His microphone is picking you up. I call to order. I call to order the regular session of the Tarpon Springs Board of Commissioners. Tuesday,
September 30th and six, 6:30 p.m. Roll call please. Mayor Kelly here, vice Mayor Eisner here. Commissioner coleus here. Commissioner DiDonato here. Commissioner Banther here
tonight. Our reflection will be Reverend Thompson from the Greater Life Christian Church. And we will follow that with
the Pledge of Allegiance. Please stand. Let us pray. Oh, gracious God, our father, we come to you at this time,
giving you thanks for our mayor, for our commissioners, for our fire chief, for our police chief, for the leaders and all
of the citizens of this great city. We ask that you intervene into this meeting, guide our every word, our every action,
so that what is said and done will be pleasing and acceptable in your sight. We thank you for all of the good will and the
good services that shall come forth as a result of this meeting. We welcome you and we thank you. In your holy name we
pray. Amen. Amen. 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. I. So tonight
we've got two special presentations. We have one with our representative, our state representative, Adam Anderson. And then we're going to have the best of the best. So and
you can see Tarpon business community is is on fire because we have a lot of best of the best. So but before we do that we're going to have a special presentation from
Representative Anderson. I'm going to ask the board to all
come up and to receive this. I hope. It's a good check. It's a
big check. Yeah. I want to introduce you. Okay. Let me introduce because this is really a big deal. It's a big deal. Yeah it's a big deal. So you know yeah it's a big check
and it's and this is this is our state rep. He's you know, and this is he's delivering for us. And first of all before we I want you to give a big hand
of applause because he came through for this city. Our city, our city manager and some
representatives from the city went up and met with representative and, you know, expressed to him the needs we had here in the community. And
again, he got us in the appropriations bill. He got us the money that we need desperately to help us with storm water. And anyways, I just want again, we're thanking
him, but he's going to have a few words to say before he gives us this big giant check. Thank thank you mayor, I will I will be very brief, but and I
appreciate the opportunity to be welcomed here to to your commission meeting this evening. I have the privilege of representing the north part of Pinellas County in the Florida House. And I always say that
the city of Tarpon Springs really is the the crown jewel of North Pinellas. So it's really great to to be here with all of you. I think it's pretty
fitting that we're here presenting this appropriation check, which which covers three different unique stormwater projects throughout the city. And it's it's ironic that it
happens to be right right now tonight, which is the one year anniversary, essentially, of that midpoint between Hurricane Helene and Hurricane Milton.
And if you think about where you were a year ago, if you weren't cleaning out your own home, you were probably doing what what me and my family were doing is helping our neighbors,
our the rest of our family and our friends clean out their home. And this was right around the time where we took a break from cleaning up and saw the news and said, oh, shoot,
there's another one headed right for us. And suddenly the the attention was shifted from cleanup to just getting as much of the debris out of our communities, away from our
homes, out of the streets, as we possibly could. And you probably remember, you know, we all wanted that to happen a lot quicker than it really did. Your city did a phenomenal job at at that cleanup effort,
better than most cities, I can say, across the entire state. And you have these these gentlemen and women here that are next to me to to thank for that. I also think back to that
time, and I was in constant communication with Chief Young. And I remember I when that second storm was coming, my family and I evacuated to Tallahassee and we had already
taken in all of our family by the coast at our house. We had nowhere else to put them. Then we were evacuated. So so we ended up going to Tallahassee. And it was really a blessing because being in Tallahassee, I
was able to communicate with Chief Young and other members of our our local governments to help coordinate the resources that we need, because it was right down the street at our State Emergency Operations
Center. And I think think back, you know, we were chief had called me and he said, we're we're having some trouble at the hospital. Can you help us out? And we were able to make some calls and work through the
EOC, get get the power back on. And then he called me and said, hey, Adam, I'm really worried about the gas. You know, we have this massive fuel shortage and we were able to get a free fuel station right here in
Tarpon Springs, at Saint Pete College and as a college campus in Tarpon. So I tell you those stories to just remind all of us that having this open communication is very, very
important, not just important during a disaster, but we want to keep that open dialog. And I welcome the opportunity to continue to work on projects like this. Senator Hooper has been a rock solid Senate
partner for our district in in the Florida Senate. He unfortunately couldn't be here. But he did tell me earlier today, he said, Adam, when you go and talk to the city commission, tell them that we
want to get even more done for them. So we'll take and we will
do it. Thank you. So. How much is this? You're an accountant.
You should know that number. $1,000,169,095. Don't forget the $5. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. This
is this is our representative working for us. This is the example of what he does up there in Tallahassee. Looking out for all of us here in Tarpon Springs. So we
appreciate it. Yes. Thank you so much. Thank you, thank you.
Very. Deposit only. Thank you. Hold on. We're going to have our. Thank you I appreciate you our chief engineer. Chief
engineer. Thanks everyone. And thanks again. Representative Anderson, my name is Bob Robertson. I'm the project administration department director. And I just want to let everyone know that this money is going to get to work
right away. In fact, tonight on the consent agenda, there are three items to approve grant agreements that in essentially get that money working right away. So we're excited about
that. We're also excited about another item on the agenda tonight is a resolution to approve the give the board, to give them their support behind
applying for next year's application. And in that one, we're going even bigger. We're going at about $2.2 million for the request. So thank you for your guidance on that. We'll look forward to this next year.
Thanks, everyone. Thank you. Great way to end. This right.
Still on shut off. No it's on okay. Our next our next item is best of the best. So I'm going to get Karen Lemons. Our
economic development coordinator. And I'm going to ask Steve Grant from the Tampa Bay times to come up. He's he's
total media and he's totally part of this whole experience. So, you know, in 2019, my CPA
firm won best of the best. And Chris Mayor at that time had invited us up to to acknowledge us. And and we were just I think we were just like in this
first row, I think there was only a handful of us. And now since then and now we're here at 2025 and we've got how many?
2026. Best of the best. And when you think about how you get this, you get this by your your customers, your clients,
they're your patients. They're the ones who are voting for you. So again, when I want it, I didn't I didn't know I wanted till I want it. But some of my
clients actually thought I did a good job and and they voted for me. But but that's what happens here. So this is all a
testament to the, you know, the what you've built and, and your, your relationship with all of your, again, your clients, your patients, your your customers.
And so it's a great testament to you. So the fact that we've gone from just a handful now to 26. And Karen, I'm sure you're proud because your economic
development person director. So you now that you see your, your, our city is doing so well, then you should be proud of that. Okay? I'm proud of everybody.
You should, you should. What we're going to do because we got so many we're going to we're going to announce the, the the the winners. You're going to come up and you're
going to get a picture. Now, we're not going to ask you to take your own little home pictures. We've got a professional here with a nice expensive camera. And then he's we've got all your email
addresses. We're going to email you your picture. And then what I'm going to ask you to do is come on down on the in front of the dais here. And then while we congregate, we're going to
get the commission to all come up. We're going to congregate. And our, our photographer is going to run upstairs and take a picture from right up there. So we'll have one big group shot so everybody will get your individual shot. And then
you'll get a group shot emailed to you. So you don't have to worry about getting somebody up here to take pictures. Okay. So
who do we got? At that time? AdventHealth North Pinellas.
Thank you. Come on down. They're not here. Harrison insurance services. They couldn't make it tonight, but
we're still acknowledging them. Gary's roofing. Congratulations.
Congratulations. There you go. Okay. Hold your award. Thank you, thank you, thank you so
much. The Court of Two sisters again couldn't make it tonight. I don't think. Right. Okay.
Currents restaurant. Congratulations. You're. Thank
you. I think that's great. Oh, this is a special one. I wish she was here because he would make us all laugh. Doby's funeral home, he is funny for a
more. He is very funny for a mortician. But he's not here tonight, so. Okay. Hold on.
They're not here. No callous restaurant. Home team services
group. Very nice to meet. Congratulations. Thanks very much. Yeah, absolutely. Congratulate here. Just stand
right here in front of me. Right here. Right. Thank you,
thank you. Appreciate it. Insurance associates. Yeah. Jim
grants. Funny. Too bad he's not here. Kim Adams, real estate
agent. Here. Thank you.
Congratulations. Thank you. Mr. Souvlaki. Eight years in a row
for Mr. Souvlaki. Nikos grill house. So this is the start of
eight in a row for you, right? Come on, come on, get away from
the microphone. Yeah. Thank you,
thank you. One amazing find.
All right. Oh, yeah. Sorry. Sorry, mayor. We do one. Yeah.
That's all right. That's all right. Okay, okay. Okay. My
granddaughters favorite Orange Cycle Creamery. Oh. Thank you,
thank you. Congratulations. Thank you. There's your. Rusty
bellies. And somebody. Saint Louis, right? Yeah. Saint Luke's cataract and laser
institute. Oh. Thank you.
Congratulations. Thank you.
Yeah, yeah. Okay. Good stuff.
Saint Petersburg college. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Congratulations. Thank you.
Congratulations. Thank you. Congratulations. Right here. Oh, come on, this way. Over here. It's the microphone. That's. Yeah. Just let's get right
right here. Because of this, every day I'll get you back in. I'm good. Come on. I'm sorry.
I'm looking. Just on the docks.
Yeah. She's here. Susan's flags
and more. Can you stand right
there? Thank you. So. Tarpon Springs distillery. I don't see
Lisa there. Our own performing arts. Oh, Tarpon Springs performing arts. I know.
Congratulations. Thank you. Congratulations. Thank you. Mayor. Congratulations. I'll let you hold. Congratulations. Thank you. Congratulations.
Come on. This is the home team, all right? They did real well.
How did you get over there? Tarpon? Total health care.
Congratulations. Urgent care powered by fast track. The
healing hedgewitch. School. Thank you for recognition. We
appreciate it. Oh. Oh, sorry. The Meadows Ave, a cove
community. Just like the Academy Awards. This is great. Only with nicer people. Oh, thanks. Appreciate.
Congratulations. Congratulations. Thank you so much. Congratulations. Are you
good? You good? Have a good.
Thank you. Crane isn't here.
Tim's performance center. Thank you, thank you. All right. Thank you. How are you? Thank
you, thank you, thank you, thank you sweetheart. Oh. Just
kidding. Thank you, thank you. And the White Crane Clinic. She. She couldn't be here. She does
great work. Okay. So our maybe we can move everybody. Yeah. So what we're going to do is we're going to get the commission to all come up here with the city manager and city attorney. Come
on up and get a picture. And Irene want to say, yeah, come on, Irene, just get in the picture. Okay. So what's up, my
boy? Congratulations. Okay, we were in. Everybody's trying to get the. I want to come home.
Tarpon Springs. I had no desire
to come home. I. All right.
Second. No, that's that's looking pretty good. All right,
everybody look up here. Give your best smiles. We got it.
Awesome. Congratulations. Thank you. Congrats. Congratulations.
I know we've had you at our house a couple of times. Oh,
yeah? Yeah, yeah. Oh, yeah, we told you that.
Yeah. Who are you here with? Who's that you introduce me to? Who's that?
Okay. I don't know, man. You know what I mean? Right here. Let's go. It's mine.
Distraction. It's funny. You say that. Always take the over.
It's never under the under. We're on time. Yeah, we don't have time on the thing now.
You're right about that. Oh, yeah. Brandon said Brandon.
That's true. Okay. Sorry. Was it something I said? It's your deodorant, Mike. I will change,
I will change. All right. That was fun, wasn't it? Yeah, that was fun. Okay, so we're opening the part of the meeting for public comments. Anyone who
would like to make a public comment on anything that is not on this agenda can get up and speak. You have three minutes. Please state your name and your
address. Come right up here to this microphone here. Evening,
Peter Lack is 514 Ashland Avenue. Tip to you, Mike. Today's reading Proverbs 16 one
through 20. To man belongs the plans of the heart. But from the Lord comes the reply of the tongue. All a man's ways seem innocent to him, but motives
are weighed by the Lord. Commit to the Lord. Whatever you do in your plans will succeed. The Lord works out everything for
his own ends, even the wicked, for a day of disaster. The Lord detests all the proud of heart. Be sure of this. They will not go unpunished. Through love and
faithfulness, sin is atoned for through the fear of the Lord. A man avoids evil when a man's ways are pleasing to the Lord, he makes even his enemies live
at peace with them better, a little with righteousness than much gain with injustice. In his heart a man plans his course, but the Lord determines
his steps. The lips of a king speak as an oracle, and his mouth should not betray justice. Honest scales and balances are from the Lord, and all the
weights in the bag are of his making. Kings detest wrongdoing, but a throne is established through righteousness. Kings take pleasure in on his lips.
They value a man who speaks the truth. A king's wrath is a messenger of death, but a wise man will appease it. When a king's face brightens, it means
life. His favor is like a rain cloud in spring. How much better to get wisdom than gold to choose understanding rather than silver? The highway of the
upright avoids evil. He who guards his way guards his soul. Pride goes before destruction a haughty spirit before a fall.
Better to be lonely and spirit and among the oppressed, than to share plunder with the proud. Whoever gives heed to instruction prospers. And
blessed is he who trusts in the Lord. Times like these, I'm really having to trust in the Lord. With all that's going on
in the news. So much death and destruction. And yet sometimes we feel powerless. But we aren't. We just need to be
brave, to speak out against the injustices that we see before us. What's going on in the Ukraine and Gaza is is
immensely heartening. It's disheartening. We need to find a way to stop wars. It's not by building more bombs and ships and stuff. It's by reaching out and understanding that they
just, like us, want to live a normal life, to raise their kids, their families. Thank you. Peter, three minutes are up.
Thank you. Next, please state your name and address. Susan Swenson, 327 Manatee Lane. I just want to preface it with
I'm a wife, I'm a mother, I'm a grandmother of ten. I am soon to be a great grandmother. I own several businesses and I operate one by myself. But what
I want to recommend is if I can find the time to listen to all the committees, sustainability, Heritage Review Board and every other one every time they're on,
whether it's I'm getting ready in the morning, I'm taking a walk, I'm doing something. I'm listening. I would recommend for all the commissioners, as well as everybody on every
committee, to read it, because we're not connected. I listen to the sustainability and I feel like yelling through there or the Heritage Board report, and when you guys come up like tonight, you are for a few of
the items that have already come through the planning board. If you watched us, you could see what we were thinking. Not that that had to make your decision, but we're not going
to be cohesive as a community unless we listen to others and we understand what's going on from one team to the other. Because sometimes I think we're
just in our silos. Thank you, thank you. Next. Lori Weaver for five one East Tarpon Avenue,
gentlemen. Recently, while I was in Dunedin, I came across this map, and this is a walking
tour map of Dunedin. It's on a billboard on a couple different ends of their city, and tourists can pick this up,
peruse it, and be able to see what's available. And we have a lot of retail and restaurants here that are off the beaten path, and I think it would
behoove the city to invest in something like this, or to encourage some of the other agencies that that do this kind of thing to invest in something
like this as a as a boost for our tourism. And on another note, I would like to perhaps plant the seed that maybe we
could benefit from a director of tourism in the city, as opposed to maybe investing in rebranding or or other avenues
that don't seem to lead us anywhere. A director of tourism, would that work for us? Would optimize our social media, and also would work with hotels and
conventions and different things to bring that type of revenue to the city? Thank you, thank you. Would you share that map with the city manager? Yes.
Thank you. Can I give them to chief? Yeah, sure. Anyone else?
Thank you. Good evening. Juliana de 413 East Oakwood Street here in Tarpon Springs. On behalf of peace for Tarpon,
I would like to thank the mayor and the Board of Commissioners for supporting us and the Rotary Club, Tarpon Springs, for our first peace pole. It
was a lovely, lovely event and it was held here in Tarpon Springs at the Splash Park. And if you go by there, you can still see and visit it and also
read what it says and about peace. We express the peace and the unity in our community and our city that day, street by street, to foster peace. And it
was a lovely gesture and I'm looking forward to more and more of these poles being put out throughout the whole city of Tarpon Springs, at the
different parks. They will make, like the miniature poles to put out, even at the different schools, so that our children would know what peace is and unity within the community. On
another note, as being this one over, the vice President of Martin Luther King Foundation here in Tarpon Springs, I'd like to thank the Board of Commissioners. We had a lovely time here at the Performing
Arts Center for our first ever annual comedy gospel Punch Line show, and I want to thank you all. We all will be will also be having other things being
put on in our city for our scholarship and benefit program. Thank you, thank you. Good
evening, gentlemen. Katie Taylor, 657 Haven Place, Tarpon Springs, Florida. As president of Rural Cemetery Association here in Tarpon Springs, the historical black cemetery on
Jasmine. I would like to thank Chris Carter, the public works director, Pat, niece and police department, and Bob, Bob Robertson and Marco for having
the dumpsters put out. But Mr. Carter walked that whole cemetery with us and I was thank we thank him for his patience and just going around hearing the history of the
cemetery because on the outside, out, out, out of boundary, which is city property, we found something that looked like a grave. And one of the professors at the college did
say that it looks like a grave. So we're looking forward to a follow up meeting with the mayor to find out exactly what we can do about that situation, as well as did determine what
address does Rose sit on? Because as we spoke to you all before about, they got four four addresses for Rose. But as far as the cleanup, the cleanup was a success. Thank Pat for
finding us getting more bags when we needed it. Mr. Robertson made sure that we had, and Marco made sure we had a dumpster out there. The police department, one of the officers even helped us put out steaks.
So we we thankful. Thank all y'all for that. And also, we're looking forward to the traffic study that we had discussed with the revitalization group, discussed that traffic study on
opening Lime Street and Safford from Alton 19 to new 19, because that's the only other street that connects to 19 and new 19. And thank God y'all got
$1 million. Maybe we can get to that adjustment board so we can get that. What splash pad. Thank you. God bless. Anyone
else. Austin do we have anybody remote? No. Hands up okay. Thank you very much. That concludes public comments. We're now going to go to the
consent agenda. Let me read the agenda. We have item number three special event Community Crusade revival 2025 annual
Christmas parade 2025 movie in the Park Fred Claus cartoon. Tarpon Springs, Tarpon Springs Christmas golf cart parade number four. Satisfaction
release of leans number five attorney fees Johnson Jackson, LLC. Number six Cops and kids. Number seven Florida Department
of Environmental Protection grant number eight. Number eight Florida Department of Environmental Protection grant for Tarpon Springs Lake View
Drive. Number nine, Florida Department of Environmental Protection grant, Tarpon Springs, Roosevelt and Canal streets. Number ten, approve
amendment one to the Emergency Medical Services. ALS First Responder number 11 renew file
for liquid carbon dioxide. Number 12 approve Novation for Myers pumps, repairs, and parts
number 13. Renew file for landscaping materials. Number 14 increase file for Motorola radio equipment and maintenance.
Number 15 Award file for single source purchase of Aqua Tech and butcher original equipment.
Number 16 Award file video surveillance equipment. System number 17 Award file. Emergency lighting and accessories. It
would any commissioner wish to pull any of these consent items. I want to pull 17, but at the same time, I would like Bob Robertson to just slightly
cover the seven, eight and nine to know what what areas are getting the infrastructure and the stormwater. Okay, Bob, do
that. I think it's a great thing. So the city should know about what we're doing. Yep. Good evening. Bob Robertson,
project administration department director. Thank you, Vice Mayor, for the question. The three projects are one project is at Grandview Drive. The amount of the total project
cost is 688,000. The grant covers the construction cost 477,000 and full second one is a drainage issue on Lake View Drive. On that one, the the
value is similar and it's not coming up on my screen, but I'll get back to that one. And then the third project is a section of Canal Street between High Street and Roosevelt. This
one address flooding over tops on the canal there with title check valve and a berm to prevent the overtopping. I don't need the money, I just I wanted the streets, just so everybody knows. Thank you.
Appreciate that. Thanks, vice mayor. Okay, let's. So let's have I'd like to entertain a motion to approve items three
through 16. So moved second roll call, please. Commissioner Banther. Yes, Commissioner DiDonato. Yes, Commissioner. Yes, yes. Vice mayor Eisner.
Yes. Yes. Vice mayor. So, number 17, I just need an explanation, because every police vehicle we purchase has a lighting package that comes
with it with the vehicle. So I was concerned. I just didn't understand why we needed to spend $600,000 for more lighting when it comes with the
lighting. Well, I think. They they come with it, but only if you buy it. Right? So about
350,000 of that number of that 600,000 is just for, for the lighting for various police units. Also for regular
vehicles, you know, that we use for service and it's basically all of our vehicles. Anything that's out in the public, you know, gets gets a lighting
package put on it. And, and we buy it through this, this one particular supplier. So let me, let me first apologize because I didn't want to put you in a
spot like this. I just got in late last night and I didn't really get a chance to see. So do you want to speak on it or. Yeah. Chris, is this the one where we're going directly to
the manufacturer instead of the city manager? Yes. So what this was, was originally the last few years we would buy our vehicles through Alan Jay and
then use their third party vendors to outfit the vehicles with all the emergency equipment. We did research and we saved money by going directly to vendor and not
through Alan Jay. So we have the vehicles, we buy it on one set. We're cutting out the middleman and going directly to the installation. And that's what you're seeing. The difference in that is excellent. I wish it was in the backup. I
would have kept my mouth shut. Yeah, that's all right. Okay. I'd like to entertain a motion to approve item number 17, Award file for the emergency
lighting and accessories. So moved. Second. Okay. Roll call. Mr. Banther. Yes, Commissioner. Yes, Commissioner. Yes. Yes,
vice mayor Eisner. Yes, yes. Okay, let's go to the business items number 18. Increase and approve. Change order number
one, invitation to bid for the construct of the new clerk's office building. Mr. Robertson. Thank you. Mayor. Yes, I'm Bob Robertson, project
administration department director. Excuse me for this item. We're asking the board to approve a change order to the clerk's office construction contract with DeMar, General Contracting and Development
Incorporated. Demar's owners, Andy Cordell and Doreen Cordell, former Clearwater vice mayor, are here tonight as well. This change order addresses several different items as explained in
your backup. These can be characterized as upgrades, improvements, adjustments for unforeseen conditions, and in one case, a correction of an inadvertent omission. The value
of the change order is just over $213,000, representing a 7.3% increase in the contract value, and distributed equally over four funding accounts, as advised by the finance director.
That comes to about $53,000 for each of the four accounts. The water sewer non-departmental account, the Penny fund, the Water Impact Fund and sewer Impact funds and mayor. To
address the question you asked me earlier today, these funds will be paid out of fiscal 25 funds. This year's current year funds, and I can get into some of the details on some of the
on line items, if you like, but I'll conclude my staff report here at this point and stand ready for questions. Okay. So let's go to commissioner comments or questions of staff.
Commissioner Banther any. Commissioner Donato. Of course, no. Commissioner coleus no questions. Vice mayor. Yes, I did have a conversation with
you, Bob. So I would like you to cover what we spoke about and how it came about. Because just the first question, I know I don't have any contractors up
here except myself, and I just don't know how mica was chosen for a building that should be commercial. Thank you. Thank you for the call on Friday. I
appreciate that there were actually a mixture of concrete countertops and plastic laminate countertops, which, through my understanding, speaking with you, the plastic laminate and mica are
essentially interchangeable. Change was made to switch to Corian instead, so a more durable and attractive alternative. Those covered the break room, the drive thru counter and a copy room that
covers the mica. Did you want me to ask just the other items? Well, I didn't even know it was Corian, but I'm just going to let you know that's not what either granite or, you know, should have been. I think that
that should have been, you know, something that the architect covered. And, you know, we spoke about that as well, because Corian and Mike are just not going to hold up for so but again, I mean, I don't
know what to do. It's it's already a done deal. The other thing was to speak about the transitional window, why that was not done. First go round.
Yes, sir. And in this case, this was the omission that I mentioned in the in my staff report. It should have been an electronic transaction door and it got specified as a mechanical door, which, you
know, for the drive through window interactions. This was an item that slipped through the cracks and we should have caught it during shop drawing review and we missed it. As such. This corrects that admission by adding in that
item that's necessary for the project. The revised cost simply brings the budget back in line with what would have what would have been anticipated had it been included from the start. So just corrects that error. And
last but not least, if you could just cover the issue that went on with the drainage, how we were not able to know where it was. You're talking about the storm drainage or the storm
drainage. Okay. Well, we did know where it was, but there's a couple drainage items that are in this change order. The first one is we saw an opportunity to take advantage of the extended and the money
we're spending on expanding the capacity of the drainage system on Gross Avenue. The original design had the had the stormwater off the impervious surface of the roof draining to ring. And we saw a better
opportunity. Since we're building all this infrastructure over on gross. Let's get it over there and we can put it through the pond that exists behind the property. So not only are we getting it into a bigger system, but we're
getting some treatment first. So we we saw a better opportunity than was originally in the design. And then there's a second part of that drainage
improvement where Public Works is doing a repair on the east side of the building right behind me, as a matter of fact, to capture the drainage off of the roof of City Hall, which is
significant. And they're retooling all that. So, again, it takes advantage of the gross avenue capacity that we're spending all this money to, to install moves it over there. We
saw an opportunity to do the same thing, where we can take the drainage off the west side of City Hall, which currently goes makes its way to ring. We have a way to redirect that also over to gross. So reduce
flooding on ring and make a drainage system that works a little bit more efficiently. So there was a positive to this as well as the issue. Yes, sir.
Okay. That's it. Thank you, thank you, thank you. Do we have any public comments on this item? Austin. There are no
hands up. Okay. I come back to the board for a motion. So moved. Second, if there's no further comment, roll call, please. Mr. Banther. Yes, Commissioner. Yes, Commissioner.
Cool. Yes, yes. Vice mayor Eisner. Yes, mayor. Yes. Okay. Item number 19. Discussion and direction. Pinellas County Regional Resource recovery
facility director. Kiger. Good evening, mayor. Members of the board. Tonight, we're going to be doing a short update on the status of the Pinellas County Regional Resource Recovery
Facility, which is a proposed regional solid waste facility. And we're going to be requesting direction from the board on whether or not the city should be participating in
the project. So we'll go ahead and pull this up.
Okay. So what is the Pinellas County Regional Resource Recovery Facility? As I just mentioned, it is a proposed biosolids process processing facility to be
constructed by Pinellas County. Biosolids are one of the byproducts of the wastewater treatment process. At the end of wastewater treatment you have clean water and then you have all the biomass that you removed, and it's useful for
other many things like turning into fertilizer and things like that. The goals of the project are to develop a common facility for the whole county to address their biosolids processing needs, get economies
of scale, and there also are some emerging regulations down the road, like PFAS and things like that, that the county desires to get ahead of, and it'll be located down by their existing solid waste facility.
This is a large project at the county scale, roughly $4 billion up to maybe over $400 million. Preliminary project cost estimates. This is the project schedule right now. The
reason we're talking about this right now is they've done preliminary engineering. They've got sort of their their concept for what they want to do and how they want to handle this project, handle all the biosolids in the county. And
they're looking for partners through interlocal agreements. And they've reached out to the city as a potential partner. And we've been in discussions with them for a number of years that they've worked through the preliminary engineering, the
overall design and construction of this would have the project ideally be delivered around 2029. They've been, as I mentioned, they're looking for partners right now. They're exclusively focused within the
county. They're not talking to Hillsborough or Pasco or any of those local governments up there. We've already been participating in their engineering study, but just providing data, engaging in
their meetings, talking about the project goals. But, you know, not committed anything financially at this time and some other we've been talking to other local governments about their needs and if they
might participate. And there it's a little bit of a mixed bag. Some utilities have drivers like aging infrastructure that they need to replace. Others don't have that driver and so they're
unlikely to participate. There's a few different options that they've talked to. These are all sort of, you know, planning level options for how they might participate, like reserving capacity or being a
full partner for operation and maintenance. These are a little bit amorphous right now. So there's no like defined partnership terms like payments or financial commitments or
anything like that. Yet it's more of like do you want to participate in these are where these things might go long term, and it's a little bit difficult to assess this right now also because the project delivery method still to be determined
whether this might be a public private partnership, might be privately owned and operated, or might be owned and operated jointly by the participating utilities, that sort of thing.
The big driver that we're looking at is operating costs. Currently, the city of Tarpon Springs handles our biosolids disposal through a contractor, Appalachian Material Services.
They take it from our wastewater plant. They haul it up to up in rural North Florida. They do all the stabilization and then they use it for agricultural purposes, like land application for fertilizer
and things like that. Currently, we're paying about $90 a wet ton, which is about four, 450 bucks per dry ton. The proposed
the planning level, project costs or operating costs for the future project. Depending on which type of process for treatment they go with. The
cost per dry ton would be in the 1516, $1,700 per ton range, which would be quite a big increase for us. The annual
operating costs at our tonnage would be somewhere between 800 and 1,000,000 million $2, and our current total costs for biosolids processing disposal
is $200,000 per year. So a pretty significant operational cost increase. So we've looked at the drivers to participate in this project. One might be aging infrastructure. We don't
handle that in house. So we don't have any drive aging infrastructure that we need to replace. There's no pressing need for us on that front right now. Our current contractor is a very economical option, so we
don't have a strong economic driver to do this. Currently. There have been some rules in the past about biosolids land application rates and nutrients and things like that. And we've discussed this with our
contractor and they are in compliance, and they seem to have a plan for how they're going to be handling this long term. And the one kind of relative uncertainty is, you know, what happens if there's
future regulations on PFAS in biosolids. And sorry about that. And, you know, so that is a little bit of uncertainty. We there are no draft rules from
EPA right now. So realistically, if there were to be any future regulations on PFAS in biosolids that probably be like a 3 to 4 year rule development and adoption process, and there's usually a run in period
like five, six, seven, ten years to comply with those rules. So we've got a long time before these regulations potentially might impact the city. So at this time they're looking for a financial like a
partnership commitment. But we we aren't sure of the regulatory regime yet or what our other options might be and how other regional utilities might be addressing this. So.
At this time we're leaning towards we were our the staff recommendation is to recommend against participation in the interlocal agreement at this time. But we would recommend,
you know, just notifying the county that we would continue to be open to collaboration and participation in the study for like potential reserve capacity without any financial
commitment, and then just continue to monitor the situation and for the PFAS regulations and stay abreast of what our options might be long term. Thank you very much. Okay.
Let's have questions of Director Kiger first and then we'll get we'll get public comment, come back for a motion. Then we can make comments. So I don't have any questions. Commissioner Banther, do you
have any? No, sir. Thank you, Commissioner de Donato. No, sir. Commissioner Gulyas. No, sir. Vice mayor Klaus. If we have no
PFAS going into the water, how can we be subjected to PFAS in the dumping system? PFAS can be generated by customers within within the wastewater
collection system from things like, you know, laundry. And, you know, people use like, legacy things like Scotchgard and stuff like that. So it's in like clothing. It's probably in some of the clothes we're all
wearing right now. So there there are sources of PFAS within, you know, people's water uses that can generate PFAS contribution to the wastewater system. So if we can take us out of the water coming
to us. Can we take PFAS out of the water, out of the solid material before it's disposed of? You can. And the way you do that is with usually it's like
an incineration process, which is what the county is looking at. So it's PFAS is very difficult to break down. It's very resilient. That's why they use it for things like nonstick and like fire retardants and
things like that. So it's a very high combustion process, Teflon. So if wouldn't this go back to the lawsuit though? Why should it be the city's issue
if we didn't put it in the the lawsuit was specifically to address the cost for utilities to treat contaminated water supplies. So there's been no
litigation at the federal level lately that, you know, like any large class actions that are similar on future wastewater regulations because those haven't been published yet. Well, that's what I'm
suggesting. Could you clarify your suggestion, please? I'm suggesting a lawsuit on the other side of it. You know, if we have to pay for it coming in,
we shouldn't be paying for it going out. I think at this time that might be a little premature just because there are no pending regulations. So until you have regulation, you don't have a driver for your
planting the seed. Okay, okay. Do we have any public comments? Austin. No, sir. There are no hands up. I'd like to come back
to the board for a motion on item number 19. So moved second. Okay, now let me clarify with voting this down motion on the
staff's recommendation. Yeah. Okay. So yes okay. So the motion is to accept the staff's recommendation to not participate in this program.
Correct? Okay. If there's no further comments, roll call please. Mr. Banther. Yes, Commissioner DiDonato. Yes, Commissioner. Yes, yes, vice
mayor. Yes, mayor. Yeah. Okay, so let's go to item number 20. Code enforcement lien reduction request. Mr. Saltzman, you want to introduce that item, mayor,
commissioners, you have a memo that I provided with Chief Young regarding the request. We have the requesters attorney here who will go more into
depth. This request had been made a while ago and was not placed before you. And it has. So from that standpoint, the request has been, as you can
see from the letter that was attached for a period of time, we were finally able to bring it before you for discussion and determination, and I will
turn it over to Mr. Curtis. Thank you. And thank you, commissioners. You should have gotten a copy of the letter
that I had sent to to Attorney Saltzman and to City manager. In that letter, there were significant number of
attachments and emails. My client back in 2019 was cited as the letter explains, the difficulty in trying to come
into compliance over the years. Initially, and as the emails the list of emails provide, he reached out to to a contractor had a difficult time getting a
contractor to to adhere to filing a permit. He had to let the contractor go, hired another contractor, and through that process he had to secure
an architect, secure construction plans, secure an engineer, obtain a survey, secure an appraisal. Because of the 50% rule, secure a roofer finding out that he needed
blueprints, blueprints for trusses he had to obtain engineer trust plans. He had to secure bids from various contractors. The project was an
expensive project. It he had to wait for months before the trusses were even provided, and then he had to wait to schedule. The contractors, secured
asbestos survey and then secure permits. It took quite a while, and one of the reasons is Covid, right? When he got started, when he started the moving this
process forward, Covid hit. And if anybody knows, it was very, very difficult to get anybody to come out and do work during Covid. And he's here and I would like to introduce you to
Mr. Triggiano, who is the represents the the trust, which is the owner of the property, the men of trust. And I'll let him explain to you his frustration and try to get this thing moving forward and why
we're asking for such a reduction in the in the fine. Thank you. Good evening everyone. Truly. Mr. is basically said everything that
that happened and all the frustration that that pursued Covid. I really feel like in the beginning of it where like in 2000, the end of 2019, I
really felt everybody was was price gouging. And, you know, not not only the laborers but also the, the materials like, like lumber, things like people
like that. So really, I, there's not much else to go into detail with, I think, Mr. Curtis hit it pretty, pretty
well. I don't know. I don't know if in your package you were provided the the email correspondence and all the communications between my client and the city. So I would
ask if, if, you know, it was that part of your package other than the letter, you could see the extensive communications that my clients had with the city, keeping them abreast of
everything that was moving forward. You know, it's one thing if somebody sits idly by and lets time pass, but it's another thing when you take proactive measures to try to
come into compliance and that when my client contacted me several years ago, you know, because of his frustration, first thing I told him is, look, no one's going to listen to you
until you come into compliance. So compliance was paramount and it's taken them that long to come into compliance. So even though he's working on coming compliance, you know, $500 a
day, $500 a day, that adds up. And and to some degree, there is a responsibility to maintain your property. But when you try to take the proactive steps to come into compliance, when you
get cited by a code, and then the frustrating part of having to deal with and you know, we've all you've got a contractor on the board, you know, sometimes trying to get and I've watched it in the city
when you've had when you're dealing with your construction projects, trying to get things moving forward on a, on a, on a, on a quick basis. So that's kind of where we're at. And that's why we've requested a
reduction in the fine. Thank you. Let's go through. Let's have Commissioner questions of the applicant or city attorney. And Vice Mayor Eisner has
requested to ask his question. First. Was this issue created by any windstorm or anything?
No. So what it was is there was the code enforcement called on the property next door. And the officer at that time just happened to appear over, saw
the tin on the roof was needing to be replaced and that was cascading of everything down downwards because then the trusses were bad and so on and so forth. So there was no wind
damage. It just happened to be appearing over. So here's the thing that I have somewhat of an issue with. So I'm going to ask you the questions. Did you
not notice this before? Not to the extent that we we saw it. We're not owner occupied. So they, they, they, they have a
tenant who, who basically controls the property, manages the property as a landlord, obviously as landlord, you do have an obligation to to look at your property and make sure.
But kind of what happened is you saw a problem. But as you start to peeling it back, it created a bigger issue, then another bigger issue. And so that's what kind of cascaded to
to why you see all the litany of things that had to be done in order to come into compliance. It wasn't just fixing it or fixing a tin roof, putting a piece of tin back on the roof or covering on the
roof, you pulled it back. Are your trusses are bad? Or, you know, sometimes you don't know until you peel, peel everything back and then and that kind of so so so I agree with that. But
the code violation board instituted a 250 a day. I do watch the code violation board. They usually start off with a $50 or $100. Why would they go
to 250 unless there was a long period of disrepair? There was a long period. There was a. Why wasn't that? My question is, why wasn't this corrected? You
know, it's it's and I'm trying not to be disrespectful. I'm just being, you know, observant. I read the thing A to Z. You can't wait till the thing is
about to fall down and then have to go through this all. And of course it was your unfortunate that Covid hit, but had you done this prior to
Covid, you would not have had this problem. And I, I mean, I have had rental things and I in the rental contract, you know, the owner is supposed to go in
and do an inspection and not wait. And why I bring this up is because we don't only have yours, we have three different code violations that are here and what we're doing. If we
decide to reduce fees for everybody that comes before us, we're removing any power from the code violation board. And, you know, they don't just, you
know, nilly willy make up numbers. So I understand that things can happen. That's why I asked you if it was done by a storm, if a tree fell on you,
you know, certain things are unavoidable. But to leave something in disrepair until we get a code violation person to come and do it. And as I've
watched it, they have to document so many things. I know our code violation board, code violation person has to document everything, do everything, and then you have
to get everything done. And it's like the horse has already run out. Sometimes as a landlord, sometimes the landlord you when you have a tenant, the tenants occupying the property, you, you know,
you catch your rent every month, you know and, and you know, you don't know. Sometimes things are, are, have issues until you know that there are issues. If you look at the email
correspondence back in 2019, when this first when he first was cited that there were they reached out to to contractor engineer to start the process. So it wasn't not wait waiting
till there was, you know, too late. It's starting the process. But the process got mired in, you know, dealing with a contractor who who delayed in getting a permit, then getting
getting fired because he wasn't getting a permit, then finding out, well, you know what? You've got trust issues. Well, you know what? You can't just go to trust. You got to get an engineer trust and you got to
get an architect. Then we got a 50% rule. So you got to go get. So it becomes a vicious cycle of things that you have to do before you can even start the process. And it's and then when,
when get hit with Covid and getting and as he explained to you not getting taken advantage of but it wasn't if you if you look at it, it wasn't that it was ignored. If it was ignored,
it's a different question. But it wasn't ignored. It was proactive in trying to get this done. And that's and that's the difference. You know, the purpose of code is to encourage compliance. And and when you
have somebody who's trying to come into compliance, you shouldn't be penalized because it's taken so long to come into compliance. You know, $7,500 is not is not small change to pay
to pay for, you know, for the violation. It's you know, it's not it's not for free. Right. But it's a $560,000 violation that I understand that. So my
thing is not I'm not looking to stay on the fact of what happened after the code violation. I agree, I follow you wholeheartedly with everything that happened
afterwards. My question is when was the roof put on first? You know how long ago and when was it last inspected? I mean, you kind of have to do that, you
know. Otherwise if it's up to code violation, he's got to go through every, every house in town and put a code violation to let people know that they need to replace their roof. And
that's not feasible. Answer. Yeah. So so this is not an ordinary roof. So this is the the part of it's for an auto body shop. So. Oh okay. So you
know okay I know I just wanted to see if you're okay. Sorry I wasn't sure if you're aware but so that's why I mean we saw it. It's just on on the trusses. The tenant didn't complain to us. Had no idea. But I think
just again, when when the officer was there looking at the other property next door to us and looked over, he's like, that could be replaced. So I, I get it. It's just wasn't in our purview. Again, I'm not putting
the onus on you because you weren't there, but unfortunately it's your pocketbook that that has to pay the bill. And I understand that. And you know, people have bad tenants and they they do things
to ruin a place. And it's the owner that has to pay it. I understand all this thing, but at a certain point, every landlord has the ability in
every lease to go back in and to inspect the or have a professional go in and inspect. And this is why. I'm not I just
don't understand how it got let go for so long. Right where it got to the point where our code violation guy went to see it. And I'm going to bring up the same thing on on all of these,
because what I don't want to do is have a code violation board. Sit up here, take their time out every month, you know, and and have to fight with somebody for 3 or 4 years. And then an
offer comes in from 560 down to 7500. Because we're setting a precedence that all you need to do is leave it, go three years, five years, ten years, 20 years, and then just work out a deal
at the end that that just removes all the power of the code violation for people to come into compliance. And to some, what I disagree with you,
Commissioner, is that it's one thing to ignore. It's another thing to find out that you have an issue and then be proactive in trying to correct the issue
instead of ignoring the issue. And so we did not ignore the issue. We were proactive in trying to correct the issue. Was he? Not diligent in
inspecting his rental properties? You know, but if you know, I own several rental properties, if my tenant doesn't call me and say, there's a problem to me, there's not a problem. You know,
I don't I don't invade their space because they, you know, I may own a piece of property. I don't invade their space. If there's a problem, they might come and see there's a problem. And that would. That never
happened. There was never an issue. And the only reason it became an issue is because somebody from the city code enforcement officer noticed that there was a problem. And so when they tried to correct
the problem, that's what started the cascade to where we're at today. So I can appreciate the fact of what you're saying. But, you know,
like I said, you know, you don't necessarily go and invade. I don't, you know, when I, when I have a client who's paying me rent or tenant that's paying me rent and I don't get a call, I
don't think there's a problem. So thank you, Commissioner Panther, do you have any questions? Are we just asking questions or giving our opinion to. Because I got confused with
Vice Mayor, Commissioner De Donato. I don't have any questions. I just asked a question. Commissioner coleus. No, I like to settle all these cases for a total of $5,000 and
be done with it. So. I'd like to make that motion when the time is right. Okay, let's go to public comment. We'll come back and entertain that motion.
Are there any public comments on this item? Austin? No, sir. There are no hands up. Okay, let's come back to the board for a motion. Make a motion to
settle the cases at four, two four East Pine Street, 420 Hibiscus Street and 435 Hibiscus Street, for a total of
$5,000. Second. Okay, so let's go to let's have discussion. So, you know, I, I agree with you,
Vice Mayor, that that we have to look at the circumstances and where things are allowed to get to a, to a point of, you
know, degradation or disrepair. You know, I think that given the situation with Covid and,
and all the. All the delays that took place during all those those years, I understand the situation here and and I'm
in favor of the reduced. Penalty. So, Commissioner Panther, you have any comments? Thank you. As a landlord, myself and my brokerage manages
about 100 rental properties, I can definitely sympathize with what attorney cous cous cous is saying. I had a situation. It wasn't code enforcement involved, but we had something
that was happening for months and one of our properties and didn't realize it till after the fact and did our best to, to to to remedy it quickly. So and also, I have a lot of
respect for the, for the Code Enforcement Board, and I respectfully disagree with the with the vice mayor. I don't I don't look at us settling as,
as negating them whether we're not respecting their authority or, or like why have them? Because that board serves a purpose. But I don't believe that that that that purpose is
to punish people who voluntarily come into compliance, that that board is there as a stop gap to make sure people know that there are consequences for for not coming
into compliance. We have somebody here before us, and I've said this before, and I have a long track record of this back to back, back, back, back to 2013. If somebody has come into compliance, you know,
willingly in every situation is different. Mister. We have I think 1 or 2 more tonight and those and those may differ. But for this situation, someone who's actively coming into compliance, I am not going to
sit up here and try and penalize them further. He's offering far above and beyond the cost of the city incurred in this process. So I wholeheartedly support
Commissioner Coolio's motion, and I hope we can settle on that. The this evening. Thank you. Commissioner De Donato. I
too feel that that code enforcement has always been for compliance. I don't have a lot of patience with just totally ignoring it, but I have been in the same situation as as this
gentleman has been under as a landlord. And sometimes you don't find out until they move out, and then sometimes it's a lot worse than you think it is, and you start the process. And
it appears to me he did start that. It says in here that it was completed August 26th of 2024. It was in compliance. So I can support the motion as
made. But again, we're not here to punish. We're here to bring compliance. That's that's my feelings, Commissioner coleus. I just look the situation, just understanding, hearing
everything. And I mean, I'm always trying to help the residents or business owners reduce, you know, bring fines down. So it's it's not try to look at case by case, but just
trying to look out for people. He he came into compliance. That one facility that got triggered by you know, the code enforcement officer was really an open air, you know, auto
facility too. So it's been taken care of. Just presenting the facts. And it's just, you know, it's we as board members can be consistent and up here looking at case by case and
just being just looking at everything and helping them, you know, get over this case by case and I think it's a good thing. So thank you Vice Mayor. So I disagree with my board
here. And I understand this is not a personal thing. So I'm I'm not here as was said, to punish you in any which way, shape or form. My whole purpose
of this is to make sure that, yes, you come into compliance and you did. But one of the things I'm going to be bringing up is an agenda item down the road to make sure that we have
a time limit to how long these compliances could come about. I understand fully about what happened during Covid, and it was an unforeseen time. My
whole issue is not that I think you did a great job from that point on. My issue is, you know, did your I don't know if I can
ask this question, did your tenant move out? Is that how you found it? No. So the comment that was made earlier about, you know, you only found it out when you moved out, that's not what happened. So I can't really listen to that.
But I do think it's somewhat your responsibility as a, you know, as an owner to be able to do inspections. You'd have to know that your roof is up there 20 years, 30 years, 40 years,
whatever it is. And, you know, you'd have to go in and protect your investment. And that's the part that I find I don't agree
with. And then I'm also curious because I would have to go back into that code violation meeting and find out why it was $250 a day. They don't start
off at 250 a day. They start off at 50 a day or 100 a day. And so it had to be a reason that they went to 250 a day. And I don't know what that is. But again, I'm not trying to
punish you as far as that goes with me. It's, it's I try to take in the facts and I judge whether I've done business with you or not done business or whether you live here. You
don't live here. That's not my point. Or to hurt you. I appreciate that you brought it up to compliance. I don't want to devalue when a code violation board sits there and
brings this up and and I think maybe then we have to, as a board look to make sure that they don't just pile on. 250 a day and make these astronomical amounts of money penalization
so that we should come down from 157,000 to, to your offer of 75, and then have a board wanting to bring it down to five, whether it's 5 or 7500 or
whether it's 10,000, I'm not looking to up it. I'm just looking to say, how did it get to this point? Because what happens is they all they all
wind up every single code violation board decision comes before us and we always lower it. And then we have some that people don't even pay it. They they say we're going to pay it
in 2008 and then we don't see them until 2018, and then they extend it again. So what I'm trying to do is not not play negotiation. We should have a
legitimate amount or we should have it where it limits out where it stops at a certain point period. So that's my take on it. But no offense, I
understand that you did what you could do from when you found out, but that's it. Thank you, thank you. I'd like to amend my motion that the fine
be paid within 30 days. Okay. Second, that that's been seconded. Mayor, just so we're clear that I want to make sure that he can pay within 30 days because otherwise it reverts
back. It it can be paid within 30 days. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, vice Mayor. No further comments. Roll call please. Commissioner. Yes, Commissioner. DiDonato. Yes, Commissioner.
Coolio's. Yes. Vice mayor. Eisner. Yes, mayor. Yes. Thank you, thank you. Okay. Item 21
code enforcement lien reduction request. Case number 16 8000582. City attorney mayor. Commissioners. Again this there
is a memorandum that was created by myself and Chief Young to present this case before you based on the request that was made. The attached
documentation also explains what happened. Okay. Is there anyone here to to speak on
behalf of this? No. Okay. So let's go to Vice mayor. You want to speak first on this? Well, this is a repeat from what I just said. I mean, we
have a situation where it's just ignored, so I think that we either need to do a workshop and figure up how we're going to handle the code violation
board, whether it goes to these astronomical 560,000, 600,000, it's all meaningless. It's it's just it's just throwing numbers out there. It doesn't make anybody come into compliance.
And you know then so it's just it's just a fictitious number that we throw out there. So and here we have a situation where
there's deadlines. And you know I feel bad for a code violation. He's got he's got a document. Every paperwork that he sends out, we got it when they got it, you know, and he's working his
tail off. And we don't even have the people to come to defend themselves. So to me, I would leave this the way it is
and, you know, just leave it. Commissioner Banther. Well, I do sympathize. I'm not I do want to give some credit to to Vice Mayor Eisner, in the sense
that I do think we need to have a broader discussion on how we do code enforcement. I he and I often disagree on the settlement amounts and methods, but I do agree that that probably would be a helpful workshop after the holidays.
Please, if we can just get through that. Thank you. But we've met more this six months than I have in my entire career. You know, again, each situation is different. You know, this
one. I have a little bit of heartburn with the fact that there was a fine reduction and it wasn't paid. But again, every situation is different. This the owner passed away.
That's when I I'm not sure if you want to call it the ER or the next of kin. Whichever, whichever it is found out about it and then has brought it into compliance. Correct. It is in compliance. That is correct.
Yes. So again, this is a situation that I don't wish, I don't wish to, to, to to further penalize this person. If, you know, we have the 2003 1550 offer which more than
covers our cost on this. And in this situation, I would recommend that we approve that. But we're not doing motions right. We're just talking. No, we'll we'll go to public
comment and we'll come back. Commissioner De Donato. Yeah, I very much Commissioner Eisner, vice Mayor Eisner did bring up a very good point there. It
does need to be some somewhat over stipulated as to what a range is and and what the tolerances are. I mean, 500 a day. In the previous example,
as we saw, mounts up really, really fast. And I think sometimes you have to take the circumstance, things that happen when you go about
finding what the problem is and you find out it's a lot more than you thought it was. So yeah, I think we need a workshop is an excellent idea. I can support that. Again, the
cost to the city were minimal and and compliance to me is the main thing. Unfortunately, there was a death in this situation that extended the
time span. So I feel at this point in time, Commissioner Coleus, I'm ready to accept the offer that they've given. And I mean, I may be the only one, but I don't think we need a
workshop for code enforcement. I mean, it's, you know, the code Enforcement Board is going to make the decisions. They're going to come up with these fines. But we ultimately, you know, as we say all the time, you know, we're elected to make
those decisions on those cases. And so I've been consistent and always trying to reduce fines for whoever it is. So that's always going to be my stance. And, you know, to Mr. Mr.
Robinson, Mr. Robinson has brought a beaming light of sympathy, empathy and being able to work with individuals in this community. And he's
given people confidence to come forward, express themselves. And, you know, I'm sure if you go up, ask him and he doesn't take it to heart, you know, he'll he'll do his job. But
he's a great fit for our community and the code enforcement board that they do the work with. And it's I wouldn't so much look at it as we're going against or, you
know, we're removing what they do. It's it's no different from us. This board going against a recommendation from a city staff member or, you know, any
other board. So I wouldn't try to take it like that. But I think it's just, you know, we move case by case and try to understand. And once they
comply, we we try to do that favor considering what they've invested to try to make that compliance as well. So thank you, mayor. I just one more thing if I can. Sure. I don't
know if our attorney is the person to go to on this, but it might be helpful. And I don't disagree with what commissioner just said. I want to trust the
the code board members that we have. My my problem with it is, is one time we have a $50 a day fine. And next time we have a 250 and then we have a 500 and
and I think we need to have a better hold legally on. That is all I'm really asking. I don't know how we stack on that level as compared to other cities,
and I would defer to Mr. Saltzman commissioners just for that very issue. We have created a uniform fine system, depending on the type of fine,
the recommendation that's being made. So we did adopt that going forward. So that's been helpful for the board. The second thing, mayor, if I may, I talked to Chief Young before
the meeting and knowing this might become an issue, if it's okay with the board before you have any make a determination or a workshop, I'd like us to
bring you an analysis of what long term fines we have out there and the alternatives, because remember, you could have a huge fine on a homesteaded property, and
there's nothing we can do until somebody goes to sell it. On the same token, there could be actions where you decide, well, okay, we've kind of had enough and we've done this before where you can look into
potentially an injunctive action to deal with the property. And those are usually the ones that are nuisance and hoarders. And we can also, if
you so choose on cases move for foreclosure. So those are the options you normally have. But I'd like to give you an analysis of really what we're looking at. Are we looking at ten properties. Are we looking
at you know whatever it is so we can bring that forward. And then you can decide, because I have to tell you, I, I agree that we have a great code officer. He's doing a phenomenal job. And the cases
that are brought before the code board have all been excellent. And the code board does a really good job. So from that perspective and the uniformity of the fines we have
adopted so that that will take effect or that has taken effect. So you won't have those in the future. Okay. So the you know, the way I hear hears I think and I the, the dilemma here and
I understand where the vice mayor is coming from. If we apply these these penalties and fines, we let them accumulate so that to get the attention of
the property owner to go, to get into compliance. However, if they if they're, if they drag their feet. And I'm not saying that on this case just I'm talking generically. But if
they drag their feet and, and they and they all know that these fines are paper fines, they're, you know, they're, they're toothless fines,
they're not you know, we we're going to just throw every one of them out anyways and give them a much lesser fine than, you know, then, then it then
then the fining process, you know, ceases to be a big motivator for them. So I think that, you know, I, I would definitely entertain whether we
do a workshop or just have an agenda item to have any general discussion on some uniform process, because I think and I understand what commissioner is
saying, everything's, you know, case by case, but I think there is cases where people are maybe understanding that fines get thrown out anyways and then they lose their effectiveness.
So let's go to the public and we'll come back for a motion. We can have discussion. No we haven't. Let me go to the public real quick. Everybody and I still. Is there any
public comment here? Once again Sue Swensen 327 Manatee. My introduction to this whole city government was through a code enforcement. My neighbor on
Manatee Lane was having parties. He had 50 police calls to his house in one year. The police had to jump in the canal and look for guns. There were three
suicide calls. I mean, it was daily and daily. He ended up having a $28,000 fine reduction. He is collecting two pensions,
Social Security, and has people other than his family living in his house, which is not allowed in our HOA. Meanwhile, he brings an attorney here who
says he cannot pay because he doesn't have the finances. So it was washed completely washed. So what do you think he continues to do today? He continues to have people living
with him and he just laughs at me because I'm the one standing up here, two feet next to him. When my whole HOA membership left and allowed me to talk. So
it really loses any oomph when when you don't enforce what's going on. I love our code enforcement. I talk to him all the time because I have another
code enforcement issue in the parking lot. My owner doesn't kill me, but my parking lot where I have a business there is. It's an old lot. It was
1950s, 1960s. It did not have a handicapped spot. It did. But no one, no one allowed it. No, everybody ignored it. So now it's painted and there's a sign. And one of the owners of the
businesses doesn't give up flying whatever. And he parks in it every day. Every single day. I've spoken to him. I've told him he doesn't care because it's right next to his business, the Jamaican Jerk
Center. I don't give a crap anyway. I know it's now a police issue, but if we don't, and if we don't find these people and hold them to it,
it's just a laugh. It's just a joke. I know there's extenuating circumstances with Covid and people dying and things like that, but we need to be consistent in how we do
this. Otherwise they don't give a crap. Thank you. Okay. Anyone else? Any other public comment? Austin? No, sir. There are no
hands up. Okay. I'd like come back to the board. Entertain a motion. A motion to accept the the code enforcement filing
request as requested by. The the applicant. Second, within 30 days. And and and have it paid within 30 days. Let's go.
Let me go through the normal thing and let Vice Mayor go last. Commissioner Banther, no further comment. I do want to say and and piggyback off of some comments, that we have a
code enforcement officer. Mr. Mr. Mr. Mr. Mr. Ralston and unlike predecessors which I did love his predecessors too, but I have received not one complaint about him and I can't
say that for anybody before him, whether whether it was deserved or not. So he's doing something well because as we know, people here and everywhere will speak up if they don't like something. And I have not heard one
negative thing. So thank you. Commissioner De Donato, just in response to public comment, I can agree with that. Certainly what I think, what most of us, at least what I'm trying to say
is $500,000 gets to be a little a little much. And but yeah, we're trying to find that that ground is acceptable. We have code enforcement to to enforce the codes. And so I just want
to make it clear that I don't disagree with you. It's just the amounts that get to be kind of crazy. And sometimes that's not always controlled because beyond your circumstance, sometimes you just can't get it
done as fast as you'd like to get it done. So just so you know how I stand on that. Thank you Commissioner. Piggyback off of what the our city attorney
said. Maybe it's a we should have a campaign to reach out to any code enforcement fine that's out there and say, hey, reach out to us in an attempt to, you know, reduce these
fines and get them off the books and and be done with it, you know, so that's maybe something we can work on as far as guys, if, you know, we we
stay at those 500 a day fines and stuff. We're just going to take their properties. I mean, are we just going to just take this person's property right here? You know, so it's a very
fine line. And I just I guess we're, you know, at some point we'll have that workshop and there's got to be a way to get people to comply. And, you know,
without reducing the fines to a point. But at the same time, I don't, you know, I'm not that type of person. I'll never be that type of person to try to take properties away from people who are, you know, I
don't know their financial positions, but that's just not in me. So we try to do our best to get them to comply and and move forward. And Mr. Rollison
is a great a gatekeeper to compliance and representation of sympathy and compassion and being able to work with people.
So thank you, Vice Mayor. So comment was said about 500 a day. It was 250 a day. So I wanted to clarify that. But we
had an offer for $2,300 and on a $70,000 currently owned, and that was ignored. It then went
to $530,000. Mind you, this was back in. The initial inspection was in 2002. So the code board
deadline was 2003. We accepted an affidavit of noncompliance, so went to 100 a day. This was ignored for 23 years. At what
point do we allow X amount of years, 23 years, 30 years? I remember back we had a situation with a liquor store on old 19 was never in
compliance until the brother died, and then the new brother came in and figured he would offer less money just because whatever it was, it was either money on the table for us, it
was money on the table for him. That's what we're doing. We're negotiating with ourselves. I feel like the board somehow has their left hand in one pocket of the city, and their right
hand in the other pocket of the city. It's not about taking their property. It's not about trying to hurt the person. But if somebody could give me a
good explanation of what we can do to bring them into compliance, other than making astronomical numbers and then bringing it down and devaluating them to where most
of the people see these rulings and then just don't give a hoot. 23 years is ridiculous. If we were to do a a violation now, I
don't think I'd see the end of when they paid in 23 years. So, you know, nobody's trying to take someone's property. But if somebody wants to come up with
a better idea on how to move the person to come into compliance. Now, it's also easy to say when you live in an area where your neighbors are also really nice on the sides of you,
right where you don't have the people leaving garbage all over the street, they're cutting your lawn. But is it fair to the person who's paying taxes?
It is our job to make sure that they have somebody living next to them that are in compliance. And when we allow for 23 years
for someone to break all the rules and regulations that we have in place, and then we decide, just give us $2,300, we don't want to punish you, but we punished the people on both
sides of them for 22 years. And that's the issue that I have. It's not about trying to hurt that person. It's about trying to heal the two people that are
on the sides of that, and the person that lives across the street who now can't sell their house because there is a s I. A
s h I t across the street and you know, we have them. So I get offended when I'm sitting here listening, you know, to you guys being the goodniks. And I don't want to be the bad
nick, but I also want to be the correct Nick. I want to make sure that the person comes into compliance. And if this person leaves something from 2002, then they don't give a hoot
about this city, you know? So you're you're telling me I don't really have to cut my lawn? I could leave it to go astray. I could leave my garbage out. I could do whatever I want to do. And I
don't care if this guy comes and writes 50 tickets for me. Because eventually, somewhere along the line, when I sell it, I'll just go, hey, what the heck? I'll go in front of you guys. Hope you still in in
office and I could get your bleeding heart. All I'm saying is, unless you're going to come up with something that is going to correct the whole thing we have, this is for compliance. So I don't understand why we'd
be reducing this and giving them a reward for allowing 23 years to just go, you know, what the heck? I mean, to me, it just doesn't make any sense.
You know, I understand the city, you know? You know, if we we if you have a situation where the people are down in their luck, they lost a job. I'm willing to
listen to that. You know, they had an issue. You see, I agree with your with your motion for the $5,000, even though he offered 7500. But I just can't
allow and I'm not going to agree to just allow people to run, run, ramrod and just do whatever they want and not care. There are streets in town and we all know this because we all
get the complaints. There's cars sitting there, there's junk all over the place, and I feel bad when I drive by and I ask the person next door, how do you live like that? And they're looking to me to
correct that. They're looking to you to correct it. And if we're going to sit up here and just say, what the heck, you know, we'll just when you're ready to sell it, you know, we'll just, you know, work out
a deal. But, you know, you're ruining the people's homes and resale values on both sides. So that's what I pretty much have to say. I don't want to agree
with this at all. This this was just ignored for 23 years, going on 24. Okay, you make a
heck of a good point. I'll try. Okay. Is there any other comments? Let's go to roll call, please. Commissioner. Yes, Commissioner. DiDonato. Yes,
Commissioner. Coolio's. Yes. Vice mayor. Eisner. No. Mayor. Kuleana. No. Okay, let's go to
item number 22. Reconsideration of a code enforcement settlement agreement. Mayor. Commissioners, this is one that the deputy city clerk was
contacted, as you can tell, another history of one, Tom Trask had negotiated a settlement back in 2011. Apparently it wasn't paid
within the time period and reverted back. Originally, the agreement was to reduce it to $1,000. Now, all these years
later, they've contacted the city and are requesting to see if this board will continue to
agree to the prior settlement. Okay. Commissioner Banther, do you have any questions? And the
property? The property is in compliance is my understanding. The property has been in compliance since 2011, since 2009, since 2009. So it started
in oh eight and it became in compliance in 2009. In that time period of a year, that's when the 42,000 was was was accumulated, correct? Yes,
Commissioner. Okay. And then he had a serious accident in oh seven. Just looking up this thing here. They're in compliance. What are usually we
have the we have the little sheet with our hard cost. I'm sure it doesn't exceed $1,000, but is that the case? Yes. I don't believe I believe our costs are being covered completely. Okay, I'll. I'll
save my commentary for the for the second round. Commissioner Donato. I just have gone through it. This is similar but
different in that it was in compliance in 2009 and this has gone on, and there was an agreement for $1,000 and it wasn't paid. And now they want
the same as it's it is. Case by case, a bit of a mess. We're also trying to clean some I, we're trying to clean some of these up too by bringing them
to you. So that's that's what it looks like actually. I just I will I'm waiting for the attorney to come back. I think that would be interesting to,
to look at some of that. But whatever the board desires. Commissioner Coleus. I'd be
willing to go with 2500 paid within 30 days. Vice mayor, was there an offer made on this
city attorney? Wasn't there an offer made on this? The offer was the one to continue at the $1,000 that was agreed to with
Mr. Trask back in 2011, 2011? Yes, sir. So we had 14 years to forget about that offer. Well, now we have within the time period, it reverted back. So
what would be the purpose of now agreeing to any amount, the money? I mean, it's the part I just don't understand, you know, I just want everybody up here to understand. I did have a
lengthy conversation with the city attorney about all these cases today. This wasn't just, you know, something imaginary I brought out of my head. And we
kind of, like, discussed this, and it's like I'm trying to get my head wrapped around, not trying to hurt people, not trying to, but but move things
forward so that we don't lose the initiative of our code enforcement gentleman back there, Mike, and that we don't lose the code violation board
and all the people that have to do things. If if we just try to get back the money that we laid out. I understand the code violation board is not a money
making. It's not an enterprise. But there has to be somewhat of a punishment for neglect. And that's what I was referring to.
When we need to do a workshop, because I, I and it might even be a workshop where we include the code violation board to be there and give us suggestions
as well, whatever it is. And it could be after your holiday, Commissioner, it's hunting season. Yeah. We don't want to, you know, disturb the Christmas I understand, Vice Mayor. I
just want you to know that not only with what Mike's been doing, but we have been doing additional things in the city. Yes, I know, and you know, we've cleaned up properties
that we hadn't done before. The city manager authorized that, and that was extremely helpful for the surrounding property owners. And so we're not letting those go to the extent
that maybe they went in the past. So I think you're doing a great job. I've always said that to you. And we're we are cleaning up a mess that's been there for many years. But I do
think we need to fine tune how we handle these cases, because otherwise we get up here and we just televise that. Just just throw a number out there and
the commission will just agree to it and you know, be bleeding heart. So to me, the offer was made, it was accepted and it
was just left there to sit. So. Mayor, City Clerk, I just wanted to add when just it's in the memo, but I just want to make everyone aware that when
Mr. Frey and his son did come to meet with the deputy city clerk, he said that as a result of his accident, he did suffer significant disabilities and other financial hardships and
legal proceedings. And so now that's why he was coming forward now, okay, so which I could feel for the person, don't get me wrong, but there always has to be a power of
attorney to me, making decisions for the House as well. So I know the son is now involved. You know, I would like to have that person, you
know, be able to deal with it. You just can't leave these things ten, 15 years. That's the bottom line. So that's where I'm at. If we when we come back for a motion, I just
did a calculation. If, if, if it was $1,000 in 2011 and we were using even a 3% interest rate on growth, it would be
$1,512.59 today. If we did 5%, it would be 1979. So be around $2,000. What the. If they had paid the fine in 2011? In
today's dollars it's probably close to $2,000. But let's go to public comment. We'll come back for a motion. We can talk some more. Any public comments
on this item? Austin. Sir, there are no hands up. So like, come back for a motion. I'd like to entertain a motion, at least at minimum wage. We get some interest on this money
because no reason why it wasn't paid in 2011 at a thousand bucks. But anyways, that's my two bits, Commissioner. If everyone gets their comments and I'll make a motion, like I
said, for 2500, be a little bit right in the ballpark, payable within 30 days. Thank you. Motion to pay $2,500 to be paid within 30 days. Second, any
further conversation on this? You brought it up 1500 more than the mayor. He said it originally, but before the mayor even said that, I was just reaching for my heart.
That's all. You're out of control tonight. All right, roll call, please. I do have some commentary first. Oh. You do? I want to say something. I'm sorry, I do. I do because I
agreed to the workshop, and I don't think I don't agree with the vice mayor on on how we're settling these things. I do think he brings up some good points about consistency and fairness and the purpose of
codes to being troubled neighbors and compliance. I my parents, have a well, I'm not going to go there, but there's there's people that serve on boards that are just as guilty as the people that we're
actually finding anyway. But the issue is this I this is you're never though I think we can better fine tune this for sure. Absolutely. But this is there's always going to be gray
areas. Every situation is different. I think it's the job of our staff, somewhat of the code enforcement board to be to be the black and white. These are the rules. These these are statutes and these are the
fines. But but that comes from us. And then it's our job as a board to examine all these gray areas. So yes. Well I do agree with the with the vice mayor. We need some better control over this and some better
consistency. Just just as was pointed out, in every single case, case, case tonight is not equal. So yes, I do agree we need that. But also we're still going to have to review every
single case up here. And there's going to be exceptions because not everything is black and white. Thank you. Roll call please. Commissioner. Yes, Commissioner DiDonato. Yes,
Commissioner. Coolio's. Yes. Vice mayor Eisner. Yes. Kuleana. Yes. Okay, let's we're going to move at the request of the
planning director. We're moving item number 27 up to our first ordinance and resolution. This
an application for annexation. Miss Vincent, you want to read this? Judicial. So this is a quasi judicial proceeding where
the Board of Commissioners acts in a quasi judicial rather than a legislative capacity at a quasi judicial hearing. It is not the board's function to make law, but rather to apply law that has already been
established in a quasi judicial hearing. The board is required by law to make findings of fact based upon the evidence presented at the hearing, and apply those findings of fact to previously established criteria
contained in the Code of Ordinances in order to make a legal decision regarding the application before it. The board may only consider evidence at this hearing that the law considers competent,
substantial, and relevant to the issues. If the competent, substantial, and relevant evidence at the hearing demonstrates that the applicant has met the criteria established in the Code of
Ordinances, then the board is required by law to find in favor of the applicant. By the same token, if the competent, substantial and relevant evidence at the hearing demonstrates that the applicant
has failed to meet the criteria established in the Code of Ordinances, then the board is required by law to find against the applicant, swear in the
witnesses. Is there anyone else who's going to speak? Please stand and raise your right hand. Or no. Do you swear or affirm
your testimony before the Board of Commissioners is the truth so help you? I do thank you, Miss Vincent. Good evening. This is application 25 Dash 55
for property at six 30th July Drive. This is a duplex. The application is to annex the property into the city of Tarpon Springs. Along with that
annexation, we also have to assign a future land use map and rezoning under the city's codes and comprehensive plan.
Just this is the property on July Drive. It's a little bit of an odd shape. You have a house and a garage on the property. It's a little
different. Look, this is Dixie highway. Zooming out a little bit, you can see the areas that are in color are those properties that are already in
the city of Tarpon Springs. So the site is directly abutting property that's in the city. The zoning in the area currently is R 70. That's
what's being proposed as we annex it in the sketch and survey of the property. This is the single family house. This is the garage structure. The house was built in 1986. So
this has been here for for quite some time. The plat itself for the subdivision was platted, I believe, in the 1920s. This is really not
readable, but this is the survey over top of the aerial photograph. So for our review criteria for annexation, there's no issues with that's
not part of a type A enclave. It's not creating an enclave. We do have the ability to serve the property with appropriate utilities. This it already is served with city water. It is
actually on septic July Drive is a Pinellas County road. It's already at or already in our fire district. So upon annexation it would also be subject to Tarpon Springs
Police. There are no active code enforcement cases on the property as it sits now in Pinellas County. There is a detached garage on the property that does not meet minimum required yard setback. Your
rear yard setbacks, both in the county as and nor would it meet it in the city. Those are deemed legal non-conformities that would just continue. If the property is annexed and is
not expected to place a burden on the city, the. There are no issues with the future land use map amendment. This would go from residential urban in Pinellas County to residential urban in the city of Tarpon
Springs, and that's consistent with the area, the surrounding area. This is in our place based area map in this neighborhood suburban, which is really just kind of keep things
as is. So that's what we're doing. The rezoning would go from Pinellas County. I believe it's or three to the City of Tarpon zoning district of R 70.
Again similar to what's already in the surrounding area. Staff recommendation is to approve ordinance 2025 Dash 12 annexing the property into the city.
Ordinance 2025 Dash 13 is amending the future Land Use map from the Pinellas County residential urban to the City of Tarpon Springs Residential Urban Category Ordinance 22 dash 14 amending the Zoning
Atlas from the Pinellas County. Excuse me R4 which is one, two and three family residential to the city of Tarpon Springs. Designation of R 70, which is a one and two family district.
This was properly advertised. We've received no responses. Planning and Zoning Board did review this on September 15th with six members, and did recommend unanimously for approval. With that, I'll stop
and answer any questions you might have. Or have any
questions. Okay, let's go through board questions. Commissioner Banther. No, sir. Commissioner. Donato. Commissioner coleus. No questions. Vice mayor, do they
have to come in compliance with the garage? They do not. It's it's not. It's legally non-conforming, you know, so there's no code enforcement case on it. The only way that
it could come into compliance would, you know, literally be to tear it down. The applicant may wish to speak to this, their intent. There's actually an adjoining property to the
south that is under same family ownership. And they want to actually have the garage be become part of their property to the south. That's really not part of this discussion, but
that will actually make it more conforming. When they do that, do they have to go before the Board of Adjustments for variance? No, only if they were going to increase the degree of nonconformity at this point. So
what happens if somebody wants to put in a via a code violation? Well, we'll deal with it. I mean, I'm being
somewhat flippant, but just this is this is existed since 1986 and Pinellas County. I don't think there's going to be anything different about it when it's annexed into the city of Tarpon Springs. We brought
up that issue and discussed it at Planning and Zoning. I mean, the applicant knows that that's something that could happen. Okay. I was just asking the question. I understand I'll ask
questions that just make you make. Thank you for that. Would the applicant like to come
forward and speak? No. Okay. City attorney mayor would. I would request that you vote on each these three ordinances to
vote on each one individually. If that's okay, I'll read them by title and and then ask the board to act accordingly.
That's okay. Yes. Ordinance 20 2512 an ordinance of the City of Tarpon Springs, Florida, annexing 0.30 acres, more or less of real property located
at 630 July Drive, approximately 170ft east of Dixie highway, and including lot seven and portions of lot six and eight of High Point
Park subdivision application 2555, providing for findings and providing an effective date, that is, ordinance 20 2512 read by title only on first reading.
It was published on August 27th, 2025. Second reading will be August 28th, 2025, and we anticipate publishing notice on
October 15th, 2025. Thank you. Are there any public comments on this item? On August 28th, the second reading, would you say second reading said what
second reading is October 15th? I said that, excuse me, October 28th. I said, August is the date that we published it the
first time. Any public comments? Austin no sir. There are no hands up. Okay, come back to the board for a motion. So moved. Second. Okay, if there's
no comments, roll call please. Commissioner. Yes, Commissioner. DiDonato. Yes, Commissioner. Yes. Yes, vice mayor. Eisner. Yes. Mayor. Yes. City Attorney
ordinance 20 2513. An ordinance of the City of Tarpon Springs, Florida, amending the future land use map for 0.30 acres, more or less of real property located at 630 July Drive,
approximately 170ft east of Dixie highway, including lot seven and portions of lot six and eight of High Point Park. Subdivision application 2555 from Pinellas County
Residential urban R u category. The City of Tarpon Springs Residential urban r u category providing for findings and providing an effective date that is ordinance 20 2513, read
by title only on first reading publication was August 27th, 2025. Second reading will be October 28th, 2025 with the anticipated publication on
October 15th, 2025. Any public comments on this item? Austin. No sir. There are no hands up. Okay, let's come back to I come
back to the board for a motion. So moved. Second, if there's no comment, roll call please. Yes, Mr. DiDonato? Yes, Commissioner.
Yes, yes. Vice mayor. Yes, yes. Ordinance 20 2514. An ordinance of the City of Tarpon Springs, Florida, amending the official zoning atlas for 0.30 acres,
more or less of real property located at 630 July Drive, approximately 170ft east of Dixie highway, and including lot seven and portions of lot
six and eight of High Point Subdivision. Application 2555 from Pinellas County, R4 one, two and three family residential district to City of
Tarpon Springs, R 71 and two family residential district providing for findings and providing an effective date that is ordinance 20 2514, read by title only on first reading
advertisement was August 27th, 2025. Second reading is October 28th, 2025 with anticipated publication October 15th, 2025.
Okay, is there any public comments on this item? Austin. No sir, there are no hands up. Can I come back to the board for a motion? So moved. Second.
If no further comment, roll call please. Mr. Panther. Yes, Mr. Donato? Yes, Commissioner. Yes, yes. Vice mayor. Yes, mayor. Calendar. Thank you.
Okay, let's get back on on track here. We'll go to number 23 ordinance 2025 Dash 16 ordinance 20 2516, an ordinance of the City of Tarpon Springs,
Florida, amending portions of chapter 20 of the Code of Ordinances of the City of Tarpon Springs. Increasing the water, sewer, and reclaimed water rates for Fiscal year
2026. October 1st, 2025 through September 30th, 2026 and fiscal year 2027. October 1st, 2026 through September 30th, 2027 and fiscal year 2028. October
1st, 2027 through September 30th, 2028 and fiscal year 2029. October 1st, 2028 through September 30th, 2029 and
providing for an effective date. This is ordinance 20 2516, read by title only on second reading.
Publication was September 17th, 2025. Mr. Kiger. Thank you. Thank you. Thomas Tiger, Public Services Director. We've talked
about this one quite at length. This is an important part of our financial plan for the water and sewer utility. And yeah, this the second reading. So I'd be happy to entertain
any additional questions from the board at this time. Commissioner, do you have any questions? No, sir. Commissioner Donato. No. Commissioner coleus, no
questions. Vice mayor. No. How? Do we have any mark that down? Do we have any public comment?
Austin? No, sir. There are no hands up. Okay. Come back to entertain a motion. So moved. Second. There's no further comment. Roll call, Mr. Banther.
Yes, Mr. DiDonato? Yes, Commissioner. Yes. No. Vice mayor Eisner. Yes. Yes. Okay. Item number 24, ordinance 2025,
Dash 17, ordinance 20 2517, an ordinance of the City of Tarpon Springs, Florida, amending portions of chapter 20 of the Code of Ordinances of the City of Tarpon Springs. Adopting the
impact fees for water and sewer connections for fiscal year 2026, effective January 1st, 2026, and providing for annual impact fee adjustment each fiscal year beginning October
1st, 2026 and on October 1st of each year thereafter. Based on inflation rates for construction, that is, ordinance 20 2517, read by title only on first reading.
Second reading will be October 14th, 2025. Publication is anticipated for October 1st, 2025. Mr. Kiger. Thank you.
Thomas Kiger, Public Services Director. This is also an important element of our financial management plan for the Water and Sewer Enterprise Fund and water and Sewer
utility. When we were developing the rates, the rate schedule for the next few years, one of the desires was to find additional sources of revenue
that would not have any impact to existing residents, and impact fees were quickly identified as one of those potential sources. They had not been updated since 2018, I
believe adopted in 2019. And so the goal of impact fees is ultimately to ensure that growth pays for growth and the development pays for
development and impact. Fees are dedicated to expanding capacity for water and sewer utilities to to cover additional growth as as our population increases over time.
And so the desire was to increase to update the impact fees, to account for the full cost of our infrastructure capacity based on current construction markets, the construction costs of
infrastructure is increased and changed quite significantly since the late 20 tens, and it's considered a best practice to update your impact fees when you do substantial changes to
your capital improvement plan. With that in mind, we contract with Florida Rural Water Association to conduct the engineering study to assess the value of our infrastructure capacity. If we have any
detailed questions, we do have Mike Chase, who is the professional engineer who did that study on behalf of Florida Water for the city. And we felt that this was a really good fit.
They specialize in working with small and rural utilities. I would also like to acknowledge Darryl Vasey, who is our water division manager, and he was the project manager for this study. Long and all in all, our
current impact fees have not been updated in quite some time. We are recommending there are two different methods for adopting impact fees. One is the remaining useful life option and the second is full
replacement value. Our historic practice as a city has been to do remaining useful life. What that means is that you evaluate all of your infrastructure like your water plant, your
wastewater plant and your pumps and things like that. And if they're fully depreciated in the financial world, they're they're not valued in the study, the full replacement value
assumes that you're evaluating all of your infrastructure at the full cost to build everything new. So we decided we recommend sticking with the existing policy that was, you
know, something that we discussed with individual board members. And you can see here that, you know, similar to many of our construction projects, the cost of water and sewer
capacity is increased quite significantly since 2018, 2019 to 2025. And when that happens over time, if we add new houses and we add new people, we have
to put in new pumps and build new wells to serve those people. And if the impact fees don't cover the cost of that infrastructure, it becomes a de facto subsidy for every new connection. And that's borne by
the existing ratepayers. And we want to avoid that. So all in all, we're recommending adoption of remaining useful life option through this ordinance. This also accounts
for tying the future rate increase, the future increase of impact fees to the Engineering Construction Cost Index to make sure that we don't continue to lose ground.
And ultimately, this will result in about $250,000 a year for infrastructure that will not be borne by existing residents, but will be paid self-funded for future capacity through new connections. And
we're recommending adoption. Thank you very much. Let's go to commissioner questions. I'll begin. Director Geiger, I want
to thank you so much for I know you've you've got a lot on your plate and you've had to digest a lot of information, and you're. Anyway, I just want to
say thank you. I really appreciate it. Even if I give you a hard time about your your tardiness, tardiness, I
understand. Shots fired. The I understand you introduced me to a guest. You have a guest that was supposed to help you with the presentation of some of
these ordinances, or. Yes, we have in the ordinance. Or shall I? Yes. This is Amir Ali. She is a student at Saint Pete
College, and she'll be offering public comment shortly as part of her assignments as a student in public policy and administration. Thank you. Welcome. Thank you.
Commissioner Banther. You have any questions? No, but I do echo the the gratitude of the mayor. You've taken a lot of I don't want to say shots, but a lot of questions and and arrows
up there and you've done well and thank you very much, Commissioner De Donato. Well, I to appreciate the time. I know you put into this. Thanks,
Commissioner. Thank you, Tommy, for being creative with this one. You know, I feel about looking out after the residents, not having them take on the burden. A lot of the improvements in town. So this
was great and thought out. And I know I've been tough on you, but it's been, you know, just good that you worked on this one too. So thank you sir. Vice
mayor well, my apology came to you when we spoke, but I'll give you a second apology. I really appreciate, you know, you always come up and you
always somehow can get the answer and appease this board, which is not so easy to do sometimes, especially when those arrows are coming quick
at you. With these impact fees that we charge, they are more so to pay the hookup. Really, not so much. I know you keep
talking about that. It allows us to dig new wells, but how much of it goes to the well versus how much of it goes towards the hookup? So these
are these are connection fees. So they're the the funding is specifically put into separate funds. That's tracked. And you can only spend these funds on
capacity expansions or capital projects that are used for improving infrastructure capacity. So, you know, in the past we've used these funds like right now the biggest
project we have funded is the replacement of the new lift station. That's a textbook example of what impact fees are used for. We built a lift station by 20, 30 years ago. It's over on the east side of
town near the police station, and over time you have lots of new customers come and they build things, they build new businesses and they connect. And over time, that lift station became overburdened. It's it's no longer meeting its
level of service. It's, you know, kind of precarious with its pumping capacity. And so we're using the sewer impact fees to upsize that lift station, improve the capacity
to address the the growth needs that were happening in that area. So who pays the hookup fees? The the the impact fees and connection fees they're
paid for by the the developer or the builder, you know, or if you're connecting a new unit, you know, whoever the property owner is ultimately. So now you got me a little confused because you said the same thing.
The impact fees are used for new wells, or the impact fees are used for the hookup from the new location, we have a separate fee schedule that addresses like new meters and things like that. Okay, so
there's two separate things that this is just for new wells and and lift stations. Yes. This is this is exclusively for larger, you know,
infrastructure capacity type projects. That's my only question. Thank you. And I always appreciate our day before meeting that we have over the phone. So even if I'm
not in the same, you know, state. Okay. Let's go to public comments. Good evening. Mayor,
commissioners, members of the public. My name is Amir Ali and my address is 3432 Hunting Creek Loop. I just wanted to start by saying thank you so
much to Mr. Kiger. He helped me so much. Tonight. The board is considering ordinance 2025 Dash 17, which proposes adopting updated impact fees for water
and sewer connections beginning January 1st, 2026. This is an important public policy decision because impact fees are not simply another charge. They're a way to ensure fairness in how we fund our
critical utility infrastructure. Right now, when new homes or businesses connect to our water and sewer systems, the cost of expanding and maintaining that infrastructure often falls back
on the existing ratepayers. By updating the impact fees, we shift these costs to where they belong on the growth that creates the demand. This helps keep utility rates more stable
for current residents, while ensuring that we have the funds needed to maintain safe, reliable service for everyone. These fees were not set arbitrarily. They're based on a
professional capacity study conducted with the Florida Rural Water Association, which carefully examined the costs of providing new connections and future system upgrades. The
stakeholders affected are many, our city leadership and staff who must implement and manage this. The developers and builders will need to account for the updated costs in their
projects. Future customers who are going to pay the fees at connection, and of course, the existing residents who benefit from not having to subsidize growth. Ultimately, this
ordinance is about balance and ensures growth pays for growth while protecting the investments of our current residents. I encourage thoughtful discussion tonight, and I support moving this
ordinance forward, and I wanted to thank you all very much for your time. Thank you very much. Saint Pete College is doing
well. Thank you. Any other public comments? Austin? Yes, sir. There is one hand up. I will unmute them now. Caller
please state your name and your address for the record and make sure you are unmuted. Good
evening. Air lock is 514 Ashland Avenue. Can you hear me? Sure. Yes. We. Okay, let's get down to the nitty gritty option.
A remaining useful life basis is to capture the existing costs of running the city's water and wastewater utility. However, option B, the replacement value, it says to
capture the true and sustainable cost of running the city of Tarpon Springs water and wastewater utility. So if you don't want to put this on the backs of current residents
and users, then that really should be the option. Now, I understand the hesitancy of moving those up to that higher rate, and I think it's on page
five where you talk about the water finding the 4130 ERC for the remaining use and the 5790 for the replacement value, and
then for the wastewater, it's 3340 for the. Evaluated fee and 3860 for the replacement value. I would suggest as a compromise, maybe split the difference on
these. So on the first one, the 41, 30, 57, 90, that comes out to about 4900. And if you split the other one it comes out to about six grand. Now, this
definitely would put you on a more solid footing for your capacity. And maybe Tommy will explain to Commissioner me the difference between an impact fee and a hookup fee. The
hookup fee is when you actually hook up to the water service, but I would recommend at least some debate about maybe moving somewhere in the middle. So
you're doing more than just remaining useful life because, you know, with inflation, if a pipe goes out or as Tommy mentioned, a lift station you need to repairs five years from
now, those costs are going to be higher and you're going to have the money to do it unless you start putting some aside. And just like the loan, it's a way of amortizing those costs
over the life of the project. So thank you for your time. You'll have a good evening. We'll be listening on. Okay Austin. Any more? No, sir. That
is the last one. Thank you. I'd like to come back to the board. Entertain a motion. So moved. Okay. Is there any further comment on this motion? Yes.
I'm just for clarification. The. Was there a recommendation for either option A or option B? The ordinance includes option A.
So that was that was the recommendation. Although if the board wanted to consider option B I got I got a few questions. All right. So the motion okay.
So this option A is remaining useful. Life. What is that engage again. So an easy you
know analogy. You know we don't have one. But imagine we had an old water tower you know from 50 years ago right. Like like many small towns. Do you need a certain amount of storage in
that sort of analysis when you do remaining useful life, that asset's fully depreciated. The value of that, that that asset in the capacity study is zero because it's fully depreciated.
So you depreciate all of your assets over time to sort of capture like the fact that things age and it's sort of the responsibility of the ratepayers and stuff like that to maintain your stuff over time. But if you add enough
people, eventually you have to make a bigger water tower, whether it's old and it's still in service and it has, you know, and it's still in use or not. So the replacement value is a
it is a more conservative approach from a financial perspective in ensuring that there's little to no costs going back into the water sewer
enterprise Fund that address growth or address new capacity needs. And I would also like to point out one thing that we've discussed quite a bit with the Florida water was the board
obviously does have the option to look at what the the true replacement value is of all these assets and adopt as a policy like 80% of that or 60% of that or something of that
nature. Okay. So the replacement value is basically. Enough money to help take care of what's needed, but also help invest in future projects as
well to get started, you know, future capacity basically, in the water tower analogy in when you do that analysis for what your cost of providing capacity is, it would be the cost of
building a new water tower. So can I piggyback off? Basically, our water rates from last time? Isn't that basically isn't option B above the, you know,
the magic line as opposed to like option A? Option A is more like the magic break even point. The the magic line was our index for operational cost increases. We we if you look at
the bin of services that we have to purchase like, you know, chlorine and electricity in aggregate, that tends to go up 4.3% a year. Capacity, fees or
impact fees are tied just to the cost of your capital assets. Basically, it's construction costs. You feel comfortable with option A with, you know,
future stuff. I mean, option A, we recommended as a continuation of existing city policy, if the board wished to adopt a number like in between
those two numbers, or, say, 75% of the full replacement value or 80% of full replacement value, that would be financially beneficial to the utility long term, for sure.
Okay, well, there's a motion for option A right now. I'll make some comments here in a second okay. Any any further
comments on either of these okay. Commissioner you want to. Yeah I just want to do this 80% of 5790 basically. It's 4600. I
mean, I think we're we need to go in between somewhere between option A and option B. That way we can it's it's no different from the water sewer rates in which, you know, we're doing
some increases to help you with Tommy. If I, if I send my motion would that you the request is to rescind the motion to adopt going in between option A and B correct.
A little more than a but but but but like less than B would be perfectly content with that. Okay I can I will rescind my motion. If you want to make that motion I'd like for us to
make a motion. Motion to do 80% of the replacement value of option B second. Mr. Kiger, are you good with that? I'm very good with that. I would
probably look to the city attorney for guidance. Since the numbers are written in the ordinance, should we specifically list the values there in the in the ordinance and strike those in the ordinance? And we'll we'll make
that change before we have the second reading. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Good catch. Is there any other comments? Roll call please. Commissioner. Yes,
Commissioner. DiDonato. Yes, Commissioner. Coolio's. Yes. Vice mayor Eisner. Yes, yes. Thank you. Commissioner. Good
job. Okay. Item number 25, resolution 2025, Dash 59, resolution 20 2559, a resolution of the City of Tarpon Springs, Florida,
establishing wholesale water charges to Duke Energy for service to their Anclote Electric Generating Station in Pasco County. Effective
November 1st, 2025. Mister Geiger, thank you. Thomas Geiger, public services director. So the again, this was similar to the last topic
in that we were looking to find sources of revenue to improve the financial health of the utility. That hadn't been updated in a while, and also resulted in minimal impact to existing residents and
ratepayers. We have a unique wholesale water rate, with Duke Energy's Anclote Power Station. This dates to. Prior to the construction of the water plant.
It was a contract that was negotiated to. They had a need for water for their power generation generating station. We're trying to build a water plant, and we needed places to
put wells and infrastructure to support the water plant. So the city entered into the agreement with Progress Energy at the time, and it was a mutually beneficial agreement. We agreed
to provide them with water at a effectively like an at cost rate, inclusive of lots of things, including capital replacement costs and things like that. And in exchange, they would provide us access to their power line corridors for,
for well, construction and some of their other property for some of the other critical infrastructure for the process. This. The value of the
wholesale cost of water had not been examined since. Again the late 20 tens. So the we elected to work with Stantec in this case, who normally does our
rate analysis and economic analysis to look at what the cost, the wholesale water cost ought to be based on the terms of the contract. The current
wholesale water rate is $5.32, and some additional decimal places per 1000 gallons based on, you know, updated chemical costs, electrical costs, all sorts of things that have
changed since 2017. The updated rate would be $7.52, roughly per 1000 gallons. And this is effectively to ensure that we're continuing to, you know,
provide water, you know, to them, per the terms of the agreement, but also not lose money in the case. In this case, one item that was we talked about this back in March when
we asked for direction, and the vice mayor wanted to know sort of what happened. How did this get out of out of line? And there was sort of two things that that contributed to the separation between what the
wholesale rate and the actual cost of production, one of which was we had adopted some lower than inflationary rates over rate increases over time. This rate was tied to our
annual water rate changes, and that included a reduction in water rates back in 2021 and then a couple of years of rate freeze, so that this rate was subject to that. At the same
time, operational costs continue to increase while the rates while that rate was frozen, that caused some separation. And then additionally, you know, we did experience quite a bit of operational cost increase, as
you know, over the last, you know, seven, eight years as a result of, you know, price increases and things like that, and also as a result of the water plant, you know, aging in and the water becomes a little
bit saltier over time as you develop the wellfield into your operational costs go up a little bit as the water gets saltier. So with that in mind, we revisited this. This will generate approximately $136,000
per year in additional revenues for for the the water and sewer utility again, which will not be directly borne by the the city's residents. Commissioner,
do you have any questions? No, sir. Commissioner de Donato. Commissioner Gulyas. No, sir. Vice mayor, since this is my topic. Yes, I had a question
for you. You just said that they got a reduction when the city gave reduction to the residents. Yes, sir. So why didn't they get an increase
when the city got an increase? They did. But because of the the reduction was a one time reduction. It sort of, you know, an ideal world. You want your your rates and your operational
cost increases to be going up about the same every year together. And when the board elected to adopt a rate decrease and rate freeze, this rate was subject to that, that
rate freeze and rate decrease as well. Well, you know, electricity and chemicals and things like that continue to to go up. So did we not give a increase to any of the residents for the eight years
as well? We did. But that one time drop it, you know, is what resulted in that separation between your operational costs and your. And your wholesale
rate. That's where I'm going with this story. So before 21, before the rate drop, we gave increases to the residents but did not give an increase to
Duke Energy. These this rate was increased by the annual rate increase. That was that the residents. Bore as well as
nauseating as I listen. Could we at least adopt something that they will now coincide with any rate increase that we
have going forward, and not where it goes to eight years? Because, I mean, when I listen to you, I wasn't blaming you by any means because I know you
just took it on. I just I'm looking to shoot somebody. And, you know, I mean, this had to be a loss. I mean, I don't know, I just don't understand how you
could just leave this by the wayside. There are largest user of water. How do you leave them to not. Not you. And I don't even know how you could explain this. It's just it's it's just
a lack of of following through on things that, you know, we're you're just putting it on the residents. So I will say we do have a solution built into this.
In this resolution for that, that externality. So the resolution specifically calls out that this rate will be increased annually by the annual rate increase adopted by
the board for all of the water and sewer rates, or by the 4.3% operational cost index that we've just assessed in our rate study, whichever is greater. So if the if we continue to have
our adopted rates rate increases that go up, this rate will go up with that. And if the board elects in the future to adopt some other like lower rate or something like that, at the minimum, this rate will
continue to increase at 4.3%, so it doesn't lose ground against operational costs. I mean, that's all I could ask for. I just don't want this to happen again. You know, it's one thing to mess up the first
time. Fool me once I've been fool. Fool me twice. I'm the fool. So I don't want to have that second comment. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Let's go to public
comments. Any public comment? Austin? Yes, sir. There is one public comment. Caller, please state your name and address for
the record and please make sure you are unmuted. Peter. Come on, let's go. Good evening. Peter
514 Ashland Avenue. Thank you, Tommy, for finally coming out and explaining the 4.3% increase, because that is a
valid factor in for the future rate. So maybe, Commissioner, I missed that part in the backup. But I do think that this is a good move because from my
understanding, new state law has come into place where impact fees will be limited by new state laws. Maybe Mr. Kyer can elaborate on this, so this
may be your last chance to raise impact fees for a while. So between your attorney and Mr. Kiger, you might want to determine what your limit is as
far as time frames about renewing any new rates. So you can fix the rates here in a way that will sustain it through that time frame, that you would be allowed to change impact
fees at that time, because that is going to be something significant. Another thing that our legislature is imposing upon our cities. Thank you for your time. Okay. Austin.
Anybody else? Of course not. No, sir. That was it. All right, let's come back to the board for a motion. So moved. Second, is there any. If there's no further comment, roll call
please. Commissioner. Yes, Commissioner. Donato. Yes, Commissioner. Yes. Yes. Vice mayor. Eisner. Yes. Yes. Item
number 26. Resolution 2020 5-60. Resolution 20 2560 resolution. The Board of Commissioners, City of Tarpon Springs, Florida, supporting the legislative appropriation request. Application of Project
Administration Department to the State of Florida for two stormwater improvement projects and one water main renewal project to resolve flooding issues, mitigate storm surge
impacts, and replace aging galvanized water mains in the historical area of Tarpon
Springs. PJ. This resolution is support from the board for us to apply for state appropriation funding. You heard Representative Anderson
earlier. We were awarded 1.1 million this year that I'm now sending to DEP. Tomorrow, once the mayor signs our grant agreement this year, we're actually applying for Bob was
incorrect. We're actually applying for $2.4 million. So Representative Anderson will be surprised. These are for three projects, two stormwater
projects. One of them is the Ross property. The other one is Pinellas Trail Culvert. And then there is a water main renewal project on the North Disston Heights water main
project. And the total of those three are the 2.4. And we have a 1 to 1 match. So the city will also have to fund 2.4 to match that total. Then if you
have any questions, Commissioner Panther, you have any questions? No, sir. Commissioner DiDonato. No, sir. Commissioner Gulyas. Just want to thank PJ and her. You know,
I guess just her and whoever other departments she works and she's brought millions to to the city. It was a group effort. Charles and Bob and the two
chiefs. It was a group effort. Thank you, Vice Mayor. So I want to thank you also, PJ, I know Bob did very minimal on that, but just kidding. Thanks,
but thank you. I appreciate all that you do. It was a blessing to get that kind of money. You know the residents are going to enjoy that. I mean, you know we always get those calls on
flooding and hopefully this will rectify at least three projects. And I look forward to getting more. Thank you. Thank you. PJ, let me ask you, are you Harbor or Tillison right
now I'm Harbor pages are admin assistant. She's the tall girl I'm the short girl. Oh okay. Sorry it was our confusion. I
can blame the city manager for that. All right, so let's. Is there any public comments on this? Austin? Yes, sir. There
is one public comment. Caller, please state your name and your address for the record and please unmute yourself. Six.
Commissioner 514 Ashland Avenue. I'll be quick. I think this is great that you're going to ask for money from the state. Hopefully it doesn't get vetoed at the end like last year's
monies did. I would also recommend that Mr. Anderson was there. You also sent some notice to State Senator Hooper, who I believe is still our
senator in this area. And lastly, you may want to at some point figure out a way to have a liaison from member from the
board who does some lobbying for ourselves. I know the city manager could do a little bit of that. Some can be done by Mr. Robertson in the projects,
but I think it's time for a commissioner to either be delegated or given authority to reach out and start doing a little bit more direct lobbying, because sometimes we get
forgotten up here and I'm talking both not only the state, but the county and the federal level also. So we've got three places we need to start
focusing more on and just tossing that out as a thought. Thank you. Good day. Chaos. And anybody else? No, sir. That is it. Okay. I'd like to come back
to the board for a motion. So moved second. Okay. If there's no further comment, roll call. Commissioner. Yes, Commissioner. DiDonato. Yes, Commissioner.
Yes. Yes. Vice mayor Eisner. Yes. Yes. Great. We got one item, one more ordinance. Come
on. Please. Got one. The. We'll take five, five minutes. Okay. Five minutes. The over under
Rene was going to take us home. You're going to take a break? I have the under, but yeah, we're gonna get there. Don't worry. Who took the under? I was gonna take the under. I took the over
because I was wrong last time. I was wrong last time. Okay?
Hey. Presents for 25. Do you have that? You must have been.
I'm sorry, I'm sorry. 15. Ordinance 20 2515, an ordinance of the City of Tarpon Springs,
Florida. Amending the City of Tarpon Springs. Code of ordinances, appendix A comprehensive Zoning and Land Development Code, article four special Regulations, Section
5605 mobile food dispensing vehicles temporary providing for severability. Providing for inclusion in the Code of Ordinances of the City of Tarpon Springs, Florida. And providing for the effective
date of this ordinance, that is, ordinance 20 2515, read by title only on first reading. Second reading is scheduled for October 28th, 2025. First
publication August 27th, 2025. Second publication anticipated for October 15th, 2025. Okay, thank you, Miss Vincent. Thank
you. If you recall back earlier this year, we did a series of amendments to our food truck ordinance, mobile Food Truck Ordinance to open up some other areas of the city where mobile
food trucks can come and go. We put some additional requirements in for things like bathrooms and things of that nature. One of the things that we built into that, that as a trial, we basically put a
sunset clause in that ordinance. So what we're back before you tonight is asking you to basically remove the sunset. And this now becomes permanent in our ordinance. We really
haven't had a ton of activity under this. We've got, I think, one truck operating and perhaps another and another one that's, you know, in process of trying to get through the hoops and
everything. So it hasn't been a really large effect to the city. I'll be happy to go through anything else that you might want to talk about with this, but we are recommending approval. The Planning and Zoning Board did review this
and recommended approval as well. Yeah, I don't have any questions. Commissioner van, do you have any? No, sir. Commissioner de Donato. No, sir. Commissioner Gulyas, unless we change a thing or two, there's not going to be any much
movement with the food truck thing, but we're just. We'll leave it now, and and the future discussions come up and they come up. So thank you, Vice Mayor. It was just good that we took the baby step and
left this open so that if it did get out of hand, we could have stopped it. The only thing that I'm a little bit upset about, the kind of inflammation that happened, thinking that what we were going to do versus
what actually happened, I just wish people would just keep themselves calm and not just inflame everything because, you know, nobody up here, we got accused of wanting to wipe out
the, you know, the whole sponge docks. That wasn't the case. So, I mean, I'm just glad it worked out. And if we need to alter it down the road, we could, you know, just to get, you know,
maybe a couple of things here or there rectified. But I'm just really pleased with how it worked out. So I thank you for your input as well because I know it was contentious. So
that's it. Yeah, yeah. Vice mayor, I appreciate you putting that date in because it gave us that trial period to show that it was much ado about nothing.
Sure. Okay. So do we have any public comments? Austin? No, sir. There are no hands up. All
right, all right. Yeah. Let's come back to the board for a motion. So moved second. All right. If there's no further
comments, roll call. Mr. Yes, Mr. De Donato. Yes, Commissioner. Yes. Vice mayor Eisner. Yes. Okay. So that
concludes all the agenda items. Let's go to board and staff comments. Assistant chief, once again, just thank you. But I wanted to thank Amir Ali for
coming out from Saint Pete College mayor. We met at SBC day, and they're doing a lot of good things. And part of that Public Policy Institute, which I graduated from, is doing great things. And the chief and
I were invited to a luncheon with the Secretary of Education for the state of Florida next week as a part of that Saint Pete College Public Policy Institute. So do a lot of good things there, and they need to
be recognized for the great students that they're putting out there. So I just want to say that thank you, city attorney. No comments. Mayor.
City manager, no comments. City clerk. Yeah. Commissioner Banther yes. Thank you. I will say it makes it much easier to stay here late, that this isn't really late. If we're laughing
and can, you know, I can look at Eisner and we can poke back, back, back, back, back, back, back and forth. So I do appreciate the, the levity when it, when it's appropriate. So thank you. Okay. Commissioner
De Donato I'm happy because everybody's happy. So it's all good. Commissioner Coolio. It was a great meeting and I was happy to see a little preview
of the crossover at the bayou over at Spring Bayou. And people are really excited to see it come together. So thank you, city manager and staff. And just, you know, the holidays are right around the
corner. So everyone hopefully enjoy the fall season and weather soon. Thank you. Vice Mayor. Liberty is always appropriate. That's all I'm going to say. But yes, I'm
serious. Some of the time tomorrow I have Pinellas, the School Transportation Safety Council, early in the morning. I don't know why I go there.
It's very tough to get anything accomplished. I did want to bring up a note that, you know, we had these issues about when
the mayor removed the green button and how it was going to be catastrophic. It's not been catastrophic. It's worked out well. So thank you, mayor. It's you know, it's working out
really well. So, you know, sometimes an idea works and who knows if this won't work. Last but not least, I just got back last night. I was away for 12
days. I was with my daughter celebrating the happy New year. It was Rosh Hashanah. So happy New Year to everybody that observes. And tomorrow is Yom
Kippur. And so if you don't know what that is, it is a day of fasting. It's very similar to the Greek holidays. And you try to rid yourself of anything
that you've done bad, and you try to inscribe yourself into the Book of God so that he should give you at least another year until the next Yom Kippur. So you cleanse your
body of the sins of the ill, of the bad comments of anything else. And of course, I have no bad comments. Seem like it's just one day you got enough time. So are you feeling that I
need to do this for two days? Is that what I think? 2 or 3 days? Yes. But you see, I have to observe the religion. They only require one day, even though others might think you need two days. But I will be
doing that. And I just want to make sure that everybody has an easy, fast. And like I said, it's to be inscribed into the book for the new year, and I'm more of a traditionalist, and I
just want to wish everybody an easy, fast. And I think it was a great meeting. I think we are gelling up here and, you know, I just look forward to, you
know, next Tuesday when we have that, that easygoing discussion on the project. Yeah. So that's it. Thank you. Thank you. And I
wish you a beautiful holiday. Thank you. Okay. You know all the all those all, you know, whether was Miss Ali being here and and commissioner, vice
mayor Eisner and and the, the rest of us that are Christians up here. You know, it all kind of comes from, you know,
Abraham and Ford and so all so many of our traditions are, are so similar. And yet we still find reasons to to hate each
other over stuff, even though we can all come from the same place. But that's a that's for another day, you know, vice
Mayor, I'm not. I want to thank you. You know, several of these. Your your fingerprints were all over this this agenda tonight with, you know, the food truck
thing. And then I think the what was the other thing that you did? The Duke energy issue and all that stuff. But you
really I gave me a sense, you know, we do only see the those people coming forward that are asking for relief from code
enforcement. And most of the time they are mostly, you know, legit cases to, to understand. But you did give me a
perspective because we've all I think every one of us have had a bad neighbor. And you know, we're only seeing that person come forward, not seeing the people that suffered again for
the 23 years, living next door to something that was a problem. So I appreciate you actually bringing that forward, because it gave us a perspective that you gave me, a perspective that
I needed to hear. You know, with Miss Ali, when she was here, I had I had spoken at Saint Pete College Day, and it
was and it was kind of personal for me because one is my daughter is a graduate of Saint Pete College. She got her bachelor's degree there and in
nursing. And I know how how you know, good the college is. But I actually taught there for seven years. I taught accounting and quite a few of
my students that I've to even to this day that I, I know one of them that I actually commented about was one of the parenting brothers that went on
to law school and, and, and went to University of Notre Dame and all that. But they were students at Saint Pete College. And, you know, I remember the first day of of
class, I would hold the my accounting book up and, and, you know, most of the kids that were students that were there were there not because they
were inferior students, but most of them were there for economic reasons. You know, they couldn't afford to go away to college and they needed to come go to a community college. But I used to hold that
accounting book up. And I would say, you know, everything in this accounting book, the debits, the credits, all the balance sheet, income statement, everything that's in this book
is the same information that they're going to teach up in Cambridge, Massachusetts. And it's you have as much ability
to learn this subject as somebody who's going to MIT, Harvard or wherever. It's the same material. And you see that in at Saint Pete College, you
see the, the, the benefactors of that, whether this really highly composed young lady that got up and spoke, you know, one of my, my best friends and I
don't mind calling them out. Mike Juris, you know, who went to Saint Pete College and, you know, went on to the University of Florida law School, became was actually graduated second
in his class in the law school and is obviously a anybody that knows him and knows him to be a highly successful person. He came through Saint Pete College. So, you know, at that time it was Saint Pete. JC so we're we
are so fortunate to have a school here. And it's not an inferior school. It's actually an exceptional school. And and I'm, I'm really proud that I
had, you know, time that I spent teaching there. And again when I see young people come forward, like this young lady that came here tonight, it even more confirms that it's
something special here in, in our, in our town. So with that meeting adjourned at 926, that should have taken you know,
sometimes you just don't know. Let me go explain to them what.