morning morning and welcome to the city of St Pete Beach special magistrate code enforcement meeting for February 10th 2025 my name is Erica aello and I am an attorney licensed to practice law in the State of Florida by the Florida bar I have been appointed by the city of St Pete Beach to serve as the special magistrate for code enforcement hearings I am not an employee of the city of St Pete Beach but I am an independent attorney I do not confer with the city's Code Enforcement Officers outside of the hearing process about your cases your hearing will be conducted in accordance
with the Florida law in the code of ordinances of the city of St Pete Beach the burden of proof is on the city to prove its case and you have a right to respond to the city's case in these types of proceedings the formal Rules of Evidence do not apply to the cases on today's docket everyone will have an opportunity to testify and present any evidence including photographs and Records anyone who is testifying today will be required to testify under oath I reserve the right to decide if anything to which you are testifying or any evidence you are presenting is beyond the scope of the relevance your case my
goal is to make sure that I conduct a fair hearing during which everyone is given a chance to present everything you think I need to hear to decide the case today at the end of the case I will most likely announce my decision today and a written decision will follow and will be mailed or emailed to you provided that we have your information um on the sign-in sheet please understand that I do not have the authority to Grant variances or give you permission to do something that the code of ordinances does not allow you to do I will try to be clear and concise in making my decision if something about my decision
is confusing or unclear please ask me to clarify my decision if I find that you have violated the code of ordinances I will most likely order you bring the property into full compliance within a specific number of days I also have the legal authority to impose a fine and administrative cost incurred by the city in filing the case if you fa fail to pay the fine by the deadline the city will most likely file lean against your property which will Cloud title to your property and may jeopardize your ability to sell the property or pledge it to secure a loan on the property and some
cases the city has the option of foreclosing on the lean to get title to your property just like the bank or lender when I call your case please come to the podium and identify yourself let me know whether you are the owner or how what your affiliation with the property owner is I will then ask the city code enforcement officer to present the case um then you may respond to the case um and you may ask questions of the code enforcement officer at the conclusion of the hearing I will announce my decision please understand that the goal of these hearings is not to punish you
but to to get compliance if the city is isn't correct in its assessment of your property the hearing is being video recorded so you will need to speak into the microphone I will now ask everyone who is testifying today to please stand and raise your right hand to be sworn in do you swear from that the testimony you're about to give is the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth so SW okay are there any changes to the agenda this morning I I so good morning um Madame
special magistrate there is a change to the agenda case number 2024 0494 which is 5A under new cases is continued is that being continued to date certain 3:10 March 10th at 10: a.m. March 10 at 10
okay and are there any other changes to the agenda this morning no ma'am okay then I will go ahead and call the first case case number 202 4157 city of St Pete Beach versus 1008 Airport Road LLC morning special magistrate bear with me for my voice the Eagles just won the Super Bowl yesterday so it's a little rough so bear with me please um this is case number 2024 0157 um this is a status hearing on a two-e extension to secure the dumpster
enclosure permit um the city um is just going to be asking for um and is agreeable to um giving an additional 30 days um to fully secure the permit um he did um the contractor did get the um fire final um that's done um put in for another review it got denied but they're working towards compliance so we're agreeable to a 30-day extension okay and is there anyone here on behalf of8 Airport Road LLC if you could come and state your name for the record for
me Jonathan Finch and Mr Finch are you amendable to the 30-day extension on this to work through the proning process um yeah actually I was going to I was going to ask you guys and just see what you see what you guys thought about it um we have another permit in because we're kind of working in our building with fold up chairs and tables waiting for um a permit to go through so we can you know do like everyone else and and get the building back up to where it was
for mhm but to do that we're going to need a um I guess the the cheapest and easiest way is we're going to need to get trailers for the all the stuff that we have inside the building once the permit gets approved that's going to take up parking space on the on the side of the building when where I'm trying to get the permit also for the enclosures enclosure so um I don't know to be honest with with the permits and everything whether or not I'm I'm going
be in here again in in 30 days going hey well actually before that going I I don't know where those trailers are going to go the best place is right there I don't know how long it's going to take but they're kind of in a conflict now so if the permit goes through um it is it would be actually better if it was two months from now three months from now when I actually start to do that work on the enclosure because I'm going to have um temporary office space
AC and another trailer possibly two or three trailers in the parking lot in order to house all the lenen all the furniture everything and then so they can work inside the building to actually get that done so I'm not sure what to do in this situation because I do anticipate a some sort of conflict with it um Mr Cruz do you know my order said to secure the permit correct but not to complete the project that permit and then you make sure you just keep in touch because you're allowed to once it's open up you
have some time before your contractor has to go okay all right so secure and I'm not going to be in going hey you made any any movement on actually doing the enclosure right that might be a SE that sounds like it might be a separate issue altogether you might have you know with a permit you might have 180 days and then you can work with the city on if you even need more time than that but so for this for the purposes of this it was just to secure the permit so is this 30 days seem sufficient to secure the permit for you yeah I don't see any any issue with that okay so then um I will
go ahead and G Grant an additional 30-day extension since today is February 10th the 30 days is going to put us after the March hearing into the April hearing um so we will come back if needed um at the April hearing uh for status check if we don't need to because it's been complied then then that won't be necessary okay and of course I will get you a written order to that effect all right thank you Mr VCH okay moving on to case number 20 2
4633 city of St Pete Beach versus Nancy Gibbs Roy and Janet Gibbs Skelly Hayden uh thank you special magistrate Lewis Cruz representing the city of St P Beach code enforcement this is a status hearing on a 14-day extension to remove the broken fence debris and come into compliance overhead please uh the property has been cleaned up they are in compliance the city um will not be asking for any fines or admin cost okay so no fines no admin cost but
the property is now in compliance yes ma'am okay anyone here on behalf of Miss Roy or Miss Hayden okay seeing no one um then the property is now in compliance there will be no fees and no fines assessed with that case number 202 oh and Mr Cruz did you want just an order finding that the property is now in compliance on that okay yes please case number 202 4663 city of St Pete Beach versus Family International Home Builders LLC Mr Cruz thank you special Magistrate Louis Cruz
representing the city of St Pete Beach code enforcement this is a status hearing on a 14-day extension to clean or remove the debris from the property and bring the property into compliance um the property is not compliant um so the city will be asking for a previous recommended fine of $250 per day from 1224 2024 until compliant plus $329 for administrative Cost Plus any recording fees associated with this case if they are not to come in within that 20-day
time frame okay does anyone here on behalf of Family International Home Builders LLC anyone here on behalf of Family International Home Builders LLC and have you had any contact with the property owner at all tried to reach out multiple times um there was a previous case um that my cooworker had that the owner of that property that he was dealing with that he was the part owner or again there's all these part owner owners there's this weird dynamic they have going on but I've tried Reach Out
multiple times in different ways and have not received any communication and just for the record I have my orders that I've sent out to this particular property owner before to the addresses located in the tax collector and on the property appraisers website have come back as undeliverable or otherwise rejected yes so okay okay um then at this point I will go ahead and um and the property has been posted is that correct okay I will'll go ahead and Grant the um fines for find that the property Still Remains in violation as
of the date of the hearing uh I will issue a $250 a day uh fine starting on December 24th 2024 running until the property comes in compliance as well as the $329 in reasonable administrative cost of the city and any amount any reasonable amount for recording fees for a lean should it be required um and it is the property owner's responsibility to let the city know when the property comes into compliance thank you okay moving on to case number 202 4668 city of St Pete
Beach versus transform LLC thank you special magistrate Louis Cruz representing the city of St Pete Beach code enforcement this is a status here we on a 14-day extension to clean to clean and remove the debris from the property and bring the property into compliance overhead please thank you there one and the other side so the property is clean and compliant the city will not
be asking for any fines or any admin cost okay anyone here on behalf of transform LLC thank you okay I will find that the property is now in compliance and I will not be assessing any fines or any administrative costs of the city thank you moving on to agenda item 5A uh which was continued to the March 10th so moving on to agend item 8A lean reductions case number 202 4430 city of St P Beach versus Christopher
Christopher and Briana [Music] Smith good morning special magistrate Pete derer code enforcement manager for the city of St Pete Beach the request before you
for a lean reduction go to the overhead please the respondent has requested that [Music] the oh amount uh to be reduced is to 11,000 plus $325 admin fees the city would like to deny the
reduction request since there is zero tolerance for short-term rental and so the fines are 22,000 which is the lean plus the administrative cost of $325 okay thank you thank you Mr derer anyone here on behalf of the property owners good morning good morning my name is Jeff pip I represent Mr
Smith um yeah we're here again on a lean reduction request this time I believe last time we were here I had indicated um you know Mr Smith is willing to make a payment to try to satisfy this um he did only make 9,868 197 from those rentals um at the moment his home has been heavily impacted by the storms and the hurricane he's not currently living in that home any longer trying to use all available resources that he has at the moment to get that home back into livable
condition and possibly find a new place you he's not asking that the fine be completely removed he is willing to put forth uh $111,000 plus the $325 uh administrative fees um that would be half of the original amount plus the administrative costs you know given his current living situation the amount of money that he made off the rentals being less than 10,000 and the fact that he's never had any previous code issues um we would believe that that may be fair um that taking the rental money that he made off of those properties reimbursing the city for
their costs is still a deterrent in our opinion um you know for him that's still a substantial amount of money at $111,000 um he's not currently indebted to the city for any reason at this moment as far as I'm aware he's paid his property taxes so we're asking the tribunal to take that into consideration and revisit the fine that was assessed and maybe work with him so that the impact can be more financially feasible okay and um as far as the payment if the lean reduction is granted um is there a specific time frame
usually we have my orders State 30 days to pay it and if it's not paid within the 30 days then it reverts back to the full fine amount is that acceptable yes your honor I I can uh pay that within 30 days in the time frame okay all right anything else that you'd like to add that's it all right anything else from the city on this one okay um I am based on the the credible evidence that was presented here at today's hearing I am going to be willing to Grant the um lean reduction um and reduce the lean from
22,000 to 11,000 um and with the $325 in administrative costs and I will get an order to um that dictates that perfect I appreciate that thank you okay anything else that we need to discuss today thank you this was an easy one um I did did want to mention I do have in addition to the 1,000 or in addition to the um the Jacob and
continuance I do believe the Baye shops we have I will get an order on that one as well for you Mr Cruz um I figured i' just do it in one fell soup and get them all out okay thank you all have a wonderful day we are adjourned