Hey, hey, hey. Hey, hey, hey. Hey, hey, hey, hey,
hey, Hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey, hey. Hey, hey,
hey, hey. Hey, hey, hey. Hey, hey, hey. Hey, hey, hey. Hey,
hey, hey. Hey. Hey. Hey. Heat. Heat. N. Hey, hey, It is 9:00. Um, and I would like to have roll call, please. Reggie Santilli
here. Pat Drego here. Gerald Fezer here. Thomas Luca here. John Maluso here. Pat Nory here. Jay Pendergast here. Doug Pettit here. Leah Washington.
We have a quorum. Thank you. Um, we have a couple people here for public participation. Connie Colby, you want to come up? And if you could just identify yourself and give the address. Connie Colby 108
Robo Lane in Orman Beach. And I'm sorry I probably will be doing some popcorn talking here because I have some I just don't know where to start. Um mostly I wanted to talk about the direct county expenditures and how they relate to
what's going on. Um most of what I have for information I've taken from the minutes from your committee or from um your meetings themselves and some from the council as well. Um, so I don't know quite where to start, but um, from what
I understand and what I've seen, most of what I have is about motocross and how that has come to fruition. Um, it looks like to me that this should have been
um, gone through some review from the committees. And what I see was that in July, I think of last year, it more more likely was brought to you and told that it was you were going to be having motocross money given to direct county
expenditures. And the same was with Valuchia Forever. They were not told before they voted that that was going to be um taken well that they would be voting to have motocross as part of that project.
Um, my understanding is that with direct county expenditures that they are supposed to be reviewed by your committee before they go to council. I'm not sure if that's correct, but um
the budget that I saw says plans will be updated as needed and changes would be re reviewed by the echo advisory committee and brought to the council for approval. Um, I don't think either one of those projects was reviewed by either of you and went to the council.
Um, also the projects are supposed to align with the goals um of your committee and this one from what I saw um was going to connect with long leaf.
The trails would collect connect with long leaf. Longleaf does not allow u motorized vehicles in there and motocross would have mo would be in a park that should have the same rules. State parks are not supposed to have
motorized vehicles. So I don't know how they're going to decide that that's going to be okay. Um there's anything else they have here real quick. um they have to comply with the state laws
and with our county laws and it doesn't look like that's happening either. Else um I I don't want to go too much further than that because some of this just applies to the county. But anyway, I would I'd like to think that the direct
county expenditure fund is not being like the cookie jar. They take money from you and then we don't know where it goes. Thank you. Thank you, Connie. Um, and we also have Keith Chester.
It's a good segue to what I'm here to speak about. It's transparency, I think, is what she's talking about. Uh, in 2020, I believe it was, some of y'all were in a room with me and other citizens and county council
members right across the street at the old historic courthouse. And there was a discussion about bringing ECHKO back for 20 more years, putting it out for the voters. And
uh there was a discussion about possible rule changes for the echo program prior to it going back out to the voters. And at that time, the then county council member Deb Denny said,
"If you change the rules prior to it going back to the voters and you do your your planned rule changes prior, the voters might not vote for it. So, it was recommended that the
rules not be changed until after the voters voted for Echo to be reinstated. That's very deceitful. The voters should have known at that time what they were voting for.
The idea that we will not change the rules to after the fact because we don't want the voters to know what the rule changes are going to be because they might not vote for Ekko again. Was horribly wrong. Very deceitful.
After that, there was a campaign to push for Echo to be to the voters to be voted for in 2020. In that campaign, we were told about legacy projects. These projects would be legacy projects. These would be
transformative projects that would last many generations to come. At your last meeting, well, I should back up. That's what we were pushed for. That's what was voted for. Legacy projects.
Legacy projects to me is Earl Brown Park. That was there when I was a child and now I'm 60 and it's still there. That's a legacy project. Legacy project would be uh Spec Martin Stadium here in Dand. It was
there when I was a child and it's still there now. That's a legacy project. That's a generational project. It's far more than 20 years, folks. Far more than 20 years. We're talking about many decades. At your last meeting, at the end of the
meeting, at discussion time, just general discussion, it was brought up to reduce the number of years required for grant recipients that already have grants
from 40 and in most cases from 40 to 20. Whenever Echo was pushed to the public. We also talked about transparency is what we were sold. That's not transparency. It was never put on an agenda. Public had no idea that that was going
to occur. It was just pulled out the last minute at the very end of a meeting and y'all voted on it. 20 years isn't legacy, folks. The fact is is because many of those original grants were 40 years,
there were several that never lived up to their obligation period. And the county was able to claw back the funding, the taxpayers funding, the stakeholders. You know, often we talk about stakeholders and we we we say
the stakeholders and we look at the people, the museum people, the the the cities, the the grant recipients. Those aren't the stakeholders. The stakeholders are the taxpayers. But this program, this echo program has
slowly been eroded and the trust in this program has continued to be eroded. Now, let me back up a little bit. Remember what I told you originally about Mrs. Denny's, the county council
member, saying that we shouldn't change the rules rules to after the citizens voted. That was also done where now your new grants coming on or only have to obligate for 20 years. That's wrong. And
I think that should also be changed back to 40 years. Let's go back to what the citizens were promised, generational projects. I look at generational, like I said originally, Earl Brown Park, Spec Martin
Stadium, these things. I guarantee each and every one of you remembers a park when you were a child in your community you grew up in that's still there today. a museum that was in your community that's still there today.
Those are the investments we should be investing in with the tax dollars, not 20-year projects. What happened at the last meeting was despicable and underhanded in my opinion. Should never have happened that now people that have obligated
signed a contract that they would do 40 years now it's just going to be given to them for 20 years. We have a couple. We have the Dutton House. I don't know if all y'all know about the Dutton House. I know most of you do. The Dutton House, we were able to, the county was able to claw back the money.
$230,000 went to the Dutton House. It never opened its doors and served the public once over a decade. And because of that 40-year rule, the county was able to claw back the money
from the Dutton House. Funny thing is the Dutton House had a uh board president and one other member and the board president's name was Danny Robinson.
She had investor friends that ended up buying the Dutton house that had been partially restored with taxpayer funds. Guess what? Danny Robinson is also the board president of the Dan Museum.
The Dan Museum was just sold to two investors, the same two investors, Mr. Spore and Mr. Green, who bought the Dutton House smells to me, folks. But let's get back to what's important. We need 40-year
generational legacy projects, not 20. and I ask you to rescend that vote from last time and put it back the way it was. Restore the trust in this program. Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Chester. Okay, I hope everyone's had an opportunity to read the meetings from June 26. Do we have any corrections? Any motion to approve? I make a motion we approve the minutes of June 26, 2025.
Second. All those in favor say I. I. I. Any opposed? Motion carries. Minutes are approved. New business. All righty. The uh first item uh to discuss today or to bring to your uh
attention is the quarterly updates from January to March 31st. So this is a reflection of the first quarter. Uh the next report is due to us for April 1st to June 30th uh July 15th. So you know these projects this is from March 31st
only. Um so the first page you're looking at here is the echo grant and aids projects. So, we have three on this list that were finished in the uh first quarter here. And uh there's just an update on the
rest of the projects. The four projects and 25 have all been issued a notice to proceed for those projects from the last cycle. Any questions on those specific projects?
I have a question. In lie of the conversations about whether it should be 20 years or 40 years on how long these projects, when does the when does the clock start ticking? Is it awarded at the time that the grant is awarded or is it the time of completion of the project? The clock starts as soon as the grant is
awarded from the county council meeting. So someone could take a grant, get the money, and spend four or five years getting their other fundings and their other things going on. And with this new 20-year time limit, it could be only be open maybe 10 or 15 years. They have two years to finish the project if it's a
standard grant. If it's an exceptional grant, they have three years to finish the project. Okay. Thank you. Okay. Okay. I'm sorry, Pat. You said of of the awarded in the I see
all of the almost all of the design is complete in the first quarter. Did you say they all of the projects have a notice to proceed? So yeah, all these projects on this list have started either design or construction. The four at the bottom from 2025, you won't see a quarterly
report for those yet because those grants were awarded in March. Okay. So they will we will get their report in this next quarter. Okay. Thank you. Okay. I'm going to move on to the uh DCE projects here. Any questions about these?
I continue to be concerned about the motocross and I see that we have the award and so far no design we have no site am I correct has been a site selected on that. So, as far as motocross, it was uh put into the plan. Uh we don't have an
update yet. It went to council for the land to be purchased. I believe it goes to council on July 22nd. And that's a Valia Forever land acquisition. Uh it's a split partnership between Forever and Echo. We both split the cost.
Okay. And of course, we have no we have no authority to recommend or deny on that. You guys actually reviewed? We reviewed, but we did not have a motion. No, we did not review. We were told I can remember this. I
asked for a review and was told the county council had approved it back in December of I think the prior year and that we they had voted to to move forward on it. So, it was they never had a thorough discussion on that project.
So, it was put into uh the plan on June 4th. County Council approved the 3.5 million into the Echo Capital Improvement Plan. Um and then it was brought to you guys for review. What meeting? Because I'm going to go back and listen to it.
I re I remember because I wanted to see if we needed to make a motion to approve and we were advised that there was no motion. And we had in the past approved and recommended other DCE projects, but in this particular case, we were advised
that a motion to approve or deny was not in order. Correct. So by resolution, you guys review the direct county expenditure plan. You wouldn't call it a review. Don't make a recommendation. You do not make you do not approve the plan. It is just reviewed. It is brought to your presentation. But you always
bring staff forward on direct county expenditures for us to review them. We were not allowed to review this particular project. Review implies input and it was presented to us for information. Exactly.
That's it. It was presented for information. It was not a review. It I'd say that's correct. County council added this project to the DCE plan. Um after that we brought it back to the committee to inform you that this has been added for the review process. Yes. Thank you.
And the review is not by echo. The re it is in fact for information only. Correct. There's no uh motion or decisions to be made on DC project or comment. I think we did ask Pat, you made the motion that it go on record that we did
not recommend this project. Yes. And when was that review done? Uh the plan has been in front of you guys. Uh this is now the I think two or three times the plan's been
Okay. I don't recall seeing it. So it came it came before I joined the board, I believe. So I don't recall seeing anything to do with the motor. Yes, it was uh last year. Okay. All right. Is there are there documents to be able to be provided that that I could review
it if I of course I I guess I have no say in it at this point anyway, right? Yeah, I can present you the whole five-year plan. I could share that with you u from a previous meeting, right? And it does go to council uh very soon. Okay. Now, she noted that I had made the motion to record that we did not review
we did not recommend the project. Yeah, I will send you guys the whole the whole plan from the previous meeting. Oh, I are we talking about sending out plans or just the whole concept that of all the things that were put into the direct
county expenditure? So that I mean, do we have plans on this that that we could see since we're buying the property? You mean to at a at a future meeting at council? I couldn't I couldn't see any plans. There were no plans because this has been kicked around.
This has been kicked around for over a year. Yeah. And it's I think they're looking for a place to put it. No, they found the place. Well, I know they found it now, but I think last year they were middle of conservation corridor. Last year it was it was going to be located somewhere else. Yeah. So the design for this plan will be presented to county county council at
a at a future date. So but not us right and as I understand it it is going into conser a conservation corridor and neither voluition forever no nor echo has any authority to approve or deny
funding for this project. It's direct county expenditure county council only is the action on this act. Am I right? Well, the the corridor is not regulatory. Uh so there is no authority to approve or deny it based on regulatory
um in the corridor. So but it is strictly uh Valuchia County Council action without approval by Valuchia Forever board or echo board. Yes. The motocross has nothing to do with Valia forever. Okay. That that's different.
Thank you. They're just buying property. It was a source of funds but nothing. Yeah, correct. The wish forever is not funding the motocross design or track. I have a question.
How much of a while we're talking about a direct county expenditure on purchasing a property, how many other instances have there been where we've used funding to buy property for for something that falls outside of maybe Valuchia Forever or didn't qualify for
Valuchia Forever, but it has some type of a park component or some type of a component that follows Echo's guidelines. Have we? There's been a few acquisitions in the past uh dating back to the 86 endangered lands program. Um, a lot of parks were
bought back then with the split funding like that. Um, Thornby Park is one of the ones on the list where u part of the property was bought with u some echo money and then some was bought with foolish forever. Some was developed into an active park and some conservation was
okay. Thank you. Because I I know uh going through this recent process of with the consultants which don't ever do that to us again what we did last meeting. I did not enjoy that at all. But uh but uh uh you know one of the things that has come out was that people
want access to nature on beyond maybe what Echo or what forever convive. I I would really like to see us consider to buying more property maybe not for a motocross track but for stuff that could be used to get people to to more outdoors since that seems to be what the one of the biggest concerns was what
people have. We need more ball fields. We need we need a lot more stuff for kid recreation that I would think would follow under the the opaces of Echo more than forever or many other programs. So it's kind of my two cents worth. But I I kind of like the direct county. I mean I
like us buying land. I know y'all don't like the motocross track. I'd rather see a motocross track out there than thousand homes any day. So, and and that's often what we're it's a balancing act. And and you know, I I don't know how well a motocross track will be utilized, but I really don't have a
problem with it. I I wish we had a place out there where you could go ride your four-wheelers and ATVs and go out and play around in the mud. I don't do it, but maybe it would take pressure off some of our public lands if we had a place for these people to go. So, but but that that land was not zoned for
a thousand homes. It would have had to come back for a reasoning. So that that was then up to the council to decide a reasonzoning on that property. And I know Stan, I think you probably know Stan too. Stan Smith who owns the property wanted to put tiny
homes on it. He that's his mission in life is to do tiny homes for people and that's what he want property but it was not zoned for that. So there there is a lot of land that's not zoned. LPGA was zoned for timber. How'd that turn out? So I we got to think
ahead corridor and the council had had taken a had said they were going to support the wildlife corridor. So there would have been hard for them to approve tiny homes in the wildlife quarter. So I I understand what you're saying but I don't think it applies to this property.
Any other questions about any other DCE projects? There's only one No. Okay. Moving on to the next item of uh new business here is the uh scope change approval for Museum of Art and
Scienc's uh children's museum. So this museum uh received two grants for about $1 million. Um, so this project has been around for 20 plus years and uh the plan is to modernize and update the current
exhibits that are in place with a new temporary dinosaur uh exhibit that will have uh modern dinosaur themed exhibits as well as interactive uh stations and static displays along with hands-on learning and other educational
activities uh for the children. and uh Tabitha Smith, executive director from Moaz, is here to answer any questions or discussion. You use the word temporary. What does that mean? Yeah. So, it's it's actually a temporary at this point. It's going to be a traveling exhibit. So, that traveling
exhibit is going to be there uh up until end of March. And then when they have their new set of master plan in, they will come with a with a new exhibit for that area to be determined.
Let me ask a question real quickly. Knowing that the philosophy that in anything we do 10% of the people do 90% of the work. Um I want to ask if anyone on this board is affiliated with associated with or serves on the board
of the museum at this point. I think it's important to to divulge that so that you know we might ask for recusal on an issue of of situation like that that we know because these are these are city community people that serve on lots
of different boards but I just think it's it's very important to have a clear picture of who's on the board or or they they recuse themselves from from a decision about a a facility like this. So I just would ask that question. Seeing none, that's great. Now let me
ask let me ask my let me ask my other question. Well again like I said 10% of the people do 90% of the work. So it's not unlikely that you might one of you might serve on the board. How has the history of this museum been in handling the echo funds that they've been awarded before? That's first question. Second
question is why couldn't this change be done through their current operating expenses or operating budgets that they have? Why is Echko uh the one that does makes this change? So Moaz has been a great steward of Echo funds. They've been under compliance with their projects. So they've done a
great job, a great partner with us. As far as there is no additional funding being paid for for Echo for this scope change. Okay. Moaz is covering all the funding for this project. It is just coming to us because we're changing the intended use of the project that was approved in the
previous grants. Okay. Okay. I just I I want to make sure I understand. I don't have a problem with it, but I as I understood I mean the square footage that's the children's museum remains the same. What they're doing is creating a temporary exhibit
that can travel and then they're going through an under uh undergoing renovation or remodeling or whatever and a change of the dedication for that same square footage of the children's museum. Is that is that am I understanding that correctly? Yeah.
Hi everyone. I'm Tabitha Schmidt. Thank you for considering this. Um, can you hear me? Okay. Okay. Um, so yes, this is actually a temporary traveling exhibit coming to us from an exhibition design firm. We are renting the show. So it will be in place in the whole children's
museum. The tiny tots front area and the pizza area all stays. That's still still remaining. the rest of it is being donated to other areas in the in the community. Um when when it comes it's actually bigger than the square footage
and it will also be in our Limmerand wing which is also an echofunded area for gallery space. So it's actually a pretty expansive show. It's running six months. We are doing a double booking because we need something that is high energy and high-profile and good for the
community while we work on the future master plan and get our final final project scope which we're underway right now. We're in the concept phase. We're hoping to have more answers by this fall. And we are we have been working to to put together one honor every echo
grant that we have and not just honor it but make it better in our scope change coming forward. But this is this is one area um as it will come as no surprise. It's gotten an unbelievable amount of use. And when the field study program came in for the fifth and eighth graders
in Valuia County, now we're on year four, it added a whole lot of wear and tear to this space. And so we had to make a decision of do we invest in some sort of transit transition or put money into something that will look very different here in the master plan in the
future. that makes any sense. Let me ask this. If if since I consider us to be the stewards of the of the the citizens money funding, can we expect sometime of a type of an accountability or report down the road on how the
change has gone on, how the new uh the new uh exhibit is being received and what your you know what your projections are. Are they meeting projections and so forth? That's an excellent question and Daniel, please make a note of this. after every major exhibit now we do what we call an
impact report. So we we can gauge our membership households for example, we can run our attendance. We can see our programmatic impact. We get visitor surveys and quotes back from the community on what their experience was. So yes, and so we'll have a nice
comprehensive look. And I will also tell you one of the things internally that the team is very excited about is this is a this is a very big exhibit. It is an expensive exhibit and we are funding the entire thing. The team is leveling
up. Our future is bigger. It's better. It's bolder. And we have work internally where we need to understand when we bring in a show like this with moving parts and pieces and sound. I mean, this requires a lot of us to manage it. And we also have a lot of obligations to the
company that we're running it from, insurance, and expectations about climate and the environment and everything. So, this is a is an opportunity for us to sort of really understand what we're what we're wanting to do and how to manage it, how to staff it to build capacity and grow this in
the future. This is one of what we hope will be many exciting um exhibits for the community going forward when we get the whole thing up and running. So, with this being a temporary exhibit, um you said it was only going to be there for about six months. Uh do you
guys know what's going to go into its place afterward or is that part of the the plan that you guys are putting together? That's part of the scope change. We we are working on you. It's it's very complex and trying to put all the pieces and parts in place, but there's the
current now, right, where we're open to the community where we've we're showing doing exhibits, we're doing planetarium shows, we got the children's museum, all that stuff going on right now. Then there's this transition moment where we have to change business temporarily while we build, right? We've got dirt
moving. We'll have safety issues. We've got to figure out where a collection is going. All of that. So, there's a lot of work to do in the transition and that's the stuff we're working through now. What does that transition look like and that will be part of the scope change for the all of our echo projects when we come back. And then there's the future.
There's the day we open in the new museum and what we want that to look like and all the parts and pieces in place. I will tell you that we are 100% committed to the children's museum concept and making it bigger and better in the future as we are to all of the echo grants that we currently have
underway and how could something like this impact um because I'm looking at it from a parent perspective as well because I have kids in the in the demographic that is being targeted with this. But um I'm just wondering like with all the changes um and the temporary placement and
everything, how is that going to impact possibly the the kids with the field trips coming in and all of that kind of stuff? So I think we're just kind of wanting to also get an idea of with the the impact to the community with the movements. Are you guys seeing any
improvement or is this kind of just to keep the eb and flow while while you're doing Are you speaking specifically about the dinosaur? Yeah, I mean just because that's the the temporary placement that we're looking at right now. Um is that just to kind of keep the accessibility
for the community in in the interim or it's yes it's to stay relevant and engaged to up our game. Um I we actually anticipate a great deal of attendance in a massive increase not only in attendance but in our membership households. So we actually think it'll
be more impactful even field trips will still be using it. Yep. They'll just tweak the curriculum a little bit. Yep. Hi, Pat. Y'all do great work. Thank you. And I thank you for that. And then just uh just a memory that comes when you
talk about the dinosaurs. Uh what was that that we dug up out of the the sloth? The sloth. Thank you. My kids now 52 and 50 still remember the field trips to the museum to see the sloth. So keep doing what you're doing
because you've been doing it for a long time and it's been great work. Well, it would come as no surprise that we would like to make the sloth even more prominent and more important in the future because it's special. Really special. It's really It was here. This it was ours. Yeah. Yeah. And in fact, apparently I I
understand there was a dinosaur exhibit I don't know a couple decades ago and I've had so many adults tell me, "Oh, yeah. I got to spend the night in the museum under the dinosaurs." So night at the museum with the dinosaurs. We're looking into that. Camping days. Have a vacation.
That's right. I think about the sloth every time I pull in the Trail Shopping Center. So, Yep. Any other questions? Sounds like a great exhibit. Thank you. Thank you.
Do Do we need a motion to make this scope change? All right. I I'll make I would like to make a motion to accept the scope change from the uh museum. Second. I'll second. All those in favor say I. I. Any opposed? Motion carries.
Okay. And then one thing just to remember too since we're on the sloth topic. Remember the uh Reed Canal prehistoric playground is bringing in the sloth and they worked with Moaz. So that project will be coming, you know, in the next year or
so. So just FYI. I love it. I love it. That is great. That is great. Thank you. Gotcha. Uh the other thing I wanted to add uh before I start my staff comments
is uh wish uh Nick a happy birthday. Happy birthday. And uh other than that, just give you a few updates. Uh Jill's not here today because she's visiting uh the Mary Mloud Bthoon home, which it's the 150th birthday of Mary Mloud. So, she's there. That's why she's not at the meeting this
morning. Other than that, exciting news coming down the pipeline. Our new micro site is about a month or so away from going live. Um so, we've been working really hard on that. Um we're about 90% done with our application portal through
Salesforce. So, we'll be testing it in the next month as well as having, you know, some grant writers and possibly some of you guys look at it to see if you guys can break what we have in place for our new cycle next year. And that's all I have for today. Any other
questions? Any questions? Okay. Advisory Committee comments. Leah, um I know Daniel, you're going to be um giving us the fiveyear plan. So that way we can kind of review it. Is there a way
of looking up um other plans that have come forward to the uh committee in the past so that way I can kind of get caught up? Yeah, I'll send you guys all the dates that you guys have reviewed and then the full plan as well. And it's supposed to go to council again hopefully July 22nd.
Okay. Done. Yeah. um at the end of the last meeting, you know, I'm the new one of the new people on the block here and so a lot of information comes to me. I feel like sometimes I'm drinking from the 8 in fire hose um trying to make sure that
I'm doing the right thing and so forth because I really do take this seriously as being a steward of the the citizens funding the money. I think it's a very important position. So when last month's motion was made by Miss Nory, I went along with it because out of respect for
Miss Nory and her her longevity to the board, thought it was the right thing. As I started on the way home though, I began to have second thoughts about it. And um I really thought that it was a quick rush to to a judgment that really is pretty impactful on a lot of
elements. Um so um you know I really thought that it it diver it it deserved a better understanding particularly from a new guy new person on the board. So with that in mind, I would like to make a motion today to resend or to change
back the grant review to 40 years with the idea that at the next meeting then we would we would reconsider the motion with staff input on what the impact is, how it what it means, what that exactly means, how you know what the legalities
of it are, all the different things that should have been looked at prior to a vote by this committee on on that issue. Um so uh again, it's not saying I don't think it's a worthy idea. I just think it needs to deserve a better um review
before we go to something that significant. Um, so with that being said, I would like to make the motion to, and I don't know how we need to do this, rescend or to just go ahead and return the grant to the 40-year process with the idea that it will be presented
at the next meeting in a manner that allows staff to inform us before we make a vote on that. I'll second that. Sabrina Slack, assistant county attorney. Uh before you second it, we need to kind of clean up the procedural
because he he kind of conflated several things together. So just to put it in perspective, um once a motion's made and passed, it is a past action of the board. Once the gavvel hits, you can't reconsider something you've done.
You can do a couple of things though. you can make a motion to resend a prior action which needs to be made in a clean motion to singularly resend whatever that action was. So if Mr. Pett could restate his motion to resend that action
um in a single motion that needs to be second then considered then you can proceed to if you want to direct staff to consider uh the implications or bring you back information about a new matter then you need to make a motion for that second action. So you've actually kind
of put two actions together in one motion which is not clear. So if what you want to do is to resend a prior action of the board, you need to clearly ask to resend that particular action. Have a second discussion and a vote, then move on to what you want to replace
that with as a new motion. And that action second and a vote. Okay, that's quite all right. So rather than rather than resend the the motion at this point, can we direct staff to come back to us at the next meeting
with information and then we can after reviewing the information, we all can make an educated decision. You could, but you've already made the decision to recommend to the county council to go to 20ear. So we're we have to go forward with that. So you have already directed us to do
that. So that train's left the station. So, we have to do that. Now, you could just make a motion for us to now give you information, but keep in mind now you have two parallel trains moving where one is the council's already going to consider what you did in the last meeting and we're just going to bring
you back information which could be stale by the because the other train's going to beat you if if you follow my analogy. So, I was too many trains too many trains. I know. And can you calculate the speed of when they're going to pass? So, I wasn't good at that in high school. So, I'm not going to be good at
that here. Um, so I I will revise my motion to be that we rescend the previous motion to move the U grant period to 20 years. I'll second it. Discussion, Pat. Thank Thank you. And I have all um great
respect for what you're what you're saying in your concern. Um, but having been here for a very long time and knowing that that we have half of our grants that are 20 years and half that are 40 years, um, we I I don't believe
and and please u help me out here if I'm speaking incorrectly. You could not take a for a 20-year grant back to 40 years. Correct? I mean that that 20 years I mean how do you how would you change that to make that 40 years?
I don't think you could do that. So uh each grant is a contract in and of its own terms. So there's two parties to the contract staff's concern. Exactly. So there's two parties to a contract. So um adding a term to a contract
would require an amendment or a modification. the converse where you are a party to the contract and you want to wave a condition of the contract which is going from 40 to 20. You're you're waving a condition. You can do that unilaterally.
But your hypothetical you're presenting to me now where you're adding 20 years to to make a 20 year or a 40-year that would be an a modification of a term that doesn't exist in the contract. So even if we went back to the 40 years on
the first time we did echo the 20 years would still continue correct which okay if I'm following your hypothetical let me go back so each echo grant is a contract with the grantee
right so each echo grant has its own terms its own restrictive covenants so in a restrictive covenant if I am museum X and 20 years ago, I agreed to a 40-year restrictive covenant that is
signed by me and it is recorded by the county. So, it's 40 years. If I was Museum Y and 20 years ago, I signed a 20-year restrictive covenant and the county recorded it, that's a contract for 20 years. So, as we sit here today
at the county, we have a 40-year contract and a 20-year contract. So, as the county, I can in the 40-year contract wave the condition that it's 40 years to 20 years because it's existing in the contract. The 20-year contract,
there is no ability for me to add 20 years unless there's a modification or amendment between the parties. It does that answer your Well, I think it does. What I'm looking at is we're we would end up with 40-year contracts from the old program from the
first 20 years and 20-year contracts that are already signed in the in the new program. And then we would, I don't know, throw it up in the air and say get whatever you want out of the oncoming incoming programs, the new ones.
Correct. Well, right. So, I I kind of So, we can make it up on the fly is what I think I hear you saying before anything new. Not on the fly, but by analogy, it it's uh like a mortgage. You can have a 30-year mortgage, you can have a 20-year mortgage, you can have a 15-year
mortgage. It just depends on what your rate is and what you're trying to accomplish. So, the truth of it is this council did not ever take action that I can recall on the 20 years. I happen to sports 20 years. I think that that's a long time as it is. I think 40 years was
originally way too much. There is nothing in the language of the resolution that went to the voters because I've got it up here right now that said anything about 20 40 years. That's an operational decision. Correct. Am I correct on that?
It's a decision of the committee. So the committee would decide you are providing the resolution. Well, no. And again, like I'm saying, it is you are providing funding to whoever you're providing funding to. You make a
recommendation to the county council as to how many years you believe it should be open to public so that we get a return on our investment of tax dollars. So again, it's a recommendation by you. So are you saying then that any program that came before us for a recommendation
that we could as a committee decide if they if they did 20 years or if they did 30 years or 40 years as part but I mean the staff handles all that. I'm not staff has done a really good job on this program by the way. meant to say that I I know I give you a lot of trouble, but I think you all do a
really good job monitoring this and taking it forward. And I trust the staff to give me a resolution or a a per a recommendation on a purchase or recommendation on a project that says here's what they want
to do and and we recommend a 20-year time limit, which is what I think happened. And I I don't recall I might be wrong but I don't recall that coming back to us as a committee to say let's change it from 40 to 20. I don't
remember that discussion. Maybe I missed the meeting but all right so I just wanted to jump in here. So as of 2020 all grants moving forward are 20 years period and that was back in 2020 when the new resolution
came in front of the citizens. on the resolution the so somebody made a decision it was 20 years that's what was implemented at that time in 2020 well I'm and I'm fine with that I'm because I I I think 40 years is way too
long to to expect an entity to continue I mean that's that's a legacy well that word was never by the way that word was I ran that the re the reauthorization campaign it was not run by the county it was born by by an
entity. I chaired it. We never used that word. Legacy was not in our language. Well, the intention of my motion is just to return what we did last meeting to 40 and then make a decision as we go forward as we've stated before. So, that's the intention of the motion.
I have a question. Um, can we penalize the grantee that has a contract with the county for 20 year restrictive covenants? Can we actually penalize them and say, "Oh, now it's
40." No, no, no. As I said, that's a you that's a restrictive covenants, a contract. The terms are the terms. Okay. So the only way you could change the term of any of the 20 years is to a actually have them agree to an amendment or a modification
to add 20 years. Yeah. So just I I want excuse me I want to make sure that I'm understanding. So the prior echo authority authorization many of the grants went at 40 and I understand there were a couple that were 30
but since 2020 all have been 20 years. So, what we're looking at is older grants that would predate 2020. And I have no idea how many of those are yet open. Okay. So, I I would need
before I vote on this motion, okay, to say yes to resend it. I'm not unders I'm not understanding what the impact is because all of those prior grants would have been granted and probably built out committed to and either functioning or
not functioning by 2020. So when I think about this, when I voted in favor of the motion to go to 20 years, it was with an understanding that the grants that had been previously awarded for 40 and 30
years predated 2020 that most of that money would have been expended andor operational and open. They still review them though. They we may still review them. And I understand the com this comment about the Dutton House and I understand the
delay. Those are valid comments that I you know but I don't understand the impact on what's the scope of taking 40 and 30year grants and that's so I'm just going to say I am ready to resend but not without
that information. So, I will vote no today, but if we have this presentation in consideration, I may consider it in the future. That's I just want to say I'm not ready to resend that vote that we had. I will vote no on
your motion, but I would ask that we have a report so that I understand the impact and then we may want to consider it. But that was the premise of my question before. Excuse me. Not not to resin today. Get the information, see where they stand and go from there. But as as
you said, we're all we're doing by doing this today is stopping the train till we can sit and look at it a little bit better. That's that's all I'm saying. I think I think otherwise the train continues to process. Yeah. So I think that understand I don't know
what's I want I want to have information. Me too. We should have had it. I should in wisdom I should have had it before I voted and that's why that's the thought I had going on last week. I'll go.
Okay, we have a motion on the floor. We do have a second. We have any more discussion? Motion is to resend. Motion is to resend. Okay. And then we're going to have a second motion to re to
so that we might reconsider. But that we don't want to we're making sure the train I got it. Okay. All those in favor of the motion say I. I. Any oppose say nay. Nay. So maybe we should do a roll call on
that one. Reggie Santelli. No. Pat Drago. No. Gerald Fezer. Yes. Thomas Leuka. Yes. John Maluso, no.
Pat Nory, no. Jay Pendergast, no. Doug Pettit, yes. Leo Washington, yes. The nose have it.
Yes. Five to five to four. Yes. Okay. Motion failed. Yes, we can have that next meeting. Okay. Well, we will have the staff will present that information to us at the next meeting. We don't need a motion on
that, do we? No. I I think we understand what they want. Do you guys I we don't really need a motion. We Okay. All right. Agenda item, right? Moving down the line. Jay, any comments?
Pat Nory. Yeah, I have comments. Again, I know we give you all a hard time, but but you all do a good job and I appreciate everything that is done for Echo and I would just encourage everybody to read the resolution that went out to the
voters. What I think the only thing that changed from the 2000 resolution was we added bonding. Would that be correct that we because because the new resolution adds bonding to it and which wasn't in the original one. We didn't
originally bond echo projects, but I think we we did add it in this one. But is that the that's the only change that I can find in the resolutions, but there is also information that supports the resolution and and uh Gerald, to your
comment, it says whereas access to the Atlant Atlantic Ocean through the establishment of oceanfront parks and provisions of off beach parking. No, that's not it. It talks about it talks about the land. Oh, whereas there is continuing need for highquality user oriented outdoor recreational
opportunities. So I don't disagree with you fundamentally on providing echo providing those opportunities or providing the land. I again I just want to be clear I don't support I support the project but not where they've
located it. So anyway, if y'all get a chance, you might read this because it doesn't a lot of what we do is operational. It is not directed by the resolution. The resolution was very clean. Thank you. I wanted to go back and talk just a
couple of minutes about what we did at our last meeting with the consultants. And I felt that we had good committee input. It was interesting. and I felt like many of our committee members were philosophically headed in a similar
direction. I do believe that having a discussion. I'm not sure that where we as a group might want to go is consistent with where some of the county council is headed and I do believe one of the things that was came up was a
joint workshop with the county council andor some further discussion. I do think that uh I felt and it was just my sense that there was a direction from the committee. I'm not sure as I said that it's in sync with uh and and some
of our priorities may or may not be consistent with direction of the county council. Thank you. Thank you, Don. Okay, Tom. Nerald. Well, one thing good about being last is most everybody said everything I already brought up. one I I felt very similar to
you Doug after the meeting I thought now I don't know that I like what we did. Uh but the other thing too on that getting back to the uh workshop the other day or whatever you call it on that process u I was was not really enthralled with with how they went about that. Uh I've been
in many of those in my career and that was probably the worst and as far as trying to come up with things and ideas uh you know it's it's a little game that we play with kids where we surprise everything on it. I I think that train's left the station for me anyway. I feel like a kid sometimes, but I felt like if
I'd have been a little bit better prepared, maybe uh on what the process was going to be. Uh maybe I I felt like I could have contributed a little bit better or more so, but uh uh I'm not really so sure what we came out of that. Um you know, it's a thing I learned back
in my economics degree. Garbage in, garbage out is way a lot of computer programs work. And I really hope that that's not what happens with this process. And so uh uh it'll be interesting to see what their uh consultants come up with on this deal. I
I don't know how much we paid them, but uh uh I probably don't want to know. Uh so anyway, I I hope we get some good stuff out of it. The the one thing that did glare to me was that people want outdoor access. That seems to be the number one priority of the citizens of Valuchia County is they want to get
outdoors. And we know that, you know, the cultural and arts and all that are very important, too. But as we cram more and more people on their little lots where they have really no place to go outside of their home, this is going to become a imperative that the county get
out in front of this. And right now we're very behind. So, uh, we'll see where it goes, but um, anyway, not happy with the process, but happy with the program. Thank you. And I'd like to thank staff for all that you do. you do make this a lot easier
for us with direction. And um on that we motion to before we adjourn real quick I just wanted to u for the newer members um remind everyone uh have Daniel go through the um dashboard because all the
resolutions the projects and a lot of information's there that you can get to. So I just wanted to uh because they brought up the resolutions and that you should look at them. All of that is available online through the dashboard. Okay. So, it is a good resource. And you know,
if Daniel just wants to kind of walk you through where everything is real quick. I know he wasn't prepared, but yeah. So, on our website, if you go under resource tab, um well, there's the transparency dashboard on the front page. So, you can click that and it'll pull up all the dashboard with all the
305 projects that we have. Um, you can look by grant year or you can filter on the map for a project glance. This will show you the design percentage or construction percentage for the projects. It'll give you a uh a location through GIS um where the actual location
is and little details of each specific project as well as the grant amount, the match amount, all that good stuff. Um, and then if if you go to resources there on the right side, there is the newest resolution. Uh, the 2020-79.
Um, the 2056 is not on here, but we can add it. Um, I know you talked about the bond. The bond was in both. It was in the original and in the 2020. It was. Yep. Can I sort by location?
Um, in this one you cannot, but I looked and I and I So that was something I left out in staff comments. The dashboard 2.0 is going to be coming out. I had a request from City of Port Orange. Yeah. To know how much money is. You're You guys will like the new
dashboard. It's very filterable. Um, you can filter by city. You can filter by grant year. You could filter DCE, regular echo. um you're able to find out answers very quickly. Instead of it's instead of three or four clicks to find an answer, it's more like one two clicks
to get what you need. Um so I'll be sharing that with you guys as well as before we go live with that as well. Can I ask a question? We we we used to do graphs and I don't know maybe it's on there now and I haven't looked at it recently but showed the percent of it
was like a circle and colorcoded but of how much went to echo excuse me how much went to the environment how much went to cultural do we still it is so you'll see here Ashlin's pulling up the dashboard there it is so down there in that left corner that
shows exactly of the 304 projects how many of them are outdoor so Ashlin someone where to click click the eat the environmental tab. Yeah. Uh it'll filter down give us 30 projects how much we've invested in environmental projects over the years. So u but like I
said the newer one is a lot more user friendly and uh I think you guys will like it. Okay. Thank you Daniel. Sorry to put you on the spot. Oh you're fine. I know my website.
Any questions? When do we meet again? 25th. Is that it? Uh October 9th is our next meeting. October 9th. Yep. Yeah. Remember, we're always frontloaded at the beginning of the year because of the grant cycle,
which remember we did move back this year. Okay. Do we have a motion to adjurnn? Motion to adjurnn. All those in favor? Hi. All right. We are journs had a discussion
that's just pulled out at the end of the meeting to the program because those rules prior to the house and some others. Ashlin, I'm sorry. If if he's going to address the whole board, it's still a
sunshine meeting because we're considering something that may go before the board. So, we if we're adjourned, we need to you can you can address them individually. I'm sorry. If it gets the sunshine law issue, if you're Yeah. Yeah.
You're just gonna have to talk to him individually at this point. Sorry, Mr. Chester. That's fine. Thank you. I had no There was a lot of lot of other