thank you all for coming The city of Stewart's very lucky that so many people care so much about what happens So [Music] [Applause] roll call please Madame clerk Mayor Rich here Vice Mayor Collins here
Commissioner Clark here Commissioner Gobi here And Commissioner Reed here Tonight's invocation will be provided by Pastor Jim Brochious of the Steuart Alliance Church And Pastor Brochious will you then lead us in the pledge of allegiance has he been able to make his
way yes Okay Sure Please stand Good evening Let's uh let's bow in prayer Father again thank you again for your grace and mercy that you give to each of us Again as we said already thank you for each one of these that are here because we care and uh for what
happens here Lord we know you care too And we're asking uh with thanks with thanksgiving with for these men and women and their service to our our city here and all those that uh assist them Lord give them wisdom and encouragement Give them uh direction just moment by
moment Lord may they work together to bring great good to our area Again I just pray for your encouragement and your blessing upon them and upon their families and upon our cities We pray this in Jesus' name Everybody says "Amen." Amen
I I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands one nation under God indivisible with liberty and justice for all
[Applause] Perhaps we should have had let the children lead us So our arts moment this evening will be provided by the children of the Gertrude Walden Child Care Center singing a song for us this four year olds The art moment of
the month of April from the VPK classes at Girt Walden Childc Care Center Most of you know the traditional ABCs but today we have a new version for you to enjoy Boys and girls are you ready
[Applause] 2 3 I'm excellent Fantastic G I'm gifted This has magic H I'm
You see my hand intelligent I am incredible [Applause] A unable original I
respectful I know I saw you walked I'm flying [Applause] I have the pleasure of working in the
East community for 42 [Music] years And Jane Parker yes her daughter was in my class I just let the city of story keep up and don't forget
music music is good singing good singing and music we don't want to be a part of that 45% that's not ready at third grade but we are working diligently now so they let me pull them
up Because we know behind you catch up So we work hard Amen Come on in the picture Come on in the picture Why don't you two ladies get on the
other side never mind She's good No no no Miss Miss doesn't have to be in the picture I'm good Oh thank you darling Thank you children Well that was exciting
Mr Bagot Mr Bagot will you please read tonight's first proclamation absolutely Public safety telecom communicators week April 13 through the 19th
20125 Whereas emergencies can occur at any time that require police fire or emergency medical services When an emergency occurs the prompt response of police officers firefighters and paramedics is critical to the protection
of life and preservation of property And whereas the safety of our police officers and firefighters is dependent upon the quality and accuracy of information obtained from citizens who telephone the city of Stewart's emergency communication center And
whereas public safety telecommunicators are the first and most critical contact our citizens have with emergency services public safety communicate telecommunicators are the single vital link for our police officers and firefighters by monitoring their
activities by radio providing them information and ensuring their safety And whereas public safety telecommunicators of the city of Stewart have contributed substantially to the apprehension of criminals suppression of fires and treatment of patients and
dispatcher has and each dispatcher has exhibited compassion understanding and professionalism during the performance of their job in the past year Now therefore I Campbell Rich mayor of the city of Stewart Florida do hereby proclaim the week of April 13 through
19th 2025 in the city of Stewart Florida as public safety telecommunicators week And accepting this proclamation in recognition of this week is the entire city of Stewart dispatch team Okay come on up
How many calls were in a year a year 40,000 Thank you Thank you [Applause] speech You have to ask me twice Let Bazia do it
Uh thank you everybody and thank you everybody for being here Um it is really important that we do recognize our telecommunicators They really are the first responders of this agency and often they are they are unsung heroes because they're never really in the spotlight and I really think it's
important we take this week to remember them and and honor them with all the recognition they deserve So thank you Thank you Mr Bagot will you please read the next proclamation sexual assault awareness month April 2025 Whereas sexual assault remains a
serious and pervasive issue that affects individuals of all ages genders races and backgrounds And whereas raising awareness about the prevailance of sexual assault and the need for prevention is essential to fostering a safer and more supportive society for
all And whereas sexual assault awareness month serves as an opportunity to educate communities about the impact of sexual violence as well as to empower survivors by providing resources support and encouragement for healing And
whereas it is crucial to continue advocating for policies and programs that prevent sexual assault support survivors and hold perpetrators accountable to ensure the safety and dignity of every individual Now therefore I Campbell Rich mayor of the
city of Steuart Florida do hereby proclaim April 2025 in the city of Stewart Florida as Sexual Assault Awareness Month And Accepting this proclamation in recognition of this month Marshall D's
on the board of director of the Inner Truth Project Would you like to say a few words first okay [Applause] On behalf of the Inner Truth Project its staff board of directors and most importantly our survivors we are honored
to receive this proclamation from the city of Stewart Founded 12 years ago by Mindy Federman the Inner Truth Project was established to serve individuals affected by the direct and indirect consequences of sexual violence and abuse Since our inception we have provided counseling and other services
to hundreds of survivors helping them embark on their journey to reclaim their power As a former law enforcement officer I have witnessed firsthand the devastating effects experienced by survivors and I am privileged to be part of such a transformative organization The recognition of the Inner Truth
Project's efforts through this proclamation brings muchneeded awareness to an an often unspoken and underreported issue So Mayor Rich Vice Mayor Collins commissioners thank you Thank you
[Applause] Thanks Mr The next proclamation please Child abuse prevention month April 2025 Whereas 3.1 million reports were made to child protective services child abuse
and neglect is a serious problem affecting every segment of our community our children are our most valuable resources and will shape the future And whereas child abuse can have long-term psychological emotional and physical effects that have lasting consequences
for victims of abuse effective child abuse prevention activities succeed because of the partnerships created between various organizations and families And whereas communities must make every effort to promote programs and activities that create strong and
thriving children and families healthy families and abusive an abuse prevention program of helping people succeed Serving approximately 400 families in Martin County is an evidence-based voluntary family support and coaching program proven to help parents provide
the safe and stable environments children need for healthy growth and development And whereas helping people succeed has been providing services to the community for over six decades we acknowledge that we must work together as a community to increase awareness
about child abuse Now therefore I Campbell Rich mayor of the city of Stewart do hereby proclaim April 2025 in the city of Stewart Florida as child abuse prevention [Applause]
month And accepting this proclamation in recognition of this month is I believe Cara Stimson Is Cara how you say her name carolyn Moses What carolyn Moses at helping people succeed Okay Uh the CEO
president of helping people succeed Would you like to make a few remarks yes Thank you so much Um good afternoon Is that better there you go Um Cara Simpson who is our CEO wasn't able to be here today So uh I'm Carolyn Moses I'm actually the program manager for our
healthy families program Uh we've been serving Martin County since 1999 and about 400 plus families a year in that time Um according to the most recent statistics we have uh in the state of Florida for uh child maltreatment uh the
rate per 10,000 children in Martin County for 23 2023 2024 um was 5.14 per thousand The state uh rate is 4.15 within our healthy families program which is serving families at greatest
risk uh during that same time period out of 682 children served and 138 children graduating there was only one child with verified findings So that's a 100% abuse rate for the graduates and 99 whatever
comes after that for children served So um we believe in this effort We know that generations of uh abuse can be broken Uh in a lot of cases it's just a matter of education um families you know when you know better you do better And that's basically what we're there for to
support families in their journey Um this being child abuse prevention month one of the things that um we're doing is um promoting our efforts by pinwheel gardens that you might see in various parts of the community Um Pinwheels for
Prevention is a national campaign that's meant to raise awareness of child abuse prevention efforts across the country and within the state of Florida So the whole reason for the pin wheel is it's more representative of happy healthy childhoods as opposed to focusing on children that have died as a result of
abuse So taking a more positive spin on that So we hope next year to have more pinw wheels throughout the community to make people aware of our efforts and we appreciate uh your support and thank you for this proclamation today Thank you Thank you [Applause]
Thank you Thanks And Mr Bagot tonight's last proclamation please stamp out hunger day May 10th 2025 Whereas every year on the second Saturday in May letter carriers across the country collect non-p perishable
food as part of the nation's largest one-day food drive distributing the donations to local food banks And whereas the letter carrier stamp out food hunger drive is just one example of how letter carriers work to make a difference in the lives of those that
they serve Since the pilot drive was held in 1991 more than a billion pounds of food have been collected And whereas food collected during the stamp out hunger food drive provides a critical supply
for House of Hope and partnering local agencies who strive to empower Martin County residents to overcome hunger and hardship collected food items supply the the four client choice pantry services in Martin
County in expanding nutrition initiatives designed to combat the rising levels of obesity related illnesses in lower inome households and whereas we would like to recognize all letter carriers for their hard work and their commitment to their communities
All food collected in our community stays in our community and we support letter carriers efforts to help those in need of in our community Now therefore I Campbell Rich mayor of the city of Stewart Florida do hereby proclaim May
10th 2025 in the city of Stewart Florida as Stampout Hunger Day [Applause] And in recognition of stamp out at hunger day I cannot think of a more appropriate individual than Rob Reer of
CEO CEO of House of Hope and and his dear Draair No Okay It's just Rob you're sufficient He just does if those of you who are not familiar with it he just does an amazing job there And Rob thank you for
Thank you Mr Mayor Thank you commissioners U so the proclamation really gave you a lot of the details Uh the National Association of Letter Carriers has been at this for 33 years now Uh we are the grateful and fortunate recipient in Martin County of their
efforts Um just on that one day we'll generate somewhere around 65 to 70,000 pounds of food for our mission Um that represents we uh last year we distributed about 1.2 million pounds of food about a half a million was fresh
produce So the the balance of that you know 600,000 and change on that one day we get about 10% of the food we need to complete the mission So it is a huge day for us Um across the community folks will get their yellow bags in the mail Uh we hope they'll take the time to put
some non-p perishable items in it and support us in our good work Uh we're reaching about 8,000 people right now direct with our services about another 18,000 each month through our food bank partners Uh and those numbers are going up uh as challenges continue to emerge
across the community Food keeps people healthy keeps people safe The dollars uh that they don't have to spend in a grocery store they can keep in their household budgets uh fill prescriptions um have reliable transportation all kinds of things it has a great ripple
effect So that day has a drastic impact on poverty and certainly um on the success of the households that we're serving We appreciate the acknowledgement Uh hopefully the community will come out big for us in that day We certainly could use the assistance and the support Lots of work
to be done and thank you to the city for recognizing it Okay didn't your food bank supply one of the largest percentages of fresh produce of food banks across the state of Florida yeah so we're over 40% fresh which is a
huge number Um and that's a big part of what we try to do is is fresh and healthy to really impact the health of the households But the non-p perishables can't be overlooked especially as we hit the summer months where hurricanes loom and you know kids are out of school so
they miss the free and reduced lunches Um you know uh seasonal unemployment all kinds of things So summer we spike and this is an important day Thank you Rob [Applause]
Okay was nice stand on that note for proclamations We have one service award this evening which is that kind of unusual and I don't believe he's here Drew Edwards Mr Edwards are you here not withstanding that we will recognize Drew Edwards for five years of
service with the fire department Thank you Mayor Yes I wanted to ask if we could I know we're not approving the agenda right this moment but for the legislative update I know at least for myself I'm
going to have want to have a pretty beefy discussion about that So I wanted to ask if we could move have that be after we talk about the sound ordinance Just the DND Yeah Also out of respect for everybody here because I want to be
able to talk and not have that pressure and make everybody miss dinner [Applause] Can we move it up anywhere we want in the agenda when we get to the agenda anywhere you want It's Mr Vice Mayor could we just if we could
have the comments by the city commissioner city manager and then do the D and D So you want to say Mr Hoggarth till the end is that what you're saying okay So if you wanted to move up the DND then to do the approval of the agenda and the
fir we'll make the first thing on the agenda the DND Fair enough Okay So we will Mr Hoggarth if you don't mind waiting Thank you Thank you We'll go to comments by city commissioners Commissioner Reid do you have any comments this evening
yeah I I had one for the city manager if there was an update on uh the Hamilton project so we can finally be done with that Uh I don't know if there there was any update or what are we waiting on the
Florida Commission the Florida Commerce was here last uh Wednesday I believe it was and a structural engineer was with them and um went through the house We haven't received the structured engineers report
When we do um we'll be addressing it Um I can go into detail Obviously we have a big room here but I'm happy to talk as much as you want but we can uh as it relates to the uh house the structural engineer is whatever he finds that's not
compliant with code will now come back to the city commission to see if you want to pay for the repairs Okay And then well we have to wait for that report Okay And I I did want to address the public Um I live across street from Terraforma and I know it's been brought
into it for the sound and the noise but it doesn't bother me and I live across the street from it So I just wanted to put that on So unless someone knows something that I don't know I'm curious what my fellow board members know cuz I can't speak to them outside of the meeting and I've
heard certain things from the public Um so I'm curious what'll happen Thank you [Applause] Uh Commissioner Joe do you have any comments as Yes I do Okay First I also want to address the noise ordinance which has created an enormous number of
erroneous rumors via social media news media and the not so friendly neighbor neighbor newsletter which is an opinion piece The opinion piece continues continues to border on lies instead of facts One statement in particular is that I personally went to the area in
question approximately 20 times regarding the noise created by a local business which was not Terraformata by the way This is a local business located in the middle of personal residences I wish I had the time to make that many visits to the company in question but I
do not The larger issue is how did Mr not so friendly neighbor know that I even entertained the idea of going to hear for myself the complaints of neighbors to this establishment since there were only a handful of individuals who knew of my intentions I could guess
that one or two of those individuals provided that information to Mr Not so friendly um or Mr Not so friendly has taken to following me which would constitute stalking Since I only went to the property twice that would mean that Mr
Not so friendly neighbor wrote an opinion piece based on false or was fed false information The second reference is in regards to terraformatada and its supporters Thank you for dressing in blue It's my favorite color I I did attempt to answer many of the
emails as possible Rumors have a way of taking on a life of their own and in this case it was tremendous focus on one establishment and the fears that the commissioner the commissioners would or myself would close down the venue change
the hours of the entertainment all of which were done in the attempt to rouse the troops The focus was of the sound ordinance in reference to it affects the city Stewart residence and certainly not focused on one music venue establishment The unintended consequences of course is
that all this media hype has caused others to look into um others to look into how we arrived at 80 dB today and other inconsistencies and how the ordinance appears to been applied to other establishments in the city who
also have outdoor music events One last thing which is a question to our city manager Um Costco is coming ready to do this particular development has caused a lot of controversy in our city and I don't know what it's called here and I apologize for not knowing the correct
terminology but normally before a an entity like this is allowed to even open there's like a CFO that is approved or whatever So I'd like to know that we will have all our tees crossed and our eyes dotted so that it doesn't come back to an embarrassment to this commission
and the city that something was missed and it was approved to open and it might have had to make some corrections before doing so Are you asking that or just staying there as a I mean yes they would have to have a certificate of occupancy before
opening Um I know that uh it's been inspected and the inspections have gone forward and built a code if that's the issue I know there's been some recent issues related to the location of a tree that was in the Florida Department of Transportation and that was corrected I
understand right of way But as far as I'm aware right now everything is in in order and will be before they open I believe the opening is scheduled for April 24th or 25th Yeah 24th Yeah This was in relation to a
light that was supposed to be approved Was a traffic light A traffic light which was not in the original plans which is why I'm asking That was on social media It says it wasn't in the original plans but commissioner uh was in there Okay It was in there I can't talk to the other commissioners So I
have no way except to ask you The only way that the only the what happened was for clarification Costco originally approached the owner of that property and needed to locate some equipment for
the light to function and offered to pay the property owner something over $100,000 for the like 6x6 piece of property that the equipment was going to be on But they said they would place the money in
escrow and they weren't going to need to purchase it if in fact the appeal that was pending did not go forward So they didn't want to buy it if they didn't need to put the light in The property owner declined and said "No I'm not willing to agree to that." So Costco
went back to the Department of Transportation and redesigned the light and installed the equipment in another location Oh okay When the light got installed the property owner then came to Costco and said "Where's my $125,000 where's my money?" And they said "We
went a different direction." And then the social media chaos ensued Yeah As I stated there was just so much controversy with that project I'd like it to be when it's approved that there's no kickback to the city or the commissioners I know
that I know that Well um yeah that isn't a good word I'm sorry I meant that there's no but the the project but just to be clear the light is on FDOT right away and that's in the county
that's not in the city but but more importantly the project has already been approved It has been um appealed and addressed The only thing left is for it to be built pursuant to the documents and that goes under the Florida building
code and is reviewed by the building official To be honest with you he may have already issued a certificate of occupancy because it's my understanding that they have employees there and they're loading things into the building I'll check tomorrow to verify it but I
have no reason to believe that they'd be allowing employees to be in there if the certificate of occupancy hadn't already been issued So I assume that's already happened The grand opening is an event that the business is deciding on for the day that they want to decide but I
believe the CO was already issued weeks ago when they started the air conditioning and started having employees appear for work and loading the shelves Okay Of course having used kickback is the wrong word What I really meant I didn't want anything coming back to the city saying we did something wrong We approved things going forward
and they shouldn't have been So I just want us to all be on the same page when this project opens Thank you Thank you Commissioner Gobi Commissioner thank you Mayor You have any comments this evening no Um
no You're welcome I just wanted to thank our uh police department and all of our staff our community services staff and those who work with us on this community project this weekend We had a a walk in the community a prayer walk and it just
shows community unity and it shows some of the needs in our community and it was really um a great event for community Uh with regard to the sound ordinance or or noise I was here when we approved the
idea for um outdoor performances or or music at um terraformada and and other places I think they set the trend We've had lots of studies with regard to decibels for indoor outdoor amplifiers
and all kinds of things But Stuart has a very uh good character for the things that we present to people and those whom come and enjoy certain things in our community And I know to some people some we have a limit at the time and we also
have certain other things So I think that some of those things are uh positive Not everything will help will be um a good thing for some people but and I appreciate all the letters and communication that I've had Some people
I've had a chance to respond to but I people are really very keen in whatever way they feel about certain things and that's exactly how it should be in our community and I'm looking forward to hearing from you when you get a chance
to talk to us as we deliberate on that matter Um today um I think that's that's all I have to say I just like I said I just want to really thank staff Mr Martell and his staff They go all out to work with our
community to make sure that things happen to to um get people involved and keep our community spirit And I really appreciate that We don't see what staff does in the background but they're there helping us keep traffic going keep other
things going So I appreciate it Thank [Applause] you Mr Vice Mayor Do you have any comments this evening i do have a few So with regard to the sound ordinance I just wanted to let the cat out of the
bag how I feel about this There have been some complaints um in the past and more recently The reason you're going to see this on our agenda it's under the discussion and deliberation portion Uh nobody up here was recommending making
an change to an ordinance but more for historical purposes and to be able to address complaints I I think the tone of this commission uh as it turned over uh in August is to be able to hear complaints and not dismiss anybody For
me personally I can tell you I have no intention of changing the sound ordinance including making it louder [Applause] to my comments So uh a couple things One with regard
to discharges uh we're all familiar that those have stopped Uh the recovery operations are still in effect for the West Coast but they stopped for us Um but the hope that over the next 3 to 5 years the submerged aquatic vegetation
can grow while the lake level increases and it has been set up for success All right but here's the bad side Here's my concern Major Bell Major Cory Bell who is our district commander for this area
He's interacts with you know Ben and all of us We all have access to Major Bell He is set to metriculate out within a year In my conversations with him uh one of the things that we discussed was he's put in for an extension which is unusual
for his position but he is a Florida guy You know often with these district commanders you can get somebody from Minnesota or who knows where that has no uh intention on retiring here or is not vested in this area Major Bell's a diver This guy's a Florida guy He's he cares
about our area and and our water quality I wanted to ask if if you all would be up for it along with the um there's a few other groups who are who are doing this already Uh writing a letter to it
would be his uh branch leadership Um Lieutenant Colonel Hammond if we could write a letter supporting his request for an extension um so that the people who were in charge of making that decision can look at it I think I think Friends of the Everglades
might be doing this as well There's It wouldn't just be us but I I do believe having this guy that we have relationships with He's been incredibly uh communicative does podcasts he will text and call all of us
We are in a very unique uh relationship with this guy who makes himself available on behalf of the core And um so if it would be okay with you I would like to request if if if we could write a letter of support from the commission from the commission to Lieutenant
Colonel Hammond who's his branch leadership and I can get more of that detail to Ben Um including his email and and everything Uh is that even possible Ben considering he's But it would have to be ASAP He's in the he's in the core which is a fairly rigid Yeah I I Well
for what it's worth I don't think it's improper Um he's obviously typically for anyone who's wondering it's typically a three-year station at that post Um he is local I I can't speak as much as um you know as the commission talks highly of him at at a staff level I can't praise
him enough His his quality is very well known um in our area So I I'm not opposed to drafting something like that for the commission Um if that's the direction for staff and I don't think there's anything improper from a command level Yeah But we have to be quick because I think that that's going to
happen soon So you're going to be busy which I believe you you can totally make that happen We we can make that happen very quick this week even Mike would you need head nods from us or a motion um I can the consensus Is there any objection from those no I was going to ask you if it was a motion I'm I don't think we need a motion I'm supporting Okay So you
have Yeah Okay Consensus All right So moving on So that would be one thing Thank you President In terms of housekeeping I also wanted to check Mike when are we going to see the updated policy uh regarding by right
projects over I think 50,000 square feet like the auto vault one coming in front of us I know that was something you were going to bring in front of us and I just wanted to it'll be it'll be coming We don't have any anticipated projects of over 50,000 square feet that are by right anyway So it'll happen before a project happens Okay So you can get that
in front of us sooner than later Although based upon House Bill 1535 we may not be even able to I I don't think it's more restrictive So I think we pass that Correct Okay Um and then there were recent TC Palm
articles about the city hall site which I don't know if any of us have even been talking to TC Pom They dug about 10 years back to create content But what what happened was there's a CRB meeting that day and the reporter for TC Palm came to the CRB meeting and they were
having kind of just an open discussion of different ideas and I I think it was Mark Breville and the reporter walked outside but I had no idea where any of that came from So So here would be the silver lining to this is I do think that we should decide what we're going to do with that with this uh physical location
assuming we all move to Wells right some plans We have several different plans but I would like to formalize what we're going to do so that kind of speculation isn't brewing I personally would like it to be a park and then have the parking uh continue versus like a hotel or
something that I think is way too intensive coming to work I would like to have a DMD initially to start um where we can kind of have some ideas maybe review the history of what has been discussed and get some consensus and then maybe move in the next direction of
a community you know workshop Yeah But I want us to go ahead and and and have that be ironed out so that there's not all this you know we'll have this many people Good Nice to see input Yes We need the auditor I think it's a little premature for a DND I think at least we need to
get on the other side of the legislative session because that could have quite dramatic Well it's it's not not it wouldn't have an impact on our development of city hall right um but I wouldn't be able to get it before April 28th anyway because the agenda is due tomorrow Yeah Mayor Mayor but this
that's that's a huge topic that we need to tackle That's what we are here to do That's our job All right So with that those were my in advance of it rather than behind I know And I have full faith in this commission We'll make some good decision songs from moving to the new city hall Mike well it at earliest it
depends Three years No Um Wells Fargo was at the time discussing leaving at the end of their 5-year lease They renewed that lease Okay And they have another five-year option on top of that And the cancer clinic also has two
5-year options So if one or the other leaves we could take that space alternatively But if neither of them leave it could be 10 years Five to 10 years Okay So I'm not saying it's not a topic we should address I agree with you Mr Vice Mayor but there's absolutely no
sense of urgency here But uh yeah at some point we should absolutely But you could also get it to address the I mean just to stop squaltch those rumors right i have no idea where that story had the same reaction you did Does that conclude your comments those are those are my comments Thank you sir
Thank you Uh I have no comments this evening Uh I was up in Tallahassee quite recently and I'm still shell shocked from what was being talked about and what could possibly occur and how threatening that is to our ability
to make decisions regarding to the look and feel of our city So um I'm still trying to digest that And for those of you who stand wait around to hear from Mr Hogarth you'll I think you'll be equally concerned with what's going on
there So comments by the city manager Mr Mortell do you have any um just briefly uh we had employee appreciation last week and it went very well and um we do appreciate all the employees at the city Um also uh since our last meeting there was an unfortunate circumstance where
one of our police officers was involved in a shooting Um I want to say that he seems to be doing fine I've been speaking with the chief about him regularly and the chief uh has been giving all positive feedback I spoke to the state attorney's office as it
relates to an investigation and I was informed that everything appeared to be have been done by the book and was no issue at all However um the state attorney's office in an abundance of caution would still be convening a grand jury because they don't want there to
ever be an accusation that there'd be anything uh in favor of or against one side or another And lastly I spoke to the gentleman's mother And um she actually expressed an apology to the city and to the officer for uh the
circumstances and said that her son had been under a lot of stress and was very sick at the time But um I just wanted to make the comment that the officer is doing well and I don't care who you are if you're put in that type of a circumstance it's got to be a heavy burden on him So uh hopefully everything
will work out well for him Um in the meantime we've uh got a meeting at the uh East Stewart on this Wednesday evening to have the final discussions regarding the zoning in progress uh regulations And I believe that starts is
at 5:00 at 5:00 at the 10th Street Rec Center Everybody's invited to attend and otherwise we're watching the last two weeks of the legislative session and taking just exactly where we stand Okay it's all good Thank you Thank you Okay
Mr Vice Mayor would you like to make a motion for the approval of the agenda so moved Second With some changes Yes With some changes Moving 11 up um for the consent to seven Yeah before the
consent calendar I basically have it be Yeah correct Just above the consent Want to take it comments from the public Mr Mayor are we exchanging item number seven for item number what is it 13 I don't think we should make Mogarth wait till the end I
think we could take them after item 11 Okay Okay Then if that's okay with the board with the commission Mhm Yes Okay Yes Okay Thank you Um do you want to move it before comments from the public or do you want to have comments from the
public on non-aggenda items first i think we should do that Comments first from the public agenda items from these are because there's no comments in the DND So that would be Yeah Okay So the agenda will now be comments from the
public on non-aggenda related items Item 11 item seven consent calendar and then commission action Correct Mr Mr Vice Yes Is there a second for that i will second that motion All in favor i
Okay So are there any comments from the public on non-aggenda related items and for clarification this would be in item 11 the the way that it's formatted there would not be public
comment in a DND because we don't have a motion So if you wanted to make a comment about the sound ordinance now would be the time Well strictly speaking I was going to suggest that rather than rather than have rather than have
everybody provide public comment it might be worth hearing the presentation from the city attorney And then in the event that there is no motion by any of a city commissioner to alter the sound ordinance in any way it may infer that it's uh inconsistent It's already
consistent and therefore there's no need to have an hour and a half of public comment because everybody's on the same page That's right [Applause] So to reiterate if you have a comment on a non-engine
engine agenda agenda related item and um terraformata is on the agenda So if it doesn't relate to that please come forward Madam clerk do you have any green cards uh Mayor Rich I did have three green cards They were for item
number 11 Um one has just changed it to make it into public comment non-aggenda item So would we like to the other two as we stated if there's no motion and no second and we're not changing anything there's no reason for people there's nothing for the public to comment on So
we'll agenda we will proceed with item 11 discussion and deliberation of the sound ordinance Mr Bagot I know you've been looking forward to this Will you make a presentation please all right So I've been tasked to go
through the uh current noise uh ordinance that we have on the books And just uh so the public knows you Is it a noise ordinance Mr Bagot or is it a sound ordinance sound it It's titled noise ordinance We are referring to it as sound ordinance I guess tonight and
elsewhere Ordinance really Um so just just so the public knows you can do a Google search of uh city of Stewart Munich Code and it'll bring up our our code of ordinances and you can find the u the noise ordinance uh there and it's free
and and available to the public on on your phone on your computer It's very easy to find But under our code it's chapter 20 um of our code of ordinances and it's article six and it's titled noise
[Applause] And I want to go through the regulation part of it and it's section 20-151 And the first subsection is tit uh titled vehicles And basically this the state of
Florida has preempted uh the regulation of noise emanating from vehicles Uh and it cites to two statutes Florida statutes that regulate it So our sound ordinance does not regulate the sound of vehicles because the state has taken that
over all and sub subsection B is all other noises or sources of noises It gives um gives a decibel limit and a time frame So for all noise except vehicle noise
the maximum permissible sound levels coming from the property line from which the sound originates shall be 80 dB or lower from 8:00 a.m until 10 p.m It lowers from 80 dB to 60 dB when you get
from 1000 p.m until 8:00 a.m And this is at all times and all days throughout the city The next subsection talks about um measurement of the sound and um what equipment can be used Our police officers have the equipment to measure
sound Um this this gives some guidance to um our city magistrate or a judge It allows it to be a little bit more lax on getting evidence in from our sound equipment as some of us lawyers can do we can challenge whether the equipment
is been authenticated or can be used or there could be uh uh basically non-admissible but our code kind of gives it a lack standard of being able to get that uh evidence in at the magistrate hearing or at a court hearing
It also puts in here that if the the sound that's at issue is only three awaited decibb higher than the background normal sound the source level cannot be derived as a violation So it kind of gives that So if there's a lot
of other noise in addition to this noise um it would not be a violation as long as it's within three awaited decibb when measuring The next subsection talks about when measuring where do you stand so for
again for non-vehicular noise originating from private property the the sound will be measured at the property line of the property where the noise originates If it's if it's sound originating in one of our public
properties or in a public rideway uh the measurement needs to be at a distance of 50 feet from the source of the noise Our next subsection gives exemptions from our sound and noise uh regulations And I'm going to list them
briefly here So we've got law enforcement fire suppression ambulance uh holiday fireworks approved sanctioned or sponsored by a government agency Just so you know I think the state has also preempted that They have a state statute on fireworks on certain
days of the year that they can use them So that might be also preempted by the state Warning devices at railroads airports roadway intersections and upon hazard use structures uh burglar alarms fire alarms I'm still continuing down
exemptions from our code Aircraft and drones in lawful ground or aerial operations Boats and other watercraft in lawful operations Chimes or bells used in permitted clock towers schools or places
of worship or assembly An amplified sound associated with special events permitted by the city um portable emergency power generators portable pumps portable
compressors and such equipment shall not emit more than 85 dB sound pressure So they have an actual uh a higher level for th that type of equipment in our code our sanitation operations including the unloading and
emptying or collection of waste or recyclables and um those operations are only permitted between the hours of 7:00 a.m and 700 p.m Um landscape power washing lawn maintenance they also um increase it to
85 dB There's also we'll get to it in a minute but there's also another section in our code that addresses the landscape Uh we'll get there in a minute And that concludes our exemptions from the sound ordinance But we do have some additional rules on certain activities in and their
related noises The first one is in section 20-122 It's titled enclosure of certain machinery And it's addressing heating ventilation air conditioning equipment refrigeration equipment swimming pool pumps irrigation pumps generators or
other electrical or internal combustion engines motors pumps compressors or machineries which emit noise in the operation They first shall be installed and operated within a primary or accessory building or outside of such
building and enclosed within a soundabsorbing structure or cabinet with the resulting sound not exceeding the requirements that I've already mentioned Um the next section 20-153 this is where it talks about
landscaping again but it's also addressing outdoor construction landscape activity and also activities of loading and unloading um as a means of assuring that unlawful noise is curtailed The following shall be further regulated And it talks about
outdoor construction demolition activities landscape activities mechanical operations and the like that depend on the use of mechanical electrical internal combustion or airdriven tools equipment and blowers shall be prohibited from the hours of
7:00 p.m to 7:00 a.m except on Sundays at city recognized holidays On city recognized holidays and Sundays these activities shall be prohibited between the hours of noon and 700 p.m Also outdoor loading and unloading
of bulk raw materials or finished goods in excess of 1/2 cubic yard or 1/2 ton shall be prohibited between the hours of 700 p.m and 7:00 a.m Monday through Saturday uh except on city recognized holidays On
Sundays and city recognized holidays deliveries shall be prohibited except from the hours of noon till 7:00 p.m This will not apply to movers of household goods at a dwelling unit which shall be prohibited from starting work
any earlier than the permitted herein but which may continue beyond 700 p.m until the work is concluded Our next section allows an administrative variance for certain emergencies um fire flood storm event in
construction Um so they can get an administrative variance from um from from our uh from the city administration for such um in in if a storm hits or if there's a bad event with a a fire or flood obviously they're going to be have
to go after hours if necessary And that include pumps sirens and all that we've already mentioned Citations is the next section 20-155 Notice to appear in the event that any person is
cited or regulated by this uh article regulation Um a citation or development issued order issued by the city Uh once that person is given such a citation or order that person person has
10 days to um in a written form to challenge and file a request for a hearing before our city magistrate And just so everybody knows the city magistrate we have a meeting once a month and all of our code violations are heard by our magistrate
The magistrate acts like a judge we have evidence uh and and the judge/ magistrate makes a ruling based on the evidence that's produced before him or her And again that's once a month We have all of our code violations and it would just be along with all the other
code violations A hearing will be held Um all applicants seeking to uh pay a local business tax within the city shall also have or will have amplified sound at the or and will have some sort of
amplified sound at the business Amplified sound means you know a PA system mics and so forth Uh any type of mechanism to amplify the sound i.e like a band Um once any person um or or business as
an applicant seeks to uh get a local business tax within the city they're supposed to be given a copy of this ordinance Uh we have a progressive fines and penalties So once a citation the citations are kind of done in
progressive order based on how many violations whether it's the first offense or fifth offense or later At the first offense a written warning shall be issued And this could be issued by our code enforcement officers or a police officer If the
violation is a second offense the violator shall pay a fine of $250 A third offense there's a fine of $500 And a fourth offense the violator shall pay a fine of $1,000 And any violation that is a fifth
offense or more shall be subject to a mandatory hearing before the city's code enforcement magistrate and shall be subject to a fine of not less than $2,500 or more than $5,000 And uh in addition to any of
those fines the magistrate can also um um levy other additional fines and costs such as the staff's time and in going forward with the violations and having the hearing Uh they can also the magistrate is also um given the authority to restrict
business operations of a violator and restrict the type location and use of the amplified sound equipment And any person who fails to eliminate a noise violation when required by an officer or code enforcement or who fails
to appear when compelled may be held in contempt of the magistrate following an order to show cause a hearing before the magistrate and thereafter may be subject to an additional fine of up to $1,000 plus administrative costs And uh that's the conclusion of
the uh the ordinance Any questions are there any questions from the commission mr Beagot Okay My question is for either Mr Bagot or Mike Oh sorry Sorry I thought you were saying Mike So my question is either for the city manager
or the attorney I'm not sure Um since if I thought correctly if we just discussing and there's no vote one way or the other then the we cannot have the public speak Is that No you're you guys are welcome to You just don't have to Okay So the comment was to to make
everybody if you guys were if everybody's in agreement they don't need to persuade you to do anything Okay Right Well you know the one thing about local government which I think is great is that um we all live in this city Uh we all don't agree on everything and this is an issue where I'm actually
representing the people who don't dislike music don't dislike terraformata They just would like to see the decibb come down a bit And that I thought was open for discussion Uh I'm gathering most of the commissioners are not in favor but I think that the residents who would like to see that should have the
opportunity to voice their opinion and what they hear and how they feel about it And so I'd like to be able to do that Well then you can make a motion Okay And if you get a second then Okay I'd like to make a motion that individuals
whether pro or con can voice their um statement on this item regarding not not the regular well actually you as a board you guys have I mean you can take the public comment no matter what you take it for the public you can do it either way is
the public the question is do you have a motion on the order as an item for the public we don't have to have a motion to have public comment it is up to us it is out at our discretion to allow the public to speak Just let them do that please
So should we get to our even though comments i have questions Yeah we all they want Well I think in Commissioner Gio believes that there are people here that are going to speak in favor of changing
the sound ordinance Either way whatever Okay Um can can we finish our comments first and then go to because I'm I'm totally open to public comment if if somebody wants to talk about it That's why we're here tonight
Um so Lee with regard to section 2151 the the concerns that I heard that you know have been bouncing around were with regard not to the decibb It had more to do with this section 8 within
2151 and 2155 2151 Okay section 8 and then 2155 section C So section 8 says amplified sound associated with special
events permitted by the city including but not limited to and I'll just skip to what would be relevant here concerts or shows that have been permitted approved sanctioned or sponsored by the city So that would
require a and this this is not my position I'm just trying to for discussion purposes echo the criticism I've heard so that we can talk about it Um that it would trigger in section 2155 all applicants seeking to pay the local
business tax within the city shall indicate if they have or will have amplified sound at the business So maybe this is a mic question But do we require any other
bars to pull a permit to have amplified sound every single first of all when we talking about bars you're talking about a licensing that the state has a 2 cop a 4 cop or a different liquor license That was the main criticism that is it is
that one particular bar um was allowed to get away with something that other bars were not So the certificate of occupancy that was issued and I think I'm going to give you a little background too In 2001 when the Cherrett took place that everyone talks about the
community that participated in Cherret identified Colorado starting at about Fifth Street going up Dixie Highway and up Colorado to US1 and kind of back and around by the post office area as well as the arts
and entertainment district that they wanted and it started to evolve and in some time in the early 2000s Terraforma opened and there was a um some issues not just with Terraformatada
but with other restaurants including the Sailor Returns and some restaurants north of the bridge that were having live music outside and as a result in 2015 there was a lengthy discussion regarding the sound ordinance that resulted in committee meetings and Mr
Trollski is sitting over there We actually set speakers up on the front porch of city hall and set the gun to measure the sound in the street on the property line and everybody walked outside and we did the whole thing to see what the difference was between the
different decibb And ultimately at the end of that series of meetings which I think was a total of five um the city adopted the sound ordinance that we have now and the the recommendations were
somewhat different than what was adopted but nonetheless the city adopted the one we have now Then in 200 I think it was roughly 18 or so uh the community over there um again that the description of ge geographic description I'm describing
of the roughly fifth street in Colorado uh over to Dixie and then all the way up to US1 um a group of them got together and uh began organizing and actually approached the city commission and essentially
petitioned that they would be named the Creek District and they wanted to be formally designated as an arts and entertainment district and they wanted um to have a I don't know if it's the first Friday you have to forgive me but
it was a an art walk and entertainment on the I think it was the first Friday of every month that the different businesses in that area would not need a special event permit in order to set up like we see the soccer tents or whatever
it is to set up in front of their businesses and to have a walking kind of street fair that went all the way up MLK Boulevard to Brutder Pond that went down by Terraforma that also included um the the plaza that's um there off of
Colorado um on um Frasier Creek and as a result the commission actually had meetings and and granted that to the Creek District and I believe they still have a board and they still have meetings regularly and they designated that area as the arts and entertainment
district The reason I mention it is because philosophically that the staff and obviously we get people that have different opposing views on issues but overall the direction that the city has had is that this area was in fact
intended to be an arts and entertainment district whether it was or wasn't hold up on I get this out Um and so I've told others that if the commission realigns that or adjusts it we'll act accordingly as well And so
what's happened since then and during that time obviously terformata was still in existence and there was no discussion that terraformata was anything other than a outdoor um patio restaurant that had live music Um not restaurant because they don't serve food because they have
a food truck for food So it's I believe a 2 COP license but it's licensed by the state and it's when it came in to get its business tax receipt it was going to have amplified sound just as Sailor Return does and talk house and Tide
House and um the others done you know Duffy's and whatever else is downtown Um in any event um the the issue then becomes well when when does it become something
that's more than what the business that is operating is and that's a very complicated um situation because I know that there have been circumstances in the past where uh the owner of Terraformata has
actually made arrangements online for people to buy tickets like you would to a concert My concern would be that if that was going to be used as the guideline to to say that it should or shouldn't be regulated that we would
want to defer the other way because he could have the choice of not selling tickets online and know that there's a huge demand for a particular band and allow three times as many people to converge on the neighborhood as the
venue can support and the traffic and the problems that that would create would be much worse than actually saying to people "Sorry all the tickets are available Don't even come over on Friday night There isn't any room for you Don't even try to get in." And I I was down in
uh Port Serno this weekend on Saturday night and the Pearl and the two Georgees both had bands and three you had to park on Dixie Highway to be in Manatee Pocket this weekend And again it's it's great It's just that it was there's a point of
there wouldn't be anywhere to go And so I don't I it concerns me and I'm not suggesting that we should have concerts and sell out sell tickets like a concert venue but I do think that when those tickets have been sold in the past it was to actually regulate the crowd rather than increase the crowd And I
honestly don't know the right answer I'm just telling you how we've reacted to it In any event it's you know if you go there tonight it's probably just a few people sitting outside and I don't even know if there's music playing or not Monday night Um and so but they're all
here Nothing's happening But but the point being that it's a it's it's a venue that's licensed no different than any other venue in Stewart That is the city doesn't regulate liquor licenses
The state does We regulate occupancy and a letter was given by the city to the state that said that that address was properly zoned for a 2 cop liquor license and to be allowed to have live
music and that was really about it [Applause] Stop that Excuse me ma'am Excuse me Um so for what it's worth the licensing takes place in many different forms and
fashions One of the things that you run into is that if I have a 2,000 square foot office the size and shape of that office has a capacity built into it based upon the Florida building code But if you have an outdoor venue the
capacity changes significantly because the risk of fire and other things diminishes significantly And as a result the fire the Florida fire code and building codes allow it to be a larger audience And the city's parking code
isn't doesn't regulate people standing It's based upon the number of seats or people dining or things of that nature So when you get into a thing like a outdoor venue where you might only have 20 chairs but you might have 300 people
standing you get into an imbalance on how you would regulate the parking or not But in this particular instance the parking application and whatever the issue was was addressed back in like I don't even know what the date was but 2009 or 10 or whenever it was that it
opened I don't even know the date And as a result it it has a certificate of occupancy and they have a business tax receipt to operate as this type of business The city doesn't have I don't
have the tools to say you can't do this without direction from the commission to change some regulation As it relates to the sound code itself what we really learned in 2015 is that measuring 65 dB or 75 dB or
80 dB is almost impossible First when it was plainly audible the police officer that could come up could hear the sound coming up and could swear to an affidavit that it was plainly audible and that was it And there was some issues as to whether that
was subjective or not But regardless the commission wanted it changed to this sound ordinance The problem you run into now is if the sound ordinance was 50 dB um when the police were dispatched to
the area that Commissioner Gobi spoke to earlier um 16 times um not because there was violations just to do random testing And it turned out that the ambient sound was about 50 dB at all times So it was
if somebody wasn't making noise the sound measurer was going to come up at 50 dB But if you pulled up on I'm just going to randomly say terraformata Um and you someone had complained about a
band being too loud and the police car pulled up onto Sixth Street and started to pull up in front of Terapformana and someone adjusted the volume and turned it down to seven By the time the police officer got out and put the gun up to measure the sound at the at the property it would be ambient sound again And then
the police car pulls away and then they turn it back up to nine And like and I'm not saying that cat and mouse game takes place or that anything's doing that but it can and it's very complicated The other thing is I mentioned the Serno last night or Saturday night Uh used to
be called Twisted Tuna but it's called Two Georges now And so there's the Pearl and Two Georgees and they're very close to each other Both had live bands So who was violating the sound ordinance and so you get into this dilemma of that And
then we had back in the 2015 there was a situation where a guy came up in a fancy sports car that was a convertible and was in the parking lot of a place and he had a very nice stereo system and it was
able to generate enough sound to get a complaint from somebody And by the time the police got there the owner of the restaurant said "Well yeah but that was a guy in a red Corvette It wasn't it wasn't me." But was it him who's responsible for the sound and the
violation is it him because it was a car in his parking lot or was it the guy driving the car that has already left which then led to well is it the band that's violating the sound ordinance or is it the owner of the business that's violating the sound ordinance and it it's an ongoing like there's a lot of
nuance to it And back in 2015 when those discussions took place the focus was really to try and like work at being good neighbors and having respect for your neighbors and trying not to be
disruptive and keep some tools on the books so that if somebody's not being a good neighbor there is a remedy for the city to intervene before it people take it into their own hands because we don't want that either and where that balance is or what that right number is is
really difficult and it's I mean obviously the policy of the boards and the city will do its best to enforce whatever the board decides but there's a lot more nuance than just saying it's no longer 80 now it's 70 and I don't even know whether we'd know the difference or
or and and what we learned was that sound is exponential so 65 to 70 is an exponential increase and 70 to 80 is really like 10 times louder than 70 would be And so it's a lot of math there
that's very complicated And I also know that when it's interfering with a neighbor it's like a dripping sink Just that drop in the bathroom can end up being so loud you can't sleep So if you've got an adjacent neighbor that has sound violations or that's disrupting
your personal life it it becomes very serious So we try to balance it out and we've you know tried to address it and and here we are And I don't I looked back to see if we had a lot of complaints over the last few years and we don't But in speaking to some of the
people that weren't happy with the sound ordinance the reason we don't is because they claim that it's not worth complaining because the sound ordinance is so high that there's no way for people to be in violation of it anyway
And I I mentioned that for your edification but leads us back full circle right back where we started I I appreciate you going over that history and I I think it's important for us to be able to hear grievances and and hear
complaints so everybody can be heard Um fourway intersections 90 Yep So for me it's a bar right and it has live music It's downtown If you live downtown you you should expect that there's going to be it's going to be louder right we're not living out in
In general I feel like you have addressed that complaint that um you know this is not special treatment for for Tara Formata that nobody else u rece you know everybody else has to do one thing and Tara gets an out I think
you've addressed that well Um Tara Formata is a local treasure and I'm not just saying that to get claps from [Applause] everybody I I talked to Chief you know briefly about this but it's like how many complaints
do you get over there how many fights do you have going on at Tariff none None It's good people Maybe one Only if they talk politics with you Only only if we talk politics But it's good people trying to just relax and enjoy each
other and life you know So the nice weather Yeah and the nice weather and being in downtown Stewart which is what we are able to offer people 10 p.m right 10 10 p.m Excuse me sir So you know for the most part the
neighborhood back there as far as I understand for the most part has not had an issue as of recently You know it's it's a couple of particular voices So again I said this already but at this time I'm not interested in trying to
augment the sound ordinance to take decibb down or change times or anything So with that those are my comments Thank you Mr Vice President Any other questions or comments of staff by the commission i did I had a question So they're they're
basically regulated by the NFPA fire code then Mike because it is outdoor Is that what you were saying occupancy is regulated by the fire code Occupancy is also regulated by the number of toilets Believe it or not it's 40 people per
toilet So what is their occupant do they have an occupancy there's not there is there's not I mean if there were a thousand people there there'd be one but there's not so there is a I was just curious that's a commissioner
Joby I would just honestly like the other side heard I know that vice mayor has stated there have not been many but there have been people who have an issue I understand and I would be all for people being allowed to make comments Okay Is there any is there any motion
with regard to this ordinance from the commission at this time can we just can we not just give me a chance here okay Okay Seeing none Okay We are done with this item
[Applause] No public comment So at this give me a chance At this time this commission has decided to take no action with regard to this ordinance However
still listening to the commission I think they do Some of you are here probably to speak with concern to terapformato or in opposition to it And without objection from the commission I would now like to provide those individuals an opportunity to speak And
and for clarity I would request that it be an opposition to the sound ordinance not particularly to moderate particular Thank you for that clarification This is about sound So you probably don't have a green card in but if you would like to
come forward speak you're then going to have to Can we make them available to us i understand that it's okay So just introduce your name and address please In objection mayor in objection to Mayor Rich Yes I have cards already Okay Okay Let call the names Call them please
Madam clerk Robert Steinberg Thank you Good evening Mr Steinberg Thank you Good evening Mr Commissioners It's been a long time since I've been here Yes I'd like to uh let me just uh tell everybody here that I'm the guy who's causing this
I'm the guy who wrote the letter and I'm the guy who wrote the letter about uh about the noise or I'm trying to speak up if you don't mind Okay Um I'm the guy who wrote the letter about the noise ordinance to see if the commission wanted to address the noise
ordinance We have the most liberal sound ordinance in Florida and on the Treasure Coast Other communities like Jensen Beach have a very lively downtown music scene with the county's 65dB limit So
the actual dB level is not the largest concern It can be a lively scene at 65 dB It can be a lively scene in downtown Cla Street at 90 dB Terapformata holds a two cop Now
check this out 40 seat bar license BTR business tax license with two toilets Does anybody here think that Terraforma has 40 seats in the uh in the
facility or does it have several hundred seats let's let her speak Let him speak Now as far as it relates to the noise ordinance which you're not going to do anything about I'd like you to know that it's not the local bands that
are causing any difficulty on a band on a night where you have uh the blues band on Thursday night or if you have uh uh the New Honks when they had a Wednesday night never caused anybody any issues
Never reached any excessive sound levels It's the concert It's the concerts that they're having that are pumped into a monstrous PA system which pumps out a lot more air mic than a little boous PA system that you put on the steps of the courthouse
of city hall This is a major concert level system It is not Excuse me Excuse me Sir sir Terraformata is the Treasure Coast's
premier outdoor concert venue That's right That's right The reason for that is that a concert venue an outdoor concert venue is not allowed anywhere else on the Treasure Coast Show me anywhere on the Treasure Coast that has the same kind of setup as
Terraforma Can I go on you can go more I have a few more Excuse me ma'am There is no business designation in the city of Stewart for an outdoor concert venue He has a two cup ball license with
40 seats according to his business tax receipt any other similarly situated business For example Mike gave me the example of the um Frasier Creek Brewery having an outdoor
event um for a fundraiser They pulled a special events permit Terraforma has not been required to pull any special event permits for any concerts Concerts are controlled only in our code by the
special events ordinance The special events ordinance is applicable to every bar So my question is why is terraformata exempt why don't they have to pull up a special events permit just like any
other similarly situated two cup 40 seat bar whether it's indoor outdoor and as long as we're talking about [Music] um code itself shouldn't there be a difference between a bar that's inside that where you can have music as loud as
you like rocket is an indoor activity for the most part when you take it where you take it I'm sorry Excuse me Could we show little respect for the person speaking i grew up in New York City and my concert experiences it started at the Filmore
East Okay And yet I'm here Thank you Mr Seinberg Thank you Mr Seinberg Thank you All right Can somebody explain to me i know I've
yet to hear from either Mr Mortell or from Mr Bagot who will answer my question Why or if terraformata is exempt from the special events program we we we will ask that they provide an answer to you Mr Zinberg All right Thank
you Mr Steinberg Madam Clerk Sharon Mason I'm I'm speaking in favor and I believe to use a music metaphor I'm speaking to the choir She's speaking in favor Next one Madam clerk John Cal Callahan
Hi Thank you John Caligan 24 Grand Bay Circle Judo Beach Florida Mayor Rich Vice Mayor Collins I'm speaking today on behalf of the thousands of live music fans that visit our local musicfinders.com website each
week looking for live music So upon hearing this I went and did some research looking for where in your code it talks about live music and I had trouble finding it but then I found the sound ordinance and and I
think I got it You tell me if I got it right It's under noise And under the noise section section 20-150 it says noise means unwanted or welcome unwelcome sound that causes or
may cause an adverse psychological or physiological effect on human beings There it is musical instruments right next to construction equipment and compressors and vocalization by
domesticated animals domesticated birds and natural persons And to me it sounds like that's singing It's under noise Well tell that to Pavari or Pat
Matheni or Hurricane Hawk and the Invaders or Cat and Carlos at a local restaurant or study So I could I could see the problem here and I have a solution There's another section called
exemptions which your town manager uh explained and and the town attorney That's where live music belongs other exemptions along with burglar alarms fire alarms aircraft And the solution is to change the noise
ordinance Yes sir Change the noise ordinance by adding four words one for each commissioner and mayor Live music is exempt Thank you [Applause] Walter Lloyd
She speaking Evening Walter Lloyd 150 Cabana Point Circle And and much of my comments pretty much echo what that gentleman's just said was it seems to me like there should be a distinction between noise pollution and music which is art and facilitates entertainment and
dancing I would think that we should be a little more uh harsh on the noise pollution aspects and allow the entertainment to happen and let people release their tensions that are you know built up through the week and work and enjoy the enjoy terraformata or whatever
venue they have Um one of the other things I kind of personally wanted to know is how this became such a politicized issue around terapformatada I I I heard about a noise from a a gutter company and I heard about you know that kind of noise
pollution happening in hours that may not be appreciated by the neighbors I just don't understand how this got proliferated to this point for termada I'd like that to be uh explained if somebody wouldn't mind to help us
understand how the community has been so agitated over something that they shouldn't have been So it was requested at two meetings ago Requested by who the board to bring it back The commission requested us to bring the silent ordinance back after a discussion which
mentioned Terraformata And it did mention Terraforma Well it mentioned the letter Mr Steinberg referenced that he wrote Okay Which mentioned Terraforma yes Oh okay Thank you I have no more public comment I have no
more public comment Mayor okay thank you all Would you like to make a comment sir yes please Could you state your name and address please my name is Michael Caputo I live at 4777 Southwest Hammock Creek Drive in Palm City I do a lot of
business here in Stewart I'm a local realtor I'm a big supporter of the music industry here in Stewart I for the last year up until this calendar year I was uh a big supporter of the Sunday Riverwalk Cost me about five grand a year I was happy to do it I'm living here about 15 years and what I don't
understand is if one person writes a letter to the board and it comes up and and his letter gets discussed amongst yourselves is it now the interpretation that we need to act upon the one complaint i'm not quite
certain that that's a good a good you know uh process in order to try and alleviate things Obviously there's a lot of opposition to what is being proposed Um I come from out of state originally I'm here 15 14 15 years like I said and
uh what I can say is the hordes of people that I take care of in my business love the fact that they can come here and enjoy the arts whether it be music whether it be uh the artwork uh any number of things Um you talk about
terraformata singling out terraformata but didn't you have a place across from Duffy's that was having live live music on the weekends and maybe Thursday through Saturday or Thursday through Sunday that was quite loud as well are we looking to limit them or is it just
located on the other side of the tracks i don't know It wasn't one level So you know that being said you know uh I don't think they're looking for you to expand on the decibel level but keeping the decibel level the way it is is fine And as far as seating with Terraform goes I've been
there numerous times I never counted the seats Have you guys all been there i have I was there Friday Okay So I'm going to guess that maybe 40 seats is about right cuz most people are standing majority of the time I mean they have some some benches some picnic tables things like that I mean what does that
count for does that count for three seats does that count for two i don't really know But um as far as the decibel level and looking to single out terraform because they have too many too many seats for too many butts I don't think that's a great process and a great
way to be doing things Uh it's pretty much all I have to say I want to thank you [Applause] Well well so actually sir this is sort of how government is supposed to work Um some people expressed concern about
it and so the commission did not propose to take a a specific action at all That's why we put it on for discussion and deliberation for exactly this reason because people write emails they call us they show up and they say "We're happy
with the way it is and that's our responsibility." There's nothing wrong with this commission reviewing on a periodic basis any of our ordinances if they're impacting our community So I'm very happy to see this turn out and I and I'm I'm confident the commission
took the proper which wasn't we took no action rather we listened to [Applause] to ma'am I'm known for being verbose but I will be quick my name is Priscilla Spiker I'm good friends with the sound man at Terraforma and I'm good friends with the
owner and the sound man is aware of this and He's committed to really paying closer attention So I think that alleviates some concern The gentleman left without listening to our side He said his piece and notice he's not in the room anymore Um we we really have
looked at this um all of us that go to Tara and obviously like you said it affects everybody At the end of the day you made a great point If you live downtown you get a lot of benefits One of the little consequences is you might hear a festival or a concert now and then and that's all part of living in a
vibrant thriving town So it has to be tolerated It just it's part of the deal and um there's also maybe some things they can do with the angles of speakers and such So there is an effort being made at Terapformata and I'm sure the other uh places would be willing to work
with the city if they're given the opportunity and some guidelines Thank you so much Thank you Thank you Okay see no no other comments we will move on to have a question Um excuse me
Yes Um this is more for the the fire code So I I understand when there's two three four 500 people there do they get portaotties then or it's just because if you're standing outside there was literally zero They haven't not had portaotties
there since 2014 So whenever whoever was yelled out that when when Mr Steinberg said they only have two bathrooms that's not true There's been portaotties there since 2014 Yeah there's one permanently make
there's more than one It's like a there's got the walk-in bathroom saying three and they've been there literally for 10 years So they don't leave It's just that there's a there was structure with bathrooms in it in the building and then next to the building and in addition to that they added the
portaotties and what Mr Steinberg was saying is that when it first applied for its business tax it had two bathrooms and that was true but when people started going to the business the city went in and said because of the capacity
and fire codes you have to have more bathrooms Turns out capitalism is a big driver as well People will not stay and listen to the music if they can't go to the bathroom I was just curious right so it drives the it drives it a
lot but the fact is there are bathrooms sufficient to meet the capacity All right Yes Um okay We're moving on from this item Thank you all for showing up Thank you
[Applause] And Mr Hogarth I was not disappointed to delay your presentation So if we can retrieve Mr Hogarth from wherever he is Did we take uh general public comment we didn't We did Take a break We did We
didn't have any Are you guys here for the service award to it after it was a little we did I should have looked at you Do you need a recess no just listen
And what happened no I was trying to see Yeah that's a break If you could just wait for Commissioner Clark to return Mr Ogarth Uh I assume you left the meeting earlier
to get an update because things are moving that fast I did Um good evening Commissioners Ben Hogarth at the community services department For the record uh I did actually update a couple of the slides probably for Commissioner Clay please Oh sorry Yeah
Would you like what he said would you like Okay Like tonight Is this warning all right WC Let's go to the restaurant Who okay We're uh we're going to take a um
10-minute recess We will reconvene uh 550 admission back into order at 552 Mr Hogart finally Good evening commissioners There times a charm I'm actually glad there's not such a large
crowd so I don't have to depress so many people at the same time I would say you'd probably prefer a smaller crowd This is actually probably a better format But um with that said I I assume um the city manager Mr Mortell had sent uh the draft out and I know you've seen it in the the agenda as well and and and
mentioned kind of what's changed So I'm not going to belabor every point that's on every slide Um what I wanted to do with this presentation is as best as I can inform um the public and the commission about what is being discussed in the legislature this year We're we're
towards the end of the policy side of everything the last couple weeks of the legislature is probably going to be largely dominated by just a budget conference So other than a week or two from now um this these are really the final two weeks that you'll see most of the bills that will pass get passed So this is kind of like at the critical
point and juncture of the uh 2025 session So uh I want to also caveat what is not in the presentation is anything having to do what with homestead exemption bills the future of adalorum taxation in the state um any changes to federal law impacting local grants and
programs and uh any legislation that kind of just really has no chance of passage Everything that we're going to talk about today has been moving through committees um is on the House or Senate floor or has already passed one of the chambers So it's going to fall in one of those categories And I do have um kind
of an update on a couple of the bills that are in the that I put into the agenda originally that have been updated either Friday or as as of today So I have information on those as well Um looks like it's not there We go So the city
appropriation request I did want to mention this first Uh right now we're in a good uh budget position either on the Senate or the House side uh either 500,000 or 250,000 The budget conference will obviously determine um what we get from that and of course we want to hope that our project and and others like it
don't get vetoed Um so but this is about as good as you can get for the ask We we are in both budgets So we've got a good chance of the Guy Davis project getting kind of that phase 2 final funding from the state which would either come total a million or uh 750,000 total between
the first year and this year um housing uh development bills This is going to largely take up most of my presentation Everything that you've seen uh in the slides ahead of today is still on the record There's only been a couple of changes With that said this uh ADU
bill has pretty much already passed I think uh uni I think it passed unanimously in the Senate Um it requires local governments to adopt an ordinance So this is something in the future uh we're going to have to look at for uh ADUs and they're going to have to go
anywhere where their single family residential is allowed That's for future So it's prospective um ordinance Uh we may not prohibit the owner of an ADU from renting the units Um so that's something else that's going to be a part of that that code requirement So again
we're speaking to everything that is home rule based in in an attack on home rule um ADU ADU owners may not be denied a homestead exemption for portions of the property that the owner maintains permanent residence So what you would have seen throughout the whole legislature is a lot of conversation
about how to address ADU uh concerns with you know if if I have a garage over or sorry an apartment over a garage that I'm renting but I still live in the residence is that exempt is the whole building exempt so they they work through all that They came to kind of a
happy medium but still the part that concerns us the most is um that there's going to be accessory dwelling units anywhere single family residential is allowed and we're not allowed to distinguish between those two What uh what about setbacks and you know
would that be considered prohibiting um I haven't seen basically what they're doing is making it so whatever is in that zoning if it's a single family home in ADU they want you as a local government to treat them equally So if there's a certain
setback for for a single family residence it needs to be like that for the ADU Well the city's code historically has allowed ADUs but the code required that the ADUs be in the backyard and that they meet the same
setbacks but that the ADU be no taller than the primary residence and that it be no larger than 50% of the size of the primary residence So how do they define an ADU or what is an ADU yeah my understanding reading the law is that I don't in this new perspective law is
that they're not changing that definition um that it would still be our code would still functionally be are you sure in place we're allowed to limit it to 50% of the size of the primary residence i did not see anything in any of the bills that actually changed that I didn't see anything that got into the
meat and potatoes of it either I don't know that they're preempting our setbacks but I think that if they pass it the way it reads that we wouldn't be able to prohibit ADUs but we didn't already So we prohibited the occupancy
Right Yeah Um well we would be simply following our code still Well the big one that when I was up with the league that we all agreed is the parking is really could be a nightmare because we're not allowed to require that additional parking That was the
occupancy end of it right and it's it's a little weird because the ADU language also occurs in another bill that's much larger and I'll talk about that in a minute Um and our current code doesn't have required parking for ADUs because they're considered part of the single family So we don't have a parking
requirement anyway So uh before I get into the the bigger bill um the last one that is basically on its way to passing so the the three bills that I'm talking about right now this is number two Um they're all passing at least or have passed one
chamber platting This is basically to simplify it is now instead of it going in front of a governing board of a local government administratively it has to be approved which is if you remember the 102 bill from three two three years ago the live local act everything was being
administratively approved for affordable housing developments that met that criteria Um this is in the same vein It's now they want local governments to create a whole administrative procedure um where whether it's the city attorney the the city manager some design is the
one that has this authority to authorize uh the plat um including when they have to work with Martin County or with with the other government to do so So there has to be some kind of administrative procedure What's the danger here Mr Martell well there's a book and I can't think of the name of it but it talks
about the family that platted Port St Lucy Mackerly brothers and essentially what they did is they came in and they platted the 640 acres at a time which is a square mile but they just platted them as 50 by 100 lots and they had no
utilities no roads no parks no nothing and then started selling them out Yeah We had a plat here in the city a few years ago on St Lucy Boulevard where 10 single family lots were platted and instead of having a road they put an
easement over the plat to provide access to the the 10 different parcels And what you get is when you have a plat no it's on St Lucy Boulevard It's called Tidewater It's right there behind Kingswood Um anyway when you have a
plat or a property your parcel your setback is 25 feet from the property line What if you have a 20ft road that is an easement over the property your setback ends up being 5t from the road
because the road is on top of your land So it makes the that this tide water our garbage trucks can't go into the property So they have to put their garbage cans out on St Lucy Boulevard once these houses start opening because
we can't pull in and out of the building of the property and it's going to be gated I assume But if an if an Amazon truck goes to deliver to house number two they're going to have to drive all the way in to house number seven's driveway and then pull in to the
driveway and back out and pull back out because they can't turn around because again the way the the road is an easement it is and the and the lots are 4356 feet square feet each So they're small to start out with in this I don't
know how it's going to work I'm not too concerned about it because there is not anywhere in Stewart currently that is agg that isn't platted So this isn't going to have a huge factor on us I don't know how it
works with an amendment to a plat because that's not administrative That's different because you've already got vested property rights This this applies to replats as well But what would So but what would be the basis to replplat so if they're replanting
as long as they're the total owner of all the properties So if somebody had a 50 acre parcel which we don't have a lot of but let's say one of those 20 acre parcels in South Stewart if they came in and wanted to chop it up into 6,000 square foot parcels and they
put access roads and utilities in it Honestly when we present the plat for approval now it's preuncter It's generally following a site plan approval that has already taken place anyway So I don't have any problem with that being administrative What I have the problem
with being administrative is the idea that someone could come in and plat and then they instead of a PUD they say well this is a platted development and they circumvent the 25% upland preservation they circumvent the landscape
requirements of adding trees and then just start building single family you know the single homes on it without taking into consideration the relationship to the others and the transportation network The PUD Mr Mayor and in in the Oh sorry Go ahead My
question is both to you and to the city manager My concern too is is the requirement to have a dedicated person or department for administrating this Well it's the development director It's that they all have that So we It's It would be the development director We
already have it technically It doesn't have to be a separate person No Oh okay She already has the development director already has the authority to do all that on Yeah The the point in them saying that is they don't want you to be able to go to a town and then everyone says "Well we don't have any that can do it administratively for
you." wouldn't be a bad idea would it and in and really although bills like this don't being so developed that we are already as a community a bill like this doesn't inherently bring with it certain dangers It's more of I want to be able
to show the whole picture and how consistent you're seeing this over and over again these administrative approvals throughout the process And I have a couple more examples in the in the presentation Um and so it didn't start ne per se with the live local act but that was really what what what generated this and for the last three
years and this being the third session um affordable housing and live local have really dominated this space So um with that said I'm going to go on to uh this bill SB 1730 which has also passed or is on I should say the Senate uh
calendar right now for for passing So it's passed all the all the committee process now it's on the floor Um has a high chance of passing Um it's been amended Uh what it does right now is it does add clarifying language to what did pass with the live local act Uh one such
um clarity of language is that first point where we talk about authorizing multif family and mixeduse residential as allowable in portions of flexib flexibly zoned areas In really an original initial meeting uh reading of um live local act you probably would have interpreted that anyway they are
just trying to close any potential loophole for for local governments and and home rule uh to get around that through PUD So um the second point uh spoke to uh what Mayor Rich said about the parking Um so we have to reduce parking by 20% uh for any of the
affordable housing uh developments that are under live local That that would be a new requirement that wasn't there two years ago Uh we also this is the interesting one because we recently went through a six-month process with the zip and a moratorum essentially on development Now they're they're maxing
and capping it at 3 months so 90 days And prior to doing a moratorum you would actually have to have a whole needs assessment on your affordable housing in your community before each time you do it So and you so you can only do it once every three years You can only do it for
90 days which is now cut in half from the max before and you have to have this knees assessment which in our in small city and towns means we have to pay someone usually to do a needs assessment for us before we do that Um and the only exception that they've added to this rule is uh if it has to do with um the
unavailability of of public facilities or services if you're doing a moratoria because you've run out of services and there's a lot of national even national case law that goes into that So they they put in a special exception for those I can see in the future um you know potential clashes and people making
that argument but nonetheless we're going to see more about this moratorium in another bill So go moving on to bills that might not pass that have have less of a probability than those first three but 943 is the big one This this presents one of the biggest uh expansions of the
live local act Um I have three slides unfortunately for this one I'm not going to necessarily read them all but I do want to make a few points about it Um a lot of the language is clarifying on everything that passed in the live local act Uh we can't discriminate um by limiting or prohibiting affordable
housing projects So again they're they're adding language in there to kind of tie any potential loopholes U they want to specify for example that multif family and mixeduse residential developments are covered by low uh live local act I think again in the plain reading that was the case two years ago but again they're they're just closing
those rags uh parking requirements uh 20% you see that 20% number again for these for these projects in this bill So it's kind of duplicative of what we just talked about The difference is in this bill they also say it's 100% if you have a 20,000 or square foot or less development So I would think maybe like
those ADU um examples where maybe there's a small someone has eight ADUs that they're turning into affordable housing that that could fall into that Um and then of course at the bottom uh a reduced uh reduction of 20% of the impact fees for those projects as well
If I can interrupt you for one second So if I built 20 1,000 square foot apartments I wouldn't have any parking requirement at all That is correct No less than 20,000 Okay Yeah it would
be one of them would be 999 square ft Well you said 21 So and then there'd be no parking requirement I just wanted to clarify I did not write these ways of fault So wow that's crazy It is crazy And I had a question about urbanism That's if here
and there Yeah My question is it say maybe I'm reading it wrong It specifies that multif family or mixed residential sorry multif family or mixed residential developments covered by live local act may not have any more prohibitive regulations regarding density Height is my concern So they're saying we have we
cannot use a height restriction We have the opposite Yeah we have they've left height in place Oh okay Then I read it incorrect We can't use the density restrictions that we have currently in place It's density whatever the highest density was
from July 2023 to the present Right and the height is whatever the highest height was Okay From July 2023 to the present So you can't come in and create new heights And then the question becomes whether or not the hospital is
84t tall The lower density we just came up with would not be allowed Right Right Yeah So in theory could you match the hospital so we have our hospital in a hospital district and not in a general
housing height district And so that is unchallenged currently Um I told somebody when the first Live Local Act came out that I would deny it and that I only needed to deny it long enough for the next legislative session because
Jupiter Island would help me fix it And they went away So I don't know the answer but I was not going with the height Okay So uh I'll I'll go on to the second slide for this Um I'm going to skip most of this but just so you could see the
first three bullet points show um more ADU language So it's a little bit duplicative here but um the the first point they talk about uh allowing it um in any I should say allowing ADUs in any area of their zone single family and
preempting us from unreasonably um increasing the cost of construction So uh whether that's direct or indirectly increasing the cost of construction of ADUs So that that that language can be a little bit problematic in the future Um but they also want us to start doing these annual reports on ADUs in the
jurisdiction uh handing that to the Florida Department of Commerce So I know the state has an interest in starting to track these so that in the future they can I don't want to say the only thing we can track is new permits and they can only be based on a property owner coming
in and telling us it's an ADU because if they're already built we can't track them We have no way of knowing We years ago we tried to just see if what houses were rented to see if tenants were in
houses or what the uses were and it fell flat We did not get any cooperation from the community at all and it just it's I mean this is basically the Airbnb bill That's what this turning into So don't we have an incentive to track it because but you can track it if it's being used
as an Airbnb I'm not saying it's easy but because you can go on Airbnb and see if it's for rent okay but if I built an ADU and put an annual rental in it and put an annual tenant in it you're not going to be able to track it There's no parking requirement There's no nothing
And it's just going to you know it's going to be very difficult We can track the new ones that go forward But we have a lot of accessory dwelling units in Stewart already that aren't tracked and where people have converted their garages into you know guest houses and
all sorts of stuff that we'll never be able to track But it is saying may not be leased for the term of less than one month which would not I mean you would not be able to use uh Airbnbs because they're usually weekly you know except for there's another state statute that says we can't regulate Airbnbs Right
Well then this is in conflict with that That's that wouldn't be the first state law That wouldn't be in conflict with itself That's the that's the irony Mr Clark do you have a comment yes So you mentioned the um the ADU and uh and the Airbnb So that
problem that we have like the CASA terrace issue with the person splitting their home into like three different units So that's not an ADU That's a density issue Okay So the distinction so an ADU doesn't count as a unit If I have
a single family home on a parcel and I put an ADU out behind it that's still one unit Uhhuh If I have a single family home and I cut it into 1/3 and I put address 123 Main Street
apartment A B and C Now I've got three units and I that's a density equation And we've had that with another property too Okay All right I just wanted to bring up the distinction So you know this this bill is duplicative as far as that point we're requiring this report
There's also going to be a requirement you'll see for all of the live local act developments that that we continue to report on those every year And that includes any litigation against those So the state's really going to be tracking every kind of activity um that involves these So what they're trying to do is be
able to say whether or not somebody is indirectly or directly affecting affordable housing developments by discrimination So that's that's something that we have to be mindful of in the future that they're really tying the hands of local governments um and their decision process So um the next
slide is the uh the most important one Now I left this up there but thankfully I think it was Thursday last week Uh the most concerning language in my mind in this bill was finally removed in the most recent amendment right before it's going um to the floor of the chamber
there Uh and that was to have all urban infill development um anywhere be administratively approved no matter what it is And it's a wide net as far as what qualified for urban development in this bill It didn't really redefine it or wasn't very specific It's not there So
it has been removed since but I left it in this slide on purpose because I want to make the point of the direction that we're seeing them go with these bills and what to expect in the future You have a question So our we we're in a zoning in progress now and the idea of
having the certain uses be under the conditional use that would be what just got removed there Yes if if that had become law that would no longer that it just void out any local ordinance that has that as a condition And the worst
part about it um other than you know changing the restrictions is that you wouldn't hear it There would be no transparency There would be no public hearings There'd be no opportunity for public comment It would literally just be their right as long as they meet you know the the basic conditions parking
all that entity Um you wouldn't hear it Wouldn't come in front of you And if it upset anyone in the public they'd want to have a formal hearing on it You wouldn't be able to do so So that's something that got removed Chances are there was a lot of complaints about it My concern is this is not the only bill
this year that that language essentially in there was early on in the in the legislature and it's not on my list here because thankfully it went dormant Um but 1209 and I'm trying to think the other the other bill number for the Senate side Um they were kind of companion bills with each other that were running with language that that was
included Now they were a little bit more specific about what infield development was defined as but nevertheless the fact that we're seeing multiple bills with this language in there tells me that somebody behind the scenes is really pushing this as a priority and we're going to see it again And you know there
were many years that um somebody told me that the sovereign immunity bill wasn't um going to pass and wasn't going to pass That probably happened seven eight years in a row Well when you see one of my last slides it's passing probably this year So uh never say never They just you know push it a little bit more change it every year Yeah Mr I I haven't
looked at the the bills to see the voting that's going on now Is are our local representatives um supporting any of this or the the bill that I sent the email on Friday
evening has already passed the Senate at 37 to zero So nobody voted against it right and according to uh Jordan Connor's standby here um there was um some
discussion The bill has one more committee of reference which is the state affairs committee and the next meeting is currently scheduled for the 17th of April but there is no published agenda The House is currently on a 24-hour meeting notice If it passes the
state affairs this week or next it'll be placed on second reading In order to be heard on the House floor the bill has been placed on the House special order calendar Once that happens it can be heard and amended Then it gets rolled over to third reading This is when the House votes on the bill Since the Senate version is in the House messages the
House could amend their bill to make it identical to the Senate version Then they would substitute the House bill with the Senate bill and pass it and it goes directly to the governor Right if they don't like the Senate version they can take the Senate bill and remove language etc but it's almost verbatim anyway So it's likely that's what
they'll do Yeah I try not to get into boring everybody with the parliamentaries but the the reality is they could at any time wave what they call the rules which is that they has to go through three committees before going to the floor of any chamber and they could just bring it to the floor of the chamber So that's why we never say never We're always watching these bills um
because they could pop up at any point Uh with that said 943 has a 50/50 right now of passing because time could run out Um one thing I will point to uh well actually two point two specifies that any quasi judicial board of local
government is not authorized to review these affordable housing projects So our LPA for example they want to close that close that loophole and really make it totally administrative So you can't see any even those advisory boards they would be null and void as far as those projects go They would not um have a say
in the process So so they go to the DEEO Uh well with so there's another bill I want to talk about later that kind of goes into that Um for this process it would just be city staff Um administratively approved affordable housing administration located right and
it's actually all done administratively because when you think about these affordable housing projects they have to be qualified as an affordable housing project but it's the state uh department that actually not the state department the uh Florida um housing finance corporation that actually will determine that Well that's actually not 100%
accurate It's our administrative review and it's our responsibility to enter into a Lara which is a land agreement that would regulate the use of the land The state only does the ones that are qualified for the 100% tax exemption
because they're going to maintain their rents at the state set rent of like 1,300 a month a month If a landlord in Martin County wants to have their rent be based upon 120% of the average the
AMI which is $84,000 the average rent there to meet the affordable housing is $2,530 a month including utilities So let's take 300 bucks off for wastewater
water electric cable and um garbage and storm water And that leaves about $2,200 If the landlord or developer wants to charge and will agree to sign a Lara agreement which is a deed restriction for 30 years doesn't do this straight we
have to administratively do it here and regulating 40% of their units The biggest problem with that is once they sign that agreement how do we know what their rents are no Yeah Like we don't get to see the rent So which is why it's
not about affordable housing right well my understanding was that I mean what qualifies as affordable housing is not set by us That's set by the state 20% of the AMI which is 2,200 bucks a month for a two-bedroom two-b apartment But then let's say we set it at that and let's
say they come in and we sign the administrative deal and we say that's what the rent's going to be right well and let's say you how do we track it advertising for 3,000 a month What do you And they say that's not one of the 40% Yeah They say "Oh no Those are the other ones That's not within the 40%
Those are our 40%s are all full We're just advertising the 3,000s." And you don't No And and how do you do the audit because this is them just trying to keep 2019 and 2020 going forever essentially it's it's to keep paving and keep producing buildings I mean that's
that's what they're doing Um I didn't want to try to this bill is massive and there are a lot of points we could go into like you can't require um more than 10% for some on the multi-m mixeduse development for commercial or some other use So they're trying to keep us uh so
that we cannot restrict the housing side of those mixeduse developments even So it gets really complicated the biggest points I think that that matter the most here um is that at the end of the day oops trying to get the laser pointer
um local governments must authorize the inclusion of an adjacent parcel of land as part of the multif family development regardless of the land use designation on the adjacent parcel So I didn't mention the demolition part I'll get into that too uh everything that is being um transformed over to
administrative procedure they're also tying the hands of whoever is administrating you know staff basically in these cities and counties Right now we're not allowed to say "Oh that's out of zoning Um it's industrial or that's out of zoning That's for single family You can't use that for multif family." If it's an adjacent parcel it's adjacent
And as long as they qualify or live local they can they can include that So if a developer bought two parcels one adjacent to the other but one of the ones that is adjacent to the developed property is also adjacent to single family there's where that you know multi-story building can go Where is
this one sitting um this is right now in its final committee like Jordan was saying and then it'll go a lot of the committees are meeting I think on Wednesday this week So we'll be keeping an eye on No this is the this is the but this is the true live local act amendment Right Right Um and there have been a couple others that were filed
this year This is the one that has been amended I think 10 times now that there's at least 10 amendments that were filed So it's gone through a substantial revision process like that infill section getting deleted which was the most important for us and it has a Senate mirror
So well without getting into the politic of it what I have heard is that some of these bills are so radical because that house member and it's usually coming from the house that house member wants something on the financial side in the budget conference So they're taking these radical policy measures and saying
"Okay well I'll amend this if you give me X." And it's that horse trading they always talk about So our best hope right now is that there's a trade and a lot of this disappears and um it becomes a nothing piece of legislation and and that person gets uh whatever project they were hoping to get funded So uh but
I think that's kind of hopeful um considering how much is loaded in here Um so that's that's 943 Mhm The next one which there's another there's another one 11:35 Oh wait There's more Right So yeah And I'm not trying to
belabor all these points but this one stuck out to me because um if I could get the projector to work today It's like the battery might be dying on me Come on Kick it There we go So
normally when I see a bill's called emergencies I think they're about emergencies No no that's different One concern that I have here is that yes it does start with the premise of an emergency as you can see But um this is really about land development regulations and our ability to adopt
them Uh pro this bill would prohibit local government in any county affected by those three hurricanes last year Uh from adopting enforcing be us right yes we we were affected by Milton So you have to when the email I sent you included the link to the federal page
but the county has to have been declared by the federal government to be in the emergency and if you look under the Milton on the link that I gave you St Lucy and Martin counties both qualify under Milton So we do qualify under this bill Good job Milton And in most I think
it's important to say that most counties in in most years do you have a question i do have a question because I read I went to and read the actual bill and the way it reads is we I'm not an attorney and I'm certainly not someone in
legislation but it reads that it's only two years No Well it it has a like it sets in 27 I think October 27 is the last time you can regulate January 28 is when it sunsets The way it reads is that you we can't do any restrictions to homes that were devastated or need
fixing under a hurricane It doesn't say the whole county So it says in the county where homes were devastated you can't for example what comp plan amendment could you make that wouldn't
affect all homes right well what I'm saying is so when it says you can't make a comp plan amendment right if you made a comp plan amendment related to just the homes that were affected by the hurricane it would be illegal and be void So you can't do that
A comp plan amendment is a global thing And it says comp plan amendment So it shows that the legislative intent is clearly to not just be limited to that And and to Commissioner Job's point I will say this this one went under the radar almost the whole session thus far
because early on we believe that the language was more sufficiently trying to target those home and homeowners that were injured under emergencies But suddenly this language appeared as an amendment of course got approved and all that that
basically complete for three years and I will say three years up front counties and cities in those counties that were in a declared emergency or near one and I'll get to that in a second because it has to do with storm track cannot adopt and they cannot adopt comprehensive plan
land land development regulations or do a moratoria by the way and that's retroactive to August of last year right that retroactive clause in there is really interesting which feels personal because that's when we started our zip right and and it is personal Everything
we just did would be voided Right Now I would say that retroactive clause I don't believe has to do with us per se They made it retroactive before the storm season started because they wanted to be able to blanket anyone that was affected by the storm Storm Yeah Um I guess I guess
with with that said they provide for uh of course a new exposure for us um if we don't follow this And the last point is the one that's even more concerning I think is that perspectively so in the future if we have a hurricane that comes through the state of Florida the governor says well I need to declare a
state of emergency for 40ome counties even though it might only hit a few counties I don't know where it's going to landfall again that that you know the it's federal It's not the state Our declaration of emergency didn't have any impact on it Neither the feds or neither the state And when I looked up Milton
Dade and Broward County were not federally declared emergencies as far as Milton is concerned I didn't look up the other two hurricanes Helen and the other ones I think once I looked up Milton and saw that Martin County was in it I didn't spend any more time searching it
I'm I imagine if you looked up all three hurricanes you'd come pretty close to 67 And and so the concern is that the first year that we would be able to actually adopt a new comp plan um that's more restrictive Again I don't know how you adopt a comp plan that that is not more
restrictive to someone Um that wouldn't be until October 1st of 2027 but if we had amendments to your comp plan that were more liberal you could go up Yeah Yeah 35 units an acre That's true And it should be noted too that that property
owners just so that the depending on somebody watching this meeting or whatever it doesn't prohibit the land owner from making an application for a comp plan amendment Just the government right that's true So again the first year we would be able to do that would
be October 1st granted Yeah To that point Yeah If a landowner came in and said "I want to reduce my density." Oh okay But but he wouldn't No he the land owner came in and said "I wanted to change
my comprehensive my future land use from a to multif family or I want to change my future land use from industrial to commercial something of that nature where the the the government has the ability to consider that kind of
comprehensive land use amendment if it was applied for just as if a landowner came in and changed like using East Stewart because it's on our minds and somebody came in and said I want to change my application from SFD to make my property from single
family duplex to make it BMI or BMU The commission could contemplate that because the applicant came in and asked for it but the city commission can't say we're gonna change that land use or
zoning Who sponsored this somebody in St Petersburg Lucifer Lucifer Mr Hog do you know who sponsored this i can look up I don't know off the top of my head I don't know which Yeah I don't
know which one But this is the one that's sitting in the affairs state affairs committee right uh and John Snider is on that committee Yeah it's in the final committee So if he picks up any of the phone the phone for any of you guys they're trying to get a hold of them for like two weeks for something
else He's he's on that committee So it's important to remember though that this bill does a lot more than this This is a very very small section Yeah This is page 57 section 30 right or page 57 progress
language John So the reason Yeah And I mean that's the way to go about it of course is to ask them for an amendment but it's important to to note that we're seeing this more And I have another bill I'm going to give you example where they where four years ago it was a single itself bill It was exclusive by itself And now it's been put in a bill that
doesn't even have anything to do with that's the last one But Gail Harold already voted on this So 370 I don't know if she voted or not I just know that the outcome was 37 To be fair to the legislators for tracking purposes yes there is a vote history We typically at least in the state of Florida don't
account for the committee votes because so it's just so often the committee say you know I I may not agree or I agree I'm just voting to move it through the process Speaking to Jordan the Senate voted right total out of committee on the floor So the Senate vote wasn't
committee It was straight vote this one Yeah Yes It's over like in the Senate It's done They finished it Was it so right That's why I was trying not to depress everybody in the room To be depressing Seriously Um like you've
done a good job Beat you to it So uh the last few bills are going to be pretty quick Um thankfully for the CRA bill uh it was amended uh or an amendment was filed I should say today uh that would remove the most problematic language which was yes
they're going to terminate all CRAAS no matter what So that that is something that we believe this bill will pass Um there won't be any new CRAAS allowed in the state Uh so they are going to be sunset but instead of it just stopping us from doing any new projects with all that tax revenue um after October 1st of
this year they amended it to say those projects can continue as long as you can complete them before the termination date of your CRA or the the bondness and the and the the debt service itself needs to be um completely cleared out before the the termination of your CRA
It just so happens that we it was a 2019 we renewed for another 30 years So almost every project that we would be working on in the near future we could get um completely funded completed long before that So that that was the the reason I kept this on here is because that was only the House bill that had
that amendment and it was the bill sponsor So it it's probably going to change I just have no guarantees over what the Senate will do and and use up that money and get it right Most people understood that this is how the language needed to be That is this could have been the objection to
the CRA come came from one house member over a parade was the source of it Maybe they'll change This very well could have been a horse trade too at the end of the day So um I'm not going to speak any more about it That's essentially what the bill would have done Mr Joby do you have a question i actually just want to
go back Um HB1535 was sponsored by Fion Representative Fiona McFarland Okay don't know her So it wasn't Lucifer Sorry it wasn't person Yeah could be co-sponsored by Lucifer
That's an odd slide I know I'm having a heck of a time with this So um impact fees I'm not going to spend time on this either Uh basically they just want to establish a new plant-based methodology whenever we um make increasing impact fees in the future I don't think it's uh
I don't think it's going to impact us uh too much I just kept it on here because again I suspect with impact fees we're going to see more changes in the future that are that are worse than this They're they're just starting the process So this is like a lookout um in the
future And if I can get this to work um same thing with this bill uh it did have legs early and in the last couple of weeks it sort of has completely died out So I think the probability of this actually passing is now going to be less than 50% But I kept it on here because
we're we're really seeing um the revenue generations for local governments be kind of strangled in different ways by the state which is pretty harmful um to us when we already are so limited And so for local business taxes what they wanted to do here that's the craziest bill It made no sense If you think of
like community like Indian Town which is growing with so many right their their their total revenue would be frozen at that Exactly make it just and so this isn't the first time that part of the language has been in a bill We've seen this the last couple of years Um and
again you're probably going to see it again I don't know it's it's different legislators pushing this too So it's not from one place competition to show who can do the most savings to the taxpayer without
taking into consideration the responsibility to provide services And what's the fee Mr Mortau we charge it's it's not 150 It's our business taxes range from $25 to $100
It's so nominal So if your business can't afford that you know you probably shouldn't be in business The only businesses like Costco or the large retail organizations are the ones that are the most enormous amount of money because of the gross
receipts for their sales which ironically enough at the bottom of this you'll see that um they they say exempts business taxes that are imposed on merchants that are measured by gross receipts So that that would still be in effect It was just but it's also the
only way the city can keep track of the businesses that are in the city This that as Mr Martell says we have a responsibility for it's also inspections and all stuff It's like so it's crazy So that bill is
probably not going to pass if I had to take a guess Um it's not uh even going to get out of committee Good news So one bill made it Um the the same thing with the local options tax It was amended um at well an amendment was filed today So in my opinion because
it's the bill sponsor it's going to be approved But uh what we were concerned about is that certax that was passed for for um Martin County residents back in November in the election that was going to be a 10year What this would would have cut it down to eight years Not the
worst thing but that wasn't the plan And we would have had to renew it before 2033 for another eight years This bill still requires all future um such taxes to only go eight years maximum However they did put in a grandfather clause with that new amendment which means
because we have this new tax already on the books before June of or the end of June this year um it's exempt from that provision Uh so it would still be able to go 10 years Then any anyone after that would only be eight years max And don't forget that also we the year
before the school or two years before the school board had passed that infrastructure half cent sales tax that would also have been affected So this bill does have a high chance of passing Um but the most concerning language at least for that uh taxes out right now Um so again a little bit more
light there So that's just going to restructure the bond the I mean I mean I don't mind stuff suns setting That doesn't bother me Yeah As long as you can renew it if you so the public so chooses right yeah Okay I think they
were concerned about some of the bond the legal u ramifications of of conflicts with bonds So I think that was part of why they did that Um and then the last two bills if I can get it to go the big the big one's the cyber immunity bill Um this is super concerning for us financially because if you look at the
changes um it's going to basically come October uh almost triple well triple if you consider multiple claims but um the potential exposure is going to go up We don't know and I've talked to Jolie many times about it already Um you cut it way
down So we're going from 200,000 uh for any torsious claim for one person or 300,000 for multiple claims arising out of the same incident So starting October of even this year 200 jumps to 500 The 300,000 jumps to 1 million Originally
when this bill was drafted it was even worse Once the 5 years went by yeah that went to 3 million Um which would have been 10 times what it is today after in five years So substantial you understand what this this is this is always a very
silly name to me it means it doesn't mean immunity at all but you know there's some smaller municipalities because the the second phase like the 200 300 if there's four people in a car accident it's a cap of $300,000 total
for those four people and I know that like personally I carry a million dollar umbrella to make sure that And so the city of Stewart only had to have a $200,000 policy essentially We all always had a million dollar policy But while I don't like the number going up
because it exposes us to more liability and it also it costs more for us obviously the truth of it is is that it hasn't gone up significantly in the last that we had one increase a few years ago 100 to 200 right but the other side to
it is is that last year they had extensive tort reform and they reduced the statute of limitations to two years and they changed the burdens of proof and and all sorts of other stuff that could reduce exposure and reduce claims over the long run So it'll have to
balance out I don't I'm more concerned about the other bills personally than this one you know the CRA bill and the business tax bill would be financial hits right up front and then the the you know where you get these administrative
zoning bills where you just nobody knows what's happening and everything's just coming forward is that's a disaster I I just my concern with a bill like this is while Mike is correct that there have been um limitations including the statute of limitations actually being reduced from I think three to two years
in in some instances We're also seeing in some of these development bills exposures being purposely increased um in different ways so that these would apply I mean at the end of and for the public that that might not be aware what sovereign immunity is this is where the government defines the conditions in
which it allows someone who has been who has a grievance against a government to sue uh that government So we're allowing ourselves to be sued but we don't the state legislature defines the terms in which we're allowed to be sued um under general laws or special law So So Mr
Martell our insurance bill if this were to pass it is passing Our insurance bill would go up Correct It will Yes And we discussed it at Trico What and we have discussed it at Tricco meetings that it'll it'll cause it to go up for sure I think it'll increase claims for sure Individual claims will go up Sure
There's a disincentive to have a large claim with a $200,000 cap with plaintiff's attorneys You move it to 500 and a million There's going to be an incentive for plaintiff attorneys to make it a bigger claim Sure There's their motivation to settle before Yeah
was better because they you know if you offer them 150 160 grand it's not worth going to trial But if it's a $350,000 claim they're not going to take 175 anymore They're going to take the take the dis go the distance and plaintiffs doctors that do it on a contingency
basis as well will keep their bills down at 200 versus 500,000 they can let it rip Yeah So it will okay well that's not good news So much for the lighter news on that on that side But um the last one is the one that I wanted to mention Um I
don't know if it's going to pass but what was most concerning other than the fact there sorry I'm trying to get back to the slide that that they're trying to eliminate regional planning councils was the fact that that's not what the bill is actually called Um it has to do with uh rural and urban business enterprise
And that does make up a lot of the bill but this makes up a substantial portion too And they added this in here but four years ago in 2021 this was a standalone bill today it gets kind of put into this larger bill that actually has to do with state agency reforms and um you know I
mean I forget how big the bill is It's massive comparative to the others and all of a sudden out of nowhere regional planning council is eliminated but local governments can create their own um and deal with centralized uh land development regulation assistance under
the state land planning agency to the greatest extent possible So for the public we get assistance in planning Um when we did the uh recent code change not not through the zip but uh last year we uh approved the formbbased code A lot of that came from you know being a small
city a lot of that assistance comes from the regional planning council and their technical expertise So effectively regional planning councils assist smaller governments with being able to to help manage their their development regulations Well if they don't exist
then it's really up to the city And I guess the state and those other developments was saying well those other bills was saying well they're going to do a lot of the regulations up at the state so I guess what do we need assistance with so it kind of goes hand in hand where you're seeing this whole thematically um stripping of of city
governments and councils with the authority to kind of determine how their communities look It's just so peacemeal And obviously the the the boiling frog uh metaphor is used often but what we've seen over the last 3 years in particular but the last several years is that
stripping away of uh local home rule And so I think that bill was just really reminiscent of what used to be normal which is a singular issue bill that talks about the single issue and now they're kind of you know stuffing it into other packages and you can't see a
question Yeah I guess he kind of brought it up but um I was wondering who was where was the money going to come from to create these entities and you know who's going to fund it primarily right now regional
plan councils are funded by you know federal grants It's funded by state and local governments as well Um there's assistance I think I think if anything this is the state putting the entire onus on local governments to get themselves together create their own regions create their own system and
completely yeah divorce the the state from that process because the the way the state is going to see it in the future is their their land planning agency are the experts are the ones reviewing what do we need this middleman for So interesting Commissioner Joby um question has it been or will it be will
this be presented to the CRA the CRB the local planning advisory none of our advisory boards is there a way to at least notify them to watch this so that they could see they're watching it I mean I mean this is a this is an annual thing we go through and once the once the bills are
adopted any changes will be presented to them obviously but quite frankly if the if the two bills get adopted there won't be a lot of LPA meetings No I know there may not be many commissioners needed either And and that again what I wanted
to get across with this presentation is regardless of which one of these bills passed the direction that we're seeing the aims that they have in the legislature right now in Tallahassee are very clear And it's important to kind of keep that in mind when you're having outside discussions with our legislators and and others and other jurisdictions
about the pressure they're under to go that direction And that's it That's it for my presentation for today Yeah Where does the pressure come from lobbyists developers obviously developers posing as lobbies Yeah Yeah Doesn't necessarily
benefit the residents that live in the state of Florida Yeah I I don't know how you look at it issue I mean yeah without getting into the politic of course of it is But it's 2100 a month Ula that's lobbyist My mortgage is less than that
Yeah we get more than the scale of the economy of scale will go down The developers arguments for for what it's worth I'm not trying to play devil's advocate for them It's just their argument is essentially when we go to city X they tell us one thing When we go to the next town over they tell us another thing And we have to constantly
adapt ourselves Why can't we just have a uniform system in the whole state and that's what they keep I understand where they're coming from but that's what makes the city unique right small town So any other questions of Mr Hogarth same Thank you Ben Thank you all I appreciate
it very much Can I get a motion for approval of the consent calendar move approval We have a motion by Commissioner Clark and a second by Commissioner Gopi Is there any public comment on this item seeing none Roll call
Commissioner Gio yes Commissioner Reid yes Mayor Rich yes Vice Mayor Collins yes And Commissioner Clark yes Mr Bagget could you read item 10 for our consideration please sure Resolution number
43-2025 a resolution of the city commission of the city of Stewart Florida appointing the advisory board member Pearly Clark for the vacant position of the East Stewart Historical Advisory Committee and adopting the member term for the remaining 2025
calendar year providing an effective date and for other purposes And we made her sit through this whole meeting She is present in the audience Yeah Mr Mayor if there's no um questions uh resolution number
432025 I move approval on the basis that I know Miss Clark very well and I know that she's going to be a good member of this East Stewart Historical Advisory Committee So I'm asking for a second to my motion please Have a motion by Commissioner Clerk and a second by the
vice mayor Do we have any public comment on this item seeing none roll call please Mayor Rich yes Commissioner Gio yes Commissioner Clark yes Commissioner Reid yes And Vice Mayor Collins yes
[Applause] Congratulations Do you want to say something Pearl we did that early in the meeting We had We had Yes we did Mike you said it was just going to be Mike No it was non
agenda item We had public comment No talk Why don't we Which item Helen miss McBride it says comments from the public not agenda Yes we provided opportunity for that So but she on the agenda No I have nothing
Okay Thank you and I enjoy so much enjoy spending time with the four of you that I'll see you all on Wednesday Can I before we uh dismiss I wanted to ask wants to say something sure After that
sir Miss Clark wants to say something Hello Board member clerk Board member Clark It's indeed a pleasure to be Okay there you go There you Thank you Miss Clark It's indeed a pleasure to be uh
appointed to this commission and I've been with the city for a while Uh attorney motel and so I'm it's I'll do my best to do whatever is necessary and whatever is
uh for me to qualify to do this job And for background purposes Miss Clark has served as our uh designate for the Steuart Housing Authority for many years and she also served on the SIRB board for many years So she's been a an an avid volunteer for the city And she's a
mother of the editor of the Palm Beach Post Congratulations M We look forward to your contribution [Applause] Mr Vice Mayor Yeah with regard to the the various bills that we went through I
wanted to ask if you all would be open to because um you know Mr Mortell can't really from my understanding even call John Snyder Well I can I can upon specific direction from the commission but I can't
anticipate your political beliefs Correct So it has to be afterwards I feel like we're all pretty much on the same page with these but I I think the best course of action would be independent resolutions
um requesting that you know you might have better language for this Ben but that they vote no that that we make some changes here but I would like to to see us send correspondence you know with a
resolution for each one of these SB784 HB 381 Um also for SB1730 also for HP 943 and um lastly HP14 I I would I would say just agree Julie Um for because of the location of
where they're at um the bills that we would have the potential of having an impact on because they're not already on the floor getting voted or have gotten voted would be 943 So the the one that we're most concerned with 1535 is another one still in committee Um we're not worried anymore about the CRA bill
Um so the only other one that would be uh the sovereign immunity bill um is still well no sorry that's on the house 784 SP 784 So that's on the Senate calendar already meaning it's um the ADU bill passed the Senate unanimously as
Mike said So that's in the house now The Senate the Senate is taking that up I think this week for the platting bill 784 Okay Um I don't know if we can do anything in so in time for those bills but at least if we had a formal resolve with the five of us or the majority of
us I think that would give a little more punch if you know we're talking to Jordan Connors or Mike's talking to John It does create a unified front going into that vote Would Would you prefer it if I if I Well because the issue is is
timing and so I I draft language and then you all don't see the language I draft or Mike drafts or Lee drafts and then we try to we try to send something I mean I think that we authorize us to send the notice and have the mayor sign the uh resolutions and upon approval of the city attorney
without coming back to the board for approval or you could just call the legislature yourself That's what I'm saying for sure But that's that's as powerful It's those of you who wish to do it Unfortunately they don't pick up the phone But I will say as a city I
would like us to in a unified if you call John Snider he won't talk to you They don't pick these guys don't pick up the phone Tried for 2 months Wow Okay For what it's worth the resolutions have always been more of like a like a public statement and and they show where
you where that you as a commission have as a position on a particular uh piece of legislation Um I my my only thing my only thought process is that a couple of these bills have already gotten so far We could still I mean don't get me wrong we could still say it by resolution but the most important one that we still
have time to affect are the 943 and the and the 1535 bill Those two bills are the big the ones we're most concerned with But also 1730 is how far was 1730 that's that's getting voted on on the floor So it's not even in the committee uh to get changed So it's those are ones
that have already been kind of decided on 943 has been amended so much there's a potential that that could still grind to a halt and there's been a lot of push back on that one 1535 was one that just blew up out of nowhere and now uh the league's all over it and a lot of other
agencies So we those are the two that we have the biggest city is working on 1730 was the the uh live local It's a small live local bill compared to 940 very tiny because what it was dealing with was the moratorum limiting moratoriums in the future That was like the primary
uh change in that bill Um and a little bit of clarifying language in the live local but it was not nearly as concerning as as 943 So my my ask would be if everybody's on the same page um 1535 943 but also 1730 If you guys could
bang those out without us 943 and 1730 Yeah Okay I don't agree to that You do not No you have to vote No I think we should just I don't agree to that Let it go through Make a motion So then I I'd like to make Do you need a Would you like a motion or consensus you have to
have a motion You can make a motion So may I'd like to make a motion that we draft those letters in in the form of a resolution as well um for HP 1535 HP 943
and SP 1730 And you guys can get that out without our And you want all three of them to be separate separate resolutions I'll second that for it too Thank you sir Is that saying that we're against the Yes the way that things are we're We're trying to protect City of
Stewart Yep Yep That's why I sit up here Yep And that's why I sit here too And And it's a pretty general in terms of the preeemption What it's it's a general home rule issue too So it's a preeemption issue And if we can get those in their their email boxes as
quickly as humanly possible Wednesday apparently is one of the big days this week So it's Yeah I know I'm giving you a lot to do Well that's fair You're just speaking against these bills generally not specifically
So that's part of the the issue with the language is as long as the commission's okay with you know staff basically drafting that language we can keep it as vanilla as possible I mean pretty pretty simple but um as long as the commission's okay in home ruled terms
Yeah And you you you appreciate how at least the majority of this commission is postured towards these kinds of issues I think you can reflect that in your language without being stronger than just vanilla Yeah It's it's we're not
politically We have form resolutions used in the past both in favor of and opposing legislation So we will use one of those and and we can keep them very short too so they're succinct It's not doesn't go over Um so we could do that
pretty quickly But um again my recommendation would would not be to worry about those other ones because it's so far in the process There's not much we could change anyway Well those three and if they have a companion um house bill as well or senate bill So like SB 1730 whatever it's companion
bill in the house Yeah So 943 has no companion Um 1730 I believe did and 1535 it has a companion in the Senate that is very different Okay So I don't know if I would include that in the resolution per se because it have you looked at it yes It's it that language that we talked
about today It's not even close to that So it's it hits on other parts of emergency management and it's a massive talk about zoning in progress It doesn't um I can't say that either It did a little bit but it that bill right there just completely eliminates anything that
we can do in the next 3 years The one that that is in the Senate side talks more about post disaster for 6 months you can't do X um on the property owners and it's it's not anywhere close to that Does it talk about retroactively going back to August 24th not that I remember
No the Senate bill I'm talking about for the 1535 HP 1535 Yeah So I I can include it anyway Um because it could the problem with these parliamentary processes is that language could suddenly change in that bill tomorrow and for the better or worse for us we
come we stay the formal position and then and then suddenly the bill changes to something we like or or it gets worse and we didn't add it Well with with I I think without getting too deep in the weeds with specifically HP535 would be retroactively going back
to August of 2024 I'd like you to include that in there Absolutely And then um handcuffing us from being able to implement the changes we made in that zip you know for the next three years Three years at a minimum because if in three years we have another hurricane
that year coincidentally it's going to end So that is where and if that language is in the Senate bill companion please please send that to the Senate as well Absolutely We can do that So those three bills and then their companions we can do that for you Is that something
that we can send to all House members and all Senate members or just the representatives how does that work you can send it to all of them but I can tell you the guy that lives in Jacksonville doesn't really care how you feel for sure But at least we've said it
and we I mean he knows you're not voting for him right can we at least send it to the person McFarland who was the the sponsor we can you certainly your local legislators but then the chair and the vice chair of the committees Yeah I can you mentioned
that the league was on top of it What is the league's position on that SP535 so flare emails I I can't recall the exact language The flare email started going out late last week like over the weekend And those emails were saying a lot of what we talked about already here
which is this is kind of the I call it the Trojan horse It's hey we're we're coming in We're going to do this under the guise of emergency management but at the same time behind the scenes control but it has some good benefits and it has some bad benefits Well the problem is again they're hiding these sorts of
changes in larger bills that deal with wholly different issues and that gets into this single this illegal question of single issue um context and that's it could be pretty broad for these legislators So um I don't think anyone's going to challenge that but the problem
is is it's a parliamentary kind of tactic to to hide them in there So the emergency bill per se maybe the the the commission doesn't have a problem with but it's specifically this language and and we can draft those resolutions to be very specific to this language which is
important because those bill sponsors want their bill to pass and maybe they're not married to that language Maybe that was somebody else that that brought that in So um anyway I I I didn't want to belabor it too much You feel like you you get where the majority
is coming from yes I do So there's You made a motion I believe didn't you i did Yes Is there a second so we have a motion by the vice mayor and a second by Commissioner Gobi Is there public comment commission Oh no I have no public comment No public comment
He was okay Are there questions or comments by the commissioners i think we've already talked about that Uh roll call please Commissioner go What was it go ahead Commissioner Dobby Yes
Commissioner Clark I'm torn Say yes We'll see what Ben presents Okay Thanks You have to vote That's what I'm saying Ben is going to Yes Okay Say the word
Yes Yes Mayor Rich Me yes Commissioner Collins Things complicated Yes And Commissioner Reid Vice Mayor Yes Okay We'll see what Ben does Thank you Mr Hogarth Thank you so much Thank you for everything Seeing no other items for our consideration the meeting
is ajourned Thank you mate It's tough