He was. Did Gibson leave?
That's awesome. Look at that. How cool. Oh my God, I look at looks beautiful right there.
Look at that. 59 and a 59. Oh that's great. Look at that.
Yeah I know it's always. Why
not. I call to order the work session of the Board of Commissioners of the City of
Tarpon Springs on Monday, March 30th, 1 p.m. Roll call please. Here. Vice Mayor Eisner here. Commissioner here. Commissioner
de Donato here. Commissioner Banther here. Okay. Today this is a workshop only. We're not voting on anything. I've asked
the commissioner elect, Lori Weaver, to sit in with us, and she can participate in this workshop as well. The. So today
we're going to be talking about the rules of procedure. Let's. You know, it's always nice when you have a new board coming in,
even if it's only one member and the four of us are staying. It's a, it's a new start. It's a start to a new year. And we get to to move forward. I want
today I'm going to ask that we refrain from going backwards, debating things that have already happened. I really hope we can refrain from that. I hope we can just focus on, okay,
what's what's the best way for us to proceed going forward? I think that one of the things I'd like to accomplish today is that we understand that none of
us have much power, that it's the group of us that have power and and that we also, to the extent we can, as police
ourselves, hold ourselves to a high standard and, you know, not waste city resources where where it's not necessary. And I
think the city attorney will help us through all that. You know, I think also we should always keep in mind our mission is to improve the lives of the
residents of Tarpon Springs. So I'll ask yourself if what we're doing is, is, is moving us in that direction of that mission. So and I think as we go through
these rules that none of these should be personal. Again, I don't want to go rehash old, old behavior, but we need to move forward and have rules
that help us to proceed. So what we're going to do is we're going to go through these. The city clerk has created these items for us, and we will go through them one at a time. I
will will go in the normal order that we discuss things here at commission meetings. I'll go first. We'll go through the each member of the
commission also include Miss Weaver as well. And then. We'll just go through these items one at a time, and then the city attorney will opine wherever he
feels necessary. So feel free to jump in wherever you need to, to jump in. Okay, so the first one is requests for information
of staff. And, and it's in this case, we already have in the rules of procedure, if you go to the rules of procedure page
three, item number four, it talks about the. How can we go to that page? I'm sorry. Okay.
Item number four, it it discusses how we request information from staff. All requests. Requests for information from city staff or city manager shall be
coordinated through the office of the City Manager. In no event shall any member of the City Commission issue direct orders or any to any member of
the city staff on. Under the City Manager, City clerk, City attorney or Internal Auditor, the City manager. So anyways, I
don't have to read the whole thing. We these employees here in this building. So we, we, we, we can direct anything we want
to a charter official, whether we can go to the city clerk, we can go to Mr. Polos, we can go to the city manager, we can go
to the city attorney. But in no case are we allowed to go directly to employees of the city that work under these people, especially those who
work under the city manager. So I think it's important that we respect that. And, you know,
again, those rules are already in place. I personally don't want to change them. I think those are the way that that that things should work. And so
Commissioner, do you have any comments on this? Yes. Thank you. And I, I think myself I'm a I'm a good example of this, not because I'm special, but because of my, you know, private, private, private
sector job. So I've always been very big on anything that I do in the capacity as a city commissioner always goes through the city manager, or at the very least if it's some
benign, stupid thing, I at least copy him on the email. So Charles is aware of everything I'm doing right. And I don't think I've ever aired from that. And then also, but I'm also a real estate broker, so I've had,
I have to have meetings with Renee and, and this and that. And while I'm not acting in my official capacity, people know who I am and there could be undue influence. So what I do and I had this happen two weeks
ago for a property, I let Charles know, hey, Charles, I have a meeting with Renee and my client this date. You know, just just a heads up. Also go ahead and register on this, that if this comes before the b,
o, c, then I'm going to recuse myself just so nobody can ever say as there's, you know, we know how things go in the past that there's clandestine meetings or secret things
happening. So basically, I rushed to create a public record. When I'm acting in my private capacity. So everything's above board. But certainly when I'm acting in my,
in my, in my, in my, in my, in my official capacity, I always go through Charles. And again, I don't want to go backwards here, but I definitely see that
that's not always been the case in this second go around for me. And I can just kind of tell that by, for lack of a better phrase, some of the vibe of staff when I'm in meetings that
it's a lot more cautious. There they are. They are a lot more cautious and they're a lot more standoffish. And I don't blame them at all. So I think we haven't been necessarily adhering to all those rules. So
I think if we can Recentre again, if you're acting in your official capacity, everything I repeat everything should go through Charles or the relevant charter official. And I don't
think anybody else here has my unique situation with work. But in my capacity as a real estate broker, if I'm acting on behalf of a client, I at least make a public record of it, and I make
sure Charles is just aware. So that's kind of how I've done it. And, you know, it's always it's always done me well. And I think and I also think it earns you the respect of staff
because, you know, if any one of us goes to a, to a staff member and gives them a directive, not only is that not appropriate according to our rules, but also it puts them in
a very difficult situation. Because while we can't fire staff, let's let's all be honest here. Charles counts to three. Right? So let's not ever.
The best we can put any staff member in that position. I don't think it's fair to them. I don't think it's good for retention. I don't think that's happened a lot to the extreme case. But I think I've seen it
happen a few times. So that's what I do and that's what I would recommend other people follow. Thank you. Commissioner.
Commissioner Di Donato, I can only say that I, I practice the same way since I've been in in politics in this city, it's always been a city manager commission form of government.
I understand that, I know the definition of it and I, I cooperate that way. I have made it a point since Charles was hired, even before that. But
since Charles's hired, I've always asked him, met with him and talked to him about what's going on. Excuse me. For Des
Moines stuff. Anyway, I believe that I. I never really worked on a on an item that we were going to vote on with the department head, unless Charles
already knew that I had had those concerns. It. I have never pushed an employee in the corner or given them no way out
to do it my way or the highway, because it's not that way in the past. Basically, if if one commissioner wanted to go towards a certain direction,
they actually brought it up in commission comments during a meeting. There was a consensus either the commission was for it or they weren't, and from there it would go forward.
Unfortunately, that doesn't always occur currently, but by all means, I believe in the city manager commission form of government. I followed it and I will continue to do so as long
as I'm here. Commissioner Coleus. I see the rules now. And of course that means that, you know, any city employee underneath Charles that would
go directly through Charles. But some of the other charter officials, we would go directly to them, obviously. As for myself, I believe I follow it
pretty much very close to what Commissioner Banther does, in which I try to communicate with the department heads. I always cc Charles to let him know, have there has there been a time or two where. I know the
question goes directly to a department head, and I may have forgotten to include Charles. Yes, but you know that happens. But I'm not requesting to provide a whole bunch of
documentation, you know, a question or something. So I try to follow that rule and I think I do to my best. I do a good job of it and always try to keep Charles in the loop to see
what's going on and get responses from other department heads as well, and just anything else in the community. And so I think it's fair and straightforward and it should
operate this way. Thank you. Thank you, Vice Mayor. Thank you mayor. I have do not and I repeat, do not give direct
orders to anybody that is working under Charles. But I've also at times spoken to Charles
about issues and I've asked, as he knows, for permission to speak to a department head for an explanation, but I will never give somebody direct
orders. And even when I speak about. I always ask that they cover anything that I say with the city manager because, as I said to them and to the city
manager, they don't work directly for the board at any given time. So if if that's an acceptable that I can get an explanation. We have sometimes just, you know, consent agenda
items or we have items that come about that I don't really see a, a problem in just asking a question and getting an
answer. And with that, I always make sure that they cover it with, you know, the city manager. So that's where I come from. I don't give orders. I
ask, you know, questions so that I'm more prepared for the meeting. That's it. Okay. Commissioner elect, you want to
comment on any of this? Thank you. Mayor, I understand the procedure and I have no problem complying with that. Thank you. I know, I know, you've lived under the same kind of rules at
the on the planning and zoning as well. So I failed to bring up one item. And again, this I, you guys can answer these questions the way you can deal
with this the way you want. This isn't personal. So all we're talking about is these are rules. Do we want to adhere to these rules? Do we want to keep these rules in place? Or
do we want to change the rules? That's it's not about, you know, nobody's on the hot seat that they have to defend themselves and talk about what they do. That's not what we're talking about, is what we collectively
are agreeing to do amongst ourselves. So I did, I'm sorry because I had it on another page. Here's an item that we need to be very careful with no
side contacts aside from introductions with vendors, outside vendors. We have to
respect procurement. Okay, so you I'll give you an example. I had a young man contact me that said he does pressure cleaning
and painting and wanted to know whether he could get on a list for. For the services that we
do at the city that don't go out to bid. I went to Charles. I said, Charles, can I introduce this person to Janina? And you said, yes. And then I
made an introduction and I was out. I didn't, I didn't even go. All I did was say this. This young man is going to call you and this is his name. She made
the arrangement. She met with the guy I didn't know. She met with the guy till I saw him at at the, the parade. And I said,
hey, did you talk to them? She he goes, yeah, I came in, I gave her my card. She said, she'll put me on a list and when things come up, she'll let me know that was it. I'm out. I'm out of the deal. Okay. So
we have to be careful how far we go with vendors, because what we could do is we can contaminate those vendors and then we can't use them at all. So instead of you helping that person, you've done the
opposite. And also this would also go to this. Remember, we can't there's only we can only do so much investigating
ourselves. It's not really our job to be doing side investigations, especially, especially things that are going to be quasi judicial in nature. We cannot go out and do
our own investigations and bring information to this board again, or introduce vendors at this board meeting. You cannot bring vendors at this board
meeting. You can you can go through the city manager, you know, somebody say here, city manager, this guy is sells pencils. Do we need pencils? Fine. It's up to him. He goes
with Janina. So what do you can you opine a little bit on that? Yes, mayor. We'll go back around on this item. We'll go back around. There's a couple things I want to point out. One, the interference with the
administration is not just one of your rules, but it's a charter section too. So it's section 13. So it's, it's definitely something that you
need to adhere to. I know it's sometimes difficult, but really this, this is a city manager form of government, meaning that you're a legislative body,
you pass the laws, he implements the laws. So I, you know, I hate to have to remind people of that, but sometimes we get intertwined in things
and we lose sight of that. When you want information, honestly, you should be going to the city manager, as you all do and ask, you know, for example, can I is
it okay if I go talk to Janina about this particular bit? The other part about that and the difference of going out and getting information versus asking the city manager to have
that information is when you're at a meeting, the whole idea is for you to get information and have the information necessary
to do your legislative body action. So, for example, if you wanted to have certain information available, we want to make sure that's at the meeting. Otherwise, we're going to have several meetings on the
same subject because we didn't have advance notice of what your questions were. So if you ask Charles those questions, we'll have that information so that you can share it with each
other and be able to make a decision at your meeting. Otherwise, we're going to go back to real long meetings to discuss these things, because you're not going to have the
necessary information. And on the vendor issue, I'll give you an example from Gulfport, because I've told some of you this, we had a situation where
the city had a lease, and as the conclusion of the lease, the city had to give fair market value to buy a building in Gulfport. They went and got
a appraisal done. One of the commissioners didn't like the appraisal, so they went and got their own private person to look at the appraisal. They came to the meeting and when the discussion occurred, they
said, well, I talked to so and so, and here's their appraisal. And it says X, Y, and Z. And you know, I had to say, well, that's all fine and dandy. We
can't use that appraisal. Not only can we not use it, but we're precluded from talking to those people because that's not your. The legislative body, the city manager has to do those
things. Commissioner Banther said it perfectly. But the point is, if you don't like the way the city manager is doing those things, then you talk about, you know, changing. If you don't like the city
attorney, you change the city attorney. But you got to go through this process. Each one of you is just one vote. It only matters what three of you say. So you just have to be
cognizant of that. The city manager is supposed to be the one who guides all those things. And the other part is, is, frankly, some of the department heads might be, you know, just
going through a lot of stuff and now's not the time to talk to him. And he might say the city manager might say, well, you know, you know, Janina is is just swamped. Can we wait on this? Because he needs to
control how those things are going. So that's why you have to go through the city manager okay, Commissioner banter, let's go one round on this subject. I brought it up. I think this ties in well with
with with what we just we just went around about. I think I've had at least in this go around one vendor who I knew that wanted to bid on the fire station and they started to,
they didn't do it in time. And they asked me to clarify the time reference and I got that information and and that and that and that and that was it. I didn't lobby on their behalf
because I felt it would be inappropriate to do so. But I was just thinking here, if I ever do that again, I think the safer bet and we should always on the side of caution, we've all been through something here
politically, whether good or bad, right? We know how it can be. But I think going forward, I think I should tell the city manager, say, hey, this is a vendor. I know they have these
questions and then let him direct it. And that because I think purchasing is our most litigious thing we could get involved in, I really do. Second only to or the next one
downs hiring. So I never, ever want my hands in that pot because that's where kickbacks can, can, can be accused of or all these different things. So I think going forward, though, I had the same experience as
the mayor in one instance. I think the super safe way is to go to the city manager still, and that's how I'll do things going forward. Commissioner Di Donato, I, I go through Charles
I that's what I do. He knows what I'm doing. He, he's even set up meetings that I, if I had questions for the department head, he's actually sent those meetings up and the three of us were four of us.
How many it took to get that done? So I'm well aware of the procedure. I am secure in that procedure. It keeps keeps me doing what I'm supposed to be doing and keeps me from not
doing what I shouldn't be doing. Commissioner, I think we could tie in a couple sentences to define this in our rules and just have that added. That way
it's representative, it's clear. It's straightforward. I follow that path right now. I mean, I have vendors. There was someone who wanted to purchase the fire station too, and I said, I
don't have an answer. Email me. Our, our city, our city manager and city help and we'll find out what that answer is. I had a guy today ask me, I want to
do jet ski rentals. Can I do it at sunset, Sunset Beach? I said, I don't know the answer. Here's my email, send it to me, we'll send it to the city manager and we'll go from there. I have
another guy who does this oxygen. Somehow there's this mechanism, and I'm going to send it to the city manager. That produces a lot more oxygen for water and the benefits from
it, from farming or agriculture or just to the houses for the community could be awesome. I said, write a formal thing and we'll send it in to the city manager and staff and have them
look at it. So I think it's the safest approach, keeps us away from it all, and it serves as a public record of when it was created, when it was thought about and when it's, you know,
how it all formed. And so I think we could articulate that in a couple sentences within that chapter. It would help clear the air for all of us. City attorney, can you think
you could you think there's more clarifying language? You could. The city clerk and I are city clerks taking down all this information. We will prepare the amendments to your
rules based on what you tell us today. Okay, vice Mayor, so I agree with what what I've heard, but there is also certain times where I'll call the city
manager and ask, or he'll know that I'm speaking with somebody, and I will either get back to him to let him know what
information it was, or have the department head speak with him about what I spoke about. I try to keep it as a public record
as well. I try not to. I definitely will never give a order. And if there's any sort of change, whenever the city manager wouldn't want me to speak to somebody, I wouldn't.
So that's usually it's a conversation between the city manager and myself.
Commissioner elect. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Okay. I think we've gone through requests for information of staff. Let's go
to records requests. I'll go first on this. The only thing that I, I, and again, I don't know, the city attorney can tell me whether it's already in the rules or not. I don't know
if these have to be clarified in the rules. I understand that, you know, city commissioners want to do record requests of
the clerk. I think that it needs to be clarified as to whether you're doing a record request as a resident, of which you should have to pay like any other resident, or if you're
doing it as a commissioner, and if you're doing it as a commissioner, I don't think the response standard is the same.
Is it is that the case? The idea is, yes, mayor. The idea is, if that you're asking for information and you have a section on that request for information as a commissioner,
and those are given priority because honestly, we're trying to get you the information so you can have it for making legislative decisions. If
you're asking for it individually, then, you know, it's come to a point, not necessarily this board, but previous boards where we've tied up the clerk's office with
public records requests going back and forth that have nothing to do with you sitting as commissioners in those situations. They should be
treated as just an anybody else because they're not being used for your position. So the advantage of not having to pay for things is because you're sitting, commissioner, asking
for things as a commissioner, if they're unrelated, then it should be treated as just a resident asking for it. Of course, under that circumstance,
they're your are subject to costs related to it. If you feel it my opinion, if you feel differently, then I would bring it up to the commission as a whole, which is an option that
you have for informational purposes. But I think we know the difference when you're asking for something on X project or, you know, something related to that versus just,
you know, something regarding resident. Okay. Commissioner Banther. Yes. I don't think I've done a records request as a commissioner. I even think
back to my first two terms, at least if I did, it wasn't from the pretext of trying to get somebody, if you will. And I feel like that's often what we use them for now. And I know if
you know, right after Covid, there was a time here when that was the norm. But I think we've all moved on from that. And I think we should. I think you need to ask yourself, well, are you within your your legal
right to to do a records request? Certainly, of course, any, any, any, anybody can do that. But I would ask yourself, am I doing this as a commissioner to move the needle forward or am I trying to get
somebody, as I've always said, from the days of the quote unquote, special investigation and all that stuff, if you really think a crime is happening, you call the State Attorney's office why we should
not be using city resources and staff to do our personal dirty work. If you we know the pathway forward. If you genuinely believe that there is a crime happening or misuse of
office, there's very clear, you know, you know, you know, like, you know, like, like, you know, procedures for that. So I would again, say, unless we need to do something, unless you need
to do a, a, a records request to help you in your position as a commissioner to advance the, the, the city forward. I would ask, what are my motives for doing this? Because they're
probably not, not not the best. And you know, again, it goes back to using staff time and resources. Anytime anything comes from from from from from
from, from, from one of us, it puts a lot of pressure on that, on that, on that staff member who's not chartered usually, you know, so that and that's not fair. So that's my approach
to that. I've not done them. I don't intend on doing them. And I would discourage others from from from doing them, unless you feel like this must be done to move the needle forward. If you feel there's crimes
happening, there's very clear pathways forward for that. That's all I got. Commissioner Donato. I need to with with
years of experience, but approximately 14 years, I don't recall ever doing or filing a request for, for, for, for records. I have asked for
information at times at their schedule. Seldom has that happened. I pretty much have always made it a practice to go to the city manager and discuss
those items, and it goes from there. Again, I will tell you at one time, any of us, the five elected officials, if if they had something that they wanted information on
frequently was brought up at a meeting, discussed and decided that that's okay, and then went forward, that's the way to stay out of trouble as far as I'm
concerned. So I see what you're what you're what you're saying, and I understand it and I try to live by it. Thank you. Okay, Commissioner. Yes. Yes, mayor.
I think we should have that defined again too. That way, if it's, you know, somewhat deemed professional or personal for any other reason, we pay for it, you know, and if it's related to, hey, I need this
information for our agenda item coming up or look at the history of this item, then we understand what that's at. And it does put pressure on us. And
as far as you know, there has been a lot of this, I don't know what's it called? Gamesmanship. Retribution, you know, a lot of stuff back and
forth. And I have put public records requested, and I'm not shy to admit that my goal is to protect the city of Tarpon Springs in its integrity and protect us as a board on any
items that may pop up in the future. And so I'm going to tie that back into our last item on ethics that we're going to talk about, because there are some
new information. And I think it's important that a lot of stuff gets aired out, and a lot of us quit the side communication. What's best for the for the city. So I have no
problem paying for stuff that needs to. I try my best to stay away from anything that's. You know, I got you or I told you so, but it's more like, hey, it's time to protect the city
from a lot of the side communication. And so if we're not doing that, then, you know, we lose our integrity too. So I completely understand and I don't mind paying the extra. And I don't intend to go back
and forth with individuals, but I'm going to protect myself as well as the city as a whole too, because we got big decisions to make too. And we all need to have our own some sort of
individualism up here. Thank you mayor. Vice mayor. So I don't think I've ever given a record request to do a hit job on somebody, but I've been on
the receiving end of that numerous times, and I probably will continue to get those from people, but that's their business. I don't believe
that's the way you handle a situation. I, I agree with what Commissioner DiDonato said. I agree with what Commissioner
Barnier said. Like I said, if I needed information from the clerk's office, from a prior meeting about a issue, I will
go that route. But I don't go on fishing expeditions to see what I could come up with and asking all the different questions of, you know, the
different names you could be called and the different period here and period there. And that's a fishing expedition to try to see if you can play. I
gotcha, and that's not what I think record requests are for. Commissioner elect.
Commissioner banter expressed expressed it well. I'm fine. Again, we're. You guys can handle yourselves the way you
want. We don't necessarily have to to this doesn't have to be contentious today. But what we're. What we're saying is I think the simple item that I
brought up was identify if you're asking for it as a resident, if you're asking for a resident, you pay. If you're asking for it as a commissioner, then that's a different story. That's it. That's is that or,
and I don't know if that's already in there, but if it's not in there, maybe then we just clarify it that you identify how you're asking for this. That's all. And again, I
as, as just a, a course of action, it may be best to go to like sometimes you can go to the city manager and ask for something first that it could
avoid bogging down the clerk. If, if you can get an answer there. So that's the only thing I said, okay, let's, let's go
to social media. All right. So. I'm actually, I, I, I, I think I respect people's First Amendment rights to say things
and, and be involved in social media as much as they want. I think it's, we already have it addressed. Page four. Number
five B says individual members of the city Commission shall refrain from expressing their position on a matter to be considered at an upcoming commission meeting. Commission members are encouraged to
consider the input. Comments of other Commission members and the public before expressing their position on matters to be considered at a commission meeting. So I think we just
have to be careful that we're not communicating information through social media. I think
that and you also just I think, as you know. Commissioner Archer had told me one time
that. When you when you put your positions in concrete before the meetings and you come to a meeting with the
desire to convince everybody of what you think, it's not always the best for government. I think what's you know, I think that, again, there's a reason
there's five of us here, not just one is that we all have opinions. And I think that the best form of government is when we come together, everybody express their opinion and we
find a common ground. And it's usually the best answer. So again, on social media, if you if you put your feet in concrete and then you come to
the meetings and then you, you've kind of boxed yourself in with, with, with your feelings, then it's hard to negotiate from that position
where if you, if you give yourself a little bit of wiggle room, then we can get here and, and make some compromises and get something, something done.
We also have to refrain from impugning ourselves, other, other officials and, and especially defaming things. We got to just be careful when we
say things that when you know, and it's in our it's it's on page six. Item number nine C,
it talks about. Elected officials are. Okay. It says elected officials must be clear that they are posting as individuals and may not
represent their posts on the official views of the city unless specifically directed by an act of the Commission or allowed pursuant to law. Elected officials are expected to be courteous when interacting on social media
with the public and other officials. So we just got to be careful that we don't impugn things. And sometimes, you know.
You make your case, but you don't have to always make your case based on what you like. Make your case because your
case has merit. Let's I think it's it's not a I don't think it's effective argument to, to go after somebody else's motives. Like you're doing this
because of this. Just say why you, why you think you're right and, and, and let the. And if you convince two other people to. You're right, then you, you get things what you want. Or
maybe you can find ways to compromise, because I really do. I think I really think it's the best. Again, social media, I, I try and I, I am, I know I'm not
perfect by any means and I'm going to try to clean up my way of functioning on social media because I have a, a mayor page and then I have my own personal
page. And I noticed that I have said things on my personal page where I've talked about being mayor and that I got to be careful with. I think I, I
think I need to be super, super careful because I have kind of muddied them up and I'm going to try my best going forward to keep this over here clean and
that over there clean. I'm not, you know, a youngster that has grown up with social media. So I don't you know, other than posting, I want to on my
personal page, post pictures of my grandkids, be an obnoxious grandfather and, and, and annoy everybody that way who I said I would never be, but I've turned
into one. So yeah, I've turned into one. And then on the, on the mayor page, I just really want to post mostly things that we're doing in the city. So people feel that they're informed about what's going on
and, and, you know, and give them something positive to look at and stuff. But that's just me. You, you guys do what you want. I do not want to police social media. I know that again, you know, Commissioner Coleus
is a much younger person and commissioner younger person. They've grown up with social media. They use it as a way to express themselves and communicate with people. They should have every right to do
that. I don't, I don't even want to seriously, other than just be, you know, just let's be just a little more careful. Other than that, I, I have no, I have no, I don't want to make
any changes to the social media policy or already have. Commissioner Banther thank you mayor. I fully agree with you. I don't use social media a lot
in in in relation to my to my to my to my, to my city work, the handful of posts I've done in a year and a half is it's, it's informational. So I think it should be kept to, but I'm
not, I don't police grown men and or and and and and and like women now of course about how to do social media, but I, I just think we should just keep it just, just very, very basic.
And when I was younger, I was more spirited on there. But as I got older, it's just, I mean, the thought of arguing with somebody on Facebook's nauseating to me at this stage of my life, and I think we
should keep it that way. We should use our social media to help engagement, to help awareness. But I would I think I think I will not think I do fully agree, agree with the
mayor that we should limit ourselves and creating concrete positions or, you know, arguing with residents or anything like that. Nothing, nothing good is
going to come of it. It's going to give you more stress. There's no upside for anybody up here doing that. It's not you might get a dopamine hit for a second and then you got to deal with the consequences.
And it's just it's just, you know, it's just that. But again, you all up here are grown. I'm not going to tell people what they can and can't do online, but that's how I do. And also, I know there is somewhat of a
public record, right? Right. City attorney created if we do stuff. So just just be mindful of that. You know, again, I would ask yourself, it's selfish, but I would ask yourself if you're wanting to
go a little bit like out of pocket on social media, ask, how does this look with me, with me representing the city? And, and really, how does this provide any benefit to me
personally? And I think almost always you're going to see that, you know, if you have to question that, it's probably not good for you to post it. And that that's the that's how I that's the barometer I use
for my city work as well as, you know, as, as well as personal stuff on Facebook. If I post it online, what I, what I, what I really think you all, you all you all, you all would
just kick me off here and I assume that goes for everybody, right? We got to keep some things inside. Right. So that's how I do it. Thank you. All
right, Mr. Donato. I it's funny, you told me social media, I, I Facebook only because I ran for office about 15, 20 years ago and I was told by my campaign
manager that I needed to be on Facebook. I use it more as, as we call it, social media. And social to me means good,
positive, keeping in touch, those kinds of things. And that is the only way I have used that. Other than two political statements. One was to thank them, thank the public for
being elected, and one was to just inform my situation and my opponent's actions. So I did do that. Those are probably the only two posts other than Happy
birthday, happy anniversary. Congratulations. Those kinds of things. Checking on my friends to see how they're doing. I kept it positive. I've kept
I've never put my own practice or business, my profession, even on Facebook, I. It's just to say, hey buddy, how you doing kind of thing for me,
that's the only way I used it. Personally, I don't think it should ever be used to, to badmouth somebody else. I don't again, that to me is not the
definition of being social. And I've practiced that and I have a record of such. Thank you. Okay, Commissioner. Yes. There
actually have been times where Commissioner Donato has used it to go against somebody in a campaign, but I just wanted to point that out. As far as social media, I use it for everything. I use it to get in
touch with my friends, follow up with business post city related stuff that I feel is really important to the residents, as well as that people should know. I mean, our
engagement is, you know, it's public, but it's not as out there as and this happens to all municipalities. It's not just this situation here, but, you know, at times we will have
to be vocal. Maybe we can definitely fine tune some of our our actions, including myself, no doubt. But I would also go a step further. Social media isn't just what you post
on your public page, it's all the nonsense some individuals do by instant messaging other residents claiming false things. Other board members trying to
message people to tell them to keep in line and act a certain way or so. And so that happened recently, you know, so there's and it's supposed to come from
two adults up up here. So, you know, maybe I shouldn't bite, you know, take the bait as some people, you know, from times and that's something I'll work on. But as Commissioner Banther said, we're all adults here. We
should be able to police ourselves. And and how you portray yourself is how you're going to be perceived in certain ways by people reading it. So I think it's important
that, you know, it goes from the public standpoint, what you're putting out there for everybody to see, but also the nonsense that some people send directly to individuals too. That's got to stop. And how are
you going to know about it unless you possibly do a public records request? You know? So you're right, mayor, we're you know, we got to do better. I have to do better. But we all,
one point or another have criticized or put in a position on why we're running for office for some other reasons why we've criticized. So I just want to be clear on that. And
it doesn't matter if you do it ten years ago or if you stop now, it's, you know, we all need to work on it. And I'm happy we discussed it. And what you say on the front end, you know, it's just as important as
the stuff you say instant messaging people on the back end. So thank you, Vice Mayor. So it clearly states on my
Facebook page, I do not use Facebook for city business, whether it be private messaging or anything. If somebody wants to speak to me, they can call me on the phone or they can
write me an email to my city email. I don't discuss it and I don't condone it. I can't stop people from sending things to me, and I will respond always
with a phone number or an email. I don't discuss it. But while we're discussing this. I read the exact same thing that you
read in here and without any ramifications, if you break these, the the rule is of no value. You can place rules out there. And if there's nothing
to make the claim that somebody was harassing or was bullying or was malicious or was obscene, these rules introduce a
mechanism. Yeah. No, no, I'm just explaining. Yeah. Because introduce a mechanism here. Sure. The end of this meeting because like I said, for me, I find it childish to get
involved and, you know, calling, name calling, I get involved in national politics and that's it. That's what I get on my Facebook page. Okay.
Commissioner elect. Thank you mayor. I believe that we would be remiss if we didn't include
mistruths in in that article, it says malicious, obscene, threatening, or that might constitute harassment or
bullying, but it doesn't address mistruth. And I would I would think that that, you know,
could be a, a loophole for someone to, to use. If it's a knowing. Opinion or statement
of mistruth. City Attorney, what do you think about that? We could add? I mean, if I could just I don't want to interrupt you. I'm through.
Okay. When you say Mistruth are you saying knowingly. No. Knowingly false statements. However, however you need to word it, I think the concept is
the one thing and a bunch of commissioners have touched on it. You have to police yourself, right? So nobody else can police the five of you except for you guys. The only other
avenues, as you all know, is Commission on Ethics and Governor action. I'm going to touch on that at the at the end. So bring all this to. So my point is, is that whatever you
put in your rules, you all have to enforce with each other or individually. And I think the, the section that was just mentioned, which is elected
officials should not post materials that could be construed as malicious, obscene or threatening, or that might constitute harassment or bullying. And if we add false, knowingly false statements,
those are again, as the vice mayor said, the only consequence is if, when we get to the end, that that you all have to be policing yourselves. I mean, if these are your
policies, you have to follow them. So that that's the one thing that we would remind you. But social media has brought out there are two issues. One is your personal page that you
have to keep personal. If you mix it, then it becomes subject to a couple things, not only public records, but you cannot remove anyone from your page.
If you allow public comment about the city or, or being a commissioner, because there's a case on point that brought all this up, which somebody
excluded an individual from a public page for their as an elected official, and that is considered illegal. So you have to keep them separate. Of
course, in a conservative opinion, by me, it would be beautiful if you didn't have your own personal one, but I understand that's that a lot of people are going to do that
anyway. But yeah, you just have to keep them separate and you have to keep them subject to these restrictions that you have. Okay, so is everybody in
agreement to add the language knowingly adding, saying things that are knowing, you know, to be false. Okay, nobody's complaining. Go ahead and do
that. It may be, Mr. Salzman, you know, to, to me, there's there's not enough meat, apparently, in this particular rules and procedure, maybe we
can define things better. And can you be patient? I'm going to get to the meat. Well, I'm just saying it needs to happen. I'll get there, I get that.
Okay, let's go to agenda. Okay. So. On agenda. All right. So
what I'd like to have changed. Is that right now as the mayor, the I have the authority to
kill an item at the meeting that's put on the on the agenda. I don't think that's. I, I, I
don't think that's a good. I think it's, it's a little awkward to have something killed here at the meeting when, especially if, if, if people
have arrived to hear something and then I want to kill it. We also can have. Again, we're a collective body. We can have
one. Any, any of us, including myself, put stuff on the agenda that is that we know we're not is not going to pass for the
mere fact of, you know, grandstanding or whatever you might want to call it, or just getting an item out there into the ether sphere. So again, we're a collective body. So I
here's what I would like to have happen. I'd like to have the rules be that the agenda is set by the city manager. And again, I don't want to put it
on him to Mark, you know, was in a little different position. He was, you know, first of all, he'd been here for five years and had a different kind of standing in the community or
amongst the board. And he used to I, I asked him to put something on the agenda once and he said, no, you're going to have to you're going to have to go downstairs to get the
board to agree to put it on the agenda, because I'm not putting it on. It's, it's, it's, you know, it's too hot and it's not. I don't think you got, I don't think you got support. And I didn't do it. I respected him,
I didn't put a bull's eye on his back because he said no to me. And but I don't I don't think the city manager quite wants that kind of scrutiny
from the each individual from board members. So what I'm going to say here is that the agenda be set by the city manager and the mayor, and that
it can be overridden by the Board of commissioners. So if if something gets to try to get put on the agenda, it is not
put on the agenda by the city manager or myself. Then at the board meeting under commissioner comments, you can say, I want this on the agenda.
You can you can even say that this I asked to put this on the agenda, didn't get put on the agenda. I want to have it on the agenda. Do I have two other commissioners along with me that would like to have it on
the agenda? If two commissioners say yes, then that overrides the city manager, it overrides the mayor. It, because right now I can kill it
even if three of you want it. And I don't think that's a power that I should have above and beyond you. You guys should override me collectively again.
I think you should override me. So I think that that would be the way we do it. You can always bring it to the commission. And if the commission says you got two
other people that say, yeah, I'd want it, then it it overrides anything. The city manager or the mayor would like to have on the how they want to manage the agenda. So again, it
brings the power back to the collective group. And I think that's the best way. So what do you think Commissioner Banther suggests? So just to clarify,
if we want something on the agenda, we tell the city manager, right. And he either puts it on there or doesn't. Correct. And I and with my with with your consent, we do it
together, you and the city manager. After you've brought the item for anyone in your position, it's not fair to just say you, anybody in the mayor's position. Right. And the city manager decided that goes on or
not then. And and then you're saying if it doesn't go on, then we have to bring it. Then we would bring it up, under, under, under, under like, you know, commissioner comments and
then see if there's three in support. Is that correct. And then it overrides any even if the city manager or the mayor do not want it, it's they can't stop it. It has to go on. I
have no issue with that. I do like the. I do like that. I think it's a good point to not have the mayor in the power too, because again, these rules could be going on for decades.
We can't just think of these rules in the in the context of this board, right? If so, I have a lot loose rules. I know you guys and whatever, whatever. But this is for, you know, there'll be almost a whole new
board in two years, right? So I think, I think this is this, this is all very important. So I don't, I don't have any issue with that. I definitely could play. I could play devil's advocate, but me personally and
how I govern, I have no issue with that. I don't think any any, any, any single one of us should individually, you know, you know, commandeer a meeting
or something and, and, and just go off on that unless there's agreement to do that. And if so, then so be it. So I'm not opposed to that at all. I don't see any issue with that. Do you
want me to bring up now my concern about our start time, or is that under a different item? That's yeah, we said that would be this. I have that's a separate debate. Separate
debate. Okay. That's fair. All right. I'm, I'm I'm good with what you proposed additional items under the I don't I don't I don't have any issue with this. Thank you. Okay. Commissioner De Donato, I do
not have an issue with that. In fact, if three commissioners want something on the agenda, I think that's healthy. But it should be asked or if if it's
one of us versus you in the city manager, it's with the normal process to me has always been that way, where the mayor and the city manager got
together primarily, it's usually city from the city manager because of all the information he has on the happenings, which I'm sure we all understand. But. If it's if
if it's okay by three, I have no problem with that. So. Commissioner Coleus yeah, I, I don't think it's a good idea at all. I mean, at that point,
mayor, you're the only one between you and the city manager. They get to decide what comes on the agenda. And that's a strong mayor form of government. It completely wipes away what our structure is. Our
charter says we, each individuals as commissioners can bring an item forward. Now, I'll tell you the truth. What has caused this? Was this a retaliation of me bringing
three agenda items that were very transparent to the community? I mean, I'm not sure the loan I'd bring back over again a thousand times and I would have done it over. I just
would have started speaking up a lot sooner, you know? As for the Harbor Watch situation, that was your best meeting. The room was packed. It was a lot of tension. You handled it the best. And come to find out,
there was some additional information that really needed to be looked into. And so we'll wait to see what that comes forward. As far as removing a person from the PNC board, I
was right all along. The meeting got cut short, especially that agenda item. We didn't even have a full process and we weren't even being able to get into the the full core of actually what the emergency
situation is, even though someone said that's what it was used for. So with all due respect, just because some people wanted to cover up the
situation didn't mean it didn't in fact happen. So the people of Tarpon Springs get to see that. So when I see that now we're going to go to a strong mayor form of government, and
that's what it is. And then you have to, you know, you have to reach out to Charles to fish around the two commissioners. And, you know, that process is going to take a while on certain items. So I would cautious this board. These
rules have been in place the way they've been for a while. And I'll tell you the truth, I bring these items up because some of them just aren't well received. And it's not my job
for some board members to do stupid things. It's my job to call them out when they do stupid things. And so if I can't bring it forward, what's going to happen with a reconsideration? If a person
wants to reconsider, then we have to have that ability. So I would really urge away from staying away. This is that's a strong mayor form of government. We can't do that. We're a council manager form of
government. We're not a strong mayor form of government. We need to stick to that. And that's a that's a charter that's like a charter procedure too, that ties into our rules of procedure. So, you know,
there's I strongly oppose it. But at the same time, you know, I don't know how this board is going to go. And if you can't present ideas to this community and, you know, we got some new
commissioners up here, they're going to want to present ideas. You know, do they want to present them during commissioner comments? Do they have to go to the city manager? You know I don't think that's fair. And so I would strongly
urge against that. I would say we can bring these rules forward here in the future if, you know, if this pattern or so to speak, you guys think is being abused in any way. But I
stand firm on a lot of stuff that I presented forward. And so with merit and unfortunately they one of them was swept under the rug tremendously without me having to go into
detail or people saying what they were saying on the mic. So, you know, that's where I stand. Let's stay away from the strong mayor form of government. I'm. The mayor's job is to run the
meeting. When Frank brought this item over for the Jitney, you know, unfortunately, he didn't even have the material, even though it was. We had to bring it forward. I presented
the item and that was it. I had no control over it. So there's going to be times you're going to have to present items that you don't necessarily like or necessarily agree with, but they got to come forward, you
know, through our procedures, we're elected as individuals to represent the people or, you know, represent items at a time. And so now can the city manager
say, hey, I don't want to do it. Yeah, he can. Mark did it to me all the time, you know, so it's not like, you know, and I urge you to, you know, to do that Charles, because when everybody starts picking at you to bring
it forward and this and that. I get it, sir, I get it. You're in a tough spot, you know. So let's stay away from the mayor
being the deciding factor on all the agenda items with them. And then, you know, if that's not the case, then he has to come back to Charles, has to come back to three of us. It's, you know, it's a lengthy
process, but some agenda items require it. But that's a big change. No matter how anybody wants to switch it around from the structure of our government in which we took our office oath of office to the charter
and the rules of procedures on how we were going to present items for this community. So that's all I have to say about it. Thank you. Can I, can I, can I offer some points to help Commissioner? PK real quick,
just some clarity. First off, I completely understand your position. I know you bring some controversial, some controversial, some, you know, like subjects forward, but I think I would encourage you to
consider two things. You mentioned strong mayor, which is a little bit different than the context. You're, you're, you're, you're using, but like, but like, like, as it is right now with the mayor, the mayor
essentially has ultimate veto power. If he doesn't like one of your items, he can just kill it. And there's zero discussion. There's nothing you or I can do about it. That that would be a
form of a strong mayor veto, at least in this scenario. There's a pathway forward to to to override that. And then lastly, I think you'd be surprised what
even people like myself that want to get home at 9 p.m. would support your right to free speech because think it's a two way street. If I don't support you in what you bring forward to talk about, are you
going to support me when it comes time? Probably not. So I have an incentive, and the whole board has an incentive to give you that platform when necessary. So like the loan thing, we sat here for two
hours. I would have supported you in that. I think it was I disagree with you, but I think it was a fair point to express. So I'd encourage you to keep those those two things in mind in this conversation. Okay. And
let me let me just let me comment because my name was brought up. This is exactly what commissioner is saying. I right now I have the strong form, I have the control. I
don't want that control. I'd rather the collective body have the control of what goes on the agenda. So if it doesn't get on the agenda, I want you to be
able to have recourse and bring it here. Right now. You have no recourse. I could just kill it every meeting. I don't want to kill it. I don't I don't think it's I don't think it's it's it's good optics for the
community for me to kill an agenda item. I'm it it's not. I'm doing this to give him some cover. Okay? I don't care if he had complete power to do it, I
don't I don't even care, okay? I've never have I interfered with you on an agenda item ever. No, I don't you. I just look at
the agenda. Trish. Trish a quick reaction. He doesn't know, but no, the truth is Trish puts the agenda. I see it like every single one of you guys see it oh okay. Whatever. And then I
and then, you know, I'll have a conversation with with him about, hey, what is this thing you put on? You know, whatever I never I didn't do it with Mark. I as a commissioner, I didn't I'm not doing it as
mayor. I don't want the power to kill it. I shouldn't have that power to kill it. That's strong form. I want you guys tight. So you guys could decide that even before it goes on the
agenda. So you guys could. You could, Commissioner, you could bring your item up at the meeting prior to the meeting you wanted on the agenda and say, hey, guys, I want to put this something on the agenda.
You get three votes. I got nothing to say about it, and he's got nothing to say about it. It's got to go on the agenda. So I want the collective group. We're all you know, none of us are here as a
sole representative of the community. We're the collective representatives of the community. And I agree with Commissioner Banther. I think you're going to find me, and I
think you'll find the rest. And that's what I want. I want to I want a functioning board, not a yes man board. I want a functioning board. If you have a good item you want to bring
up, I'm again, I want your cooperation. If I want to bring something up, I can't put it on the agenda without without the approval. Okay. We're just talking about management of the
agenda. So you guys want to bring this stuff up before the the next meeting? Bring it up. It's it's, it overrides anything he and I want to do. Okay. I just want to be able to give. I'm giving him cover. I
don't care if I'm involved in the process, be honest with you. Okay? So I'm happy just to see the agenda and, and come to the meeting and do my thing. And then if I want to put something
on the agenda, I put it on like everybody else. So Commissioner De Donato. I think you went already. He went on and everybody went, I think, yeah,
I do want to say I don't have a problem with with with, with, with you, with doing what you're saying. However, you we have a mayor for a reason. I
mean, somebody's got to be the responsible person. And I know you, I know you have been. And I know you will be. So in other words, I, I'm hesitant to give
up your authority. Right. But yet I see what you're saying. So I guess I'm somewhere in the middle, but someone has to like if there's rowdiness from the
crowd or something, you have that power to see that they are escorted out of here. I don't, I don't somebody has to have it. I just want us to be mindful of
that. But I understand what you're saying there and I don't disagree. It's just that somebody has to be the one, sir. I mean, the way the the way
things are right now. You know, I, I have the power to hit this gavel and adjourn the meeting right in the right in the middle of anything. Okay. I
don't like the way it's going. I think whatever, I could hit the gavel, say meeting adjourned, 207. We leave. That's not functional government. Okay. And I agree
with you. If you know the first of all, these rules and procedures can be changed any time they're fluid. If if we're doing it and it's clunky and it's not working or it's
getting abused, we can at any meeting vote to change the rules. We can we can suspend the rules. We can do all kinds of things. We have the again, the collective group has way
more power than than I do individually. But, you know, I just again, I'm looking for a way to not have like I remember
what was the word you used, Commissioner? Like not filibuster would you use. I forget what it was a good word. It was commandeer you said commandeer which the captain
down there would would appreciate commandeering. So yeah, again we don't want that to happen. But again, this is just I'm I'm throwing it out
there as an opportunity for us to to move forward and. Vice mayor, thank you. Mayor. You know, I'm listening to what
everybody says here. And I happen to agree to some degree with Commissioner, as far as. I
do believe that this is a call, more so that should be done by the city manager. That's just my take on it. You know, in the
beginning when he was new, I understand that there was, you know, the newness, the honeymoon and all that stuff. But at this point, there's nothing wrong with him making a
call to me. Ask my opinion if it's not something that I'm bringing up, and to call 2 or 2 other commissioners and get somewhat of a consensus this
way, it's not on him and it's on the commission with an unofficial type vote. And of course, I'd like to make sure that the commission sticks by
what they said to him, because, no, I'm not looking to hang him out on a shingle, but I don't think that it should be. I think we're all 20% of the
decision making that goes on in Tarpon Springs, and it's all under the city manager's jurisdiction. And if he feels that there is something that I
or any other commissioners bringing up that is not appropriate, just make a call to to other or just get two other people to say, man, it's
inappropriate and I don't want it. And I just don't think that anybody should have that strong mayor. As was said. I know that's not your goal. I know
that's not what you're trying to do, but I kind of like the way Mark handled it. And he has told each and every one of us at some point that he's not
putting it on, and we don't have the coverage to accept it. And we were Sol. So, I mean, you know, I'm just okay with
with that. Actually, that's one of the notations that I wrote here because clearly our agenda preparation, it says the city manager, city clerk, city attorney or the mayor or any
commissioner may place an item on the regular agenda for action. And if it is something that is really not something acceptable, he has the right to
just make a call. He's called me. He's called you. So that's that's my take on it. That's all. City attorney how? Okay.
Go ahead. Commissioner elect. I think I think the effort here is for us to policing ourselves, as you stated. And and I can
see a majority vote achieving that goal. So I agree with where you're going with this. I hate to see you lose your individual power over it. If
there was a way you could combine it, I think it would be more ideal, but I would be in favor. I think it puts the power back into reasonable people here on the on the board.
I would remind everybody that in your rules, the next sentence after the the one the vice mayor read is matters placed on the agenda by the mayor or any commissioner must
be related to the adoption or implementation of matters of policy. So that kind of feeds into what you all are talking about. If it's not a policy decision you're suggesting,
then it really should be something that a majority of, of you want to talk about because, you know, it goes back to as a legislative body, you
should be adopting policies. That's your but if it's something else, then it should be a majority of you at some point saying, yes, we want to talk about X, Y, or Z. I'm. And
I'm fine with it staying the way it is. I'm fine with it staying the way it is. But what we, I think we collectively have to agree upon is we cannot
put a bull's eye on the on the city manager's back. If he says no, then we have to respect that. Absolutely. And if we can all agree to respect that so
that he doesn't have that kind of pressure on him, then you, again, like Mark said, you can always bring. What Mark would always say to me is I'm not
putting it on. Take it downstairs. And then if downstairs wants it, then fine. I think ultimately the power should be amongst this group here. And so I'm good with with
leaving it alone, I really am. I'm fine with leaving it alone. Let's just all agree. If he says no, then we bring it down here. Okay. Is everybody good with that? And you still
maintain your power to cut? I don't want your power running the meeting. Be limited in any way. Okay, then let's. Then. I'm good. Is everybody good with leaving it again? We just
agree to respect him. Bring it down here. And if he says no, we don't take it personal and we don't. Okay. You want to say something? Yeah. First of all, if we leave it the way it is,
then any commissioner can put something on the agenda and just express how I how I view this. First of all, I feel like I work for the five of you and I want to facilitate, you know,
we have a new commissioner coming in. I want to get things done. I want to facilitate that. And I don't see myself saying no to you guys. I think that's a problem. That's why I was advocating for, you know, at
the end of a meeting under your comments, you say, hey, next time I'd like to talk about X, Y, Z. You look around if there's a consensus, because then we know if I'm if I'm calling you and I call you back
and go, there's not enough support. That's like voting privately. You don't know who was a no. We don't know why it was killed. Like I I'd rather that discussion was here. And you realize, oh, there isn't
enough support to talk about this. And we know who those folks are. So if residents want to advocate to those folks that were know, they can say, hey, could you change your mind? I really think you guys should
talk about this. So and it does take me out of the from saying no to my the people I work for, even if it's like, well, I've talked to everybody and there's not enough support. You know, you may not believe me that
there's not enough support, but we can't we can't have it both ways. We are a strong city manager form of government, not a strong mayor form of government. So you're going to
have to just be strong. And that means you have to if if you want to say no, you just say no and bring it down here. You can anybody can put it on the agenda only if it's policy,
only if it's policy. But you're going to have to make that call about whether it's policy or not. Could I say so I really I, I'm not trying to be I mean, argument with you, but either
you either you got me in the mix because I, I, I, I know I don't, they're not, they can't do anything to me. These, these four other people can't hurt me. They can hurt you. I don't mind
being in the mix. So either I'm in the mix or I'm not in the mix. If you're the guy, then you got to be you. So yeah. Go ahead. So I understand what
you're saying. Okay. But if you do say no, then we would actually be going to the regular routine any which way, which would be speaking at the
end of the meeting. The reason that I am not for the other idea of where you and the mayor decide is because we have meetings two weeks apart. So if
we have to first put something at the end of our meeting, then wait to put it two weeks, it could be a a moot point at that point. It slows it down. So
what I don't want to do is if it's something that important, it should be something where you and that commissioner have the prerogative to put it on. If you feel it could be a
hindrance or detrimental to a detriment to us, then you can, like I said, make those calls. You're not putting the target on yourself. We're all agreeing to respect that phone call. And
if it's a no, then the those commissioners could bring it up at the end of that meeting anyway and say, okay, I spoke to him. He said no. And at this point, I want to bring it up.
And do I have a consensus to go ahead with it? And then, you know, right away. So, I mean, I think that gets you out of the hot seat. What are the rules of of regarding polling? How do
you stay off of that? You cannot poll. So you cannot the city manager cannot act as a conduit. However, if there's a general issue painting the
building white is anybody you know, he can ask, Commissioner, would you like to, you know, are you willing to discuss or do you want on the agenda? You know what? We're going to paint the building. Yes, yes. So
that's just for purposes of putting it on the agenda. It's not saying, you know, the mayor said he wants to paint the building white. Are you okay with that? Putting it on the agenda? No, you can't do it
that way. But you can take an issue and say whether or not you want to put it on the agenda. And I think, again, looking at something that if it's not a policy decision, then somebody's supposed to
make a decision as to whether or not that goes on there, because individual commissioners cannot put on something that's not a policy. Right. You know, are you going
to help us define what policy means? I will do absolutely. Okay. I mean, again, it goes back to the whole idea of legislative your legislative body. You're creating policy
for you're not implementing policy. You're not telling Bob, you know, go out and, and, and rip up the roads or something like that. It's a policy.
Generally in our budget, we're going to look at repairing roads. That's a policy versus telling them specifically what roads he's got to pull up.
Commissioner, I think what we know what we want out of this rule and like we said, the last few months have been contentious. We know that. I believe everything is settled
down. It should at least. And so let's see how it goes. If, you know, we feel any one of us are commandeering, you know, the the board meetings, then we can bring it up. And at one of
the next following meetings, 2 or 3 months from now, have that one chapter defined. But I think we're going to you know, we got to help a little learning curve, not much. But at the same time, we got some
projects to work on. I think it's going to work out fine. I'm I'm good with that. How about everybody else? Do you want to keep the rules and
let's see how they work function out. I'm fine because we can also call the question if that that, that, that that's a that's a nuclear option should not be used frequently. I think I've seen it used once.
Maybe again, we also, we always have an opportunity to bring things up down here. Okay. Correct. City manager. I mean city attorney. Absolutely. So we can do it. And you you had
you had said one of the other cities you worked at, they, they would do that on a regular basis at the end of the meeting when you have commissioner comments, what I've seen in
other cities is at that point a commissioner could say, I'd like to bring up this issue. You look to see if you get a consensus or a majority. If it
is, then you discuss which agenda to put it on. You know, the city manager would say, well, we have a full next agenda is full. Can we do it in May? You know, that kind of thing. Okay. And then also,
again, goes back to what we talked about earlier, which is the ability for us to have whatever information you need to help you make your decision. If we don't have the time
period, then we we can't do that. Well, what I but what I don't want to see happen is if somebody brings it up and this is where, you know, obviously I can try to control it with the
gavel, but if somebody brings up, okay, I want to discuss this at the next commission meeting, they can introduce
information into the community where there's no opportunity to rebut that information. It's almost it's akin to reading the
title of a resolution or an ordinance. It's the bare bones aspect that you're asking. Can we talk about public works priorities? Yeah. Rather than
not not going, you know, you want to get into, let's say you have some issue with something. It can even be, you know, we'll use Bob Robertson's example sitting out there. You know, we
have an issue with Bob. You don't you don't we don't litigate the situation with Bob in the meeting. We just say, I'd like to bring up X and then
we just leave it at that. Okay? So that that way it doesn't sit there and Bob has no opportunity. Bob has no opportunity to rebut it for two weeks. It sits out in the world, so should just be enough for
the other commissioners to understand what the subject is. So again, I think and so much of all this is us just respecting each other and respecting what we do. And I
think that if we move forward and we're and, and also respect that we're all representatives of the community, not just any one of us have a pipeline to it. We all are representatives.
Okay, so let's go on public comments. I think we beat this one to death in the last commission rules of procedure with the three minutes and all that is. Yeah. The only thing
we wanted to bring up, mayor, if I can, is that to just in case, the Commission, for example, would like to have a workshop on an issue and you want to have public comment,
you only have to take public comment once on an issue before you vote. So for example, let's just say you were having a workshop, you took public comment and it was going to be
a voting meeting a week later. You don't have to take all the same public comment. You can go ahead and vote at the meeting. If somebody hasn't made a public comment, they can make
public comment. But in the past, not this board. Other boards have, you know, repeatedly had public comment on every issue, many times, which you can but you don't have legally. You
don't have to. You only have to take public comment once prior to voting on an issue. And that's just for information. You also preclude if somebody if we allow if we have a
special session or, or something and somebody comes up and has a public comment, and then they come back at the commission meeting and want to make a public comment, can we preclude one individual from
speaking twice on the same item, on the same item? Yes. Okay. But you have to be careful with that. I you know, it's not worth it. Yeah. I mean, trust me, there's a lot of people I wish, I wish I had a mute to be
honest, but it's just consequences. I'm just not I have no I have nothing on public comment. The the other submission do you have anything on public comment? I just I'll say this. I'm very pleased. I
know not everyone on this board with Covid era things we had in place with emails being read and Zoom, I'm very pleased with with with with, with, with where we are now. I don't I
don't see any changes. Okay. Commissioner De Donato, I'm fine with what it is. Commissioner. Yes. I still think we need to bring Zoom back for at least ordinances
and quasi quasi judicial hearings, quasi judicial order. Okay. That was all right, I guess not, Commissioner. I mean, vice mayor. I have no issues
with the way it is right now. Okay. How about commissioner elect, if you could just clarify, because I've seen it both ways. Public comment is
often requested prior to speaking on an agenda item by the board members, but on occasion, it's also, once you've concluded the discussion,
a requested again. So at what point are we requesting public comment prior to or or after our discussion? Mayor's
discretion. Well, the way we do it now is we have a presentation Commissioner questions, public comment. Come
back for a motion, then we discuss, then we vote. So the public comment would come after we do, after we question staff or, you know, if it's a quasi
judicial if there's a representative here, an applicant after we've done ours, then they would come forward and public comment could come up, okay, that's how we do it.
I know it's it's I think at the PNC we did it. I think a little differently. But that's I think that was the chairman's kind of
preference of how we did it, I don't know, it seems to work well now again, I I'm open to any time you guys want to talk
about, you know, changing the that I don't have a problem if if there was. But I can't have it twice. So I can't have public comment before the motion and then have public comment after the motion would
have to be one or the other. I've allowed it. I've kind of had it before, I think. I don't know, when you were mayor, how did you do it? I would just switch it up depending on the item. And I think that should
just do as long as you have the public comment at some point before the voting, whether it be, you know, after the introduction and the Department head to whatever their info and
you can go straight to public comment or we can have a discussion, then you can go to public comment for the reason. The reason I like the public comment before the motion is
because if you say something that impacts us, then we it could impact the motion we make. Absolutely. And you know, you want to listen to them or maybe information they're giving us
about, you know, I didn't think of it that way. And then when we make our motion now, when we're deliberating, we've already heard from them. And it's, you know, so I know it doesn't. I mean, it's, it's, I
think it's better when they hear us discuss a little bit because it gets their ears going. They get to talk for a second and then it brushes us up on, on some ideas that we
may have lost. But if there's an item where, you know, whatever it is, and you just go straight to public comments and it's not going to hurt, I have
no issue. I have no issue with, you know, and I did this when I was a commissioner, I'd say, you know, because I hadn't you remember, I had my little final thing. I gave you one of them.
You know, I said I was like a point of order. Can we have commission comments, public comment after the motion? You if one of you requested that I
have no issue in in in doing that. So we could kind of stay with what we want. But if you if any commissioner has a feeling differently, just say. Point of order, I'd like you to consider doing this. And I'm
like, hey, I'm cool with that. So yeah, I learned that from my little laminated thing. Okay,
so voting. I think I, I think the only item in voting and this is really nothing serious, I don't care at, at the, at the
regional planning, Tampa Bay Regional Planning Council and other places that I've functioned in, in committee, there's sometimes when we vote
on something that's not like, say, a quasi judicial or something where the vote is necessary for you to record as
the clerk, like, let's say at the end of a meeting, you guys, we you bring up and again, this is real small potatoes, but if you guys bring up, hey, I'd like to have something on the
agenda. I could say all those in favor say I anybody opposed and then you don't have a vote like. So there might be some times where that pops up where I don't she doesn't need a
record of the vote. We just need to get to get a consensus. Everybody okay with this? And and sometimes I've done that before where I say, y'all okay with this? And everybody says, yeah, yeah, yeah. And I just go.
So I could just say, all those in favor say aye. All those opposed say no. But but most of the time we need a record of the vote. So she has to hear it. So anybody have any comments on
voting? Okay, okay. Additional items. Let's see what we have here. Commissioner Banther, you said you had an additional oh
I'm sorry, you have political campaigning, use of city official. No that's next. No. That's next. Got additional items first. Second. Okay, so I I've long said this. I think
our meeting should start at, at, at 6 p.m. for several things. And I know there's always the argument of working people and coming in and I respect that. But any item where some. The
first part of our meeting with with presentations, with proclamations and consent is very benign. Anything that citizens get involved in is later in the meeting. Okay, so
I don't I don't think that would that would that would, that would, that would preclude that. I've always said you get after 9 p.m. in these meetings, the attention spans wane. People aren't tuning in as much.
And people have lives. They want to go home. And this includes staff and, and, and members of the public. So I think starting our meeting 30 minutes early will help allow for ample time for, for, you
know, presentations, proclamations and plenty of housekeeping. But, but before we get to the section of the meeting that involves, you know, any kind of contentious, you know, you know, you know, like
commentary and I'd be for starting CRA earlier, but that might be pushing the ball here a little bit. But I just think we get more engagement. Like I said, with that amazing CRA
presentation, I, I'm still, I'm still, I'm still, I'm still, you know, thinking about that, that, you know, we had an auditorium full of people. And if that would have been seen in the beginning, would have had a
lot more impact than just us and a few people in the crowd at 930 at night. So I personally would like to see our meetings start. Start. Start. Start. Start at 6 p.m.
If you look at surrounding communities, I don't have the data in front of me. But I know the county meets, you know, meets meets meets, you know, meets much earlier in the
afternoon. And I think some other some other municipalities start at start at 6:00 as well. That's the only thing I had to add that that wasn't on on on on on on this agenda. Thank you.
Okay. Let me be the first to comment on that one. Go around the bend. I agree, I mean, we're talking about two meetings a month. I think we
all have ample we all know and well in advance right now. We know every meeting we're going to have for the rest of the year. So we have an opportunity to move our schedules around. I
mean, when I decided to when it was decided that I was going to be mayor, I made changes in my own professional life. I, you know, I, I had I have two parts
to my practice. One was I do traditional accounting work and tax and the other is I do, I did litigation support and I did expert witness testimony. I
gave that up because I that I didn't have control of. There was no I could not tell a judge, hey, I got to go to a commission meeting and I got to get out of here. You know, the
I didn't have that. I, I didn't have that power there for sure. So and, and so now, you know, I know in advance that there's going to be meetings and I, and
I make sure that I am available for the meetings. What I, what I think we have to be cognizant of is, is staff. I, I actually
my preference would be the meeting start at 6:00, we have these CRA meetings, which I don't know why we have so many CRA meetings, but that's a whole nother story. Maybe we
can limit those. I yeah, you know, whatever. But so, so yeah, I okay, I got, I got it, I got it, I got it. Okay, I, I can
still gripe about them. So I would, what I would like to do because again, you're a perfect example is we have a CRA meeting at, at the end of a meeting, we have a meeting,
let's say, you know, we're not going to be it's, we're not going to have the luxury of, of every meeting getting out at, at 9:00 or 830 or whatever. I mean, we try to, to be as we've, I think we've done a good job
of being efficient. But, but, but, but it's not always going to be that way. And to ask staff that's been here all day long now to just hang around even you see them like Renee sits in her office, watches the
TV. I don't know who knows what she has to do, what she's doing in there, you know, poor lady. And she's sitting around and then she has to come running in here at so and so time, or to
be at a CRM meeting. And that doesn't start till 930. So I, I would like the meeting. I would love the meetings to start at six. I think the CRA meetings
should be 530 and then they're done. And, you know, and so and we're not going to have we won't have. How often do we have to have CRA meetings? Well, we've decided to have them once
a month. We don't have to have them once a month. We could, we could do them as, as, as needed, as needed. Okay, so as needed. So even if we have a CRA
meeting once every two months, you know, again, we'll know about it well in advance. You adjust your schedule to make sure you're here. And, and we do our business. And it's, I think it's better for the
community because nobody's staying up super late. They're, they're not hearing us when, when, when we've had meetings, you know, during even the include harbor time, when, when
meetings were continued three, four times and going into 1:00, you think anybody paid attention to what we were saying. And that was really good stuff that they needed to be engaged in. And yet, you
know, it's I don't think it's good government to for to, you know, these people have kids to get ready for. They got to go to work the next day. You know, it's, it's, I don't think it's good government to be up that
late and being conducting business because I don't think you're in the, in the, in the light of, of day, that's for sure. So Commissioner De Donato,
what do you think? I have, I'm not opposed to starting earlier. In fact, if you're really going to change it, you probably should just start at 530. In my opinion, especially for the
staff, because it lets them not have to sit around so long. That's number one. Number two for me is, is I agree with Commissioner Banther. If excuse
me, I have always felt that when we come to these meetings, if you have questions, they should have been answered before you got here. I firmly
believe that. I mean, I've been criticized by a couple of up here because I don't often say a lot, but I don't at the same time haven't come here not
knowing what was going on. And and I do listen, I learned a long time ago, you pick up more knowledge by listening than talking. And so I listened to
what everybody says out there here. And there have been times that there's actually affected a vote or two for me. But if you if you've done your homework before you got here,
there isn't any way you can go through 25 items in 2.5 hours. I mean, absolutely true. I mean, I've done this long enough to know that that's a fact. And in
fact, you can actually do it in less time than that. But but when we're, if you use it your time to, to talk for any other reason than to get business
done, then then you're defeating the purpose because there are people that come to these meetings. There were people that listened that would phone in when you have those
lengthy meetings, of which I have when I first started, we had some 1:00, 2:00 meetings. Fortunately, they didn't last long, but we had some of those. You've lost your audience,
you've lost the people. And even even the, you know, somebody brings somebody to talk about their point. I mean, they, they all have to go to work the next day. So I'm all
about being efficient, getting things done, moving forward, staying positive, dealing with the negative because you got to deal with that. But if we're doing this right, we we don't
need to prolong meetings in any other way other than the what the people want out there, because we should have been doing our homework before we
got here. So. I think it's a shame for somebody to come here and sit for 2 or 3 hours. Sometimes I challenge any of you. If you haven't done it, look at them. They'll check
their watches. They they've got to go to work the next day. So get up at 430, 5:00 in the morning and we're keeping them here until God knows when. That's that's not efficient
government, in my opinion. I. If you've done your homework before you got here, you can agree to disagree and find a solution and move forward. And that's what we should be doing. And that's efficient government.
And so anything you want to do to streamline the meetings, I'm pretty much with you. And starting earlier makes sense to me. I think it's better for staff. Like I said, five 30th
May make more sense. It gives it a chance. And they come down here, we get the business and they're out of here. By 830, I saw a film. Yes, I think it's a
bad move by all of us. As much as this board is trying to sit there and say, oh, it's for our staff or it's for transparent government, or it's for people to make sure they get home faster. No, it's really to
convenience yourselves. You signed up for the oath yet again. You're. No it's not, it's not fair. That's not fair at all. Starting off wrong. No no no no no I'm not telling you.
Impugn the motive. It's not for what you say. It's exactly what it is. Because you guys, even Commissioner Banther said that she wants to get home at a earlier time because after 9:00, 930, everybody's a little bit
distorted their minds or their way of thinking. And the bottom line is we took an oath of office. We know the rules start at 630. The meetings, you guys want to convince yourselves to bring it forward and attempt to
act like you're doing a service for the residents, and that's not the case. And as far as Frank, he's not even going to be on the board anymore. So why is he even making a big decision? So you're right, he
does. But he also has a right to sleep half the time up here too. So no meeting. Why do you have to go there? Because why do you have to go there? Because I see you got Commissioner. I see you guys
trying. This is the problem. No problem. Just for yourselves. And that's where we're at here. So I'm going to tell you now. City clerk, what's the rules of
the punishment for coming late to a meeting? I'm not after? You'll have to help me with that. I don't believe there is a punishment coming, but I'm
aware of punishments. So all I'm saying is I work. My Tuesdays are my busiest days. We are processing tens of thousands of dollars in payroll, which, of course it's not your
concern, but the bottom line is we've all signed up for 630. We've known that you guys are claiming that it's to be for the residents. The residents
only aren't even going to be able to get here by the time they get off work, drive through traffic, get their kids settled, like you guys are claiming they have to go home early. Well, that was another reason we wanted to have Zoom
so they could participate from home. But y'all let one individual, one individual get underneath this board's skin to stop that. So all I'm saying is if you guys want to convince
yourselves you're showing it, but if it's twice a month where you're saying it's twice a month, we come here at 6 or 530, it's twice a month. We come here at 630. What's the
difference? If you go home at 9 or 930 and you guys act like it's that big of a deal, well, we're going to look into it, but it's going to inconvenience me. But you know, most of this board members are retired or
whatever. And yeah, if you're you basically it's allowed for you guys to impugn that you're trying to help the residents out when really it doesn't seem that way. As far as staff, I
respect staff a lot, but this has been the same scenario for many years. They get paid good money to sit twice a month for some of these agenda items, to have to deal with them. So, you
know, you're changing the times for the convenience of yourselves. As much as you're saying it's for the residents and for our staff, which I don't think it should be in their control anyways. You know,
these meetings are meant for people to come here at a reasonable time, not rush here during rush hour for these. And as far as the c r a, that's a
great presentation, but I guarantee no one's coming here at 530 right away to listen to the c r a presentation. So there may be times I'm going to come late to a meeting. And so
I want to know what there is for that because I'm not going to be convenient an hour earlier for me to have to come in when I've signed up for the charter and the way the rules have been for many years now
for 630. So that's all I'm going to say real quick so I can fully I can fully appreciate your position, but I encourage you to look at the bigger picture of the logic. And when you say that we're
doing it selfishly, of course we all want to go home. I don't I don't think that's a that's a bad thing. I mean, we all have lives. I'm the only one that has that has that has that has kids at home here. You don't
see me using that as an excuse to go home. And I'm self-employed. I can though I start work very early because I have a I have a very active hobby. I go to work at two in the morning if I want to.
That's my thing. But The inverse logic I just must point out with like respect is that you said Tuesday is your busiest day and that, you know, therefore you don't want to change it. Well, that's you, that's you being self-serving,
right? So we can all sit up here and point, okay, well, David likes to be regimented and work out at 3:00 and this and that. So we do that. We all have lives, right? At least for me. And I think Frank's
comments were some of the the best comments I've heard this whole, this whole, this whole work session to me, yes, I do get annoyed when, when, when, when, when, when, when we go late. And I and I've always been very, very clear about
that, but it's not because I want to go home and sit there. It's because I've been doing this eight years now. And, you know, I do see that the looks on on staff's faces and people that are here for certain items
and they don't want to be here that like, you know, like, you know, that, that, that, that, that, that late. And I would not be for any punishment for you coming to a meeting late this, that this, this is not a
prison. Okay. If you have something in your personal life, you need to be here late. So be it. And if it's a big item, we should we should we should we should we should we should, you
know, adjust that for you. But I would encourage us all to, to look at this big picture. And it's not just for our individual preferences, because we all could come up here and say pro or con, it is for the
residents and it is for staff. Thank you. Vice Mayor. So this is a hill I don't want to die on. I have really this is my
full time job. I am retired, as I said, I don't really care if we start this at 233, 35, 30, ten, 30 doesn't affect me. But if you're asking my opinion, I
think that if you want to move this up a little bit, to be considerate of some of the people and making it 6:00, and we can get through our invocation and we can get
through our pledge of allegiance, but not make that request that somebody that has a busy schedule on Tuesday needs to be here, and he can show up at 630. And if we even
have to wait a few minutes, which we've done in the past, but we can get through some of the stuff, some of the public comments. I personally walk out, as you know, for some of the
public comments. This way you don't have to be here for the public comments, Commissioner, unless it's unless it's something really important. And you can always watch it on the
replay. So if you wanted to move this up and be somewhat negotiable to make it a 6:00 deal so we can get people out earlier. And I, I know it's
important to try to get the C, r, a to people that care and concern. If they are, they can watch it back on YouTube and see what people say. I just I
feel for the people that want to get out of here earlier, which is the, the public, the staff and the people that have children. I appreciate the fact that you want to be home
earlier. So I think a half an hour is negotiable. I don't think that we should try to make it 530 or 430, because there are people that rush to get here, but we can get
through some of the initial stuff that not everybody has to be here for. I've many times been asked, what time should I be here? And I tell people, we start at 630. If you really
want to get into public comments, I can guarantee you're not going to hear anything before 7:00. If it's a business item, you're not going to hear anything until 730,
7:45. So that's where I would negotiate. But again, I'm willing to listen to whatever the board says to me. It doesn't matter. Commissioner
elect. So I have a question. Are proclamations necessary to be part of the official meeting?
I know where you're going with that now. So, so, so so the question becomes, could you potentially start proclamations at 6:00 or 530? And if they
don't have to be part of the official meeting, because that's family and interested parties coming to witness that, and they generally leave before the official meeting and then
start the official meeting at at either 6 or 630, depending on what this board decides. I personally don't have any stake in this. I, I dedicate I, you know, as elected by the people
I dedicated the entire day to, to the city. So. Okay. You know. And I didn't want this to be
contentious and I don't, you know, Commissioner. All arguments don't have to be this contentious, right? You state
what you want. You, you know, like, and it doesn't have to be impugning. It doesn't have to be you guys are doing it for this and you guys are doing it for that. You know, in
somewhere along the line, there's got to be some growth in how we present and make our argument and make our case. If I, I know me and I think the
majority of this board are reasonable people. And if you make a reasonable, cogent argument that isn't a
constantly, constantly an attack of impugning motives, it's exhausting and it's unnecessary. Okay, you made your case. I get it, I'm a
compromising person. I think what commissioner, commissioner elect said is, is exactly where we could go. We compromise. We have the meeting starts at six. I would agree to the meeting.
Start at 6:00. We have proclamations and all that. At that time. If it if if if they end up if they end at 615, I
call for a recess. We come back at 630 and get down to business. That gives you an opportunity. If you can't make it, I'm sure some days you will be able to make it at six. Some days you
can't be able to make it six. I, I want to cooperate with with other commissioners. I understand you have a you have a life and a business. I don't want to hurt your business, you know. Hell, I was your
accountant for years. You know, I, I don't I want to see you make money because you can pay your bills. So which you always did. So you were good. So I
don't I want, I want you, I, I'm let's just 6:00, let's just tone it to where we just talk about just make our case. You
make a good case. You're, you're. And I'm, I want to say this to you as your friend. I've known you. I've. I knew you before you were born. I knew your mother. Your mother
worked for my parents. You are smart as hell. Okay? Just use that instead of the. It doesn't have to be the attack. Just use that because you're really smart and I want to cooperate.
I think everybody wants to cooperate. So how about that as a compromise? I think what you said is I deal. We started six that allows that would allow
staff not to have to be here quite as long. We if I if I see that the meeting, if if, if proclamations of our end at, you know, 615 I recess, we come
back at 630, we start the meeting and start the business. If you can be if you can be here at the proclamation, it's wonderful. If like somebody is absent or we do that regardless. So like I say, you know, we're
all here at six. Yeah, I, yeah, I would, I would, yeah. If everybody's here. Yeah. Oh no, no, no, if everybody's here we just keep rolling. That's fair. But if I see that we're, we're short a person and I know
you're coming. I just say recess and wait till the end. We wait till Commissioner Gutierrez shows up. We want a full board. We don't want to lose any members. So, mayor,
the only thing I would ask the board is for consistency. So if you're going to move your meetings to six, I would ask that you move all meetings at three 4 to 6:00 because I think
it gets confusing otherwise. Absolutely, absolutely. Yeah. And I think you would you'd find appreciation. I know on the planning and zoning, we all wanted to start it earlier. We were all willing to start
earlier. And, and I think you see, and now we've got people that are, you know, are meeting upstairs at 2:00 in the afternoon. We got people meeting at all kinds of, you
know, the sustainability sustainability meetings started too. And I saw the board of the code enforcements here early
doing things. So I, I think that that's a great compromise. Okay, so do I hear a yay, how
do I do that? Again, all those in favor, I know we're not voting. Just I want to I think you have consensus. Do we have a consensus for six. What about the c r a situation at 530 I
think. I think we could we can play with that. Okay. I think what we could do you know what I think we do. Can we be here for that. Yeah. But can the
cra's if if before the meeting is set for the CRA, if it's a like that meeting there that was strictly informational, right? Does it have to be a separate meeting? If it's
informational, it does only because you're sitting as the CRA. Okay. But he but the city commissioner, I mean, the city manager could call the commission and say, hey, any of you guys have can you get there
at 530? We can do it at 530. If she says no, you got to do at the end the meeting, then he puts it at the end the meeting, because there's no set time at the end of the meeting. So it's
not like the public knows what time it is because it could be 930, it could be ten, it could be 1030. I was really worried about a 530 regular meeting. So let's, let's, let's I think we have a consensus to go with
6:00 and then not not the official. If we don't have a full board, we recess and wait for 630. Okay. All right. Can you write that up? Yes. All
right. That was an easy one. Okay. Politics. You know, we may end up going past three. Is everybody okay with that? Let's get everything. Let's get everything done. I think this is a great meeting. I think
it's a great meeting. Okay. Politics. Let me go first. All
right. So you know. We again, we any of us can support who we want as individual people. And
I mean, we're, we're still citizens and residents of the community just as everybody else. I think a lot of this comes down to how we're
campaigning. Okay. And I'm just going to bring this up because this was a hot topic. And this whole thing about, you know, city apparel, identifying
yourself as a commissioner while you're campaigning, I think is, is inappropriate. I
think I understand people, you say, well, everybody knows I'm a commissioner. I don't know, I think I think your your your head's gotten a little too big.
I went to Publix today and nobody in that store recognized me except David Banner, who was getting his sandwich and who was way smarter than I was because he called his sandwich in and just picked it up and
left. I had to stand in the line and get my get my sandwich. So not everybody knows who you are. I go walk around here. Not everybody knows who I am. I'm telling you what, I don't wear that damn city shirt unless I
have to, because I want to go eat. I don't want somebody to come up to my table and tell me about their sidewalk. I just want to eat and go home. I'm with my family. I mean, this
and this thing's going to get us. It gets in more trouble. So, you know, you can't hold a sign and wear a shirt that says commissioner on it in any form
or fashion, because now you're advertising your campaigning as a and and holding yourself out as a city official campaigning. I think we need to separate our.
Just like we do on social media, we need to separate ourselves on politics. You want to campaign for somebody you know, just campaign for them as a
person, not as a commissioner, as a mayor, as a vice mayor, as anything. Just let's let's keep it separate. I don't know if that's already in the rules, but if it's not, I think we
need to clarify how we campaign and if we're going to campaign, we need to campaign as a resident. Make it clear, hey, these are my opinions as a resident, I am supporting so
and so. I am guilty because I wrote things that said I'm supporting this person. I'm looking forward to working with them. As soon as I said that I was acting as a mayor, I. That
was wrong. I think I was wrong, and again, we're not going back. So I'm I'm off the hook. It's retroactive. Yeah. These rules go forward. But going forward,
I, I was, I, I was wrong and the way I wrote my thing and when I, when I wrote stuff. So it's, I'm not, it's, this is again, not us defending what
we've done in the past. This is about going forward. Going forward, I believe we should keep ourselves separate. We should not, you know, and again,
this is insistence on wearing city apparel all the time is only going to get us in trouble, I really do. I think it's a you
know, I, I, I'm, I don't even care if I ever wear those damn shirts. I'm cool. I like my clothes. So Commissioner banter,
what do you think? Thank you. I have a lot of opinions on this. First off, and again, I'm not using myself like I'm some crowning example. Trust me. And BCC can tell you. Go back to my Facebook 1015 years ago, you're
going to find a much different David. But I was a younger man and we should all mature and grow up, right? So I'm not ashamed to say that. But I think, you know, this is the policy that I, I did for myself
starting in this campaign. I was very public that I endorsed a Mrs. Weaver, and I'm very happy with the outcome. However, I never once publicly
disparaged Vasileia or Mr. Lunt. And I can tell you, Mr. Lunt has said some horrible things about me. Okay. So I think, again, this goes back to the social media. It goes back to
what we talk about self self-governance. You know, we we should not be discouraging people from running for office at, you know, like at all. And
I think that, you know, yes, we have First Amendment rights and we should be able to say, you know what, I'm supporting this person. In fact, I think a lot of people in the public reach out to us that are our friends
to ask that because they can't the most. I'm sorry guys, 80% of this town has no clue who we are. Okay, that's just the truth of the matter. I lived here my whole life. They have
no clue who I am and I'm fine with that. So we have to be involved in that. But we should never publicly disparage another candidate for office. That that's the that's the barometer I use. Even when
there's ample opportunity to. The best thing is just to stay who you support. And then you leave it at that. And also selfishly, then it leaves a lot less mud on your face. I, I, I,
I, I, I can tell you, you know, I have supported many candidates who lost, but I'm not out there trashing the other person. So like if I, so if I had one, I was cordial with her. She friended me on
Facebook. I exchanged niceties with her. We. I knew I knew her sister, she got elected. I would have served with her. No, you know, you know, it's it's it's not. Everything has to be a nuclear option. Okay? That's
number one. Number two, the whole city gear. As you as you all know, I'm not into that. I don't wear name tags and all that stuff. Again, I'm not going to tell other grown men
and women what not what not to wear. That is that that that is your choice. And because of my hobby, you know, shirts don't fit me normally. I have to, you know, I the ones, the ones
Trish got me lasted two wash cycles. And I said, forget about this, but I think there should be a rule that you are not to wear anything. Identifying yourself as a commissioner, including use of
of the city seal outside of your duties. That would be defined as a meeting, you know, a workshop, or you are going in your capacity as a commissioner
to something and then promptly change clothes. I know that sounds very militaristic, but I think that's going to get us that's going to keep us safe and keep us out of trouble. And
I would on the caution of not wearing it, period. But then again, I don't want to get into telling grown folks, you know, you know, what kind of what kind of what kind of clothes to wear. But if you decide to wear
the city regalia, I'm as I'm as I call it, then it should only be done in your official capacity. And when you're finished, it should be taken off. And I learned this in the very beginning. 20 years ago
when I was in grad school, I worked as a civilian over at Pasco Sheriff in the jail. And they had the rules that when you when you when you when you when you left work, you have to
wear a jacket or take off your shirt. You don't go walking around wearing Pasco Sheriff on your on your shirt, especially as a civilian. So I think that, again, I don't want to get too nitty gritty because again,
we're adults here. I don't want to police your wardrobes, but I think it should be hard and fast that it's only done in your official capacity and never, ever, ever done as campaigning. That's completely
inappropriate. Thank you. Commissioner Di Donato. I too feel that it belongs in in government, not outside. I actually have gone home before
I went somewhere else to to take off a shirt that I had on. It belongs in, in a government factor, not in a personal life.
As far as campaigns are concerned. While I ended up on Facebook a time or two, it was a picture that was taken. I try
to support. And in fact, you alluded to it, Commissioner Banther, the longer you're up here, the more people you have that actually come and say, who? Who should you know? Tell me
about the candidates. And I can't even tell you how many times that happened. This past election happened quite a bit. And it will keep happening to all of you because you've been
up here. That is perfectly fine. I think that's part of our job personally, because we do have that experience. We do pretty much know quite a bit about the
people that that are running for these seats. So I think we if someone's asking for guidance, I think that's fine. As far as, as the social media,
I think I alluded to that before. You know, if we use social media in a positive, informative manner, it takes care of itself. And I hope
that's what we do in the future. As far as campaigning, I've always been uncomfortable deliberately going out and endorsing. Not that I haven't,
but I've never been comfortable doing that. But I'm not afraid at all to to talk to people that want to talk about it. That's fine. So I think that
the things that have been said here, as far as the politics of it, are fine. If we just follow those facts, it's fair to all
in that way. Commissioner Coolio's. Yes. You know, the the political campaigning, everybody's right in, you know, everybody's got some good
points. I wish we'd all refrain from it, period. But it seems that even all of us can at some point even, you know, so, you know, we have a right to endorse people. And, you know,
as far as, you know, criticizing or impugning or anything like that, let's, you know, just for the record, this, this last time around, we went
strictly to wanting to endorse somebody, to being told by a candidate to stay in your lane or as a black male, something would get introduced. So those are the facts and those are the
timelines. So, you know, some people's actions are a reflection of me trying to, you know, call out certain things. So I and, and Mr. Salzman, did
I not turn that into you when I saw this email, that or instant messenger that came in from an individual. Yes. And what did you say to do this is a commission on ethics thing.
This is an election thing. I didn't send it in. I'm not one of those people. But there was something there. A matter as much as anybody on this board
may try to seem like I was the person being a bully or or trying to bother people going forward, that was never the case. Going forward, what would you like going forward? I wish
we all just not post who we're going to endorse at all. We you know, you do that though, right? I mean, I do it, but I had to do it last at everybody else. You know, take away your powers, take away mine, whatever. All
right. So we can endorse, we need to be more professional and we shouldn't hold ourselves out as commissioner for the with the endorsement. Right. Or or I'm about to go into the campaign. I'm open. Yeah, I'm
about to go into the logo, you know. So could I have been better? Yes. But I will not. I will not lie and say I wasn't triggered. And sometimes I fall for that, you know? But it
ain't going to happen anymore. As far as the logos seal. The city seal. Most of us have been on this board from time and time again. We. We were
lectured one time when Mayor Vatikiotis was around. You know, we've been reminded again, have I taken positions on social
media? Yes. But that logo, that seal is a representation of the city no matter what. And when we start using that and we're campaigning for individuals, it
gives the impression that the city is wholeheartedly endorsing a candidate. Okay. And then, you know, we explained this already too. And,
you know, could have surfaced again. But long story short, you know, there were two people there from this board that saw all that happening too as well. So with all due respect, we all
know the rules. Whether you're a candidate for office or you're on the board, they all apply the same. And I want to see, you know, how we're going to have our city logo official
one. And then our like our, what do we call it, the auxiliary one marketing, the marketing. Maybe we shouldn't even wear the marketing shirts either, you know, their
representation of who we are as officials. We shouldn't wear them either. And maybe we need to write into this rules once the meeting's done. Once you
leave an office, you get in your car, you take the shirt off, you can go wherever you want, you know. So that's what I think has happened. And also, we can't be wearing these to
places, to organizations assuming that, you know, we're representing the city on behalf of the titles that we have. And
so taking them off, unless you're invited by a certain organization to be so and so, as as an official of the city, we understand that, right, city
attorney. But just to do it, assuming it's not good. So I think the logo only wear when we're in our meetings and our capacities, even if that means taking taking it off to go to Publix, you know, just take it
off because you don't want to be annoyed anyways. And, and then the marketing logo as well should apply as far as official
powers. Guys, that there was a few of us, you know, actually, I don't even think mayor was up on here, but when Commissioner car had that logo situation and
he wrote with the logo, you know, it made a certain look. This logo with the campaign stuff is no different. It's apples to apples, bananas, bananas. And so let's define
that. Let's put it in our rules and procedures. That way none of us have that appearance. And you're right, half the people don't know us unless we have our logos on. So that's, that's
where I'm going to go with it. And like I said, man, campaign season's over. I'm really good at forgetting stuff. I hope you all are too, no matter how much we may be offended by it and stuff, but we got to move, move
forward to get to work together for this community. I've shown it. I can do it time and time again after elections are done, and I'd like to see it done again. Thank you, Vice Mayor.
So let me first sorry, let me first speak about campaigning. I could fully understand. And there's a lot of jurisdictions which I did research on that do
not allow any city logo to be on a shirt, and it is a misdemeanor. We do not have that here. And if we're going to change that, that's one
thing. But as that being said, my full time job is the right now vice mayor and it's been the city commissioner. And I
will unless this board actually puts a vote out where it's restricted, I will wear that shirt every single day because I represent the city and I want people to come up and bother me.
I want people to come up and ask me questions, and I do not have a full time job as Commissioner Bantha has. I do not have a full time job as Commissioner Penny Otis has. I
do not do any of the other stuff. My full time job is responding to the residents and I am actually a little bit offended by what somebody wants
me to contribute or not contribute. I've stood up here numerous times and said, this is my city. I've served for eight years on the Board of Adjustments. I've served for four years on this. I have two
more years to serve, and I will be happy to walk around proudly as a city official and be able to take all questions as they
come. The one day that there was a discussion about me having a shirt on, I left. That was the day you, mayor and I went to do reading at the
reading R and when I came back, people were flipping signs and that's what I did. There have been times I have turned my shirt inside out and wore it backwards, because I did not
want someone to know who I was, but there was still people hollering out the window, hey, Vice Mayor, hey, Mike, how you doing? The same thing happened yesterday when we were in that parade. So many people in the
parade were sitting there going, hey, Mike, we love you. Hey, Mike, whatever. You know, it's so I understand that what the
original reason to inform the board of why there was no insignia to be used was really not for the commission. It was
for us. It was for staff people, so that they don't walk into places to get discounts on meals. I don't let anybody pay for my even my coffee. So when
I go in, I'm not there for free meals. I'm not there for extra desserts, but I am there to represent. And if anybody knows me, I am the person that walks
up to people that have their phones and they're looking around and I go, can I help you? What are you looking for? Are you looking for a place to eat? Are you looking for some
directions? That's who this personality, Mike Eisner, is. And I refuse to do anything different. This shirt prevent. Shirt prevent? No, no. But I put the shirt on from. I know
the shirt. They have to know your vice mayor. Know? Why do they have to know for you to tell them? That's a good place. All I'm saying is I put the shirt on in the morning. I run
it all day long, and that's it. All right. Unless if the board wants to take a vote to have it not, then I'll change the shirts. I'm not looking to disobey. What I'm looking to do
is I represent Tarpon Springs as either a commissioner or as a vice mayor or as a mayor, whatever. I am 24 over seven.
That's my job. Okay. Commissioner, let. When I spent time in the Coast Guard, we were ordered to remove our
insignia epaulets, not wear our hat. If we had to travel somewhere outside of our duties. But it involved some portion of
the day being in uniform. So. So you could not go out into the public in uniform unless it was to stop and get fuel or something on your way home. So
it's not it's not encouraged because it, it does, it does have possible ramifications. You know, I agree with Commissioner Eisner because I,
you know, once elected, I feel the obligation to be of service to the people here. While it wouldn't be in my repertoire to necessarily wear, you know,
that clothing every day, I have a pretty nice closet of clothing I prefer to wear. But Mike, I know you like your gray. It's fine. I like a little
color once in a while. You know, I understand where Commissioner is coming from. I don't really again, I don't have a dog in this fight. I think it goes
back to. To what? The city attorney can come, can come with, with regard to the regulations there, I, I will
speak to the campaign issue. I completely agree that disparaging remarks are self-serving and have no place
in, in our in in our repertoire at once. We're elected officials. I as residents, I think we're entitled to, to have a preference or make an endorsement. I know that
there's, it's a gray area. I'm going to leave it again to, to the legal minds to, to come up with a solution, but I hate to see my rights as a resident who
votes here and in elections other than my own, be stifled under those circumstances. Thank you. Let me say something that I go back to anybody else
who wants to talk, first of all, the Seal issue is a state statute, and there's a state statute about the display and
use of the seal and anything other than. A official. Your official duties. And it's a second degree misdemeanor to wear that and display it
outside of your official duties, or unless you're approved by the governing body, which would be, you know, if you were on
the, the, the forward Pinellas and you've been voted to go to forward Pinellas and you wear a shirt because the voting, the governing body had you go there
and represent the city. I, I, you know, I think this needs. We got I don't want to over
police ourselves on this on this stuff. You know, I, I'm cool with myself. Like I'm cool, like I don't, I actually like
my own clothes better than I do the city stuff. And I, and I don't necessarily need, you know, even, even yesterday.
Commissioner Gulyas was, you know, being very gracious to me. And he said, hey, man, get up front and like, I don't care, like I, I really don't, it's just not my nature. Now, I'm
not saying that's your, each of your, every one of us has our own thing. I, I, I, I've said it before, I want to, I want it to be mayor because first of
all, and anything I've ever done, whether when I was in my fraternity, I became the eminent Archon that was the president of this fraternity. Anything I'm on, I like. I like
having the gavel. I don't know, I'm just a control freak or whatever. So I wanted to be mayor. I just thought I, you know, I like the governing of
it. I never have been attracted to attention. I don't need attention. I when this thing is over, in two years, I'm going to go run. I'll be by myself listening to podcasts. I'll be
the happiest guy in the world. You guys, if you need me, you call me. Otherwise you're able to see me. All right, so you ain't going to come up here? I ain't going to bother nobody. I'm going to go about my life.
I'm happy. I'm going to spend time with my granddaughter and grandson. So I'm cool with that. I think we just have to have some judgment. I get that you're proud to be a
commissioner, I get it, but there's times where, you know, it's it's it's it's overdue. It's over. Done with this, you
know, here I am thing that's but that's your that's your own gig. I just think that it's going to get you in trouble if you are wearing city stuff, you
go and have a conversation with somebody about anything. They're looking at that city thing. Whether you're wearing a seal, whether you're wearing a shirt, whether you're the
police. He wears a his anything. He doesn't have to have a seal or anything. But they know he's he's there as a cop. You're there as a commissioner. You know, people can still talk to
you without you having all this. The, the, the paraphernalia on. But when you do wear the paraphernalia and you go do something, they know they think
you're there in your official capacity. That's where it's dangerous and going to get in trouble. I'm telling you. So, you know, it's up to each one
of you govern accordingly. But you it's it's going to get you in trouble. So I get it. You're proud. I'm proud too, but. Yes,
I'd like to have that rule written in. I mean, consensus for it. Well, what's the rule? Not wear your city logo or marketing outside of official
city business or any invited in your capacity as a city official? Because the problem is when you're out and about and you're wearing it all the
time, there, there may come a chance in which it doesn't. You know, you start talking on different topics and you may not necessarily know all the details of the topics, or you try to help out and it gives
off an impression that, you know, there's more to, to where you're at when what you're doing. I agree, and so, but here's another thing, you know, we had the, we had the, the
vice mayor wear the logo here, the hat. A lot of people didn't like it online. Is that are we going to wear hats in here? Okay. Okay. So we'll we'll let
it be then. All right. So that's cool. And then yeah, I just think we get it written in and that should be good to go. And it solves everything. I
have one thing there. I mean yeah, mayor. No, no. Mike. I think Mike, I first off, I'm sincere when I say this, I am I, I do appreciate all the things you go to and do. I'm not a
very social person. You enjoy that stuff. I think it's great. I mean it sincerely. And I know you like wearing that city stuff, and you don't need a man of my age to, you know, to, to, to like, you know, tell you
what to wear. But I think none of your, the mayor, the mayor put it best that these rules were shirts don't prohibit any of that. And I think people know who you are very well. I mean, I let's just be honest
with that. So I don't think any of these good things you do will be precluded by not wearing a shirt. I think this is to your benefit because with respect, some of the situations that have arisen aren't
necessarily about about what you're doing. You're within your right to, to do all those things, but it's what you're wearing. So just eliminate the problem. And then you can be Mike Eisner as Mike Eisner wants to be, as I say, and
everything's good. But if we. So I'm in full support of us not being allowed to wear anything, identifying who we are outside of official business. Thank you. Can I make
my comment now? Yeah. So. This board does not go to the first Thursday. This board doesn't go to the first Friday. This board doesn't go to school
transportation Safety Council. This board doesn't go to the forward Pinellas. This board doesn't travel to all of the MPO meetings. So if the board
wants to you go to work. You go to work, you go to work. I don't go to work. This is my work. So if I have to be in a meeting from 1 to 3, which is
what I have to be at, and we have workshops for Forward Pinellas. And you want me to go there and not be called.
Everybody has a shirt there. Okay, okay. So that's one thing I do want to clarify that the hat comment, because there were three rude people that made
comments that the city manager had to take down Wednesday. I was in for surgery. Thursday. I went back in for surgery. Friday I was in for surgery. Saturday I was in for surgery.
I didn't come home until Sunday and we had a meeting on Tuesday. So Monday I just didn't have a chance to get a haircut. So
anybody that made that ignorant comment was rude and nasty, including yourself. Making that without knowing that was just it was just uncalled for. I meant what I said, it's
uncalled for when somebody doesn't know somebody else's position and nobody made a comment when Jacob Call wore a hat at every meeting. So I'm
just saying it's nasty. It's nasty to say that kind of stuff. But the point that I need to make on this is I do want to have the shirt to wear. And if the board decides not to, I
will abide by it. But I think that's wrong because yes, I am a social butterfly and I do want to speak to people in this town and I am not always out there speaking. I'm not ever
speaking about the board. I am speaking to people mostly about what good is in tarpon. I sit there and ask each and every person, why are you here? Why do you like here? What would
you like to see change? What would you. That's what I do. That's who I am. If that's not you, okay, I'm not here to to to change your personality. But
that's my personality. So, you know, I personally think I was the one instrumental in getting our apportioned seat on the
forward Pinellas board. And I do represent us there. And I'm fighting now to not have that MPO be, you know, conglomerated with Pasco, Hillsborough and
Tampa so that we don't lose that seat. But you guys want to vote. You guys want to vote on that. When when it's a vote. Fine. I, I do not want that. I
want to represent unless it's illegal. Okay. So. I don't want to again, I don't want this to be a nasty contentious meeting
because we still got a little bit more to go. I think you need to use judgment. All of us need to use judgment. If we find that judgment isn't working, then I think we have
to do something as a collective body. I mean, write it in now. Well, I'm, I'm I don't think there's two votes over here. And I'm I'm not going to go
over with you and David on this. I think that I don't want it to be that onerous. However, you've got to be careful. I
tell you, one, you can't hold a sign and have a big old t shirt that says, Commissioner, I don't care if it's a joke. Commissioner's t shirt, you can't wear that. You can't do
you cannot be in because that's part of this thing. Political campaigning. Use the CEO official powers. You cannot wear anything that calls myself a commissioner while you're holding a campaign sign for
somebody, regardless if it's says, you know, I'm the commissioner asked me or I know everything, I'm the commissioner or whatever that shirt said, which I, I, I don't think was a great taste, but
that's, that's, I don't, I don't buy anybody else's clothes. So I, so I don't think you should be able to do that. I think that should be part of it. I think that wearing the
shirt around town that says, you know, Tarpon Springs on it and says, you're who you are. I mean, I think it's going to have I don't want to I don't want to overly police this. You
definitely the seal. We're obviously we're going to get away from having the seal anyways. We're going to go to this logo thing so we don't get ourselves in trouble with state statutes. You just got to use
judgment. Like there could be a case where there's a situation involving the police. Okay. I had a situation where I was out by Riverside Park and I was
running, and some guy, I see some guy laying on a pit bull, he's laying on the dog. I walk up on him and I say, he's he's
saying, help me, help me. This pit bull got loose and attacked his dog. His. He got. Somehow he got his dog in the tennis court, locked the. The the. The
fence and hat was on top of his football. And he was afraid of the moment. He let his dog loose. He was going to bite him. Okay. That's what he was afraid of. I got 911. I called the the the police that you guys show
up real quick. I'm standing there. I don't want to be standing there as a commissioner, okay? Or a mayor or whatever. I don't want to be standing there because it messes up. And if, if, if there
have been situations, we know there are situations where a commissioner has shown up at a police site and made the officers nervous because they
called the chief and said, hey, I got a commissioner here. Okay? We. That's the stuff. Now, when you wear a shirt, when you're at a situation that's wrong,
okay, because a cop shows up and you're a commissioner, that's a problem. Or if you want to get involved in any campaign related matters and
you show up somewhere about signage or whatever, and you're wearing a shirt, says, Commissioner, that's a problem. Okay, so you've got to use some judgment to this point. You
like to wear it all the time. And that's where the problem is. I don't see any temperament temperance in when you wear it, it's like, I want to be a
commissioner everywhere. Airplanes all over the damn place. You got to use some judgment. Okay? I know you're proud of it, but you ain't. I don't think that's even going
to get you some extra peanuts on a plane to wear that shirt. So we just got to be careful, all right? Let's just be careful. I don't want I don't care to go as far as you guys are going, but enough. But you
got to use some judgment on it. Okay? So go ahead. Just just one thing to remind the board, there's an attorney general opinion that says if you're in that position where you have
something on, you have an affirmative duty to tell whoever it is that you are not there acting as a commissioner or acting on behalf of the city. You can't it's not passive. It
has to be affirmative. So if you walk, if you happen to be in some area because of, you know, you were wearing your shirt, you just have to do that. And so that that's the
requirement. Thank you. That's exactly what I do. Yeah. Mayor, I think there's enough votes here. Commissioner. Let's going to be on the board. We've heard her statements a little bit.
Sounds like she's on board with not wearing it outside of any capacity. That's not representing the city. You said that. You say that. I think the votes are there to get this ruling and just once and for
all, because we're going to hear the excuse, oh, I told them I'm not in my capacity. Come on, sir, we brought this up because it was an issue. We
brought it up because it was a serious issue. We can't just skate around it. You know, I say we get it in writing, we get it out the way, and there's
no more excuses. You could say, I'm not in my official capacity without the shirt on. I'll agree to have it written up tight, but we can also debate this at the meeting when we
vote on it. Sure, if we have to alter it at all. But commissioner elect was on the fence, so I don't know. I just I think we have to have our own personal judgment. Again, I'm proud I'm very proud to be the
mayor of Tarpon Springs, but I'm I got but I'm careful so that I'm not you know, I coming from the gym, I don't have a shirt that says mayor while I'm all sweaty and, you know, going
to the coffee shop, you know, a four year issue though, just that it's been an issue that's going on for, for, for years. Whatever, I got it. I got you. Okay, mayor? Yeah, I just can I
mention one thing? Since I'll be having shirts made here in the in the next month or so, it's my, it's my intention to not not use the city seal.
Right. There's all alternate designs, but my intention was also to put the design on the
shirt with no identification with name or rank in a sense. I will use a magnetic tag under
that to identify myself. It becomes more easy to remove that and your and. And at those times when you don't want to identify yourself as. Lori Weaver, Commissioner, then I
simply have a dive helmet that says City of Tarpon Springs, and it could potentially eliminate some of this trouble. So I would encourage other people to maybe look at it that
way. I appreciate that. Okay, so let's go to the last one. Civility ethics codes of
conduct. Okay. So I, I have we're going to go back to
policing ourselves. Again. I don't want to rehash things that have happened in the past, but I want to have some
mechanism for us to deal with things without them having to go to the other two extremes, which are to go to the ethics
board, or to have to go to the governor to ask for somebody to be removed from office. And and
I, you know, I think when we talk about civility and again, I really don't want to hash old times, I just think we all need
to exhale, do some self-reflection. If you know, whether we're over sometimes overreacting, I, I, I'm, I'm, I remember, you know, trying to
make a joke because I watch a lot of movies and, you know, the spinal tap, you know, where they're the loudest group in the, in the, in the world. And
because everybody, they, the, the way they could prove they were the loudest band in the world is everybody's amplifier went up to ten and they had an 11 on theirs. But what happened
was the knob broke off around around ten and a half, and all they did was like blare noise. So. So anyways, so I think we
have, you know, we need to have a civility standard where, you know, behavior unbecoming of an elected official in and out of the meetings, you know, we need to be cordial to each other.
I'm, we're human beings. We're, we're going to, you know, we got, you know, we all have we have a temper. You might say something and, you know, you can go back to the other person and say, hey, I'm sorry, you
know, I was out of line or whatever. Okay. I don't want to. I don't want to, you know, stifle our humanity. If we were all perfect, you know, we would
be somebody who were not, you know, the violation of these rules, like, okay, we, we agreed on a bunch of things we have to have a mechanism to
because really, other than going to the extremes of those things, you know, if we had had some mechanism in place at the time that Jacob car thing came
up, maybe he wouldn't have to go to going to the board of Ethics on Jacob car. It could have been a way of just dealing with something and at the meeting or in, in a, in a, in a
different way, you know, abuse of our position, you know, and, and, and all the different things that, that we know, you know, of behavior issues and things of, or, or decisions we
make that maybe we shouldn't. So what I want to recommend is that we have that we go to a censure, which is where we
create a we have censure hearings. If we feel that something is egregious, we bring it up just like you would an agenda item and say, I would
like to have a censure hearing. And again, you don't want to spell everything out because then it's not fair to to the person who's being accused to have all this stuff put out and
there's not a meeting for two weeks and, or whatever. I think as a matter of fact, I believe the censure hearings should be a separate meeting versus a
having them at a board meeting. I think that punishment once if you are found to be censured, and I think it has to be again, three people have to agree to
hold a censure hearing. Okay. And I've covered this with the city attorney, and he says we're well within our rights to to hold a censure hearing. And then we would if there was a
vote for a censure hearing because of anything that's happened, then we would have a date and a time and, and, and we would have an approved date and time to have a censure
hearing. The punishments could be very light. They could be a public reprimand. They could be a removal from committee assignments. Like I'm on the
Tampa Bay Regional Planning Council. If you do a censure hearing on me, then I'm not. I could be removed from that. It
could be something like receive no communication other than agenda items. It could be something as as it could be removal or suspension of an
appointed position. Anything that we have the authority within our board, then we could use any of that as punishment. I, I think that oftentimes just
having a censure hearing and saying, hey, you know, you, you, whatever you did, we believe was inappropriate, you know, then, you know, most of the time it's just going to be a
reprimand. But it's, it's a way of isolating. It's a way of having some recourse amongst ourselves. I mean, it could be I mean, it could get if, if, if,
if there's behavior in the building, let's say that we agreed that we're not going to be bothering staff directly. And then you come in, somebody comes in here and they're
constantly going to staff and they and and they're not doing they're not following the rules. I mean, we, we could vote to
rescind their building access. This my swipe thing doesn't work. You can come to the you can come to board meetings like everybody else, but you can't come in here because you've
abused it by running around the the halls. Okay? I mean, it's us policing ourselves. I hope we never have to have a censure hearing about anything. I hope that we just all behave and,
and, and, and, and be cordial. We're going to have our times. I remember with when one time, you know, I want everybody to respect the gavel, but I remember a time when I was a
commissioner and the mayor was hitting the gavel. And I said to him, I don't care. You could your hand could fall off. I'm going to keep talking. Okay, I said it. That was wrong. Okay. I don't think I should be
censured for that. Like, you know, because if I if I do it every meeting, if I if you know, but if I have a moment, everybody's entitled to a moment. Nobody. We're not perfect people. Okay. We're
entitled to a moment. But if you, if you're, if I repetitively interrupted him and never let him get a meeting. Have a meeting. Well, yeah. Then then you guys should call me on the on the carpet for
that. Okay. I don't think I only I think I only did that once, but, but so we're. So I just, I think we should have a mechanism to address these
issues so we don't have to call the police to get involved. Okay? We don't have to, you know, we don't have to go to
ethics boards and we don't have to call the governor. We just deal with stuff amongst ourselves as a operating governing body. So this is what
I'd like to have. I would like to have the opportunity to have a censure hearing. And if in fact, I mean, we could do it without having it in the rules, right? City manager, city
attorney. Yes. I mean, we could do it without having it in the rules, but I'd like to have it somehow in the rules. So it's there for for all boards going forward that there's a
mechanism to deal with ourselves within ourselves, not to have to go to officers, go to the governor's, going to
other things to deal with stuff. Now, if there's stuff that's criminal, if something's criminal, that's a whole nother story. We, you know, we're, we're not we're not a court of law. We're just talking about
just general stuff between us that can be dealt with. I think if there had been such a thing when the thing was with Jacob, it could have been dealt with differently instead of, you
know, putting him through the anguish and, and, and the cost of having to, you know, go to Tallahassee and all that, I think it could have been dealt with. I think, you know, and,
and that was acting outside of the scope of what he should have been doing. Okay. So let's Commissioner Barnier, what do you think of such a thing? I
think it's a great thing and I think it's a good thing under these bumpers is that first off it obviously takes three commissioners for it to do even a censure hearing, right? Right. It can't be. I'm off at, you
know, choice of color of shirt that day and we're having to censure. It has to be three of us vote for it. That's that's a pretty high bar. I think you'd have to have a pretty egregious
offense to do that. And number two, I would like it put in there that this is this is only for the time of adoption going forward. I don't want past ills
past beef again, not that I'm a sinless person, but I have zero drama up here. Right? So I could say, yeah, let's hope up to the past. But no, it's stupid. This is only should only be for moving forward. I
don't want to litigate past past sins. So I think with those two bumpers, with those two guardrails rather in there, that's a pretty high bar for somebody to, to actually have a
censure hearing. And that's how it should be. So it's not used in a, you know, in a like vindictive manner. And also I just, you know, I'm glad you brought up the like police department. I've not been
involved. I know there's been a lot of that going on. I don't I'm not privy to any of that. As a grown man. I think it's a pretty weak move to call the police on another grown man. Unless your life is in danger.
Like just just like you don't you don't have to accept every argument for which you're invited to. And I think if we just go forward with that, there's been probably five things said here in the past
three hours. I'm like, I want to say that, but I'm like, no, it's not going to add anything. It's just me ping pong with somebody, right? It's stupid. So just govern yourself like grown men and now grown women
and move forward. And I think we do need this censure structure because what our rules, if there's no enforcement. Right. And I think there should be a high bar. So
it's not used for personal, you know, like, you know, vindictive, you know, nature. I think with those guardrails of it takes three commissioners to call for a censure hearing. And
it's not for any past sins, it's only for the date of adoption forward. I think that's very, very fair, and I would support that. Thank you. Commissioner DiDonato, what do
you think of such a thing? Would you think it would have been useful in your time? I'm fine with that. As far as going forward is concerned. I'm okay with that. I don't think that
ever happened, but maybe once that I know of. But if need be, then that procedure should be there. Yes. Vice mayor. Oh, Commissioner. I'm sorry. I
don't know how I feel about it. I mean, it's just some of us can get moody from from week to week, let's be honest, you know, and it's like, are we going to
pick a certain topic? Like, you know, honestly, was there something in particular that raised this idea for, for the, the I've never even heard that word before. So excuse me,
censorship, you know what I mean? So it's. I think the more rules we have written in place, the less of the semantics or
the interpretation there is of it. I'm just worried that, you know, a board can gang up on any individual if needed. You know, was, you know, me bringing the PNC thing
considered a bad thing? I don't think so at all. But this board could have felt a certain way and and gone, you know, a certain, you know, direction. And that doesn't warrant a
censure hearing. I don't you know what I mean? So I'm not sure. Yeah, I'm just confused. You're not breaking any rules. You have to break a rule. Right. It's used for breaking. It's something if you break any of
your rules, you have. No. I think the vice mayor brought it up. There's no penalty if you do anything. But you didn't. That's not you. Bringing something up on the agenda and having it voted on is not
you're not breaking a rule. What, are you breaking a rule? Okay, I'm just trying to. I mean, I think I'll be in good hands then, because that's that's what I was thinking of. But something like that. And
I'll go with it. Listen, a lot's changed recently. Like I told y'all, we're gonna. I see there's vindictive stuff that can happen at all. And it's not
just a, you know, tap your wrist. It's to really get you in trouble. That's not the stuff we need. So you're right. We can have this censured thing
that we have. But I do want to talk about our ethics, you know, and, and, and I want to be clear on this, you know, we, you know, I put a public records request in because I
wanted to see what type of communication the commissioner elect and the vice mayor had. Well, there's this one little section where there's a thumbs up, and if everybody wants a
copy of it, I can give it to you. I have copies, but the point is that those are the kind of things that would be if you thought that was egregious
enough, that it warranted a hearing to discuss it, then you would have that not going back, because we know we're not going back, okay. We're not going back. But, but, but things like that would be what we're
talking about. If, if there's, if you, if there's something egregious that has happened, how do we, how do you address it? We have no way to address it. You know, you're going to send. Do you think the governor
is going to. He'll laugh it off. Yes. Okay. And and we have to have a mechanism for us collectively to deal with issues. And this give us a mechanism. And I think we all
agreed that the Commission as a whole will never send an ethics complaint on an on one individual in the Commission moving forward. I think we just legal anyways, it's it's illegal. Yeah. It's illegal.
Yeah. Okay. There was some I can't remember the verbiage. It is. I never knew that. Yeah. So my main point is we have to be
careful of what we text and communicate with each other, you know? So when Commissioner Eisner goes, we could agree to give PK. So I hand the 400,000
and move on because we got a lot to do and donate. No is only considering 200,000 because he's nicer. That was related to the city clerk's
building. Okay. These are two individuals. One's a elected official, one's a commissioner elect. But what I'm saying is I'm not moving forward with any of this, but this type of stuff,
this should be a scare you factor. Stop the nonsense. Stop the extra communicating with each other. We know better. We all know better. Had that item
been presented one week later, it would have been a different story on who could and couldn't vote on it. And look, we did exactly opposite of what Vice Mayor was talking to
commissioner elect about doing. We all went forward through it and paid. We took Bob's word and we went forward with it. So.
We're all adults up here, but a couple more are more adults and more experienced than I am. But say less, don't communicate with each other. And, you know,
as I spoke briefly yesterday with Commissioner elect, I get there's, you know, some sense of, you know, we got some things to work on and I know we do. But what I will tell you is
you. Oh, no one up here. Anything you got in, you got in by yourself. You form your independence and you're going to do the best. You keep
everyone arm's distance. I buy and you're going to be very effective. That's my only encouragement to you and for the rest of this board, because
I don't want perceptions, everything, just the mere appearance. And I want us to all be tight lipped, focus on issues without any side
commenting. And so that's where I'm going to leave it at with that as code of conduct, you know, believe me, you're you're going to see a different person. All right. I know I've been
vocal, but like I said, I try to fight for what's best in my community. I've obviously have reasons to put in certain requests that I did there founded, you know what I mean? And it's a reminder and a
warning for all of us. Arms, distance, everybody. It's the best way for us all. So thank you mayor. Vice mayor, city
attorney. Is it a crime to quote a a comment that somebody else makes crime? Yeah. No. Okay. So the comments that were
just made were just they're quotes. That was his quote. And this commissioner's quote. Is that a crime? Did I commit a
crime? No. Okay. So wasn't my comment. Is your comment. So I have no issues because I don't bring things up. I, I come back
when I'm attacked, so I have no issues with this ability. I have no issues with this
censure. I would agree that if three people find anybody doing breaking of these rules, we
should have them censured. And I'd even like I said, I want to clarify something. Just going back a little bit. I know I said, and I made the comment
that I wear this, this all the time, but that's not 100% true. It is worn when I have and I do go to a lot of things, as commissioner said, but I'm also
not into changing my shirt two and three times a day unless I'm soaking wet in it. So if I'm going to an event and I'm going to put it on, I don't need it. I don't know how your
guys do your laundry, but I'm not into dating my wife. Would changing it to humid this board because otherwise I won't wear the shirt at all. I could care
less on that. But I do represent this board on ribbon cuttings. ET cetera, et cetera. And as you know, mayor, I I'm
at every event unless I'm physically not capable of being there. I'm at every police award and I speak at every police award. I try to get to
every fire award. Again, I don't have another job other than this job. So I'm going to be in a shirt more than anybody
else. And I find that offensive that we're going to try to restrict the use of it. If I'm working on my boat or my car or my anything else in the house, the shirt doesn't go on. If I'm
just going to Publix, the shirt doesn't go on. But if I'm going to Publix after I've been to the forward Pinellas shirts on. So that's that's my statement
on that. That's pretty much it. I really have nothing else to say. Commissioner elect. I
think before we promulgate these rules, they really need to be clarified. This is you know, this. I'm hearing a lot of things. I'm not really sure.
I'm completely clear on what the end result is. I would I would like to ask the city attorney an additional question. At what point after a vote is
made, are you allowed or not allowed to discuss the outcome? It's an interesting question. I've been asked that many times
over the years. The problem is, depending on what it is, it may not be over. You know, just because you have, for example,
let's just use the the vote on on having the change order. That issue may not be over if something goes south, that that issue is coming back in front
of you. So that's one where I would caution you not to discuss that because of the potential for it to come back. And I'm very conservative with my opinions because I don't
want any of you to get in trouble. So I don't also don't want you to put yourselves in a position where you're not going to be able to vote, which could be, you know, a problem. So
depending it really turns on the factual issue as to whether or not that matter is concluded, you know, hiring, say the city
manager is and he accepts that's a that issue is over. So there's no problem with that particular discussion. Other aspects about his position
might be considered something that you cannot discuss. Okay. Thank you. Mayor, if I may, I would advise to the to the new commissioner, I and this is my
eighth year. I cannot tell you where I have found benefit from texting another another, another board member. Thanks at all. It ends in screenshots. It. Miss text could be misconstrued
as just rereading them with friends, right? Or so-and-so's mad at me or whatever, but I think it's even compounded in elected office. And I just, I mean, I texted PK happy
birthday. When was the last time I texted you? Like before that it doesn't exist. Like it's, I mean, it's just, you know, I have just found no benefit, you know what I mean? So that that's how I govern
myself going forward. But, you know, I wouldn't engage in text messaging with any board members. Ideally, it's the safest for yourself. Yeah, I
agree. I think that we. You know, it's, it's we're again, we're human beings. We walk out of here. You know, Commissioner,
you get hot sometimes. Of course I do. All right. And it ain't always just because you're fighting for the residents, you get mad. Yeah.
Okay. And, you know. You know, talking about. You know, what I said or you said at a meeting. You know, I can't believe you
brought that up tonight or whatever. Okay. I mean, that's not city attorney. That's not an issue. Right? So talking
about, you know, attitudes or how we how we function amongst each other, I mean, I've had, you know, when I was on the PNC,
somebody say to me, how the hell did you vote no on that? You know? And I'm like, because I thought no was the right answer. I've had reservations about things I voted on. I
really had major reservations on the issue that came up with Bob Robertson and the City Clerk's. I'm I'm glad it was. Already three votes had already
been cast, so it was easy for me because I didn't have to pass. I'm not sure if I was the third vote, I would have voted that way, I really don't. Sometimes it's easy when you've. It's already passed. Yeah, I'll
go along with the guys. I'll go along with the majority just to make it for harmony amongst the the, the board. So, you know, there's times where we, you know, we question ourselves. I
agree we shouldn't, you know, try to keep texts to a minimum, especially if somebody's writing something and you may not want to, sometimes you're just better off not to, you
know, even bite on it because it can go somewhere and always understand that anything you text could possibly become public record. I mean, I kind
of learned that when I was doing litigation work, you know, everything becomes a court record, like all my communications, especially if
I'm, if I'm an expert, not an advocate, expert. So if I'm an independent expert, anything. So I like, I never wrote anything down. Like I would
always just talk on the phone. I did, I just talked on the phone. I never wrote anything down. I never had anything in notes because all my notes were discoverable. So you had, you know, you had to be careful
even if you wrote, you know, like, you know, something derogatory about the lawyer who's like, you know, or drew a picture of his head and, you know, had a, an arrow going through it or something, you
know, you had to be careful. So anyways. Okay, so is there, are you, are we generally okay with just creating some mechanism
for Accenture? If we, if we have to deal with something again, it's got to be, I'm telling you right now, I'm not going to censure over you. You getting mad at me in the
parking lot? Okay, I hope you don't, but I ain't getting going to go to censure for that. Now you get like, if we have an issue and it affects somebody else, then maybe I would I
would consider that if it or if it's such an ongoing thing that it's gotten, it's getting like almost is we can't function together, then then that's
something different. So I think we have to this is going to be something, you know, it's got to be something good, real. It's got to be something. Again, I hate to keep picking on our friend Jacob, but that was an
issue where that could have gone to a hearing. He could have been publicly reprimanded. It could have been over. He could have got some kind of one of these things, you know, take away his is swipe card for 30
days or something, whatever it is, you know, and then it rather than having to do that, you know, could have been a lawsuit. Okay. But anyways, it could, you know, there's things
that we could do, but I think we just got to be careful. And I think that's the moral of this whole story of what we're talking about tonight, today is,
is let's be careful. Let's be respectful, let's, you know, again, we, the five of us are going to have to work together to move the city forward. That
should be the litmus test. AM I doing what I'm doing? Because I believe it's in the best interest of the community as a whole, and making anybody else's life better. That's what we have to have as our litmus
test. If that's our litmus test, we're going to do really well. So if there's anything else anybody wants to talk about, we got we got two years together, guys. So let's be good. We're going to be cool. Try and do it.
Okay. All right. Commissioner elect good. It was nice having you up here and Frank, see you next week or two weeks from now.
Okay. And meeting adjourned at 359.