##VIDEO ID:nVaIoG421rI## e e e e e e e e e it's call to order the city Commission meeting of the city of St Pete Beach today is Tuesday August 27th 2024 it is 6: p.m. please stand for the Pledge of Allegiance I pledge aliance 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 city clerk commissioner res Niki here commissioner Marriott here mayor petrola here let the record reflect that commissioner Nick filz is present exiting commissioner Philz is present as well as Commissioners Robinson and moh Holland who will take their seat after the oath of office thank you city clerk commissioner Philz yes former commissioner Phils thank you so thank you all say a few things serving as commissioner for the past eight months has been one of the biggest honors of my life I trade my time being commissioner as the top priority in my life I'm thankful for the opportunity thankful for the support I received thankful for the people I have met along the way during my time as commissioner I stayed true to my Integrity consistently treated others with respect and treated others with that same respect throughout my campaign I always did what I felt was best for our current and future Community Based on the information and facts that I had I feel it is important that we as a community remember to try to think less short term about what may or may not affect us personally and think more long term about the future of this city and the future residents of the city being a young father that is exactly what I tried to do in my time serving thank you to our city staff for answering many of the questions I've had and for helping me in accomplishing things for our residents and for our small business owners and most importantly I'd like to thank my wife Hannah for her support throughout the past several months I wish the best for the future commission for our residents and for the city I make myself available as a resource to our commission and to our residents if I can be of any help to anyone in the future and with that thank you all God bless thank you [Applause] mayor is it okay if I just say thank you certainly just to thank Nick um for your service um to the city and for stepping up when when we needed it thank thank you a lot thank you city clerk per section 38-12 of the city code of ordinances in ordinance 29-29 adopted on October 27th 2009 the city commission previously delegated the canvasing board responsibilities to the pelis County canvasing Board to Canvas and provide the results of the August 20th 2024 special municipal election the penela County canvasing Board comprised of County Judge Edwin Jagger County Commissioner Kathleen Peters and alternative member BB pson met on Friday August 23rd 2024 to publicly canvas the results of the nonpartisan election held on August 20th 2024 and certified the returns for the city of St Pete Beach District 2 commissioner election as follows the whole number of votes cast was 715 of which Nick filz received 206 votes Lisa Robinson received 509 votes I will now administer the oath of office to commissioner Lisa Robinson all right I Lisa Robinson I Lisa Robinson do solemnly swear do solemnly swear that I am a full-time resident that I am a full-time resident of the city of St Pete Beach of the city of St Pete Beach that I will support that I will support protect protect and defend and defend the Constitution and government of the United States the Constitution and the government of the United States and of the State of Florida and of the State of Florida that I am duly qualified to hold office that I am duly qualified to hold office under the constitution of the State under the constitution of the state and that I will well that I will well and faithfully and Faithfully perform the duties of commissioner perform the duties of commissioner on which I am about to enter on which I am about to enter congratulations [Applause] I will now administer the oath of office to commissioner Joe mahand put your hand on the Bible and then raise your right hand are you ready you've already done once I Joe mahand I Joe molland do solemnly swear do solemnly swear that I am a full-time resident that I am a full-time resident of the city of St Pete Beach of the city of St Pete Beach that I will support protect and defend that I will support protect and defend the Constitution and government the Constitution and government of the United States and of the State of Florida of the United States and the State of Florida that I am duly qualified to hold office that I am duly qualified to hold office under the constitution of the State under the constitution of the state and that I will well and that I will well and faithfully and Faithfully perform the duties of commissioner on which I am about to enter perform the duties of Commissioner of which I am about to enter yes congratulations yes so help [Applause] thank you and welcome new Commissioners city manager thank you mayor Commissioners and members of the public I have the honor tonight of recognizing one of our very own employees and before I announce who the winner of the employee of the third quarter is I would like to acknowledge all of the employees that were nominated by their peers this last quarter which is I think a reflection of of teamwork within the city in itself so first um nominee Rita Bishop in the city manager's office greten Johnson Parks and recre Recreation Department Frank scani Parks and Recreation Department Jenny keer Bodkin the city clerk's office Ariana Wilson Romo the city clerk's office Alexa sawer in the library and Patty Cordis in Community Development and with that it's my pleasure to announce that Rita Bishop was selected nominated by her peers and chosen by the committee for the third employee of the third quarter she was nominated for her outstanding support and service to the city clerk's office this quarter while the city clerk was on leave while the clerk was out Rita assisted the deputy clerk with public records requests and helped wherever else possible so that the clerk's office could focus on attending meetings and meeting agenda deadlines Rita consistently shows support and compassion for employees when they are ill have a personal issue or are celebrating a birthday she is a kind person who goes above and beyond with a smile on her face making others feel appreciated cared about and recognized her care for the city is evident so congratulations and welld deserved unfortunately she could not be here this evening but um wanted to uh personally uh congratulate her [Applause] thank you city manager do we have any amendments to the agenda as proposed mayor I just have a couple of things obviously I would like to request the removal of resolution 20246 election results as I just read those into the record and I would like to make a correction to the address posted on item 4E it should say storm water gravity main repair at 3526 Bell Vista Drive East thank you city clerk I have a couple of things Mr Mayor whenever you decide to come to me yes sir I would request that um I be allowed to make the motion on the Landscaping service agreement it's item a on the consent agreement uh the purpose for that is so I may uh insert a condition um as it relates to the Certificate of Insurance I'm sorry which item is it please it is for I mayor for I okay yeah for I so we will pull that from the agenda and that will be item five e five what I'm sorry sir five E I would also request that um items under consent J J and K be moved to action items okay we will move those to items 5 f and g and lastly for me uh I would request that for items of discussion um that we add um a discussion uh on the City attorney contract okay any further I have a few too okay commissioner Robinson yes I'd like to add a discussion item for lobbyist reg uh registration will be item under e and I'd like to move Item B to discussion uh the resolution under consent resolution conceptual Alternatives and safety study I had a few questions we can move that to item 5H perfect and then I had um item for discussion uh TRC meetings streamed both streamed live and also taped okay any other amendments to the agenda thank you may I please have a motion to De adopt the agenda as amended motion to adopt um the agenda as amended Second City Clerk if you'll please do a roll call commissioner moholland yes commissioner Marriott yes commissioner Robinson yes commissioner Nikki yes mayor patrilla yes motion carries thank you city clerk city clerk do we have any audience General audience comments Ed store if you will please state your name and address for the record it's store 555th Avenue St P Beach can you see my three minutes so I just want to talk about history is a great teacher if we pay attention so what am I talking about but let me start with a question to ask you all if the people that and this is a serious question if the people that caused the problem would you put them in charge of the solution especially knowing they would not be accountable for their decisions now this a simple yes or no yes no would you a serious question I see silence this supposed to be interactive seriously would you do such a thing or or no yes no I I I abstain I believe this is not interactive correct this is this is voice my opinion okay I'll voice my opinion I'll voice my opinion so let's go through some history to answer this question because in my opinion I believe the city has actually answered this yes which I find is shameful so in December 23 we had four resignations so let's look at the results and not I'm not going to rehash cuz I don't have the time but let me rehap or let me share with you what transpired so we know on December 21st that District 4 there was a three to1 vote in favor of putting someone in place and the mayor voted no the mayor also had a nomination that we withdrew with lack of support and at the same meeting there was a discussion or a vote to extend the submittal period to allow more people to come on board again it was a 3 to1 vote with the mayor saying no so a couple of things from that that I took away by reviewing all the transcripts and I reviewed those videos is relative to the extended period these are things I've learned in my 40 Years of business is if you don't like the result change the rules to the result you want now it's not supposed to be funny but remember rules are made to keep people out and you continue make exceptions to justify why you're making the changes as the changing rules as you go on and I find that to be quite shameful because we make decisions then we change them make decisions inconsistent and what happened after December 21st well we all know after December 21st that we saw December 26 district one guess what a 3 to1 vote mayor saying voting no December 27th District 2 a 3 to1 vote and the mayor voting no and then the January 9th for District 3 we had a 3 to1 vote and the mayor saying voting no now I got to tell you when I looked at this I find that alarming that the mayor is the only one voting no in all these situations and everyone else voting yes and these are the same people who are not accountable for their decisions so here we are today the initial nominations by the mayor back then eight months ago are now sitting in front of us that we just uh brought into oath of office we wasted eight months the will people finally have spoken and we see what the result is thank you sir implications are very important that when you vote no but here's the important part right here Mr saer I you need to demonstrate accountability you need to demonstrate credibility and transparency to earn the trust the respect Integrity of the people because guess what you don't have it now you know it's it's a fact you don't have it and my last slide I have a request I'm sorry I know my time's up but we need to look at this situation very seriously to understand what transpired why it transpired and what are we going to do about it so it doesn't happen again because it's not a joke and everyone behind me views what happened last December of farce but we pay the price Mr ster please if you wouldn't mind I would appreciate if you forward us a copy via forward you a copy presentation so that we all have a copy of it so we can review it in detail with and I could provide a lot more detail if you give me more time I'm I'm I'm available I'm here now thank you sir okay thank you Tim mcer if if you wouldn't mind clarifying with the city clerk separately which subject you would like to speak on and then meanwhile we can call on the next person city clerk I don't if you'll please clarify with the city clerk which subject you would like to speak on later did just you can just tell her I'm a marine contractor so I was here to talk about any restrictions being placed on our use of Trail it's not on the agenda sir it's not on the agenda sir so if you would like to take a minute and speak by all means now the time I'm talking so if you'll please step to the microphone if you like please state your name and address for the record T MRA Island Marine construction thank you sir it was my understanding in that that we were trying to make a move towards restricting the use of some of the trailer ramps in the city for my fellow Marine Contractors and myself to be able to deliver our products to be able to build docks maybe I'm confused here was that on the agenda not on the agenda today sir okay thank you Doug spieler if you'll please state your name and address for the record Doug spieler 519 Crystal Drive medir Beach Florida I'm not sure if you want me to speak it's on the same topic you have three minutes to speak on whatever topic you like at this time and I I thought I had applied to be on the agenda we just are trying to clarify one of your ordinances we're told by one person in the office here that we're allowed to use the the ramps and the easements with a permit your code compliance officer is telling us that that's not true and we're not allowed to use it and I tried to get the answer and I apologize for taking your time first of all thank you all very much for taking the time to listen to us I tried to get this resolved by talking on the phone but I couldn't get a returned phone call but the codes it's it reads without a permit that's how it starts off reading so we're taking that that with a permit we can use it and we're all very respectful of the pro of your property of the boat ramps of the residents time if we're not allowed to use the boat ramps or the easements we're going to have to barge everything in and it's going to cost all the residents a lot of extra money our family's been working here since the 50s we've always used the ramps we've always used the easements now the Cod compliance officer is telling us we can't we have an email from someone in your office that says we can use it as long as we get a permit we all are respecting that we want to apply for a permit we're fine with that but your code compliance officer he put a chain up on the easement just north of or just south of the Donar ramp or somebody did we're just trying to get some type of clarification okay we don't abuse the property we take care of it we clean up our mess if there's a problem we'll take care of it we we can be held responsible with that we have an association we just want some clarification if that's possible and I I heard you loud and clear saying it's not an interactive form I'm not sure how you want to handle this I've tried to do it on the phone I can't get a returned phone call certainly if you wouldn't mind leaving your contact information with the city clerk and we'll ask the city manager to get back in touch with you or have the appropriate person get back in touch with you by the end of business I mean by the end of bus Sorry by the end of the week okay well thank you very much thank you sir Ian Ryan if you please state your name and address for the record Ian Ryan 5503 67th Avenue North pelis Park unit 12 mayor patrilla esteemed Commissioners city manager and city clerk thank you for being here tonight and listening to our public comments uh my name is Ian Ryan I'm with Advanced Marine construction we've been operating here in pellis County since 1998 and me and my fellow Tampa Bay Marine Contractors Association members are here tonight uh for one simple reason October excuse me August 21st last Wednesday uh enforcement manager duer DW R um sent an email to the group and in the email the Press was don't use the ramp don't park at the ramp unless conditions what are those conditions he laid out in the email you got to have an open building permit you got to have an open right way permit now in our organization I'll uh spill the beans we always turn in those two documents so we've never had U issues um about using the ramp now in the email uh last Wednesday U Mr derer said listed 9433 a through G and then afterwards in what I would consider an advisory opinion he lays out he says you cannot trans for materials at the boat ramp even with the right of way permit I believe this advisory opinion is an error I think it was a simple mistake I don't know if um this what I would call a regulation on the Fly was run through you city manager um and so that's why we're here because simply put the code 9433 a through G does not say you cannot transfer Freight in fact section A says you're not allowed to block the ramp unless you're transferring people or Freight so I would ask the commission I would ask the city manager please reach out to us at the tbmc and provide clarification on this issue because I'll put a number to it if we have to barge things in we're talking minimum a five grand tax that the city's putting on the waterfront residents it's a tax because we have to charge it because we have to spend much extra time performing the project um with the remainder of my time I'll thank you very much for a quick and Speedy resolution like I said I know that this was a complete misunder understanding that can be fixed with what's the magical word communication it it plagues us all in every organization everywhere let's communicate a little bit more and be on top thank you very much thank you sir Lisa Ryan I pass David hubard if you'll please state your name and the address for the record David hover Bas gu Drive um before I get started I just wanted to welcome our two newly elected Commissioners and thank you for choosing to serve um I am here tonight speaking as a member of the city City's planning board at our May 20th meeting I expressed interest in representing the board at public engagements City commission hearings and conversations with City staff on the topic of comprehensive plan review as our code permits a member to do my fellow board members agreed to allow me to do so in our City's code subset of section 22- 247 it states the board's responsibilities include to prepare or assist in the preparation of the city's comprehensive plan and to make recommendation ations to the city commission for the adoption or implementation of the plan as a whole or parts thereof after the preparation of such a plan it will be the duty of the planning board to continue to review the plan and perfect it as necessitated by changing conditions I know the public has an interest in our comprehensive plan receiving a review current residents desire an opportunity for input I believe everyone would like to see it represent today's realities across numerous topics that is to perfect as necessitated by changing conditions such work can take numerous forms but it all comes down to the comprehensive plan effectively governing what is now possible for both residential and Commercial development where there are interests techniques features budgets that would have been assumed impossible or not fiscally viable 15 or more years ago I've been on the planning board nearly a year and a half now which crosses 17 scheduled meetings of those 17 seven were canceled with no work to perform we had a 2-hour joint workshop with this Commission on April 25th of 2023 where Mr Brandon Barry gave an excellent review of the current state of the comp plan and how it got to where it is over the preceding decades it's a great meeting to watch and review the slides from for those who have not seen it since that time the city commission heard two vendor proposals for this review project in October of 2023 discussed it further in early November 2023 to set a scope voted to select the vendor Calvin jordano and Associates for services related to a comp plan review of this type four months later in March 20124 the planning board had a discussion of preferred methods of interaction between the board and the selected vendor May of 2024 the planning board meeting included a rough draft from the city on an approach to the project there was a brief discussion it went to the commission for refinement when I checked on the status of this engagement on July 11th it was awaiting the vendor modification of the scope per commission and City requests when I checked on it again today the city's most recent status update was last week with the document still yet to be delivered but expected soon and will likely come to the commission on the September 9th meeting my reason for walking you through all this is to explain how across 17 months one of the planning board's most important responsibilities has seen two and a half hours of activity and no consequential output I know my fellow board members would love to put time in effort into this I'm personally frustrated with the pace so I'm just here to be a squeak of wheel and ask that you keep this project top of Mind as you might encounter opportunities that may allow you to get it moving at a reasonable Cadence towards action and deliverables thank you thank you Mr Harbert and I believe we'll be having a discussion on just this topic towards the end of this meeting Lisa Reich that's all the cards I have thank you city clerk may I please have a motion to adopt the consent agenda I'll make a motion to adopt the consent agenda as amended Second City Clerk if you please do a roll call commissioner Marriott yes commissioner Robinson yes commissioner is Nikki yes commissioner Mah yes yes thank you next we have action items 5A the election of a vice mayor yes mayor and Commissioners I put a fiveyear um T table on your seat letting you know the history from 2019 to present and then um excerpt from the March 22nd meeting in 2022 just identifying that we don't have a standard policy but what has practice has been thank you Commissioners will entertain a discussion and nomination for vice mayor please I'd like to nominate Joe mahalan since he's been on a board okay um could I could would I sure the discussion goes on until we have a second and beyond that and and I appreciate the motion but um there's a the rest of us have been on boards too so I just want to you know be able to talk about it I I um earlier was watching or seeing uh the document that Amber gave us that and I remember and I recall that there was some kind of history of how it was done before so um I'm you know I'm good with keeping I hate to say tradition but would like to possibly have something written somewhere so that it's more formal since this was brought up I guess a year ago and maybe more often I'm not sure um in the past how often this has has been an issue so generally this is whenever correct me city clerk is this an annual yes okay so generally around the March election this year we have a special election um is when we nominate Vice Mayors um yeah we we sort of have a tradition I don't think that we have anything codified as to you know saying one person gets it now another person gets it later um maybe that's something we need to look at maybe that's a discussion we can have at some point um at this point we don't really have a set pattern as to who goes next so we generally it's in all every other case it's been a nomination from somebody um and then usually the person nominated will say if they're interested or not I mean they may not want the job um especially once you're he you have to sh up at The Big C every every last Wednesday of the month so although I'll trade you if you want to go to the PSTA meeting instead thought you wanted that one I do I mean I I appreciate the opportunity to represent our city and the and the panel's residents at the PSTA meeting so um but I do miss go into the big sea and Ambert because it's kind of hard to um see I can see like the numbers progressing but then I I don't know what would be who would what would be the next number if it was by because it's you know one two three then it went one two then four I couldn't really ascertain a pattern other than what was stated in that motion that um excerpt about how it's most senior seated who hasn't been vice mayor that's the only logic but like the city I came from they just rotated like if it was District 3 then the next year it would be up for option to District Four and so I've seen it you know different ways Amber is uh um since there will be another election next march these will all get reshuffled again in March correct so I mean you know where District 4 um with former commissioner Lorenzen was the vice mayor um from January till now if if commissioner molland is willing of course um leaving it with him Le it in District 4 till next march it gets reshuffled again then I you know I don't I don't know that we need to overthink it too much unless he's not willing and then we might need to start overthinking well I'm not bucking to be vice mayor um but by the same token I feel that whoever the majority of the Commissioners feel should be the vice mayor irrespective of any government standard protocols that many of us are frustrated with um shouldn't necessarily dictate who we choose so uh to answer your question if I were nominated I would accept uh but my principal goal is to be a commissioner for my district but I will accept if I were nominated and approved by the commission and Amber just to clarify vice mayor essentially is just the person who runs the meeting in the event that the mayor is not able to attend correct yes and it's typically his alternate like he stated at The Big C and the mayor's Council and then in the mayor's absence he would be signing or he or she would be signing a document if he were unable to do so okay do we have a second I'll second any further discussion city clerk if you'll please do a roll call commissioner Robinson yes commissioner res yes commissioner mahand yes commissioner Marriott yes mayor patrilla yes motion carries thank you next we have action item 5B the appointments to outside agencies this is another one of those annual items that we do typically after the March election um so I've provided you with the list of the various outside agencies who is currently alternate and who is currently primary and where the vacan lie uh obviously we can fill just the vacancies or we can dissect the whole thing and give it an overhaul it's completely up to the five of you okay um generally what we've done in the past is kind of let the Commissioners pick where you want to serve I think that probably makes the most sense um unless you're opposed to that I mean I would just invite you to tell me I start at one one and go down to four and um just kind of say where you there's a couple where I'm you know on the mayor's Council for example where I'm already there um but if you have any requests or if you have any thoughts as to where you would like to serve um most of these generally meet once a month so I've been um on the sunos league of cities I would like to stay there um and then I have I had been the alternate for the Tampa Bay Regional planning Council um and so since I have been foll following along with those meetings and attending some of them um I would I would love to just be the appointed person for that one okay any objections to that no well I I had my eyes set on something so um I put that out there the Tampa Bay Regional planning Council as well as the primary or the alternate I could be the alternate if that's if that works okay any objections or the primary yeah I mean I would prefer to move into the primary role if that that's fine okay Mr Mayor the only thing I'll say I don't necessarily prefer to be the Florida League of cities I do have um a couple preferences but um that's not my preference to serve on that particular committee unless of course the rest of the commission decides that that's where I need to go commissioner RZ Niki yeah I'm on that which one Florida League your is the alternate right now so I can be the primary okay um and then but you're also on the pelis county flood insurance committee which I could stay on as well okay so you not opposed to doing double duty no okay um then commissioner mol would you be opposed to being the Florida League of cities alternate that would not be my preference no okay are there any other vacancies that we've missed Big C alternate just to confirm vice mayor mahand you will need to be the alternate for that for The Big C and they meet um at the end of every month the last Wednesday of every month I have a calendar and my office coordinates that with you so you know where you're going you know where the agenda is but primarily the alternate for that board has been the vice mayor you're speaking of The Big C correct yes absolutely I'm willing to be the primary or the secondary on Big C and for the mayor's Council I don't know if we've gotten to that but I'm certainly willing to be the secondary obviously the mayor would be the primary I assume I'm happy to fill in on the floor the league of cities since I'm involved with them anyway yeah I was going to say I'm happy to I'd give up the Sun Coast Le of cities if somebody wants that and be the alternate on the Florida Le of cities that makes no difference to me there so okay so I'll fill in as alternate for Florida Liga City okay commissioner mohal and will fill in his alternate for the mayor's Council and he and The Big C okay we just need an alternate for the penis County flood which one alter pelis County flood Insurance committee alternate I'll do that want to do that one okay okay okay that's every every slate can we please have a motion sorry do we have any audience comments no I have any okay do we have any can we please have a motion to approve the board appointments as discussed I'll make a motion to approve the board appointments as discussed I'll second city clerk if you'll please do a roll call commissioner Nikki yes commissioner mahand yes commissioner Marriott yes commissioner Robinson yes mayor patrilla yes motion carries thank you okay next we have appointments or reappointments to the city of St Pete Beach advisory boards and committees first um city clerk did you have anything okay great so first um you want to ask the current uh Commissioners the ones that were here last time if you wanted have any reappointments or any changes okay thank you I do not either and then we'll start with uh commissioner Robinson do you have any changes you would like to make or any new appointments uh yes I did I submitted those to Amber as well um and uh that would be a new appointment to the library as well as to um sorry I'm it was library and I'm sorry um I did not bring my notes Board of adjustment and um plan uh planning board as well sorry thank you commissioner moholland yes as I've already provided these to Amber the city clerk I'm sorry um Beach stewardship Dan rothberger Beach or Board of adjustment Dan small historic preservation board Danielle d Parks and Recreation Robin Gibson finance and budget Jerry shuby library and advisory Shelly newoff and planning board Terry Groot thank you sir Madam clerk just can I do you want to clarify District 2 appointments by name since just for the record to be consistent yes I'm sorry at least I don't remember your library board appointee but I do remember Board of adjustment is Chris core and planning is Cindy cind Perry correct and Maggie Milton is library and all other boards stay sorry thank you okay city clerk do we have any audience comments thank you may I please have a motion to no no action required thank you all right next we have uh 5D a discussion on possible action on voting district boundaries yes thank you mayor commissioner so I was provided Direction on the July meeting to work with the gis coordinator he did complete the map as attached to the agenda where he identified each district and the number of registered voters per the panel County Supervisor of Elections information to the city on in April um we also designated the area in districts three and four that were specific to Don CeSar Place Neighborhood individuals so that you could see how many in each district and make a better educated decision on what you wanted to do I have outlined four options that I thought of of course if you have a different direction you are more than welcome to give that to me okay thank you city clerk Commissioners thoughts comments thank you um and and in my option I Look to take no action and the reason why um I mean I I was one uh from a long time ago even before being commissioner had brought this up uh to the commission um our voter numbers change often I guess um but looking at the numbers in you know I just did a simple division you know divide everything by four and then looking at the neighborhoods it in my mind um and Logistics trying to look at where there's associations like condo associations that maybe we could keep together and move from one to the other it became quite difficult when I was looking at the maps and look at all the different associations between um not so much between District 4 you know I could say Okay combine you know the doncesar to District 4 and then getting to District three became a little bit more challenging because then pushing off this District 2 it was hard to get to the I think the suite number was about 1750 per or 1800 and it was really difficult um to see that without really knowing how many voters are in each Condo Association um so unless our numbers change and we have more voters and and I and I hope that we have more voters who actually participate to and because if they didn't maybe it would be even easier to do something like this this but um I don't know if any of you did the homework on that to kind of see how it would be but it it didn't seem feasible without then making another District in the two or the one side off balanced as well um anyways but thank you I do appreciate it thank you commissioner moholland so just so I'm clear commissioner RIS risi you are um not advocating for changing anything yes I I came prepared to discuss this top Topic at length um but I definitely uh concur with the District 3 commissioner that we really shouldn't do anything at this point um we for some reason we were advocating doing something differently I would be prepared to argue against it but I I feel where we're at is probably the best solution uh for the situation so I would be prepared to make a motion that we take no action on this particular instant or this matter thank you sir I agree no further comments and I don't know if we need a motion but just I think the continued practice of being able to revisit is what I appreciate because I think that's where we had the issue before that it hadn't been Revisited in quite some time yeah I think the last time we looked at it was about a year and a half ago and um very similar discussion I think it's an imperfect solution but it's the best we can do at the moment and I think we've got a lot of big projects that we need to tackle you know Beach ordinances comprehensive plan review um there going to be a lot of work before us do we have any audience comments on the subject no comments thank thank you with since the consensus is that we leave it as is um there's no need for a motion I think we just table it for a future discussion if it comes up again thank you all right next we have item 5e formerly item 4 I the L Escape service agreement for District 3 and four commissioner melholland you had some thoughts on that uh Ju Just so I'm clear this is still in consent no sir this has been pulled as an as a separate action item okay so uh yes the landcape service agreement um that I I reviewed it apparently the current landscape company that we have has been approved to be recommended as the new landscape company but in reviewing the documents their Certificate of Insurance had expired um their um general liability policy has expired at least based on the information that we were provided uh there was no note of any Certificate of Insurance as it related to workman's compensation and their auto policy expires in the next 30 45 days uh so for that reason I raised the concern based on some of the previous history before I was on the commission and while I was observing that our city has had numerous problems with expiring certificates of insurance often times from months or years um so that kind of threw up a red flag to me so for that reason uh I wanted to be certain that the existing contractor who we are getting ready to potentially approve to be the new contractor does in fact have the necessary insurances in place uh in order to to continue the service for the city thank you sir I think we would all be in agreement with that um and I one of the things that we can do is if the commission does decide to approve this is to approve it with the stipulation that uh the vendor does provide by you know updated insurance documents yes and then you could also in your packet um just make the motion to uh that the the agreement will be executed in accordance with all legal requirements okay any further discussion on this item great do we have a motion to adopt the Landscaping service agreement for district three and four I'll make a motion to adopt the Landscaping service agreement for District 3 and for conditional on the contractor having a upto-date certificate of insurance and meeting all legal requirements and meet all legal requirements thank you sir do we have a second second city clerk if you'll please do a roll call commissioner res Niki yes commissioner mahand yes commissioner Marriott yes commissioner Robinson yes mayor patrill yes motion carries next we have item 5f formally 4J the passag girl CW wall emergency change order number four commissioner Robinson there was a seaw wall yes I that wasn't me that was that was Joe nope sorry no harm yeah May again hey you came ready to work today I did uh so in reviewing uh the passag gr or passag grill seaw wall uh change order number four and number five um while both the change orders uh so far as their need uh seem to pass a test for me um however uh I believe that the residents of passag Grill would fire me tonight if I didn't ask the question um of why we have no credits um for the pass Grill seaw wall project because the seaw wall uh was installed 8 to 10 Ines lower than what the previous commission had approved um so I would like a clarification on how we got I understand how we got to the point um the Public Works director um spoke to the commission um a couple months ago as it related to that um that there were some decisions made after the commission approved it um but I have to ask the question did we get any credits um because we're being asked for two change orders and the sum total of about $57,000 um but I have not in my observations I have not been deeply involved behind the scenes with the city but I've been heavily involved as a resident um observing what has been happening with the commission and I have heard nothing of any credits as it related to the seaw wall being 8 to 10 in is lower than what was originally approved by the commission thank you sir director your honor Commissioners uh Mike Clark Public Works director um so there are two things going on here as I can as I figure one there's a discussion about money because we didn't uh raise the seaw wall to a foot and then the other is the discussion about raising the seaw wall to a foot and so if uh you go back to the uh the commission meeting that approved the contract I believe in 23 um things were going along pretty well I thought I explained the contract to the process rather well until we got to the point of whether or not the seaw wall was uh going to be elevated and then it kind of went off script and so I am quoted along with um city manager Alex Ray at the time and and several other Commissioners who are no longer were sitting uh about various Heights that we would uh raise the seaw wall to in order to reach 5 ft in av88 which is our city code I should have put my foot down and said you know what I really don't know and I'll have to get back to you as to whether or not we're going to elevate the seaw wall another foot or even 18 inches as was mentioned and uh but I didn't and so for allowing that conversation to wander uh sideways I do apologize to all of my fellow residents out there and to the commission um it was incorrect the contract for the seaw wall was for 5 feet navd88 as is in accordance with our city code the design was precisely that and the contract award for the contractor in the value of the money awarded was for precisely that the idea that we needed a credit because I didn't go to 6 feet is a result of my uh inconsistent statement at the time of a Ward and so uh we have a completed project it is at 5 feet as it should be in the code and the uh and the lesson that uh I Learned was if you're not absolutely concrete positive keep your trap shut and and we'll come back to you later and so uh that that's my explanation for where we're at thank you sir so Mr Clark just to clarify there should have been and should be no expectation of a credit because the seaw wall is 5 feet as opposed to let's just say six that is correct thank you so the we clear the contractor is performing according to the to the plans and to the contract that was signed with them that is correct okay city manager any additional comments you would like to add um no mayor thank you thank you your honor thank you if you would like to make an audience comments the cards are in the back you can register with the city clerk please okay do we have any audience comments okay commissioner are you satisfied with the answer I'm not saying you like it I'm just saying I'm not sure the residents are but yes I am satisfied with the answer thank you thank you sir may we please have a motion to approve the passor girl Seawall emergency change order number four I'll make a motion to approve passil sea wall change order number four do we have a second I'll second city clerk if you'll please do a roll call commissioner mahand yes commissioner Marriott yes commissioner Robinson yes commissioner R Niki mayor patrill yes motion carries commissioner moholland do you have any additional questions for for for item 4K now item 5G I do not thank you okay do we have a motion to approve item sorry do we have a motion to approve the passor gr sea wall emergency change order number five please I'll make a motion to approve pascarel sea wall change order number five do we have a second second city clerk if you'll please do a roll call commissioner Marriott yes commissioner Robinson yes commissioner Riki yes commissioner mahand yes mayor patrilla yes motion carries thank you next we have item 5H forly 4B resolution 2024-the with that project that uh our First Responders had with that I'm concerned about the safety of the residents and and any delays uh that could happen for any um improvements or or changes along that for uh response time I believe there was an email sent by the city manager um my recollection of my involvement with that project um at this point it's in the planning stage I think any concerns that we have with access or uh moving up and down the boulevard is going to be addressed in design so we're hoping to uh have a voice in that process to make sure that we have access to all the points that we need along the boulevard other questions I'm I'm just concerned that my thought would be that you would be involved in the initial um you know time is money when people you know sit there and talk about things and don't involve the right stakeholders involved it I think at that point it was probably a 30,000 foot View and then as we zoom in I think we're going to be more involved in more um direct with our responses and uh definitely involving the Fire Marshall and uh you know some of the other items that we have at play to assure that we have access so with your help and with the guidance of the city manager I think we're going to meet that goal great just wanted um confidence on that that that you were involved rest assured thank you Chief thank you all right do we have a motion to adopt resolution 2024 d05 I'll make a motion to adopt resolution 20245 adopting the Gul Boulevard conceptual Alternatives and safety study Second City Clerk if you'll please do a roll call commissioner Robinson yes commissioner Riki yes commissioner mahand yes commissioner Marriott yes mayor petrilla yes motion carries thank you okay next we have items for discussion the first one is 6a a pause on development so as board member Hubbert mentioned uh not too long ago we I apologize I was using the Royal Wii here I made a motion and recommendation on my very first Commission meeting after being sworn in as mayor uh that we reopen the comprehensive plan that we make you know bring it before the boards bring it before the residents get resident involvement um and then review the comprehensive plan and make any changes as necessary to better fit the needs of our community as it is today um and looking forward to the future um after several rounds of discussion um that motion was eventually adopted U we hired a firm um we gave that firm Direction um to start the process um I'm glad to hear that it's moving forward now um but as part of that uh one of the things that um I made at the as part of the very first Mo motion was um a request that while we do that review that we put a pause on planning um as we been told on a number of occasions by the City attorney that is a one of the reasons to put a you know put a pause on especially large scale development while we review the comprehensive plan so I wanted to bring that before the commission for a discussion and see if the Commissioners would be so inclined um to you know instruct the City attorney to start working on a resolution for pause of planning I think that's an excellent idea um considering uh concerns from all my residents in District 2 being one of the most impacted districts um for the development I think we need to have the right plan in place and know we're going in the right direction for all the residents so I tend to agree in in concept anyway that I think the the the majority of the residents at least my temperature reading of the other the residents is that they conceptually would agree with this but this appeared on the agenda and I did a little Google researching and uh that can be dangerous uh what would this look like um is this are we talking like a six-month moratorium and if we are is it a qualified moratorium where it's just for commercial development is it for partial residential I I just need to understand a little bit more before I could um that is that is a valid point and one of the one of the dangers as you mentioned um is just having an open-ended which which is not the intent um the way that I would Envision it is that we um initially do a 12-month moratorium um specifically coordinated with the comprehensive plan review um to give us the opportunity to take 6 9 12 months to do the review in its entirety to get community involvement to have surveys to have Town Halls um to be able for residents to provide input as to what they would like um as far as who that would impact that is specifically for the comprehensive plan so it would impact um those entities that would fall under the comprehensive plan which would not be the residential side so in my G Google research um which once again is dangerous I recognize that it appeared as if most of the pauses that in the State of Florida that I observed or six-month pauses is there a precedence for 12month pauses is that I don't know if the City attorney needs to Pine in on this or not but is a 12-month pause um something that is likely to withstand scrutiny the reason I mentioned 12 months is because that was roughly the estimate that we received from The Firm that was doing the comprehensive plan review it wouldn't make much sense if they tell us it's going to take you know six to n months maybe 12 months if we do a period shorter than what the firm has advised us it will take um and that was you know and the other thing is if we finish the planning in six months there's nothing correct me to the attorney if I'm mistaken but there's nothing to prevent us from lifting the moratorium at that time and saying we finished a comprehensive plan review here's the new plan plan you know let me know when you want you to chime in Yeah by all means okay so uh this is a moratorium so I I get that we want to call it a pause but that's more planning vernacular than legal vernacular um yes comprehensive planning is a valid purpose for enacting a moratorium the reason for a moratorium would be to maintain the status quo while you go through this process um in fact as the mayor indicated back in April 20 April 25th 2023 there was a joint planning and commission meeting this was all discussed there was a lots of PowerPoint presentations about um discussing the scope uh as you indicated commissioner or vice vice mayor uh like the scope and the geographic location and things like that um in what you are going to have to get past in an if someone were to challenge your moratorium ordinance is that you would have to get past a takings basically a a regulatory taking of private property the way that you do that um you have to enact your moratorium in the same manner in which you would enact a zoning ordin a zoning ordinance so that means uh two it's an ordinance so it would be two readings um in fact we may have to look at does it have to go to the uh local planning agency which is the planning board so it' have to be two of those um high due process which would be whatever scope you choose those Property Owners need to be you need to be able to say to a judge we've notified all these Property Owners given due process Etc um and it needs to be the language of the ordinance drafted needs to be very very specific um I I do think that it would be helpful to have some uh some input from the Planning Group that has been retained that says we can do it and we recommend doing this and if I recall right that that Planning Group did have a uh a land use attorney teamed up with it um and that you know so I can't put enough emphasis on how the ordinance has to be drafted because that's going to be exhibit one in Defending Your moratorium um uh to the vice mayor's point they're not there's not really a formula for six months or a year they definitely have to be temporary they can't be permanent um it really depends on uh what you are undertaking and the in the public interests behind it so what I would suggest is that we get the Planning Group here or in a meeting with staff and we get something via a document official document saying like we know what the scope is and we believe we need to have this much time uh in order to do this that way it will be an exhibit to the to the ordinance because again you know this has to be due process is a very important part that a court will look at in in order for you to be successful uh in defending a challenge uh to your moratorium uh a year is not unreasonable um only because uh let's say that even if you do your I mean to do these types of um assessments of your comprehensive plan as the mayor indicated there's a lot of stakeholders will be talked to there if they do their job right it'll be a lot of public meetings where there will be public participation there might be workshops uh it's not going to be behind closed doors or anything like that because that's not the way uh that kind of planning takes place um so I I would recommend that when if you if you request that legal start drafting an ordinance uh to start its way through the process again it's got to be two readings and in addition to that we would have to do an economic impact statement because that's part of the Florida Statutes now that says you have to show what kind of economic impact this ordinance is going to have um we would have to get staff involved in that um but I think having your having the Planning Group here um here I say here I mean on board and working would benefit the drafting of such an ordinance so that it will withstand scrutiny as you indicated uh but again it is a valid purpose public purpose for doing a moratorium um it's been stated in courts all over the place um it's really going to depend on being very specific in the ordinance about what are you placing a moratorium on not just the geographic scope but the the types of approvals um we we have to identify uh who is already vested and who isn't vested in other words um so there's an the whole purpose of this is to establish a status quo situation to give the city time to rethink its legislation so your comprehensive plan is not quasi judicial it's legislation it's your highest level um so really it's a very important document and it's considered to be that important that something like this can be done but I I would I would feel um remiss if I didn't ask you to get your Consultants together as quickly as possible to give us some testimony and some information that we can attach as an exhibit and get it through start getting it through the process now that's again I think once the geographic area is defined then we have to do a really really good job at notif in those property owners that their property is going to be placed under a moratorium that's the due process that the court will look for uh in this process not just uh putting a notice in the newspaper that's not going to that's not going to cut mustard so to speak um so without getting into a lot of legal ease happy to work on it um I just recommend that you get your the planning team here to um to help provide some specificity in that in that ordinance um and then we'll have to remember you know we have to do the economic impact um we'll have to look into whether it has to go to the local planning agency or not I don't it's not a it's not a change in your comprehensive plan it's a a moratorium to do the change in the comprehensive plan so I suspect it probably doesn't have to go that route but I would just want to check the box on that want to make sure we're okay so I hope that's enough uh information for you uh on that topic I think there's a very good valid points um thank you for bringing up I i' forgotten that the um um the planners actually had a an attorney that they recommended um I mean if the commission would be in agreement I if we could hear from them maybe at the next commission meeting I'm not sure if that's enough time to give them two weeks or a little over yeah two weeks time um just to be able to kind of walk us through that process um and then the other thing I would I think is probably a good suggestion is because we do have we've had turnover on the planning board as well um even if we scheduled a joint Workshop again so that the new Commissioners which I think there's four new ones now since the last meeting and almost as many board members as well um it it certainly couldn't hurt to get them involved have a joint Workshop so that we're all kind of on the same page where we are with the comprehensive plan what the review looks like and what a moratorium might look like as well I I think looking into I I mean I think I think traveling down this path is a wise move I think we need to we need to know where we're going and what we're doing um I also think that the the the devil's in the details right and and I think this is one where we can get ourselves into um a a whole lot of unintended consequences if we're not very careful um you know I think I think we need to be be very clear as we're going through this process we need to be very clear about about very clearly defining what we're talking about you know I know that in the process right now there are people who are um you know in the process for some zoning changes or some conditional uses on you know putting up three town homes that's development in neighborhoods that we might be talking about pausing development in do we want to are we pausing that development I don't know I mean is it is it um defensible uh uh youit ases the city I mean from a from a legal aspect is it defensible to essentially say we don't want the hotels to do anything but anybody else can like I mean because because I think that's what we're getting at right I mean like let's let let's let's say what we're doing and so um you know I I you know or if the goal is that we don't want anybody putting a second story on a house or we don't want you know I know when there was a sewer moratorium nobody could add you know capacity to the Sewer so I think I think being very clear about about what we're trying to to limit in that time period um and then and then making sure that it's defensible you know I mean I I I I think the last thing any of us want to do is put the city in to be involved in another lawsuit I I would agree with commissioner marot um and I think underlying from what our City attorney said is that we need to have that valid public purpose you know what's what's the purpose and I and identify that and maybe through a meeting with the planning board in a workshop and and the Consultants we can Define that I just hate seeing all the foot dragging um 17 months on the planning board and not really getting much done is disturbing to say the least um the plan is 20 years old there wasn't GPS as we know it back then um our impervious uh ratio is out of date for us with sea level rise there's a lot of issues and this has to get done and this has to be a priority again my recommendation is that we get the planners before the Commission in the next two weeks that's the next available um and then you know in the interest of expediency we can also look at scheduling a joint Workshop in the next 30 days or so um in fact when is the next planning board meeting what time is it 400 p.m. what what day is that I'm sorry a Monday okay yeah I mean we could look at what day what Monday the 16th September 16th Monday but I think generally what the city clerk will do is she will send out a survey that says here are the available dates and then we will pick something based on what most people are now keeping in mind the limitations that we have commissioner Riki you're not available before 400 p.m. correct okay so that's why I asked the question what time they meet because if they already meet you know that Monday at 4 p.m. if if it works out for everybody else we could just meet at the same time so that we don't have to schedule one more meeting with the planning board um that's during business staff hours as well so I'm certainly all for us getting this going I just want to make sure that we're smart about it and do it right um well I mean the decision before us tonight what I'm asking for is to move the process forward we're not asking for a resolution tonight right because those are all valid points we need to flush it out iron it out make sure that we have it done the right way to minimize any potential un intended consequences um and so by having the planners come in and give us a presentation as to how they might be able to assist us in this process um will allow us to make a decision whether we want to go down that road and then also working together with the planning board um yes mayor and commission um just a matter of process so we did mention September 9th we are tracking to bring in the Consulting team and you're going to have an opportunity to help us Define the scope of the work and I think to the city attorneys Point that's a great opportunity for us to now hear from you what is the scope of that planning and then further direction of how would we proceed further within that scope because then we'll be Off to the Races I will try to see if we can get the their attorney at that meeting um that's so I'll follow up and and let you know if that's possible on process um and then we'll we'll I think we'll get more information from you that night on what exactly would you like us to take to a joint meeting perfect I have my my only other comment I think is that um an and and the these are all important things that we need that we need to be moving forward with and figuring out um but but in the last few months I feel like we've had um two or three probably three things now that are all the most urgent thing right there's reviewing the comprehensive plan there's infrastructure there's flooding but the nature of something being the most important thing is that there there's one of them right and so I I think we need to be working on all of these things but I think I would also like to hear at some point from the city manager about um you know some some realistic information about the capacity of the staff and what what what's what's a realistic place to be to be spending energy for the most productive result um you know because we we can't have everything be the most important thing i' ask if you could give me um not tonight to respond to that I'm no absolutely no I'm not expecting a response right now working I have been working a lot with staff on trying to figure out what how how full the plates are I know they're full yeah so um and very soon I'm bringing a priority work session with this body to have you help me prioritize and and really uh stay focused because that's how we'll That's How we'll deliver results thank you okay do we have any audience comments thank you all right so do we have consensus we're going uh city manager is going to talk with the planners see if their attorneys available to come give us a brief rundown and then we can look at tantly scheduling a joint workshop with the planning board yes all right thank you next we have item 6B a discussion on customary use for the beach so we've had um some challenges with our beaches beach access residents on the Beach visitors on the beach um there's also been there's also been several at least one significant um legal case that was just recently uh decided on customary use uh just down the road in Readington and so um I wanted to ask the City attorney just give us a brief U maybe summary of Where we've come from because we did we did use to have this just bad English we used to have a customary use ordinance on the books um that was uh resented a few years ago and then also what the potential impact is of the Readington decision uh and what uh future steps the commission might take okay mayor thank you um frankly the the beach and regulating the beach has been a topic that I've been intimately involved with since the day I got here um the commission did uh upon my request uh seek out some advice from University of Florida law school they have a beach and Shore preservation Clinic there um they did provide us with quite a bit of good information about our ordinances and things of that nature um as we went forward um the in 2018 the uh the the legislature uh it was March 23rd actually 2018 governor Scott signed in the law House Bill 631 which is uh entitled possession of real property the impetus of that bill was to um preclude local governments counties and cities from enacting uh what are called customary use ordinances so um what our and this was kind of borne out of of several lawsuits that were um taking place in the uh in the Panhandle in Walton County I believe um but when we say we're talking about customary use it's a it's a longstanding legal Doctrine um that essentially says that this area has been customarily and uh historically used without interruption and without um uh without um challenge for X number of years and it's a lot like an easement it's not saying I own that property it's a lot like I I can it to a PR prescriptive easement so if you need to go over somebody's property to get to your house over a certain number of years the law says that you have a prescribed easement which doesn't require uh filing anything so it's very similar to that so in this this house bill that was enacted in 2018 and it's at Florida statute 16335 it um it ignited a Statewide frenzy of um on the one hand um lots of people who own property on the beach felt like that was the green light to put up fences and signs and say this is my private property nobody's going to you know nobody's going to go on it on the other hand uh it created a lot of problems for local governments who did not have a customary use uh ordinance on the books because there was a uh deadline it did say that if you had a customary use in place um by a certain date then it could stay it would be grandfathered in but there was some caveat language to that so a lot of there was a lot of debate and it was happening very fast lots of local governments were trying to figure out whether they needed to just enact something you know to sort of save their their place in this or whether um they should just rely on the new law the new law actually um what it does doesn't forbid customary use ordinances it just sets in place a procedure for doing so so and that procedure essentially is to uh have a lot of public comment like notify the people that are affected um then ultimately take it to court uh a circuit court judge and then have it blessed at that level I'm simplifying it so they didn't Outlaw customer use ordinances they just said if you're going to have one you have to follow this path of doing so um one big aspect to that obviously besides notifying people that are affected is um collecting of information data that supports the fact that um evidence that the governmental entity would rely on upon uh to prove a recreational customary use has been ancient reasonable without interruption and free from dispute so uh um at the city we did adopt something fairly quickly in order uh we just you know followed a couple of other cities that were doing it other ones were saying we're not doing it uh we did do it we enacted something that was very um basic um we did get challenged by the Silver Sands uh Condominiums uh who or a beach owner they have their Beach um and as a part of that settlement was to uh resend that ordinance you know at that time nobody really thought that the Readington Beach thing would get this far or go that far because most people were either settling or dropping their cases or so forth so it doesn't say the the settlement agreement with Silver Sands doesn't say we can't enact one um you can it's just asked that we we resend the ordinance that we had on the books so fast forward to the case that you just mentioned uh mayor up in Readington Beach this is a actually an order that came out this is in the Middle District it's a United States District Court Middle District of Florida um this was rendered um by judge Hernandez Covington on the 12th of August 2024 and this this has to do with two cases that were initiated in 201829 um Readington Beach uh enacted its uh its ordinance in same similar fashion like yes we need to get this on the books and then there were two cases one was in State Court one was in federal court um there were an amend one C the state court was amended then it went to the federal level so you had both cases at the federal level and then you had the um the plaintiff's first prevailing and then it went to the 11th circuit which is the next step up right below the US Supreme Court the 11 circuit reversed in favor of the city and then uh reversed it and remanded it back to the Middle District which is why the judge rendered this 53 page order I've provided it to you all to read if you like um in my view as long as this stays and holds and is not appealed we'll follow and see this I think it does swing the pendulum uh a little bit more back towards the public so you have that that legislation that was put into place and everybody sort of took it for granted that nobody's going to go through this process that they've laid out in the statutes but now you have this case law that actually did a really good job of analyzing the process and the doctrine the customary use Doctrine uh so I I tend to think that this is a uh you know they fought very long I don't know what they spent on this but it's been in court two cases that got combined ultimately uh and if it stays I think it is a it is a question about whether you know a circuit court judge in Florida would look to that as a that Federal decision would they look to that as a as precedent okay two different types of Courts but yet it speaks very clearly on the doctrine of customary use in Florida and the important of be the importance of beaches in Florida and one of the things that I found very interesting is that as support for uh the city's customary use ordinance they actually cited the statute and said if the State of Florida wanted to Outlaw customary use they wouldn't have established a procedure for it I'm paraphrasing so I personally feel that this is a positive case for um for local governments that have beaches and need to um have some type of customary use for recreational purposes um it's not necessarily taking somebody's property but it's establishing an ordinance on how you would use either part of the Sandy Beach or all of the Sandy Beach it depends on your ordinance um I have not been shy over the years about saying that I have a concern that as time goes by you lose that element being able to collect historical data that you're going to need if in fact you do go down this route you that's part of the prong that you have to show um that I just read to you you're going to have to show like all this evidence and historical information about your Beach uh that it has been used time in Memorial uncontested things like that and some of that is done uh was done done through uh lots of great research also um affidavits by people who have lived on the beach for a long long time and have memories of it and if you read the case you'll see that there were folks that testified that witnesses that said I remember going coming here as a child and uh setting up you know on the beach and so those are the types of things that you would need and I I vocalized my opinion about this because I just feel like it doesn't hurt to collect data and it's a fleeting resource so as people move away or they pass away you lose that historical information um so I don't want to go too much further but that's um I think this case really is a game Cher if it stays if it's not appealed or some some reason or another and on on that same thought process and I know with us having had something on the books previously um I'm just exposing my legal ignorance here but is there such a thing as resining a recension uh no mayor there isn't I mean you rescinded it was rescinded um you can't revive a rescinded ordinance I I think we're in the position where if we were to go forward with it um I think it does help to show the if you were going to go to court you have to go to court to show that there was a an ordinance enacted and due to lawsuits and uncertainty uh the commission decided to resend it but I would think that the method the path that you would have to take would be the statutory path um citing of course the Readington Beach case which did a really good job of one talking about the procedural history and two doing the analysis of the law and the evidence thank you sir Commissioners questions comments um I've got a couple questions uh for the City attorney I think the first one is what's the uh what's the timeline or or the amount of time that that that ruling has to be appealed I believe it's 30 days okay so we'll know pretty quickly if it gets if it gets appealed and then in in your reading of that of that ruling is there anything in there that would make you say well you know that's that that's what they decided for there but there's something that's different about St Pete Beach you know I I know that in Readington it was pretty much exclusively single family home residential um and I don't know that that makes any difference at all from a legal standpoint and I I don't know if you have an opinion about that or or if it just remains to be seen you know the fact facts are the facts are important facts uh fact specific issues to every case is important um this doesn't say it necessarily applies to everything but you're right that is a um predominantly or I think maybe 100% residential Beach whereas St Pete Beach has a mix um but I think it ultimately is going to come down to that test um that you have to show again once again um to prove a recreational customary use has been ancient reasonable without interruption and free from dispute so those are the four things that the court sort of looked at um and and they were citing plenty of cases that were that have come out of Florida um on customary use so it's not something that the courts haven't dealt with in the past um but yeah it could there could be a fact specific difference for St Pete Beach in favor of St Pete Beach as opposed to I mean because it is a very popular very popular Beach um certainly passag Grill is about as old as they come I mean it it they've documented uh you know indigenous uh indigenous folks in that area one time so I I think there's plenty of both both sides of it you know like the complexity of St Pete Beach may make a judge say well you know this is PA pause a little or it may make a judge think yeah I mean it's it's so popular people come here from all over the world it's a it's an international destination um you know I've seen plenty of photographs I know I know you all have and I've read lots of documents and information that are kept by the clerk's office or um down at the Historical Museum um things like that so it's it's anybody's guess um really um there are attorneys that are are that's this is all they do is customary use work I know a few of them uh so you know that's also something to think about is uh getting an expert that has gone through this in Florida and and working with that and and then my other question is is it is it a All or Nothing proposition and what I mean by that is that so I'm assuming the process is similar to what we were just talking about with a with a with a moratorium based on the comprehensive plan it would be by ordinance it requires two readings it requires an economic impact study it requires public meetings um if if if that if if if we go down that path is there you know you know kind of like with the with before when the city had the the customary use ordinance before and then it was challenged and and and so we rescinded it are there are there options that are in between like can you can you have an ordinance have it challenged and end up in some middle ground or is it a either there's an ordinance and you have it or there's a nothing you you can draft your um your ordinance the way you like um I believe that Readington Beach encompassed all of the Sandy Beach um which would be basically the high water mark up to where the Topography of the beach changes that's usually the definition of sandy beach when it becomes Dune or or Sea Oats or something like that um you don't have to go that far Upland if you don't want to you could say let's take it 50 fet you know um above the high water mark or something to that effect I mean you can craft your your ordinance any way you want um I and I and I guess my my question probably isn't a fair one my question is more that if if you if you get to the point where there's a legal challenge of it you know if if we say it it's it's all the Sandy Beach just like Readington does um and then there's a legal challenge to it is is resending it or or or having it negated the only option in a from a from a legal standpoint or or could you end up in a situation where a court would say well if you do this and you do this you can keep this or if you change your ordinance you can keep that or it's usually just a here's what here's what we've here's what we've passed yes it's okay or no it's not it it's a little hard to say because I don't really know of anyone who's really taken this path yet through and nobody really knows how what kind of order of the judge would issue um I do know that people would all the all the affected Property Owners would have an ability to inter vene um you know if even even before you go to court to have a court bless it if you feel like it's not it's not worth the effort you know let's not do it you could stop there if you wanted to after you have your public hearings but um but yeah I think what you're going to be looking at is the same kind of challenges that Readington Beach had legal challenges which are um taking of private property M that's what you're going to be dealing with and that's the same issue with the moratorium that's the kind of um unconstitutional taking of private property that's what you would have to try to defeat Matthew did you have something you wanted to contribute I know you've been really involved in this very quiet this evening uh Matthew McConnell assistant City attorney no I think Andrew hit on it I just want to be clear here though that I think the first part of this if we're going to move forward is the history Gathering because the way the process works works is it's not an ordinance it's actually a notice of intent M to IND adopt this Doctrine and what you're doing is your your notice of intent encompasses the area the evidence everything that you're going to do at a public hearing and like Andrew mentioned you're serving all these people and any affected property owner is going to have the right to intervene so you're not essentially being sued but they're you're starting the circuit court case and they're intervening in it so then you could potentially have 40 or 50 people and the one distinction I I do want to make because I was heavily involved in this ordinance shage along with small cell uh small cells Wireless facilities along with medical marijuana all of these kind of came out in the same two-year span the ordinance that we adopted was specific to the statute which allowed us to use it as an affirmative defense so if had we had a customary use ordinance in place prior to J July 1st of 2016 then we would have been grandfathered but we didn't so we scrambled to get one in place for the affirmative defense only so even if we rescinded our rescinded we didn't go through the judicial process of determining a customary use so our ordinance would be null and void anyways right so I do think that's an important distinction here that whether we resend or don't resend the reality is we'd have to go through the process anyways um and that's a decision for you all to make and I also will add that there are some I think St John County might be one there's a few counties um that have they they adopted customary use decades ago and had to put up uh you know deal with the legal challenges but there are some that have done that a long time ago may can go ahead I have a couple of questions and and as the discussion I was just trying to get some notes that I wouldn't forget um because we mentioned um you know collecting evidence or or history but our beach or St Pete Beach Beach is is fairly complex um when you think of of the history we weren't St Pete Beach um forever right there were several several towns um operating separately and and with various history you mentioned P Grill but P Grill is very unique um from many of the other areas belvista Donar town and any of the other cities that Consolidated to become St Pete Beach um so that alone to me is very complex in gathering that information because I know and and and City attorney probably knows I one question you know free from dispute but how many disputes collectively with all these towns have we've had because I I do know we've had more than one um so does that already remove us from this because we've had gone to court on a couple of incidences um so it it doesn't check off that box so that that's one um hey what are we trying to resolve and is there any way other way of trying to resolve whatever we're resolving the mayor spoke about access um and you spoke about prescriptive easements um is there other ways of getting the same resolution to wherever the actual concerns are um and time and money you know how much time I think that case was over five years or close to five years and I don't know the total amount of dollars and earlier today we're talking about priorities and spending and infrastructure and flooding and all these other things I mean are we ready to venture and and move the city into an opposite direction um even staff load you know I wouldn't I wouldn't propose to even have our City attorney doing this kind of a case because we have a lot of things that still need to get done um so I mean this I think needs a lot of questions that need to be answered I don't think we could answer them all right now and also to have resident involvement because again I think it's different in different districts um not Citywide you know so and maybe mayor you could explain what the issue is what what are we trying to resolve um because they might be different in different locations commissioner Mahal any questions comments my only comment I did have one resident before this actually uh before the agenda came out uh in a very intelligent resident very involved resident excuse me that reached out to me on this matter and was concerned that maybe we were going to consider it what the cost would be um other than that um I participated in the beach stewardship me meeting last week um I am not one 100% up to speed on this so I'm kind of here to listen tonight on this particular matter other than the feedback that I had received from the one resident that I I don't know if you know he just came about this on his own or had some sense of it or whatever but he did call me and and rais concerns that we were going to go down this path um but um I'm here to listen really on this matter thank you sir well I think we've we've got a if the commission want to go down this path we have a good road map based on the comments from the city attorney and it sounds like it starts with the residents right so if there was a desire by the residents to show the commission that this is a path that we want to go at the end of the day we we are here to represent our residents the people that voted us into office um so to me I'm more concerned about making sure that we address and get the consent of the Govern so that we can govern appropriately and if the first step is for residents to start Gathering evidence pictures affidavits and so on I mean that's something that if the residents decided you know what this is something that we would like to see in our city for the posterity so that we have customary use of all the beaches in St Pete Beach not just today but also in the future I mean that is a good step it's a good first step for the residents to undertake on their own and say look here's this is something that we want and if they were to take that first step and bring it back to the commission and say yes this is what we want you are Representatives we ask you to represent what we want to see in our town I think that's that's and that's the discussion that I wanted to have is one so that we have a better understanding of where we are how do we get here what are the options for moving forward um but I think if the process starts with the residents I think that this would be a great resident-led initiative if there was a desire for that so I would put it to the residents and say I mean I've I've seen your pictures I've had the conversations with the residents and if that's something that you want to pursue here's a here's a great Road mapap on how we might do that and then we can bring that to the commission and say look this is what our residents are asking us to undertake at the end of the day it is their money that they contributed to the tax dollars and they should have some input on how we spend it and I think this is one of the ways to do that and on a matter of priority if we get you know overwhelming resident support that tells us what the priority is and what the priority should be for the commission because at the end of the day you know as many of my Predators have often said we're just pres here like everybody else and is our job to represent and to represent what they tell us that their priorities are and that's the reason that I brought these things up today the moratorium the customer use because these are things that residents over the last two years have overwhelmingly told us in no uncertain terms no matter and we may have different opinions on that but to my ear it's pretty loud and clear what residents are asking for and so that's why I brought it up you know and again if if residents feel that this is something they want to tackle um I would encourage them to start that process do we have any audience comments I see there's some cards there BJ Lawson if you'll please state your name and address for the record yes uh BJ Lawson leani Drive 547 leani drive just so there's Clarity in terms of what I believe residents want as I've seen I was on the beach in front of one of our hotels when when a resident and his family were told incorrectly by the sheriff that they needed to get off the beach they were trespassed because they weren't in the wet sand literally in the water so that's the kind of beach access that I don't expect to have to argue for as a resident when I buy a house here and to the point of gathering the history it's fascinating to go back and look at all the old plats from the forming of St Pete Beach initially all of our East West Avenues terminated right at the gulf and they were deed to the public perpetually as an easement now fast forward a number of years and you've got the governor proclaiming us to be the sunset capital of Florida we're not watching the sunset from Gulf Boulevard we watch it from the beach so we should be able to get to the beach we should be able to enjoy the beach so I don't believe any Resident would object to that and as long as we have questions about hey can I put down a chair and enjoy my time at the beach and the sheriff is going to show up and say no you've actually got to be in the water that's not serving the public at the same time I'm a big fan of Law and Order right and there are people who shouldn't be on the beach if there's violence drugs defecation sleeping the stuff that we know that's happening that shouldn't be happening yes we need to get that off the beach but I do think we need a reasonable plan that doesn't exhaust our resources to ensure that we have resident public beach access thank you Dana Richardson if you'll please state your name and address for the record Dana Richardson 5830 Bahama Way South I wasn't planning on speaking I don't know how long this article is but this was uh article was written by Paul rener who is a state representative now he's a speaker of the house uh regarding the 2018 law and in it he goes on to say here are the real facts our right to enjoy the beaches is protected by the Florida Constitution neither the legislature nor the county can interfere period in some cases private property owners who live on the beach own lots that are platted to include the dry sand between the dunes and that high W water mark even though this is private property and even though those owners are taxed on the dryand portion of the beach it is not uncommon that many of us use it through the courts Florida law has recognized our right to the customary use of that private property because we have been using it for years those rights are completely preserved under the law just passed stated differently differently your rights and mine to use the beach have not changed one bit the rights we have today are the same rights we will enjoy in the years to come so on that being said we pay 80% of the taxes and I think that we need to do whatever it takes to be able to get our beaches back to be able to use them be able to put our little tents and our chairs and our coolers anywhere we want obviously not up on the hotel property closer in and that's all I have to say thank you thank you for your comments Ruda H if you'll please state your name and address for the record hi my name is Ruda Hance I'm at 7711 Kina Way St Pete Beach uh just wanted to say I wanted to make my voice heard that myself as a resident and all of the other residents that I speak to on a regular basis we all are in favor of the reasonable and customary use I lived here just from my own background from 1987 to 198 1995 I was in my 20s and I can testify that there were at times up to a hundred of us out on the beach in that area we would all hang out on Harry's beach bar which was part of the Sara we were all welcome just to hang there in front of the trade winds in front of the Sara the hotels welcomed us because they wanted us to come into their establishment and buy a drink while they were there sometimes there were sand dance parties in the evening for the residents that would that would come there um nobody ever kicked us off the beach we would all stay there all day Saturday Sunday STS and law students would hang out there routinely on the weekend and it was never an issue so I think there are a lot of people here that can testify that we did indeed have reasonable and customary use at least during those years that I was here thank you thank you for your comments I thank you city clerk any further comments or discussion on this topic mayor um one last state on this um as I indicated there this is a specialty and uh if in fact you wanted to get more information which is what I would ask that you do is probably maybe ask for uh one of these attorneys that specializes in this type of law it's a very specialized type of law to give you an opinion a legal opinion I mean I'm telling you what I know what the law is which um you know I think I know enough to give you some direction on it but it might be good to um invest a little bit to possibly get an opinion from someone that's gone through this and has dealt with it and can answer some of your questions with uh more Authority and experience than I have with adopting a customary use ordinance something to think about would the commission be opposed to having that discussion with a customer use attorney to give us additional information and kind of give us a you know either a road map or you know give us a breakdown of what some of the challenges might be I think that makes sense you know to get an idea of what what is the what do the process look like what is it likely to cost what I mean you know you can't make decisions without those facts I agree would that be something that'll be worth having as a discussion or a joint Workshop there I say a joint workshop with the beach stewardship commit but I mean I think would it would be prudent to get them involved in the process yeah absolutely okay so could we look at scheduling sometime in September a joint Workshop thank you so it would require me to like reach out to some of the attorneys obviously I think the attorneys that worked on this Readington Beach case might be my first uh go-to since they've got experience in this um General geographic area on this but I think it would really depend on whether I mean I'm happy to make the phone calls there's some other lawyers that I know that have dealt with this issue um it really depends on how quickly they can make themselves available um and you know of course they're going to want to get paid and um I can't authorize that but I'd be happy to solicit some names and see if they're interested in it and find out what their um rate would be to um prepare an opinion for you I think that's what you really need is a legal opinion um uh for that that you at least hear from someone other than me someone with experience in this area uh so um I I I can definitely find and reach out reach out and find some lawyers and see if they're interested in it and then bring that information back to you um with a possible cost or a budget okay would that be agreeable okay is that something that um you might just be able to provide us a report on that by the next commission meeting yeah I think so just do it okay all right any further discussion on this item okay next we have item 6 c a discussion on advisory boards commissioner Holland I believe this was your item thank you Mr Mayor so I've provided uh to all the city officers as well as all the Commissioners just uh uh a first pass draft of some recommendations that I have as it relates to the planning board board of adjustment historic preservation board and Beach stewardships or stewardship I should say I believe our boards and committees need to be utilized more effectively and in order to help facilitate that I recommend we discuss more uh modifying the ordinances for those boards there was a previous discussion on this item um back in I want to say October or November of last year while I was an observer in the audience it never really went anywhere um but there is uh some inconsistencies between all the boards as it relates to accountability attendance and some of those things um I believe very strongly particularly after having served on the board of adjustment um that we are not fully utilizing our boards in the city uh I think the board should be empowered to do more I think they should be expected to do more and think they should have a voice with us here on the commission and as a result of that I've put forth some proposals uh that I would like us to consider moving forward uh to adopt on these particular boards um so commissioner moland would you be and I I appreciate you taking the time to do an extensive uh analysis of the individual boards would you be opposed to one entering this into the record so that we have it for for the public it should already be I've provided a copy to the clerk already okay um and then also to give us some time to digest and maybe bring back at the next commission meeting as a discussion item absolutely I just wanted to get it out there yeah uh it is something that uh has been a topic that I've been very interested in for many months now and I do hope that will take it seriously and give it serious consideration moving forward no and I appreciate that because the concerns you've brought up are many of the same concerns that I've brought up in the past um and I think it's worth taking a look at and making sure that we have boards that that serve the com serve the commission serve the residents and the way that they're intended to be a voice from the residents back to the commission so can we we can move this to a discussion item or just put it back on the agenda for the next commission meeting would that be all right it's absolutely fine with me as long as we're as long as it's not going to get buried months I just want to be able to read through all the the comments that you have here so that um so we're actually have a for my part an intelligent conversation on it okay is the Commission in agreement with that sure yes okay city clerk if you would mind just putting this back on the agenda for the next commission meeting all right um commissioner Mahal I believe you're up again item sixd a discussion on the city attorney's contract sorry so in my prior life this isn't typically how uh this situation would get handled uh normally this would get handled behind closed doors these type discussions wouldn't be public discussions but obviously we're public servants and with the Sunshine Law being what it is everything has to be in the open and transparent so for that reason uh this particular matter brings me no particular pleasure uh I will say Matthew and Andrew um I am not not necessarily pleased to have to do this in public but it's uh essentially how things have to be based on my many months of observation and participation in City business I don't have confidence in the City attorney I recommend we consider exercising our contract option so we as a city may get a fresh start so that's my initial comments on this matter Mr Mayor all right comments questions um I have some pretty significant concerns with um changing City attorneys or being without a City attorney in the midst of all the things that the city is currently involved in um so I mean I guess I would be interested to hear your opinion of how you think this would go exactly well that's ultimately for all of us to decide with Council from uh the city manager so the contract calls for us to have a 90-day um up to a 90-day notification period termination period um so there would be a transition period uh would assume that we would have to ask this um city manager uh to find potential Replacements now the I I will say this also that mutually agreeable the city manage or the City attorney could agree to stay on longer but the contract and correct me if I'm wrong Andrew um the contract says we have up to 90 days um so I would assume we would begin a search and it is certainly a concern of mine um you know this is what certainly what I don't want is what we had in December that type disruption in chaos I was uh I was a front row participant in that and I have been uh involved in that since and uh I I'm not looking for a repeat of that I hope that we can navigate this uh in a way that is best for the city long term but I do believe we need a fresh start and I think that whether it's 30 days 60 days 90 days or a mutually agreed upon end date um that we ought to be able to find a path forward um but these type decisions clearly are not um comfortable to make there's always risk involved I understand that but I feel it needs to be made that's my position and so is your your feeling that this needs to happen just because essentially there's too much baggage there's too much past baggage and we need a fresh start or there's no I uh I have a number of items that I could certainly site I don't necessarily believe in an atwi contract that is to our benefit to to cite case and verse of how I arrived at this position I think as you well know I have been a participant and an observer of city government for many many months now so it's not like uh I arrived in this seat tonight and all of a sudden this was a light of of the blue that uh I felt that this is something that we should do um so I obviously based on the the the circumstances I couldn't or I don't think it's probably appropriate or maybe it is for me to ask the city manager's opinion whether I should site the five six seven specific generalized examples of how I arrived at this point um because then once again on an atwi contract not sure we want to get into those discussions I'm perfectly willing to if either the commission or the mayor or the City attorney says yes please tell us more how you arrived here can I ask a question um it is our I mean your this is your first day obviously here first day on the commission the commission correct thank you um corrected um so and and I and I agree with the mayor when he says you know we're we're here representing the residents I've never heard a resident come to me to say this must be done um so I would like to know because I I don't know what those five things I don't know if that's something you were talking with the city manager this is you know coming off of nowhere to me so I I would appreciate specifics because if it's just you personally I don't again I've never heard a resident come up here to dispute our City attorney one second one second um before you go forward with that um just do that with a knowledge that if I feel like something is imping my credibility my character I absolutely will defend myself understand but but if you have something that you just have a personal opinion that you think something should be different I don't I don't mind but you're not going to get the same kind of fight from me that um you may have gotten from a past city manager I you're you're my clients and if we can't have a good relationship then I don't want to be here fair enough I'll gladly answer that question unless um I I don't know the right legal terminology to help you hear here um I'm not sure it's in and again maybe this is a thread carefully I'm sorry dread carefully walk carefully whatever you say next because and maybe you don't say anything maybe you say whatever it is on your mind um that's those are my comments at this point is you you know you've made you've made your uh you made your thoughts if if you wish to elaborate on that I'm not going to stand in your way I don't think anyone else will stand in your way either but I will ask you to make sure that you are on solid footing moving forward thank you Mr Mayor so um I am perfectly willing to be transparent and I understand that I have to be careful how transparent I am uh in the environment that I'm in uh I would just say two things uh I have a lot of experience I've been observing for quite some time now and I have come to certain conclusions on my own but I will also say commissioner riski that I have had many residents reach out to me about this particular matter I hope that answers your question I would ask whether we're looking at a staff position potentially or we're looking at a contract position because there could be some monetary issues with that as well that could benefit the community so we're looking at a trailer officer but my understanding is that unlike the City attorney sorry unlike the city clerk and the city manager this is a contract with a law firm rather than an employment contract with an employee of the city as it is with the city clerk and the city manager and a new position could be as a staff position correct potentially I the city Charter calls for us to have three Charter officers um I genuinely don't know if the city Charter prescribes whether the City attorney specifically needs to be an employee or if it could be a contract uh I can tell you from my experience in working with other cities other Commissioners and mayors that it is not uncommon to have a law firm represent the city in the City attorney position rather than having an OnStaff attorney now there's certainly plenty cases where they have OnStaff attorneys and I've seen plenty of cases where they have a firm generally that firm might have one attorney that is you know dedicated to that City some of them you know kind of move them in and out um but there's as far as specifically how our city I'm not sure I don't know if our city Charter calls for having a full-time position position or whether it calls for leaving leeway I mean I'm guessing it leaves leeway for a contract if that's what we currently have I don't see how it's good I don't see how it's in the best interest of the city in the situation we are currently in to go down on that path do we have any audience comments BJ Lawson BJ Lawson 547 Leon Drive I think this is a great question to ask especially in light of of where we are and where we have been since moving to this community nearly two years ago it became pretty clear that we have walked into a government in into a city with a government that has a long history of effectively being at war with its residents if you talk to people who have been here much longer than I have this is a problem that's been decades in the making and it really comes from the top it's come from the top it came from past city managers the tone is set by City commission and the execution of that mindset plays out through councel plays out through the advice given by the City attorney and I'd argue that we are in the position that we are in because of the the advice that we've been given I'd asked for this information to be shown on the U overhead and I asked myself actually a couple of weeks ago as I was just curious enough to ask for the current city attorney's contract how much are we paying for the representation we're getting and if you look over the past four years we're paying about 2.6 2.3 2023 2.8% of our departmental expenses goes to our legal Division if you look at either surrounding communities or a comparable Community like Marco Island which is about our side our size further south they pay significantly less now some of these some of these cities have in-house Council some of them have law firms both can happen but what I have observed as a res president is we have someone who is working for the city but not representing the residents and again this is the residents who pay 80% of the taxes so I do think this is an important question to ask I think it's important to ask why are we spending so much more money in legal services than surrounding incomparable communities is that because we have so much more conflict well why do we have so much more conflict and might it be time to make a move in a different direction where we have a neighbor who's living alongside us who's serving this position I've talked to several residents who are attorneys and their comments are when I show them the numbers are like oh my gosh this is ridiculous we could staff an in-house legal department with a great City attorney and a paralal for much less than we're paying leave extra budget that would be available for Consultants as necessary and that would be someone who would be a neighbor in the same way that our new city manager and her husband are our neighbor because I do honestly believe we've got a great opportunity here with the clear message sent by this election and the fact that residents have come together to say we want to unite with our city government we are tired of being at war with our city government no resident wants to sue the city ever because we pay for both sides of that right it's one thing to have a city that's representing us and defending us if someone Su us but when residents have to sue the city it's time to change thank you sir Ruda H feel please state your name and address for the record Ruda H 7711 coino St Pete Beach I just like to start with the reiterating I agree 110% with everything BJ just said and I think most residents would also say the same um interestingly uh myself and a few other residents actually brought this issue up to Karen marot the other night um just from a financial standpoint because I had heard um that we've paid the city this Law Firm I don't know between 500 to a million dollars 500,000 to a million dollars in the last year I'm not sure if that's true or not I did a little digging and I just picked up pulled out the month of January I think we paid 54,000 in that month alone just this past January and then just doing a Google Search and just looking online I think we're paying this Law Firm um for Andrew $230 an hour in his billable hours the other attorney's on his staff $200 an hour and don't quote me but I think some of the other support positions maybe around $75 an hour and then when I looked online what the average municipality pays for their staff City attorneys not contract um it just seems the average City attorney salary is $13,000 a year as of August 2024 the hourly rate for that is $494 an hour uh South Florida is right inong in line with that the average City attorney salary is 103,000 Orlando area the median salary 139,000 um and then when I look online at all the other jobs sit zipia salary.com payscale.com it's all very close all very similar it just seems to me we are paying probably about twice as much as we should be per hour thank you thank you Dana Richardson if you'll please state your name and address for the record uh Dana Richardson 5830 Bahama Way South again I didn't mean to speak tonight and this is nothing against uh Mr Dickman or his Law Firm however um I moved here in 2020 my goal was to enjoy the beach live the life and it has been not that I have been having to come to these meetings in the last four years and sit in and observe I am ignorant on a lot of things when it comes to law but I know when something's not right and there isn't anything right we're finally turning the page we've got a new city manager we've got a mayor we've got a new Commissioners in District 2 and four the residents have spoken loud and clear when they voted for Adrien as mayor where they wanted this town to go and we still have had problems I've heard Mr Dickman say at times well this could open us up to litigation well then why go there and how do these things get a approved everything gets with these cup applications everything gets ironed out in the tech review committees yet how do we passing these things that definitely go against our Land Development code or our ordinances well obviously I'm assuming my ignorance that it's getting ironed out by a city attorneys Brandon Barry will actually say in his uh letter that hey this goes against our code residents won't be happy but and so where does this come from we need a we need everybody on the citizens page we need them fighting for us we are the dominant ones we are we are pay 80% of the taxes and uh let me see did I forget anything I think that's about it this is financial this is about getting somebody to on our team that's for us not against us oh one last thing I've also observed multiple times I don't know what it is about one of the residents here but it's very apparent that there's an issue with some of the residents here when they speak and I don't think that that's proper thank you thank you okay well Mr mahalan what is your ask or recommendation or what is it you're proposing to the commission well I guess my first question would be to my fellow Commissioners because I have already um in many meetings with residents I've received resident feedback um but commissioner riski Le led me to believe that she has received no feedback so I I don't know if um we need to give the Commissioners that haven't heard from their residents any opinions on this matter whether we need to give them an opportunity to have opinions or we just want to move to try to make a decision I'm I'm at peace where I'm at uh both as an individual and based on what I've had for communications with the residents in my district um but I'm only one person person up here so uh I guess I'd like to hear what the others have to say as it relates to that well I think you've heard from all from everyone up here at this point we you either make a motion either he gets a second or he doesn't get a second and that tells you what you need to know or you can add it on the agenda for a different time in the future um so do we want to have any discussion or we do we want to consider 90day um um I don't want to use the word I hate to use the word termination but a 90day end of contract do do we want to consider something different do we need to ask the city manager questions uh I kind of need to lean on you Mr Mayor on this I mean you've got a lot more experience up here than I do your it was your discussion item so you if you have a recommendation okay I'll make a motion that uh we ex exercise our 90-day contract option uh on the city manager's contract and I would also recommend or or I would also uh Mr Mah the City attorney not the city manager don't don't scare the new city manager I I apolog I apologize uh I recommend that we exercise our 90-day contract option on the City attorney and additionally I recommend that we have the city manager uh immediately begin uh our search options for what's available for another firm or um a attorney pargal is there a second I'll second that any further discussion I will just say that that I heard from exactly three residents about this issue their concern was brought to me in the context of what it costs there are also people who are actively involved in litigation against the city and so I I I think we're now up to five very important crises for the to address and and and you know I think this is irresponsible am I allowed to comment of course at some point uh we need to do what we What the residents want us to do to move forward and um I I obviously nobody wants lawsuits and from my background I understand the cost of lawsuits but sometimes you have to make tough decisions and I feel this is a tough decision that needs to be made and if it's the wrong one I'm quite certain I won't be here seven months from now and I will venture to say that I've heard from my District Two residents and they feel the same way they they uh do not support the City attorney commissioner I just want to say I mean I agree with commissioner Marriott that we're making um I haven't even had a chance to even look at the attorney's um contract well to give it to me right now and read it if you give me enough time to do research and ask questions I'll be more than willing to entertain it but I I don't have it I don't even know when it expires maybe we should look at it when dur you know I don't even know maybe you could tell me when it expires since you have a copy of it um and and believe it does expire but the ter there's a termination Clause I believe it's a 90day at will which is correct on either side I personally would like discrimination Clause again I you're asking me to review it right now so I'm requesting no no I'm not asking you to you you had said that you didn't have you copy if one one at a time thank you so commissioner res Nikki I again would prefer to have time to review it and to understand and listen to um the residents in general I mean we I agree we have people from one particular group and I'll be willing to say Protect St P Beach come up here who is law has a lawsuit to and named us um as well not to mention um Lisa Robinson was a a prior name on a lawsuit to us now sitting here I need time to look into this I don't want another legal battle with anybody um but are we doing the best thing for the city you know time money again what are our priorities we haven't even had time to sit with a city manager to prioritize things for the city and even discuss a strategic plan with the residents of the city um and now we're making all these quick harsh decisions um with no plan of action I would caution us as well I believe there was a plan which would be to have the city manager try to recruit somebody or get somebody else so there is a plan may I ask commissioner riski a question to make it easier res Nikki yeah thank you thank you um your concern about loss suits what what's your concern about lawsuits as it re relates to this particular matter I'm not sure I mean I I haven't researched this I haven't asked anybody I don't really truly know all the concerns again do we need to re-evaluate the contract is there an evaluation process in place for our City attorney um that we revisit we said I mean I don't even know if there's goal it's an atwi contract so typically well I'm asking sorry I'm I'm asking about evaluations not about whether it's an atwi contract but do we even evaluate the contract like cost for a resident to come up here and give us cost I need time to verify it just because we're seeing this on our screen doesn't give it truth I mean some of the cities that are listed even from a presentation are not similar to St Pete Beach so again I caution us without knowing what it would cost who would we fine I mean it's you know again I would just caution the city on something like that any further comments from the Commissioners city clerk we have a motion on the floor if you'll please do a roll call commissioner R Nikki no commissioner mahand yes commissioner Marriott no commissioner Robinson yes mayor patrilla the question before me is [Music] whether we have the right representation to move us forward whether we have what the city needs whether we have What the residents need um whether we have confidence um my vote is yes motion carries three and two on further discussion on the same item I think it is important for us if the commission does not feel that we have the right representation as seems to indicate um I would say that we need to have a discussion whether or not we ask the City attorney to withdraw from all active lawsuits at this time pending a pending an interim City attorney appointed or a new full-time whether employed or contract I think if the commission does not have confidence then I think it'd be challenging to say we should leave the same person in place to continue the current lawsuits that we have and if you think we have two or three it's not it's 18 19 it's a lot of them and so I'm not saying this because it's going to be fun or it's going to be easy and so one of the things that I'm going to ask the City attorney to do is to provide us a summary by the end of the week of all active lawsuits where we are and who else is involved in the lawsuits representing the city what other attorneys are working on behalf of the Cities so that the commission can review whether those attorneys as well represent the direction that this commission wants to go in mayor mayia certainly great um couple of things um whichever attorney you get next um understand that that attorney does not represent the citizens they the the the client is the city okay just understand understand that that is not that citizens are not not that we haven't been involved with citizens but our job is to represent the city secondly as um some of you may know my pattern of practice as well as um Matthew McConnell is prior to any commission meeting we have always contacted individually Commissioners just to ask them do you have any questions do you have any issues that are coming up uh so that we could be prepared for that talk to you Mr Mallen never mentioned this once no no let me finish no I want to respond no no let me finish has the floor if you'll I'm saying that what you're not going to get for me is a fight and you really aren't unless of course you defame me or you do something outside of boundaries which you haven't and I appreciate that but I think it would have been courteous to at least tell me where your head was so that I could at least be prepared not to put up a fight because frankly like I've fired clients before and clients have fired me before this is business I don't look at it like that this is not personal for me it's although it is personal because I love the city and I care about it quite a bit it's why I've been here 10 years but I just want to make it clear that you know to kind of sabotage me at at a at a meeting like this and not be prepared to um at least have given you my perspective on things and you be able to privately give me your perspective on things and I do appreciate you um taking the the mayor's um caution that there really is no need to to uh to hang out any opinions about me personally because I as I said I won't I mean there's a limit to what I will take but frankly it's if if you all have if the majority of you clearly have lost confidence in uh our law firm and that's perfectly natural between attorneys and lawyers you said it yourself vice mayor um it's unfortunate this has to be done in public because you've probably hired and fired lawyers before and uh you know it's business so you're not going to get that kind of um uh problem for me at all whatsoever I mean it's just business um um I I I can certainly you know start I we have a list of all the cases I know I didn't start them I didn't file them um but I would be more than happy to put together an exit strategy for you um the manager can go forward and she could also probably confirm who I represent and who I don't represent but I will be happy to bring whatever documentation is needed I don't really need to defend myself to the information that was provided to you by the public that's just neither here nor there it's not worth me spending time on it uh but again I want to assure you all that you know my ethical obligation as a Florida bar attorney is to make sure that you get legal representation um as I go out the door um you're fortunately most of the I think most of the cases are um has an attorney assigned defense counsel through your insurance company so at least you know us exiting won't leave it in a situation where another attorney has to quickly come up to speed there will be another attorney there so you're in good position you're in good position there good shape there um uh it's really just some don't don't worry I'll transition out without any you know this is all not personal to me okay commissioner mahen uh yes just to respond um as I said in the opening of this particular discussion item this is not would not be my typical mode of operation uh it certainly was not comfortable for me not to disclose this to the city manager when I spoke to him yesterday it was yesterday I believe right uh that's not that's not really my style I'm a pretty straightup guy but I just did not see it in the best interest of the city to have that conversation um and while it personally doesn't bring me joy to have this conversation and to have not had the discussion with you and particularly Matthew because I have a working relationship I have worked I don't want to say extensively but I've worked a lot with m Matthew I don't feel great about it I don't feel great about any of that but I do feel that the recommendation that I made needed to be made and it didn't happen as well as I would have liked to have but it needed to happen so okay here we are again I don't want you to be in an uncomfortable situation it is a difficult situation for a lawyer to represent clients who don't have confidence in them so it's probably best that you do get a lawyer that you have confidence in and so I wish you the best of luck in that thank you for being gracious okay and if we may come back to the two items I brought up uh the first um requesting of the City attorney to provide this a list with um by the end of the week just so that the commission is up to speed since we have two new Commissioners um make sure that we all know exactly what lawsuits are currently the city is engaged in um and then the second question is again my recommendation is that if the commission has lost faith that we have also at this time ask that the City attorney withdraw from all active litigation so how would that look as it related to uh advisement during commission meetings and the like are you just talking specifically to lawsuits talking specifically AC of lawsuits so the way the way that that works is that we file um a notification with the court that we're withdrawing that's it um that's what we would file and then who would you know the the lawyers that are under contract for these various lawsuits from the insurance company or various other who who do they then communicate with at the city if not you um I would imagine they would communicate with the city manager and I also would need to work pretty expeditiously to try to find an interim solution because I think the commission would want to go through a process for a selection of your permanent solution y okay so I would like some instruction we do need to provide I would like that instruction we do need to provide um instruction to the City attorney so do we have have consensus I mean I'm not in favor of any of this I think this is ridiculous I think we're putting the city in a terrible position and now we're going to put the city in a position of our contract lawyers having to communicate with our city manager who is brand new who has now seven crises that are the most important thing to deal with on her plate and I see this as being an unmitigated disaster so I have no idea what the correct inst instructions to the City attorney might be okay I have made a proposal I'm assuming you are against it mayor just so you know like I I Will Not only am I will I withdraw but I'll I'll ensure that defense Council and anybody else has francis's contact information so uh again it's it's my it's my ethical obligation to make sure that there's a a transfer of those cases so I'm not I'm not planning on leaving the city in a in a in a jam I mean so I want to make that very clear I mean I will I do want some instructions that you you're instructing me to withdraw from these cases and we will do that but I I also want to assure you that you know ethically as a Florida bar attorney I will make sure that those attorneys all know how to contact your city manager and vice versa I will will make sure she has all that information I think too um what I understand is we have 90 days to transition on all other legal matters I just want to be clear on that direction and hear from the city attorney that he's willing to or where are let let's ask that question yeah no the the contract is what it is I said uh in our contract we um I think obviously vice mayor has seen it it's a termination clause and it does say that we're more than willing to um stay on during the process I think it's 90 days which should be plenty of time for you to find someone um and and that's that's Our obligation I mean we're not going to walk out and be angry about any of this I mean our job is to make sure that the next Attorney that comes in is ready to represent you all to the best of his or her ability so I mean if it ends up being 30 and you find someone that's great find I mean I think obviously you need someone that you have faith in and you can talk to um but yeah we we it's up to 90 days you know I mean obviously we're going to have to keep submitting our invoices and and the work that we do we need do need to be compensated for um so I want to make sure everyone understands that um the the instructions that you gave me earlier with regard to moratorium and to customary use I would think that you don't want me to spend money on that um because it's uh you know from an attorney you don't have confidence in so I will I will I will not pursue those um but I will make sure that uh all of so just so you understand we not only have to manage the cases that are filed against the city but we also have what are called requests for legal services from all of the Departments um and there are quite a few of them and they come in we process them we get them back um so we do a lot more than just attending meetings in fact the meetings part is the least of what we do um it's important but it's the least of what we do but I will also make sure that the manager has a list of all the um the because we have a system in place with uh a form that each department fills out and they submit and it's it's it's all systematic and so I'll make sure just like we have the cases I'll make sure that the city manager has a list of all the requests for legal services that we have open still and that she's aware of them and you know well again you're not going to have a problem with the Dickman Law Firm at all I mean it's our ethical duty to make sure that that you all get the lawyer that you want want you feel you need and it's not personal trust me okay did this person happen to speak on this topic already yes but I think what his thought process is you kind of brought up a new discussion okay I that's my understanding is that correct and I will leave that to the Commissioners by consensus do you want to hear from one more resident on this new topic no we have a new card a new comment card from somebody who would like to speak on this new topic do we want to hear why we wouldn't want I mean it's not like it's 1 in the morning I don't know why we wouldn't want to listen to him I say yes due process sure okay please state your name and address for the record PJ Lawson 547 Leilani drive just to set folks mind at ease and having only been an observer in these sorts of proceedings not certainly a lawyer but it seems that the City attorney in withdrawing from the act of litigation could also request the court stay the litigation until the city has you know hired councel and just put things on pause we see this happen all the time stuff gets stayed because of things happening so I just throw that out there is something that seems like the cities generally in front of the courts get a ton of leeway and if the city doesn't have a City attorney representing them it would make sense to Simply ask that it be stayed until a suitable interim or replacement is found thank you mayor just so you know that you have um I'm almost certain that all of the cases have a defense Council paid by Insurance in one way or the other on those cases I feel like it's you know if I do see a case where I feel like it's necessary to have a stay I um yeah but I don't I kind of feel like that's not really my you know my decision to do that you know I think that would be um the city manager and defense Council should have a conversation about that on a Case by case basis because each case is different they're they're all very different thank you so again the decision before us right we do need to make a decision we cannot leave this in limbo is whether or not we ask the City Attorney at this time to withdraw from all legal from all lawsuits and if he withdraws he uh we are still represented by in the second chair or the first chair unless I'm mistaking and in insurance company when the CD receives a lawsuit the insurance company assigns an attorney and then the City attorney generally works with them so we would have somebody that's still assigned to that case mayor if if we already said that the attorne each case is obviously different we we have different defense attorneys for for each case if we already mentioned that those attorneys are going to be communicating with the city attorney then what's the request for withdrawal and you know if we already said that that's what the communication process would be and plus we've asked earlier for a list of all outstanding lawsuits um maybe add you know a column to that list telling us who who that attorney is um and then that therefore we could make a better decision because maybe we already have an attorney for those cases sure so we have an attorney for all those cases unless the City attorney can think of a situation where we the city received a lawsuit and we the insurance company did not assign somebody I don't see how that happens so the question isn't whether the question is simply in at this time as we have voted to terminate the existing contract looking for either an interim or a permanent position to fill whether we you know my recommendation is that if the city does not have 100% Faith which to me terminating a contract seems to indicate the opposite that it be best for both the city and for the attorney himself to be removed from that situation where he has to deal with those active lawsuits if the commission does not want to go that direction this is why we're looking for consensus so that we can provide a City attorney with very clear instructions if I'm the only one that thinks so please say so now and we can move on this conversation right if there is a consensus that that's what we want to do then we will provide instruction to the attorney to that effect if not then not but we need to make do need to make a decision yeah and if it's going to help you I mean we we do need to get out of those cases um and you know it really is up to the judge to issue those orders um and I will say a stay frequently is a litigation strategy like the cases against sarata and Tradewinds they've been seeking a stay so for me to file asked for a stay because of that I think it's a litigation strategy that should not be on my plate and so I mean we will we we we would like to withdraw from the these cases as quickly as possible because we're going to want to we have a lot of other work that we would have to wrap up um with the administration as well as making making sure that we have all of our files ready to um transfer over to whomever you select so I actually I'm almost requesting that you give me instruct I don't want to file those withdrawals without you all telling me we want you to file those let's make this easy I will make a motion that the commission instruct the City attorney to withdraw from all Act of litigation is there a second I a second any further discussion city clerk if you'll please do a roll call commissioner mahand yes commissioner Marriott yes commissioner Robinson yes commissioner res Niki mayor patella yes motion carries thank you thank you I appreciate it next we have item 6E commissioner Robinson is that the TRC the other one sorry um yes uh discussion on uh technical Review Committee uh the meetings um to have those streamed live and I think 6E is the lobbyist registration yeah oh sorry um yes so lobbyist registration um I just wanted to uh I worked with Amber she was gracious enough uh to go ahead and get the lobbyist information the registration on uh the website so so any Resident can go on the website and look to see who's talking to your Commissioners who's talking to everybody here you can also look to see what employees and who they're talking to so that is all on there and for transparency purposes and it will hold some employees feet to the P to actually fill out the form because they haven't been in the past um that I have seen some of them from previous meetings um and uh I wanted to bring up the fact this is goes back to the attorney so on the lobbyist form though on the registration there is a generic and a specific that's supposed to be listed as to what they're lobbying for or against um I don't see any specific on there and it's the instructions specifically legally request that so how do we make that happen and it and it says in there if you want me to I can read verbatim on it um but it does say that uh if there's additional uh issues that they can attach pages so I I believe that needs to be listed specifics of what they're lobbying for okay so they work the lobby the lobbyist registration um which I agree with you is a is an important um feature that was adopted um it is organized and managed through the clerk's office and I think that that would just be really a form change or somehow highlighting that's I don't know that that's a form that we created but um well somebody has to be able to say whether this I don't know if it's necessarily like Clerk's job from a legal I don't review so just so you know I don't review lobbyist registrations okay I don't review every single one of them I mean that would not be a prudent use of my time um but I think you just if if that's what what you want is specificity more specificity I think that you know I think I'm here the clerk's here the manager here we hear that and it needs if it's if that's what the ordinance says then that's what needs to be put down it if I may clarify or ask for clarification are you saying that the forms aren't being filled out correctly is that the issue correct they are not being filled out correctly great that that we can solve easily y city clerk would you be opposed to just what what's your suggestion on this I think if they should be filled out in in totality right there should I've commented to you mayor before just like on our 101's how this ordinance has been very difficult for me I'm not and I'm not I'll be frank I'm not well educated in what lobbyists are or what I mean I I get the general concept I'm I'm not a complete dumb dumb but I don't it's hard for me I guess is what I'm trying to say and that's what I explained to commissioner Robinson and I don't know exactly what I should be looking for when we adopted this ordinance I worked in conjunction with the city manager at the time and the City attorney to develop this registration and kind of you know get it out that this was new when I came on there well there was none it was in 2022 that we adopted this so based on review of other municipalities that do this talking to other Clerk even in pelis county that do this that's how I developed this registration form and then the form that you all fill out as well we do identify on the form to please list the name and business address of each principal and then the general area and then the specific area and the position if I'm hearing from the consensus of you all you want that to be filled in and required then I can look at it and make sure those boxes are filled in I don't know I just I guess I just didn't understand if it was a requirement to have the specific like the general yeah they should definitely have a general think the issue is if i' if I understand correctly and I've seen this just recently is the request is for the person registering right to fill out the form and they will say John Smith and I'm representing you know Bob Johnson but we don't know who Bob Johnson is Bob Johnson might be the owner of XYZ property or hotel or commercial per or whatever else I think what the commissioner is asking for please correct me if I'm wrong I'm not trying to read your mind here no no I'm is because I have received Lobby registrations form and even after reading it I did not understand who they were representing and what the purpose of the representation was sometimes it's just general as what are you representing a see my favorite one development just one word answers no ideas to what development means in this context what they're looking to develop are they looking to do a parking lot are they looking to do a Condo building or what so I think maybe we can look at that form and just provide better instructions and say look can you please be specific who is your client right and if your client is Bob Smith does he represent a larger entity and what exactly is it that they want to do that would help certainly would help me understand when I when these individuals approach us you know what they might want to speak to us about does that get to the yes it's just it goes back to the general and specific areas of legislative interest that is accompanied with this form and it says on here that the regist shall provide a response for both the general and specific specific area of Interest as required by city code they are required to disclose uh with sufficient specifity to permit a reasonable individual to clearly associate a lobbyist activities to an issue disclosed on the lobbyist registration form if they're representing a client on multiple issues each issue must be disclosed separately and the general and specific nature of each issue must be disclosed in a manner to permit clear identification of each issue separate and apart from other issues there's also a position and they also have to list their position problem I'm having is I have people uh um lobbyist listing stuff like the general is Land Development and the specific is Land Development and the position on the area of interest is the developer that's not anything that you can tell what's going on what they're asking for what they're wanting what their approval what their displeasure as anything it's just not clear enough and there's a slew of them and I guess the only way is just start rejecting them if if they're not filled out and they can't put it on there then they I would think they would need to be rejected until they can fill them out to be appropiately as it says a uh reasonable individual can can clearly associate what they're doing and I can't really on that and and other ones are you don't know what property they're representing or what who that person is so just for transparency purposes and the yeah I think the form is fine it's just we don't have people following the or lobbyists following the commissioner since this is this is your initiative would you be opposed to going through the lobbies registrations pulling out the ones you feel are insufficiently filled out and then sending those back to the city clerk and say can we please get additional information on this because I don't I don't want to give Amber just we don't like any you know but at least this one we can provide some Direction yes I'd be happy to do that I work with you on that that commissioner is that are you agreement with those those instructions I think that would give the city clerk something specific to address rather than just the generality but going forward we should probably have more than a one-word answer all right any further questions or comments or discussion on this item next we have item 6f commissioner Robinson TRC I'm just bringing that back up again that the TRC meetings need to be streamed live and taped for transparency purposes for the residents so they know what's going on in the community who's again going up and and what they're asking for and and how it's all laying out um if it's stream live and people have an opportunity to watch they're not in there making comments they're just watching they have an opportunity listen and and and hear what's going on firsthand I I are they not I think I'm I've watched them so have I they're not live streamed no we record but they're recorded right yes they are recorded and I post them to the city's website after the fact because it's not conducted through our same system like I'm using this evening so it's a manual process we use teams and and it's fine um I can't I can't tell you about live stream or not live stream that would an IT and a city manager discussion I can tell you that we're we are using teams and I do upload it within I try very hard to get it up within the next 24 hours so since it's already recorded right which I think you're if you're point is transparency making sure that the public has access to view those meetings are you satisfied with them being recorded because again the com the public doesn't get to make comments right so whether I think it just been undue burden on it to figure out one more thing that they need to live stream and make sure it stays up and then it goes down for two seconds and then we've got a few emails that say your live stream went down rather than just when it is ready you know within a reasonable long time one or two business days to get it up is that yeah that'll be fine okay thank you so we can keep doing what we're doing if the commission is in agreement with that then okay all right uh lastly we have staff reports city clerk based on discussion tonight and then we had a discussion I don't know I think it was like back in June about having a joint meeting with historic preservation board and um member Lowry wanted to wait until I don't remember what the topic that was supposed to be on that mayor do you I I just don't remember I have been trying to figure it out all day but irregardless it was the it was the oh thank you it was more it was more than just the overlay it was that the historic um they wanted to have some input in um architectural design an architectural design and and to be able to have some kind of um let's let's talk to to uh Lowry to Mr Lowry anyway can we can schedule that yes so what I'm what I understood then is to do that and then joint PB planning board and Beach stewardship all after 4M and all in the month of September is it premature though now to Jo to schedule those joint meetings with Beach stewardship and the planning board because we're not going to have the advance work done by a City attorney which we won't have working on those things to schedule those meetings so we should probably put those off I would think I would think that we can well the the planners will be here at the next commission meeting at the 9th we can ask their attorney at that time to give us a presentation on what their thoughts are for a pause on planning or moratorium I agree with the you know Beach um customary use maybe we put that on hold for the time being um the historic preservation board that is a that's a board issue it's not an ordinance or anything else like that so we can still have that conversation and then after the meeting on the 9th we can then decide what we want to do with the planning board if anything is that okay so so keep the historic board correct because they have well they're looking they're looking for a they're looking from input from the commission on some of the requests that they're making okay so if I if I may mayor real quick because I've been sitting with the historic preservation board right now they have a joint meeting with the planning board on September 5th then the idea was to have a joint meeting with you right after so I don't know if we really need to schedule one yet um but it's about the overlay it's about expanding the historic district it's about everything that Cher Lowry has mentioned to you before I just do the Dole whole thing and get some dates maybe I I just don't know if the planning board is going to want another one right before they go straight to Commission because the whole point is there's a a whole Land Development code regulation change for the overlay that has to be reviewed by the LPA which is your planning board so the idea was to go to them first there's going to be a meeting right after the historic preservation board to make any modified changes and then at that point I mean I just wanted to clarify that we're already kind of in that process of setting up a joint meeting um so if you want to go ahead and send out a joint uh doodle poll I just hopefully that helps wait to do that on the 6th after I hear I watch the you know and the commission meeting on the 9th so we'll be able to make that okay that's all I have okay city manager sorry no report tonight thank you City attorney yeah I have a couple of things it may take about an hour or two just come on you guys lighting up it's okay I have a motion to the meeting P 10 p.m. I just want to wish uh commissioner Robinson and uh vice mayor mahalan all the best with your leadership it's been a pleasure um uh commissioner Marriott commissioner RZ Nikki it's been lovely getting to know you and mayor patrilla it's been a pleasure working under you so all the best of luck to you thank you sir District 4 uh first excuse me first I want to thank all the residents who encouraged me to run for the commission to get off the couch and do it and I especially want to thank my partner Maria who for her support and encouragement and while I'm giving out thanks I want to thank the city manager Jennifer and Kristen for finally getting the pucks removed uh at pass of Grill I know a lot of the residents are very happy about that that uh long overdue so thank you um and then uh last two things I'll be having a community meeting at 6m at the Warren Webster building on Thursday September 5th assuming we don't have a special meeting uh and then we'll be having a town hall uh with the city uh manager and others from the city uh at the Warren Webster building at 5:30 p.m. on 18 September thank you that's all I have thank you sir District three thank you mayor um just a couple of updates um what's going on in District 3 or or myself I I did attend the Florida League of cities uh conference uh the city manager and and the mayor were there in attendance as well very informative a lot of networking with other cities um a lot of collaboration is going on so it's very eye openening to see all the cities working together and and um sharing ideas um I wanted to put a good shout out to the Doom savers on August 24th at upam beach I think it was like 1,200 plants I'm staring at Lisa cuz 1,500 1500 plants and I wanted to thank um keep panella's beautiful and and your leadership too in St Pete Beach ambassadors Turtle trackers panella's chapter of the Native um Plant Society and all the volunteers um we were um there from 7:30 and we were supposed to be there till 10:30 planting but there were so many people there I think it was done in an hour and a half and I think it's I'm giving it more time um and then at the end we had our St Pete Beach Fire Department show up to bucket some water on our plants so I I was expecting the the engine to show up and hose it down but we got buckets so but it was great and anybody who hasn't been out there uh would see the wonderful job that that was done um um it it was very well organized and very uplifting so I appreciated that from everybody um and just to put out a little um update for different neighborhoods in the district um just to Bo let boasa know that I have um spoken with a couple of residents about traffic calming um and as well as with the the flex valves on the um East End of basa aisle that that's still flooding so any Resident out there that wants to reach out to me please reach out to me because we are talking with a group and I've brought this to the city manager as well um and hopefully that we'll have a plan and action for that same for Leo um I've had residents before in the past talked to me about traffic calming and parking um and I know we've talked um or at least I spoke with the the city manager before maybe we said it at a commission meeting I don't remember quite yet about having um some of those traffic um U I don't want to call it traffic study I think it's it's more of a parking study right something of that nature Transportation um and Bel Vista too I've I've already spoken with the city too about um the 44th um drainage issue um especially that I saw that after um tropical storm then hence hurricane um Debbie um so hopefully that we'll be working on and obviously we had a consent agenda uh for um belvista East go through so and then for the danar neighborhood um there was a meeting about a week and a half ago maybe two weeks now with fdot about the Bayway and the flooding issues at the homes along that area as well as further in into the Donar um we're experiencing um and still continued work on the flex Valves and the El Centro uh repaving so please feel free to reach you know out to me my number is listed but it is 727 334 3838 it is on the website and um I've always asked for the associations to let me know I know there's not that many and I did or will be getting a list of Association presidents outside of their neighborhoods but more so the condominiums that are out there um to hopefully meet with them as well so thank you thank you commissioner District Two um like to give a shout out to all the residents who showed up for the election and for their overwhelming support I greatly appreciate it and I look forward and I'm honored and um feel privilege to represent you and give you a voice um in the community and um I look forward to that I'm setting up uh meetings over at the library and that'll be um on the website soon um as well as my phone number I'm just I was little behind on getting all that info to to Amber um since it wasn't really quote unquote official until Friday but thank you everybody really greatly appreciate it thank you commissioner District One um so no real report from my district um I would like to thank the City attorney for his years of service I think it was just last week that we gave them a plaque for being here for 10 years um as a as a resident before I was on the commission um and as a business owner coming before the commission there were certainly times when I did not like what the City attorney had to say but it never I never doubted that he was doing his best to represent the city actually I'll go back on that I I'll say I did doubt it a little bit because after I was on the commission I actually called around to some other attorneys uh who are in this same sort of practice and said hey do we have a good City attorney because trust but verify right and uh um and they overwhelmingly said yeah you've got a pretty darn good City attorney and uh I'm sorry to see him go and I hope that we can find a suitable replacement I hope that we can find somebody who's willing to take on the chaos that we have created and I want to make it very clear to everybody who's listening that what I saw here tonight was individuals who are involved in litigation against the city coming up with a fantastic plan to make their positions Stronger by getting rid of our City attorney and continuing to create some chaos and I apologize to all of the residents in District 1 that we will probably have some delays in getting anything really accomplished and that's all I've got tonight thank you [Music] commissioner I'm sorry I don't I don't mean to drag this out um I wanted to um I've got Labor Day coming up I'm sorry that's a little anticlimactic Now isn't it um and um if if I may and I I apologize for putting you on the spot but if I may nominate an employee of the month um the city manager is instrumental in making sure that we have we had a dry run this past week with the sheriff um in anticipation of Labor Day we've had you know years of chaos on the beach particular hotpots you're all familiar with um I've sat in the meetings with the sheriff um she has taken on that that very tough Challenge and I can tell you from from this side and from the residents uh it's very much appreciated when I get a a call on 4:00 on a Saturday from the city manager and asking me about ordinances on the beach and I'm like where are you it's like I'm on the beach walking the beach checking out this stuff it's like I just want to say I appreciate that very much and I apologize for putting in the spot um but you know I do appreciate that and I'm also looking forward to you know as a former commissioner who always used to say what is the point of having ordinances when we don't you know when we don't observe them when we don't enforce them we don't really need more things on the books you know we have a lot of great things in in this town um in the city that are on the books that are designed to make life good for the people that live here and I think it is prudent of us to make sure that we monitor those things that we can keep an eye on them to make sure that we do enforce the city ordinances so that we do have a nice you know familyfriendly environment where we can all enjoy our lives here in the city um so I appreciate any effort from from our city manager from your staff from the sheriff's department uh to assist us in that and I I see it as a first step um in in improving that especially like I I don't I've been on vacation in places where it's just chaos and it's not fun to be there and while we may have our tension between the residents and the visitors you know I would prefer that people that come here say wow what a great place place to be here it's a nice clean Beach what a nice fun familyfriendly environment it is right and so I appreciate any steps that we take in that direction um so I just wanted to say my thanks for that um we've got a lot of things coming up in the next uh in the next couple commission meetings um the budget being one of those big fires that needs to be dealt with right so we've got that in the next uh two commission meetings so look forward to that if you'll please note that the schedule for for those commission meetings has changed from the way from our normal schedule which is you know the 2 and fourth Tuesday of the month um that has changed so please be aware of those changes and for those of you who you know love to stop by the library they say hi during the mayor's open Office hours please also check the library schedule because that schedule has changed as well with that thank you everyone for coming we are adjourned e