test you already got the second yeah we're gonna Good morning everyone on behalf of the members I'd like to welcome everyone to the April 4 2025 meeting of the Valuchia Forever Committee uh Advisory Committee
um just a quick reminder as usual everyone in the room to please put their phones on silent so that uh we don't interrupt our speakers and if we could have roll call to get us started please wanda Vanam here jessica Gal here gerald
Feer here derek Lamontine here john Maluso here suzanne Cyber here david Sosa here we have a quorum minus Kelly Frasa
okay very good and then as um you've noticed we have a new old member welcome back Mr feeser and if I could ask you just to tell the other members a little bit about yourself that would be great oh thank you i'm a almost a lifelong resident of Lucia County we had a farm
out in Deleon Springs that we uh operated until 2018 uh at that time we tried to do a conservation easement on it before evolution forever came into play but uh I got a quite an education and experience in doing that it ultimately did not come to pass and um so now to
find time in my days I like to volunteer and do stuff like this is something that I always forever has always been very near and dear to my thank you welcome back okay um public participation anyone
that wants to speak prior to Okay all right very good then no public participation um approval of the February 7 2025 minutes did anyone have any additions corrections changes on
those okay hearing none would someone like to make a motion on those please i move we accept the minutes as recorded second okay motion by Mr maloosa second by Mr gambo I believe that was to find um to approve the minutes of the
February 7 meeting all in favor signal by saying I i any opposed okay it's to Sunshine Law and Public Records good morning Sabrina Slack assistant county attorney this is uh
about a two-hour presentation with a movie and a quiz at the end you got my PowerPoint so um this is your annual Florida sunshine law and public records law
review um so this is a constitutional requirement that all meetings in Florida of all bodies collegial are in the public except for a few exceptions so what does this mean okay
so there's three basic things that you need to know about uh meeting in the sunshine your meetings have to be open to the public you have to give reasonable notice and there has to be minutes taken of the meeting the good news is we handle the notice and the minutes so those two things you
don't have to worry about the thing that you need to worry about is number one open to the public so it won't stay on that one there we go technical difficulties already what's
that it should be on that one it won't stay on anyway what is a meeting meeting is either don't ask uh a meeting is a gathering of uh two or more of any of you where you discuss the uh any matters
that may come before the board so why do we have these these rules that you have to uh she doesn't want u what's that oh don't worry about it it it's just it it just goes over I almost
have it memorized so we're fine so uh a gathering any meeting is a gathering of two or more of you and where you discuss any matter that may come before you so it's not something that's on the agenda it's something that just may come before you so any matters
relevant to the board uh if two or more of you get together and you talk about it you're having a meeting why is this it's because every thought or affirmative action that you do that is a decision that might be made by this board the entire public is entitled to
know about how you got to that thought process so you can't discuss or deliberate outside of the sunshine or outside of the public now it's complete can you put the rough today all right so what kinds of discussions are covered obviously
verbal discussions so if you meet each other on the street you start talking about what's on the agenda now you can talk about other things you know your dogs the weather whatever you like um but you cannot talk about anything that
we handle here what else is a discussion emails so if we inadvertently email all of you about the meeting time and ask whether you're here don't reply all because if you reply all then you're replying all to everyone and you're
discussing whether or not you're going to be here which could be a violation if somebody else replies and says "Yeah I can't wait to talk about matter X." So um always emails telephone conversations calling each other internet discussions
got to love those Facebook social media all those posts so if you guys are out there on the many uh Facebook issues issues all of our favorite ones if you make a comment and somebody else makes a comment back to you you've now had a
discussion outside of a public meeting and you violated the sunshine law so you have to be very careful about your comments on social media that is a violation of the sunshine law text messages you know uh what has gotten most boards in trouble is sitting up
here and Wanda texting John to say "Hey John make that motion because I'm tired of you guys not moving this meeting along you guys have violated the sunshine law by texting each other." That's a that's a favorite of boards where they text each other while they're sitting up there so just be aware every
time you check your phone some public auditor first amendment person thinks you're violating the sunshine law so be careful with your phones up there too um and and it's a good warning um they can make a public records request to see what's on your uh cell phone especially
if you're using it during a meeting they have a right to ask and then we basically will ask you hey is there any public records or sunshine law issues on your phone and then you know we we're hoping there's not so what kinds of
discussions are covered okay so this is also a good um point where you guys don't do it as bad as some of the other boards I have where you have sidebar conversations so if you're sitting there and John and Gerald decide to have a
conversation about whether or not the brackets doing well in March Madness but I'm talking about this important sunshine law stuff and the public sees them talking amongst themselves there could be an issue because if they're talking about what's on the agenda it's a problem talking
about March Madness not a problem but if the public asks we're going to call you out and you're going to have to disclose what you were talking about so it is something to try to avoid sidebar conversations while you're sitting there even if they're not about anything on the agenda because it has the appearance
of impropriy so um also it's always uh a kind of a thing that that is hard to avoid but your discussions during recess before the meetings and after the meetings when you're standing around it's fine to talk about the weather
again and your pets but if you're talking about anything that is on the agenda may come before the board anything you'd like to see come before the board any of those conversations you could be violating the sunshine law so always make sure that your your conversations during recess or before or
after the meetings are uh personal in nature only this is the what I like to call the telephone game rule the Aison rule every one of you have a right to come and talk to the staff about any matter on the agenda anything you might think comes before the agenda anything
that has to do with the forever board you can come and talk to any of us staff members what you can't do is ask Tim what another stat what another board member said or what the temperature of the board is so for instance we have something coming before us and you're
you want to know what the rest of the board's thinking don't call us and ask us that is actually a violation of the sunshine law so you can have individual conversations with us but do not ask us to poll the other members of the board do not ask us what other board members
think do or say because that would violate the sunshine law leaison rule exceptions this will never apply to you but it's fun trivia for attorneys so uh there are exceptions called shade meetings uh you can have a meeting
outside of the sunshine law under these specific uh exceptions which are in the statute um if there is litigation that the board was actually involved in which you know I say never but so if you guys actually get sued for a sunshine law
violation and there's litigation we could potentially have a shade meeting about that but other than that um these are typically they deal more with as it goes on collective bargaining with unions um committees uh for findings of facts or screening and portions of
meetings that reveal a security system or plan and some solicitation processes are um closed bids and those types of things are out of the sunshine until they actually are opened so notice and meetings again that's
something that we cover um there is this is a attorney special it's just reasonable notice so um there is an attorney general opinion that says seven days is reasonable but essentially we publish all of our uh meeting schedules on the internet and we also do press
releases so we do the notice of the meetings as far out in advance as we can it's a nice blank slide fill in what you like so the attorney recom uh the attorney general's recommended the following guidelines for notice time
place subject matter again we do those and um prominently displayed so uh as you come in we have the TV monitors that also prominently displays when we're meeting this is fun somebody's added like
the the spoiler alert clicks no it's I'm sure it's somebody in our office uh so this is the uh seven days for the attorney general uh special meetings if there's an emergency of some sort we can actually give uh 24 hours to 72 hours
notice um typically those types of boards don't have those types of emergencies because if a hurricane's coming usually there's no reason we're going to have to meet to have prepare for the hurricane um then those are the notice means minutes of the meetings uh
as you have approved we do keep minutes uh minutes are actually only required to be very minimal uh they do not have to be descriptive they do not have to capture everything everyone says they're not a transcript of the meeting uh the meetings are recorded so um we do have
what would presumably be a word for word record of the meeting so the minutes typically um the minimum requirement is that it captures what's on the agenda what was discussed what motion was made and what carried uh we actually supplement our meetings with a little
bit more uh that is actually a little more than is necessary but that's a good practice so the public has a right to participate in all of your meeting that's the sunshine part of it so anytime um you have a meeting you have a
public participation segment on it uh very few boards have an exception to this for example code enforcement that's one of the boards that has an exception to public participation but you um have to have public participation on your agenda when you make a motion on a matter uh you you are also if a public a
member of the public wants to speak on anything you make a motion on the public also can uh speak at that time we have a clerk if public wants to go there they just need to ask opportunity to be heard um you can uh restrict how long they can
speak but you do need to make that by motion and you do need to give them a reasonable amount of time otherwise uh they can speak as long as they like hopefully not 25 hours but that does happen um the other thing with public participation
um there is a strong first amendment right that persons can say whatever they like so long as it does not disrupt the body so they can go off but after a certain amount of time if it is not um related to the meeting it can be
considered disruption of the meeting so you can reel somebody back in from going way off topic but otherwise they have a first amendment right to say pretty much all they would like to say okay so all of that what if you
actually violate that with one of those horrible text messages between each other so there are penalties personal penalties not just penalties to the county penalties personally to you so if you unintentionally violate the sunshine
law you can be charged with a noncriminal infraction of up to $500 and if you do it knowingly which is essentially uh you've done it before or it's very very obvious that you were doing it uh it becomes a crime it's a
seconddegree misdemeanor which is punishable by up to 60 days in jail up to six months on probation or a $500 fine and or a combination of all three of those um the state is the one that pretty much enforces those so you can
also be faced with a suspension or removal from office um you can be suspended or removed uh under the general provisions and you can also be uh charged attorney's fees and court cost which comes into the the
real danger really because you know you're like $500 I can do that no problem or unintentional um if a lawsuit is actually filed and the public or person prevails they can recover all of their attorneys fees and
cost and as Jessica will tell you we are not cheap we charge by the minute any questions on uh Sunshine Law all right public records law oh go ahead Derek thank you yeah I do have a couple questions if you don't mind so
about you said there are some examples of shade meetings and stuff is that if there ever is a uh you know legal action or something um are we required to be part of a shade meeting like if they say "Hey we're we're going to do a shade meeting can I opt out?" you yeah you do not have to uh be a member of the shade
meeting uh you don't have to participate but shade meetings like I said they are very very rare uh they typically only would be a board that actually makes decisions um so for instance uh with you um the shade meeting would have to be
all the members of the board pretty much would have to violate the sunshine law and then we would have to have a reason to all of you meet together to discuss how we're going to move forward on it or whether it was an actual violation or that type of thing where we're discussing uh basically litigation strategies what we'd be discussing uh
you wouldn't have the authority to settle the case decide what the county is going to do with the case or whatever the only possible scenario I can think of would be where there is a violation of the sunshine law and we need to talk to all of you at the same time about
what happened or what we're going to do or you know whatever um very rare probably very unlikely um I mean I can't even remember the last time we had a shade meeting with our county council so they're extremely rare and you have to do something usually very very bad for
us to all want to get together out outside of the public one one followup but unrelated a little bit uh the factf finding uh meetings and so forth so can you maybe just give an example of what what that is because okay so like that would be uh so a factf finding meeting
would be the county is faced with litigation of some sort and we need to get together a group of people that are going to be involved in the litigation but again it's it's tied to essentially litigation strategy or something where we need to go on a factf finding
um so it really dubtales into what I was talking about before where we would get the whole board together to find out what you guys did that was the violation of the sunshine law same scenario where we're going to go on a factf finding we're doing it not to discuss what we're going to do with litigation but to actually get together to say "Let's talk
about X Y and Z." Because you do I if if and again these are scenarios if you have committed a crime you have a fifth amendment right not to to uh what's the word I'm trying to think of Jessica incriminate incriminate thank you i I
literally could only think of intoxicate and I don't even know why you have a right not to incriminate yourself so we we I know so you would uh have that we wouldn't want you to um wave that fifth amendment right by getting you together to talk about the subject so we could meet in the shade so that you wouldn't
violate your own right not to incriminate yourself so it would be a factf finding we're not talking about strategy and those meetings are all there is a court reporter there they are actually all recorded uh everything you say is taken down by a court reporter and when the reason for the shade
meeting has expired everything you said is then put in the sunshine so these things don't it's these aren't that's why they kind of call them shade meetings because the sunshine eventually comes back and puts light back on it um so it's not like uh it's not in a cave i
mean there's not there's going to be light so once the me the whatever the issue is is resolved then you're going to be back in the sunshine everything that was said is going to be public transcript's going to be public everything's going to be back out there so that's why they're only in the shade
thank you anyone else yes sir gerald you were talking about everything before a meeting what about after a meeting if the vote has been taken and maybe I'm on opposing than John did but he thought said something that I thought about later and I say you know John what about
you did what was your rationale blah blah blah is there any problem after the fact there is and I'll tell you why you're an advisory board so everything you do has to be goes is going to go back to council and you you never know when it'll come back so for instance if
you watch Tuesday night's exciting episode of the county council we had echo grants come up so um those are the echo grant would have been dealt with 2009 2006 they came back before the the county council uh for an issue so
there's still a a a longgoing thing that may come back before the board so my example there is so you made a decision 20 years ago it could come back before this board or the
county council in 20 years for whatever issue so if it's a conservation easement they violated the easement they've done something you never know when these things are going to come back before the board so even after you've made your vote and you feel like your work is done on the issue you don't know when it's
going to come back before the board and it potentially could so the the rule is very uh open to something that may come back before the board it's not just something that was on the agenda so you dabbled it on the agenda it is a
conservation land it's a conservation issue that's an issue that could come back before the board so the two of you should not talk about it while both of you were on the board so you're gonna have to write it down and when you see John when you're not on the board anymore be like "Hey man remember that time three years ago we need to talk
about that." But yeah no that that is So yeah you you even after a vote you should not have out of the sunshine discussions about why you voted what you voted for or what what was going on if you want to discuss that you have to do
it on the record so I know it is and that's and it's like I said it's it's the way the law is written it doesn't say what's on the agenda it says things matters that may come before you and like I said even after it's done it might come back so it it because it's a matter of conservation in Valuchia
County and forever okay all right now this is the good news about public records law if you think I was talking fast before I am really going to pick up speed now public records
essentially the public records law is another constitutional right for every person to inspect or copy any public record made or received in connection with official business unless it's confidential or otherwise exempt so the
issue is uh what is made or received so it's the policy of the state that the county has to provide these things to the public now here's the thing you're on the board you're part of the county welcome so um what we do here again the
staff will maintain the majority of public records the thing that you have to be cons conscious of with public records is is whether or not you are in possession of a public record because you are an extension of the county so you need to understand what a public
record is so a public record is essentially all things tangible so it's you know papers letters maps everything that's tangible it is also text messages electronic anything that's that's there
um and it has to be made or received um pursuant to law ordinance or in any connection of the transaction of official business by any agency and we are aboard so um it's basically
something that formalizes any knowledge of the county or any of the people acting on behalf of the county the location of where it is is irrelevant so those emails that we send you to schedule the meetings we send them to your personal emails those are public
records the good news is we have copies of them so we're maintaining them for you the bad news is if you forward that email to a friend or somebody in the public and invite them to the meeting or discuss the meeting to know any of your
friends you've now made a public record on your personal phone so you want to be conscious of what you do with uh information and how it's shared and what you have done with those records of
sharing knowledge so again just because uh the record is on your personal phone doesn't make it not a public record so we give you those notebooks with all the information in them and everything so those are public records the good news
is if you don't change them we have a copy and we we keep the public record and we maintain it the bad news is if you change it and share it with someone so if you make some notes on it and you share it with someone you have now made a public record of what your thoughts
are on that matter and you've shared it with somebody else once you take it out of the realm of your own personal notes for your own personal reference you've made a public record and once a public record's made you have to maintain it because if anybody asks for it you have
to produce it so for instance um you know if we had something where um well a member of the public brings in something and they share it with with you we make sure you give it to the clerk don't take it with
you because if you take it with you then you're the custodian of the public record and you have to maintain it and produce it but if you hand it back back to the clerk or one of us then the public record stays with us for retention so um again the the thing that
that you have to be aware of is if you alter uh any of our presentations or documents share it with any member of the public you've made a public record and you need to let it uh you the best thing to do is to give it to us um because otherwise you're the custodian
and you have to maintain it so again here it is uh communications regarding county business which would be forever business is um basically reduced to any medium paper tape compact disc these are
old they need to update these uh thumb drive whatever so um the examples of what doesn't qualify as a public record again are your personal things um your grocery list um
your computer password a ballot that has not been voted uh these are all u things that are not public records because they're either exempt or personal so um the reason why they don't qualify so a personal grocery list is something
that's doesn't have to do with county business so if you write that on anything that's your personal list computer passwords are going to be exempt under the law and an unv unvoted ballot is actually also exempt from public records all right so the common
exemptions from public records uh your typical financial data social security numbers bank account numbers personal information uh one thing you should know is your email addresses your personal uh home addresses all of those things are not these are public records those are
not exempt unless you qualify for another exemption um so the other thing that we're going to have as exemptions are our security fire and safety plans our building diagrams competitive solicitations that are
sealed all of those things are not public records there is a public records um manual that has exemptions it's about 200 pages if anybody needs to read that um so how can public records be made
this is one thing you do need to pay attention to a public records request actually can be made to any person in the county any agent any employee so if anyone ever asks you for information please immediately relay it to a staff
member it can be verbal it can be made in person it can be anonymous they don't have to say who they are um anytime you receive any requests for any information for anything we're doing on the Forever Board please forward it to one of our staff members and we will take care of it um if somebody just verbally ask you
how they get a copy of things you can refer them to us and you know if you let us know that's better uh but if it's just a random member of the public then they weren't If a random member of the public comes up to you and says "Hey I'd like a copy of everything you guys
looked at today." you can just refer them to staff because going in back in time their request wouldn't have been specific enough and all those types of things to actually have formulated a public records request but I will tell you some courts have found that just a
casual request for public information can be a public records request so again anybody ask you anything immediately refer them to staff um if you get an email forward it if it's a verbal request send them to us we also have on
the county's website a um a form that they can fill out for a public records request um that can be done so how we handle the public records request just for your curiosity and knowledge so um when we get a public records request we
don't ask them why they want it they can ask for any reason uh we don't ask they don't have to tell us who they are they can make an anonymous request to the internet um when we get them uh we have an obligation to find any records that we were required to preserve or protect
and we cannot deny for lack of specificity we basically have to follow up with them uh and ask them exactly what they they wanted or what it is exactly they need um for instance we sometimes get public records requests that we want every item the forever
board has ever dealt with so we're going to go back and say every item they you know first off uh that's not very clear and can you narrow it down uh and also if they don't narrow it down I'm probably skipping ahead too far
we just have to do that okay we can um so once they give it to us if we can produce it immediately we have to uh there's really no fiveday waiting period uh we can redact we basically redact out the personal information so we do have
to have the ability to review and redact um we are not we're not required to answer questions so uh some people get confused about public records request public records request is a request for a
document that we have in our possession something that exists we do not have to answer questions so if you send me a public records request that ask me to summarize or give my opinion or
um basically create a document by compiling other documents together in some sort of format that's not a public records request a public records request is only give me all emails that Wanda
sent to John that's a public records request it's something that exists if you ask me uh give my opinion of whether Wanda and John's emails are violation of Sunshine Law that's not a public records request that's a request for information
or an opinion so that is not that does not qualify as a public records request it's solely documents so the format that's the same so with format of public records if it is a piece of paper I can you can have it uh digitally or you can have it in
the paper form um if it is an Excel spreadsheet or something of that nature you can actually request it to be produced as an Excel spreadsheet uh not as uh a non-digital thing okay so exempt versus confidential are two different things so some things
uh are exempt from public records which say for instance uh the security system for this building is exempt uh your social security number is confidential so with that you would uh redact one um not the
other i don't know why they're killing you guys of federal versus state all right so this is the I thought this slide would have been earlier so when you make a request for public records um we can also charge you a fee and a
charge and we can request that you pay that before we produce the public records now the fee or charge has to be reasonable and it has to be calculated uh to the lowest hourly rate of the staff member who can competently produce
the records so that's as clear as an attorney can say so essentially um even though it's a public records request we can still charge for um well we can't charge for inspection
or supervising which would double the cost but we can charge for um the cost of our staff member to com to get the records together and to copy them and to produce them so to avoid that you can actually ask just to view the records on
site so uh if you do that then we have to provide you with the records we still have to screen them for confidentiality and those types of things so if you did request um something that had to be reviewed and scanned and redacted we can still charge you for that even though
you're just viewing them but um we cannot charge you for the staff member that has to sit there and watch you look at them so we have to make sure that you don't alter or remove the records but you can view them which will reduce your fees so while you're looking at them if
you want a copy you can ask for a copy but we are allowed to charge you 15 cents per page for a one-sided copy it's a real money maker uh so um the county we presently charge a special service charge for request
where more than 15 minutes of staff time is going to be involved in producing a public record the charge is calculated based on the salary and benefits of the staff employed to respond to the request and is intended to compensate the county and taxpayers for the actual cost of responding to the request so that's
actually our policy which follows the uh case law on that the AG says we can request an advanced deposit so if you request it we can request that you pay it in advance so penalties back going back to the part before I went went down the rabbit hole
of what we do um there are also penalties for not producing a public record so again if you create that public record with the email or you share documents that you've altered you fail to produce it you can be found
guilty of a first-degree misdemeanor which is punishable by a $1,000 fine and up to one year in the county jail or one year on probation or a combination of those three punishments so uh failure to produce it
is also like your sunshine violations there's an unintentional and an intentional the unintentional is a noncriminal violation of a fine up to 500 and your intentional is your first-degree misdemeanor which we just discussed so a failure to produce is
also going to have the same sanctions of um removal from the board and potentially if there's a lawsuit paying attorney fees and cost so um the records it's uh this is kind of an interesting one so we do not have to
keep records forever there is a manual that is a couple hundred pages long that essentially describes all types of government documents and when how long we have to keep them and when we can actually destroy them however before we destroy them we actually have to tell
the state we're going to destroy them so um there is a whole process of retention and um destruction of the documents based on um it's actually through the library in Tallahassee which maintains the archives
so to summarize uh remember not to talk via email text u from on matters that may foreseeably come before the board for discussion outside the confines of a duly noticed and open to the public meeting promptly
respond in good faith to all public records requests and ensure that confidential we will ensure confidential and exempt records are not there you don't need to redact it we can do that for you um this is the government in the sunshine law manual it actually is
published online every year by the attorney general um it's 300 pages of riveting case law and statute about everything I just went over so if you it's actually very well indexed so um the the links at the bottom there they
it is in PDF if you want to print it but um it is uh searchable online and it has a very good index so if you ever have any questions about Sunshine Law or Public Records Law uh the government the Sunshine Law Manual by the Attorney General's Office is an excellent
resource um and then again when in doubt please call us uh we can assist you with whatever you have questions and anybody has any questions i have I have one go ahead John if a member of the public
accuses a member of any board alleges allegedly violation of the sunshine law does the county defend so the county does defend unless it is an intentional act on your part so if you really really do
something that is completely outside of the scope of your duties then uh we're not going to defend you because you've you've basically done something intentional beyond what we would defend we defend anything done within the scope of your duties on the board so the investigation would show if the
investigation showed that person was innocent based on the investigation you would go ahead and defend it doesn't matter whether you're innocent or guilty i mean as long as you if you if you did it within the scope of your duties then we would defend because
right now you're a volunteer for us you're under our our self-insurance and all of our uh risk pool so you're under our risk pool for things that are done within the scope of your duties but if you go completely rogue and intentionally violate the laws we no
longer have a duty in our risk pool to defend you because you've gone beyond what we um we didn't employ you we volunte okay thank you anyone else mr omaha
um yeah about the public records uh again thanks for presenting all that um question can uh a records request be fulfilled if it's asked of you know the county or just anyone's asking simply by saying it's on our website or do you actually have to like give so I can
actually digitally uh do that i can actually send you so for instance if you requested a um I don't know just an agenda or whatever I can actually send you the link because I've responded to it
digitally and says here's the link now if you specifically say I want that and paper or PDF or whatever then we will go through what it is and determine whether or not that can be done um so for instance if you wanted the audio of this
there's a link on the website and I would be able to produce that to you for free but if you wanted me to produce that in some sort of medium a thumb drive or whatever I can charge you for the thumb drive or whatever else so typically you know what most departments will do is say that records available on
our website for free immediately you can click but if you insist on having it in some other medium then we will then do an estimate of what it would cost for us to produce it and we'll get that to you so if the like website changes too doesn't that kind of affect like say
here's a link and well a record won't change so what I'm what I'm referring to are things that we have available through our website that are records so for instance um I go back to code enforcement a lot but code enforcement will put all of their meetings are on
the website and you can click on a link and you can get that immediately you can also uh click on a link with the clerk of court website and get an order or a fine immediately so what we will typically do is respond to the public records request and say you can
immediately obtain this record through these methods now if you come back to me and you're like "Well I don't have a speakers or whatever that's not going to work for me." Then what I will do is say "Okay we will produce those records but it's going to cost x amount of dollars." And then we'll go back to you because we can charge you uh for things that'll
take uh time and or that have to be produced like if it's paper 15 cents i don't know what we charge for thumb drives disc or whatever i don't really know i'm sure we have a schedule that that makes sense i I think I I got that i just know sometimes I've I've seen
websites be re revamped and so it's harder to find so all of our websites are um we have to actually um they're still there i'm losing all my words today but anyway so all of the versions of our website
are still available and you can make a request for those um from our IT department and again that would then uh require us to go back and pull you know whatever historic digital documentation we have to preserve those but and then
also um what I was talking about the record retention manual so there are record retentions that will vary from some records um like if you leave a voicemail if you call and leave me a voicemail that says I'm going to be at the meeting
that is what's called a transitory record it's basically here and there and I don't have to save that voicemail but if you call and leave me a voicemail that actually gives me information and again code enforcement is always the easiest examples if you call and give me a complaint for a code enforcement
complaint that actually has your name your address and what the complaint is I have to save that digital record under the record retention policy and so then that would then go to a record of a code enforcement case which has its own record retention policy whether the case
is pursued not pursued whether there's a fine all of those have different schedules so it can range from 30 days till the fine is actually paid which a code enforcement fine can be for up to 20 years so all records are not retained on the same schedule all records are not
retained in the same amount of time so they're all going to vary whether we have them or not um business tax receipts those applications are one year so we don't even do them anymore but occupational license we only had to keep those for one year and then we destroyed them all so you know it's it's going to
vary by that record retention policy that's given out by the state whether we still have it or not thank you i just one one last one on a different uh topic well you mentioned about the audio if I wanted to request that so just regarding like an audio or video of a meeting like this or something so I guess first
question is how long um yeah are we keeping those um and then two I guess any sort of broadly agency um you know not just even us but like if there's uh some entity that's recording their their meetings and then um they have it like
automatically be deleted it's like oh our our Zoom recordings or whatever like just delete after like a year or something that doesn't seem to be following what you've said it's going to vary on the records retention manual so again it's like a 200 250 page document
so again it's going to be it's going to depend on why it was made what it was made for and what the record retention policy is on it so I I couldn't tell you off the top of my head i'd have to look um but it and the record retention policy is also published online anyone
can look at it so it's not as it's not indexed as well as the public uh records manual but it is uh indexed also so you'd have to look um to see what the retention policy is on those i'll check that thank you
anyone else any other questions all right and if you want a copy of the slides we can get those to you and if you have any questions just give me a call thank you Miss Slack very good okay
uh now before we start with new business um Dr burb did you want to address us please i did and I think this is a each time where we have new members join us at you know we go over the sunshine law but also I think it's an important time to go over our collective roles um in
the process and um there's a careful separation of duties that protects the program from individual preferences ruling the day and really where collective decision- making is and I just wanted to talk
through uh the process as what it is outlined in resolution 2021-11 which is you know the committee serves in an advisory capacity only um staff maintains operational authority over the negotiations um and proposals and then the county
council retains the final approval power so your role in this process um is number one to ensure that the public's involved and we appreciate you and the diversity of knowledge that you bring to the table um the resolution explicitly states that the purpose of
the this appointed body is to oversee the review of proposed acquisitions and improvements and make recommendations to the county council while you evaluate properties and you recommend them for acquisition based on established criteria the final decisions on
acquisition including partial acquisitions modifications to proposals arrest with county staff and ultimately the county council the staff role in this and and this is in 2120 or 21-11 as well as um we're responsible for
publicizing the program soliciting contacting and negotiation negotiating with property owners potential sellers or representatives uh thereof um is the sole responsibility of the county manager and or his design
which is me so um the res the resolution establishes clear division of responsibilities the committee evaluates and recommends while the county staff negotiates and implements i will say county staff must consider multiple factors when
finalizing acquisitions including budget constraints seller willingness and balancing conservation with other county priorities i realize that one of the the the properties that you have voted on um did
change after um you know after it came to this committee and I will the buck stops with me as the director of this department and we should have done a better job of communicating that after um that decision was made and it was on the county council's agenda so just
wanted to put that out there i know we'll talk about it further but I wanted to be clear about what our roles are in the process um and in terms of the authority of of staff and or the county manager and his design the role of council who has the final say on all of
these deals and then the role of the advisory committee as well okay thank you for that anyone have any questions on that i have a question okay so I have a question Brad pertaining to
land that we place in conservation and um the land that was in Edgewater that was I believe sold to FD um so that land specifically let's just
take that one is that going to be and so it's being used for storm water i saw the press release is it going to have um storm water piped to that now
so there are already outlets there's a So if you look at the the property on the eastern boundary of the property there is a very large canal system it's 20 these canals are 25 ft wide um that was previously under private ownership
and uh Edgewater told us that they would get in and try to maintain as much as possible um they had tried to get an access easement from the owners at that point in time and they were unable to do so um so what we've done is we've taken when we went to convey the property to
Florida forever they of course did not want to be responsible for maintaining those canals so what we did is we've we've carved out those canals as well as a 50- foot buffer um adjacent to the
canal or 25 foot tim reared his head i knew I said something wrong so a 25 ft uh buffer to the west of the canal um the canal is very long probably over a mile so when we look at you know the 50
ft for the can 25 ft for the canal 25 ft for the access piece from north to south it represents about 9.06 acres what we've done is conveyed that 9.06 acres to Edgewater who has outfalls already in
this canal we had a survey done of this canal and several people who several people who live along the canal have illegal docks and other things that are um tempering flow I would say um so this
will give Edgewater the authority to put it under their regular maintenance program to make sure it's properly functioning during storms so that's what we've done and at the press release you may have seen yesterday so continued on this question
the lands that we vote on that the county um keeps an inventory they are for natural storm they are for natural storm water storage only correct you're the county is not
um to send storm water to it so the the way that the the resolution reads in terms of um water resource management is the goal of this committee the goal of conservation is to keep the land intact to keep it in its natural state and
protected so if it has benefits water retention benefits like the um wetlands that we just bought and and edgewater we certainly are happy about that now if we wanted to do some minimal um green infrastructure improvements like swailes
um I think that would be allowed under our ordinance we haven't tested that yet because we haven't needed to and the reason why is the team in front of you does an excellent job of balancing our needs 49% of the acreage that we've bought over the since 2000 has been
wetlands so we understand the the importance of having a balance when we acquire these i think the renewed entrance on flooding and flood plane protection you'll see that a lot of our um acquisitions are strategic wetlands
that we have identified as such with the water management district this should be protected in intact manner you good okay any other questions all right thank you very much for that appreciate it
brings us to new business please good morning Tim Teler chief of conservation acquisition for the Village Forever program so we are now going to start um our sorting process for the project that you previously uh determined to be
eligible and this project is called the Southerntherland project approximately 52 acres in size is we've got a map up there showing show showing its general location and its uh location in uh relevance to the uh Florida wildlife
corridor okay the Southernland project came in as a uh working forest and farmlands application 52 acres in size it scored uh 10 out of 19 and the minimum required is nine out of 19 for eligibility um potential match matching
funds are Lake to Lagoon and rule and family lands protection program and attributes we we found none okay so rule and family and protection program as a as an easement okay all right any questions on this
comment i have a question um anybody that wants to answer it um the SP 1118 that's going through legislators right now at the state uh that's taking preempting like
development things like that is that going to have any impact on these conservation easements that we have in this county and I'm asking it because of the situation now coming that we're about to vote on I'm talking about the rural lands Brad
it it may in the future But the I will say that we have made sure that our easements are ironclad um and in perpetuity um we also as I I've shared last time one of the ways that we kind of protect them is by asking a third
party to be a a serer to them so Conservation Florida ACT Autobond we typically will ask them to be you know on the on the easement with us one of the things that we've um Yeah I'll I'll stop
with that but we we're making sure we our language is very strong we've looked at it in the last year or two because there have been changes that have tried to be made to um the extinguishment of of easements but we are we are well protected the attorneys
tell me yeah just to follow up we do everything we can we can't predict the future so we do everything we can to make sure that we are as strong as we can be in our um goal of conservation so that's all we can do for now
okay any other questions comments all right would someone like to make a motion on this property please for ranking A or B i make a motion put this property on the A-list aotion by Mr sosa
to put it on the A list do we have a second second second by Mr gamble all right all in favor of putting this property on the A-list signal by saying I i i any opposed okay very good those on the A-list
okay so we're going to start uh the eligibility review section of the meeting now we have three applications but remember this is the phase of the meeting where you're determining whether determining whether a property meets the program goals or does not and is eligible for further consideration
got a map up here again showing it these uh properties in relation to the Florida wildlife corridor and the location in Bush County for you to take a look at the first one for your consideration is called uh Lake George Road this came in as a fe simple application with a staff
score of 11 out of 21 with the minimum required here for fe simple acquisition is 10 uh acreage is 26 acres it is within both the eco andma overlays and it's in in holding within Lake George state forest um adjacent conservation
property is a lake George forest and wildlife management area and with that we stand by for any questions okay questions of staff comments on this one okay someone like to make a motion
on this one please can make it i make a motion to make this property eligible second second by Mr gamble okay so the motion is to find the property eligible for the program okay okay all in favor signal by saying
I I opposed okay very good next property please hi everyone hunter Falmer chief of land management our second property for your
consideration is Witchman uh this was a fee simple application uh staff score was one out of 21 on our eligibility required is 10 out of 21 um it was not in any of our acquisition target areas
and it was around 5 acres and there were no adjacent conservation properties near this parcel and with that we will leave it for your consideration any questions or comments on this property okay if not would someone like
to make a motion on finding this property eligible please or not eligible i'd like to make a motion to make this property not eligible uh yeah just um just for purposes of
um making a motion it's always best to make the motion in the positive and then uh if you do not approve it then to vote in the negative so uh if you could limit your motions to positive saying uh I move for this property to be eligible
and then uh if you want to not make it eligible vote in the negative it's just a better practice to make your motions in the positive and then um discuss and then decide whether it should be yes or no if we can always just make the motions in the positive it just makes it
much easier down the road in making the motion in the positive does not bind the motion maker to vote in the situation correct correct you don't just because you make the motion in the positive um it is um just a good practice uh we we could do Robert's rules but it's more
boring than um sunshine law i will warn you uh it is just a better practice to make your motions uh for positive action and then vote uh either positive or negative you're always only making a motion for the purposes of discussion uh you can vote either way once you've made
a motion or seconded a motion so okay can I change my motion to make this property eligible okay we have a motion to find the property eligible do we have a second i'll second for discussion okay we have a motion by Mr gamble second by
Mr maloosa now discussion on the property Mr lamonte yeah so just uh to be clear some of it was I think overlapping type here but um are they only looking for feast simple or was there just double check um can you
clarify what types they were looking for going on there we go limited communication that we've had with this applicant indicates that they are interested in a fee simple transaction okay and they mentioned it's near Tiger
Bay State Forest but not adjacent to anything or trail i think it said you know about where that trail is I guess no I have no familiarity with that trail okay i'm just curious if that we can find out some time what what that is or
if the owner is willing to share that additional information i didn't see any indication of where the trail is but they mentioned it as you know so I'm just curious if you had any more but you don't so um and uh I think one other
question you didn't go to the property or anything did you no we have not visited this property okay and so I just want to clarify for the access though there is like a little road on the side to get to it though for scoring
purposes so that's not as clear when you look at the map series that is in there so there's county maintain road listed shown on your map there and there appears to be some type of a gap in this section that we don't have a firm answer on right now so I can't give you a conclusive answer about public access
yeah I just want more information I guess to but that's my comment and I will just note the the application form says that there's not legal access I guess it says there's no easements or any rights to access
okay any other discussion on the motion okay all those in favor of finding the property eligible please signal by saying I Okay if you are opposed to finding the property eligible please signal by
saying I i next property okay okay the next property for your consideration is the um Melania property uh fe simple application staff scored it three out of 21 the minimum eligibility is 10 out of 21 it's roughly 3/10en of
an acre in size we did not find it within any target acquisition areas nor did we find it adjacent to any conservation properties okay very good questions of staff on this property
do we have anyone that wishes to speak on this property okay if you could on the microphone and then before you leave fill out a form so that we have record you got it okay very good
so I realize now that you know this parcel is very small compared to what you guys are used to dealing with um we feel like we're in a bit of a unique situation um after purchasing it it was determined that we cannot build on this
lot um after being told we could uh I even joined the parcels so that it was supposed to be acceptable for the zoning to to build on it then finding out that it is 100% wetlands after doing a delineation with the local engineer um
also finding out that there is some type of waterway that runs through from across the street to different parcels that drains out behind our development uh I'm in Corbin Park by the way if you guys don't know that area and so that was the other problem that we found out
obviously later um we were told that it was a buildable piece of property when we bought it before we bought it um from zoning department and building department as long as I joined the two parcels which I did did I paid the application fee through the county to join the parcels um and we just feel
like we're in a really bad situation we spent we spent a good chunk of money to buy this lot and now we are pretty much left with it we can't we personally can't put it back on the market to sell it because we are not the type of people that would
uh hide the fact that it is not buildable now that we found out it's not buildable we don't know if the previous owners knew that we we are under the impression that they did but we can't prove that so this is this was like almost a last resort i guess we were we were recommended to come here to try
this and so that's what we're doing um I feel like there's a flaw in the system a little bit because I think the red flag should have come up somewhere uh before I was able to actually put an application and and join these pieces of property i kind of feel like there should have been something that said
"Well wait a minute this is this is wetlands and you're not going to be able to do what you want to do anyway so that's why we're here this morning we're here taking a chance to see if we could again I think the waterway part is really what got me that it is like a
drainage through Corbin Park to a uh retention pond in the back so um it kind of limits well it doesn't limit us it kind of it it it tied our hands um to do what we wanted to do with it uh we spent you know $58,000 or on the property we
actually have got more than that into it with engineering and and other things that we've done but uh yeah so we're kind of at a landlock we don't know what else to do basically question yes is this in the city or in
the county this is a county it's okay it's listed as county property okay if you're not successful here I we don't know you might want to talk to the storm water people in public works okay because they do land they do land acquisition for storm water purposes
okay and this is an area of known flooding they may be interested they may not i don't I wouldn't speak for them but I used to be in that years ago so I I know that they do do things like that on occasion so okay that that's another option for I appreciate that
i was going to say I'll pass this along to uh water resources and we're doing a basin study in Corin Park um so part of that is looking at potential acquisitions that will help alleviate flooding i will make sure that this is
um included in that study share with our public works director as a potential acquisition in that basin study okay so they can look at it so after the fact we found out that the piece across the street girl that bought the home across the street was told that she could not do anything with part of her property
because it was determined that that waterway runs from the front to the back right through our lot we didn't think anything of it at first until she told us that because we are kind of a we're kind of on a caddy corner to her so we didn't realize that it went and it's
weird if you look at the map i saw the the travel from the engineer and it takes some turns and it cuts across some places but it goes right down the middle of us and it was determined in the delineation that there was absolutely no 0% that we could use on that property
and then we were we were told about the about the wetlands by we learned a lot in the last couple months about buying certificates for other wetlands to use our wetlands but now we just sat in on a meeting last month that they seem to be
doing away with that and they're not going to allow that anymore so like I said we're just at a spot where we just don't know what to do anymore and we can't resell the property not now because we would have to disclose that it's wetlands and you know we're not trying to be shady about anything so we
would want to be honest so I I don't see where anybody else would benefit from owning this property so okay that's why we're here we may have an option for you that's what all I can promise is to connect you appreciate anything yes sir all right thank you thank you okay good
um any further discussion i I guess I just want to appreciate Thank you for coming here um for telling us about your story it's always good to have the public participating um and yeah we definitely hope I mean I'm just speaking for myself i guess hope we find a solution for you that uh you know
hopefully the staff or some other of these uh departments i I like Mr gamble's suggestion um about the um you know these other entities that buy properties maybe they're part of the city and talk to the water management district especially if there's water on your property but I guess I guess for
our purposes I'm just curious if there's any way we by perhaps um making it eligible and you know maybe not eventually an a or something but if that could help assist the property owners with getting to these other partners and so forth
where you know working with the FTP or the water management district like they end up buying it but we're just like a facilitator in that capacity again maybe not with actually purchasing it and so forth but I mean if the staff's already helping then maybe you're good to go there but um yeah I guess maybe everyone
else can weigh in on on what they think if that's maybe going to help them um but not eventually um actually be in the Folutionia Forever Pay program but finding the partners If we end up losing out in the end we
lose out i mean it's a life lesson we're We're not kids um but there's got to be something on there's got to be something in the system that should have red flagged this before I got as far as I got like I actually came to the city in zoning to question that it was a
buildable piece of property before I spent $60,000 and I was told it was so if there's a waterway running through our lot I would and in an area like Corbin Park that has been studied quite a bit um because they were supposed to do I would I would wish that there would
be some kind of alert or red flag that would come up to so that we would have had an option up front to look into it further before we purchase um uh it it just would have helped us a lot make make a decision obviously obviously if we had done the delineation first we
would have found out that it was not buildable or that it was 100% wetlands so it's I kind of feel like there's a a flaw there for for our benefit the public's benefit um and I hope if nothing else comes out of it that something could be done about that in
the future okay thank you thank you um do you want to address u Mr lamontine's request that we be able to do something outside of the scope of our regular duties here to help this individual
um we are um the most we can do is what M what Dr burb uh indicated so the most that the board can do is basically um understand that staff will do what they can do but the board itself does not have the authority to do anything beyond
either uh approving or denying the eligibility for this particular parcel for the forever program so you know the the just you have to you can't direct us to even do anything other than understand that we have now heard it and we will do
what we can but the board doesn't have the authority to even direct us to do anything beyond funding forever eligibility and those types of things okay okay so for our purposes at this point we can strictly vote whether we believe it to be eligible for the
program or not and that trust that the property owner and staff will work on any future steps correct okay very good thank you for that okay would someone like to make a motion on this property yes I would like to move to include this okay we have a
motion for approval do we have a second i'll second okay a motion by Mr feeser second by Mr lamontine to find the property eligible all those in favor of finding the property eligible please signal by saying I i okay all those
opposed to finding the property eligible signal i none okay all right voted to be ineligible six to one nope i'm sorry am I counting wrong okay very good that is the end of
new business and I too would like to thank the property owner for coming in on that appreciate your time okay that brings us to staff comments please so we're going to start out with an introduction to the newest
member of our team here Miss Jessica Stroble she's recently joined us and if we could just give her a minute to introduce herself to the committee good morning everyone i just want to give a quick introduction about myself so I was born in Rochester New York but I've been in Valia County since I was
three i attended Seino State College where I received a degree in legal studies from there I went on to work at a law firm and a title company in Lake Mary for six years i was there helping out with all their closings and real estate work there um before I accepted a
position with resource stewardship I was actually already with the county working in growth and resource management as the real estate specialist handling the county owned lands process um land donations to the county deed work contract work um so I'm really happy to be in this new role and I look forward
to working with all of you thank you well welcome glad to have you and I I just want to add to that that there's a lot of technical real estate work that goes on with this program so having Jessica's background uh is a huge
benefit to the program uh as a whole but she's also uh you know a warm uh excellent communicator and really maintaining a relationship with these land owners as they work through the process is extremely important we've t we've spoken multiple times about the trust building process that has to occur
here to actually get to a closing on a piece of property here so Jessica is going to be an excellent addition to our team in that regard also good okay so I think I have property updates
next so first one is uh Trip Ranch uh this is an agricultural easement project that we have uh been working on for quite some time it's a great example of how much back and forth can take place uh with a landowner on these projects um so Tim Nick is zooming into them on the
dashboard as you're talking about them for the committee's interest all right thank you roger that okay um so we are in a stage right now where we have uh reached a verbal agreement on easement terms uh and so that gentleman has now
taken the easement document to his attorney and we hope to hear something from him very soon on whether that will proceed as is or there's requests for any further changes uh next one that I have is the McMillan property so the McMillan property was uh
west side of uh Lake Ashby uh this was also an agricultural easement application we have uh easement terms agreed upon and we have a contract price agreed upon we are preparing that item for the county council's consideration now likely next month uh after McMillan is the double
eagle project this is 990 acres down in southern Valuchia County um we are pretty squared away with the land owner on this one but this is a partnership project with the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services so we both have different program rules here
and what we've been encountering is we're essentially using this project as the template for future projects and has taken a lot of back and forth on the legal documents to get everything squared away for this project and future projects as we partner with them so we
uh are are uh again exchanging documents hope to have this one wrapped up in the next two weeks tamoka Marsh is the next one on my list Nick so we're up in the northeast corner of the county 1300 acres of marshland um
this is an example of our relationship with the Florida Department of Environmental Protection the Florida Forever program has stepped up they have a verbal agreement with the landowner right now um so we are closely monitoring the progress of that transaction we hope to see an executed document very soon and we'll really
celebrate when this one moves forward to uh to to finally be closed upon it's it's one of two holes in the donut up there and that all the conservation work that's been done so it's a great uh acquisition Stewart property so we're
now in the Edgewater area this is a 2500 acre project that we had moved through we talked about it a little bit before with the canals on there uh the canals are actually located on that piece that we're in the process of uh uh selling to the Florida Department of Envir environmental protection so the Florida Forever program will sometimes um
purchase land from from the county after the fact and so that's what we set up here with the contract um we have our closing documents circulating for signature internally now and so that'll move to the state signature next week and we are all discussing a wire
transfer of midweek next week uh hopefully we can stay on schedule with that one one important component if I may um the water management district will manage this for us the state will retain ownership um because they have about
1300 acres and the Turbo Hammet conservation area which is just south here we will provide recreation opportunities on the uplands if you see kind of the the backwards L that sticks out towards Cow Creek Road that's where most of the uplands on this property will be and that will be the access
point for um for the public off Cow Creek okay thank you for that that's actually a good transition to uh the next project which is the Carter piece um and so to pick up where Brad left off this is one that uh Valuchia
County will be the land manager of because it manages the adjacent Deep Creek Preserve uh so excellent news here the state has closed on this property again this is a a reflection of our our um our partnerships with the Florida Forever Program they've stepped in and purchased the property valuchia County
will be the land manager now and and Nick and Hunter are in the early stages of getting those uh management agreements set up and operational i think another example of Echo synergy is um when we've we just had approved at the the previous meeting the direct
county expenditure for Echo it included $150,000 um to update or to um start a management plan on this property but the very important component of that management plan is the recreation component so passive recreation not
trying to change anything um in terms of the the things that are allowed passively um but we've we've um charged our consultant to think outside the box we want we want new things that are passive so we'll see if they meet that
challenge next one for your um information is the the Cooper project this is down west of Wiregrass Preserve roughly 40 acres um I would describe this as about 97% complete we have uh executed all
documents funds have been transferred everything's done except for the recording of the deed so the deed is in Q right now there's there's about a a week and a half lag from the time that you actually submit the document to the time it show up on the the clerk's page so it's in that process now of getting recorded on the clerk's page so another
acquisition complete and Tim can I add to that real quick we will be absorbing this 40 acres into the Wiregrass Prairie Preserve and we are looking at ways to provide some public amenities on this site as well talmage is the next one that I'll
discuss um we continue to work with the landowner to try to find a u an agreed purchase price um so we're in an appraisal phase right now we're taking a look at comparable sales and seeing if there's any new sales on the market that could be considered for for uh uh the
appraisers on that project uh communication is excellent uh but we do have some work to to do before we can actually close the gap and the asking versus uh where we think we're going to come in at uh next one I'll I'll move to is the
Tamoka Farms Road project so we are um we have just completed the appraisal process on this one um to give Brad a preview we're going to present a negotiation plan for consideration uh next week and we anticipate we'll be
able to make an offer shortly after that um Lake George in Holdings we continue to monitor that situation uh no no uh um material updates that I can present other than I've spoken to the landowner and for background I'm kind of jumping ahead here but for background
this is a project where the water management district had taken the lead in presenting an offer for the acquisition of these pieces um there had been kind of a communication gap we've reached out to the landowner from Valuchia County are trying to reinitiate those discussions it was a very positive
conversation with the landowner so we hope to see this one move forward soon also uh Lake Harney piece uh so this is the 5,500 acre piece down in southern Valuchia County um again we've had excellent conversations with the
Department of Environmental Protection they're now starting the appraisal process on this piece um will either come in as a partner or potentially even split the property uh with Valuchia County taking portion and the state taking a portion but that one is also underway and we should see an offer uh
it's going to take probably about three months before they'll actually see an offer on that one and that is the extent of my updates uh for projects okay sounds like some good progress on some excellent pieces
of property so thank you for all your work on that everyone okay any questions of staff mr beaser yes uh on that property there in the land the the I call it the old Jacobs property i guess it's the Ford property and and I know Forever has taken the lead on that but
that parcel can be used for so many different things if not it's going to be developed uh and I know the the back portion certainly has got great environmental purposes but the front part of it you know could be developed into ball fields and and and and educational facilities obviously much
higher value with other partners that are non-conservative conservation-minded uh we are working with all those people correct to try to come up with a joint use of that property maybe to keep it in the fold so there are conversations with
potential partners and other uh entities that have needs on there so communication is ongoing with Falia County in the lead uh for the acquisition that city of Dand and uh should be actively involved too I would hope yes sir okay any other questions of
staff okay very good quarter updates conservation corridor update nick's moving over to his seat i'm going to start this introduction and I know Nick's going to want to add to it so we have put a lot of work into the
expansion of this Florida Forever project area this is the Florida Forever project that essentially runs up through the spine of Valuchia County um we have uh done an analysis uh through GIS on uh potential expansion areas and uh we do
have some uh updates on in that regard essentially we have uh uh quite a number of property owners that we need to reach out to now so we have a clarification conversation later today with D on exactly what that correspondence needs to look like and what type of response we need to get from land owners for
their inclusion in this proposed expansion area and if uh just just forformational purposes let me emphasize when we talk about Florida Forever project areas it's a voluntary uh uh it would only be a voluntary sale if one were to go through this does not commit
a landowner to a transaction with Valuchia County or the Florida Department of Envir Environmental Protection and it does not and add any additional regulatory burden on a property it doesn't change the property at all essentially all we do is open up another pool of funding for acquisition
here so it's important that we go through these steps because the uh entity with the largest purse is the Florida Department of Environmental Protection so we try to work with them as you've heard throughout this meeting as much as we can this is a an important step for us to try to broaden the area
that they can operate within and we could find additional opportunities for partnership okay thank you tim can I add to that now just to explain the map a little bit um first I want to state that this is a temporary tenative target map so we're
at the point in the process uh through the multiple data sets that we've had through GIS we've identified areas that should be our targets for the expansion of the Valuchia Conservation Corridor uh so what that means is we've identified
approximately 1,900 addresses that will need to be contacted to ask if they could be a willing seller in the program so we will compile that data that we get back um from the yeses on the willing sellers and this map will change a
little bit based on that um those responses and that new map will be what we take to the state in Tallahassee for approval so this is a temporary snapshot of the areas that we're targeting uh currently the Bush Conservation Corridor sits at approximately 80,000 acres um if
we were able to get all of these parcels in we would be looking at adding an additional 38,000 acres to the corridor but as I mentioned I expect it to not be that much based on the willing seller response uh one of the major benefits of
the expansion for the Valuchia conservation corridor is when we have projects come in there we'll be able to take a lot of those straight to triage instead of going through the 18-month process through Florida forever um go ahead Brad
all right I'm on okay so triage uh we throw these terms around from time to time and we always we want to back up and make sure we're all on the same page here so it's divine triage um when we start working on a Florida Forever project the first step is to get it eligible for for the Florida Forever
program uh if it's not within a Florida forever boundary we go through this protracted process which we did on the Carter piece for example that can take about 12 months to work through that process to get a piece that's outside a Florida forever project area inside the project area to expand the boundary
essentially uh when we have these properties that are already within the boundary it gives us the ability to essentially I I essentially write an email to the Florida Department of Environmental Protection staff and ask that this be taken to triage they essentially meet once to twice a month at it's an internal staff meeting and
they essentially look at what their current workload is what their current budget is and what they can take on and Lucia County benefits greatly by having partnership dollars in here even though they don't ask us for dollars very often we often get to the front of the line simply because we're a well financed
program that has a very good track record in its history so when we talk about triage that's the step where the the Florida Department of Environmental Protection gives a go or no go at that point in time thanks Tim and I'll and I'll add real quick um a few of you may be
contacted by some land owners in these areas we're going to be sending out some uhformational um some information with the letter for um the willing seller letter so uh just to be clear we're not asking them right at this moment if they're want to sell their property to
Valuchia forever we are asking them if they're willing to participate in the program at a future date um so we're not putting out an all call to buy everybody's property right this second um so if anybody asks you about that this is just to participate in the program to expand our parsible possible
boundary it gives land owners options that's what it does and that's the way that we're trying to frame the letter and help them understand some research that's been done um as where your val the property of your or the value of your property increases when it's next to a Valuchia forever or a Florida
forever project area or acquisition on this map there's kind of two keystone pieces of the 30,000 acres 38,000 I think Nick said um two property owners own about 15,000 so those are people that we've engaged heavily with um
around Lake Ashby there and then the kind of keyhole north um of 40 um so I think that's about 8,000 acres and then 55 or 5600 acres so um they're not there yet but we're engaged we're engaged with
those large land owners and and one last time this is a temporary map and expanding the corridor um this is something that's been happening all throughout the program right whenever you whenever Revolution Forever would
work with a land owner that was adjacent to uh a Florida Forever project you've been working with them to expand their boundaries so this that part of it is not new that's just something that you're going to continue to do okay
all right any questions i have a couple questions so pertaining to this map that is temporary um the yellow areas because it does not show are there any current um
conservation lands in those yellow areas already this is targeting um mostly private parcels um if there are smaller conservation areas in these areas they would not show up very easily on this map because they're so small
we are targeting private land owners with these areas so we're not going to send a a letter to an area that's already under conservation no I understand that i'm just asking from trying to figure out the map so let me go to my next question because that didn't get me where I'm trying to go
here um the point on the map towards kind of towards the middle where the yellow is there middle to southern end of the county what is the road
because I don't know some of these roads so what is the road that's going southwest what is 415 okay yeah there's a date road 415 so you can see Lake Ashby the the water body there that's Lake Ashb so if you're
coming down that's 44 um if you're going north or east west you get to that and you come south down 415 okay and then on the um northern part where the wide yellow is can you give me
any road or um that's State Road 40 no I know that but any road or landmark as to where that goes to the right side of that yellow um that goes approximately from Barberville East um all the way over to uh the the big
yellow section is actually one of the larger land owners that's warehouser in that area okay but any landmark at all like a road or like how far east does that go is this what you're talking about here yes so on the far left that's
11 on top that's 40 and to the right it's really all woods it's it's it's timberland out that way there's Okay does it go in the city limits of Orman Beach i do not believe so i Okay i believe it's too far west to be Orman
Beach city limits okay the one of the things that we're missing from So this is the corridor that we've established around Tiger Bay tiger Bay is not on this map so you're missing that out of the full picture which is 27,000 acres there in between I4 and and uh 90 I4
yeah that's what I was shooting for trying to get you're missing Hard Island is Long Leaf Pine Preserve the west section doesn't that run up to I4 it does yeah that's not on here either
right the current conservation lands layer is not on this map this is the map of the corridor itself okay okay but shouldn't the state lands be on that i mean just just give us We'll We'll update it and share it with you guys it makes it look prettier yeah but
that's a simple ad we can add the conservation lands layer to this map we'll share it with you well we were told in the beginning that this was going to be a lengthy process and something that had been worked on and would be continue to be worked on so it sounds like everything's moving in
the right direction here so we appreciate everybody's time on this and I think it it needs to be pointed out that this team sitting before you when we initially took on this task were you know shopped consultants to do this work for us at about $25,000 but since we
hired our GIS person he said he could do it so um this team and and our GIS person worked together to do this and saved us about $25,000 so thank you okay further staff comments so I just
want to wrap up by saying that was a a very healthy discussion here at the committee and just want to remind committee members you don't have to wait for these meetings if you have questions please reach out at any time and we're happy to answer them and we want to answer your questions because we anticipate that you folks get a lot of questions about the Vucha Forever
program so we're here to make sure you're fully informed okay thank you all right that brings us to Sorry I'm sorry did you have one more addition uh just an update that the police forever um resolution changes are scheduled to
go to council the first meeting in May at this time do you want members of the uh committee there or always or if if you can't if you can write a letter or if you see your your who has made your appointment to let
them know that it's a committee work product with staff input um that would be helpful okay all right that's what I was getting okay thank you anything else from anyone on staff okay that brings us to committee
member comments just a question or request in the mapping series for the packets can we add back in the I know it's not definitive but the wetland map from the public system and then maybe the floodway map as well we got we have the flood zone areas but I think we have
a floodway layer yes i may need more clarification on which exact flood plane map because there's a few sure you said add back in so that's one we had used in the past i I know we've had the wetland in the past i don't know if we ever had the floodway
think it might be helpful okay y I know given the importance of the topic and I know it exists in the GRM interactive map so we might just be able to pull yeah the map we used to have was a little bit different than what these are
so okay all right mr feeser yeah this this is somewhat related to what we were talking with these folks out here on the small lot lat lot lot that's not buildable and and I've also had some neighbors out in Leon Springs
that have experienced similar situations it was either through a a flood or the zoning or the property was too small it was a nonbuildable lot uh and like they said well the realer never told us anything and and which was bad but is
there any pro any work being done in the county now to identify these parcels that really aren't buildable for the variety of reasons i know it wouldn't be through forever but I know y'all got your ear to the ground to hear that would identify that that would show up somewhere in the in the process or the
deed that that this may not be a buildable lot due to to zoning or or wetlands or or whatever so that we would not have these situations maybe occur as much so we do have a program for when forever it's a small lot acquisition
program so that's within those nine antiquated subdivisions we've made significant progress there jessica actually when she was in GRM led the program for us um there is not a a county process outside of those nine
antiquated subdivisions however I know as we embark on these basin studies across the county that all vacant land privately owned and publicly owned will be considered um if it's undeveloped as
a potential acquisition um for uh storm water management at this time we have money through transform 386 to um acquire or um homes or properties
that would mitigate against future flooding so we have another pot at this point in time to use okay thank you okay anyone else questions comments mr so I just want to just want to thank
Nick and Hunter uh they took me on a nice tour of the Deep Creek Preserve a couple weeks back uh you know it's a really nice preserve if you want to go horseback riding or just hiking it it it's beautiful out there and thank you guys for taking your time to take me on
that yeah anytime and that goes for anybody up here yeah we're very fortunate we have some absolutely beautiful um parcels in our program and It's it's a great estate for anyone and everyone to get out there so okay
additional questions comments Mr lamonte um yeah just you had mentioned transform 386 can you um explain what the current like what what that status is I guess for people are they're currently still looking at um getting feedback for that
or they further along the process so I I can't say I I'm you know Donna De Marsh or Donna Butler rather um is in charge of the program um I will tell you I think there's a lot of consternation out out there about the the
the length of time it may take you to get through the program but I in their defense I think that HUD dictates that you have to serve um based on uh income levels first so it's it goes in rounds so if you may be a moderate income
person we've got to go through and qualify all of the very low and lowincome people first and provide them service before so you may have been approved but you're still in a queue if you're at a moderate income level so there's some wait time associated um
with that program uh so that's kind of where we are we can ask for a written update that we can share next time if you'd like or you can call Donna directly she's open to meeting and then just one other quick thing i I appreciate um Miss Slack earlier giving
uh that presentation could I get a copy of that or that's Yes we'll email you a copy thank you okay anyone else questions comments okay good meeting everyone and
uh again thank you to our members of the public for coming good luck with your situation hopefully you've got some additional avenues you can pursue now so all right uh remember binders we like to leave the binders behind if you want to
take the um pages take them out please and I believe next meeting June 27 do I have that right i think is our next meeting okay so thank you everyone we'll see you on June 27 we are adjourned
that's public record yeah you should never write [Laughter]