Good evening, everyone. Today is Tuesday, March 3rd, 2026. The time is approximately 7 p.m. We'll now call to order this meeting of the South Miami City Commission. If you could please do us a favor of turning off or silencing your cell phones, we greatly appreciate it. Madam Clerk, if you can call the roll, please. Present. Microphone, please. Vice Mayor Corey. Present. Commissioner Boniche is absent. Commissioner Calle? Here. We have a quorum? Quorum, yes. Thank you. Let's please stand for
a brief moment of silence, and we ask that you keep our men and women in harm's way in your thoughts, and hopefully a prayer for peace as well. Mr. Calle, the pledge, please. Pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all. Please be seated. Thank you. Madam Clerk, we have presentations this evening, correct? Correct. Could you read item E2, please? Police Department for Officer of the Month, October 2025, Madai Castellano. Chief, you're recognized. Good
evening. Good evening. Mayor, Vice Mayor, Commissioners, tonight I'm proud to recognize Detective Madai Castellano as our Officer of the Month for October 2025. During the month of October, Detective Castellano managed five active cases, seven additional no further information cases, clearing seven felony arrests and two misdemeanor cases. Cases by arrest, thank you. Two of those felony cases were originally classified as having no viable leads, yet through persistence and investigative skill, she successfully developed those cases and
brought them to resolution. Three of the felony investigations involved complex fraud and money laundering offenses. She obtained statements from 15 witnesses and secured numerous subpoenas, conducted a surveillance operation that resulted in the safe apprehension of the offender. Detective Castellanos' diligence professionalism, and commitment to justice reflect great credit upon herself and the South Miami Police Department. Detective Castiano, congratulations, and thank you for your outstanding work. Please come forward. Congratulations. I'm
going to ask Sergeant Bosch to present her this award. He's a man of a lot of words. Come on, sir. Yeah, say something. Come on, Bosch. Luckily, I have a They call them Charlie's Angels. I have three girls that are, and one guy that's about to retire, but these girls are amazing. All three of them are incredible. And she's currently new in the unit pretty much. And she's picked up so fast that I'm really impressed. So I thank her for her work and thank you. Detective, you want to say anything? No, you sure? Come on. No, okay. Let's take a picture, please. Come on up.
Ready? One, two, and three. Hold it. One, two and three. OK. Bearish her a little bit. Come on. He has firsthand knowledge. So
we're going to recognize Commissioner Rodriguez for a first-hand accounting of the story. So I was contacted by one of our residents who also happens to be one of the partners at Cala Mayor, and he called me just to basically say what a great job the detective did on that and that South Miami PD killed it on it, and they were very happy and... you know, congrats for the work that you did on that. Thank you again. Thanks for reflecting the best
of our department. We appreciate you. Thank you all. Okay. Madam Clerk, if you can read item three, please. E3. Police Department, unit citation award presentation. Chief, the floor is yours. Thank you. Good evening again. Tonight is my honor to recognize a team that truly represents the very best of the South Miami Police Department. I'm proud to represent present the unit citation award to the uniform patrol divisions Delta squad for their outstanding performance during the first, second and third quarter of 2025.
This team led by Sergeant Cassandra Livalwa and compromised of officer Jose Sagato could not be here tonight. Officer George Bravo officer Duvami Gonzalez who could not be here tonight and officer Luis Gonzalez as well as officer Kesnell Arbizu. They have all consistently demonstrated excellence in both the performance and community engagement. Their productivity speaks for itself. 195 arrests, 1,975 citations, 593 traffic warnings, 745 community engagements. What truly sets Delta Shift apart is their balanced approach to policing.
They are proactive in enforcement, focused on traffic safety and committed to reducing crime, yet they prioritize community engagement. They park their vehicles, get out and then walk the neighborhoods. They visit businesses, they speak with residents face to face and build trust. They show up for one another and they show up for this community. They also routinely assist other shifts and support our criminal investigative division when needed. Their cohesion, professionalism and teamwork reflect not only well upon themselves, but of the entire South Miami
Police Department. And law enforcement, consistency matters. And month to month, Delta Shift proved to be leaders in productivity, service, and professionalism. Sergeant, officers, thank you for your dedication, your integrity, and your commitment to keeping South Miami safe. Congratulations on this award. Sergeant, a few words on behalf of the squad. A few words on behalf of the squad? Anything you wanna say or share? Uh-oh, it's not a trick, I promise.
Thank you for the recognition and the support. Thank you, let's take a picture. Okay, Madam Clerk, E1 please. Red light cameras by Chief Hatfield. Chief, floor's yours again. Sorry for all the presentations. Good evening once again. Thank you for the opportunity to present this overview of the City of South Miami's red light camera program, including the continuation of the current program, vendor costs analysis, and a proposed expansion option. This presentation will review the
safety benefits of the program, the supporting crash data, vendor proposals, financial impacts, and recommendations moving forward. The primary goal of the Red Light Camera program is to reduce crashes, serious injuries, and fatalities at signalized intersections. According to the Federal Highway Traffic Safety Administration, red light cameras reduce right angle crashes which are amongst the most dangerous types of intersection collisions, formerly known as
a T-bone. Similarly, the Insurance Institute of Highway Safety has found that the red light camera programs can reduce fatal crashes at signalized intersections by as much as 21%. In addition to crash reduction, the program improves driver compliance with traffic signals, serves as a deterrent, and enhances safety at high-risk intersections. Ultimately, This program supports the city's traffic safety and public safety objectives. The city program is authorized under the Mark Wandel Traffic Safety Act, Florida statute 316.0083.
South Miami initially implemented this program in April of 2014 and renewed it in 2021 for a five-year term, which expired January of this year. Currently, The program is operating on a month-to-month basis while the city evaluates vendor proposals and determines the best path forward. Go back. All right. Vendors under consideration that we currently use, I should say. For the purposes of this presentation, we will be viewing current vendors, Vero Mobility and
Red Speed. Vero Mobility is the city's current provider and has operated the South Miami's red light Red light camera program since inception. Red speed currently provides the city's school speed zone enforcement cameras and has proven experience with South Miami. Both vendors offer similar red light camera technology and provide additional integration with license plate readers. Current camera locations. The current camera program includes four cameras located along South Dixie Highway corridor. Southwest 57th Avenue and US1, Southwest 72nd, Southwest 73rd Street, and Southwest 80th Street. These locations were originally selected based on the
traffic volume and crash risk data available in 2014. US-1 is one of the busiest and most dangerous corridors within the city, making it a top priority for traffic safety enforcement and safety measures. These cameras have played an important role in improving compliance and safety along the corridor over the past decade. The proposed expansion locations would add up to four additional cameras at key intersections in the city. These locations were chosen based on crash history, injury data, and safety analysis. The proposed intersections would be Southwest 62nd Avenue in US 1, Southwest
70th Street in US 1, and Southwest 72nd Street and 58th Avenue, Southwest 72nd Street, and Southwest 62 Avenue. These intersections, especially Southwest 62nd Avenue and US 1 is the most dangerous intersection for crashes in the city. And it does not have a red light camera there. Southwest 70th Street and US 1 is the third most. Southwest 72nd Street and 58th Avenue had a fatality a few years back and is
a main artery into our city. Southwest 72nd Street and 62nd Avenue is number six. because the number fifth one is 80th Street and Red Road. Supporting data, current crashes. Sorry, can you repeat that one more time just in terms of the most critical intersections? The most critical intersections currently is 62nd Avenue and US 1 is number one for the most crashes. 70th Street and US 1 is number three. And 72nd Street and 58th Avenue is just
because of a recent fatality there and is kind of a main artery into the city. And then 72nd Street and 62nd Avenue is number six overall because the number fifth is actually a stop sign for intersections. Okay, thank you. We're just looking at signalized for this purpose. The supporting data, crash data, supports expansion, for example, 62nd Avenue and US 1 experienced 48 crashes, including a motorcycle fatality and serious pedestrian injuries. 70th Street and US 1 had 21 crashes.
And as I mentioned- Chief, I'm sorry to interrupt. I think we're a slide ahead. John, if we can go one back, please. Thank you. Sorry, Chief. That's all right. And Southwest 72nd Street and 58th Avenue experienced a pedestrian fatality. And 72nd Street and 62 Avenue experienced 16 crashes. These locations have been also identified through Miami-Dade County's Vision Zero Initiative, which focuses on eliminating traffic deaths and serious injuries. They're also part of Miami-Dade's County High Injury Network, meaning they represent some of the highest risk locations. In 2025,
the city commissioned Stantec Consulting to conduct a comprehensive safety action plan. This study found that 96% of all fatal and serious injury crashes occur on major corridors and intersections. Between 2020 and 2024, the city experienced over 4,200 total crashes, including 40 with serious injuries and six fatalities. The study specifically recommended proactive safety strategies and technology-based enforcement tools, such as red light cameras, to reduce crashes and improve safety. Some of the cost proposals, currently the city pays approximately $17,080 a month for four
cameras plus associated fees. Under the new proposals, Vara Mobility would reduce their costs to approximately $1,400 a month and Red Speed would cost about $15,200 a month and that's staying with the four camera current configuration. This represents a savings with either vendor providing the greatest, with Vara Mobility providing the greatest cost reduction. If we expand the camera program to eight cameras or up to eight cameras, Vero Mobility will cost approximately $28,000 a month. Red Speed would be about $30,400 a month.
And Vero Mobility would save the city approximately $2,400 per month compared to Red Speed with the expansion of up to eight cameras. Chief, can I ask you a question on the proposals? What's the revenue side look like? Is that another slide? Yes, sir. I'll get it. And these are, because on the Red Speed contract for schools, we don't have... any sort of a minimum monthly cost associated with that, correct? It's just based on citations issue? It's based on a percentage, sir. And this works differently? Yes, sir, it does. Okay, thank you. The expansion would double enforcement coverage and significantly increase
safety impact. I think we just covered that one. The ALPR integration, both vendors offer integration with automated license plate readers. This technology through Flock Safety The city currently operates four ALPR locations tied into our school's speed zone camera safety initiative. This technology assists law enforcement in locating stolen vehicles, wanted persons, and suspects involved in crimes. This enhances the police department's investigative capabilities and public safety efforts. The added benefit significantly increases the value of
the program beyond traffic enforcement, looking beyond the license plate itself. Vero Mobility is also offering a block the box pilot program. This technology detects vehicles that block intersections. Currently this would be used for research purposes only. No citations would be issued until authorized by Florida law. This pilot would allow the city to evaluate future enforcement capabilities or opportunities. In addition to safety benefits, the program also generates revenue. Between July 2024 and June of 2025, the city issued 7,474 violations, generating $716,675
in revenue from which the city retained $391,650. This revenue helps support public safety programs and city operations. However, it is important to note and for me to emphasize that the primary goal of the program is safety, not revenue. The Red Light Camera program is a proven safety tool. The data clearly supports expanding the program to high-risk intersections. This expansion would allow us to align with the Vision Zero program and the city's commitment to preventing traffic fatalities. Maintaining and expanding this program
represents a responsible data-driven investment in protecting the safety of our residents, visitors, and road users. The Red Light Camera program is a proven safety tool. Depending on any questions, that's what I have. Colleagues, questions? Commissioner Kaye, you're recognized. Thanks, Chief, for the presentation. Can you talk a little bit about the blocking program? Is that with the US-1 and the Florida Department of Transportation? How does that work? So right now, this would be a pilot program offered by one vendor,
Vero Mobility, as a pilot program because there's no Florida law currently that allows for us to use that for enforcement. So we gather data for us as to what that actually looks like. Hopefully eventually one day, you know, the block the box would become a legislative matter. And currently we have two different systems, one for the school zone cameras and then obviously, I forgot the brand name. Red Speed, yes. So, well Red Speed's the one that we're using for the school zone. Yes sir. Moving forward, do you see an advantage or a disadvantage having two different vendors? What's the
advantage of having one vendor with information? Is it transferable databases like What is all the information that we've gathered from previous information on our current red light system? Can it be converted? Does it integrate anywhere in our platforms for data? I'll say that regardless of what vendor we choose, the data will be there. It's just how you extract it is what it boils down to. It doesn't feed any other system, so we're only pulling from their vendor system. So it doesn't feed into another system that we currently operate. Are we using that data for any of our
information? So the information that we're just getting from data purposes on the block, the no blocking zone, are we using that data for anything else? Like, can we use that data for anything else? Yeah, I mean, I think we can use all that data for data-driven strategies. I mean, that's what we're hoping to go to. That's what our urban SDK modeling, you all have seen, portions of that, whether it's a complaint from a citizen of speeding in a neighborhood or how much traffic volume, time of day, day of week. So yes, we would be utilizing all this data for all
of that. So, just on your question regarding the vendors, when we went through the procurement process with Red Speed around the school zone cameras, Vera came in with a proposal. Unfortunately, they would not match the terms. At that point, I think I'd spoken to the chief about, or the chief staff about the benefits of having one integrated vendor, since we were already on their system and platform. I think that would have been our preference, but again, the terms that were offered by Red Speed were markedly better than what VAR was willing to provide at the time. But from my perspective,
it would have been VAR's contract to lose since we were under a contract with them for the Red Light Camera Program. That integration probably is the most optimal at some point. So Chief, thanks Mayor. So Chief, do you think the delta in price between one and the other, having the fully integrated system, do you think it's a benefit? I think it could be a benefit for us. It's just, again, we will lose, the one thing we will lose that's not being done would be the block the box. So it's a trade-off. Do we look at a pilot program of potentially
being first and forward and a block the box potential, or do we just stick with one vendor because it's easier for us to extract the data out of one database? The block the box is only with? Vera. Vera, yes, sir. And they come in at a lesser price currently. Last question. I saw a portable unit in one of the pictures. Is that something that we can also use as well? This is only for red lights? This is only for red lights, sir. Yes, sir. So
last from my colleague here. With respect to the vendor selection, is that ultimately coming from a term of years, I'm assuming it's going to come to this commission for ultimate approval? It's not coming from a vendor's perspective. We're just asking from- Is there a solicitation that's outstanding? No, no, sir. This is simply just us reaching out to the commission and kind of getting the appetite for expanding the program. And then we would go back to vendors at that point and say, show us what you have and explain to us a little bit further in detail. On our current contract with Vera, are we still, I mean, the old, I haven't been around these contracts for
a long time, but I remember when the technology was deployed, There's typically, if we wanted to terminate the program, there's like an amortization cost that we have to pay if we terminate early. Is that part of our current contract or? What termination price do we have? Our current contract has expired at this point, so we're just on a month to month with them. What I understand to occur, should we choose another vendor, would be that that vendor would buy out Vera's camera systems from them at no cost to us. They would just take over those already permitted polls and so
forth. At this current point, we have 80th Street in US 1 is still under construction with the underline, so that camera's been down for quite some time. They're not charging it for us. Vero Mobility's not charging us for the camera because they know it's down and they can't get to it. And then the one camera right where the new Avalon Bay 2 will go is gonna have to be moved because that is a corridor into where I think a main thoroughfare for that Avalon Bay is gonna be. So we gotta move that camera as well. You're recognized, sir.
Are we looking to stay at a month-to-month or are we looking to sign a contract? We're looking to sign a contract. The question is, does the commission wish to expand that program to an eight camera program versus a four camera program? So once the decision is made for the red light cameras to, let's say, if we say expand, then you'll go through and sign a contract. How many years? Just curious. We're soliciting a contract, I'm assuming. Are we doing a solicitation or are we doing, are there more than two vendors in the universe that provide the service, first of all? Yes, sir, there are more than two vendors. The only reason I'm sharing these two
vendors with you tonight is because they currently operate in our city. Correct. It's not for, we're not soliciting those vendors. Hold on, so is the intention to solicit formally a bid for the service for a term of years? I think that we would explore all options as to what's the quickest way. To your point, there was language that would allow a vendor to recoup their infrastructure investment if we ended it short. And so obviously they've recouped that probably by now, we would assume. So I think we'd look at options and say, okay, what's the
best route to get there? If we're gonna expand, do we expand with the current vendor? Do we completely start all over and put it out on the street? So that's what we would like to analyze. Further questions? Well, I was just gonna say, I mean, ultimately, as the chief said, their equipment would have to be bought out by whoever were to take over the contract if someone new came in. So I would imagine that being their equipment, they should provide the best affordable price, because no one's just gonna... So I mean, I think my two cents on this is I
prefer to go the route that we have with Red Speed in terms of how our contract is structured. I think we had, we could terminate with relatively no notice. There's no cost determination. It's all on them. Mr. Secretary, you can correct me if I'm recalling the salient contract terms incorrectly, but I believe we had the right to terminate after a year without any, without any penalty, we certainly didn't have to pay them for any sort of advertised costs for the deployment of their equipment. There was a period of time, I can't remember if it was a year or a few months. I'm pretty sure it was a year. There was definitely a period of time. There also is no minimum guaranteed payment on our part.
So we're just splitting revenues. Again, I don't know if that's a function of the statutory authorization of one program versus the other. But certainly my preference would be not to have to pay a fixed fee every month. If behavior is improved and less people are violating the law, That's really the goal, the goal is not to claim revenue and I'd rather not have the downside of a fixed payment if in fact we're getting compliance. And then I just wanted to just add on the expansion, I'm not keen on the four intersections. I mean I think the two critical intersections are
62nd and US-1 and 70th Street and US-1. That's where I kind of observe the worst behavior and particularly on 62nd and US-1 that's where we have the worst blocking of the box. Think of any of the intersections in the city. And so I'm interested in certainly trying to figure out if both one, both or any other vendor can provide us certainly the data collection opportunity around blocking the box because I'd love to take that data to Tallahassee and say we need an enforcement program because as we've discussed, the difficulty with citing people when they're committing the violations, we're
pulling them over and we're further reducing capacity on the right of way which is already constrained. So we exacerbate the traffic problem. But if we could cite them for blocking the box through a I'm not sure with, through this kind of technology, I think we could get some better behavior long-term and reduce the traffic impediment. So I'm certainly interested in that capability. VAER is the only provider, and that certainly would certainly give them a substantial advantage, in my mind, over anybody else in the marketplace. Colleagues, any other thoughts we want to share with the chief? Commissioner Kaya?
I would agree with that. I think blocking is a big... deterrent for traffic situations. And so what you were saying, instead of doing eight, you would say six? Is that what you were saying? Yeah, I think those are the two that, again, I'm open to be corrected, but those are the two that I, in my day-to-day experience, have seen are the most critical. I'm assuming on 70th Street and US 1, we're really talking about just the north and southbound movements? Yes, sir. That we're gonna try and screen for. I mean, on 6th, 2nd, US 1, I think all four movements are critical because, People will violate the red light going northbound and southbound and certainly
people going in any of the cardinal directions are blocking the box there, depending on who they're trying to get around at four o'clock in the afternoon at that intersection. The only thing I would say to finish off my point was the deterrent of not having a monthly cost initiative is that we're not totally dependent on citations for revenue on both sides, right? I think there's an incentive for the company to give more citations. That's how they make more revenue. So I don't necessarily have a preference if it's one or the other. You guys find out
the math and then whatever you think is better. I just don't want to be dependent on the company to be dependent on citations where it's just constantly pushing citations up. If you can address that, because I think one of the safeguards that I recall is that we actually have to review the citation. We do an audit, right? We don't do every citation. Yes, we do. Well, the company will initially do a self-check, actually two self-checks, and then it kicks it over to a traffic infraction officer to review that and confirm or deny. and then it goes to
a formal notice of violation at that point to the offender. And then subsequently, if they don't pay, then it goes to a UTC further down the road. I'll take that back. Yeah, they're checks and balances. I just wanted to share that for the benefit of not only you, but the public as well. Yes, sir, you're recognized. Chief, I'm sorry, you probably did mention this. If we were to do these four additional, there's no cost to the city or there is a cost to the city? There is a cost to the city. What it really boils down to is like, I mean, Either vendor's cheaper than what we're paying now. So that's a good thing, and we're still, revenue-wise, it's still profitable for the city in that aspect.
But it basically would take a, let me just find it here real quick. Currently we pay $17,080 a month for Vero Mobility's four cameras. They're proposing to reduce that cost to $14,000, so basically a $3,000 savings a month. on those four cameras. Red speed would come in just a hair bit higher at $15,200, so a little bit less of a savings. If we expand up to eight, the mayor only, the commission decides it's six,
it would be per camera, I'm just giving a total cost of eight, would be $28,000 per month by Vero Mobility and $30,400 per month by Red Speed. So, Vero Mobility saves $2,400 a month, but they had that added benefit of block the box as well. So again, two different systems, but there's more out there that we can solicit from. We only use the vendors that currently the city has had a contract with. Chief, is there a, I
don't know, maybe Stephen has this answer, is there a piggybacking option here on an existing contract that we can leverage? If you can repeat that to you for the benefit of the audience. He believes there is that we looked at that with red speed initially. We have to verify. Yes sir, you're recognized. No, I would say I agree with you on the six. I don't think we need all eight. It's just really small areas. We're talking about 300 meters between some of these cameras. Correct. I don't know where the state legislation lies with doing the block program. I mean, I'd love to have that data, but we still have to provide that back to Tallahassee. We are talking about one
of the busiest streets in all of Florida. So I don't know how much of that data they're actually going to consider to make this legislation at the state level. I think it just gives us some data to take to Tallahassee and say, hey, we're having this problem. Enforcing it in a traditional way exacerbates the traffic problem. If you authorize this, here's a way that we can begin to correct behavior and improve traffic capacity and I would argue quality of life by extension. Yeah, Chief, I think the only thing I would tell you on top, so you would have to balance whether you have a fully integrated system with Red, I always
forget their name. Mira and Red Speed. Red Speed. If you have fully integrated systems with Red Speed, what are the pros to that versus having this data point, which I like as well, and I think that's just a decision you guys got to make, right? Do we have a fully integrated system, and what are the benefits of doing that versus having two different options with the ability to do the I would look at it as, I don't know that it would change that many clicks on the mouse, is my point. I would click one app versus another app on your phone and then maybe delve into that by reports. But it could
potentially be a little bit smoother. Chief, am I wrong in believing that we could procure both services under a future solicitation? I mean, we could move to terminate our existing school enforcement camera contract if we wanted to. I think we have the option of terminating at this point, had no penalty. So if we wanted to put out a procurement to integrate both functions, we can. So that's just, I mean, again, just wanted to put that out there. That's something that you want to consider. Yes, sir, you recognize that? I don't necessarily disagree, but just to play devil's advocate, I
would say that it's probably best to have two separate vendors because it kind of keeps them both honest. Rather than having one that knows that he has, or that the company has both red light and school zones. I think it's good to divide them and let them know like, there's competition out there. So the one thing I'll say, I think we'll just try to, any further comments? Anybody, questions? Just to close, I mean, I think, as the Chief said, right now we're paying more than the two known offers that we have. So it's probably savings of what, $3,000 a
month? Yes, sir. So, I mean, I think we're probably best served to move with some deliberate speed here to save money if we can. But I mean, is there a desire to go to eight cameras as presented? No? I'm at six. I'm good with six. Okay, so I think six is a consensus. And do we want to ask staff potentially to look at a piggyback option with either a vendor for one or both services? Or then solicit, sorry, put out solicitation for just the red light enforcement option. with I guess a request that
any vendor that has the ability to collect data on intersection blocking be prioritized or given additional points in that solicitation. Since that's data I think we want to certainly collect. I agree with that. Chief, is that vendor, Vera, the only one that we know that does We haven't researched the block the box, but that was news to us that they even had that capability up until recently, so we didn't reach out any further than the current vendors that we had. We just wanted to speak tonight just on the current vendors that we operate within our
city and just see what the commission's appetite and direction was to either move forward with expansion or just continue with the current operational footprint. Yes sir, you're recognized. I was just curious, looking for a solicitation or piggybacking, How long do you think that could take? Because again, every month we spend more than we need to spend now, right? Mr. Manager, I don't know if you or Steven can give us a sense of time to review other contract opportunities that we can leverage. Yeah, piggyback, I mean we can land that plane pretty quick as to what contract is out there
that we could leverage. A whole new solicitation would take a bit. I mean we have the framework of one that we utilized before so we can We can tweak that, but it's still issuing within a period to evaluate committee, come back. That could be two plus months. Three months, yeah. The piggyback would be a quicker turnaround. If there's an existing contract, we think it's good to leverage. So should we just look at the piggyback and if that doesn't exist, choose between the two vendors? We have also the option of selecting one of the two and waiving competitive bidding. option we have, but I think. That's why I was kind of brought in my
answer to you, Mayor, when you asked, I said, because I think we want to explore each of those avenues and see, hey, what pros and cons, right? I mean, we have some things on the table that we may be able to start leveraging the savings right away with a known partner, and that there's value to that. But maybe there's value to things that are out there, just like we learned about the block-to-block technology. So I think we would do that, which avenue will get us to where we need to in the best way possible. Colleagues for the comments, thoughts. Final direction then, six cameras, explore piggybacking.
Do we want them to have direct negotiations with the two vendors and see if they'll further refine the prices if we integrate both? I'd like to see us go away from a monthly fixed number, given that we do have checks. I do not know if the statutory framework is what's dictating this particular fee arrangement. I know that the Red Light Camera program for school enforcement is a little bit more where speed enforcement is a little bit more flexible and probably why we ended up in the format that we're in. But if you guys can, my preference would be to get away from that fixed monthly and go to a citation driven fee sharing arrangement.
And if you can bring us back alternatives, I think certainly probably faster than going through a formal solicitation would be preferable. And it sounded like a yes, I just want to make sure and explore the pilot program for Block the Box. No, without a doubt. That's frankly the thing that I'm most interested in. That's the reason I would say to keep that. Honestly, for the record, for my purpose, the reason I want to add those two intersections for cameras is for that reason, not because of the red line enforcement. I just think that those two intersections right now are particularly 6-2 and US-1. It's scary between 4 and 5. Some of the maneuvers people are
pulling to kind of get into the southbound queue or head southbound across US-1 and avoid people that are queuing back into the intersection. Okay, thank you, Chief. We appreciate your time. Thank you. Thanks, Chief. Okay, we have an add-on. Madam Clerk, if you can read F-1. Add-on. And the resolution of the Mayor and City Commission of the City of South Main Florida ratifying the approaches of emergency, mechanical, obviously, maintenance services, for Southampton Canals from Moore United LLC authorizing the city manager to expand funds for the payment of those services. Any objection to adding this item onto the agenda? Seeing
none, considering it added on. Mr. City Manager, your report, please. All right, Deputy Manager is going to provide. Madam Deputy, good evening. Good evening. On Monday, March 9th from 1215 to 115, there'll be a food distribution event that's happening at South Miami Children's Clinic. That's thanks to the support of the Family and Children Foundation and it's being coordinated via a parks department. On the community affairs side, we've been grateful to have several ribbon cuttings welcoming new businesses to South Miami. It's been great. So our next one is March 5th where we'll be welcoming Board Cuban and
celebrating their official opening at 3.05 p.m. And I'm happy to report, as you already know, that Congresswoman Salazar announced that she was able to successfully secure a million dollars in funding to advance our subject to sewer projects. So her office has advised that sometime between April and May, she can come in person so we can all thank her in person. Thank you for that. That's the manager's report. Colleagues, any questions of the manager? No, I was remiss in asking on the new business section of our earlier Sunset Agenda, can we add an item on code compliance? And Mr. Manager, what I'm particularly interested in is understanding how we follow up on our development orders on
the landscaping side. Because I'm just noting a few buildings are kind of, they make improvements and then the maintenance kind of falls off. So if we add that onto our kind of our goals meeting for the future, and kind of maybe, I don't know if Ms. Cabrera can work on looking at some DOs for some sites around town and just making sure that, you know, we can follow up offline. I can give you a couple of examples, but okay, thank you. Mr. State Attorney, you're recognized. Just two bits of good news. There was a case,
a false arrest claim that was asserted against the city of South Miami police. Just wanted to let you guys know our insurance council received a summary judgment in favor of the city recently. So that was a nice big win. And the other thing was today at the Board of County Commissioners, but I can let you. You can deliver the good news. All right. The county commission approved the CRA. They have delegated the Commission, the authority, so in the next couple of meetings you will see items in connection with that and with the aim of having our first
CRA meeting as a group sometime in April. I'll just note for the record that as soon as our City Attorney arrived in the chamber, the item was moved and approved. Thanks for your timely arrival. Questions for the City Attorney? Mr. Attorney, just on the item we discussed before, I know we had talked about we have a solicitation out on solid waste. In terms of conflict counsel? Yes. Does that matter? Because I think I am aware that one of your clients is. Yes, one of my firm's clients. Clients, correct, is a possible respondent. Yeah. Will you be
bringing back a name for us to consider at some point for appointment? I have three or four that I can propose to you. Okay. Yeah. Colleagues, would you like to see a recommendation of one or all three? What's your preference? This is just to advise us and help us in negotiations with any party that's responding to the solid waste RFP. You're talking about a consultant? No, I'm talking about a lawyer. A lawyer I think. Yeah. Oh, you have to. I have a conflict. RCA attorney's firm represents one of the potential respondents. So. So they have to. We'd have to either, we'd have to either have to recuse themselves, we'd have to waive the conflict. So,
yeah. Those are the options, correct? You can do it. No, you can't do it. Me, no, yeah, no. It's never a good idea to be your own lawyer. We don't really have a choice. Well, we do have a choice. Well, we can waive it. No, yeah. So, yes, we have a choice. We can waive it or we can appoint conflict counsel. I mean, generally, we've approved it, a waiver, but personally, I think in this case, it's direct adversity on an item. I think it's best to You're the attorney on here, man. We'll follow your lead on that one.
We want to see one name or three names. What's the difference between one, two, or three? I don't know. It's just for you to consider options. I mean, I would say I would leave it to the discretion of the city attorney. Bring back your best option. You got it. We'll do it. Okay. Thank you. We can do the next meeting. I'm not sure when that solicitation closes, but sooner that's in place, the better. Thank you. Any further questions? Nothing? Okay. We'll move on then. Open up the floor to public remarks. No, John, anyone can you guys, no one's registered? Okay, is there anyone in this chamber who'd like to
address this commission in public remarks? You're welcome to do that at this time. If you've not signed up, we'll ask you to sign up on the black signing sheet. You can speak beforehand and sign after. No one in the chamber? Madam Clerk, is there anyone online? Anyone on Zoom, please raise your virtual hand. Again, this is an invitation to address this commission in public remarks. Okay, seeing no one in the chamber, no one online will close public remarks. Okay, let's move on to, is there anyone in the audience who's here for any particular
item that we can take so we don't keep everyone here? Yes, ma'am. Yes, so let's move that item. Madam Clerk, if you can read item one. I apologize, should have taken it earlier. Item one, a resolution of the Mayor's City Commission of the City of Southampton, Florida approving and authorizing a waiver of certain event related fees and costs in amount not to exceed $7,092 pursuant to section 15B-6 of the City Code for a special event known as 2026 Twilight 5K Run-Walk presented by Team Footworks Education and Fitness Corporation to be held Sunday, May 31st,
2026. Thank you very much. Why don't you come up very quickly? Give us your name again for the record. And if you can just share with people again the date of the event and where they can register, cost, et cetera, so they know how they can participate. Okay, hi. Thank you so much. My name is Maria Seminam. I'm the race director for Team Footworks. And we are putting on the Twilight 5K. We're going over 30 years of putting on this event. We have a website, twilight5k.com, and we invite you guys all to sign up. I know you're at the gym, so come run with us. He does, he actually goes to the gym in the
morning. I see him out there. He does every day, very faithfully. He is there, he is there. So yes, we're going on over 30 years, and it's an event that we're trying to build back up after the pandemic, so, and we're excited. We did change the course this year, so the start and finish is gonna be in the same spot. So I think that'll bring everything kind of more celebration and more congested, not so far apart, so. Yeah, we're excited and hopefully we get more than 500 participants this year. Great, thank you. Any questions? Sounds like there's a challenge somewhere. I don't know, Steve. I'll definitely walk. I'm not gonna run, that's for sure. Mr.
Attorney, should we put on a challenge somewhere? What should we do here? I'd love to see all you guys out there, it'd be great. We'll work on it. Okay, I'll give you guys all free entries. What's the cost of registration? The cost right now is we're still at the bundle at $45. $45, okay. When does that price? That's going to expire in about 10 days, so it goes up to $60. Okay, we've got to get the mayor to pass. You've got to get it passed, okay. So invest your $45 fee while you can. Yes. Okay. Colleagues, is there a motion to adopt item one? I move the motion. Is there a second? Second. I have
a motion by Commissioner Kaye, a second by Commissioner Rodriguez. Madam Clerk, please call the roll. Yes, Commissioner Callaghan. Yes. Commissioner Rodriguez. Yes. Vice Mayor Cory. Yes. Mayor Fernandez. Yes. Madam Passos-4-0. Thank you. Thank you for doing such a great job. Thank you so much. I appreciate you guys. I'll give you, I'll sign up and I'll run the 5K. I'll run. I'll see you out there, sir. So I put the challenge up for everybody. I'll walk. I'll walk. It's nice to see you guys there. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Okay, anyone else here on an item? Yes, sir, why don't you come on up? Doggy Park. Doggy Park. Okay, we'll go to that first. It's not about what you think it is, Jason, I promise, okay. Well,
maybe it is. Maybe it is, I don't know, maybe it is. Maybe I spoke too soon. Right in front of your house, Jason, right in front. Anybody else here on an item that we can call up out of, no? Okay. Okay, let's go ahead and take up item M6, please. M6, Mayor Fernandez's dog park. Yeah, so the reason for this is just to get a status update from the manager on the current situation with the dog park adjacent to the Elks Lodge. So sir, floor is yours. Thank you, Mayor. Mayor, some months ago
Elks Lodge representatives had reached out to the city and parks regarding the longstanding agreement. I think that park had been there since 2016, but the agreement apparently had expired, which was news to me. In that conversation, they expressed very strong reservations with their exposure from a liability standpoint. And the dog park is primarily on a city property, and there's about a 15 foot width from the back of that soccer field that's there. So from the back
of that fence, behind the goal, about 15 feet into the dog park is the portion that is Elk's property. So that objection was raised. I was out of town. I know our city attorney attended a meeting with our deputy manager. Given the concerns raised at that meeting, there was an immediate act to close the park because they felt like every waking moment that the park was open, they had this exposure, and they were really concerned about the exposure. That step
was taken to close the park while we evaluated alternatives. Obviously messaging went out to the community. I think there was a lot of consternation in the community not really understanding the full dynamic. Obviously Alex has been a good partner for the time period of providing this piece of property or a portion thereof to facilitate the dog park. So we tried to have a message that was a little bit more encompassing as to the relationship and the why. because they were receiving a lot of complaints and even people walking onto the property to object the closure
of the park. And so we understood it, but I think it was done in a concern for our partner and their potential liability. So that's why it was closed. Since then, there's been a few things that we've done. John Tyson has gone out there with staff. We verified more or less what is the portion of what could be impacted from an option standpoint. What are our options? Well, we could move the 15 feet of the fence and just have a smaller part that would really impact a couple things. One, the fence. Two, there's an A-frame that
the dogs climb. And then there's a vertical sign So those elements would have to be moved further west. Potentially it'll be a smaller park, not necessarily ideal. It's already kind of a tricky location given that it's only one formal parking space and a handicapped space. Other options could be potentially, I had a conversation briefly on the issue of could the city maybe obtain and acquire that 15 feet. that is owned by the Elks Lodge.
I think that there was an openness to it, but there's a concern about how it may impact their property from a total real estate standpoint and what they could do in the future there if losing 15 feet would prevent their ability to do something that they're entitled to build. Mr. Andrews, just to add some color to that, my conversation with them, they basically are concerned that's going to render either their existing improvements or the ability to build in the future non-conforming with their zoning regulations. So I was gonna ask, Mr. Resilio, have you had a chance to look at the underlying subdivision for that property? Is that whole property
platted as one tract, multiple tracts? They lost 15 feet, would they need to replat, for example? I mean, have we done that kind of level of an analysis? We have not done that kind of level of analysis, but I am familiar with the plat because we were locating the park. Correct. And the park is actually within, what was formerly right of way. So to answer your immediate question, those 15 feet are part of their tract. If they were to be reduced, it would not affect them until they actually come in for a building permit, but the idea would be that we would do something like a waiver of plat to
allow for that. But couldn't we avoid the need to replat if we simply had them dedicated to us? if we pay them consideration for the dedication? Yes. So is that an option we've discussed with them? And I'll just explain to them that it basically has no impact on their need to replat the subdivision, whether it's by waiver or otherwise? Yeah, if they're dedicating it to the public, they would retain like a reverter? Correct. Yes. We could pay them compensation for it. Yeah. Yeah, that's okay. And they would avoid the need to replat. And that's an exception to the replatting process, correct? Yeah, under 28-4 in the county code. Yeah, you're absolutely
right. So, I mean, I just don't know if we had to, maybe that's something to throw on the table, Mr. Manager. Again, it doesn't necessarily address their concerns about it constraining their development options in the future, but certainly does not trigger another burden, which I think plating, whether via waiver or otherwise, would be a costly exercise for them. Correct. Okay. And so... you know, moving the fence and moving those elements, there's a cost to that. It'll probably be the most expeditious way to get the park open again. And or, you know, some of these other
ideas that could keep the park in its current state and protect them from the standpoint of their property. You know, ultimately, you know, I think the city for sure, given our geographic location and that location is very south, I think ultimately we would need something that's, you know, a little bit further north. So that could also be a consideration that we look at another site, potentially, whether it's further north or in the area, potentially, that could be another option that could be a little bit bigger as it is. It is somewhat constrained, and there's only one parking spot. So notwithstanding
the situation, maybe every crisis has an opportunity. Maybe there's a bigger picture here. But those are some of the options. And certainly, I think the mayor wanted to shed some light and put this out in public because there was a lot of behind the scenes social media I think we wanted transparency on the topic. I think their concern is somewhat legitimate. We are in the risk management business. But how we get there, we have these options that we're discussing. So certainly any feedback from this commission or will, we can further that. And I think
notwithstanding, to me it gave rise at some point, notwithstanding what happens with this site, we ought to consider. Potentially an alternate, an additional site given the size of our city and how limited that location is. It's really designed for people that can walk to it because people are parking in the Elks Lodge where they're not supposed to, probably parking in the business that's closed now, but across the street and probably becoming a little bit of a nuisance to some of those other businesses. So that's some of the ideas and where we're at and certainly would further any PROCESS THAT
YOU MAY WANT US TO TAKE A LOOK AT IN FURTHERING GETTING THE PARK OPEN AND OR ADDITIONAL LOCATION. COLLEAGUES, QUESTIONS? YES, SIR. CAN WE INCLUDE THIS IN THE PARKS PLAN TO MAKE SURE THAT WE CAN HIGHLIGHT MAYBE A POTENTIAL SPOT FOR A PARK, A PET PARK, A TALK PARK, WHATEVER. MY PREFERENCE WOULD BE WHAT THE MAYOR SAID. I REALLY DON'T WANT TO SPEND TOO MUCH TIME AND MONEY allocating 15 feet if we don't need to. We can work on amicable solution legally. I think that's obviously the best solution. We have been getting a lot of calls
down there about the pet park. And what other park can we do in the area? I would look to the city to see what other options we have, whether it's Veterans Park, any other parks down in the South, you would know more than anybody else, but there's some areas down there that we can Look into it. Veterans or Fuchs are probably the two that are probably the obvious choices. Van Smith Park is another one too. Which one? Van Smith. I know Fuchs has an area that probably could lend itself for that too. Without disturbing any trees, you can probably fence it just to the east of the tot lot, which
is also fenced. So that could be an option as well. Further south too. I was thinking, and I had this discussion with the manager also about Fuchs Park and that. where we were thinking of doing the paddle courts into a dog park. The only thing I'm thinking about that I started thinking about after and I bring it to you guys, is that park really one that would be used by our residents considering that it's surrounded by mostly residents that are not part of county. They're not South Miami residents. So if we're
gonna do a park for our residents for their dogs, I would imagine we do it in a park that's centrally located for our residents? Well, the trade-off there, I mean, location is an issue given how far north we go to Bird Road, but now you have parking. True, absolutely, I get that. Yeah, you could drive there. Our current location is just, it is very limited. If you really enforce where people are parking where they're not supposed to, I mean, you got the one spot, right? And so it really is more of a neighborhood, walk to that park. But even if we had Fuchs, I think long term, from a master plan standpoint,
I think it would behoove us to take a look at another location as well. So we can better serve the residents from south to north. Sorry. And I guess we'll discuss this as part of the park's master plan, but also there is an opportunity at Brewer because to, I would say to the east side of where the swing set is, it's just, there's an open grass area that then goes into like a rock area. Maybe converting a small corner of that into a small dog park that people can walk around from the neighborhood could be
an option. It's not a huge dog park, but it's something smaller that can be used by the residents. The park is already pretty busy. It is pretty busy. It's more for walking. Parking was bad. It is. Sir? I would just say I'd prefer, obviously, for us to have these conversations and have the conversation come to an end, whatever it ends up being, with ELKS before we decide to move anything, obviously, since that'll be disruptive and take a lot of time. The faster resolution may be coming to terms with ELKS on something. So I
just want to level set expectations with the ELKS because I think, and this is without disparaging them or anyone, they've been a great partner, and the irony is this all came to a head because we're trying to recognize their contribution to the city over the last 13 years with a sign that we were asking for their permission to place on the park, noting the contribution. But without getting into any details that were shared with me in a conversation with the representative for the Grand Lodge, and by the way, the Elks, fascinating history. If anyone ever wants to look into
it, how it came to be formed. There are internal issues that may make a speedy solution with them very challenging. And that's the point of one conversation, very honest conversation with them. There are issues in the Grand Lodge and the local lodge. And so ultimately that might be a barrier to getting to, I think would be an obvious resolution where they dedicate the land, we avoid the need to trigger a replot, and we can pay them consideration for that dedication. But we'll see what happens. So,
Mr. Manager, I think the, I would certainly agree we should try to, if we can, present an option that avoids triggering any sort of other entitlement process for them. If we can figure out from our appraiser what fair considerations for that 15 feet or 10 feet, whatever that amount of space is, and if we can figure out what the total cost is and bring it back to us for maybe final ratification or approval. I mean, I certainly would be fine with spending the dollars to acquire that as right-of-way that we could use as a park. and have them make a dedication and avoid them having to do a future waiver of plat or replat when
and if they ever decide to redevelop that site or sell that site off for some of the use other than the current lodge use. Okay, thoughts? Can we offer them a variance that's already that goes attached to the lot? We can't contract for zoning in connection with the acquisition. So that's the challenge. Am I correct? You're correct. You're correct. But if they had an application that ran at the same time to seek a variance for that, we could certainly . So the question is that requires cost on their part? It could, yes. And so I
had a long conversation with them about these options. And I think, as I've thought about it, this dedication solution might be the easiest way to avoid all the heartache. Because otherwise, I'm not sure how we would apply for a variance on their behalf. avoid them having to come in with an application, pay fees. Or waive their fees. And again, what's the variance from? Because we don't even know what they're proposing. There's no project to build anything. Correct. Correct. But the commission could consider a blanket variance of setback on that side. You could do
that. to uphold what they currently are able to do. But again, my concern with that is that runs with the land in perpetuity? That would, yes. And so we don't know what blank check we're writing there. Although that is an edge I don't see. I mean, again, of all the places where we could grant a variance, probably the one that has the least amount of impact is we talk through it, because it's on a canal. Again, I just don't know what the end condition looks like. So I'm a little leery of doing that. Again, if it's an option that they want to explore, I would say throw it into the mix and see what they
come back with, Mr. Manager, Mr. City Attorney. And I think either option, we can discuss it and choose if they're unhopeness to both. Okay, let's move on then. Jason, did you want to add anything by way of comments or questions? I'll give you a minute if you want. No? Okay. Yes, please come forward. On this item or something else? Please come on up. If you could just add your name and address for the record please. Thank you. It's all right. How are you? Good, thank you. My name is Anita Chevalier. I'm living
in 5910 Southwest Texas Street, Miami. Teresa Del Rosso. I live on 79th Street, South Miami. Thank you. Okay, we all understand the concern regarding the dog park, knowing that we've been using the dog park every single day. of our daily life with our dog. We noticed that they closed the dog park with only one day notification, which was very bad news for us. Our concern is try to find a solution as fast as you can, because we
have a lot of residents that have no garden, no yard, kind of very old people that they can't walk their dogs in our street. So they go two, three times a day to the dog park for the dog to pee, to poo, to run, to play, and for our old people to meet with other people and to make friends. It's all about not feeling lonely anymore. So the dog park is not only for the dogs, it's mainly for us,
the community. I'm talking on behalf of them because I have my own yard. I don't really need a dog park, but I I'd like to be in the dog park to meet these very nice people over there. So please find a solution, even like a temporary solution, like reopen the dog park. Meanwhile, you're looking for another location. I really, if you can do that, it'd be very nice. Thank you. I just wanted to add, I've been- Speaking to the microphone so we can- South Miami resident for 28 years. I've had dogs all my life. And I can vouch
for what Anita is saying. We have a very big community within the dog park. And one of my best things is coming home from a 10-hour shift at Baptist and taking my dog to the park and socializing and letting her run around. So again, the streets in South Miami are very busy now. I can't even walk 78th Street anymore because I'm afraid to get run over around rush hour traffic time. So that was my safe place to go to take my dog. to have her exercise and do her thing. So as we're getting more and more busy here in South
Miami, all these high rises are going up, these people are gonna need places to socialize and to exercise their dogs. So I would just hope that we could get a temporary solution and then look to maybe not put just one dog park in, let's try and do two dog parks. Right now I'm traveling 10 minutes after work, 15 minutes to go to the Bark Park in Coral Gables. So I'm utilizing their services Coral Gables, they have a couple of parks, and I can't utilize anything in South Miami because you guys have nothing for me. And I've been,
again, a resident for 28 years. So I've seen all the changes over the years, some of them good, some of them not so good. So if you can just respect the fact that we had our little space there and try and resolve it temporarily and then find a more permanent solution, that would be great. And again, I apologize, it's caught us all. unaware, quite honestly, and I'd like to promise you could find a short-term solution. I don't know that there is one. We'd probably have to find a permanent solution to get the Elks comfortable because the only short-term solution is to move the fence and make the park smaller.
I don't know that that's, as a user of the park, I take my dog Milo there on occasion, it's not the most optimal solution because the park's not that large to begin with. So hopefully we can get to a point. I know that the manager, his team, I've spoken to them individually. I mean, in terms of the liability, the park's been open, I think since 2014, by my understanding, and no one's ever been bitten. There's never been a claim. That was a concern on the part of the Elks. We could certainly ensure against that risk, indemnify them against any claims.
We've offered that already. If I'm speaking out of school, Mr. Manders, you can correct me. They're still reluctant. So I think really for us, and again, I just wanna put it on the record so that you're clear, we're probably gonna have to acquire an interest in that 15 feet. in some form or fashion so we can keep the existing park open. But I agree, as we add more inventory of housing, we need to add more capacity. And that's been something that's certainly come back by way of resident feedback in our master planning process for parks. So certainly I'd like to see more facilities developed south of US-1 where we need them and also north of
US-1 where we don't have one currently. But again, I apologize. It's just an unfortunate situation we got thrown into here. Thank you for coming down. Any other comments? Anyone else like to say anything on this item? Okay, if not, we're gonna close this discussion and move on. So getting back to the regular order, let's take up item M1, Madam Clerk, if you can read it for the record, please. Have a good evening. Board proposal, certificate of appropriateness. Ms. Cabrera, is this your item, or Mr. Manager? Yeah, I think,
Between city attorney and Ms. Cabrera, both can tag team why this item is coming forward and I'll let them kind of share the history on it. The certificate of property is going back to the historic preservation board? Historic preservation, yeah. Yeah, so the historic preservation board would like to see all historic properties that come in for permit to go to that board before we issue a permit. There aren't that many of them, so it really, I thought it works well. It's not gonna really slow down the permitting process for historic properties. So staff is in favor of that. Okay.
Colleagues, questions or comments? No? No objections on that? I have one related item, which is, we don't have an exemption that we've authorized for improvements to historic properties in terms of the 10-year abatement. I mean, that's available to commercial properties. Is it available to residential properties as well, sedutorily? I don't believe it's available, I don't believe that we have authorized it. Okay, so colleagues, there is other jurisdictions do allow, in order to kind of incentivize people to protect
the historic home and invest in it, allow for a 10 year abatement on the plus value of any improvements done to the house as an incentive to continue to preserve the house. And so I don't know if anyone would like, I'd like to sponsor an item to kind of enact that under our code if it's not, if it's statutorily authorized. I couldn't remember if it was or was not. If it is, if you can bring back an item just to add that as an incentive as well. But certainly I have no objection to having the CAs referred to the Historic Preservation Board, okay? Yes, sir. Mr. Mayor, can you
in layman's terms kind of talk to the public because I really don't understand. Yeah, so if you're, so in other jurisdictions, if you're a historic, if you own a historic property that's commercial residential, The city and county will, when you make improvements, not tax you on the value of the improvements you make for 10 years as an incentive for you to reinvest in those properties. And so I'm just proposing that we should add that as an incentive to encourage the preservation. Most of these are cottage homes on Miller. They used to be part of the Biltmore when they had the
honeymoon bungalows people would get to invite canals. Correct? You're talking about the ones in Coral Gables. I know, but there's- The historic homes in Coral Gables. They have- We have them too. We have them as well. Oh, on 57- On 56- On 56- Yeah, yes, I know what you're talking about. Yeah. So, I mean, I think that's the majority of the stock that we're talking about. So- I have three historic homes on my neighborhood, a little block. Okay. So again, just as an incentive for those residential owners to reinvest and get the benefit of that investment, I mean, I think we should consider an abatement. And again, it's not something that we would authorize, would
be authorized typically by the Historic Preservation Board, so. Okay, okay. Thank you. If you can read M2, please. Public Benefits Trust Fund Policy. Actually, you know what? Out of respect for Mark, who's here, probably wants to go home, can we read item M3? M3, Clarifying Certainty and CD Provisions. Okay, Mark, you guys want to address item M3? I don't mind being here for M2 as well. Okay. This is an item for, as we go through
specific approvals that are, we're very fortunate that the TSDD is actually being built, so we have a code that's very active, but we have in evaluating some of the proposals, notice a number of things in the code that could use some refinement. The memo there lists quickly a few of them, and I'll just go through the list. So this would be, discussion item for you and then we would bring that to planning board and through the commission to make changes to the code. The first item is we have for off campus student departments, one of the things that's
in there, most of these are fairly small. We have in the code that we would have the bedrooms be greater than 150 square feet, the bedroom including the in suite, bathroom and closet. The ones that have come forward At this level of approval, nobody has the bedrooms calculated. So we would rather do that as the entire apartment unit divided by the number of bedrooms would be 150 or another number. Very, very fine point, but it's again, it's impossible to really enforce that.
On the street hierarchy plan, we have for some time noted that we have a problem that we're asking for dedications on county and state roads. In the three cases now that has occurred, we have, during the approval, made those into easements because once we dedicate, if a county road or a state road has a dedication, we lose control of it. And the idea was that we would get that property, that five feet strip, and we would have the sidewalks and landscape the way we want them. We can't do that on a county road. We can't do that on
a state road. So in three proposals now, we have, or two approvals actually, we have converted that to an easement instead of a dedication. And we would like to codify that. On open space plan, we made a bad assumption. We always thought about open space being open to the sky. We've had a proposal that was brought forward where the open space was under the building. It's a problem partly in policy that we would We imagined it to be open to the air, but I'm open to that either way
through the discussions with the planning board. The bigger problem with that is that we have a bonus. The bonus anticipated, so the bonus is actually open space, whatever open space you have, a square foot turns into 24 square feet. That's actually a doubling because it anticipated that once you lose a square foot down here, you lose eight square feet above it from the eight floors that are as of right. But if the building comes over it, we're double counting. So that's the bigger problem. So it's a very big problem for giving a bonus on the open space. The
code we'd like to correct at, the basic method would be that open space is always open to the sky, directly above it. If it's not open to the sky, it becomes private open space, and that still accounts for some of the requirements for the developer. I think that one's probably open to more discussion than some of the others, because there's policy issues in there. Why don't you tease out the policy issues, unless no one wants to hear them. From your perspective, on the last one. Okay, or should I go through the whole list? How do you want to handle it, folks? Let's go through the whole list, we'll come back to that. The other one is about contiguous floor area or floor
plates. We have a regulation in the TSDD, and it was done for the purposes of towers. So we wanted to control our towers somehow from not being too big, everything above the fourth floor. We decided on a 20,000 square foot floor plate with waivers available. We've had some applications where the floor plate uses, floor plate means something specific in the South Florida building code. And a floor plate can be connected to another floor plate. It's just more of a fire code issue. So we want to separate that definition and create our own term of art and we'll
call it contiguous floor area and that it has to have air in between the floors. Again, how much air is something that we can talk about for policy purposes. The other one would be for sustainable buildings. So we have a requirement. We have a number of applications that have come forward and we've had two approvals come forward where instead of LEED Gold, an alternative has been proposed. For bonuses, that alternative process is evaluated by the city manager and determined by the city manager. That is silent in the regular part of the code, not for bonuses. And we
just want to correct that so that the city manager determines the applicability of another standard. For building elevations, we have a glazing requirement, and the glazing requirements for the ground floor and the floors above it, it's separate for each one. One of the things that wasn't anticipated was that on side streets, We never anticipated that we would have a glazing requirement for the driveway and for the back of house space of the building. And we would like to correct that. We have on the applications that have come
forward not included that, but we would like to codify that. Also for glazing, the reflectance value. So we don't allow reflective glass and we probably need to find a way to modify that more accurately so there's a percent reflectance. Along with that, there's been some issues that were brought up about frosted glass being at the front of the building. And again, this is more, I'm drifting into a micro policy, but there's a policy issue we may want to include that we don't allow frosted glass because it doesn't achieve the purpose of having people
be able to look into the windows and look out of the windows as they walk along the street. The street hierarchy, the commission, I think on this agenda, the discussion item about incorporating the streetscape master plan, and we would have to incorporate that into the streetscape plan of the TSDD, so there would be changes for that. If those two items go together, we can probably incorporate that all together. Typographical issues, and one thing I missed on this list is there have been discussions on the last approval about bicycle, rooms and bicycle racks being
broadened in their definition to include personal mobility items would be part of that space that we could allow. So that's the whole list. Great, thank you, Mark. Colleagues, why don't we do this? Are there any items that we have no objection to advancing to modification on this list? I would ask which ones do we want to pull out of that list? So I would say, for example, the sustainability standard, I think is one that's an obvious one that we should just direct staff to incorporate into a modification. Anyone disagrees, I know that requires
a lot of conversation. Sorry, I'm borrowing. Vice Mayor Corey's list here. I think the street hierarchy item as well. Yeah. That's I think an obvious one to advance. Without discussion. The building elevations as well, excluding codifying the current practice. Mark, any others you want to help me with here that don't require a lot of policy discussion? Off campus student departments. What's your solution there again? I didn't understand. Just to take the whole
unit and divide it by the number of bedrooms and that'll be 150. because at this level of an approval, nobody has their bedrooms and closets and bathrooms defined in terms of area. So we'd like to simplify that. It would be the same way that we do. Say it one more time for the slogan in the room, I'm sorry. How would you do it? So right now it's 150 units an acre. No, it's not density. It's 150 square feet per bedroom. Including the en suite, bathroom and closet was the way that the code was written. But that's an impossible, to
measure at the level of approvals that we're doing. So what we could do is we do it the same way as multifamily. Multifamily has a minimum apartment size based on the number of bedrooms. So we're just kind of converting that 150 to something that we can measure. So I, sorry, Mayor. Go ahead, you're recognized, it's fine. I.E., a condo, I mean, a unit is 1,500 square feet, there's five bedrooms, there's 500. Is that what you're saying? if it's 1,500 and five bedrooms. 1,500, sorry, 300, yeah, sorry. Why not just cap it at an equivalency of no more than three student
beds per apartment, for example? Because there was a request for four to five bedrooms. I understand, but we can do an average. So you can have four and five bedrooms, but you have to have a density average that's based on a multiple of three, for example. So you have a maximum of, let's say, 450 beds, right? Divide, all the apartments divided by the number of beds. Correct, they can choose how they apportion that 450 beds. That's probably simpler than doing a floor area basis. I think the goal was to actually get the bedroom size to be, make sure it's a minimum of 150. When you do that, you need to do it per unit
basis. Commissioner Kai is right. There were twin aims of this. One was to address the number of bedrooms per site and per unit, per cluster. But the other thing was to at least have a minimum private space for each student so that this was not essentially a dorm. So we were trying to avoid. And right now it's 150 square feet. Per bedroom, but it includes the bathroom and closet if the door faces into the bedroom. Yeah, that's impossible. That's
a lot of detail. That's a very small. with bathroom and closet and room? I lived in a room smaller than that with another person my first year in college, so yes. The kids are fancy now. I know they're fancy. I think they're anticipating the market. These are fairly large units. Okay, well I think that one requires more conversation, so we'll take it off the automatic list. Anything else that we can just give the direction and go ahead with? Easements and dedications.
State and county roads? So this is the street hierarchy, second bullet? Yeah. Yes, I think that's fine. Mention that. Okay, so street hierarchy. Open space plans next. We can, maybe, Bork has some policy issues he wants to share with us on that one, so I'm happy to hear him. The open space? I think there's, well, first of all, on the bonus. I just want to take the ones that are off the table. So let's just, the automatic ones are, okay. Street hierarchy, so second bullet, right? Yeah. Sustainable buildings. Fourth bullet. Yeah. Fifth bullet. Fifth bullet. Building elevations. Is
there a percentage you wanted to recommend there, Mark, on building elevations? The prohibition on reflective glass. No, this is just to exclude the driveways and back of house. No, no, the subsequent bullet, building elevations regarding reflective glass. Oh, no, I don't have something. We'd have to look into it. Okay. Through the mayor. Yes, sir. Mark, bullet four. Can you elaborate on that? I'm sorry, we've gone through already like five of them. I just wanna recap. The massing and form requirements? No, the building elevations. On the fourth bullet on the second page. Sorry, yes, my bad. About
reflective glass? Yeah. We have in the code that we don't want reflective glass. It was done for, we didn't want to have a bird safe ordinance, but we did include the reflective glass as a minimum. reflective glass isn't defined so how much reflectance we just need to add that something we'll have to research oh no I'm sorry no no the one on top of that one I apologize the one on top of that one we're trying to we're trying to we have a we have a standard for glazing on secondary frontages but what mark has been doing in practice is excluding driveway driveway aisles loading bays and other
back of house features from that standard And you wanna change that? We're codifying the practice. To codify the practice. Yeah, because right now the standard is silent, so what can be excluded from that calculation? Okay. Okay. Okay, so left on the table are bullet one on page one, bullet three, which is the open space on page one. We've got bullet one on page two. And we've got, I guess Mark, you'll bring us back a standard on the last bullet, which is the reflective glass recommendation? Yeah. If you just wish to have us
look into it, we'll find the correct standard. And so that's it. So colleagues on the- Mayor, sorry. Yes, sir. You're recognized. The last bullet was street hierarchy plan. We suggested, yeah, that was good. And one that's not written there was to, as far as the bicycle storage? Yeah, yeah, the typo. Yes, correct. Okay. I think we all are fine with expanding the definition of. To. To include mobility. Correct. Okay. So on the open space calculation, Mark, you wanted to mention there are maybe
a couple of policy issues that we should consider. Yeah, there's two parts to it. One is about the bonus. So, and it's almost impossible to separate open space without doing the bonus. Once a building has a bonus that's for part of that open space, so let's say they have. a required 2,000 square feet and they have another 1,000. That 1,000 multiplies by 24 for the floor plates above. And the reason we did that was to account for the eight floors of that same space that
they lose, right? So in other words, automatically if somebody gives you an extra, let's just use an easier number, 10 square feet of open space above what they need to, they've given up 80. 800 square feet above on an eight story as a right building. They've also given up, when they receive the bonus, they're giving up that piece of the bonus. So what we did when we did that, and the reason the 24 number came up is we were literally taking that whole column of air which used to be building and saying, well, we'll
give you double as an incentive. But once we allow the building to go over that open space, we're double counting. So in other words, you're getting like a double bonus without paying for it. So that's a real issue on the idea of a building coming over the open space. The other is without the bonus. That's more of an aesthetics and policy issue. I think there's some people, I've talked it through with a few people, and some people say, of course it should be open in the air. Others say, it was great to have shade and protection from
the rain. And I walked around just the oval on the lake on the and so a lot of buildings that have this sort of open space under the building and it's fairly attractive and protects you from the weather. So I think outside of the bonus question, it's an open question for the boards and for the commission to determine what it is that you would prefer to see for open space or if we want to have rules about how much the building can encroach on the open space, but for bonus, we would very strictly say that
it shouldn't count if the building comes over it. Yes, you're right, can I answer the question? Mark, so does that mean that, for example, this issue falls in that student housing project that we just, did they get double bonus basically because? They did, yeah. Yes. Yeah. That part of the building didn't go all the way up, so it's a little trickier to figure out what doubled up, but yeah, there's. It's early on the podium. They got some credit. So we, that was a question
early on in that project, but the code was missing that definition that is open to the sky. And to make matters worse, we had defined it on Paseos, so it wasn't something that, you know, if it came down to a long discussion, we would not be able to say it's just overlooked and it's assumed because we included that on Paseos. Paseos are 50% open, 50% can be covered. So we would like to clear that up and codify that correctly. I think Coral Gables, in their code, you can satisfy the open space requirement with
covered colonnades, and you get some very nice executions, but you don't get bonus square footage for that. So I think, certainly for me, the bonus is a no-no, unless it's open to the sky. I could go either way on whether it satisfies the requirement. I think I'd prefer that if it's gonna be open space, that it be, on a principle front, right? So that you get the benefit of the public interaction with that space, as opposed to a Paseo, which could be internal, could have limited public access.
So those are my immediate thoughts on the subject, but definitely the bonus should not be something you get for covered open space. I agree, you agree. Thoughts on how, so, Mark, by way of feedback, just make the modification to exclude it from the bonus calculation? Yes. We're going to have to look for the way to write this correctly so that we've got it parsed out just the right way. Correct, yes. Just a quick clarification. So under your definition, what you would like to see is no cover
whatsoever if it's going to be public open space that it counts for bonus. Correct. Okay, even what about a shade device, like canopy or anything like that? No, I don't, the, so let's one at a time and into the microphone. I'm happy to recognize you. Go ahead, sir. No, no, sorry, I apologize. So yeah, so I would, as open space, but just not qualify for the bonus, if it's covered. If it's covered in any way. I think what Mr. Russi is asking is, are we talking about covered by the structure? Right. Right, the building itself. if they use an
eyebrow or a shade device. An awning. An awning. Because it's still counted as open space. I would say, yeah, go ahead. Yes, sir. And I would add, yeah, and that was an issue that came up about brows and colonies and so forth, which gets us into maybe refining it where we have an angle and a height and something like that. That's more of a design question, but the other part of this is that once you have a base amount of open space, let's say you meet your 10%, and then you have 5% more, the whole 15%, we have to work
it out so that the whole 15% can't be covered because you can't say, well, I'm covering my base but I want bonus on this open to the sky part because that's part of the base. I mean, we don't distinguish unless we find a very clever way to distinguish them. Are you following what I'm saying? Sorry, no, I'm not following. Okay, sorry, let me try to restate it so I'm understanding. So you're saying there's a base minimum unless we're exceeding the base minimum, we shouldn't be allowed to qualify for bonuses, correct? So if let's say 10% is the minimum requirement,
only to the extent that we exceed the 10% with public open space that's open to the sky, would you be eligible for the bonus, correct? Correct, that's the way the eligibility works now. It's only a surplus. That's the intent of our... So if we allow for it to be covered, the intent was that, okay, the language is unclear, If you said we're gonna allow for that standard to be met, you're saying we need to set a minimum threshold that should be provided as
open to the sky? Right, so what I'm saying is if you have 10%, that's your minimum, and then 5% for bonus, you could not say my 5% is open, but I have a part of my 10% over here that's encroached. That's not gonna work for us because we don't see the difference. You know what I'm saying? Those spaces, we have a problem that the space, we don't assign this space to be our primary space and this space to be the bonus. So we don't want
an application that comes in and says, our bonus is open to the sky, but we have covered up some of our base because now to us, that's no longer meeting the criteria. Tony, can you translate? Yeah. Sorry. Yeah, I think he's, Mark is concerned about the overall calculation to get to figure out whether there's a surplus or not. And he's concerned about a developer cherry picking and saying, well this is what I'm gonna count as bonus, so that's open to the sky, and this is the remainder that's not open to the sky, but that's to meet my requirements, along those
lines. Maybe we can resolve this by saying something along the lines of the, it not only has to be surplus to qualify for bonus, but it also has to be adjacent to a right-of-way or public space, and open to the sky. Those three criteria. And maybe through that, we can pinpoint, okay, this is the bonus area. And we do have to be adjacent to a right-of-way. There has been an application that came in with open space not
adjacent, but we fortunately have that language in the code. Okay, so the adjacency is in the code. The only thing we've presumed was that it was gonna be open to the sky. And your question is, should we allow for this public space to be, open space requirement to be in any way satisfied with covered open space? Correct, the base amount. The base amount, correct. I mean, you can see how a project might want to have some open space component that has some kind of covering over it. That's a possibility. No,
I mean, look, I think we, you know, worked on a project in the Gables with Ms. Cabrera where it has a Paseo that's covered. It's a fantastic, it could be, hopefully will be a fantastic public space, a bisexablock, but it's connected to another covered space that satisfies, I think, the vast majority of their open space requirement. It's all, I'd say 90% covered. We went back and had to change it because we had the same issue like what counts does it have to be open to the sky or is it a sale count? What is it that we wanted? I don't recall exactly how it was finally written
at the end But I was telling mark that I think we should maybe let us go back staff go back take a look at what we did in the gables Maybe look at a few other cities that have done successfully and then come back to you with something that I think to mimic, you know, imitation being the highest form of flattery there, I think one of the good things that you all did was that you've been able to incentivize people to create open space and aggregate at the ground floor by providing bonus site, which I think was the intention here, but not, you know, certainly not covered by the structure. So if we could replicate,
you know, I think that's in what the MX, MX2 and MX3. Yeah. Zoning districts. I mean, let's look at that as a model and see if we can bring that back. That's what I would recommend. Let us go back and look at that. Sorry, Mayor. You're recognized. I would see the example where Bouchon is, for example, that has the open area patio straight to the- Or Busshours? Busshours, I'm sorry. Yeah, yeah. That's a very similar subject where you have arcade, you have open space, and you have open street. I don't know how that was covered or how that was
coded, but I think that's what we're looking for. Yeah, I got it. You know what I'm talking about, right? Yep. Yep. Okay, next up on the list. Do we want to tackle the density issue quickly? Or do you want to come back with a recommendation on how we should calculate the unit calculation on student housing? Yeah. We can come back with a recommendation. Okay, great. Yes, sir. I was okay with the calculation the way he set it up the first time. That's just my opinion. Why don't we repeat it one more time and maybe we'll all
agree. at the 1,500 square foot per unit condo, like apartment. And if it's a three bedroom, it's calculated at 500 square feet. If it's a five bedroom at 1,500, it's calculated at 300 per square foot per bedroom. That meets the criteria. If it's anything lower than that at 150, it does not meet the criteria. Okay, so we're saying a unit size is equal to 1,500 square feet as a minimum? As an example. I'm sorry, so I'm not, so what's the actual application here? So if I have a five bedroom
student housing unit, right? Right. How would that get calculated against the density standard for the district? The way we would be doing it now as it's written would be five bedrooms, 750 square feet of bedroom, bathroom and closet and no regulation on the common space within the apartment. That's at this level is almost unmeasurable. So we're just looking for a way to say five bedrooms times some number for the whole apartment. Okay. This is not a density question. This is just a basic requirement for square footage of a bedroom. Yeah, minimum size. It's just a specific
number on how to calculate the bedroom size. It's not a density issue. Well, I mean, I think it is because, I mean, it's gonna translate, I mean, otherwise what's the point of having a density denominator for this? Well, our density is measured by bedroom, by number of bedrooms. So what's the cap on the number of bedrooms on a per acre basis? It's a multiplier. It's 3.5 times the number of dwelling units that are allowed in that district. So for example. Okay, so we do have three and a half. I'm sorry? So it's three and a half to one. Three
and a half to one, yeah. Okay. Yeah, that's what caps the number of bedrooms. And so what are we trying to solve for? The minimum size of a bedroom? Yes. Yes. And what Ms. Travers is saying is that at when it comes before you on a large scale development approval, we're measuring those bedroom sizes, but that's gonna change over time throughout the development process. But what we can do, what may be a more accurate predictor is saying you need this amount per
bedroom on an average for that unit. So the unit itself under your scenario, five bedroom unit, would require a minimum of 750 square feet. the entire unit. So we can measure that. The unit or the bedroom space? We're trying to get away from the bedroom space. No, but I'm saying that's too small. But those numbers you just did don't make sense. But it'll be way too small. I'm using the same 150 that we have right now. If we were to apply the same 150 that we have right now, we'd say 150 square feet per bedroom times five bedrooms, because that's a five-bedroom unit in this example. That's 750 square feet.
That's the minimum size for that five-bedroom unit. That's what... Mark is saying. It's not the number, it's the method. We just need a method that we can work with at this level. Yeah, that's what I was saying, Tony. The number doesn't, that doesn't. And maybe we need to increase the amount because we didn't, we're not counting the common areas. Correct, we're not counting the common areas. So maybe we say 200 per bedroom. I would say it's easier to just increase the number. Yeah, we could do that as long as we, I think what Mark is advocating for is to apply it on a per cluster basis as opposed to, measuring out each individual bedroom at 200. Mark, would it be easier just to elevate
it like from 150 to 200? That would be absolutely easier. So if we took. We're at 150 per bedroom and we decided 200 for the one. No, no, I'm just giving you an example. So if we change it to 250, 300, whatever that number is, it makes it much easier. Yes. Okay. I think they're probably the better numbers. I think at least 350. So Mayor, why don't we just go back, recommend a number that makes sense, feasible, like what we want, and just come back with a number. Okay. I agree with Commissioner Kaya. Just give us a recommendation of what's
a well-sized unit. So 350 at five bedrooms is 1,750 square feet. That's doable. Yeah, that's not bad either. What we'll do is we'll look at the last application. There's one going through right now. We'll get the averages from those per bedroom and recommend that. Thank you. But are those small or are those... You don't know, you don't know. They're fairly nice sizes. They're luxury student apartments. Oh really? Well remember, they calculated 150 square foot per bedroom. We're gonna run a very short meeting a very long time here if we keep going this way, so let's move on. What else do
we need? Are we covered? I know we've got the building location, massing, and floor requirements. So this is the contiguous floor area recommendation? Yeah. This is, again, we have the floor plate meant to control the tower sizes. We probably need to modify that in a couple of ways. One is, one of the issues is that floor plate means something specific for Florida Building Code. It's a fire safety issue, and we want to get away from that set of words. So whatever term we want, but I offered contiguous floor area, would be tower size, wall to wall, and it has
to be separated by air because a floor plate does not. So that was one source of confusion. It hasn't come before you. We've dealt with it. So floor plates can be contiguous under the Florida Building Code? Between a garage and a habit. So we're talking about the subtext project specifically. We're ahead of that. Okay, got it. Okay. I'm just, again, let's put, you know. Yeah. So we want to separate those words. And then there's probably, we've been discussing this, that concept
was intended for the tall towers. it's not a good fit on six story buildings and we're coming to realize that. So we may offer some recommendations on how to address that. Okay, why don't we bring that back? I think that's a lot to try to cover in a discussion item. Okay. Colleagues, thank you. Let's move on to M2, please. Public Benefits Trust Fund Policy. Thank you. Who's got this item, Mr. Manager? Mayor Redekop, our city attorney is going to provide some information and updates on a
couple of additions to the document. I'll just tee it up from the standpoint of it. Obviously, the conversation is to have something in place that will guide this commission and staff on the funds that are going to be coming in through the public benefit program and obviously to have a framework for it. So this is a discussion item. for that purpose and I'll let the city attorney sort of add a little bit to the document that's before you. Thank you. So as the city manager just
mentioned, this deals with the money that comes in in the payment. This is for the money that is paid as payment in lieu of on-site bonuses. Okay? Just to refresh your memory, open space, we just talked about that. That's one of the ways to get bonuses. There's also workforce and affordable housing. There are other ways to arrive at those bonuses. falling short of that, you can pay into this trust fund. And this trust fund is supposed to be available for the public benefit. So what we've tried to do is guide, give you some ideas as to where this
trust fund could be, these monies could be applied. We've tried to keep it, it's intentionally flexible. And there are a couple of things that came up during briefings that I wanted to put in front of you for your consideration. We've got a, We've got categories, but essentially, funds are to be used for improvements, equipment, and operations that reasonably relate to the impacts associated with added development intensity. They're paying for bonuses. We are using that money to improve the public realm and public areas and public offerings. In terms of categories, we've got
potentially funding affordable and workforce housing, funding public open space and public realm improvements, funding sustainability and resilience, especially in connection with city facilities. That helps save the public money going forward. Transportation enhancements and safety, public safety operations and equipment, and just a general category of other public benefits. Now, I promised that I would add a couple here that came up in briefings. One of them in public open space and public realm improvements. The suggestion was to
add any kind of programs or improvements to counteract blight as a general category or subcategory. And then in terms of other public benefits, just to again provide some additional flexibility to you, right now it says that other expenditures would have to be deemed by the city commission to benefit the public and mitigate the impacts of increased density. The suggestion is to change that and to and or. Mr. Attorney, sorry, Mayor. You're recognized. Can you repeat the first one? Sure, sure. The first one would be an added bullet point to public open space and public realm,
that category. And it would be programs and improvements to counteract blight. Can you expand on that? Would blight? Certainly, certainly. Blight can be a number of different factors. It's everything that is in your finding of necessity under the redevelopment plan. But blight, can be streetscape improvements, anywhere from streetscape improvements to homeless assistance programs, if we're including operational needs, it would include all of those things. Pollution control, litter pickup, those kinds of things. So I'll just jump in here with a thought. I'm generally not...
of authorizing operational expenses with this money. I mean, I kinda look at this as almost impact fee money in a way. And I just think we kinda create a structural imbalance in our budget when we start looking at one-time revenues to fund operations. So I just don't like that as a practice from a budgeting perspective. So I mean, I would like to strike pretty much all the operational references in the policy for that reason. But that's just my thought initially. Mayor, I understand where you're headed with this, so no necessarily an objection, but there's,
for example. You can inject, it's okay, Jim. Canal cleaning, right? I mean, it's a service, it would fall under an operational expense, but it could be something that, it could be an extension of what we do under the whole thing of blight and things like that. There are maybe some uses that are a direct service, if you will, instead of increasing staff or paying for salaries. So within that context, I just share that because there may be some things that are a direct service that falls under our OPEX budget. No, I get it. I just don't, I mean, again, same
as June Park's operations and programming, again, very open to be part of our core services. I mean, it's hard to... to put a bright line rule around any of those things? So in those cases, they could be obviously, you know, part of this is increased density, right? And so now from a park programming standpoint, we may, you know, add some staffing to maybe create, let's say somebody talked about a dog park with all the new buildings that are coming up. So there could be an expansion of staff to accommodate, you know, the density that's
coming online. I get it, but again, it's just from my perspective, the canal maintenance, we can stop. any time without any recurring GIF balance impacts. That example is frankly what I'm more concerned about in that you adding people, recurring expenses, one time revenue, revenue goes away. All of a sudden we've got to reconsider. It's just easy to hire with one time revenue and then very hard to sustain that TO when the dollars go away. So that
last example is really the one I'm concerned about. Less about the canal maintenance because today we have the money, tomorrow we don't. We're going third party to contract for it. We can stop offering that benefit. No argument on that. I mean, I agree. I mean, we've been very careful to not use one-time revenues for that purpose. Yeah, I know. There could be a very strategic approach, but the global operations were things that We may find something that is a service. So that's where the city attorney talked about flexibility. But I understand the rails that you're alluding to to avoid us getting used to a one-time revenue.
Just on the transportation enhancement and safety subcategories for traffic enforcement and parking enforcement, what's in the mind's eye of those two phrases? Enhanced enforcement to the extent, I mean, those two provisions specifically came out of, or they were, the genesis of those were some meetings that I think Commissioner Kaye had had, and I didn't have the discussion with Commissioner Kaye, but you know, it's in the air that people are concerned about these things. And to the extent that we
needed to surge operations for a little while to improve the situation, teach people that they can't block the box and they can't do certain things that they've been doing. That was the idea behind it. But this is not an impact fee, but I understand your point about recurring. No, again, there's a difference here of degree that's important. It's not the same thing. This should not be strictly limited for capital. But
again, it's nice to have one-time revenue. Right now, we're probably going to see a period where this may be very healthy, but these fund balances will quickly dwindle, and the costs compound a lot faster than the revenue does. So, in those cases, there could be technological investments, right? So, we may use technology to deal with transportation enhancement or parking. So, those would be a one-time cost, right? It's an investment of- And I have no objection to those. As long as there's capital in terms of software or physical improvements to address those issues, I don't have any objection to
that. What I'm concerned about is direct staffing costs. that we're incurring using these one-time revenues. Colleagues, any further thoughts? Yes, sir, you're recognized. Yeah, I think that we're all in agreement. I mean, we've always spoken about not doing fixed costs that we have impact fees to recurring expenses. I mean, that's not something that we should do. But I do see the opportunity to, A, most of the things that we would do would be a one-time fee, whether it's a traffic circle, whether it's improvement in technology, it's a one
time, now there's a recurring fee to that. Obviously that comes from the operating revenue, I mean operating budget. I'm trying to think if there's any circumstances where we would add a service, a short term service, and not come back to it. I think that's the only question where I think the manager and Mr. Attorney are speaking of. There's very specific services that maybe it's a one time service. but I can't think of anything right now. But I think that's what
you guys were alluding to. Just to give you an example, if there's a lot of construction going on in downtown and there's an ambassador program that you want to sponsor for some period of time to help business owners negotiate that construction and get people into their businesses, maybe you might want to consider something like that. Yeah, so we can do a short-term improvement on capital,
people capital, and then that's the case, it's just we know it's short-term, but it has to be allocated at short-term. Chip, remember, what was the old joke of the city of Miami when we used to work? There's nothing more permanent than an interim director, right? So I just kind of feel like we're, We're getting into that space. I mean, look, I think my other language of the public safety operations and equipment, again, no disrespect to law enforcement. It's just that that is very broad. And that speaks to hiring people. And again, those dollars, we'll run through these dollars very, very quickly. But we'll have the obligation to that officer,
that personnel, throughout their career. And so I'm just really, I'm really, I mean, to the extent that we wanna pay people overtime, to maybe provide that ambassador function. We're not adding TO. I'm fine with that because maybe that's maybe another way to kind of get to the same thing. But we're incentivizing the officers or deploying resources that we already have a recurring burden and that burden is budgeted for. We just want to kind of surge them for it. I have no objection to that. And I'll throw something out, just a suggestion, because it plays into
a recurring cost, but the funds wouldn't be utilized in that fashion. For example, obviously this money comes in within a certain time period of after the approval, but there's a ramp up period for construction, when the impact of the density comes online. But we could use it as seed money. We may say, hey, we know that we have this project coming on, and we think we're going to need to hire two more officers. So we may use the seed money to put somebody through the academy or something like that to ramp up when the building will be open. The ongoing
expense, we know that we would pick up through growth. So there would be a commitment to the recurring expense through that, but it could serve as seed money for something. Now, it's part of a recurring expense, but not necessarily because you're not saying, well, now we've got to figure out how the heck we're going to spend the money or we're going to find new money. Well, it would be a conscious effort. So what I'm saying is that there are problematic areas where you tie a one-time revenue to recurring expense, but there are opportunities where you may be able to incentivize or seed it without relying on it in the future, because you're
relying on growth or some other way. So I'm very mindful and careful, given the comment that you made, because I came from that dysfunction and fiscal crisis. It wasn't always dysfunction. Yeah, and you learn from good and bad, and I learned very quickly how you can get in trouble. by using one-time revenues for recurring expenses. Commissioner Rodriguez, yes sir. So through the mayor, so I don't necessarily object to allocating funds for certain items based on where we're, as it's broken down here. Why don't we just remove anything that's recurring, that's
recurring, just remove it off the list. That's it. And just keep items that are, So if it's a recurrent payment that we have to do that's on the list, just remove that. So I mean on the public safety category, I think I'm fine with the second bullet point, public safety officer recruitment and retention bonuses, right? Because those are one-time enhancements or incentives, if you want to call it that. But the public safety operations deemed desirable to ensure satisfactory coverage. services to address increased density that to me seems to something we should underwrite with future receipts
okay I would try I would want to strike that language okay I'm not sorry yeah go ahead you recognized I'm not completely comfortable with the first bullet point with the affordable housing and workforce component only using this has got funding or the acquisition of land without the abilities to really find out how we can afford it or have recurring payments on set workforce housing development or set units that we might buy. So I wouldn't like to use this particular fund for this. That's just my opinion. So, through the mic. Yeah, is he recognized? So I'm
just asking you a question. So for affordable, so we get funds due to bonuses paid for workforce housing that they're not using for penalties, not bonuses, penalties, you wouldn't want to use it for other affordable or workforce housing projects that will be upcoming? Yeah, I don't. I think that unfortunately workforce housing and the way that we can fund this is only through city land. So it's difficult for us to do anything with that money that be allocated for this particular space. Like we've been through
this already like to try to understand what we as a city can do for affordable housing, it's near impossible. So like it's just, it's difficult. I know it looks good and it feels good, but in reality it's not gonna be useful. I don't necessarily disagree. I disagree, I'm gonna disagree. Not vehemently, but strongly, which is I think, yeah, I think just a big, I think I'm gonna anticipate your comment, which is basically we, this is just a policy, how we allocate these dollars. I mean, it's gonna change year to year. So I wouldn't want to not
have that language in there if we had a strategic opportunity that we could take advantage of and make a gap investment. a deal where we could provide $5 million and actually deliver a light tech project, right? It could, in that case, deliver a couple hundred units and we provide the gap. Are there going to be a ton of those opportunities? Commissioner Kai, I don't disagree with you, but not having the language in the policy doesn't allow us to spend the dollars that way. Correct. That's sure. I understand. Yeah. we're not gonna be able to make a huge
dent in the marketplace. Correct. And I don't disagree that it's gonna be difficult, but I wouldn't, that doesn't necessarily mean I want the language gone. Okay. Fair enough. Further comments on the policy? Commissioner, Vice Mayor, you good? Yeah. Okay. Commissioner Rodriguez, anything else? Nope. Commissioner Kaye, last bite? us the feedback, is that sufficient? Do we need to take any sort of formal action or what's the next steps on this? No, we would, I'm assuming this is, you're giving us this direction to bring this back as a resolution with a formal policy. Correct. Okay, based on your input. You got it. Got it. And we will,
I guess, make out when going into this year's budget cycle, Mr. Manager, we'll just make allocations based on opportunities consistent with the policy or what's your... What's your vision as to how we'll use the resources that we've got? It would influence our discussions through the budget process. Because we've mapped out, we know what we've gotten and we know what may be coming and if it's gonna come in that fiscal year, we would sort of account for it. Colleagues, I mean, I guess, so we're making the decision that we do not want to reserve. If the dollars are paid as a bonus for affordable housing, we do not want to reserve that
money for that specific purpose. Just use an example. I do not. I do. You do? Yes. So generally, if someone makes a payment into a fund, are we going to create sub-accounts for those particular activities? This policy would not require us to do that. No, would not. It just says you can spend it in accordance with this policy against any of these categories? That's correct. Okay. Do we, so... Oh, well... Again, I just want to be clear. We're choosing... we can spend the dollars on. Correct. We're not prescribing how the dollar is going to be accounted for. We'll
do that in the course of the regular budget every year. Everyone's in agreement with that. Okay. And yes, because, and I agree with that because there's not many opportunities as far as affordable housing is concerned. So once those opportunities are gone, then we can't restrict those dollars then in the future. So that's why I would agree to it. Okay. I just want to clarify so you know what choices we're making. Okay, perfect. Thank you, Mr. Manager. Thank you, Mr. City Attorney. Let's move on to M4, please. Sustainability regulations.
Madam Director, you're recognized. Good evening, Mayor, Vice Mayor, Commissioner. Tsunami Cabrera, for the record, Development Services Director. It's late. I'm going to do something that I was challenged to do here tonight, which is I'm going to take off my shoes to get my presentation. And the reason why will become evident during the presentation, so let's dive right in. I don't know if you'll recall, but in 2025, this commission asked staff to look at the solar ordinance as the city's solar ordinance and see if we could revise it to better meet the city's sustainability goals. The solar ordinance was
a good first attempt, but after years of being in place, it wasn't really meeting the city's sustainability goals. It was difficult to... It really wasn't doing what it was supposed to do. So we looked at it and we thought, well, there's two things that we can all agree on that really would move the city in the right direction for sustainable construction. And one of them is reduce energy consumption, and the other one is to reduce our water consumption. So how do I move forward? There we go. Water and energy are really tied
together and this slide really shows that when you think about that Miami-Dade water and sewer. No, your daughter. She wants to record. You can record it from over here. This is a big deal. Sorry, Mary. That's fine. You're recording this work. This way so you can record it because this is going to be fantastic. What's your name? Now you're part of the program. Please introduce yourself. Come on. No, enter the microphone. Come on. Tsunami Gomez, not Cabrera. Nice to meet you. Welcome. She's a
sustainability influencer. So, and this slide really shows you Miami-Dade Water & Sur is one of FPL's biggest clients using up to over a million megawatts of energy a year. When you think about that, your average home uses 12. That is a lot of energy to clean and get clean, drinkable water to your home. When you think about that 70% or more than 70% of that water is used to flush your toilets or to water your lawn, it shows you that there's a humongous waste of energy and water in our current system. And that
brings me to green roofs and my daughter was like, well, how does that tie in? Well, green roofs are part of having less water going into our sewer systems, into our drainage systems. They help your house. She's over there on the dais. This is very distracting. They absorb and retain water. They cool buildings through evapotranspiration. So I mean, I could get into what that is, but basically that's- Can you say that one more time, please? There we go. No. Go back. That's the one. So the green roofs, they cool
buildings through the evapotranspiration. They insulate the building. They reduce heat island effects. They actually do extend the life of your roof, and they can support biodiversity. If you plant the right things, you could have bees, butterflies, the whole thing. So this is a big, it's expensive, but it goes a long way to reducing the energy consumption of a home. And it's done successfully in other places. So it's not something that is new, it's done successfully in other countries. This, not exactly how it is today, but the main attempt here of reducing water and energy consumption went to the Green Task
Force. had a lot of comments for us which we have addressed in what's in front of you tonight. It also went to planning and zoning board. Their concerns have also been addressed and as I go through the presentation I'll show you what it is that we've done to address the comments of both those boards. So how the system works, it's incentive based. It basically gives you a menu of items. Depending on how many of them you incorporate into your single family or duplex homes, you get points. Depending on how many points you get, you get either reduction in your permit
fees, there has to be incentives for developers to want to do these things, right? So a tier one would be minimal. You have a white roof, you use pavers that are permeable. Thank you, permeable pavers, you plant more trees than you need to. These are very simple things. And by the way, I took about three of the four homes that have been permitted recently, and none of them make even a tier one, but it would be very easy for them to be a tier one by just planting a couple more trees and using the permeable pavers. So a tier one is really a very simple, if they
just want to do something nice, instead of picking just any paver, pick a permeable paver. It gives you points, you're headed in the right direction. I'm not gonna go through all the point systems, but basically there's different things you could do. 10 points is a tier one. There's no zoning incentive here. You only get a reduction in your permit fees. I've calculated that. I think I shared it with the commissioners. It could add up to thousands of dollars in permit fee reductions if you reach a tier one. And also we would give you priority in the plan review and the inspections so that if you're maybe used to being two weeks in plan review
for a single family home, then maybe you'll be one week because you'll be at the top of the list in the queue for the reviews. The tier two is 20 points and I don't want to go through all of these because when it goes back to planning and zoning, these numbers may change, the point system may change. and it's gonna come back to you two more times. It's late, and even though I have my shoes off, it's probably keeping you engaged to find out why I took them off. We don't have to go through every single one. So tier two is 20 points, and you could see there a few of the things that you could do to get 20 points. This one you would get additional square footage in the construction of your home. That's a big incentive for all builders. And in the
tier three 30 points, you would get even more incentives. So one of the things that Planning and Zoning Board didn't like is that we were giving up one apparent green construction by having a smaller footprint for another so that you would get a bigger footprint if you put a green roof on the property. They didn't like that. They didn't think that that, you know, why are we going to give up one green for another? So we addressed that and actually Mark came up with a very good one for that. For two-story homes, right now we have step backs. So if you do, if you get a tier two and you get 20 points, you will be able to reduce the step back of the second floor. If you have a
tier three and 30 points, then you will be able to zero step back so you get a lot of additional square footage if you actually implement some of these items to get the 20 or 30 points in the development the green roof incentive this is another issue that the planning is going to give a question I'm emerging here to my right no I was just gonna say for example on the two-story right now we have let's say a 10 foot setback on the sides and then on the second floor it's almost a 20 foot setback that's 20 that's 10 square feet all the way across all the way around a lot of square footage that they have yeah it's a lot of square footage So for single story homes, we
have something that we would get rid of some of the side yards, because side yards really are not usually very useful. I don't know how planning and zoning is going to feel about that. It may be that they want to change that. But for two story homes, I think we have a really good solution with the step backs. The green roofs, that was another issue that they had. They didn't like the idea that there wasn't something measurable. So we made it that at least 25%, a minimum of 25% of the roof has to be a green roof. It has to meet certain standards for green roofs, which we have those standards. And if you do more, you get more. So if you do the minimum 25, you get 8% of
additional square footage. But if you do 35 or more, then you get 12%. We're still working with the numbers depending on how I'm looking at actually properties that we permitted to see like what is reasonable so that, you know, we want it to be successful. The passive solar design, this is a really interesting one because if you look at They don't like the idea of having the windows, the operable windows and some of the things that this incentivizes. I haven't found anything that says that having
operable windows would actually cause mold. They're concerned with mold. I haven't found any research that shows that in fact my daughter was telling me that in Germany they have something where you're required apartment buildings to open your windows for like 15 minutes a day to bring fresh air in and keep the air healthy and to help the buildings stay healthy in a sense, right? We all know about sick building syndrome, so there is no evidence towards that, so honestly, I'm not sure where the green task force came up with that. This one here is on
the overhangs and how you face your glazing on your property. There was a concern that we didn't have enough of a measurable incentive for this. So in South Florida, if the majority of your glazing is within 15 degrees of the true south, then that's considered a very good way of doing it because you're not in the hot sun in the west. And all of us know that in the west here in Florida, if you have a bedroom that faces west and has a lot of glazing, it is very, very hot. So how you site the property, the overhangs,
where you put the glazing all make a huge difference on how much that property is going to actually consume and energy to keep it cool. Because again, we want people to want to do this, but we don't want them to be like, well, I have to have my AC at 85 degrees to save energy. Nobody's going to do that. But if you properly glaze your home, if you properly put it on the site, then that they will do. Because you could still be comfortable, but you're saving energy. So the natural ventilation, cross ventilation, that's what I was discussing about having operable windows. But they have to be positioned so if you actually open them, you
get cross ventilation. There are ways of doing this. These are not new things. It's done in older homes. If you look at some of the old homes, even like Little Havana, you'll see that they have a lot of these in the design. The deep overhangs, the deep porches, the operable windows, cross ventilation, all these things are not new, we've just gone away from it. We want to go back to that, because we want to reduce our energy consumption. That really is a better way of moving forward. So we've given like a quantity on the, let me see, let me go back. We've actually quantified like It has to be six feet minimum for a
porch. You can't just have a little porch and say that this meets that standard. You can't just have a typical 24 inch overhang and say that you meet the standard. You have to go beyond that. So that's what this is, how you get points for that. And then this is why I don't have shoes on. If you've ever walked barefoot in a parking lot and it's a hot summer day in Miami, it will burn your feet. And you find a little blade of a palm that's giving a little tiny bit of shade you run to it and you will have immediate relief. It really is that big of a difference. Now think that that's your
roof. We come in and we cut down trees, we don't consider that they give shade that will actually keep your roof cool. And there are studies that show that a hot summer roof will get up to 175 degrees. But if it's in the shade, it'll be 90 to 100 degrees. That's a huge difference. So we really want to incentivize keeping existing shade trees, building so that home from day one has a shade from the existing trees. And that's no shoes. You guys try it next time you're out in the parking lot. All right. Using recycled materials,
this is something. Been there, done that. Thank you. So using the recycled, yeah, I should have gotten a pedicure. But using recycled materials, that's something that's pretty typical. We implemented it here. high thermal mass that's pretty simple in Florida I mean we build with block and Dade County so almost everybody will get points like that not enough to meet the tier one but enough that hey you didn't do anything extra you're gonna get two points anyway you know this typical construction Florida we're gonna still it's good environmentally speaking we're gonna give you points for it the cool roofs and green
roofs I actually changed the green roofs on the last time I think that I spoke about this to give five points just because it makes such a huge difference it really is it It's a big ask for people who aren't used to doing this, but if you look at some of the homes in other countries where they do this, it becomes part of how they build. It looks better. It reduces heat island effects. It keeps your roof in better shape for a longer period of time. I mean, there's just a lot of benefits, and we really want to incentivize that, so we're giving five points for that. I mean, and I'm hoping that that
will be something that will really motivate the developers in the city to incorporate the green roofs. We want to keep the solar ordinance. It was a good ordinance. For today's day and age, it wasn't really working. We are giving incentives for putting solar. We're going to reduce our energy consumption, but for the energy that we do use, we want to be as sustainable as possible with clean energy. We're giving points for having the solar readiness or if you actually implement the solar, if you have a full PV installation, you get more points. Bird safe blazing. I know we've talked
about the bird safe blazing with the buildings, but I I live in a house that's full of glass and I have found many times little birds that they get knocked out from hitting the glass. So it's really very simple to do. There are a lot of very simple ways of having bird safe glazing. So we want to incentivize that. And then the onsite water retention, this was one of the concerns the planning and zoning board had. They were concerned that this will have become a mosquito hazard. I haven't found that the bioswales become mosquito hazards. It's not new construction. It's not nothing new. I mean, these are things that have been done in the past. You could also have underground tanks that collect rainwater or you could have above ground
tanks. And the first picture I showed has an above ground tank, which is actually done very beautifully. And I have the picture at the end so you could see that. We're getting points for this, for the bioswales. And basically we're the first city that's going to do this. I've tried to find as much as I can. There's a lot of net zero construction out there. It's easy to cheat in those systems. They're well intentioned, but it's easy to cheat. In this system, you can't cheat. You either do it and you get points or you don't. You can't buy your way out by giving money. That's not going to work. We really want people to
build this way. So the idea is that we're going to track this. And we'll come back to the commission and we'll let you know how many homes have applied, how many of them meet tier one, tier two, tier three. Is it really incentivizing? Are people really making a difference? Are we making a difference or do we need to go back and modify the ordinance and maybe look at what incentives are working and not working? So the idea is to track it for three years, come back to this commission on an annual basis or if you want it more often we could do that too. With the software we have now we'll be able to track these things more easily and have reporting mechanisms to get this type of information. And
then here's that house with the exterior tanks. It's a beautiful home, has above ground tanks, has the green roof, it has cross ventilation, you see it all there. And the manager actually really loves this. We're not asking builders to do more, we are asking them to be rewarded when they do better. And that's really what it is. We want to show people that you can be green, you can really care, you can do sustainable construction, and it's going to be good for your pocket too. Thank you very much. I'm glad we did not have a Khrushchev moment tonight, okay? Your
shoes, so. Colleagues, comments? Yes, Vice Mayor. I just wanted to say I was very excited for this presentation. I think you did an amazing job. Shoes or no shoes, it was a great presentation. I would love to see adoption of this. Obviously that was kind of an issue with the previous ordinance as well. And you had mentioned before earlier that some homes had come pretty close to it. I don't know if there's a way for us to advertise with people getting into that starter package mode of hey, don't miss out, you can
get to these 12 points, because I think that that would encourage even greater engagement, just to be like hey, here's what you can do right away and you'd be foolish not to, and then they can kind of build from there. Absolutely, I mean I'm looking at maybe going back to, we have four homes that we've identified, three of them that I've already done the system on, and going back to them and letting them know, look, if you just plant a couple of extra trees or use the permeable pavers, you could really refund part of your permit fee and see
if they'll actually do it, because it really is very easy for them to get to a tier one. And then just my other question, I know that solar has its benefits on the back end, a lot of people are concerned with the front end cost. Do we kind of have a sense of how much money somebody would save compared to what the initial cost is based on the bonus or the points they'd receive? So there, if you go to a solar company, they'll give you numbers and I don't know if it was Commissioner Guy or somebody that was actually telling me that, I don't know if, I can't remember, I can't recall
right now, but they were telling me that the savings really hasn't been there. Right. I don't, I, I think if you're gonna put solar, it shouldn't, it was you? Yeah, that's right. If you're gonna put solar, it has to be because you really believe that it's clean energy, you know, it's not a money issue. It's because you really believe in clean energy and you wanna do the right thing and then if the city also rewards you for it, it's even better. But for me to get up here and say that, hey, yeah, solar's gonna save you money, I can't say that, no. Yeah, I'm sorry, I was just talking about maybe offsetting the initial cost
with the, the points, not really anything substantial. No, I think the mayor had asked me that too if the permit fee, well, one of the incentives is that your permits for the solar would be no fee. But that doesn't offset the cost of installing solar. Right. It doesn't. Absolutely not. Yeah. No. Good? Yeah. Great. Commissioner Rodriguez and Kaia. Again, I think this is a great presentation. I did mention there is cost
savings just for the vice mayor. There are cost savings. I was expecting a little bit more, but there is some cost savings. I'm not gonna say that there isn't. I would also say that from experience in having solar panels installed within last year, one of the aspects that you can put in there also is that it does insulate the heat. So my roof doesn't get as hot because you're getting that coverage or your roof is protected from whatever coverage you have the solar panels on from getting direct sunlight. Yeah, I mean it's in the shade, right? Yeah, so
it's in the shade technically and I think we felt it more on the portion of my house that's a flat roof. So because that used to get very, very hot. So I would possibly use the solar panels as an and the insulation method also as well. Other than that, I mean, we've spoken of everything and I commend anybody who wants to grow a green roof and they definitely deserve the points that they're gonna get. Which, sorry, I'm sorry. Which by the way, I just wanted to ask, is that,
so when you do the green roof, I've been building here for over 20 years, I've never done a green roof, so I'm very interested in, so is this, you do, you have your top roof and then you have, sort of platform where where you now put topsoil and grow the roof or you put topsoil on the flat roof and no no there's a whole system that's in place so there's a protective layer because you know you don't want to puncture through when you're planting and things so there's a protective layer there's special soils we're not talking about planting trees you're talking about you know your little shrubs your you know yeah yeah no trees yeah
yeah correct yeah shrubs but but there there's details for the entire system that you put over your plywood, let's say. But the truth is that for a lot of the new homes that we're seeing, which are, I'm gonna call them jewel boxes, right? And so the design, concrete shells, mostly flat roofs, it's a great execution to put on the roof. I mean, probably requires no additional structural reinforcement of the roof because it's all concrete block, but it does reduce the heat island effect substantially. It actually makes probably a portion of the roof usable because,
you reduce the glare, you can get up there, you can activate it, and it actually becomes an extension of your outdoor living space, right? So I think there's a lot of potentially very good executions for what seems to be now very popular. Architectural style, not my favorite, but certainly one that people seem to like because we're seeing them all over my neighborhood. Commissioner Kaya? Yeah, so obviously I'm the biggest fan of this particular hopefully ordinance and we get it out there and There's a lot of things that we should do besides of what we're doing
just within the city. I think outside of the city there's a lot more things that we can do. We need to publicize this. We need to talk to the University of Miami. I think we need to talk to many architects or board of architects or architects associations, as many as we can, invite them. Let's see if we can get some panels. What I really want to understand is how do we get this word out there, feasibility? How do we get developers on board to understand the cost analysis to do types of architecture specifically in our city which in the long run is really going to sell our city. It's going to give us a lot
of notoriety and in the end it's going to be what we want, right? I mean we want greener, we want it cost efficient, all the above, right? So I would just, whatever we can do to get it out there, I mean when we do a business case, There's one person that actually been the product, which is what you're doing, but it's another thing to sell the product and I know we've talked about that before, right? So I think that the city could help and figure out what else we can do, not only just you and your team. Commissioner, on that point, just to kind of build on some things that we already, conversation
already started. I mean, I think before this ordinance goes live, we should go to the Builders Association of South Florida. And we're having that conversation already. We should go to the local chapter of the IA and give them a copy of the ordinance and solicit their feedback. Absolutely. That'll help socialize it in the mainstream from an efficacy perspective, which did not happen with the current ordinance. And I think it'll also help sell the opportunity to those networks. We'll hear the resistance up front as opposed to after we've already enacted something they think may not work. 100%. Yeah. I
agree with you on that. Those are the things we're talking about. But if there are other networks, Do you think that we should kind of socialize us through? We're open to that conversation. Right, and I'm following up on what we discussed in the briefings, which would be to go to the builders associations and do presentations for them. We're also, I was waiting to go back to planning and zoning, because we have builders there. And maybe we could have a workshop here in the city where we go over with architects so that they know how to use it, they don't have to stumble through. It's different, nobody wants to be reading the zoning code and figuring
this all out so we could have basically workshops where we would sit with them and help them meet the ordinance. There's a lot of things that we can do. I think what we need to do is just really start, and you can include me in this, I'll love to help out as much as I can, how we get the word out there is just let's start having these meetings, let's invite people, and let's have a recurring conversation so it continues to flow and hopefully snowball. I saw even our green task force and things like that just solicit feedback these guys you know there's there's Agronomers across the board in our city. There's a lot
of good good feedback I didn't see anything in the code about installation In general from a building perspective. I don't know if you missed it or because it's not natural or whatnot but Installation is a big factor in cooling down a lot of these houses and maybe giving them points from a different perspective from an R30 to an R38 to an R48. Like there's a lot of different things that we can do to incentivize that and I think it's important. But I don't know where you stand on this. Yeah, I need to look at the ordinance because we did have something that if you go, I mean the Florida energy code does a really good
job as you know. But we had something that if you go above with the Florida building code, the energy portion gives you that it will give you points. I don't recall exactly what it stayed at at this point. I need to check, I may have missed that in the revision. And no, I mean, so those are the things that I would love to help you out with as you get narrower and narrower now to really getting out there. And I'd love to help you be an advocate out there and we can speak to a lot of different people. So Mayor, it sounds like you're on board and we have GCs on board and we have
marketing people on board. So collectively we can do a lot of really cool things. So let me close by thanking you again. I said it privately in our briefing with the manager. I mean, this is exactly... what I wanted to see by way of a product when we start this conversation. For me, this conversation started because of a frankly Miami Herald article, so thank you to the Miami Herald for some good journalism about passive design techniques that were being used in some homes. We had a conversation, the manager and I, with an architectural professor at UM. Unfortunately, that conversation didn't go how exactly I envisioned it, because I wanted to have them help
us write this, really the goal being to get back to designing homes the way we used to build them. before we became very proficient and dependent on mechanical systems to kind of deliver the places that we live in. So I think this goes a long way to realizing that opportunity, giving people more flexibility in how they meet these goals. I think the only thing I wanna see changed in this draft is two things. One is I've shared with you privately, I think tier one should be a mandate, should not be optional. I mean, it's the
minimum we can do to kind of, sure that our sustainability goals are met. And I think we can definitely take the examples that you've highlighted to kind of demonstrate to the community, whether it's residents or other stakeholders, that it's not a heavy lift. And to the body, I would say, I know that we have been a little averse to go the mandate path, but this is one that will actually help us achieve our enlarged measure, probably the way it will be executed by expanding canopy on private property. is really the only way we're gonna kind of
green our city very quickly. So I would invite us to kind of consider that when it comes back to us, having tier one be a mandated minimum standard with all the attendant benefits kind of accruing to tiers two and three. The other thing I just wanted to just suggest, I know this only relates to single family and duplex housing and we've got some other opportunities. I was fortunate to be invited onto a panel on Friday of last week this is a real estate and tech conference. It's a sub association that's been created by the National Multifamily
Housing Coalition, talking about energy optimization and the use of tech, both enhance the functionality, the experience of new buildings in particular. And so I'd like to see this, I don't know if there's a way for us to also provide another tier of incentives for including like machine learning and AI, right, to maximize the, and use those analytics to maximize the efficiency of our HVAC systems that we do put into these homes. I would like to see us kind of develop standards around that for our commercial buildings as well as a kind of a companion or
extension of this ordinance. Because I think there are, in terms of there's some other jurisdictions that have required minimum reporting around energy use, water consumption. I think that's helpful data for us to collect as governmental units so we know what kind of infrastructure we should be building. and what our true demand is, and also have an understanding of what, you know, how we are driving savings in both of those areas, which should be our goal. And I think that's the big takeaway from this ordinance is getting away from mandated systems that don't reduce consumption to actually reducing
consumption to make us more sustainable or more efficient. So I've got a couple of ideas that I've picked up along the way here. We'll talk about them further, but those are some other elements I'd like to kind of add into this ordinance. particularly on the commercial. We have a lot of new buildings coming up. I'd be happy to give them a very substantial reduction on their building permit fees if they enhanced their optimization of their systems through AI systems and machine learning. So as the building develops an operational rhythm, it automatically readjusts to reset for exterior conditions, interior
utilization, et cetera. There's a lot of opportunity there. But thank you again. I think an excellent job. Thank you. Okay, let's move on to M7, Madam Clerk. Commissioner Rodriguez, work allow on holidays. Commissioner, floor is yours. Okay, the reason I'm bringing this up, colleagues, is because recently we had, I'm gonna give you just the back story. We had an issue where it was a holiday and we had a resident removing a tree
And obviously when it comes to tree removal, we have residents that just are very skeptical whether there was a permit or not. So there was, phone calls were made, spoke with the manager, manager had police go out. There was in fact a permit being issued for the residents, but So basically what this brought out is that there's a loophole. So there's no construction allowed during holidays. But
you can do tree removal and you can do other items that are still just as obtrusive to people on their day of holiday. So initially I had thought about just proposing where tree removal with the chainsaw, which is very loud, it's probably louder than some construction being done. that we would also restrict that from being done. But in speaking with the manager, he came up with that, let's try to encompass more than one item because you could have crews
out doing other items that are also noisy and bothersome to the neighbors. Then we expanded the conversation further with Surami and basically came up with an idea that if if you have a project that is permitted, you should not be allowed to work on holidays. That still allows for, if you wanna cut your grass or if you wanna do simple things like that, but if you have a permit, you wouldn't be allowed to work
on holidays. And that would restrict anybody that may be trying to get away with something or any resident that wants to know, like, why is this work happening? At least we would have the building department enforcement working and so on so forth. So that's my reasoning for bringing this. Commissioner, any comments? Mr. Spiceman? I think it's a great idea. I mean, I think other cities do it already and people are really respective and they know it's there so they want to have
their peace and quiet. I just don't know if other cities like Coral Gables you're not allowed to do on holidays? Can you still do weed whackers? Can you still do blowers? Can you still do landscape on holidays? I wasn't sure about that. We have noise restrictions in our code currently, correct? Yeah. So we have a limitation on time on Sundays that you can actually operate noise-emitting equipment, right? Yes. We have, so between 9 and 5 PM, we allow commercial and non-commercial operations of like the landscaping, loud. 9 and 5 p.m. 9 and 5 p.m. Monday through Sunday?
Yeah. No, we have a different. Yeah, we allow it from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday, and then Saturdays, Sundays, and legal holidays from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. It is just a decibel limit, whether it's daytime or nighttime. Correct. There's always the decibel limit. There's a decibel limit, but you're allowed to use it. So there's the operational limit, and then there's the noise emitting limit. Correct. Okay, so it's two standards. Okay, I mean, I think my only comment on this is, I see illegal construction happening all the time. I mean, we had that pilot program and people continue building on Saturdays in residential neighborhoods. Sunday, drove by somebody's
home and they had the guy who was doing the, speaking of installation, installing the installation home that's being remodeled a block from my house on a Sunday. So I mean, I think the problem here is just generally we just need to figure out what we're doing from an enforcement perspective to crack down on should not already be happening. And as soon as we kind of get a reputation for being a bit more aggressive on enforcing the stuff that's already not allowed, people will probably stop taking chances on doing all the other stuff that's maybe a loophole in the code.
So that's kind of my general thoughts on that. I don't know what we are doing from a staffing perspective and maybe it might be a good conversation as a corollary to this. Maybe one of our future goals meetings to kind of understand how we're staffing enforcement on the weekends? So we don't have code enforcement on the weekends or after hours, which is precisely when you need it, right? Yes. But there's a non-emergency police number. Yeah. But I don't want my police officers responding to code enforcement calls, personally speaking. Can I ask, is that a bargaining issue that we can't have
people work beyond, or is that just a basically administrative decision that we've made? At one time we did have somebody who worked on Saturdays and their shift was adjusted for that purpose. He's no longer with us. And so that's still an opportunity. But I think even within that, there are things that are permitted that I think impair the enjoyment of the holiday. I 100% agree with the commissioner's point. But I think just, again, even if that was the only issue, I say let's focus on that, but the bigger issue is that, again, from my perspective, I'm in
a neighborhood where we've seen a lot of single-family home development happening. It's a hot place for demolishing homes and building new structures, and I can tell you the construction is continuous. I know people that know better and their subcontractors are out there doing work on Saturdays and Sundays. What? Why'd you look this way? I'm not saying you. Well, they should know better, not you. People that come here often and know what the rules are and presumably they're subcontractors know the rules as well. And they're still working beyond the permitted hours. So, I mean, I think we need to
figure out a staffing plan that, you know, frankly, is focused on the traditional non-business hours at least a few times a month. I know it's an imposition on those staff people to have to work non-traditional hours, but that's, I mean, really when it affects the quality of life for neighbors, right? Yes, sir. I agree with you 100%. I think you're focusing more on construction, which is already limited. The examples you gave are people who are doing
construction. What we're trying to do is close the loopholes of everything that's not construction. Commissioner Rodriguez, I get 100% what you're doing, and I support bringing back an amendment, but we can close all the loopholes. If we are not making an investment in enforcement, it's for not. We don't have the staffing, we can't enforce it. But I mean, we could look, and I don't know if there's a bargaining agreement issue, but we could look at maybe like an on-call program for the code enforcement officer that if they're willing to be on call on a weekend, so that we would just be reactive if we get a complaint. We would send code enforcement
out. Is this something we could, I mean, I'm happy to pay them overtime, right? Can we use the building permit fee revenue for this activity? Is it eligible? For construction without a permit, yes. Construction beyond the permitted hours? No, because that's not really enforcement of the building code. That's a city ordinance. The building code doesn't address at what time you can work. But if you're working without a permit, yes, we can. Would you agree? This isn't really the city attorney. No, no, no, I agree, I agree. That would not be enforcement of the building code. Mr.
Manager. I don't think I fully answered your question. I just want to make clear, those positions are within the Aspen bargaining unit. I just wanted to say, I'm not saying it's a prohibition because of that. I'm just saying that they are covered. I don't think I answered your question. No, that's fine. I assume they were covered. I just wondered whether there was a limitation on their hours of work based on the contract. And so I don't know if there's a bargaining issue, then I'd love to. No, I don't think that on the hours of work it was. It's just that basically what it boiled down to is that three days out of the week, we would have only one officer here. Because he would
work on a Saturday, but he wouldn't work on a Monday. So now we had three days a week where we only had one officer, and one officer here. I just wanna have any. If I may. Yes, you reckon. I think that the director's suggestion of an on-call is actually pretty good because one weekend you may not have nothing and then the next weekend you have calls saying, oh, someone's doing work and then it's an on-call basis. I think that for the weekend that's not a bad idea. I mean, it's something for the manager. I think it's maybe, if we don't wanna, look, our co-compliance folks do a lot of building support activities, right?
the regular course, so I'm sure they've got plenty to do right now beyond adding hours, but maybe it's something where we, rather than adding to the TO, we just basically reserve some dollars so we can go third party. I don't know if we can use a third party contractor to provide this enforcement support, Mr. C. Attorney, or do they have to be a member of the city's formal staff to help us identify violations and cite people? I think we could use a third party for that. We could use a third party for that. I would like to understand how we can kind of force multiply
here. It's either change the staffing hours, right? I understand that having one during the week also probably makes no sense. But in my mind, the problem is we have a hard enough time enforcing the rules that we have successfully and probably in aggregate that's more impactful to the neighbors than just the one off holiday violation. shouldn't be violating, we shouldn't have those loopholes either. I would want to close those as well. Just because there's two separate issues to address. One is the on-call nature doesn't really deal with the problem because we deal with the problem. To be honest,
we don't get that many complaints from holiday weekends. It's happening, but we don't get the complaints. When we do get the complaint, we have used police, and I understand what you had said, to double-check and ensure are they working outside. So they've intervened. But we don't get that many of those. So the on-call wouldn't necessarily, it's the visibility aspect, which is I think the bigger picture where if contractors know that we're out there and we're doing physical, formal inspections, that that changes the program, right? From the standpoint of- Mr. Manager, I think the best evidence of the fact that people
aren't afraid of getting caught was we had a, recently we had that major event for the city. We had a contractor performing work. adjacent to the event, right? And on a Sunday. So again, not in the residential neighborhood, but not allowed in that district either. And, you know, I mean, that's as blatant as it gets, which tells me that unlike parking, right, where people know you cannot pay your parking in South Miami, on the contracting and building side, right, there's, I think, a perception that we've got a pretty lax enforcement regime. So I'm all for investing more resources,
however we need to, particularly after hours on the weekends, Sundays, because I'm just telling you, as someone in a very active neighborhood, I see it happening all the time. I don't wanna be a mayor who's calling in complaints. That's not how I wanna use my time. I don't wanna be, I have plenty conflict with my neighbors around some recent public improvements in our neighborhood. I don't need to be in that kind of a, but I see the violations, whether it's boats, two boats on one lot, whether it's construction after hours, I see, we mentioned the thing about landscaping not being
kept up to par. I think we just, if we're gonna get to the kind of place we want, we need to invest the dollars on an enforcement regime. Yes, sir. I just want to expand for, I couldn't agree with you more. Over a year ago when I came on, I think one of the first conversations I had with the manager and with Tsunami was that I feel our code enforcement department should have at minimum four, especially that we're growing in construction sites. I will advise also that right now we really have one field. George is the, I had
a long conversation with both of them on Saturday by coincidence because of all this that was going on. And at this point, Carol's pretty much administrative and George is really the only one out on the field. I think for one person, it's a lot of scope. And I love what you're saying is investing and putting money into this department because I do think that with the ongoing construction that we have and the growth that's coming, we definitely should expand that department. And that's just an opinion
I have. Yes, sir. I think this is a budgeting discussion. Yes. I don't think it is. I want to be clear. I don't think just throwing more money at it is. I mean, I think there's probably a lot of automation in our process. It's not throwing money, Mayor. No, no, but I don't. It's staffing. I think it's part staffing. I think it's part process. I'm not necessarily comfortable saying we need I mean, I'm not saying no, but I'm not saying that two more bodies is the answer. I mean, I think, what are we doing in our workflow that we can optimize through technology, right, to reduce the
administrative burden and get people out in the field? I mean, you know, that's... Well, we have fewer code officers today than we did 10 years ago. In Coral Gables, I had 11 code officers for, I don't know, the population's like 50,000. Yeah, it's four, yeah, it's three times our size. You know, and there's a lot of work that hadn't been done correctly. that has been a lot of catch-up work. The manager has talked to me about it and because there is a lot of work that just wasn't done. We have liens that were never recorded. There's a lot
and there's been a lot of catch-up. So just cleaning up the cases has been a big task and people don't stop violating. So they're cleaning up and so I think when I'm hearing that Carol is more administrative, which she's not, so I need to look into that. But I'm assuming that it's because of the cleanup work that was being done in the software. But that's done and over with, so I'll look into that. Yeah, I've got to echo that because nobody has been designated admin and field. If somebody self-annuated themselves as admin, he has a different conversation. But the reality
is exactly that, that there was a lot of catch-up stuff administrative in nature that we needed to bring up to a certain point, so it would require a lot more time, but there's no designated program as one is admin and one is, so we'll figure that one out and correct that. But. I think let's have a, I mean I'm happy to talk about one, but I'd like to understand where we are from a process perspective. Because if there is an e4 more research, I certainly want to support the request, okay? Anything else you want to add? So are we good with- Bring legislation for the loophole. Bring legislation for the loophole?
We got into the whole- Well, let's figure out the enforcement because I just think the legislation is going to solve the problem. To the city attorney? So I think we're all on board to bring some sort of legislation as far as to close the loopholes. And if you have a permit, you're not allowed to work on holidays, I guess in short. What we're doing. Okay. With a permit or without a permit? My concern with that. Both. Both, yeah. My concern with that is, is that an incentive for someone who would be getting a
permit? Well, that's what I'm saying. Any work. If the work requires a permit. Okay. Because a lot of people work without a permit. Right. You can work whenever you want. Yeah. If the work requires a permit. You're not allowed to do it on a Sunday. Or if you have an issued permit. Or holiday. Or if you have an issued permit, you're not allowed to work on holidays. I think it's already pretty obvious that if you don't have a permit, you're not supposed to be working at all. Whether it's two in the morning or two in the afternoon, Sunday, Monday, President's Day. So I don't want to give anybody impression out there that that's out there, right? So the issue is, if you have a permit, I think what your intent is, that that permit does not allow you to work
on holidays. Correct. That's what you were trying to achieve, I believe. Yes. Okay, thank you. Colleagues, can we defer M5, which is the City Hall discussion items? Yes. Discussed it earlier? Okay. So let's defer M5. And Madam Clerk, if you can read resolution two, please. Item two, a resolution of the Mayor's City Commission of the City of Southampton, Florida, supporting their preservation of the Miami-Dade County Urban Development Boundary, UDB, urging the Board of County Commissioners to uphold Mayor Daniela Levine Carver's veto proposed
development outside the UDB, urging the Ford legislature to oppose any legislation weakening the Miami-Dade Charter's UDB protection, encourage investment of affordable and workforce housing within the UDB without expanding into environmentally sensitive lands. Mr. Vice Mayor, you're recognized on this item. Thank you. And yes, just for some background, this is obviously a resolution supporting the veto from the Miami-Dade County Mayor. on a project that was approved encroaching on the urban development boundary. The reason that
I'm bringing this up, the discussion on that item was pushed to later this month. Other cities who have passed resolutions in support of this include Surfside, Miami Beach, Pinecrest, North Miami Beach, Palmetto Bay. The idea obviously, the urban development boundary encroaching into it would negatively impact fresh water flows into all the South Florida cities, potentially hurting the bay, hurting the aquifer through salinization, making it
possible that in the future for us or even our children, fresh water may not be as accessible. and the bay could also be damaged, which is why we've created that boundary for the urban development boundary. I do think that sending this would be a great message, not just that the city support maintaining that boundary, but also from our city, who I believe has acted very responsibly in developing in commercial spaces where density is required, which is what we'll have to
do to be able to preserve and development boundaries. So I hope everyone will join me in this effort to protect not just the Everglades, but our future as well. Thank you. Mr. Vicer, I'd just like to propose an amendment so I can vote on the majority of this item because I do have, I think, a conflict with respect to the second request of the veto because I had kind of a pre-engagement relationship with Kelly Tractor on this very item, so I don't want to violate of my ethical obligations as a lawyer on this
matter, even though I did not prosecute the representation. So what I'd like to do is kind of bifurcate the resolution with your support and just extract that language and what I would just so I can vote up on the resolution as to the other three items. I think there is a state legislative bill that's being advanced by Representative Barrero, the number of which I can't remember. And we might want to reference in the legislation as well, which would basically not only reduce the standard for moving the UDB, but also affect our charter
in terms of standards for votes required to make zoning modifications. So I don't know if you'd wanna expand the resolution to also address that. And for purposes of transmittal, send that to the state if it's not included already. Yes, that's fine. And just for clarity, what parts of it did you want to remove? Just on the veto specifically, just given my relationship, what I'd like to do is bifurcate it. Maybe you can take it up as a second resolution, and I can recuse myself from that specific vote. Yeah, the only issue with that, I believe the city
attorney mentioned, if you do recuse yourself, we won't have quorum to be able to vote on it. On three? Yeah, we need four for quorum. So now I can move it to the next meeting where we'll have four, and that will still be prior to... The commission's- The commission's- The commission's- Right, that's right. The commission is- But then I would just have to- Why do we need four votes on the item? No, we don't need four votes, we need four people sitting- Really? Yeah, that's what our charter requires. That's stupid. I hope we're changing that, right? Okay. Okay, well then, I apologize. Yeah, if you have to, then I'll just defer it
to the next meeting. Okay, then let's defer it to the next meeting. Okay. I apologize. Not a problem. Do you want to take a vote on the remainder of it? It's up to the vice mayor. If we do that, can we still do that? I would say let's vote on the remainder because there's only a week left in the legislative session. Okay. If we want to transmit with respect to, I forget again, Representative Barrero's bill, we can still send whatever, express our preference on that legislation. Right, so we're transmitting to the state, not the county. We can transmit to both on that issue and then transmit a separate resolution
on that. on the veto specifically at the next meeting. Okay, got it. That bill is specifically House Bill 399. 399. Representative Barrera. Yeah. Yeah. Again, I'm happy to proceed any way you want. I'm not trying to hijack it. No, no, no. I apologize. I think it's fine. I do obviously want to have that sent to them prior to the next meeting, but because we do have a meeting on the books for that. Yeah, 17th, we would transmit it the morning after. And Commissioner Benicio will be there, so. I can't speak to that.
Yeah, all right. Okay, so are we deferring it or we want to bifurcate it? What's your preference? We can bifurcate it and then I can vote on the first half. Okay, let's do that then. So we'll just redact the sections related to the veto and modify it with the sponsor's acquiescence to include a reference to the House bill. That would modify not only the standards for changing UDB, but also the standards and charters regarding development authorizations. Any objections to the amendment?
Okay, so show it accepted with the sponsor support. Is there a motion, Vice Mayor? I move the item. I'll second. A motion to adopt the item by Vice Mayor Correa as amended, with a second by Commissioner Calle. Madam Clerk, if you can call the roll. Yes, Commissioner Calle. Yes. Commissioner Rodriguez. Yes. Vice Mayor Corian? Mayor Fernandez? Mayor Fernandez? Item passes 40. We've got one more piece of business very quickly. Madam Clerk, if you can read the add-on. Add-on. A resolution of the Mayor's City Commission in the City of South Miami, Florida ratifying the approaches of emergency mechanical harvesting
maintenance services for South Miami Canals from Moore United LLC authorizing the City Manager to expand funds for the payment of the services. Thank you, Madam Clerk. Mr. DeJuner, this is not a public hearing item. is not a public hearing item. Okay, great. So, colleagues, any questions on the manager on this ratification? No questions? Is there a motion to adopt? I'll move the motion. Second. We have a motion by Commissioner Rodriguez and a second by Vice Mayor Corrie. Madam Clerk, please call the roll. Yes. Commissioner Callihan? Yes. Commissioner Rodriguez? Yes. Vice Mayor Corrie? Yes. Mayor Fernandez? Yes. Item passes 4-0.
Thank you. With no further business pending, we stand adjourned. Thank you. Actually, hold on. Sorry. Can I just say? You can. We will hold off on the adjournment. Sorry. I just want to really quick commend the chief and South Miami Police Department on Saturday at the Unity Festival. They did a great job as far as controlling the crowd, the traffic, everything. I mean, they had all hands on deck and- Under very tough climate conditions. And very tough with tents flying everywhere. and all
that, I just want to commend the chief that everything worked out great and you did a good job and he literally had all hands on deck. So congrats and good job on that. Mayor, if I may, just expand on that, Commissioner. Thank you for the recognition, which is well received. Obviously, we had Parks, Public Works, and code enforcement out there that were part of this event and so I want to thank them as well. of the turnaround of that site. The next day we had 10 Miami basketball playing, so the clean up, and so I
appreciate everybody's coordination. Obviously, the South Miami Black Cultural Affairs Foundation for putting on the event, and so there were a number of coordination meetings to kind of improve upon how we handle the event, so I wanted to extend the thank yous to the other departments as well. Thank you, manager, for cleaning that up for me. Also, I just wanna, we're gonna be doing So we had the initial collaboration with Miami-Dade County for the upskilling. We had 20 people there, 13 of which were registering for programs, which we found that was pretty good
for the first one, and we'll be having another one, I believe is on March 14th, here in Chambers, which is a Saturday. So just wanted to advise the board on that. anyone that's looking to get higher education. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else? No? I'll take the opportunity since he opened the door. So again, thanks to the staff for another excellent arts festival and to the Rotary for another great event. I was there
Saturday. The turnout was extraordinary and it was a gorgeous day. So grateful for that. And I do just want to share with my colleagues, St. Albans, which is a Head Start Centers here is trying to raise a few dollars to fund a summer program for kids aging out of the Head Start program at five years of age to help mitigate any summer gap loss. So if you guys are interested in making a contribution, they are soliciting contributions. I had agreed to send them $500 out of my expense account to help raise some dollars for that
activity. If you have any interest, I'll leave the contact information to the clerk If you've not been there, actually, it's the first time I've been there. It's a beautifully maintained little facility, and it's a lot of fun. I got to read for Dr. Seuss Week, Green Eggs and Ham, to a bunch of three and four-year-olds, and it was a lot of fun engaging with them, a lot of really bright, smiley faces there. So I'd encourage you to do that as well. It makes for a fun hour. And with that, we stand adjourned. Thank you, everyone.