that happens is the question you know I mean and I don't mind it happening here although I don't think we're the experts and sometimes you know I mean off the top of our head is not the greatest place but there are some things
that we want to do but I also and I do want to empower the staff to be able to do that under the conditions that they understand what would be beneficial to that community so that's that's just a comment that's my comment okay right down the line commissioner lockart and
commissioner her yeah I I hear what you're saying um and I think I'm going to be very careful about how I how I thread this needle I think we are still new in in
the additional updates that have just been added and I think our staff is still new in working with some of these updates um we have new staff members also um and I think we are going to need
to work together to find that happy medium that you're talking about for to allow staff to have the flexibility to to help get things together before they maybe get here um because otherwise you
do wind up with that back and forth that that can go it can go south or we could have maybe done something even better if we' taken more time um i' I'd like to live through a couple of
more and see how it works s and and be you know kind of be gracious with everyone through these next few because we're knowing that it is new um I think one of the things we have to be very careful about and I would um ask the county manager to to think about how to communicate this to
staff the criteria that we established as these are the things that you you need to have two right like pick two from the Chinese menu um those have to be legit it like you
can't try and shoehorn in something because you have to pick two and so you know H well this sounds good we we'll we'll come up with a way to make that one work yes we want to be helpful to people who want to develop in the county but we don't want to help them get
around the reason that we put these criteria in place so it's a balancing act that I think the county manager and the County Attorney working with their respective staffs are going to have to work their way through until I'm willing
to say that I want to change it yet commiss I think the work you've done addresses all the major concerns that we've dealt with in the five years that I've been sitting here um I think it is too early to add others because we may by adding others undo the work we've
already done because it's not been tested um the push to move from PD to Conventional is appreciated I think that solves a lot of issues that if the conventional worked really well we wouldn't have the need to go to to um
PD I would I am the one that raises the issue about negotiating from the Das I've been very open about that and I think I think commissioner Constantine you said it perfectly is that we are not the experts and we could actually be asking for things to be done that are not the best possible solution and I've
seen us ask for things to be done that everybody knew could be done done so they said yes to it and then they knew it wasn't wasn't feasible so we got nothing um and I would also throw out there that I think one of the things that happens when the developers know
that they're come going to come in and and have a negotiation that takes place from the dis they're going to hold back on staff they're not going to give staff every single item that they could give them and that's where I want it to be given and I would do that if I were them I do that in negotiations all the time
cuz I know who's coming at me for just a little more to get the win and we hold the win back so I I do think that talking about it openly and I appreciate you bringing it up because I I would have forgotten to is really healthy but
I I think we all want the same goal we want that benefit for the county and the neighbors and all of that and not to see them erode the way that they have eroded over the past 5 years some of the rules and District 5 has been a victim of it there's no doubt about
it yeah so I concur with pretty much everything that's been said I've been very vocal about staff level reviews from the standpoint of equal treatment under the law there has been numerous occasions in the I don't
know eight or nine years I've either been on pnz or sitting here as a commissioner watching approvals for a PD that was given latitude on this project but not this other project when arguably
they're basically identical um and that sometimes is a change over in staff other words it's two or three years later and there's a new staff member that didn't do things that and a lot of this interpret it's it's the
structure has to be rigid enough that we give Clarity to staff on where their ability to make decisions are where they start and where they end and be consistent across the board the problem
however is when you get into where this county is going to face over the next 30 and 40 years is Redevelopment now it's hard to have a conventional zoning process when you're a County who's pretty much buil out you're trying
to plug things in for redevelopment in areas that arguably may be commercial industrial may be Montage of stuff that have entitlements from way far ago and then the one slide this whole
ideology of you can't treat the entire County as one I agree I would love for us to have no more traffic in this County but the reality is our Mobility fee is set up in
sectors purposely for the mobility that exists so to have this Vision that we would ever reduce traffic in the spine Corridor of this County on 1792 Ronald Reagan Boulevard and that whole Center
area I don't know how you get there if you're trying to do Redevelopment and do the mobility fee that you can support for the fees that you charge so I think the PD has to be looked at slightly
different on what this board is really trying to drive this County to look like both based on its Mobility fees based based on F future Economic Development and based on what lands available and what arguably will be mainly Redevelopment in the core spine of the
county an example is I don't know that you can treat a PD proper the same way on say 1792 and Ronald Reagan or 1792 and 434 the same way that you would treat a
PD say out on Orange Avenue uh or somewhere else in the county I think that's where we sometimes get into the weed and I know that's a more complicated model to try to figure out but if you're going to try to do one siiz fits all we may hamstring the
Redevelopment Corridor of this County and I want to make sure that doesn't happen so that's my that's what my concerns are Mr chairman if I could could I add something sure so I know one of the um priorities of this board when I came here a couple years ago was look at this whole process not only the PD
but the development review process and Mr Gomez um has has done that he's revamped it has uh we have gotten uh we've received I should say a lot of positive results um working with our community members our businesses we've
heard a lot of your concerns about P PDS so having um Jose now over the development services he understands that so he actually gets he's involved um immensely in every project that comes through and I want to thank Kate Lor County attorne attorney's office because what they have done with bringing Miss
borker on board she's involved they work hand inand and to ensure that um that just like this if we're doing a PD we're getting uh something out of it as a greater benefit and good for the community in there so I agree with some of the comments we made is like with these new changes that we've made let's
go through it um as you know we work things things out and then if we see some issue we know what to bring to the board and and what we can handle uh at a staff level I've always said this to m Mr Gomez if anything's in question what do we do we bring it right to you all um
to make that decision right yeah and I concur completely to to the point of the spine of the the county is bringing a benefit to the community so is an abandoned strip mall where drug activity takes place and is
derel should it remain because they can't move forward in a PD process because we've got so many oversight things and requirements it can never be developed into anything tangible that it's affordable to develop and that's all I'm saying I would argue it's a benefit to the community to get it on
the tax roll clean it up make it a viable Community once again and I think that's where we where we're going to struggle a little bit on how we mold and figure that for certain parts of the County uh obviously in my district district 2 and
probably a majority of commissioner delari in the rural area just an non issue I mean it's just not going to have a PD out there I mean probably not in my lifetime anyway but um but in the core and other districts it it's going to be a problem Mr
chairman if I could just say that um you know I my concern with PDS was that it wasn't what you're suggesting because I believe in redistricting I mean in in Redevelopment is our greatest opportunity to improve this community
right um we're it's going to happen I've been through it way back in the 90s with alod springs and and the changes so things will things will change for the better right and we have to be flexible and that's why we also have to never
take away the opportunities that might exist up at the Das even though sometimes you know um you you want to limit it but you need to have that but in the um in in Redevelopment I you know what we are talking about and and what
we the the difference is what we we've seen recently is just you know what is straight our residential coming in and wanting a PD because they can squeeze in a few more units here or there or something else like that and and that's
there is a difference between Redevelopment that and that's I think also the difference between when PDS are good in Redevelopment and when PDS are just useless for the citizens okay
agreed agreed that's why I think it's important if we're going to have a new PD policy it cannot be a one siiz fits-all there's got to be enough movement or delineation on portions of the county whether it's Redevelopment or new
development etc etc and I'll leave that in the hands of the experts to to figure that out but um that was my concern that we just don't kill Redevelopment and chairman I do have a followup question if appropriate um the
direction seems to be that we don't need big changes to the PD at this time um does that include the three bullets that we had mentioned on the previous slide in terms of these recommendations no those are good we're talking about the process more you ask for other y indeed
I just wanted to clarify because I asked great clar implied question but to to that point back to the spine of the county I have a strip mall dilapitated derli has not a single plant or piece of grass on it's all pavement
and concrete um two points on that I will add that one of the greater benefit criteria is crime prevention um so that may address that and um also prior to the last update again the county had no mixed use zone so every mixed use
project was forced to go to PD and that's no longer the case so um again we haven't seen I don't believe we there's we've seen an application under that process yet but hopefully there will be one soon great thank you anyone else see none and
with that we will go to our last section um core overlay Urban centers and corridors so this comes straight out of the comprehensive Plan update the um comprehensive Plan update uh significantly um re um reorg or not
reorganized sorry updated the centers and Corridor section of the comprehensive plan one element of that was the requ requirement that a core overlay um map be created within the Land Development code that actually came from this board because when you looked
at the um the urban centers and corridors overlay map you said gosh this covers a lot of area and not all of those areas are the same so we created within the comprehensive plan the opportunity for the board to essentially refine this map at the Land Development
code level in terms of where the biggest bonuses would be permitted and where lower bonuses would be permitted um again the intent of the urban centers and corridors is to encourage walkable uh compact Redevelopment properties within the
centers and quarters have access to increased densities and intensities and uh per the existing policy if any portion of the site is included then the full site is part of that Center and corridors overlay um as part of the the policy that was written within the
comprehensive plan essentially what it said is that the core over lay should be at a minimum the overlap between the centers and corridors and the core Mobility fee area within this map so that essentially is the area between I4 and 1792 as well as along
436 so when we overlay those two maps essentially what we get is this the orange area being the core overlay area now those Maps don't quite line up so we lined them up and that is um that's one reason we wrote at a minimum in the comp plan so that we're not strictly Bound by
that lay because if we were you would see Stripes along 436 distinguishing between the quarter acre and uh sorry quarter mile and the half a mile um we made those lines match uh which is well within the the policy that's written in the comprehensive
plan um of course not all of the land Within These centers and corridors which are defined off the major roadways are governed by the county with respect to land use so this map shows the properties that actually are affected because they're unincorporated and then um as we mentioned the policy
which is on the bottom right of this slide core over core area overlay which shall include at a minimum the urban quds and centers within the core Mobility fee area um allows for the the board to add now or at any time in the
future additional areas to that the one area that we had identified so far that might make sense to add would be this area of West 434 that's highlighted in the image um the reason behind that is that there is a uh we both looking at
the physical attributes of the area as well as um a septic to sewer concept plan which was done which recommended the ex expansion of sewer services to try to get people off septic and onto sewer within that area so the idea being that extension of more development
options to this area might incentivize some Redevelopment which um usually the private sector has to choose to connect to that sewer line even if that sewer line is provided down the street so some Redevelopment of those S sites might fund on the private side them connecting onto the sewer as well as create more
tax revenue for the county to fund and maintain um the expanded sewer system so that was the thinking there again the county um the board is not required to include that area and could add it in the future um or could consider adding it at this time and just a couple more
slides um so wanted to clarify that for mixed projects which would receive the maximum bonus available do have to go through a rezoning process in order to reone to mucd so they're not automatically gifted with these bonuses they have to go through a process there
are some projects within the missing middle overlay which could go forward without a rezoning but they're fairly narrow because they're based on the underlying zoning so if you have a low underlying zoning you're allowed one additional typology if you have a little bit more intense underlying zoning
you're allowed um a few more typologies and that uh doesn't nominally limit the V density but it effectively limits the density because you're not allowed to do apartment complexes um and then lastly the uh there is also a new compatibility policy that was adapted with adopted with the
last comprehensive Plan update we've already built a number of compatibility standards into the the recent code updates such as maximum height within 100 ft of uh res presential single family lots within the mucd um as well
as certain other compatibility policies but we do have the option as part of this process to further Implement that policy by adding more compatibility standards to either mu mm or any of the other um affected zoning districts and with that um this
presentation is complete and happy to take any questions um I would be in favor of including the West 434 Corridor my two cents on on that portion we'll start commissioner her work our way down I think you've actually done you I
think you've actually done everything we asked for it is exactly as we expected so I'm good with it I would also incl I I'm happy to include it I would defer to the district commissioner on that did District commissioner okay I'll be
I'll be brief you know I I agree with the 434 and the West Corridor we've talked about that before I think you know and and the other issues that you have brought up that will continue to be um discussed I just wanted to throw out
some more just to make sure that I'm not missing anything we you know we're going to have to have ongoing discussions of septic to sewer as we've talked about um we have landscaping and I did want to bring up and I have brought up to the
county manager um couple of things that have occurred recently CU these things are gr as we know you've said that this is a living breathing document couple of things uh just over and I was going to bring this up at the at our um at our uh
later on in my um discussion of my report but at the East Central Florida Ral planning Council um Awards Diamond Awards uh Maring County received an award concerning edible
landscaping and interesting enough you know that but it's part of the University of Florida's new development of Florida friendly Landscaping which also they had something at the last Florida Association of Count's meeting and U meeting with some of the the
doctoral um uh members of that thing when they they had have a new center for landscaping conservation planning so it pro puts landscaping and conservation together just something and I did pass it along to Joe I mean Jose excuse me
Joe I know a Joe Gomez so it's always hard I always want to say Joe please forgive me um and also you know we've we've continued to discuss in times again about as you said the buffer open space I think that's an ongoing discussion but one I wanted to bring up
and I've discussed with the county manager as and it's all what the C County man uh the county uh chairman has said in Redevelopment one of the things that I've always thought that
was sad when we didn't take advantage is that doing underground utilities you know when I was a child you know hurricane Donna came through Florida and that was like the only hurricane it was a big deal that was
1960 and I was a child and and they let me go out and look at go look at the hurricane you know that's how bad it was and for the record I wasn't born yet trying to get rid of me go look at the hurricane yeah
go play the traffic but the fact of the matter we all know the hurricanes have become more and more prevalent they're not going to stop and the fact is what is what is the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and not you know and expecting a
different outcome we we have polls all over the place when we do Redevelopment in this County we should be looking at underground utilities um throughout and and I mean in new development as well as
um Redevelopment because fact of the matter is the power companies get reimbursed no matter whether they put in polls or they put in underground utilities and it has been proven that
you're going to lose less energy uh usage and you're and it's safer for all the citizens to have underground utilities so I think we need to look at that as we're going through this Land Development code um and and consider the
um the opportunities that exist in there I don't know what the answer is I'm not the expert I'm just saying that something that we need to really consider as we start to go move forward Mr lockart um I think it definitely is something that I I would be open to
learning more about um in sitting down with a couple of folks um from are they progress or Duke now I keep forgetting Duke whatever um check every month I know uh I'm I I have FPL so I don't I
don't pay as much attention to Duke but one of their comments in having that discussion with them several years ago was that there are there are positives and negatives to both and that in when there's flooding and the W the lines are underground they have to wait for the
water to recede to get to the work that might need to be done um and that was that was actually I think problematic over in The aloa Lakes area um a couple of years ago when you have big old trees and you love them and you have above ground
power lines and poles it it is a mess and um but I I i' I would want to know the advantages and disadvantages of of both before going further on that commissioner that's we need research mhm I have nothing else I think we had
already gone to the end my hands are waving around with that we'll stand adjourn till 1:30 this afternoon thank you thank you so much
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good afternoon and welcome to the Border County Commission meeting here in seol County today's date is February 25th 2025 this is our afternoon session we've completed the morning session I would ask that each and every one of you please check your cell phones or any other electronic devices you have make
sure they're silence and respect of the proceedings today and the speakers that'll be presenting we're going to move to our public hearing agenda I will first look for proof of publication move second motion second all those in favor I I
oppos like sign see none carries unanimous uh please disclose each and every commissioner any expar communication that you've had mine has been submitted electronically chairman also submitted also submitted
also mine was also submitted electronically thank you very much we will now now go to the county attorney Miss Kate Lor for the rules of public participation good afternoon while the board welcomes comments from all persons with an interest in these proceedings Florida law requires that the board's
decision in quasi judicial actions be supported by competent substantial evidence presented to the board during the hearings on the applications competent substantial evidence is such evidence as a reasonable mind would accept is adequate to support a conclusion there must be a factual basis in the record to support opinion
testimony from both expert and non-expert Witnesses persons presenting testimony May rely on factual information that they present information presented by County staff information the applicant presented or on factual information included in the
county staff report to support their testimony all persons who Present written materials to the board for consideration must ensure that a copy of such materials is provided to the clerk for inclusion in the board's record of the proceedings the official minutes Mr chairman thank you Mr Lor uh if you're
here to speak on any of these matters today if you'd please grab a form in the lobby yellow form fill it out bring it up to the clerk at the front here miss Dominique she will put that and call us we'll call you up as the appropriate
time permits we will first start with a presentation by our staff on these items second we'll we'll invite the applicant if they desire to say or make any statements we will then go to the public for anybody that wishes to speak in favor or against the particular item
then we will go to rebuttal from the applicant if need be and then we will close and put it before the board for consideration the first item up today is item 27 6699 silven Woods Drive boat dockhouse this will be presented by
staff member Miss Kathy Hamill Miss Hamill excuse me can I have the clicker thank you hey hello hello I'm Kathy Hamill development services I'm presenting item number 27 this is for approval of a 3,448 squ foot boat dock and house at
6699 silven Woods Road this is a request to replace an existing boat dock that is the same square footage of 3,448 square foot and since the dock and house are over a th000 square ft it requires the board of County
Commissioner's approval the boat dock and house are on Lake silven this lake is a very shallow Lake it is a mean um depth is 7t and the maximum is 16 ft therefore the walkway is from the high water line to the platform is
540 um feet it's 4T wide so this constitutes 70% of the total square footage of the 344 the walkway is located 60 ft from the property line to the north and 60 ft from the property line to the South and
it is because of the length of the walkway it is 700 ft from the house on the north and 600 ft from the house on the south this request meets the criteria of 70.7 which ensures minimum impacts to
the lake and adjacent Property Owners by providing a turb barrier during construction setbacks that exceed our code requirements having less than 25% of the lakes with for clear navigation
and has obtained the required perit from FD we are requesting that the board accounting Commissioners approve the request for the 3,448 boat dock and house at 6699 silven Woods Road and I would be happy to answer any of your questions thank you
any questions for staff no seeing none is the applicant Mr Fleck here in desire to make any statements to the board I spoke to him this morning unfortunately he is unable to come this afternoon but he does have um someone from his staff here okay if that person would come
forward if they desire to speak anybody here to speak on Mr fleck's behalf seeing none we'll go to public comment do we have anybody here to speak on behalf or against this matter no sir seeing none we will go and close public
input we will go to the district commissioner commissioner her this is your district chairman I move to approve the request for a 3448 ft² boat dock house walkway on Lake located the west side of silven Wood's Drive approximately 2730 ft south of
State Road 46 more particularly known as 6699 silven Woods Drive second motion is second any further discussion seeing none all those in favor I carries unanimously thank you all very much thank you Miss Hamill next item is
number 28 Panther Street RightWay vacate this will be presented by Miss Caitlyn apgar and this is a continuance from a previous hearing Miss abgar hi good afternoon Caitlyn abgar planning and development
services applicants Joshua and Sarah Lewis have P petitioned seminol County to vacate and abandon an uncut portion of the public RightWay known as Panther Street formerly known as Aria Avenue in the Van Arsdale addition at Black Black Hammock
subdivision Panthers exists to the southwest of 1,000 Elm Street as a local 50ft rway not maintained by the county Panther Street Per County records is unimproved for the portion running along the southern border of 1000 Elm Street and then begins again as a 50ft rway
after the intersection of Elm Street to the east as a local a local Road not maintained by the county the existing ride of way as platted is 50 ft in length however for the length of lot 144 there only exists 25 fet of
RightWay the proposed subject area to be vacated is 6726 Ft in length and 25 ft wide with an overall area of 16,826 Ft the entirety of the area will be comp
conveyed to lot 144 1000 Elm Street because the parcel to the South was not include included in the original subdivision of the land Duke Energy required a 10ft wide East ement across the area to be vacated seal County engineering required a 25t
drainage easement which is over the entire area to be vacated the applicant has provided letters of no objection from all other applicable utility companies the purpose of the vacate per the application documents un file with the county is to retain the driveway INF
fense structures that are currently located within the RightWay vacating the RightWay will not affect access to to adjacent properties and therefore does not result in adjacent properties being landlocked this request complies with the requirements for vacating a right of
way under Section 35.1 184 of the seminal County Land Development code and the authority of sections 33 33 6.09 staff requests the board of County Commissioners adopt the resolution vacating and abandoning an uncut portion of the public RightWay known as Panther
Street in the van rdale Edition to Black subdivision thank you very much any inquiries from the board for staff thank you very much are the lewises here and wish to make any statement or their representative and if so please come forward and do
so name and address of the record please good afternoon Commissioners Philip capro 5200 South US Highway 1792 sweet 1000 Castleberry Florida 32707 I represent the Louis uh and have been assisting them through this process I would ask could you pull up the
vacated the the area that's going to be vacated want to make a couple points very clear for everybody so there's no questions um actually the one that showed the the neighboring piece perfect so if you look at the yellow side that's
the side that has been given over to the county as part of the RightWay the property to the South never subdivided and so it has never given over that 25t to the county as a result even though it's identified as a 50ft RightWay it's not really a 50ft
rway there's a 25ft rway that exists and a 25 foot RightWay that would exist if there was ever a subdivision of that property and it was given over to the county as a result the area that's being given as a uh that's sought to be vacated is the exact same area that
would be retained by enement um I know there's been questions in the past about water needs or perhaps if there was something drainage that was insufficient in the property and the answer would be if that was the case you would be in the same position whether or not it was a RightWay or an easement which is you'd have to figure out whose property you
were taking um so with that there's no reason not to uh approve and the statutes uh uh all the statutory requirements have been met uh the lewises have gone through the process with staff uh and been very patient getting to that point um and they simply
asked that the that the right of way be vacated and replaced with an easement great thank you very much anyone here from the public wish to speak on this item yes sir there are five speakers okay if you would call the first three if you all would line up on
this side of the room we'll try to get you all through I would ask in consideration of all of the citizens here today try not to duplicate your presentation keep it specifically to this item nothing other than this item
um and we'll try to get you in out of here as efficiently as possible okay if you'll read the first three names please Richard Robertson Tara Merritt and Michael prudi not mine okay Mr
Robertson Miss Meritt thank you my name is Richard Robertson I live at 971 Elm Street of and my main concern would be where I live I've had flooding in my house and I've spent couple thousands of
dollars repairing this flood through a drinage and I'm afraid the way the water continuously runs in front of my house I'm going to have potential problems earlier and I think that this could help
remedy if the if the uh if they make a situation where the water drains in that area and and I'm just concerned about the water raisin where we live at at this point and I just like the
um everybody to take a good look at Engineers Etc and determine the way things are going right now that this could be this remedy could be Pro you know could be taken care of before it becomes a real problem and um
that's about it okay thank you very much thank you and just just to be clear I want to make sure our staff is is correct this will still be retained as a drainage easement should the county need it right now I have a constant stream
understood we'll get to that a little bit later as your District commissioner I'll try to help you with that towards the end of this thank you thank you very much we have Miss Merritt good afternoon thank you for the opportunity today I'm ter Merit I live at 1580 Panther street that would be lot
149 with my husband since 2011 we are the applicant neighbors across on Elm on Panther he's home watching our seven-month-old hi uh so I'm here representing us today our position is to deny this request we live in Black Hammock for privacy and peace we keep to
ourselves we are reluctant to speak out as we want that to continue continue for our family but feel the need to speak up for our community and the impact your decision has by the applicants own admission they made improvements to their property without due diligence they've built structures exceeding this
25 fot sl50 fot uh RightWay in question plus uh possibly the neighboring property which we understand has pending litigation hence this matters before you in an effort to leave those improvements as is in my career situations like this usually come up when properties change
hands application for financing is made Andor improvements encroach upon easements or neighboring properties the sketch they provide shows this roughly point4 Acres they want to be granted given by the county uh a survey of the property of the land in question would possibly reflect the structures they
have built in the right of way and possibly on adjacent properties the stress seems to be made on this is only 25 ft but it's by 6725 ft which we believe amounts to again about4 Acres Our concern is any of these parties and properties involved at any point and
choose to sell their property hence why this these ride of ways exist to ensure the county is able to serve the community when and if it is needed without delay or litigation cost to our taxpayers in fact this particular property has been listed for sale in 22 and then withdrawn in 23 so should they
choose to sell again or neighboring Neighbors in the future we don't uh want any prevention or delays and litigation that's why we want this right of way to stay in place in closing our position is that you deny this request respectfully ignorance is not Bliss and should not be
rewarded we are disappointed in the lack of consideration for our side of the street and the property and Culver that we maintain due to the applicant structures forcing anyone who reaches the Dead End of Elm to use our Culvert and our driveways to turn around this would be setting precedence for Rural and maintained County Roads for
homeowners and developers to come to the county for land grabs and the applicants have already instructed or told staff in writing that they're okay with using the driveway their driveway or land as needed to place the drainage if ever needed but they would prefer it be moved to the southern aspect of what was the
50 Foot rideway so their attorney statement of the net difference to the county is zero sum other than the available uses of the property is exactly Our concern it would be a shame for our black hmet community who have waited many years for help with flooding issues to either not get the help or
have help delayed due to litigation if the county is not granted access or restricted access access by current homeowners or future homeowners thank you again for the opportunity your time and we hope this application is denied thank you m Merritt Mr bti good afternoon Commissioners I'm
Michael purui I live at 980 Elm Street in Ovito my property is to the South is this vacated Panther Street my property extends from Elm Street on the East to
Canal Street on the west so um only a portion of my Northern boundary is affected by this vacate uh we were in front of you uh on January the 14th you voted unanimous to deny the application
I'm asking you again to deny the application I I'd like number one I don't see any reason to be here on every hearing there is nothing new but number two I asked Caitlyn abgar if you could
put on the screen my survey which includes Panther Street which shows all the encroachments of by the lewises on Panther street she told me that I couldn't do that so I'd like to give you
half by 11 the survey Mr presi is we have to retain a copy is that copy we can retain that's good okay uh my survey started can we get that up on the overhead please oh you do have an overhead great
fantastic and by the way this is not another hearing that was denial it was a continuance of the original hearing Mr pudi oh I understood the hearing was new that you had to reargue everything again correct
reconsideration okay okay so if you see it um they have a dumping area right on Panther street that the extends into my property property they have a fence line that crosses Panther Street goes down into my property they have a gate a
vehicle gate a pedestrian gate they have signs up that says you will be bit by our dogs if you cross this line they have no permits to do any of this and I'm asking that the court uh the court
I'm sorry that the Commissioners deny um deny their application um there's there's more than just this at stake we have a great community at the
black hammocks everybody looks after themselves but we all have a water issue how it's going to get resolved I don't know it's going to get worse every day because of the developments around us
they just keep on more and more water on us and to give up any right away at this point in time I think is is not being responsible to the public and so I do request that you deny the application
thank you thank you sir next speakers Alicia prudi and Lawrence Capone Miss Pudi hello Alicia pursui 980 Elm Street oito I'm going to read this off my phone it's a little bit quicker and easier for
me yeah so good afternoon Commissioners just two weeks ago you denied the row of Panther Street I read the letter that was sent to you by Mrs Lewis to have this rehearing and found multiple M misrepresentations she said she's been using that driveway since
1981 when in fact she bought the property in 2017 te she also said that when she bought the property that they who the county or realtor told her that she owned the row I would like to know who told her
she owned the row I also cannot find any survey from her on the structures with the fence her structure fence and gate that occupy the row have never been permitted I don't think Miss Lewis understands it's not her land it's the County's land it belongs to SEO County
for their benefit whatever that is in an active need or a potential future need I know you discussed at the last hearing about the water levels in the Black Hammock my ground water level was surveyed last
year it has gone up 2 and 1/2 fet 9 fet since I moved there in 2009 during the summer months our 12 person capacity septic tank needs to be pumped out every 30 days the water engineers and wetlands experts which
I've hired and talked to say it's due to the water level in the black hammocks Rising while it may be unlikely a canal a ditch or a water water holding service who knows I do think it's short cited to give up a potential County resource that only is becoming more important each day
as development in and around the rural boundary continues I say you vote no thank you thank you hello council members name is Lawrence Antonio Capone I live at uh 16001 Panther street right across the way I
actually have two lots over there um I have the exact same issue pretty much as the neighbors have but similar to what lewises have because I have easements between my property and properties behind me um over the last two years obviously
like everybody else I've had an increase of a at least a foot and a half of water where one of my Lots was totally when I bought it no water whatsoever but now onethird of the lot every summer gets flooded I've had to address these issues
myself because I couldn't get anybody to help me to make that easement a drainage and carve out a drain all the way down to the main drain of elm to try to relieve some of my draining problems of course I had to get permission from the
back people who own that that say okay for their access to if they ever decide to go can I put that there it's taking a lot of personal time and I can't get any help from the city to try to resolve the problem and I think giving up
property you could give it to me I'll take the property on the other side if that's going to be the presidents of the of the city but I don't think you're taking in mind the entire community and how it's affecting the entire community on just a 25t piece of proper
well that's I know I'm I'm an engineer so I know what that can hold I know what it'll take to flow that water out it's going to take a lot of time effort and people to look at the exact problems to decide what is going to be the answer to
make the solution and giving up the state the property that the we own as the county without having that information I think is very premature thank you for your time thank you I
appreciate it and thank you for all your service J sure thank you any other speakers on this matter for or against no sir okay we'll close public input and we'll go to rebuttal from the applicant do you have a rebuttal sir a brief one and yeah the applicat would like to
speak okay we'll give you some latitude try to make it as efficient as possible I will try to be as brief as possible thank you um just a few points uh with respect to the reference to 1981 this property has some of the speakers know um because they've represented the
grandparents it was the grandparents property and it passed on to the lewises so they have been there cons consecutively since 1981 and um there should be no confusion about that to anybody that that lives in that neighborhood in that
area um with respect to everybody else's concerns um I would submit to this body that vacating the right ofo and maintaining an easement for specifically for drainage and utilities is actually a better use of the County's strength
because otherwise the right of way could be used as a road it could be used as other for other purposes other than the drainage which is apparently the primary concern of all of the neighbors so by making it exclusively uh for the use of of drainage and utilities you're
actually helping the neighbors rather than uh H hindering them against potential actions by the future commission with that said I know that Mrs Lewis would like to speak and address body so I'm going to ask her to come up at this time thank you all thank you hi everybody my name is Sarah Lewis
and I reside at 1000 Elm Street I just wanted to clarify a few things because there's been some misconception or I'm not sure what's going on but my grandparents owned this property we bought the property after they passed away and Mr pursui was actually their
attorney for the estate things went a little bit South we'll say so I had to get attorney myself to get the property long story short we've had the property since 2017 we've maintained that area of the RightWay when we bought the property
our surveyor from lantech his name was Rick my grandparents had the survey done by him prior he had us just like update the survey we'll say um so that we could buy the property and then when we built the garage I questioned him then why is
there a RightWay showing in this area we had a fence already up around the property where it is now as well as the driveway gate that opens and closes in The Pedestrian gate so it had existed since the 1980s um he told me that we were
grandfathered back that portion of our RightWay back in I want to say it was 201 13ish whenever the count or maybe it was 2002 I can't remember now but whenever you guys decided not to extend Panther street through there because they said it would never be done because
all the you know protected Wetlands through there so that's what he told us we Built Well we built the garage and remodeled the house with the premise that that part of the property would came back to us now we placed an egg stand out there and we did update the
gate because somebody hit the gate and knocked it over the entry gate and we redid the fencing because it it was old it was like dilapitated and everything so and we told them we were doing that to keep their dogs off of our property we have pictures and videos where their
dogs were on our property daily and they had already been in a squabble with one of the other neighbors Miss leou I'm ask get to try track to this point I'm sorry I just want to clarify some things because I don't I these things just keep being brought up and I'm not understanding why they keep cuz they
clear really no but um anyways so um the water issues yes we have water issues and part of that I thought was because of foster Grove whole issue going on um whether or not it is or not yeah obviously we live in The Hammocks
we know there's water issues giving you guys the rights to put a drainage easement you know drainage ditch whatever needs to be done is only going to help our property and keep our that area through there dry in the event that's what needs to be done our main concern is you know we live out there
for a reason we like our privacy we don't want to be sharing the um driveway with somebody else he approached me in May before bringing up the driveway issues um and wanted to put a second driveway to his home for his renters so
I obviously said no and then the issue of the whole fence came up so long story short I just hope you guys will approve this and um it goes back to our property I thought anyway but I'm more than W you know have you guys approve thank thank you Miss Lewis
thank you very much all right we've close the public hearing we'll go to board action uh this is my district uh last time this was before us um it was voted for denial asked for reconsideration because it was brought to my attention that there was
information that staff had shared that was not in full clarity which I was briefed by the staff afterwards uh and dug into further that there was the right for the county to reserve this area for drainage improvements in the
future uh whether it be from through this process or any other process also reserve the utility rights um so I will be moving for approval of this but before we get to that Mr slot if you'd stand up
please and this for the benefits of a lot of the drainage concerns I just heard from the hammock uh Mr slot is is our our director of engineering and currently there are multiple Basin drainage studies going on within the Black Hammock including the backside of
Ovito these are to identify areas of concern that drainage can be mitigated as that works through we will be having Community meetings to address some of those concerns and meet with people we've already done the Deon
Street uh project meeting with the community uh that's being programmed right right now as these things move forward everybody in the community will have an opportunity to talk to the engineers and the consultants and share their
specific concerns with them but no we are looking at that that said it is the Black Hammock the Black Hammock drainage was pretty much put in by Farmers years ago we now have the city of ovita which runs a lot of their drainage to the lake which is the normal flow it always went
questionable ditches and CTS and those kinds of things we're aware of so we're looking at that from the county standpoint this piece of property could be utilized at a later date uh for drainage enhancements to help anybody in
the hammock if necessary um so I I was assured that by not only our legal team but our our engineering staff so that's no longer concern for me so with that said I will move for approval adopt the resolution vacating AB banding the uncut portion of the public right away known
as Panther Street and the Van Arsdale add to Black Hammock subdivision as recorded in plat book one page 31 of the public records of seol County Florida for a property more particularly known as 1000 Elm Street OVO Florida second
motion second any further discussion commissioner Constantine thank you very much um not to be contrary but fact of the matter is because of everything that you've said I am concerned concerned about um doing the right away vacay
right now I believe that uh we have numerous studies going on um I would rather I think this is premature I would rather do it when we have those studies finished um quite frankly I've you know from what I hear from both sides um if
the if this is abandonment I could see the property owner going in and building other things within this right away that potentially would then come back and we would have to pay for to take off if if we were doing that and so frankly I'm just you know I'm going to vote against it I don't see any reason to change my
mind from the last time commissioner her and then commissioner lockart so I think there's still active litigation on this I realize that they're two separate issues uh I don't I think now is not the time to vacate the
property I do think that there were improvements put in the right away and this is a solution for that behavior and I don't think that's a good precedent to set so I I'm still going to vote no as well commissioner
lockart I think while both of those concerns I respect and are valid they don't change vacating this right of way does not change the County's ability to address any future concerns it was not
that property is is a right currently unopen RightWay it will continue to be able to be utilized for us just for drainage it won't be able to be opened up to have traffic on it if additional drainage or projects
need to occur we're going to have to either purchase someone's property a portion of it in that area which you talk about an expense or or condemnation of private property that's a significant expense from my perspective looking at
this from the county the the the the nature of the neighborhood drama is not anything that this board can take into consideration and us making this decision so I'm looking at it from the benefit of the county and the overall neighbors and what might be needed in the future and I think that this makes
the best decision moving forward and it actually shows that we are not taking those items into consideration in this decision so for for for the same reasons but for opposite rationale I'm supporting it sure so in abundance of
caution I want to go to the county attorney so you've heard what's been said here today and I want to make sure everybody has a clear understanding I if this was to move forward does this impair the ability of the county to utilize this property for
the purposes of the easement for drainage in any way shape or form if this moves forward meaning the vacation request is app corre no because a condition of of the vacation is the granting of a utility and uh drainage
easement to the county So currently the county can use it for drainage and if we were to move forward it can still be used by the county for drainage is that correct that's correct no change no change okay uh are you as County attorney in
any way shape or form concerned about how some private litigation impacts our decision here today and if so how would it well I've reviewed the complaint in the referenced litigation that's the only document in the lawsuit that I have reviewed so my
knowledge of the case is limited to the complaint um I think that the granting of the vacation request um is not uh related to the litigation and
that whether you grant this request or deny this request I think the litigation will continue but affects it in no way shape or form from our decision-making process cor correct and is there we've heard that there are
and confirmed by my fellow commissioner that there are structures or improvements in this existing area and if the county were if that's true and proven out by a survey and what are the County's options
at that at that point if the county decides we've got to put a cover through there or a ditch um is it the same in all easements the structures have to be moved by the property owner or are we litigating to move the structures if we have easement rights the easement would
address whose responsibility is to remove any structures that are in the way typically the easement would we would remove the structures and put them back after our work was completed okay thank you commissioner her so we would remove the structures that have been
built in the RightWay and pay to put them back after the work is completed therefore validating the building of structures in a right away by this vote I'm still a no I'm still a no if they were
properly I'm sorry lock I I just want to make sure we understand that this board has vacated rights of way with existing structures in the many times doz this is not the first time this would occur there it it happens with with some
regularity correct okay any further inquiries any further questions or discussion all those in favor I I opposed no no two2 fails motion
fails anybody car to make another motion well then it dies very good thank you all for being here today all right our next item up will be item
29 this is legislative public hearing this item is considered an ordinance establishing the semal county tourism improvement district be presented by Mr Guna G we good to see you this afternoon we got to see you this morning thank you
sir good afternoon Commissioners uh item number 29 uh and 30 are uh item number 30 is contingent on 29 per the T procedural uh ordinance so I was going
to present both uh at the same time it's so you want to do both at the same time is fine yes I love the efficiency thought thank you sir so first off I wanted to take a look uh the tourism improvement district
outlined the procedural ordinance that was passed uh May 17 2024 in order to establish a tourism improvement district uh there needs to be a district plan in seol County the
term assessment map an Advisory Board which we'll see in uh item 30 needs to be established all surplus funds would need to be used for that tourism improvement district plan there are no
more than two tid assessments levied on any tourism property as defined uh by the ordinance uh 50% threshold of the rooms within the tid map must sign the
petitions uh approving the ordinance and also a yearly resolution of the expenditure of the levy of that ordinance would come back to the board for the term of the tourism improvement district so the semal county tourism
improvement district formation ordinance established a qualified property qualified Hotel property definition of 60 rooms or more for the benefit of sports tourism development within the
county so looking at the Department of Business and Professional Regulations the DB PR of the state that is a total of 5,054 qualified rooms 50% of that PO per
our procedural ordinance would be 2527 we have signed approval petitions for 2,679 rooms for a term of 10 years within the plan unless tied to a bond
for $1.75 ass investment per room per day an estimated gross tourism improvement district revenue of $3.2 million a year in the first year that of course can change with more Hotel development and also will be collected
monthly by the seal County tax collector in line with the tourist development tax collections item 30 The Advisory board if 29 is approved per the procedural ordinance the seal County tourism improvement
district Advisory Board would meet on a quarterly basis there would be seven Advisory Board seats one appointed by each commissioner one by the county manager and one seat appointed by Central Florida hotel Lodging
Association with a 4-year term with no term limits there will be reappointments allowed the tourism office will be the secretary of the advis board in line with the tourist Development Council very similar there each appointee by the
county commissioner and cfhla must be a seino county Hotel year in line with State Statute it would be operator or owner and then County manager appointee would be an at llarge
seat so the timeline here for tourism development want to make sure uh we level set and get everyone on on the same page we have the formation ordinance item number 29 on your agenda The Advisory Board item number 30 if
approved the levy of assessment would be March 11th and then discussion of that benefit which is the indoor sports facility would be sometime in summer in summer of this year of 2025 that's when
we will take a deep dive into that part of the proc project this is so Sol for the tourism improvement district ordinance so requested actions uh for seal County a motion to
adopt the seino county tourism improvement district formation ordinance then a separate motion to adopt the seal County tourism improvement district Advisory Board resolution any questions for staff
on 29 or 30 I do commissioner lockart um definition of an operator how far down into the organization is that as long as they're employed by a seino county tourism property they would be uh
they would be in good standing to be an operator so general manager assistant manager Hostess yes anyone that's employed by Seal County Board now do we okay we've never at the tourist Development Council
um we've never had anyone below a director of sales uh become appointed in Seal County so since I've been here and in the history that we've tracked a director of sales was the lowest um position that has sat on the board the
only reason I bring it up is that words have meaning and and we won't we will not be necessarily hopefully the board that will be sitting here in 20 or 30 years when this is still in effect let's hope not and if yeah just shoot me and
and if for some reason someone gets a wild hair and wants to appoint someone to this board who happens to be an employee who isn't necessarily at some type of an executive or management level there's nothing in here that would prohibit them from doing
that is that what we want So currently we we created the ADV board structure to match as closely as possible with the tur Development Council State Statute all I'm so that's why yeah that's why the definition is in
line with that State Statute of operator and owner okay yeah I just I I had to get that off my chest I'm sorry it's been weighing on me and G isn't there a time limit this has to be Revisited every four years so uh for
reappointment yes yes so so every four years there is reappointment uh consideration right any other inquiries from the board seeing none we have public speakers here today I would like to First recognize Mr Jason seagull
who's here with us today from the uh president Orland great Orlando Sports commission Mr seagull thank you for being here today and also we have Robert agusa here I think somewhere in the back from the central Florida hotel years Association thank you both for being here today all right if you would call
the first three names Madam clerk Jeffrey Smith Brenda uas and Kristen Oswald these are on item 29 and 30 make sure welcome sir how you doing
I'm Jeffrey Smith I'm with the 4750 State 46 uh our main uh questions were involving the implementation of the fee uh it states that you can charge guest folios for the uh fee and we were
wondering how that would work in relation to guest rooms that aren't occupied are we able to will it be languaged where we can have the fee at any rate we want as to where it doesn't affect our property's expenses uh also we had questions about
the uh if the other proper other businesses that benefit from the sports complex or Improvement plan that typically when there's large events in Seal County you know hold the it spreads to other counties and other
businesses benefit uh restaurants and things like that is there any way to include any type of fee or anything in other types of businesses within that uh and then uh as far as you know the payment of the fee uh how that would be
structured on our guest folios when we're collecting it from guests as far as it would be a collectible County assessment and how that will all be structured to in order to pay the fee but that's all I have at this time thank you very much G if you could get with this gentleman and
see if you can get uh answers to all their questions uh I'd sincerely appreciate it all right our next speaker Miss Brenda welcome hello Commissioners how are you guys um I'm Brenda Urias chair of the seminal County tourism
Development Council I also own several businesses here in town SE or Sanford tours and experiences and BC GL the bike shop I've also spent 24 years plus in the tourism industry on a corporate level with AAA National so I'm very familiar with the benefits of um tourism
to our community and as chair and on behalf of the seol county tourism Development Council we support and would like to move forward with the tid thank you thank you if we could call the next three please Kurt Esser Jason seagull and
Robert agusa yes ma'am hi good afternoon my name is Kristen Oswald and I am a general manager of the town playay suites by marot alont Springs need your address for the record please business address is fine me yes oh uh 151 Douglas
Avenue Timon Springs Florida 32714 thank you go ahead okay um I've had the privilege of working in Seal County as a general manager since 2018 in several of select service hotels in Sanford Lake Mary and Altimont Springs I've been following the tid
indoors boards complex for about a year and a half now um I'll be the first to admit I was originally not in favor of doing this at all um I had moved over to Altimont Springs um as a new general manager over there and I was concerned that we would not benefit from this at
all um I knew the hotels closer to the facility would do tremendously greater volume in room nights as my experience worked in when I worked in the Sanford and Lake Mary markets um gee and I have sat down and um continuously talked and
went over numbers and oh my gosh forever um and our data shows that you know people want to be an Altimont as well um and they want to be able to go to the theme parks they want to have it all um but they don't want the the price
tag of Disney um so as I continue to review star reports for the county and Central County Florida and the central Florida counties um I keep up on what's going on in the surrounding areas and then incorporate those into our forecast
budget and calls with our above property team um I know during like our budget season I had four different forecasts going from four different counties and this is where we're at this is where we need to be so that I can give that information to our owners um as the
Summers have gone by I've watched our occupancy plateau and unable to answer the question of how do we gain more occupancy without sacrificing rate I'd love to be able to answer that question today and say we need to create more demand in SEO County the answer is
we need to be the ones to add the demand generator our hotels cannot survive in the without the addition of an indoor complex we are in strong need of weekday and weekday yearr round business that will turn guests and put put guests in our hotel rooms it's more than just
Sports we want the indoor complex to be diverse as possible how great would it be to hold a graduation in Seal County right now we don't have that so those who have people in school um this is one of the many many events that this building can facilitate
our main driver is what brings room nights to the county we all know that we our summers are continuing to get hotter and families are looking for alternative options for their children they are looking at our destinations with either cooler temperatures or indoor options
SEMO county is a perfect place to add an indoor complex where Stone throw away from the theme parks and you can go North to the beaches as well when families are coming to Florida they want an affordable option and they make the most out of their time and their money A lot of them use their vacation time and
so they want to get two for one deals on that um that being said I urge you to support the proposed seal County tourism District Improvement plan and let's make SEO County great thank you thank you
next speaker please and name and address for the record please you bet curtes are with uh simal State College 100 Welden Boulevard um at simal State we love to host championships and we love to host events over a 4-year period we hosted
five championships events that brought in roughly a million dollars in economic impact that impact number does not include our regular season events uh that we host in baseball softball and women's golf if we were fortunate enough to receive a portion of the tid money
and bring back women's and men's basketball I would submit bids to the fcsa for regional championships uh this event is currently being held in the Panhandle at Northwest Florida State College uh it's been there for over six years and I think they want
to get back to Central Florida I would also like to host the um annual Florida college system basketball Showcase in December which is currently being split between Tampa and Daytona and they would love to host it in one location and every summer the
njca takes an a national showcase to either Alabama Georgia North Carolina and I would love to host that event as well I believe that the team of simol County and simol state would be much better at hosting these events and I uh
finally if we bring back basketball unlike softball and baseball the logistics allow for overnight stays so we would probably be a travel partner with Daytona State and when we host Miami or teams from out of state they would be coming and playing back-to-back
nights on Fridays and Saturdays so I 100% support this and would also love a little share of that so thank you very much thank you Mr hler I don't know about the share of that but I'll do you this go State go
far Mr seagull welcome so basketball again good afternoon Jason seagull 1865 East Adams matland Florida uh pleasure and honor to be here with you today appreciate uh certainly
the strong support uh from uh seino County Board Board of County Commissioners and staff and uh honor to be with you um since 1992 our organization has been proud to partner with seal County working together for
over 30 years to drive Sports tourism uh to the region in preparation for today's meeting uh we engaged with numerous stakeholders across multiple Sports uh event rights holders to better understand the opportunities this initiative can create establish ing a
dedicated funding source for additional services and infrastructure improvements will allow seol County to achieve many of the following objectives increasing visitation generating economic impact uh rate generation and of course tdt
recovery uh we expect that in most cases when we're bringing opportunities to the county we're generating more than a one for one uh recovery of those bed taxes that are used as incentives uh to move forward uh stimulate job growth for sure
um expand opportunities for event organizers to bring high-profile uh tournaments and events here to the area uh strengthen the destination's marketing efforts and of course enhancing the local Recreational Sports opportunities for the residents of seminal County this Initiative for
sure uh will do that as the residents um in addition to of course having a great opportunities to participate in what comes out of the ground here in SEO County um but will also reduce the need for families Ames to travel across the state country and Country for tournaments keeping both competition and
economic benefits uh here closer to home uh we look forward to continuing our support of sports tourism in SEMO County and appreciate the opportunity to speak to you today thank you Mr seagull Mr grusa welcome today good afternoon um Mr chairman and
Commissioners uh Robert ausa 6675 Westwood Boulevard Orlando Florida 328 21 uh good afternoon and as you all know uh the vibrant tourism industry is essential to seminal County's economy you know last year alone the tourism and hospitality industry generated a record
$4.1 billion do in total economic impact for the county this industry also directly and indirectly now supports over 26,000 jobs here in semal County making it a critical driver for local prosperity and one of those key contributors to this success has been
the significant growth of sports tourism since the construction of the boomba Sports Complex uh sports related tourism has generated over $300 million in positive economic impact directly to the county playing a vital role in strengthening and diversifying our
visitor base and economy then in 2023 seal County and each of you uh the Commissioners conducted a tid feasibility study which confirmed that certain areas within the county would benefit from a targeted tourism focused improvements to increase overnight visitor demand and recognizing this need
need nearly 54% of what you had showed on the screen there of total seminal County hotel rooms including several properties who are here today or not able to join us uh have signed on to this self-imposed petition in support of this tid that's why after more than three years of
collaborative discussions meetings presentations between seminal County our Sports tourism partners and our local hotel years I stand before you today on behalf of the Central Florida hotel and Lodging Association in support of the proposed seminal County tourism improvement district this public private
partnership will create a long-term sustainable Revenue source and an Advisory board made up of hospitality professionals that will help enhance our community and our regional Sports tourism infrastructure and competitiveness now more than ever destinations Nationwide are fiercely
competing for the N the top ranking as the number one sports Deb business destination by the sports Business Journal which we proudly received last year to remain competitive must continue to invest in our Sports tourism infrastructure so in closing I urge you to support the proposed seminal County
tourism improvement district ordinance and resolution and together we can make this transformational project a reality one that benefits our economy our local businesses and our community thank you for your time and consideration thank you sir Miss Dominique any other speaker
forms on this matter no sir is there anyone else here in the audience which desires to speak on this item seeing none we'll close the public input and go to board action and what's the flavor of the board or attorney you want to make two separate yes I was just going to say
that thank you I would like a separate motion on the ordinance and the resolution for the Advisory board so let's take up 29 first Mr chairman commer before I make this motion I just want to say how proud
I am of the collaborative effort that everybody had to put into this over multiple years this is unique it is creative it's the first of its kind in the state and God help us when other people start doing it and the legislature gets a hold of it so let's
get done first and let's get grandfathered in and so therefore I will move to adopt the Florida uh the seol county tourism improvement district formation ordinance second motion second any further discussion all those in favor I
I vares unanimously item 30 chairman I'm happy to move to authorize the chairman to execute the resolution creating the seminal County Administrative Code section 4.5 seminal County t uh ID Advisory Board providing
for The Advisory Board purpose duties and responsibilities management of funds membership structure legal and staff assistance second second motion and second any further discussion seeing none all those in favor I I opposed like sign seeing
none carries unanimous thank you all for great work that you've done and congratulations on all the work you put in has has manifested into a great day here in SEMO County so thank you all very much sincerely appreciate it all
right next item up we are going to go to the county attorney's report chairman before we get to my report I need us to revisit item 28 which is the Panther Street rideway okay um you are correct that when you have a tied vote the
motion is defeated correct however and I'm sorry I didn't speak up quicker but sometimes this job doesn't allow me to do that and I had to think about it and you move so fast me so here's the problem we still have a public hearing and we have a pending application so we
have a two two vote I was kind of getting the sense that no one was willing to change their vote today so because we have an application and we don't have an approval and we don't have a denial I would recommend that there's a motion to continue this item to a date
certain because we need five of you here to make the decision one way or the other we can't leave the applicant hanging uh with an unapproved or undenied I don't even know if that's a word um application so again I apologize
for bringing it up 20 minutes later um I would recommend that staff reach out to the people that were here today um to let them know of this development just so it doesn't appear like we're trying to do something underhanded honestly I was just sitting here thinking about how
to handle it and we had moved on we have to move on so sure um so with that said I'll make a motion that we continue the panther street right away vacate item 2025 d138 to a date certain of guess you to
calendar out while you're making that motion Mr chairman is do we know when these drainage uh projects are going to be completed because that's a big concern that I have if we're going to do this again before those studies are done I I may not I may have the same vote I just
I just want to so so what I can tell you what I've been told by staff to try to answer that is there's female money involved in some of it grant money the study is ongoing they will develop them as soon as possible possible but at the end of the day I think what I heard from
even our legal council was whether study's done or not we still have the right to put improvements on that property at our expense in some cases for things at our expense no matter what well not necessarily so there are more things that could be built sir I'm just you know it's not just there there's a
history there's more things that could be built that would cost us even more that's all I'm saying um Tony Nelson for a record um the basin studies we're expecting all of them to be completed by the end of this year and I just want to add to the
conversation regarding the easement um the E the the location that's up for the vacate it's 90 9% 95% in the Wetland so if we ever going to be doing a project we need to mitigate for that impact
so that's another great area that's something that we need to consider so public works at this time have have no plans to do any kind of improvement but if the joury studies come back and say we need to do additional improvements we have to mitigate for the Wetland impact
so I think what I'm hearing what you said is it's and and I think some of us was mentioned part of the briefing majority of this land that's in this easement is Wetlands wet which cannot be touched unless we mitigate
other property through St John's program in order to get the per to do that is that correct D and D yes sir the project should be built commissioner lockart would that mean that the property owner would then also if they wanted to put
something in those wetlands have to get a permit that would require mitigation yes they would what if we were to put an additional no a fence isn't a structure that yeah um what if we were to put an additional um
uh condition condition thank you um that would prohibit structures being built whether they were to mitigate the wetlands or not I I'm just trying to figure out like if trying to trying to do what we said
earlier we aren't supposed to do and do things on the Fly um no we need but I I'm just trying to think like how if the concern is that something might be built in in that M which is a wetland which we would have to mitigate for even if we were to put
in a drainage use it for drainage the property owner would also have to do mitigation in order to build a structure because clearly now they would be coming through a permitted process um for anything that they would want to continue to do there what if we were to
just spell out the obvious in the easement in in the RightWay vacation and putting the easement over that property that was not just a drainage easement but also prohibited there from being any type of structure being um built in that
area as well so I I I understand what commissioner Lockhart's saying and I want to make sure I'm clear it's my understanding that the allegations are that there are structures or buildings currently in the right away by some of
the residents that were here I believe the complaint alleges there's a fence and that they're operating some sort of produce or egg stand okay um some of it's on the plan's property the the P
prudes that showed up some of it is within the panther Street that's the claim in the complaint and then the survey that was attached to the complaint seems to reflect that sure so at the end of the day does that not become a Code Enforcement
issue absolutely yeah now that it's been our attention should we not have if the presence of those things in the public right of way violate our code it would be a it would be taken up with code enforcement Building Division if it requires a building permit that wasn't pulled it's a Code Enforcement issue
corre code enforcement would handle all that M so whether it's this easement or another easement whether it was a fence a Proto stand or shed or whatever that should be a code enforcement addressable issue
at the expense of the property owner other words it's not the County's responsibility unless the code enforcement magistrate decides it's the County's responsibility that we would have to pay to remove it correct I think that's a fair statement yeah I mean it's not the
County's responsibility to move something out of the RightWay if it's in violation of the code correct okay commissioner her I think we have a first and a second and I'm going to call the question I didn't know I got a second but I thought you
seconded his motion I thought you wanted to talk more about it but if you did I'll make the motion again because I was trying to fix find a date yeah he was he was looking for a date but I yes my vote's going to be the same if we litigate it again right now because
that's where I feel like we're going so the motion on is to reconsider or move for reconsideration no let's I'm sorry can we do a motion to continue motion to continue Panther street right away to a date certain of March
25 I think this is where we got hung up because we started asking about um drainage basin studies and we said that if those were not complete that the votes would be the same as well but we were just wanting to get a fifth commissioner here so is the purpose of the continuance to wait for a fifth
commissioner or is the purpose or is the purpose to wait until two Commissioners who are uncomfortable have different uh information so the motion will answer my motion is and my opinion is based on all I've heard from our County attorney all
I've heard from our Engineers is that a this piece of property is in the wetlands it would not be considered unless there was some mitigation process to need this property for taking of easement is that fair yes sir and I've
also heard that if there are structures in the right away currently that's a code violation that our code enforcement board should be dealing with and with that said I find no need to wait an extenda period of time to arrive at what I'm hearing is already going to be my
decision as a district commissioner um I don't see any of that impacting the concerns of the two Commissioners that have voiced the concerns I just wanted I just want one of the Commissioners that have voiced his concerns I will simply say that now I
feel even very uncomfortable that the people have already left and we're discussing so I'm I'm my vote's going to be the same also Kate I don't know what you have to do to get this resolved but
frankly you know unless this is done after the drainage have have you know been completed the drainage Studies have been completed and we have looked at these different structures cuz I'm sorry I feel very uncomfortable that those
structures exist I don't know what they are I don't know if it's just an egg stand and and and a fence other people have said other things and that going in other people's properties and all the other stuff so you know there's no reason I please there is no reason that
they need this now I they I unless they want to build something in it there's no reason that they need this right of way in my opinion now so if they want this and it's strictly because they want the
property more power to them we can wait until after the drainage and after everything else so if I was going to make a motion I would say you continue it until the second meeting in January 2026 because they said it was going to
be done at the end of the year the chairman made a motion to continue this until the second meeting meting in March which is March 25th I don't believe and we have commissioner lockart seconded the motion okay any further discussion and
just for clarification this is not legally required to be read vertis because we're continuing to a date certain but I do recommend that staff notify everyone involved given that the way that we're discussing this uh a few minutes after everyone left so sure and
I think it also gives the opportunity to have a full board here and have a full discussion uh of that but with that said all in favor I oppos like sign no passes 3 to one it'll come back on March
25th if I may Mr chairman we will uh work with Jose Gomez and his team to ensure that the folks that were here today are notified but also work with code enforcement yes yeah I think I think you know once those allegations have been made in a public setting it's behooving upon us to take action or at
least put put it on their radar so very good next item up is county attorney's report 2.0 thank you uh my report's brief today I just wanted to acknowledge the retirement of one of
my attorneys a deputy County attorney David Shields is retiring on Monday and this week is his 19th anniversary with the county and I just wanted to thank David for his service to seal County and wish him well in retirement congrats David congratulations David good stuff
congratulations David and that can't be all is that all that's all unless you want to ask me anything else think I've done quite enough today indeed County manager's report anything from the county manager's office just
one item Mr chairman wanted to make sure that the board and the public are aware due to unforeseen circumstances the West library located at 245 North Hunt Club in LA wood closed this afternoon it will reopen tomorrow morning okay fair enough thank you very much anything
else seeing nothing else we will move to District commissioner reports District three commissioner Constantine well just like being the last it's always difficult when you're the first because you don't want to take other people's U um oh go ahead that's never stopped you
in the last 50 never stopped anybody here so let's just move let's just say that okay I just just did wanted to recognize again that the central Florida Regional Planet Council East Central Florida Regional Planet Council had their Diamond Awards in Lake Mary and it was quite the success a lot of great um
projects were um were recognized um folks that we have used many times here at the county consensus Communications including for our sales tax had their 30th Anniversary this past week and I wanted to congratulate congratulate Trey
and John and all of the the folks that are part of that um also the taste of Altamont was February 20th and it was great um as well as the day they also opened the um celebration of the alamont global
Innovation lab uh on the 23rd yesterday when many of us were out at a wonderful wedding uh the uh waka Island paint out had the opening welcome dinner and they will have their paint out all the way through next Saturday wonderful
Community event gives lots of money back but um just celebrates beautiful and and incredible vistas of of Waka Island I mean Waka uh River and all and the surrounding areas the um Orlando
economic partnership U some of them I saw here today will be running over to the barbecue in the park if it's not raining badly uh right after this uh at 5:00 today 5 to 8 also um Career Source will be coming will have a board meeting
on the 27th in CMI thought youd like to know that I'm looking forward to the spring hammock induction into the old growth forest on the 28th of February on March 1st as it is becoming little league and bab Ruth league openings all
over Altamont Springs will be doing one on March 1st always a tremendous event thousand at least people coming there and the March 5th is Ash Wednesday for those of us that are Catholics and like
to have a little Ash on their on our forehead uh but more importantly Daylights not more importantly but daylight savings starts March 9th yay and also I see in the audience a birthday girl and I wanted to
congratulate our our new supervisor of election on her birthday today happy birthday and that's my that's all very good commissioner lockart District 4 for the record episcopalians and others do
celebrate Ash Wednesday as well wonderful is that more important than okay did I say I wasn't okay yeah you caught yourself you should be giving up candy that's all I'm going to say l you should be giving up barely touched it
today Witness is All Around Me Okay um so commissioner Constantine is trying to get a hold of Davin Suggs at the florid Association of counties on a the um a recently filed bill that he was wanting to report on and so he's been every time he loses he misses the
call he's like oh I can't leave yet and so so for my report he's decided this is a this is the appropriate time to leave exactly um so I need to give you an update on the medical examiner advisory committee
meeting that I attended a couple of weeks ago um you're welcome I don't know how I don't know how I will ever repay you but i' but I've been contemplating it um and I I am going to ask staff um
maybe Christian Swenson is here there might be an opportunity for him to help round out some of my comments because this is a very um complex topic and it's it's getting more complex only because of different people iterations and Recollections that seem to not be the
same or match minutes of of meetings I'm talking about the medical examiner board so um at the last meeting which was in um Sumter County uh Mr Swenson and um Cassidy why do I
always forget Cassidy's last name Purdue Purdue from the county attorney's office and Allison Thal um attended along with with me and there was also staff from the other counties except for Hernando Hernando was absent their board member
and um staff were not there so there was Su I'm I'm laying the groundwork here so Sumter Citrus Maran seminol and Lake were the five counties in attendance um it started off fairly amicably with a recognition on the part
of the chairman that we're going to move forward and not dwell on the past and then Within short order started dwelling on the past um so it it really was a very protracted
circuitous meeting um there was a lot of rehashing and and talking about the same issues over and over again really my my sense was for an attempt to persuade uh and change opinions of the Lake County Commissioner and myself not
necessarily to actually take action and and um have there be actual um votes taken um there was a request on the part of the chairman who is from Citrus County that we vote as a
medical examiner commission to give some type of consensus to for every County to try to make Maran whole for their funds that they have expended so far toward the building that they
decided to go ahead and start the engineering and design and the property purchase for without any of the other boards giving right consent um and and it is a nominal amount of money it is not a lot but it
is Meaningful in that um it is in their mind a an acknowledgement that we had committed to something and we pulling out so from my perspective and I made very clear at that meeting that if they were going to insist on a vote at that
moment my vote would be no I did not have the approval of this board or the direction of this board to commit us to any sort of funds um the Lake County manager was very clear in in her comments at the meeting that there she had direction from her
board on a 4 to1 vote to separate from the existing me district and join seal County there was a lot of discussion about the State medical examiner board meeting occurred um also different Renditions of of how and why that
happened um at the end of the day what was asked of of the Lake County Commissioner and myself is that we come back to our respective boards and ask um if there was any
interest in contributing our portion would be $25,000 in change to make Lake County whole um um and and to reassert our our intentions of of staying or or going I I
did tell them that I didn't feel it was necessary for me to bring it to my board that from the county manager's perspective and staff's perspective they already had very clear direction that we had planned to um to set forth on a process to to go back on our own or
partner with lake and um so I did say in that meeting that no we're out your wild card is Lake County we are we are not the wild card um that being said I in the spirit of of good faith will throw it out to you all to ask if there's any
interest in um participate in making a commitment at this point in time to contribute the $25,000 toward a building that we did not say that we were interested in building and that was Maran accounting Maran so from my pers
perspective and and thank you for commissioner lockart for agreeing to take that post over from me of having it for 5 years um I needed a I needed a fresh breath of air from from all that uh and a different set of eyes but I am not interested in
rehashing what has been rehashed not only here but at that board numerous times but in addition to that there is a separate fund that already been set up in our Consortium as a quote
future building fund Kitty if you will um and if they've gone through all that which last I checked they had not um maybe that's a discussion they ought to consider um you know that was it was a
fund to not only use towards future whether it was identifying properties down payments but also maintain the existing infrastructure that already is in place I the agreement etc etc um I have no interest I mean I think our
staff has reviewed all the documents the the all all the minutes my statements in those meetings I think Lake County statements in those meetings and I think it's pretty clear where we stood and to your point the fact that they decided to move
forward without consistent direction from all the partners is very telling I will tell you there are folks on that medical examiner committee who remember it very
differently of course and and and at some point in time you know I know we have gone through the minutes we have read the verbatim minutes from those meetings and and we have say we have the receipts but
you know we we have the minutes that make it very clear um but they just just so we're clear they are very insistent that what happened didn't happen sure yeah commissioner her I have no interest
in furthering their confusion um and the good news is it's $25,000 so that split among the remaining partners and that is is not harmful 25,000 is our share I understand but if we back out it adds 25,000 to the
remaining number that is there it is not going to crush the project and it sends the message that we've not said we would do this and I'm assuming that includes Lake 25 from lake lake is in the 25 range as well so but we're only voting on ours we're we're communicating about
ours what lake does as lak's business correct okay very good I think you got direction if it's to right now I would just simply say we don't have to make a decision
if I'm understanding they're asking but we don't have to say yes or no I'm just right now I'm I'm I'm with everybody else I'm not willing to pay for it I think one of the things that I shared with them at the very end they're very concerned about how to move forward and are they you know how many how many
partners are they moving forward with and what size building now are they going to have to redesign the building and and in a conversation I had with Dr Wolf after the meeting she shared with me uh that she does not think that with the grow growth that is occurring in those counties that it would be wise for
them to cut back too much on that building that and that perhaps um they do will in fact need that space if they're planning for 40 50 years out sure um the other thing that they they the refrain is you know we we we
need to make a decision we have to make a decision we're running out of time we're wasting time it was a very pressured time influenced discussion and I said to them you know the what you could do to make this much easier and
make it go much faster is support Lake County and seol county in our request to the State medical examiner board to have us go ahead and leave because then you've got your answer and wouldn't that be great um rather than you trying to
continue to keep us and Hold Us hostage I think was actually the phrase I used um perhaps you know you could be a part of of helping us just move on our way I will say the Sumter County representative did Express that he that he felt there was not a need to try to force someone to continue to be in a
partnership that didn't want to be in the partnership so I thanked him for that um so you know there there is an opportunity still I believe for uh the C what I committed to them is that our staff is working on a plan we will come
back to them with whatever that will be at at the May meeting um that may involve some type type of remuneration for their trouble um maybe in in support of for their consideration and in support of helping
us have an amicable separation that's a conversation I don't mind having so I so I think that there's you know if if we frame the conversation and we're not saying necessarily you know we
we want to leave and stick it to you we want it to be an amicable separation but we're not going to just pay you without there being a plan and some understanding of what um what the move forward is Christian I am going to let you either refute or add to anything
that I said CH Chris swon assistant County Manager I just wanted to add a couple things the commissioner law cards everything you said was spot on just um the SEO County the sorry the Maran County Manager did send an official kind of invoice letter to us on um
Valentine's Day ironically um we are in the process of drafting response will include um obviously the this uh this discussion at the board in that and we'll circulate it for everyone to review they're in in their request for their payment of the $ 20 some th000
there's some questions on it as to you know funds that were expended from the building fund there's also questions when looking at it trying to look at it in detail some of their line items there you know there's appraisal cost and things like that in there that they may be you if they're planning on keeping the property you know should they be
borne on to the partner so I'll circulate that around and capture this information but everything appears spoton we will uh we'll try to get a a draft together for some type of extra strategy for them to review and get that to you as well in brief everyone oh one more thing that I do need to add um just
so that it doesn't appear that I I withheld this the in a in an 11th Hour attempt to maybe revisit this separation um one of the committee members said
well what if we were to look at um the current funding formula and what if we were willing to consider going from a population funding for funding for formula mechanism to a usage base and I said well I thought that that was off
the table quite some time ago um and they said well maybe it could be back on the table so I feel like a little bit like we you know being toyed with some um and so I I my I think my response was I I believe ship has sailed but if if
the board feels otherwise you don't have to let me know that now you can think about that but um well if you're going to draft a letter probably ought to have our feelings or at least input um my input
is we had several conversations over a different model and quite the conversations uh with multiple counties and why they should or should not consider it um and it was a non-starter to get to
the contractual Point uh we were on the losing end and I think Lake was also in losing end if I remember right they advocated for a use model I even advocated okay let's stay where we're at at the end of the year let's inventory the services used and let's square up
amongst the partners true up um that was a nonstarter and now it's going to be in Summerfield Florida a long way for our law enforcement our investigators and our citizens to drive up I75 in the turnpike to get there to identify or
pick up loved ones you know items and it so I'm a no-o on that at some point you just have to call it stupid dating right you know it's not going to end up in a long-term
relationship and you got to see what else is out there and maybe that's because it's been a long day and I'm tired but that's how I feel you asked me how I feel and I don't see this coming to a fruitful end of us driving all of that way to be part
of this massive building project when we know that our growth is going to support this being closer within the next 40 or 50 years it is not a good long-term strategy for us so at this point I feel like we're stupid dating and no kissing and making up huh nope so
unless I'm only throwing this out you know if I was looking at this thing and I you know Christian I'm sorry if I'm unless um number one they did change it to a usage and they kept it in Lake
County well that so I can tell you for what it's worth that process was well vetted MH when I say that in in all fairness well vetted by Maran County in the
vetting process as the administrative arm of the group I think there's property there that absolutely would qualify but not necessarily desirable uh by some of the others
but and and I only say that chairman and and um representative uh Lockard onto this committee is that I haven't been you know I haven't been at any of the meetings in in some just off-hand
comments by them at other meetings that I have had um I think they're feeling the pressure and if you know if they came back and offered it per use and at Lake County I don't want us to shut the door
on that potentially I'm not saying we have to make any decision understand what you're saying um and I'll just rip the bandaid off which is they were not properly informed by their staff and their
representative on that board I'm not going into any in my opinion it became very obvious to me and other conversations things were mentioned and made statements I'm like where did that come from what that didn't happen to the meeting I was in but
anyway um I think I have great Direction I appreciate it I think commission her we're done dating I'm going I stupid dating might come up um I might have to I might have to use that and and hopefully that's good feedback for Mr swensson to as he drafts um his response
and and I gave Mark a heads up that you'll be home and not in the best of mood this afternoon I have two more quick things I want to say uh send a huge shout out to the seventh and e8th graders at tuscco Willa Middle School who participate in student government I had the opportunity to speak to their class last week and
they are just the most engaged group of bright young people that I have had an opportunity to speak to in a long time they had a lot of great questions they were very very interested about um how uh revenues are
what taxes I we talked about taxes a lot um which I did not anticipate coming from a bunch of seventh and eighth graders but they were very very interested in all aspects of County government and I suggested that they each one of them ought to consider a career in public service at some point in time um so shout out to to that group
of students oh and two of them are actually going to be participating in the page program uh um this legislative session which is very cool nice um and thank you to everyone who attended the seminal State dream Gaya and contributed such an incredible event and the contributions for our students and the
scholarships just literally change lives and this year's theme was magic and all of the magic that happens um on our campus and with our students and um it was it was just another great event so shout out to everyone at that um on the
foundation Trisha uh who serves on the foundation board and everyone else that um attended thank you beautiful set up and that's all I have thank you commissioner commissioner her District 5 we were happy the Highland team was happy to sponsor a table at the dream
Gaya and a good time was had by all at our table it was a magical evening I brought some props so deliver to your office is the uh East Central Florida Regional planning Council which in all these years I can't believe they couldn't shorten that up um annual
report so this has been delivered to your offices for your review and I also sent along to your offices this was sent electronically the presentations for the cfx board meeting dated February 13th and I want to call to your attention the
whole thing is interesting but I want to call to your attention a program called moving for forward so moving I4 forward because that was very hard to understand with the little New Jersey accd I heard it
um and it is a new way of reimagining how we are building roads and it is literally Road building on steroids I shared it with staff so they're designing and building as they go for all of these bottleneck intersections
that are happening along I4 it was the governor's initiative it is really fascinating so I would tell you it's probably worth looking at you've probably all heard by now we're moving to variable tolls in the express lanes my kids have been put on notice to get off of
my EP pass yes uh fabulous job at this this uh state of the county event I thought uh it was very nicely done to all of our uh professional team members that put that together to the CA Cruz to Jay for
delivering it nicely a shout out to the folks that did celebrate Lake Mary I didn't get to attend this but a my family went and a good time was had by all there as well we did cut the ribbon so I'll do the retrospective review at silv loop trail and if you've not been
out there I would encourage you to go out there and walk the loop it is stunning uh you should take your Claritin with you congratulations to the folks that hosted porch Fest I hear that that was wonderful as well and a call out for the
4th of March at the Bronx House Pizza in Lake Mary is having a uh pizza party and all of the cash receipts for that day so everything that they sell for that entire day that money goes to rescue
Outreach Mission it's not the profits they give 100% of what they take in that day including gift cards great so that's amazing and we thank them and we eat a lot of pizza there to thank them and that concludes my report all right thank you commissioner her uh
update by the way on the West Branch Library it will not reopen until 1 p.m. tomorrow I'm told so stay tuned um I'm sure our public information folks will post that accordingly and make sure that uh we have that out on all of our
feeds um state of the county thank each and every one of you for participating great work on each one of the projects yall took up I especially got a kick out of commissioner herd driving the John Deere tractor in a dress and heels that's right perfect um so it was great
stuff but everybody did a wonderful job um and our staff thank you very much for putting that all together in such a great uh program and and programming that for us to get it done as well as the constitutionals who participated this year I think it was great
collaboration ation to help bring them in and let the citizens hear from them and their perspective of what they've got going on so thank you all very much uh oo High School is bringing back the agricultural program after all these years yay so it's something that I've
been advocating for for about four years now and and what was amazing to me although I'm very proag the benefit to this to the the students as well as the school system is it's a totally separate
program not related to the current funding program that the schools get this is a funding program that's modeled where the funds are not clawed back as long as you are moving forward with the programs but it also includes things believe it or not like Plumbing welding
and things you are not necessarily quote AG related but if you think about it a farmer has to be a welder a mechanic an electrician has to do all those things to make sure the farm keeps working and so all these programs are Incorporated
under this a program now at uh Ovito High School which is great to see that come back to our community so thank the school board for moving that direction uh March 6 uh please join Florida Department of Transportation simol County and the City of Vito for Riv
riving cutting for State Road 426 419 it'll be at 311 East Broadway March 4th homeless Summit AT 600 p.m. action Church 650 East Airport bouard I think everybody's probably gotten a a notice of that from at this
point uh so keep in mind if you're able to make that sheriff Lima's faith-based Community celebration internation women's day is March 7th 11:00 a.m. to noon oo Amphitheater Cultural Center uh also reminder that uh March
12th at 5:45 is Interfaith ifar at the mosque for 2025 5 p.m uh and you've already said the Little League March 1st over at alamont Springs with a Bambino and all the other
young folks running around with baseball and that pretty much wraps up my Chairman's report as well as my district report we do have item number 31 we've been asked to appoint uh and approve appointment of
Alexandra Garnier Mercier a local senior resident to the commission on Aging for term dating 1 2025 through 1231 2027 uh you should have received a copy of their application I will move that as
a motion second any further discussion yes please commiss rockart so I I asked um a couple questions about this item just because I I was not familiar with this individual and I I was not provided a copy of her application until I sat
down here on the dis but um we all know I get wrapped up in words that's kind of my my thing and so I was looking at what a senior um represented a local senior resident would be and and I just I'm thinking that's probably
going to be age related like to qualify as being a senior and not knowing who this individual was um I found out that she's she's the age of younger than some of us on this dis
and so I questioned what is considered a senior and and it wasn't because of her but just because of the way that we tend to and this goes back to our item earlier about the the composition of the um
TI Advisory Board it we tend to say things but then we don't Define them so we say to local senior residents in my mind I'm thinking a senior is 60 plus maybe and then I asked the attorney I said what's you know is there
a definition there's nothing in the in this this you know item and so she did a little bit of research you want to tell them what you found I wasn't sure if you saw my message I did so there's one Florida statute that defines what a senior
citizen is it's related to consumer protection that's the statutes related to Consumer Protection it's 60 and above damn I know right hey some of the men's ha you for the insult but now I guess thank you well I this this individual is
younger than that and so I so I it seems like she would be a phenomenal member of this board after reading an email from one of the staff members who recommended her she clearly is very involved and engaged and she wants to be on this board and she works in the Alzheimer um
field and so it makes sense that this is something that is near and dear to her heart and she would be an expert in this but I don't know how she qualifies as a senior resident I would think that we would want the senior resident to be someone who is actively living in our community and experiencing what it's
like to be a senior citizen living here um so are you asking us to define a senior I I'm asking us as we move forward and we have all of these boards and committees that we get a little more granular in defining some of these
positions and who actually appoints them and there's there's great confusion on the third floor about who is supposed to be appointing whom and where and when and as we as we get into this and I think Melanie shared with me earlier today
that they are going to bring all of these back to us at some point in the next I don't know how long from now um for the purpose of doing some of that that type of cleanup work but I just I just wanted to bring it to your attention if you read this like I read
it thinking you're appointing a senior citizen to this board that that is not who this individual is even though she seems like a fabulous woman with a masters in gerentology well I guess you know I've been in restaurants to clarify 55 and over as a
senior I've been to place at 60 and over some are 65 some are 62 we have Senior Living that starts at 55p is going down to 50 oh yeah I mean I don't know where you start um yeah that's annoying Maybe
change maybe it's maybe it's easier to change the title instead of I I just I'm I'm just I I will vote to support this person joining this board because I think she'll be a wonderful addition to the board we just need to be clear of what our intentions are if this is our
board and this is the makeup of the board that we want to have senior citizens on it then we need we need to be clear what we believe that is all those in favor I I opposed see none carries commissioner her I'm going to do a retrospective eye CU I had my hand up
so I thought we might still be discussing I think the bigger issue is process it's not related to this application it's related to The Continuous issues that we have with these and so this is not the first time we've ended up up here with an application in front of us we've ended
up up here with somebody making an appointment that wasn't their appointment We've Ended up up here with the it's the chairs or the boards we're not sure and I think there's been a tremendous amount of work done on the part of our professional team that is
actually working through this but it was not in good shape and there's still refining that needs to be done I also think that we should not be presented with an application at the dis unless it does qualify and it is the
responsibility of that committee that's making the recommendation before it comes into our offices because I wouldn't have Googled her birth date quite honestly I don't have that capability commissioner lockart is fabulous fabulous at that um so I mean
we should be the application for that committee should have asked for that if that was a requirement that's the level that we need to get this to so that we're doing this the way we should be doing it and I don't disagree um we've done our best in my office
to look at that entity's operating policies and what they're supposed to be doing and what we're supposed to be doing and there's not Clarity on any of it in my opinion and I've gone back and looked at minutes six seven eight years
and some things have been done some things haven't been done they've been appointed by uh District Commissioners by The Chair by the board it's been all over the map so agreed it needs to be cleaned up um and vetted through the
process so very well I trust staff will make those notes and move forward with helping us along with that okay next up is going to be public comment on items not related to the agenda other words if you're here to speak on matters not
related to anything that was on the agenda today this will be your time to speak for three minutes we caution you keep the decorum nice and light and polite and courteous and professional and we'll get you your three minutes and uh get you
back out of here as quick as we can can so if you have given a a document to speak speakers form Miss Dominique if you'll call their names out we have two speakers Sean ler and Dennis schepner and Mr chairman while while
they're coming up um I just wanted to let our County manager and everybody else know the 1080 uh as well as others um fac is on it they know on our concerns and others concerns
they're also looking at the rural initiative because that could be a hiding place for things also in there when they're talking about you know revitalization of rural rural areas so they are they they talking to the
executive um director of of legislation Davin Suggs and he said that and he says please feel free to call him okay thank you yes sir your name and address for the record please Christopher sha ler
119 cabria Springs Cove Sanford Florida 32771 um I'm here on behalf of the library Advisory Board of Simo County um I'd like to thank the commission for all of their support in rebuilding our libraries in semal County um we're very
excited to move forward with the master plan now that the penny sales tax has been uh approved with the libraries as a as an AS uh mentioned on the the the um legislation um and I'm going to seed my
time back to the chair thank you very much sir we appreciate it's not often we get somebody comes in and says hey thank y'all thank you for everything you're doing with the Advisory Board because without people like you and volunteers
of our citizens given their time away from their families their husbands wives significant others and children and dogs and pets we would have a rough time trying to get on top of everything so we sincerely appreciate your time so thank you very much for being here I'm happy
to help I'm I'm for the future of my daughter Emma yes understood thank you Mr chairman it's nice to see Carol Henshaw here also former rotarian with me but also is on the rotary board I mean on the library board does a great job retired librarian for the University
of Central Florida by the way good stuff like to promote every everyone getting a library card you know it's free amen great thank you Sean yes thank you next Mr
shopner is that our our last speaker yes sir yes sir hello my name is Dennis schepner I live at 1167 Oak Creek Court in Winter Springs good afternoon Commissioners I am here today representing a group of
citizens as I have in the past who continue okay I'm sorry I see my time is at three minute Mark but I had uh put in a request I'm speaking well you made a request are are you a legally yes
licensed corporate entity either nonprofit or otherwise yes okay yes it's I'm going to give you I'm going to give you some latitude let's get going as long as we're moving forward making I just want to make sure my clock time is correct
okay um as I have in the past who continue to be concerned about civil rights violations occurring in our elections and documented in the Florida Department of state's own official and certified election records these violations which occurred in the 2022
general election of both voter roles and votes have been discussed with you also discussed with our previous supervisor of elections with our County sheriff with the Florida division of law enforcement and with the Florida Department of State responsible for
elections across Florida after addressing these board this board in public testimony three times all five Commissioners were concerned enough to send a letter to the S soe and the Department of State along with the evidence of violations asking for
investigation and remedy did that action lead to investigation and remedy no none of those efforts even received any acknowledgement any response or inquiry
either to the county attorney the Commissioners or myself and so we collectively sat on our hands we should not be surprised to learn that the very same violations occurred in both the 2024 primary and general elections in
some categories the percent of violations even increased I'm back once again reporting to you and to the public on the 2024 election violation results as I've said previously this issue is not going
away and it's impacting on civil rights of every of each and every one of us candidates are not getting a true accounting of legal votes from citizens but more importantly every citizen is having their civil rights infringed it's
not just having a few extra and illegal additional votes counted and certified but each of those illegal votes dilute the legal votes of legal citizens this is an inaccordance with our federal and state constitutions and
laws I now have the results of the 2024 general election and would like to share two of them for with you I want to remind you that these violations were found uh within the official Department of State Certified election records and
Simo county is neither the best nor the wor worst across the state but we can improve number one simal County for 2024 general election there were 8,516 total apparent registration violations and
2,124 total apparent voting violations the second bullet is that in Simo County there were two uh 26,631 72 voters on the voting roles that's a difference of 358 more votes counted
than voters on the voting roles in essence of time I'm only providing those two examples if you would like the full set of findings I will provide it upon request why do we tolerate this illegal encroachment on our rights and Injustice to our system of government this is a
question we all need to reflect upon how many illegal voters and votes are tolerable how much money do you allow thieves to steal from you before you reported to the sheriff and expected diligence well this is a similar
question however I submit to you that each of our votes is much more valuable than the dollars We Carry in our wallets what monetary value do you put on the impact of your lives your children's lives and our
community this is not only this is not going away and now some of the remedies I've been fighting for in this County and in Florida are now part of President Trump's platform and promise to America Governors and state legislators are
feeling increased pressure from president Trump to address election issues although not directly responsible and accountable each of you do play an important role and can influence positive change therefore here here's
what I'm asking all of which is within your legal Authority and oath to do number one now that the county has elected a different s soe formally submit a letter to S soe Amy penck giving her your full support to
investigate these violations request that she investigate and validate violations then refer them to law enforcement and make systematic and procedural changes to close the gap which have allowed these violations to
occur I want you to know that I'm scheduled to meet with her and her staff Thursday number two additionally I asked that you support s soe Amy panck with additional funding to support their her budget under Florida statute
104.4 I it states Commissioners are authorized to appropriate funds to the s soe for the purpose of investigating fraudulent registrations and illegal voting should the s soe exercise her authority to do so and lastly number
three I ask that you assist me in gaining an audience with Sheriff Dennis Lima according to Florida statute sections 102.0 N1 and 10411 the sheriff's department is responsible for and I quote the sheriff
shall exercise strict vigilance in the detection of any violations of the elections law in apprehending violation violators unquote this is what I want to discuss with him yet with each of my requ so you're out of time you've had
your six minutes have have prevented me from meeting with him so those are my three requests today thank you for your attention all right anyone else here to speak on any matters no sir commissioner
lockart well I see a couple of folks here from the s soe's office and I didn't know if maybe they already were looking at this and I understand the request is to send a letter but the supervisor election just heard the concerns and so I don't know if either
of you would like to speak to that holding up here to celebrate her birthday I she's not I guarantee you she is not here to celebrate her birthday do you want to wait there are no Moos in this chamber uh thank you um thank you
commissioner for recognizing my birthday I greatly appreciate you announcing my one year older um um thank you thank you again for all your support um we do in fact have a meeting with u Mr schepner on Thursday not aware of the violations that he is
speaking of when it comes to state level data uh we have not seen any report to the state to us giving us any indication that we have uh that volume of issues I'm interested in seeing this the specific detail that he provides on um
on Thursday however I do want to correct a statistic um as of the end of last year we had 353,000 registered voters as of right now or as of the end of the election we had 351,000 30 voters uh it just shows you
that we are continuously working our voter roles to clean up any issues of any concerns uh so I look forward to um providing a followup with either through Dennis schepner or to you directly on the issues uh that we are resolving but uh
in my short term in the office I I can honestly say uh seminol County works our team works very very hard to make sure that we have a really solid clean election um and we will continue to work very very hard uh to provide
transparency through our office to make sure that each of you uh the Sheriff Dennis sher's group and our entire voting population uh and upcoming voting population has a very trust uh in our process uh something that I pride myself on something that our team Prides
ourself on um uh my assistant uh supervisor teeman um has come back with a wealth of knowledge um in our time in the office over the last month and a half we have not found widespread issues from the last election uh but we will continue to look at the at the
information that is provided to us happy to answer any other questions all I can say is good luck on your new undertaking thank you uh I sat on the canvasing board this past presidential election uh you are correct
350,000 plus registered voters um I did not observe anything nefarious as sitting upon that uh canvasing board that would rise to the level of the same person was trying to vote multiple times
or the person wasn't qualified to vote or wasn't registered to vote or any of those things that we continue to hear of not in this Chambers but perhaps across the country um and the point being is we
did send the data that was supplied by Mr schepner uh up to Tallahassee um there comes a point when so many people have this information it's either the best conspiracy in known to mankind or people
are just ignorant to the fact there's a problem I can't believe for an instance your office or anybody else that's taking the oath including in Tallahassee would fail to act on information that was delivered to them whether we get a
response from them or not and I think you're going to do a great job and I think you're starting with a good clean slate and of course we're looking for collaboration with your office and my trust is that we will have that as we move into our budget season so when you
have things that you need bring it to us with a good business argument and we're all open-minded you got that I'll be calling you next week to schedule some appointments cuz we have some needs great thank you very much yeah I I
will I'm I'm going to go on the record I will take just one minute if I may take a PR because I think that you need to understand uh what our team has done over the last month um as we have really promised to invest in a good culture and our organization um we have your staff has
been very gracious in helping us do some upgrades to the facility once it's done I would invite you to come out uh we've painted we're looking at some some updated furniture that will allow our staff to have some better work service and work areas um but to save the county
money we actually went and pillaged the Sanford mall of materials uh shelving materials we probably saved uh the taxpayers about $25,000 in shelving in furniture and other materials that we have put in our office to make our office more efficient uh and save tax
payers dollars and save um stuff from going into the dump so right good work um you know we're not we're not just out here asking you for money but we're also really trying to make use of what's out there so great awesome good Stu thank you thank you all very much thank you
all right we will now close anything else for the good of the word before I close the meeting we are here closing the board County Commission meeting thank you all for being here [Music]