--------- oak trees arriving hopefully by next week okay hopefully by next week okay I just want to make sure that I said that a couple of times so that those trees will be done they're going to be the bigger caliper ones the thicker ones uh
so they we won't lose them because of you know smaller trees so everything that um is is is moving forward H that's what I have off the top of my head uh I've been missing any anything okay unless you have any
questions yeah I do mayor I was going to wait for the commission report but um are we doing anything about the fpnl the lighting on the city the PO lights thank you for asking me that question go based on the question commissioner Ian um
commissioner ranua yourself and a couple of others have asked the president of of the commission um I kept hearing lights that are out and stuff like that and I said let me just check so I had uh our chief code officer
get a a group of the Cod enforcement officers and kind of switch the the schedule on them and go at nighttime and count the lights up to now I think we have a total of 71 lights in one part of the city and we're still finishing up
the other part with fpnl I got a a call in with fpnl to see the status on these lights I also have done a review with u finan that we're comparing the budgets of the Florida Power and Light and the
lights and why are they out and so on I know there's a strand lights on sth street and but 14th Avenue Northwest 7 Street they go on they go off it's you know depending when you're going by they're either on or off that should not be so I'm we working with Florida Power
and Light they've been very receptive to work with us and in fact they just uh brought in today I believe tomorrow is being installed a Transformer and in the park that's 800
watts so we're we're building up a great relationship as we've had in the past and we should try to get those lights on as fast as possible but beautification is something we're going to be looking at the city and certain areas and we might be looking at enhancing the light
system to the LED Style and we're looking into that too so part of the beautification is improving the look of the city but also the quality of life yeah so that's where it's at mayor do we have a contract with them with we
do we have a contract but we that's part of um looking at everything within that contract and finding out which polls are and are not within the system and that's been a little special yeah because there there's a couple of places that we need
a little bit of lighting so we improving we're improving certain areas right now due to the grants that we've got in federal grants we'll be improving some of the areas and one of the areas that you mentioned and so did the president of the commission uh we're looking to improve lighting the street
and also drainage there severely and that's in the works as we speak and and that's also coming from the grant it's coming from one of the grants one have several grants working at the same time thank you mayor welcome all right so moving over to Commission report which I
think uh CH he's ready taking it over go ahead yes okay I really want to congratulate Sandra and her staff they're doing a hell of a jobs I have been there you know on Thursday night and she has make actually the park alive today you should see how many kids the
parents are really very grateful I have been having a lot of calls from them thank you you mayor for what you doing and they really appreciate it and Sandra thank you you're doing you're working very hard I really appr I'm seeing your work that's what I'm saying I really
appreciate you go ahead we knew she was an ace but mat she's got even better thank you yeah um I I would like to give my condolence uh also to the um
Oscar from the Senior Center thank you he uh passed away I don't know if you guys know this or not he passed away the other day and um nothing that and also I would like to um give a special welcome to this kid right
here Andy Garcia his dad is not Andy Garcia he's that he's a ninth grader his grandma called me the other day for a past a month to C so he so he can come to the first meeting of his life so welcome to Sweet Water buddy Andy thank you very much for being here Andy yep
and um that's it I don't think I have anything else I got something for the police report whenever it comes in for for the chief thank you all right go ahead uh Mr V thank you Mr President so uh mayor and and chief of police um listen what you
guys have been doing um in the time you've been here it's going to be a year and a half or two years now may congratulations and thank you for the work you guys do um in area one specifically the area where the dorms are where our residents are continuously
complaining about parking issues and unfortunately a lot of the students are parking in front of not only in front of uh the residential homes but they're actually blocking driveways so I have made a recommend sort of parking system
similar to Miami Beach Coral Gables whether we have a colorcoded parking Zone um it's something to explore I respectfully request that you guys come up with some sort of system uh because it gets to a point to where these
students are parking in front of residents homes a lot of the residents will go ahead call the police the police will respond immediately the car will get towed and now the residents are feeling like their heart their house is being targeted uh by those students and
they're they're feeling some sort of way so if we can you know come uh and have a general consensus or some sort of plan of attack I know it's not the most important thing you guys are most certainly handling um a lot of important issues but if we can figure out an
efficient way to address that issue specifically while we're developing the area I would greatly appreciate let's be included in those conversations conversations are taking place uh we have two companies that we're zeroing in on um and Scott you want to come up a
second this is a little bit more complex I think you guys all know this because you've been through this problems of having buildings without parkings and some that have have the parking that they should have and so on that's why I've been so strong as you all well know
that one bed one parking space because that would eliminate it kind of in the future because of the Overflow students but we have to deal with what we have one of the things we do have is an Antiquated system that people had to do and pay for x amount and half the time
the machines are broken and it and it's uh even though it's street parking and we have to relook at the certain areas that the parking could be allowed there's commercial areas that this city has not taken advantage of which other cities do take advantage of
every city that used to have free parking outside of commercial areas I'm not saying inside their parking lot but outside the general areas have created pay by by phone or one of the other companies or so on so he'll explain the
both companies that we're looking at right now but it's either going to be all or nothing or we we have to figure out what which way and these companies are supposed to be helping uh look in the
areas they're professionals they could see the the need and to do these things but Scott what go ahead and we're talking to two firms Scott melberg Finance Director City of Sweetwater we're talking to park mobile and to pay by phone um the two companies that dominate the app industry for parking so
that we can get rid of the um parking meters that we have now that break often they require receipts people have to put things on their dashboard it's just not convenient for the customer if they want to add time they have to come back to the machine they can't do it remotely so
we're talking to both of them I want to get it so that we don't have two different signs for each one but we have one sign with both apps on them like if you go into Coral Gables now or you go into South Miami you have both of these apps on the signage and then we're going
to have a parking study done they do have a service where we can look and see how we can maximize our parking Revenue but as you've all said there appear to be places in the city where we could add parking spaces to make sure that we have additional parking for the buildings that existing now and make sure that if
you're parking in those places you're paying for them and if you're not paying for them then we can have you towed but we want to do a study we can use our CIT money to do that and later on this year if it's above the mayor's threshold we'll be bringing you the contract for that parking study and that is the
conversation and then we'll have as commissioner what I was asking for um I know in the past you guys have floated out ideas of having a centralized parking situation like some cities have had to go to because of limitation as to
areas well we're we're almost there we got eight more buildings coming into the city and it's creating even though everybody's trying to buckle down to try to get less less parking in their buildings because it means more of a profit to them and I understand that and
God bless them but at the same time we have to protect our citizens and protect the way of life here and the quality of life in the city of Sweetwater so this is why it's so important what Scott just mentioned because we don't want to do rule by thumb you know we we want to have the the math behind it and so on so
we already looked at it we have one more issue which is um we were talking to other cities about who they use and we're the uh count City attorney just recently sent a letter to the Department of Revenue because there's a question about about whether or not we should be
charging tax on the parking and we believe now but we're going to confirm this with the Department of Revenue that if you're parking on the street we don't have to charge but if you're parking in a city lot or in which is off Street like our city hall or in front of
passport or in a city garage if we would ever have a garage we're supposed to charge and pay sales tax so there's a lot of moving Parts on this and there something that we I listen I'm trying to make it affordable and at the same time
respectful to those that are coming for whatever reason into the City and they need to park somewhere but there's people that taking abusive uh situations and parking overnight parking in people's parking spaces uh come home from work like the gentleman when we
first started here there was an incident uh comes home from work and some student had parked in his parking space in his duplex as the only place he could park working 6 5: in the morning gets home has an issue and
it it got out of control there this is what we need to try to avoid everybody this is a great City we just got to find a place for everybody to fit in and but we want to do it right we don't want to just try to oh this is a solution oh this is a solution we got to make sure
that it's that and everybody here will be part of it okay thank you Mr just to follow up on what commissioner being was uh I believe he was proposing we actually do have uh an
ordinance an entire section on residential permit parking areas um it is uh it begins at section 42-44 of the city code and goes on for uh for several sections actually um I'm not saying it's perfect I didn't write it this was
written by by another attorney uh but um I don't know if it's if it's good or not because I I didn't write it I haven't reviewed it in several years but that's definitely um um a place to start I believe you might want to look Mr President hence the reason why I'm
saying what I'm saying I want to make sure we do the math on this we want to see what's right I don't want to take up somebody else's positioning uh because we need to understand exactly what's out there first where are we going where are these buildings coming in capacity load
everything else that is important a planner as we're looking at too to see how to plan this properly uh because there's a lot to this it's not just Building a garage and charging no there there's a lot more to this so we want to
be fair to all uh and that that section that you our attorneys ref Part: 2
currently in our impact fees we have our police impact fees and our Park impact fees but we don't have parking impact fees and I'd most certainly like to explore implementing a parking impact fee due to the fact that we now have a
very healthy development in the city of Sweetwater that parking impact fee is only going to help us generate positive cash flow and revenue to eventually maybe have a municipal parking garage or whatnot giving the mayor and the commission more ability to expend more
funds that's just food for thought maybe a strategic planning meeting uh with whomever you decide to to head that most certainly I I I I've been trying to do this for a long time I think now we have the right team in place to do it um so that's just food for thought and the second thing is I want to welcome back
uh my best friend the City attorney Mr Ral Ventura thank you uh we've been he looks he looks better he he looks he looks dashingly handsome we've been smile we've been BFFs for well over a decade um uh listen welcome back I'm
glad you're here I'm not going to talk about the specifics thank you commissioner uh but I'm glad you're uh you're back you're healthy and uh you know good to go with that I it's it's good to be back thank you Mr yes sir um now that we're talking about the parking do we have any
contract with this parking uh contract do we have any contract with these people that we had now no uh all we have is a series of parking meters that if we want them to be fixed they'll charge us and they'll charge us for warranty I
mean it's it's oh okay so are they working all they working right now or do you have any I believe there's at least one over at the um Fifth Street yeah no the the the busiest one over here where the buildings are on 13th up there it's not they're not working yeah I don't
think they one over here on Fifth Street on 107 is working either Fifth Street 107 so there's two the one in front of the um passport agency no id id oh yeah no that's where I'm talking about right yeah that's the one you're talking about that's probably the busiest one too yeah that's the busiest one cu the other day
I was around there and and they're parking in there overnight and all that good stuff all right thank you okay all right thank you very much so moving on uh city clerk's report is it attached city attorney's report uh yes just very quickly uh the 300 building and the
people at 300 Building made their uh third of four payments of $250,000 um the finance department confirmed receipt on February 20th so we're proceeding well with that the uh trailer park case our defense Council uh
that I'm in contact with weekly on this matter uh have filed their motion to dismiss it is an excellent document it it reads like an Appel brief it's like 30 pages long um I have a high level of confidence in that
motion uh then finally we do have one um uh one uh code enforcement lean forclosure matter that uh that has been lingering I agreed to freeze that matter for a few months to give the individual
uh the Lord's home is an older guy he yada yada y you know sob story um and that he um he needed time to go ahead and request uh mitigation uh in front of the mirror um I gave him the time
he hasn't done anything and I spoke to the lawyer today and I said I'll be moving for summon judgment this week so I hope to have that case wrapped up with the next two or three months go ahead without speaking about specifics is this a residential home or a business no it's a business well it's
a residential home that is being rented as a business it's in the North End I can't tell you exactly where it is I can I'll talk to you offline as to the individual but it's it's a house that's being it's being rented out so it's they're running business although it's a residence it's not a homestead is what
I'm saying well we used to decide that but I have all the faith and confidence in the mayor I mean he'll look at you know he'll look at the the particulars of the case we're not trying to screw anybody over it but the fact that he's not responding cause for concern that is cause for concern and I have given the the lawyer as much consideration as I
feel comfortable giving him at this point I I gave him fair warning this morning I said that I will be moving for summary judgment um hopefully by the end of this week if not by the end of next week I've been in touch with Martin Garcia already in order to uh to brief him on this matter and hopefully we'll
be filing something by the end of this week the end of next week at the latest this is a case that I want I want to light a fire under because I feel that um they delayed too far too long thank you uh one more thing um I do
want to thank everybody as as commissioner viena my best friend alluded to yes that um I uh no I I I um I was ill and I I will have some some more challenges coming in the next few months but I do want to
appreciate the um the concern that's been expressed uh by everybody on this panel by by the mayor the mayor staff as well and the courtesies that have been extended thank you all very much it means the world to me soral almost got emotional I didn't
know possible all right moving over to police report um before we start the police report I know it is attached I want to have Chief Gil come up real quickly move he's got an he's got an answer to a question appreciate it uh commissioner M I did get you an answer
to that and basically uh BMW was not giving us uh the same monthly rate but the biggest issue was that they weren't giving us any service with that so Harley-Davidson is giving us a great service package where everything and
anything is included to include clutches which this will be I think the first time that we get that on the house uh so that's huge for us um and and and the other you know also although not the only thing to consider is harleydavidson
is currently the only police motorcycle that is uh manufactured and made in the US because when Kawasaki stopped making them in 2005 over in Lincoln Nebraska they stopped making police motorcycles Al together so thank you Chief
appreciate that all right thank you sir appreciate all right so the police think he's got a question for you no no oh that was for me no that was for you that was the answer to the uh oh okay thanks no he's got yeah I have a yeah
Chief I have a question for the chief that's good it's good Chief thank you for being here Chief I appreciate it it's uh I just want you to um at last week we had a uh promotion ceremony that we have over at makosa you know
recruiting this police officers um I know you talk about over there the um the crime the crime and other good stuff can you bring it up and share to us to the whoever is watching right now so good evening sir J Diaz chief of
police uh good evening mayor and Commissioners yes I did say at the promotional ceremony that our crime rate went down by 34% just to give you uh a little bit of a history I came in in May of
2023 and I started um doing data driven um policing it's called comat and what that is is basically we we map and track all the crimes so we went back to
January of 2023 even before I I started um and we started tracking all the major felonies so I was able to determine with the year 2024 and 2023 our our crimes went up or down and
I'll give you a small snapshot in 20 uh 23 we had 42 aggravated assaults this is just an idea in 2024 we had 19 um sexual batteries in 2023 we had two
last year we had zero and burglaries 2023 133 last year we had 106 so when I add all the major crimes we brought down and I say we because it's a
team without my officers that this would not be possible uh again I said it at the ceremony that it's a team and they have done a great job and we did lower the crime by 34% in
2024 thank you and also Chief also I have another question on reference the uh the trailers I call it the Big Brothers can you give us a any update on that you're talking about the command post yeah the the trailers no no no no not the command post
the trailers that you have on the corners with the lights and all that good oh the the the ones with the cameras yes sir so we we currently have two that we bought and one that a company lend us to use I mve them uh strategically around um the one that I
put by the river right by the uh the condos I mean the the um the FIU dorms has been very very uh good to us I basically we've been watching how pedestrians cross any
accidents anything uh the other two I've been putting throughout the residents in the inner core uh like for our Zone one one I've been putting them in different areas um we currently have another one uh placed uh I
think where The Dumping is too and we also uh have bought uh a pull Cam that we're currently trying to install properly um I can tell you that since I started here um the
littering The Dumping has gone down drastically and I think it was because they knew we meant business Y and we made a rest yes sir we've kept so I think that that's been very crucial to making the city uh much nicer and safer
I will continue to move them around I always ask for any uh suggestions and uh so thank you for letting us buy those uh those trailers with the cameras thank you Chief thank you Mr so uh Chief I'd love for us to
buy two more uh next year's budget hopefully we can you know find enough room in the budget Mr Mayor whatever you can you know we can come to a consensus on that um the reason why I wanted to comment to you is uh talking about the promotional ceremony that we had the
other day [Music] so I've been around the city for a long time the mayor has been in the city even longer I think the mayor's been in the city for what 55 years is that
accurate um I have never I have never seen anything like that in the history of the city of Sweetwater Police Department um the ceremony that you guys put forward makes me extremely proud so thank you uh for everything you do do
and I always say in my police department um honored privileged it was awesome I look forward to watching the department grow I look forward to you know hiring what was it 75 more officers was it 75 only um and assigning ninja stars to the
officers with Bazookas on top of their police cars it's going to be great um but thank you thank you for for everything you do and everything you continue to do um amazing appreciate it thank you thank you anyone else and and by the
way we have uh well I'll get more on that to each one of you but we have improved not only the equipment the the actual quality before there was lacking of equipment not only is that having the equipment
but the quality of the equipment also it took several months to go through and find the right setup on those trailers to have the right camera systems um with infrared and everything we need but you need to understand that is also part of
our Emergency Management because when things do occur one of the things when we went through the flooding and the hurricanes and the things like that was remember I how I explained the communication and making sure that certain areas were looked at not maybe
during the storm but so I know commissioner Manan has looked at them and so on but that's something something that I saw through Emergency Management that we are continuing to increase too because we've been lucky so far we've
been very lucky because when we get hit hard and hopefully that will never occur but we know better and we know that could happen any year that we have to take care of our own residents because everybody will be taking care of their
own residents so that's why we have gone out and we are trying to find the best of quality to make sure that we have and we do have the best of the best as officers starting from the chief all the way down and we're very good and very
dedicated but I want you to understand too that I'm relooking at everything that's Emergency Management and making sure we're prepared and we're going to be looking at certain courses for our own employees not just police police
takes all types of courses but to our civilian staff to be able to help out in every way possible and I I I wanted that added into your book of knowledge too because it's important coming in the new
future uh when we're looking at budget all right so moving over so building and Zoning report is is attached hold on I got something for building mayor if you don't mind can you give us an update on the new building and a new buildout for code and uh the
new building is uh as far as the the CH Rock was up already they were working on the on the floors planning them out making sure we ordered uh the kind of uh alotment we got we got a very nice designed floor to go in making it look
elegant at the same time it's great for maintenance and keeping up the building and it's a lot less work for the people cleaning and everything that needs to I got three quotes already sitting uh we got the final one right okay ready for
FN the equipment and the stuff that goes in there so I would say within a couple of months hopefully we'll be looking and uh already it has looked that the everything that is going to go out of there everything selections that were
made last month now in hinder moving forward now we're going to have the visual side of those buildings also attached as part of the whole system so any of the government buildings are being protected with 360 cameras and
everything attached so we should be within a couple of months moving into that building I have a a meeting uh to determine what's happening with the other building um as you recall that's a gift that we got for the past and we're doing the best that we can to see how we
work through it so as far as the building is concerned it's an asset and uh it should be incredibly well for the building department thank you thank you go ahead where the lease that we currently have were building and code are are we on a
month to month there no we own the we own the buildings uh the two bays no but no the were they currently oh I'm sorry you mean the current one no we still have you remember that automatic um I'm not going to yeah that was a president oh you
won't say our former mayor Alando Lopez yeah you're number one so have a three-year lease pending yeah I have a meeting tomorrow I want to I want to see if I could find a way out of there okay that's my goal keep us a breast man I know like I said
it was a gift that keeps giving oh yeah so we're uh we're dealing with it and I have a meeting tomorrow and let's see uh let's see what I could do there the good thing is there's a not lot of Need for people in this area that are looking for
office buildings and certain things let's see if maybe we could get out from under it the one thing I won't do is either we subase and so on but I'm not going to just roll over and just give them the the funding as they kind of were suggesting and that's not happening
so we we'll use it one way or another but hopefully that won't be the case yeah all right thank you so moving to Code Compliance report is attached public works department report was attached Finance report as well Community Services report was is attached Parks and Recreations reports
is attached so we're going 13 unfinished business new business goody order motion for Ajman all in favor Annie nay thank you very much have a good evening you