##VIDEO ID:N1fQkcfhOEQ## for [Music] for [Music] [Laughter] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] me there you that's the list thank you good afternoon everyone you have to tell theim did you tell Vince did you okay good afternoon everyone may I have your [Music] attention get out afternoon everyone it's so great to see so many of you here this afternoon I'd like to call the meeting to order and again welcome all of you that are in attendance here uh today it's my pleasure to begin the 2024 installation and reorganization of the Leon County Board of County Commission but before we begin with the invocation I'd like to recognize some individuals that have joined us today I certainly welcome chief judge Francis Alman sitting down front uh and you will hear from him later on when he swears in a newly elected Commissioners I also like to recognize Clerk Marshall Knight who will conduct the reorganization of the board later in the program but we do have some other officials elected officials that are here Leon County Supervisor of Elections Mark early is here where are you thank you for being here Mr early we have Leon County Sheriff Walt mcneel where are you Sheriff okay Sheriff mcneel we have our Leon County public defender Jessica Yuri where are you our public defender okay awesome we have our Cedar Tallahassee mayor our great Mayor John daily mayor daily we have City Commissioner Curtis Richardson that is here thank you commissioner Richardson uh we have Leon County School Board member Alber Smith I don't see her but she oh in the back okay thank you Miss Smith we have Tallahassee Housing Authority director Miss Renda Williams thank you she's on the front row we have Leon County Judge elect Miss Lesean Riggins where are you and we have Leon County deputy sheriff Ron call where are you Ron another we also I'd also like to recognize my former partner our Circuit Judge judge barara Hobbs where you judge HS okay we have Leon County School Board member Mr Daryl Jones Mr Jones we have Leon County Circuit Judge Frank Alman I'm sorry he's on the list we've recognized him but you're the chief judge so we can recognize you more than one time chief judge we have Leon County Circuit Judge Angela Dempsey that's here judge Dempsey and we have the capitol city Chamber president Miss Katrina tuggerson thank [Applause] you we have our tax collector The Honorable Daris Malloy thank you and we also have Reverend uh mallister who is a newly appointed Bishop that's here here with us and did I miss any elected officials who they who are they showing we have former mayor John Marx that's here with us I see Jo oh our former County Commissioner who's office I now occupy commissioner Manny Manny joannas is here than thank you I did oh you did I did did I miss anybody else will you all please join me in giving a resounding Round of Applause to all of those officials who thought it not robbery to join us [Applause] today at this time I'd like to recognize Reverend Ernest phell as he comes to the podium to give us the invocation I want you to know that Reverend frell is a current pastor of St Mary's Primitive Baptist Church which position he has held for over 32 years yeah that deserves a round of applause and and he has another distinguishing fact that I'd like for you to know he was the president and CEO of the Tallahasse Urban League for 46 years before he retired in 2018 so we certainly thank you Reverend frell and we appreciate you for all the public service that you have provided to Leon County and the City of Tallahassee and now I turn it over to you for our invocation thank you very much um since I'm standing and everybody's seated if yall would just stand with me IID appreciate it dear God we know that all things come from you it is you who have made us and not we are sins we are blessed Beyond hundreds and thousands just to be here tonight we give you honor we give you glory that you richly deserve thank you for this occasion so important for our community particularly the county that as they be installed and reinstalled in the new program for the year began we pray for their wisdom we pray for their strength we pray for their protection in a world that's violent in me pray that you continue allow your love to abide in them that they will continue to give you glory and honor for the privilege to serve or you serve this present age our call in to fulfill we pray and we thank you and we honor you God and we pray the success of all who are in leadership position that they all remember the people whom they serve and we give you go we'll give you honor and we give you glory because you deserve and we ask it all now Lord in the name of your name in the name of your son Jesus Christ and the they all say it with a resounding amen amen amen thank you Reverend frell will you all join me in the Pledge of Allegiance Pledge Al to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for it stands one nation under God indivisible with liy and justice for all thank you all so much for participating in our opening at this time I'd like to recognize my vice chair commissioner Welch and I would like to turn this portion of the meeting over to commissioner Welch is the gap thank you thank you madam chair um and and I think we forgot to recognize commissioner DM commissioner DM we're glad you're here thank you for being here um and thank you sincerely for all you do for for our community uh yeah let's give him a round of applause uh it is uh my honor to take a moment to say a few words about uh Madame chair Carolyn Cummings who is um is uh is stepping down from her year of service leading our commission and I've got some prepared remarks and I'll try to stick to them but I might come off of them a little bit just because I don't like prepared remarks um I want to begin by saying what a pleasure it's been to serve as your Vice chair Madam uh Madam chair commissioner Cummings throughout your chairmanship uh you know you and I came in together four years ago and to this to this board and it was a much different scene four years ago uh it feels like the longest but also the shortest four years of my life it's just the weirdest sensation and four years ago we had plexiglass between us and we were we were all wearing masks and this room was not nearly as crowded uh and man have we come a long way Madam chair and I think it's only fitting that that that your yours and I first four years our first four years on the County Commission ends with the renewal of a second term but also the recognition of your service to this board in this community uh you have set a high standard for leadership uh your grace and insight and collegiality have been really refreshing to all of us up here uh and it says that on here it really does but I mean I I think that like you handle yourself with such a Grace and such a peace when when things are getting snippy and and you know we're getting heated and commissioner Proctor is over here nipping at me and and trying to get your attention you handle that so well and it it really it's like a motherly calm that you bring to this dis and and I think that that is invaluable in your service and your voice to this community during this year uh of your service those qualities have been Amplified tremendously you've represented our board so well uh you've set an example not just for for us us as as Commissioners but also for Future Leaders in this community you are a uh a Trailblazer in this community um you are a just your legacy is going to be untarnished in this community and if there's anything that we can do about it I'm sure we will reinforce that um so in closing and I and I'm sure that our colleagues will will Echo these sentiments um I get the privilege of presenting you with your commemorative plaque but um it's really we we do this together and and and the six of us have been so fortunate to to sit this last year under your leadership and so although I'm getting to present you with your uh with your gavel plaque commemorating your service it's really from all of us and I know the County Administrator there will Echo these sentiments as well so um uh at this point I would would like to present you with your plaque and thank you from my heart my fellow Mississippi my fellow Mississippian um and not everybody understands what it means to be from Mississippi so uh and now we are so so grateful and proud and thankful for you so thank you so much please join me in in [Applause] congratulating thank you so [Applause] here's all your okay at this time uh I'd like to recognize our County Administrator Vince long uh for some remarks as well thank you Mr Vice chairman uh Commissioners Madam chair you know we have a a little tradition around here during reorg where I get the have the honor to present our outgoing chair uh with a collage of which captures highlights uh from what was an extraordinary year this year Madam chair as I reach forward here uh you'll see that that uh not every chairman uh has uh one of the as one of the highlights uh a photo with her with a sitting president but it's been one of those kind of years I think we' all agree um Madam chair I want to just thank you on behalf of all the men and women of leyon County government uh for your accessibility during uh almost more emergencies than we could count this year uh also Commissioners I can't remember a time when uh during this B Centennial year where we had our chair represent us uh on so many events but you were always accessible to us uh it was absolute pleasure to work with you needless to say everyone here knows that I hope you find uh somewhere to uh display this and you can uh uh it can remind you of what was a very proud year uh for all of us with you as our chair Madam chair so with that on behalf of all the men and women of leyon County I'd like to present this thank you so okay all right there you go thank Youk with that Madam chair I'd like to invite up someone I think you know uh chony Haynes chony come on up thank you Mr County Administrator Madam chair members of the board Madam chair as your time as the chair of leyon County Board of County Commissioners comes to a close I wanted to express that it has been an honor to witness your character and strength in leadership not only in corralling this mly crew of Commissioners here at the county but also in your ability to coales with all the members of the blueprint governmental agency board of directors your guidance and unwavering commitment to leyon County as a whole has been instrumental in steering us toward success I look forward to working with you in this next term as I know you will continue to Foster collaboration navigate challenges and Inspire Innovation for all citizens of Leon County thank you for your tiess efforts and for setting such a high standard commissioner Proctor as they say in the Baptist Church as I close from the best Aid on planet Earth commissioner Maddox scientist have Albert Einstein commissioner o'keef artist have rbrand commissioner Miner music has Michael Jackson commissioner caban chefs have Julia Child commissioner Proctor Sports has Kobe Bryant M Mr Vice chair the Civil Rights Movement had Dr Martin Luther King Jr in politics in Leon County we have the best leyon County Commissioner on planet Earth commissioner Carolyn D Cummings coming I'd like to honor commissioner Cummings if you would come forward Madam chair those came out of my yard [Laughter] we were talking um once before and I did clear this with the county attorney so I I I did tell her I said I'm going to have that gift disclosure form ready to for her to sign so they say anything over $100 so uh I have it filled out ready for her in the office so uh but you know we were talking and we were talking one day she says well every woman loves Dillard so commissioner Cummings thank you for the pleasure and the opportunity to work with you uh and just as a token of my appreciation for you thank you so much thank [Applause] you can I leave this thank you Chanty as uh as Madam chair makes her way back to the dis um and before we get to her farewell remarks I would like to invite each of our commissioners to uh say a few words um in reverence to to our beautiful chair guess I'm still new at this commissioner Maddox you are recognized thank you sir mam chair it's been a pleasure having you as our chair this year uh we've we've had some of the uh hardest times storm wise that we've had a long time but what I can say is that from the from the beginning you commanded respect from us as your commission uh and you even kept this in line when it comes came to us speaking out of turn uh which is hard to do when it comes to commissioner proerty you know that mouth just goes um I mean it's it's but it's true though bill it's true man um but we we're going to miss you as our chair um congratulations on your new term and I look forward to to to four more years of working with you thank you Mr Vice chair thank you commissioner madx Madam chair thank you for your year of service and providing a wonderful example of leadership um and bringing collegiality um and keeping us in line to to put it politely um I think one of the main indicators of someone who's a leader is does what they've done carry on and I think that your example as chairwoman here over the past year will play a role in the future chairperson um in keeping us during some extreme times and discussions about very important issues um keeping us moving forward keeping meetings moving forward and keeping us focused on um the issue at hand thank you very much thank you commissioner oi uh Madam chair um let me start this saying this you know being the chair is actually much harder than it looks you've got to run the meeting you've got to uh take a look at what all the the six other County Commissioners are doing um it's it's very difficult and for those who may not know we have we have a little application on our computer screen where the chair sits and it shows you where the speaker uh order is so when someone clicks on a little button here at each of their desks it shows up on the Queue um and you're supposed to use that to kind of gauge you know how who wants to speak on the Das the problem is not everyone uses that application so some people use their you know raise your hand and all that all that you're trying to run the meeting recognize the folks who want to speak um listen to what everybody's saying both from here on the dis as well as uh citizens that come to talk to us um and then you also have to talk about your positions on the issues that we're discussing all in one meeting and it it is harder than it looks but um Madam chair you've done it with poison Grace during a year where we had almost constant emergencies uh hurricanes left and right um and I want to thank you for your leadership because it it does set the tone for the rest of this body on on how the chair conducts herself and uh you did that in an Exemplar fashion I want to thank you for your leadership and it's been a real pleasure serving with you this year looking forward to the next years coming forward thank you ma'am thank you commiss Miner Madam chair I think uh commissioner Welch uh nailed it on the head when he said uh the way you manage this board with such a motherly Instinct and with such Grace I think is is this such an accurate depiction of your your your your Championship to last year um you know behind the scenes a lot of folks don't know about some of the struggles you had personally through the last year you know and uh and we do as your colleagues and to see you show up every single day um with your game face on you know out in Fort Braden um at the water during the water food giveaway after the Hurricanes um or at St Palm Elementary after tornadoes uh watching your perseverance for our community is truly humbling to watch so thank you for your service this year thank you thank you commissioner kaban Madam chair um Chanty never stops campaigning and uh you are the the best chairperson in the whole white world but he is not the best Aid in the whole white world I don't know what is gone to his head but nevertheless mam sh I heard uh our mayor uh say wonderful Splendid things about you uh recently and um God knows um John Daly has never said that about a previous chairperson at all and uh certainly not about me uh as chair but for daily to say all those things you got to be cooking with gas I didn't know you know during the 200th anniversary of our County and City uh how two people from Mississippi would be the chair and vice chair of our County government you know I mean I guess roll a dice and um but you all have done a splendid job and you've been on the scene I mean left and right all kinds of measures I had it in mind uh really get some flowers but uh I I didn't Rachel or something miscommunications and then you know that the ones I wanted cost way more than those I don't know why Chance is so cheap but you probably the ones I wanted i' had to feel like by three forms for disclosure so that's why you didn't you know the ones that I really had in mind um I was asked today um who perhaps some of the most memorable uh uh County Commissioners um and it's just hard to say but um I I truly know that the the most sweetly loved um and sweetly adored by far uh has been you commissioner Carolyn comings and uh that you know that um uh your charm your effervescence uh your class uh I you sure you want to you know follow that right there I don't know all that but I just want to conclude by saying I love you and uh God speaked up on you we've really enjoyed you Carolyn Cummings thank you thank you thank you commissioner thank you Commissioners um and now it is time for Madame chair to uh share with us some outgoing remarks thank you thank you my vice chair and before I begin my remarks I'd like to recognize a couple of people uh that have come in Mr REO who is this city manager the great city manager for the city of Tallahassee uh as well as Mr Michael offord who is the great FSU a athletic director is here let's give them a round of [Applause] applause thank you all so much oh awesome and we also have representative Alan Wilson Williams I'm sorry I was looking at Alan Williams we we really appreciate you being here absolutely before I um give my remarks I'd like to just thank all of my fellow Commissioners for all your love and your support certainly thank um County uh administrator as I began a second four-year term as County Commissioner I'm truly humbled by the level of support I received from the voters and from the citizens of Leon County on November the 5th I'm grateful and very appreciative and I truly thank the citizens of Leon County for their vote of confidence in me to serve a second term as commissioner so I thank all of you for your support this past year to the County Administrator s Vince long thank you for our County attorney who is always here keeping us uh straight uh we thank Chassidy for all of her legal support and both of you our County attorney and our County Administrator have said great examples High Caliber examples for local government operations and we thank both of you all will you all join me and giving them a round of applause and it goes without saying that we certainly appreciate their staff County staff for the County Administrator as well as our County attorney they also demonstrate very high examples for local government operations I want to thank the citizens of Leon County again for allowing me to serve them because I believe Services is not a right it's a privilege and it's been a privilege for me to serve the citizens I want to thank my commission a uh chy Hayes who is the greatest commission a on planet Earth commissioner Proctor for his uh kind words this afternoon for the beautiful flowers but I I want to thank him for all that he does for me and what he does for the citizens of Leon County which in many instances most instances you don't see you don't realize it but he makes sure that we respond that I respond to every single phone call from citizens to every single inquiry to every question and of course he does so much more but I certainly appreciate his dedicated service not only to me but to the citizens of Leon County as well so again commissioner Proctor he's the greatest Aid on planet on planet Earth yeah let's give him a round of applause thank you so much and also to my fellow Commissioners and of course your AIDS as well there are great AIDS and I thank and I appreciate each of you for the manner that we have worked together this last year on this board to maintain a high level of respect and collegiality among ourselves and I am honored commissioner madx who have been selected as chair after your chairmanship but it's just been great and you set a great example for me and I certainly feel honored to have served on this board with each of you as I reflect on my time as chair there are some moments that have been special and I'll just name a couple I'm proud of the collective efforts of this board to address affordable housing and we did so by investing millions in housing developments that have increased the number of affordable housing units throughout Leon County and I'm proud of the fact that this board LED and supported team Leon in response to the series of tornadoes that devastated our city and our County in May of this year and this board approved team Leon and approved the expenditure of $1 million of targeted assistance to businesses and individuals that had suffered loss during those tators and those funds were delivered to those businesses and individual uals in less than 14 days I'm proud of the fact that this board invested in building and sustaining quality infrastructure that supports orderly growth improve mobility and economic opportunities in Leon County that benefits all of our citizens and there are many other actions this this board has taken to address the daily need of our citizens in our communities that will be very impactful now and for future successes and those actions and I won't go into those it would take too long but it makes me so proud to be part of this commission and part of the guys on this this board when I was elected four years ago my mother was alive and she was a citizen and a voter here in Leon County but here four years later she's gone to Glory but her spirit lingers on my mother was my very first public servant role model and some of you have heard me say this before when President lynon Johnson declared war on poverty during his presidency and especially in the south my mother a amidst a lot of threats and controversy opened the very first Head Start school in the PO county in the state of Mississippi and that was Perry County and I want you to know that through that program many poor children in Perry County County for the very first time received dental care and Vision Care and in some instances health care so I was very proud four years ago to have been elected to be this boys representative on the Children's Services Council also to carry on the Legacy of my mother's care and concern for children so I want to thank our executive director of The Children's Services Council Miss sea green and she might be here today I'm not sure she's here thank you so [Applause] much and I also want to thank the chair of the Ser Children's Services Council Mr Daryl Jones who is here and they both share the same care and concern for children that my mother displayed through her bravery in the 60s I believe that through my public service work I will continue to carry on my mother's Public Service Legacy last year when I was sworn in um and became chair of the commission I wore purple because purple was my mother's favorite favorite color well this year doing my swearing in for another fouryear term I'm wearing red in her honor because she loved her red lipstick so I've got on I've got on my red lipstick to demonstrate what a great public servant and Ro model that she was for me so once again Commissioners I thank each of you for your love your support and for allowing me that opportunity to serve as your chair I thank all of you for coming here today to witness this occasion and I ask that God will continue to bless each of you will continue to bless the work of this commission that he will lead and got us to do the best for the citizens of Leon County and I want you to know that I love all of you and I thank you may God bless each of you [Applause] ma Madam chair if I if I might I'm sorry we we we've never done this before but I nobody brought it up and this is this moment I think we we have to take advantage of first of all I got to say um Chanty asked me to wear red as an Omega I don't own anything red so I'm sorry about that part but um December 29th 1824 Leon County was founded uh 200 years later sitting as our chair would be a africanamerican woman that wasn't brought up today but think about the significance of what Carolyn cmings represents for us as a nation and as a county that she gets to be the one that brings us into 200 years of being County Madam chair I could I [Music] couldn't Madam chair I say with pride I know your mother would be very proud that she was a TR Blazer that you can count yourself as a Trailblazer because you got to represent us as our chair and lead us through a year that's significant not only today but for the rest of our history let the record show that 200 years from now that we'll be able to say that Carolyn Cummings was our chair for our 200th anniversary congratulations Madam chair thank you thank you thank you so much commissioner Maddox and if I might just comment it's been a great year I've certainly enjoyed representing the the county this Centennial year and it's just been a great run with our great mayor mayor Dy he and I have been on on the stump together representing Leon County and tallah hass's 200 year by centennial celebration so thank you for those comments and I just appreciate the opportunity and thank you Mr Mayor for being so gracious M Madam chair since commissioner madx violated protocol and establish a new president I I I I couldn't help but think that you left out an additional point and um aside from your mother being extremely sweet uh your mother was an extraordinary dresser and look good all the time and I think that uh for the record we need knowe uh in your following in her stride that you've always always kept pace to look extraordinarily good and you've always been well-dressed just like your mother um as we've known you over the past few years so that part had to be added to go with a mother's comments sharp sharp B Madam chair I I think I'm supposed to hand you back the gavl here to for our inst swearing in ceremony so here you go thank you uh my vice chair commissioner wilch and as you all know we have three Commissioners to be sworn in today uh commissioner Welch commissioner caban and myself so at this time I would like to ask our honorable chief judge almond if he would go to the podium and we will meet him at the podium for the swearing in ceremony thank you judge Al thank you very much Madam chair I bring greetings to all of you from the judges serving in the Second Judicial Circuit and those in leyon County I'd like to welcome all of our County Commissioners and of course their family our County Administrator long and County attorney chassid ostein and of course all honored guests to this installation and swearing in ceremony I want to thank you for allowing me the honor of participating in this important occasion and I do want to thank all of our leyon County Commissioners for answering that call to serve your fellow citizens so let us begin just for two commissioner Christian caban can you come forward please all right bring with you your Witnesses and family members [Applause] [Music] who's going to do the honor honors yes ma'am all right sir if you'd raise your right hand repeat after me I do solemnly swear or affirm I do solemly swear or affirm that I will support protect and defend that I will support protect and defend the Constitution and government the Constitution and government of the United States and the State of Florida of the United States and the State of Florida that I am duly qualified to hold office that I am duly qualified to hold office under the constitution of the State under the constitution of the state and that I will well and Faithfully perform that I will well and Faithfully perform the duties of the office of county commissioner the duties of the office of county commissioner on which I'm about to enter of which I'm about to enter so help me God so help me God congratulations sir all right can we have District Four commissioner Brian Welch with his Witnesses and family members he all right sir if you would place your left hand on the Bible raise your right hand repeat after me I do solemnly swear or affirm I do solemnly swear or affirm that I will support protect and defend that I will support protect and defend the Constitution and government the Constitution and government of the United States and the State of Florida of the United States and the State of Florida that I am duly qualified to hold office that I am duly qualified to hold office under the constitution of the State under the constitution of the state and I will well and Faithfully perform and I will well and Faithfully perform the duties of the office of county commissioner the duties of the office of county commissioner on which I'm about to enter on which I'm about to enter so help me God so help me God congratulations sir thank you judge thank you before we roll out judge I just want to introduce my famam if you don't mind uh these are my in-laws Bill and Karen Brown down here on the end my aunt Deb right here my oldest Chloe my 18 16-year-old Cameron my mom Julia my son Carter who's just turned 13 and my wife Kim um when we did this four years ago we were wearing masks and and it was a weird experience and and um and this is a much cooler experience I can tell you that so I'm I couldn't do anything without these folks and I just want to recognize them and say how much I appreciate them being here I'm going try not to cry I do this every time Carter Welch got his first suit today he is looking like a million dollars it's like it's bringing me to tears man he he he's like we got to go by that josa bank place and get our outfit so um uh just want to say thank you to you guys I love you all very much and I said this uh after our election um you know it takes a a lot of people to help win an election but uh it takes a uh a small group of really dedicated people to keep you going through the rough days and rough nights so thank you guys so much and hopefully we'll get a chance to say a little bit more but uh I just want to say I love you and thank [Applause] you all right very well last but not least our outgoing chair at large commissioner Carolyn D cumings please bring your family members of commissioner CS come on up please Adam sure if you put your left hand on the Bible and raise your right hand repeat after me I do SW solemnly swear or affirm I do Solly swear all firm that I will support protect and defend that I will support protect and defend the Constitution and government the Constitution and government of the United States and the State of Florida of the United States and the State of Florida that I am duly qualified to hold office that I am duly qualified to hold office under the con constitution of the State under the constitution of the state and that I will well and Faithfully perform and that I will well and Faithfully perform the duties of the office of county commissioner the duties of the office of county commissioner on which I am about to enter of which I am about to enter so help me God so help me God congratulations ma'am thank you de appreciate we got let me get [Applause] oh and judge almond I'd like to introduce my family this is my brother's son from California you doing Joshua Davis and this is my sister's son he lives here uh Jace Lindsay and he's also my godson okay [Applause] thank you very much Madam chair and now it is my de distinct honor to recognize the clerk of the circuit court and com troller uh The Honorable Gwen Knight to uh preside over the reorganization of the board clerk Knight thank you your honor uh good afternoon Commissioners County Administrator L County attorney Ting County staff and our esteemed members of the community again I'm Gwen Knight your clerk of court and count comp troller I have the duty and the honor of conducting the 20242 reorganization of the Leon County Board of County Commissioners I will start the proceedings with the nomination for chair do we have a motion to nominate a chair Nom any other nominations hearing none all in favor say I I all oppose same sign congratulations chairman Welch congatulations congratulations next I will open the nominations for vice chair do we have any motions to nominate a vice chair Madam clerk I nominate uh Christian caban for vice chair do we have a second second are there any other nominations all in favor say I I all oppos same sign congratulations commission gaban Vice CH congratulations I will ask this chairman Welch if you would join me at the podium with any of your Witnesses family or friends to swear you in as chairman of the commission [Music] sister clark um I want to recognize commissioner kaban he did not get an opportunity we're waiting on someone else right quick so if you would like to recognize your family friends he's he's waiting on someone M wal okay um I would I have a few special people I would like to acknowledge that are here um as my guest today um I first have my partner Alex who's sitting over there who is uh holds the house down when uh we work lotss of late hours and lots of Sundays during the campaign season so I appreciate you Alex um I also have my two sisters uh Greta Owens and Lindsay Meredith that are here um my sister traveled from Virginia to be here with two little kids at home and then my other sister traveled from Ocala and um very very thankful to to have them U they were very both very pivotal um in my in my upbringing so I'm thankful to have them um lastly I would be remiss if I did not acknowledge um my predecessors uh the late Jimbo Jackson's family that are that are here today um we have Ally Richards Justin Richards Ashley Rutherford Lucas Beth and I believe the all the kids are here so I really appreciate you all coming today um and support thank you U that's all I have thank you your right hand when I say I state your name and continue to repeat after me I Brian Welch do solemnly swear or affirm do solemnly swear or affirm that I will well and Faithfully execute that I will well and Faithfully execute the duties of the office the duties of the office of chairman of chairman of Leon County of of Leon County Board of County commissioners of the Leon County Board of County Commissioners to the best of my abilities to the best of my abilities so help me God so help me God congratulations [Applause] all right um so let's see I've got the opportunity provide some remarks um Madam chair um okay so I think I've officially taken hold of this thing is that right no just kidding just kidding um I did before I before I said a few words and I and I think something that we're going to find in my tenure as chair is I'm going to try to be brief you guys um I did want to if commissioner caban or madam chair wanted to say anything else in regards to their re-elections um you know and if we're good you let me know want to make sure everybody has opportunity to say what they need to say and I also uh would be remissed if I didn't recognize former School Board member Maggie Lewis Butler who is in the audience thank you I believe one of if not the longest serving is that school board members um well I wanted to say a few things uh just real briefly and uh first I wanted to say thank you all for being here uh your presence is important to all of us um all the elected officials and and family members in the room um this is a an important day for for us as individuals but also for our government and our community and uh and and one of my themes you're going to catch on to here is I really try to embrace the privilege that is our opportunity to serve um you know running campaigns and and running elections we we all owe the community at large you know a huge debt of gratitude for the opportunity to to serve on this Das these are not our seats these seats belong to the residents of Leon County and I sincerely believe that um I think that as a as the chair of the County Commission um I owe that that privilege to you all uh that you have entrusted me with the opportunity to to to handle the the gavel for a year and and that is something that's very important to me and I just want to say thank you to to all of my colleagues on this Das for your support um and G entrusting me with this responsibility uh just like I want to thank the the entire Community for entrusting me with the responsibility of serving uh particularly the residents of District 4 um when I was elected in 2020 I when I gave my comments uh after being sworn in I said the phrase the gravity of the trust of this job was not lost on me and at the time that I said that I I wasn't really aware of exactly what that meant being that I had never done it before and now after having been in this role for four years it really occurs to me what that really means and we are given a great opportunity to serve in this capacity and it is a gift of the community and it is a responsibility that we all bear it is a weight that we carry for really wanting to do a good job in service to our community and so in my incoming remarks I just want to acknowledge that we are really just small pieces of the puzzle here um Leon County government is an an incredible organization that consists of a thousand employees roughly I mean um you know led by an incredible County Administrator an incredible County attorney who advise us up here under the bright lights but uh the folks who are really doing the hard work are not getting all the bright lights and and so for us to be able to sit up here and provide some level of Direction and some level of contribution to the movements of this great organization is really an honor and I I just want us to acknowledge that and just for one second would like to give a round of applause to all of the employees of Leon County government who do the work day in and day out [Applause] I was going to I wanted to say something about each of you just real briefly and what you've meant to me in the time that I've known you some of you for four years and some of you for a couple years commissioner Maddox is is out of the chamber right now um but if he's listening you know I've told him this before he's like uh he's he's younger than I am um even though he acts way older than I am I call him kind of my younger big brother because commissioner Maddox in the four years that I've served with him has been a he's really a DEA operator on this Dias he provides a voice of reason in times when we are discombobulated um he really is a steadying force and here he comes he's been on I mean I think he's going on 14 15 years or something like that uh of service to Leon County so I just wanted to to thank commissioner Maddox for his support throughout the years commissioner O'Keefe I've had the opportunity to serve with you for a couple years there's commissioner Maddox can we give him a round of applause thank you commissioner O'Keefe has been a really welcomed addition to the County Commission you are a very studious a very well- read prepared County Commissioner you have a Heart for Service you want to do what's right for your constituents and I know that you have read everything in the book and are looking at the little things and that means the world to our whole board and so I just wanted to thank you as well commissioner Miner um one of the most compassionate Commissioners that I've had this the the pleasure of serving with really wants to do well really really wants to serve his community to the best of his ability um you are a feeler like I am I think you really sense the the that weight that I was talking about that responsibility that we have and I think you carry that like like I know I do and your contributions to the board are remarkable and and I just want to thank you as [Applause] well commissioner caban I feel like kind of cut from the same cloth when it comes to serving our districts um you know I you feel the same way about Fort Braden and Woodville as I feel about Bradfordville um you have come in and and really been a hard charger you know about business very professional really trying to get the job done eager to serve your constituents again a value that I share um you know you've got uh you know uh a fantastic life you know and and like and yet you come here and then just sort of get into the minutia of of public policy with us because you want to and that's because you want things to run you want the the the to run on time and so I I value your contribution I value your support and your mentorship and uh and I'm just thrilled to serve with you as my vice chair [Applause] thank commissioner Proctor um you know I joke around and say Carter Welch sitting out there is going to be mayor someday the mayor did the mayor bail on us okay well Rees if you're still around Carter Welch he's he's he's a Charming young man and and he's got a bright future future ahead of him but I I'm going to take pride in telling him that I served with Bill Proctor because commissioner Proctor is you know we throw around the word like icon and and Legend uh casually but in his sense you really are the embodiment of that for Leon County um your name will echo through generations as I mean you got to be the longest serving County Commissioner I'm not certain of that but if you're not you're very close um commissioner Proctor uh you are uh you know a immense contributor to everything that we do up here every dialogue every conversation nothing gets past you you're the goalie for the county you are uh you know guarding the gates at all times and I think that's because you feel significant ownership about it because you've been here so long you've been serving this community for so long and and I respect you immensely and I appreciate you immensely it's been awesome to get to sit next to you for a couple of these years um you are a remarkable man I admire you in ways that I cannot describe and I and again I hope someday to tell my grandkids and and remind Carter Welch that I got to serve with the great Bill Proctor so thank you and outgoing Madam chair Caroline Cummings I know I said a little bit of this earlier but you are like our den mother up here you keep us um you you it can be a little jocular I think without you so you are uh you are the embodiment of the grace that we so desperately need sometimes and the calm and the patience when we're like a bunch of kids throwing food at each other you're the one that goes calm down children we're going to get through this um and so tremendously appreciate your support your mentorship having come in with you in 2020 has meant so much to me and I'm just privileged to serve with you with you so thank you [Applause] so Vince long chassis ostein just want to say something real quick about them um Vince has been very instrumental to me uh you know when I came in here four years ago I didn't know any of these folks from Adams houseat um I came in to my first briefing with Vince and Kim Welch was with me and that was only because we just don't come downtown very frequently so we decided we would make a day out of it and have a lunch or something and I think Vince was like why is this guy bringing his wife with him and it was you know nothing other than just that but Vince has been in instrumental in in my ability to achieve success in this role um chassid is constantly measuring me and keeping me on track you know for to to make sure that I don't do anything wrong and and giving me just really incredible advice and so you guys really make the trains run on time around here and none of us would be successful without your uh your commit and your dedication and certainly in in um Vince's case he's also been here a long time I believe your tenure kind of coincides with commissioner Proctor roughly which is really a remarkable Testament to your service to our community um and so I I think it's very important that all of us acknowledge the the role that Vince and chassid play in uh making Leon County a wonderful organization so thank you guys all right uh in closing you know I was trying to think of something that I wanted to uh to emphasize in my year as chairman with the gift that you've given me um and you know I I I said something to this effect in Vince's most recent um uh an uh analysis what do we call it job job evaluation thank you see Madam Madam attorney evaluation um how do we put a value on Vince and Chassis right it's evaluation evaluation is out of the charts um and it was you know we Leon County in my experience and I work in the school district as well you know Leon County does a really good job guys I mean I think that we all acknowledge we do a really good job here of providing services to our community being responsive to Citizens solving problems I mean we're here to solve problems we're here to S sort of sees Sal problems before they get to us and try to solve them um and one of the things that I challenged Vince with in his last evaluation was you know that can breed complacency so I want us to continue to innovate at the county I want us to continue to find ways to improve whether that means in how we provide parks and recreational services or or how we provide Permitting Services to our community I am committed to the idea that we need to grow a private sector in leyon County we need to create jobs and I'm proud to say that in our four years in my four years on this commission you know we with Vince's Big Time help we brought in Amazon with our blueprint um with our targeted economic development program and we we're able to you know really create really a really a big job mover and I think that's had a ripple effect across our economy and I want to see us do more of that I want to see us double down and commit to recruiting companies to this community to provide jobs to grow a private sector so that we can we can create uh a standard of living and a quality of life for our citizens that that moves them you know nothing moves the needle more than economic Prosperity right getting people out of poverty and and providing safe homes for them and safe communities and so I want to see us commit to doing that I also feel like there's an opportunity that we may be missing out on as a board of Leon County Commissioners and that is Building Bridges across the street not necessarily to the city who I think we have a good working relationship with and I look forward to that continuing but to the big building across the street the state capital of the Third largest state in America is right across the street from us and they have a billion doll budget over there and we are the home of the state capital of the third largest state I want to see us build Bridges across the street I want us to go over there and I want us to talk to the governor I want us to talk to the speaker of the house I want us to talk to the Senate President and I want us to say hey the governor lives here 365 days a year right the the legislators and all of the people over there who make very important decisions for our state live here for a vast majority of the year I feel like we have a responsibility to break down ideological barriers and try to get over there so people might call me naive people might call me you know hopeful or Wishful but I'm going to try and get a meeting with the governor I'm going to try and get a meeting with the Senate President I'm going to try and get a meeting with the speaker of the house and I want to sit down with them and say hey man do you do your kids enjoy playing baseball at at Meyers park or Levy park or city facilities do you enjoy you know getting around town in the events that we have we need your help to make Tallahassee the greatest state capital in the country right we are kind of torn between this small town State Capital idea or this are we going to be uh a big city state capital a big state state capital and I don't think we have to choose between those two but we do need to commit ourselves to growing and moving the needle down the road so I feel like those people across the street are a great resource that we need to build more relationships with so I'm going to try and do that I think that's a step in the right direction nothing may come of it I might get the door shut in my face but I'm going to try I'm going to try to reach out and and and impress upon the decision makers across the street what a beautiful place Leon County is and we're proud that they're here we're proud that that legislature is here we're proud that that they create um a a sense of place and an economy in Leon County and an identity that we want to embrace so that's uh that's kind of the gist of my comments you guys uh I appreciate once again the opportunity to to serve with each and every one of you um you are all mentors to me you are all friends to me all colleagues to me I couldn't be here without your support same goes to the folks on my right um and uh I've got oh here's the prepared remarks uh thank you Commissioners for your support and I look forward to working with each one of you over the next year I am confident through the board's vision the leadership of the County Administrator and County attorney and the dedication of our County staff we can continue to effectively address the needs of our community and serve the citizens of our great County thank you once again to everybody who's here we are um going to recognize Dr Ernest frell to conduct our closing prayer uh and benediction so uh Dr frell if you would not mind once again stepping to the podium thank you very much as we stand for the closing okay okay May the grace of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ the love of God sweet communion of his holy spirit may it rest and abide with each of us now henceforth and forever and we all said amen amen God bless you amen Commissioners we will now recess very briefly I would ask you to stay in the chambers cuz Matt needs to get our board photo folks out in the audience we have a nice uh spread out there uh reception in the lobby so please enjoy that we're going to take a photo and then we will be out there we're going to reconvene at 4:30 4:30 that was the county administrator's recommendation so 15 minutes so don't go anywhere commissioner Maddox good job good job thank you so much [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Laughter] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Laughter] [Music] [Laughter] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] I [Music] [Music] [Laughter] [Music] I [Music] [Music] [Laughter] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Laughter] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] was it too was it sorry was that too aggressive of a of a gaveling about right okay uh so we will call this uh meeting of the Leon County Board regular meeting of Leon County Board of County Commissioners to order at close to 4:30 4:35 um okay sorry let me get myself right here oh bless it we already had the reorg okay uh Mr County Administrator take it away thank you Mr chairman I believe we have Awards and presentations uh up first it looks like we've got commissioner Maddox uh recognized ing the 32nd annual Big Ben minority Enterprise development week award recipients commissioner Maddox you recognized to present your Proclamation thank you yes sir thank you Mr chair I have about five proclamations to present Mr chair if you'll be patient with me yes sir go ahead um okay I'll just take it from the top if I can Mr chair um yes sir okay my first Proclamation I proudly get to present Mr chair well no I'm going to say that for last my baby all right um let's see if I could have Miss ah DJ Lea JP please come on Mr chair the proclamation reads where as since 1983 the first week of October has been recognized as the minority Enterprise development week by the president of the United States and observed locally by the Big Ben minority Enterprise development week committee and whereas the Big Ben Med week committee including part uh Partners such as the Tallahassee Leon County Office of economic Vitality Florida State University Office of supply and diversity Leon County Schools Florida Office of supply and diversity Florida A&M University Small Business Development Center and local Chambers of Commerce promotes Business Development and Entrepreneurship in this community and whereas for the first time the very first time in history of the event a youth has been honored as the youth entrepreneur of the year with Miss Lila Wilson owner of DJ Lela Jade receiving this year's recognition and whereas Miss Wilson recognized by Time Magazine and praised by by broadcast broadcast icon Tom jonner has shown a commitment to entrepreneurship since beginning her DJ career at age seven I was still wiping my nose at age seven uh she continues to manage a busy a busy event schedule while pursuing a bachelor's degree in broadcast journalism at Florida State a Florida A&M University I was trying y I was trying ah and she plans to attend law school following her graduation this spring Still Miss Wilson plans to continue to manage her nearly 20e business d J Lea Jade now therefore be it proclaimed that the Leon County Board of County Commissioners do hereby recognize Miss Lila Wilson as the 2024 big band Med week youth entrepreneur of the year and commend her and her achievements and contributions to our community this is signed by the chair as well as the rest of commission tested to by the County Administrator thank you everybody I don't have a speech today commissioner oh commissioner wel yes M um Miss Wilson uh I just want to say that we are immensely proud of you and we we thank God for you and your father Van Wilson uh mother and his mother I was getting ready to say that your mom and your dad have invested a lot in you and it shows we appreciate your parents we appreciate you and we know the best is yet to come so thank you congratulations yes hold on Mr chair that moment when your your best friend gives you your glare to let you know that he was supposed to be up here yeah um so if I can ask Mr is Keith here Keith Bowers okay well Mr Jones if you can come up please Mr Jones is our M mwbe director and also uh his his staff put together the med week uh activities they can come up as well all right our next Proclamation will be honoring MB of the Year minority business uh minority business Enterprise of the year if they can come up please this Miss uh teron and Miss Samir Samir Samir Shay there we go uh the first week of October has been designated as minority entrepreneurial development week by the president of the United States 1983 observed by the Big Ben minority Enterprise week uh committee um whereas an important activity of Med week observation is a selection of the prominent male and female entrepreneurs for recognition as the minority business Enterprise MBE of the year the mwe committee is proud to have Miss tun Tony and Mr I'm sorry Mr Tony and Miss Samira Shay owner of Enterprise Express Printing and copy as this year's MB of the year and whereas the shades bring over 36 years of prestige as small business owners in Tallahassee Community they begin their business journey by providing Sweet Treats to the community via 31 flavors of ice cream at Baskin Robins uh the enjoyment of embracing the community by acquiring Express Printing in 1999 uh Express Printing provides printing binding and mailing services these Services enhance to support local communities in in Leon County and whereas the Shay is attribute attribute have successful business to their to their businesses in professional Acumen uh Mr Shay has extensive experience in business as he has served as president CEO for several entities M has a professional background in the financial industry serving as the financial services officer and a member services representative the combined experience provides a solid foundation for the shades and it is evident in their success over the past 36 years and whereas Mr Shay Rel relishes the opportunity to embrace and serve the community he also serves as a member of the Tallahassee Chamber of Commerce Commerce business Network International and the Tallahassee Club 100 additionally he serves on the executive advisory committee of the med week the minority business experience office and Salvation Army of Tallahasse Mr Shay is also founding member of the Indian Association of Tallahasse it is with true is a true Testament to his dedication and commitment to deliver to deliver exemplary services to the tassi community the shades are quite simply tassi proud now therefore be it proclaimed that Leon County Board of County Commissioners do hereby recognize Tony and Samir Shay as the 2024 minority business Enterprise of the Year signed by the chair as well as rest commission and test to by the County Administrator it's a great honor and privilege to be recognized for this great honor great award for today and staying in 37 years in tallahi that means a lot it's like a home to me I moved from Nairobi Kenya from 1988 and 10 years we had Bas Robins stores multiple stores in town and working seven days employing almost like 40 uh school kids mly and also college kids and then thereafter in 1999 we acquired Express Printing that's also about 25 years old now thank you and we really appreciate this award thank you [Applause] all right next up we have the women business Enterprise of the Year miss Hank here H all right whereas an important activity at of annual Med week observation is a selection of the prominent women entrepreneur of uh for recognition as The Women Business Enterprise of the year the med week committee is proud to have selected Miss Linda hunkier owner and founder of banman landscape LLC as this year's we uh wbe of the year and whereas Miss hunkier originally from Long Island New York she moved to Homestead Florida during her high school years where her father retired and became a Avoca farmer Linda and her husband John moved to Tallahassee in 2006 and whereas Miss hunkier brings over 30 years of experience in various aspects of the Horticulture landscaping and agricultural industry banman Landscaping has built a reputation for professionalism reliability and customer service Bannerman's success is largely due to miss hunkier ability to cultivate a te a talented team of professionals who share her commitment to Quality exceptional service and attention to detail the company has continued to grow and diversify since its Inception in 2007 whereas Miss hunkier enjoys spending her spare time with her husband John and three grand three grown children not grandchildren grown children uh two daughters and a son and recently welcomed her first granddaughter now therefore being proclaimed by the board of County Commissioners we do hear by recognized Miss Linda hunkier owner and founder of Bannerman landscape LLCs 2024 Women Business Enterprise of the Year congratulations thank you very much we're honored to receive this award um I did want to thank the minority office and Daryl Jones and the whole staff has helped us tremendously Through The Years um but um on behalf of myself and the team that really is out there doing the work like to thank you very much now I'd like to recognize the 2024 Reggie L Ro Economic Development champion of the the year Miss Brenda Williams whereas an important activity of the annual Med week observation is the selection of a prominent entrepreneur for economic development advocate for recognition as the Reggie L Ro Economic Development champion of the year the med week committee is proud to have selected Miss Brenda Williams executive director of the Tallahassee Housing Authority as this year's econ iic development champion of the year and whereas Miss Williams earned a ma in sociology social work and a b bs in sociology from Lincoln University Jefferson County uh Jefferson City Missouri upon gradu uh graduating from college she join uh she joined the St Louis Housing Authority as a manager in the in the public housing in Section 8 Department after graduating from college she spent 12 years at the agency and Rose to the position of executive director of a very large public housing authority and whereas M Williams has had outstanding efforts at the St Louis Housing Authority she was recruited to serve as chief of staff at the New Orleans Housing Authority which was plagued with operational mismanagement and was placed in receivership by Hud where she served uh successfully for over 5 years towards the end of her term with New Orleans Housing Authority she was recruited by the by the under Secretary of Hud to improve the operations of the Camden New Jersey Housing Authority which also was trouble was in trouble status with HUD again she oper uh she was successful after 15 years of operation operational experience of directing relatively large housing authorities she began a career as a consultant providing technical assistance to public housing authorities throughout the country and whereas prior to joining Tallahasse Housing Authority Miss Williams was president and president of a consulting firm that provided services including assisting the Board of Commissioners executive personnel and local local government officials and improving the delivery of affordable housing and supportive communities services to the to their constituent population Miss Williams is is dedicated to providing a decent and safe environment for all housing authorities residents she is committed to providing residents with Support Services with that will enable them to become self-sufficient our resident Service uh staff stands ready to help with education job training counseling Etc now therefore be it proclaimed that Leon County Board of County Commissioners do hear by recognize Mr B Brena Williams as the 2024 Reginal LR econ Economic Development champion of the Year congratulations I don't have a speech either but I do want to thank the commission for your support and for this award and on behalf of the team at the Tallahassee Housing Authority we are grateful for your ongoing support as we continue to provide affordable housing within the county of within Leon County thank you [Applause] now proud father moment I get to present the 2024 Big Ben Med week committee youth entrepreneur of the year to miss Nyla Lea Maddox all right whereas for the first time in Med week history a youth has been named two youths have been named youth entrepreneur of the year with a years honores being Miss Nyla Lea Maddox co-owner of Maddox youth dance company and whereas Miss Maddox has demonstrated her dedication to dance as a choreographer and co-owner of madx Youth dance company as well as through her involv met with the golden dolls of James S Rickers High School where she is a graduate graduating senior a National Honor Society member and outside linebacker on the James S Rickers flag football team where he wears number 20 number 20 now as her father did long long long long long long long time U now therefore be it proclaimed by the board of County Commissioners in Leon County that we recognize Miss Nyla Maddox as a 2024 Big Ben Med week committee youth entrepreneur of the year Young County commends her for her achievements and contribution to our community it's assigned by the commission chair as well as rest Commission test to by the County Administrator congratulations woo I would like to say thank you to my parents my grandmother family and friends to these kids here that I not only teach as a dancer but to teach them to be a better person and also to my J major our records raiter March B Angel Gavin Whitmer thank you madam chair I I didn't want to take this opportunity to to recognize uh her mother ematics who had the insight to make her daughter Nyla a co-owner of the studio and celebrating 10 years of the ma youth Dance Company being open that's quite an accomplishment for her to have so congratulations to you as well okay Mr chair will you tell me the order of the proclamations that I have to present sir um it got Capital City Chamber of Commerce next if representative from the Cap City Chamber of Commerce will come up please receive Proclamation we have our president of the chamber Miss Katrina tuckerson with us today and she bought her whole team who she's going to introduce when she speaks um they are celebrating 30 years uh being in the whereas the capital city Chamber of Commerce found in 1994 has been a Cornerstone of Economic Development and Community Support in Leon County for the past 30 years and whereas since this establishment the chamber has been dedicated to fostering a vibrant business environment advocating for local Enterprises promoting Community engagement in maintaining strong relationships with the public and private agencies and whereas the capital city Chamber is the go-to organization for develop for business development and the community outreach partnership and advocacy opportunities in this community we call Leon County the city of uh the capital city Chamber is dedicated to supporting underserved small businesses in the area of Education certification and assessing Contracting Contracting opportunities in capital and whereas we celebrate the achievements of the capital c chamber and recognize the contributions of its members past present and who have worked tirelessly to support our community now therefore we the Leon County Board of County Commissioners do hereby recognize the capital city Chamber of Commerce in Leon County Florida in in honoring of 30 years the 30th anniversary in the unwavering commitment to our community it's assigned by myself as as well as the rest of the commission and attested to by the County Administrator congratulations I I I'm speechless for once um but I want to say thank you to everyone that's in this room um anytime I text or call or reach out to anyone everybody responds um because you know it's not about me it's about doing the community work my team I could not Shine without them standing right here beside me they're ready to go but I said just hold on a minute but and also I wanted to recognize the Godfather of Capitol City Chamber of Commerce Mr Frank Williams that's the opportunity to clap I got that from Daryl um he's actually one of the founders of Capitol City Chamber um but we have have been very um almost the glue for small minority business right along our other two Chambers but um I just want to thank Vince I never said it publicly um when I text and said um hit the initiative for the micro lending program and I and I called him on a Friday at 4:45 and he know I just you know we we ready to go home he answered and I said I got an idea and I got um and because we had been talking about it in other meetings and you responded and I said we're going to do it anyway but I want you to help me and he said no problem Katrina that was his response um and so since then I've been working right along with shington I cannot not mention shington and we just been um joint H hand to hand he ready to let me go but I won't let him but again I appreciate everybody in here and thank you commissioner Maddox for this opportunity and recognition thank you and finally for me Mr chair yes sir I believe you got M Dr yes sir uh if I could have uh commissioner partner come up please and uh Pro Tim darl Jones please along with the bishop please we talked we talked earlier about icons in this community uh is losing one uh in Reverend Dr Julius mallister as he moves on become a bishop here uh for the am church and so I wanted to under him with a proclamation I had to call commissioner Proctor because the first time I went to a service by uh that was held by by Bishop McAllister now Bishop mallister sitting in the pool pit was commissioner Bill Proctor as Reverend and sitting over in the Amen Corner as a as a steward amen as much as he could was darl Jones and so this is a special moment did you hear him say Well I did I did I did I said I did I wonder who is that interrupt in the service that's what I wanted um but I had to have them up here because they are this is a special moment for them all and so the uh Proclamation we reads whereas Bishop Julius Bishop Dr Julius H mallister Jr is the son of retired senior Bishop Julius Harrison McAllister senior and retired uh supervisor of mission Joan Mara mallister Bishop mallister Jr and his father Bishop mallister senior holds a unique distinction of being the only father son in the AM church history to serve concurrently in active Episcopal Ministry since the church is founding in 1816 can we give that a hand that is special and whereas throughout his ministry Bishop McAllister Jr has been a passion advocate for justice equality and compassion providing guidance and support to countless individuals and families in our community and Beyond and whereas as the 35th pastor and Senior minister of the bethl am Church in Tallahassee Florida Bishop mallister represents the fourth generation of ministers in his family answering his call to Ministry in 1992 he served various pastorial roles initially as a youth minister at Oak Grove am Church in Detroit Michigan followed by Pastor past rates at uh pay church am Church uh pay Chapel am Church in Chicago Heights Illinois and greater institution in institutional am Church in Chicago whereas as pastor of Greater institutional am uh Church Bishop mallister dedicated to Community Development led the establish establishment of the come home for Christmas military which provided critical support to to nearly 5,000 homeless adults 2,000 children and raised 700,000 to8 families in need during the Christmas season in Chicago and whereas at church at bethl in Tallahassee Bishop mallister emphas emphasized compassionate Ministry urging his congregation to show the carrying end of ministry as chairman of the bethl Community Development Corporation bethl CDC he develop he directed initiatives that included the construction and Rehabilitation of 85 homes for lowincome families at a a cost of $15 million alongside development of 10 single family rental homes and whereas Bishop mallister has ardently pursued the am Church Church's mission of serving the needy encouraging pishers uh to engage in ministries addressing hunger homelessness literacy substance abuse and more and whereas Bishop Julius Harrison mallister Jr was elected and consecrated as 144th Bishop of the African Methodist Episcopal Church during the 52nd quadral uh session held in Columbus Ohio in August 24 and whereas Bishop McAllister's elevation to the office of Bishop reflects his unwavering commitment to tenants of Faith service and community and is a source of inspiration to people of all walks of life now therefore be it proclaimed by the board of County Commissioners in leam County Florida that we hereby honor and recognize Bishop Julius H mallister Jr for being elected and consecrated as the bishop of the African Methodist Episcopal Church and for his years of dedicated service to spending uh to spreading the message of Hope love and unity here in Leon County this is signed by the chair as well as the rest of commission tested to by the County Administrator Bishop M Let the church say amen amen um members of this community commission uh we have been fortunate to have had uh as it have been shared those words captured but in no way to convey the intense uh giftedness with which uh this leader of the bethl am church has uh served as the senior Minister for the last 16 years since 1985 uh I have served on the bethway me Church ministerial staff and no a thing or two because I've seen a thing or two at bethl am church but I say that with the services of uh Bishop McAllister uh this is not a brag when it's true but in Columbus uh this year the summer he was elected he was elected on the very first ballot yeah of ballottin and um no comparison at all but our beloved leader Bishop AJ richardon tried and had to come back another time another year it's rare to never that anyone goes in on the first ballot but in his first run for Bishop uh our church was so enamored by his service distinguished leadership that they thought it not robbery to receive him and take advantage of him offering his services to the African Methodist Episcopal Church as he heads to um Alabama to serve that jurisdiction we know that he's fully prepared and ready and we wish him God speed uh commissioner Richardson is trying to get in on the county ceremony you you know you can tell I'm City commission but uh as a long serving Trustee of of the church he knows very well uh ministerial efforts and focus and brother Daryl Jones as our uh you we saw the Baptist parlance of head Deacon but our uh our Steward protim uh has been a wonderful undercurrent in Wind Beneath the wings of a great leader uh um Nick was kind enough to let me U share this moment uh Pastor McAllister but I've shared so many moments with you and you've allowed me so much um in serving alongside and to that we give God the glory and thank you very much thank you to County Administrator Vince long to these wonderful County Commissioners who provide strong leadership in the life of um Le County to Nick Maddox thank you for this distinguished honor that you have bestowed upon me on this day to commissioner Bill Proctor to commissioner um Curtis Richardson and to brother Daryl Jones who serves as Mr everything at bethl African Methodist Episcopal Church in a context not too dissimilar from this one on yesterday um when we met with the City commissioners I said even though that this is not an ecclesial institution or a church setting It's mighty sweet to be able to say this is the day that the Lord has made and we shall rejoice and be glad in it I'm grateful for the opportunity to serve one of the greatest churches known to humanity and that's Beth African Methodist Episcopal church right here in our beloved City Tallahassee Florida where we believe is a place where it's easy to find God and hard to forget him and where Eternal things really do happen it was 16 years ago that me and my family we left Chicago Illinois for Tallahassee and it has been a tremendous spiritual journey our lives have been enriched exponentially by all of the wonderful men and women boys and girls that we have met I can tell you that our work at bethl even though I am being honored today but the 1700 members of Beth African Methodist Episcopal Church they too they're being honored as well I thank you for the countless times that you have helped us along the way with our ministry a Ministry that has touched I believe every fabric of this city this County the State of Florida but most importantly the length and bread of our Union I'm grateful again for yet an opportunity to serve in so many capacities not just as the senior pastor of bethamy Church but I was given the opportunity to serve as a commissioner for the Tallahassee Housing Authority Under the tutelage of Miss Brenda Williams I was given the opportunity also to serve as a board member for United Way and also had the opportunity to serve the Boys and Girls Club of America but most importantly my greatest job as a human being is being the husband of Dena young mallister and our three greatest investment being a father in this day and age so I'm grateful and as I close I thank you all for your support but I thank these men and the women who are here with us on today from bethl church and I just want to say this I remember when I first moved here to Tallahassee and I took a cab from the airport to bethl church and there was a young man who was driving the vehicle and I told him that I was the new pastor of bethamy church and he knew that bill Proctor Reverend Proctor was a member of that church as as well and he asked me do you know Reverend Bill Proctor and I said after being the pastor of bethl Church for two and a half weeks who doesn't know Bill Proctor in this city but he went on to say I know without a shadow of a doubt that I probably will never meet Bill Proctor but will you tell him thank you for being a voice for the little man and I said all that to say this even as Commissioners you are voice to the voiceless you are not only a voice to the voiceless but also you are a Trailblazer and not a Pathfinder you're an oak tree and not an acorn may God continue to bless your work as you do God's work in a more excellent way thank you again for this signature honor and as it has already been stated the best is yet to come but if I can rephrase that our best is yet to come in Christ Jesus amen move up all right M chair yes commissioner Maddox um commissioner Proctor is up next commissioner proor you're invited to present your next Proclamation thank you Mr chairman Commissioners ladies and gentlemen I want to ask if Miss lenan Griffin would please U join us here at the de want to ask if uh her pastor Bishop McAllister please come and those persons who are with her from strong and Jones uh muary Services if you all would come staff members family all right staff persons when I was a little boy uh Mr chairman um folk proposed to uh have a fight and declare that they would beat some somebody so bad that would need to call strong and Jones to preserve your bones that's awful and I never did get one of those tight whippings but I heard them Proclaim that that's how bad somebody was going to get whipped Mr Griffin you didn't even know that um strong and Jones had been lifted up in that way so many times as a boy we're um really excited that uh joining us as pastor and members of our church and uh all of the staff persons here this Proclamation reads whereas Lynn and Jones Griffin was born on September 15th 1942 in BBD Georgia to Elbert W Jones and as an as Augustus Stevens Jones and whereas in 1960 she graduated from Allen High School in Asheville North Carolina laying the foundation for a lifelong pursuit of knowledge she furthered her education by earning a Bachelor of Arts degree from then bth cutman College a master of education degree from Florida EDM University and a master of Library science degree from Florida State University and whereas in 1981 she expanded her educational Pursuits by earning a diploma in funeral services from gpam Jones college of mortuary science ensuring that she could serve her community with compassion and professionalism during one of life's most difficult moments and where since that time Lyn Anne Griffin has worked as a licensed funeral director and obalama at strong and Jones Funeral Home her motto is quote let your light so shine that men shall see your good work that glorifies Our Father which is in heaven end quote and whereas Lynn and Griffin is an extraordinary woman who lives a life of purpose and devotion consistently embodying the true Spirit of service not only in the business world but also in the life of her church bethl am Church where she is actively involved as a member of the trustee board ushers Ministry and women's missionary Society she serves as president of the pull pit Aid Ministry and is a church school leader and whereas ly and Griffin has three sons Thomas J Tommy Griffin Jr Albert J Griffin and Alfred s Griffin three grandsons Thomas J Griffin III Tyler J Griffin and Tristan Griffin and one granddaughter Aaliyah a griffin her family is her true joy and whereas lyan Griffin is a member of various professional ass ual and nonprofit organizations it is the scholarship that is offered to a deserving woman seeking a degree in mortuary signs in memory of her mother inz Augusta Stevens Jones a founder of the strong in Jones funeral home that she holds near and dear whereas for 43 years after graduating from uary School Mrs Griffin still lives her dream and Legacy as strong and Jones Funeral Home co-owner strong and Jones Funeral Home remains a place of peace and Solace under the leadership of Mrs Griffin Mr Daryl Lawrence Mr Raymond Patterson to the big men Community wave your hands AR R now therefore be it proclaimed that the Leon County Board of County Commissioners do hereby recognize the contributions to our community and achievements of Miss Lyn and Griffin and commend her leadership which exemplifies the qualities of compassion humility and faithfulness inspiring others to lead with love and to serve selflessly in all areas of life dated this 19th day of November 2024 Miss Griffin is assigned by all members of the board of County Commissioners and attested to by our County Administrator Mr Vince long we um celebrate you and offer to you for your distinguished career and service this Proclamation may God bless you Amen to God be the glory when my staff called me to tell me about this honor I was very surprised I've been had a long ilding lymy ilding God caught me off God but he brought me back to the life and I'm so thankful my pastor was right there with me and I'm thankful to him and I'll always be turned grateful to him and my staff Raymond Patterson has been a wonderful doing a wonderful job am cuz this called him off God CU I got sick on the spirit of M and I thought that I was going to leave this world to my family I'm grateful for you being here I have my youngest son AF and his wife and I'm all and my other sons are not here in tah has at the present time so I'm thankful to the Commissioners for giving me this honor and I always be grateful to you and appreciative to you for this honor and I do thank you I can't stand too long so I'm just going to say thank my neighbor Curtis I'm here my God Son my God children and I didn't realize all of them were coming so they really fooled me and then they bought me in a lemine that really shocked me they called me and Lady Mama cuz all of them call me mama mama don't worry about driving cuz we going to send the limousine for you and we got a special driver for you so thank you all for honoring me and thank you all for having me here and thank my guest for being with and Mr Pro now Mr don't know I'm about the only one in here call him what his mama call him Junior you didn't know they call him Junior they don't call him see I see you don't say it you don't say a whole lot Junior and I guess I'm the only one in here that calls him by that name right y'all tighten up in the picture all right one more later right there amen thank you so much thank you thank you great job great job all right at this time we'd like to recognize um Mr Tom Napier to give us a presentation regarding uh Leon County's continued support of Honor Flight Tom are you here yes sir yes sir all right there you are always great to see you Tom I appreciate everything you do for Honor Flight man thank you Mr chairman congratulations on chairmanship thank you sir Le on County Commissioners we like to bring a little history for I want to thank uh lot of it you look good or gray hair is like my hair that's a lot better than mine but anyway we go back 10 years we gone on a complete our 10th year on Honor Flight this past trip if you remember back in 2010 your County Commissioners came before us and told us we needed start Honor Flight Tallahasse 2010 and we cannot thank you enough because what we've done these past these years and all the past trip 10 trips we just completed we've carried over 756 veterans of World War II Korean and Vietnam veterans of which we've had to over 14 different parts of Guardians of that many Guardians and we've had that many people and we had a trip and every trip that comes back it goes well and it goes some of you County Commission have been on it chairman well you've been on it I don't know how many times Rick Miner thank you so much for going with us and we urge you all County commiss to get off and get up at 5:00 and have breakfast with us and get on the airplane we go off and leave for a one day trip on a flight Tallahassee is ongoing we're not going to stop they keep on going and Matt Kemp is our chairman he asked me make this presentation and I I want to thank the county commissioner back in 2010 when you first started to give us the opportunity to formulate and do honor flight talahasse and I present this onor flight to do the County Commission 2024 chairman well could you come and get the yes sir why is coming down thank you chairman uh Rick Miner for making appointment for me thank you Tom appreciate you this is pretty oh get a picture awesome thank you so much Tom uh just want to reiterate how much um we support Honor Flight and appreciate everything that you guys do uh I know commissioner Miner's probably got more trips than I've got I've done it a couple times certainly intend to do it this year uh and every year that I can and uh I know that our County Commission will continue to support you guys thank you so much thank you sir good for you oh thank you thank you Mr chairman yes sir thank you very much Tom I just want to thank you for for being here and presenting that and and thank you very much for everything you do for Honor Flight um I think I've been on Honor Flight three times it's it's a tremendous experience for folks out there that would like to volunteer and serve as a guardian uh or or if you're a veteran that would like to go to to Washington DC for a day and and see The Monuments I I can't I can't uh uh highlight it enough there was one um um I was a guardian for one veteran from Korea and on the flight over to DC he talked about how he finished his tour Duty flew back home into the United States and there was no one there to greet him at the airport and you could tell that for 50 years this has been kind of eating at him and one of the greatest memories I've have of of Honor Flight is he didn't know that on the way back home to Tallahassee from that day in DC he was going to get the homecoming that he deserved it was 50 years late but uh we did it justice and to to to stand behind him as he's walking through the prominade and seeing what seemed like everyone in Tallahassee welcoming back our our our folks that had served uh back home into the airport is something I'll never forget so that's the type of thing you see at Honor Flight that's the kind of thing Honor Flight does and I want to thank you for and and and the whole team but Honor Flight for everything that you all do thank you Tom appreciate it all right thank you again Tom uh now uh Mr County Administrator we have any citizens to be heard on consent and non-agenda items we do um Mr chairman we have several speakers to be heard at this portion of the agenda first Speaker Renee Perez to be followed by Kathy Davis Renee Perez is that we pronounced that right uh Rena Rena Rena like Renegade Rena okay Rena Perez uh please state your name and address for the record you have two minutes my name is Rena Perez I live at 11700 Evergreen Hills Court um I'm here uh this afternoon uh on behalf of myself and my neighbors with regards to a variance request that Leon County uh sent uh to use Selena Road for heavy machinery uh specifically I'm here because they plan to build a sand mine in the property it's just 20 ft away from my house and and thank you uh the project brings uh significant concerns about the health safety and Welfare of our community uh our road was never intended for the support for the heavy trucks and Equipment we've already faced localized flooding in the end of the road where the dirt road meets um The increased traffic would just uh cause that to be worsened um our children use this road every day uh the school buses don't drive into the road so they have to walk up to Woodville Highway in order to get to the school buses and uh along with several family members and neighbors that use that road fairly often to bike ride and get that their exercise there um all of that just poses a serious risk to our our kids and neighbors uh the issues as well along with the sand mine would introduce dust and pollution to our neighborhood um there'd be a significant decline in our uh the valley of our homes and for most for many of us um that's our largest uh investment is our homes um you know a drop in our value could go beyond what our loan would be and we're just I'm just urging that we try to find a better location for this sand mine um I've gone around the neighborhood and gotten about 45 signatures um just about every home I knocked on says this would be terrible for them nobody wants this in the neighborhood so um God willing we can find a different location uh for this sand mine uh project and I'm just hoping that you guys could just help us find a better solution for this that's it thank you Mr Perez uh next speaker Mr administrator Kathy Davis to be followed by Reverend Sylvia Jones yes so I am right next door to U Rena and uh so we live really close to the area that they're looking at mine's just kind of like some bullet points and the bullet points are uh first the TRU trucks an average weight of the dump trucks is 50 to 80,000 lb full 20 to 35,000,000 lb empty dump trucks will run all day night long which will create a loud amount of noise dump trucks Can Begin work as early as 4:00 a.m. in the morning our neighborhoods around the Selena Road have children from young babies to older children also play on the roads in front of their homes Selena from my understanding is in County Road and has not been maintained by the Leon County properly already so it is not prepared for this kind of weight the weight of the trucks will continue to add a further damage to the road and I'm also fearful that leyon County would want to make an additional access point down the Evergreen Hills Court to the sand mine again we have families with children and and pets that enjoy spending quiet time in their homes and yards the location of the sand mine variant is located by the power lines which are located on the backside of our homes this is all private property is owned by the people on Evergreen Hills Court when we purchased our property we were told that only the city of Tallahasse electric would be the uh be allowed to access this area some people have their property fenced in this area as well so in order for city of Tallahassee to come through they have one lock and then one key both the owner owns it and then of course city of Tallahassee has it um on notifications to the residents the letters were received on a Thursday and only gave people that did receive the letter till the following Thursday to contact a county staff member that means that the people did not receive the letter um only had five working days to contact someone because weekends don't usually count the meeting was set on Thursday at 1 p.m. so the few people that did receive the letter didn't have enough time to take off work in order to attend the meeting some of the following information on the letter was incorrect example on the front page the email for Anna Richmond project was Richmond a at Le n County Florida government.gov so if you emailed her she wouldn't have received it and on the back page where it says for more information about how to participate in this meeting the website shows us www. Leon permit.org if you go there that is actually a website out of Hong Kong sorry and so U again in Failure to be able to contact properly at that time so thank you m Jones Davis Davis yes oh never mind sorry it's okay thank you next I think mrri administrator is Miss Jones Mr before I begin I would like to uh on behalf of the Capital Area Justice Ministry would like to congratulate all of you who have been sworn in and the new leadership and the new commissioners and we look forward to working with you this year my name is Reverend Sylvia Jones retired pastor of the am church I'm a member of Mount Zine church I serve as co-chair of the Capal area Justice Ministries affordable housing committee I reside at 4250 Woodbridge Road Tallahassee Florida today I was asked to relay a message to you from one of my fellow Mount Z members miss Shay Smith who is a teacher at Pin View Elementary School in Tallahassee uh Shay is also a Glenn Howard distinguished educator recipient when she was at connley elementary school she says good afternoon I want to talk to you from a teacher's viewpoint on behalf of students that are in transition homeless or otherwise in an unstable home environment these children are not able to get the best education possible because of the lack of attendance and consistent instruction through no fault of their own they lack uh a fixed regular and adequate nighttime residence including those who are sharing housing uh uh couch surfing so forth due to loss of housing economic hardships those who live in motels hotels cars Parks due to a lack of alternative accommodations at the beginning of the year or whenever we receive students teachers began building rapport with them that can take weeks to accomplish we began learning about their stresses and weaknesses doing interventions meeting with parents and other stakeholders to figure out what's the best way to educate the child when there are gaps in their education the children in these unstable environments are not able to receive the amount of Education that they need because of their treny it takes at least 6 weeks of data collection and interventions by the teacher to get them on the list to be staffed if there are needs beyond the teachers control regarding their educational gaps students that attend multiple schools throughout the year have to restart this process every time they go to a different school this does not not give them an adequate amount of time in any circumstance to gather enough information the students have to relearn procedures and routines in each class that they attend the parents have to get to know the school environment the teachers and staff which takes time when students are transitional consistency matters and they don't get the consistent care love and attention that they need it's unfair to them because it's not their fault it's just our situation a situation that can be fixed if we can reexamine our priorities and have a policy that put in place to help these children it will be phenomenal life Cher for them and their families the existence of stable home environments will be a factor in their ability to become functioning citizens of our community the struggle is real I implore you to think about your decisions and how it affects the the many of our children who we will one day be our taxpayers thank you thank you m Jones Latricia scriven to be followed by Robert Gibbs greetings my name is Latricia scriven I'm the senior pastor at St Paul's United Methodist Church also the co-pastor the co-president of Capitol area Justice Ministry and I reside at 2162 Golden Eagle Drive West in Tallahasse more than 1,000 children in our schools are homeless and they attend every school in every Commission Miss District we are here today because we believe that this is unacceptable at your May 2023 homelessness Workshop shington Lamy reported that homelessness is principally caused by the lack of affordable rental housing as we have reported many times over over 16,000 families in our County who earn extremely low are very low incomes or severely housing cost burdened they're spending more than half of their income in rent and utilities and their children are most at risk of being homeless you took a step to address this in May by directing the Housing Finance Authority to quote promote the development of affordable rental housing units for individuals or families exiting homelessness we know however that the principal impediment to providing more affordable rental housing is the insufficient income that is produced when mixed income projects include large numbers of units for families with extremely low and very low incomes developers are unable to cover their Debt Service and project operations and maintenance costs Kim sought unsuccessfully to convince the city commission to allocate 5 million a year for a financial incentive program that would gener generate about 120 new units a year for families with these incomes mayor daily urged us instead to pursue funding through blueprint 2020 and as you will also recall that effort also failed because of the lack of support from the majority of City commissioners but y'all stepped up five of you voted in favor of kum's proposal to pre to create a blueprint infrastructure project for an affordable rental housing land purchase and leaseback program that is modeled after the very successful program in penell County we are here today to urge you to step up again and to take the initiative to finance such a program with County funds and now my colleague will explain more fully exact what we're asking why it matters and why we need you to step up amen thank you m grien Robert Gibbs to be followed by the final speaker Jimmy dicki good afternoon my name is Robert Gibbs I'm a retired United Methodist Minister and member now at Trinity United Methodist Church in Tallahassee and I serve on the affordable housing strategic team here with Kum uh I reside at 6V 40. call Court in tallah every affordable housing developer and expert with whom we have consulted agrees that the solution to this issue is money as Mr long recently acknowledged to us when we met with him this problem requires a dedicated source of funding to finance a long-term initiative the Lake Bradford apartment uh project is is revealing the developer has assembled an array of financing including bonds to be issued through the HFA that you approved in October of 2023 a million dollar of City arpa funds and a state department incentive loan they would set aside in this project 25% of units for families with extremely low incomes more than 10 to 14 uh more than the 10 to 14 that are typical of these projects the developer can afford to do so only because delasse Housing Authority will be sub subsidizing the rents paid using Section 8 project vouchers projects like this cannot be sustained under current local policies and programs and all arpa funding must be spent by the end of this year the Housing Authority has a limited supply of housing vouchers we are here today to ask that you establish an affordable rental housing land acquisition and leaseback program based modeled after panel's counties and that you fund it by reallocating 20% % of the County's annual blueprint tax surcharge funds doing so would yield about 1.3 million in 2026 enough to produce about 33 new rental units for families earning extremely low and very low incomes this would double the annual production of needed affordable rental units that has occurred since 2020 therefore we come before you today and ask that you vote to direct staff to prepare an agenda item in collaboration with Capital Area Justice Ministry with a proposal and implementation plan for amending the 5-year Capital Improvement budget to set aside 20% of the County's annual blueprint surcharge revenues beginning in 2026 for the duration of blueprint 2020 to fund an affordable rental housing land acquisition and Lease Bank program modeled on the penny for penel land assembly fund we hope you will step up to initiate the process for providing a dedicated source of funding for addressing this critical problem in our community thank you very much thank you Mr [Music] Gibbs final speaker on this item Jimmy dicki good afternoon I I am Jimmy Dicky pastor of Greater town of Chapel in Quincy I serve on the executive committee of the Capital Area Justice Ministry I reside at 1929 marel and drive here in Tallahassee now is the time to act current federal federal state and local programs and policies are clear clearly inadequate and we cannot count on someone else to care about our communities there are affordable rental housing crisis the people facing the challenges of spending more than half their income for rent and utilities while earning incomes on the order of $43,000 to less than $33,000 for a four are not shiftless folks who are not endeavoring to find work they are essential workers in our economy many of them many of whom are working two and three jobs to try to make ends meet undoubtedly some of them are working for Leon County government they are not nameless statistics they are members of our congregation members of our family friends people with whom we work the city commission has essentially ad advocated its responsibilities for the welfare of the thousands of citizens within City Limits who are severely rental housing cost burdened many of you on the other hand demonstrated that you recognize that this is a problem that demands our attention when you supported the proposed new blueprint infrastructure project but now we are asking you to make a commitment to uh doing some to doing something that will require considerably more efforts we recognize that uh figuring out how to accommodate relocating 20% of the County's annual blueprint funds is going to require reviewing the scheduling of Road restructuring and intersection Improvement projects and may uh require finding other funds to uh supplement gas tax revenue this is a heavier lift than any than approving the use of blueprint infrastructure funds but we are not going to just make any progress on the uh immense problems until somebody is willing to make the heavy lift we are asking you today to by voting to direct staff to develop an agenda item that will bring back a plan and a proposal for how to make this happen do unto others as you would have them to do unto you then let us imagine walking a mile in their footsteps thank you so much thank you Miss dicki um as a reminder you guys the board doesn't engage on um citizens to be heard in conversation so um obviously we'll consider whatever comes before us thank you uh Mr administrator uh we're going to move on to consent but there's been one item pulled by commissioner Proctor so I'd like to entertain a motion for um consent 1 through 14 minus 12 uh move by commissioner madx seconded by Vice chair caban all those in favor sign by say I I I all right all opposed and it passes so we are on item 12 Mr County Administrator appr by commissioner mat uh proor thank you Mr chairman Commissioners item number 12 is a department of Florida of Transportation off system Bridge Project agreement for the replacement of the Spring Hill Road Bridge over mson slooh uh again uh this item was pulled by commissioner Proctor we're happy to answer any questions you may have commissioner Proctor you recognized thank you Commissioners um certainly we've been through uh this territory before uh I wanted this item pull uh to vote against it um certainly as a placeholder of Consciousness that I fail to understand how uh a bridge spance of about 50 ft uh is being replaced uh with a which which is now a a two-lane bridge is being replaced with a four-lane bridge with each of the lanes 11 uh foot wide uh an 11t wide uh roadway is the size of those streets uh in in the neighborhood of uh Myers Park um that's a wide Street and I am unable to reconcile uh and have never seen anything drawn uh but I can remember to see the safety point of Spring Hill Road being two lane you get to the bridge and it's four lane with 11t wide Lanes uh that right there is uh about 44 ft in width 44 Ft worth of road that goes for 50 ft and it goes back to two lanes uh that seems to be a hazard uh something bad not not not going to go right and I believe that um while this road staff tells us in these notes it does not come under the general opes of the State of Florida um I still don't understand why it's being called a Gateway but it's not scheduled for four lanes how can the bridge VI a four-lane bridge and there is nothing uh drafted modeled to reflect a uh future four-lane Road something um this makes no sense they're asking the county for just under $300,000 um to match uh we did a great job in commissioner command's District I think we replace the bridge in one day uh something like that the same day it went out uh there's no indication of how quickly uh this spance of uh roadway will be replaced and um there's just no data but we're paying in contributing to the negligence of the Florida Department of Transportation and I refuse to uh contribute to their their elected uh Behavior Uh in the southide this road is a uh uh I think the east side of it is Proctor's District uh the west side is a caban district and uh we deserve way better than a four-lane bridge um for 50 ft uh in the midst of a two-lane road so commissioner I just wanted to vote against this as a matter of conscience thank you thank you commissioner Proctor um would anybody like to make a motion second this for staff recommendation commissioner Maddox okay second second second commissioner o'keef all right uh any further discussion all those in favor signify by saying signify by by saying I I I all those opposed I okay uh 64 and commissioner Proctor against uh that gets us on to General business Commissioners we have a 6:00 public hearing scheduled which is in 11 minutes do you think we can you want to take a shot through 1819 Mr County Administrator thank you Mr chairman and yes we keep uh this General business agenda pretty light acknowledging uh the reorg ceremonies and the first two actually are ratifications of previous Workshops the first item 18 is the ratification of your actions taken at the purchasing Workshop we're recommending uh option one and we have no speakers on this item Mr chair move staff recommendation second all right we have a motion in a second uh commissioner madx makes the motion commissioner Miner at the second uh is there any discussion seeing none all those in favor signify by saying I I I I I as well all those against show it passes unanimously uh item 19 Mr Mr County Administrator thank you Mr chairman uh again this item is ratification of the board's actions taken at your October 22nd workshop on the 20125 state and federal legislative priorities we're recommending options one and two and we have no speakers on this item Mr chair move items one and two but I do want to make a comment after the second okay we have a motion from commissioner second from commissioner minor chair um I did want to make put in a public record and let let Administration know that uh as we go down this road to RFP and I do understand that the CH there has been a change made to the uh mwbe portion is based off of our policy from the 10,000 to 11% which I believe is roughly about 4,400 or so uh which I'm okay with because that's our policy but as we move down this road what I would ask is that uh whatever firm uh we do come out of this thing with work very closely with our firm that we have uh in place right now to make sure there's a coordination there uh else is going to turn into something I don't think we wanted to so um let's just kind of emphasize how important it is for uh the firms that we have working on behalf over over at the capital where it be on Appropriations or legislative priorities work together to to get the job done secondly I recognize too that that our federal contract may be coming up and as I understand that the the folks we worked at work with in the past may may uh no longer uh be with the firm that we've used for our federal contract I want to let the commission know that I'm looking um if we're also looking to to put out our state contract and spring I'm looking to put out federal given the fact that folks that I've known here and commissioner proct has known here since since we've been on the commission uh will no longer be the folks that we work with for our federal lobbying efforts and so I'm open to that discussion when that time comes but just for this for the for the uh purposes of what we're voting on today want to make sure there's a cohesiveness between uh the Appropriations uh lobbying group that that we have as well as our main lobbying group um which is uh Mr Shark's group as well thank you Mr chair all right uh any other discussion commissioner Miner thank you Mr chair I I was going to basically say the same thing that commissioner Maddox just said I think it's going to be very important that uh whatever this leads to if we if we do hire another firm that they're not two separate silos they've got to work together in coordination with each other which is essentially what commissioner madx said thank you very much thank you commissioner Miner commissioner Proctor Mr chairman um I U Echo sentiments Express uh however on the project the fair grounds beautification and Improvement which we're at the project phase of construction it's $13 million Mr chairman I heard you very very plaintively today and uh and I concur uh with the emphasis that you made in your uh comments that as the capital of the nation's thirdd largest state there's got to be something greater more uh for us to add velocity to uh our community uh as being the primary AR uh urban center in North Florida uh station between Jacksonville and Pensacola we is it and after 200 years uh Mr Sherman I I support your thought your vision and we need a convention center and I think that with the fair ground beautification I wouldn't want for us to commit so quickly this money without opening a conversation wider to incorporate your vision and just possibly uh to view this 13 million as seedling money seed money and then I concur with you uh that across the street is $117 billion of which we ought to tiptoe creep walk uh moonwalk whatever we got to do to go over there and uh get to it and uh B up on some so I would like to say to the commission that while this project is posted um we really need to and hear what chairman Welch just said and possibly that it becomes uh the new Big it that incorporates uh and makes our a Convention Center would bring heads to beds on a consistent basis uh heads to beds here miss Carri post our exec director of TTC uh is keenly aware and I want to share with the commission that uh her staff is looking at uh and doing some perspectives with respect to a convention center and what it could mean its impacts for our community so I'm just a little hesitant that we just wrap our arms and and um just sing Kumbaya over 13 million let's hold up let's hit the breaks on that project and figure out um y'all saw they packed up yesterday and they packed up up um um today the little Fairground y'all saw a little Fairground um you can't just do that 10 days and hold 147 Acres hostage in the center of the state capital uh five or six red lights down the street from the state capital um is just inadequate and it is just not enough people um to justify holding that kind of land out and then um I think that is very important as we talk about shifting uh Federal lobbyist and I concur his time um we need lobbyists who are perhaps connected can demonstrate connectedness with a new Administration consistent with um uh Reverend dicki um I'm I'm I'm very impressed and uh Reverend Jones uh your ask for us to take uh 20% of a surplus of blueprint money the county share to go to toward uh a lease buy back of land for homeless I agree I agree that when we have a surplus on that Penny and what they're asking is that we would dedicate um 20% 1/5 of um whatever amount so if it's a dollar uh how much that is dollar2 C right okay got to ask the cter up here so 20 cent off every additional dollar will be dedicated and then to show you how it all patterns and fits together our new lobbyist our new lobbi Mr long you know well know has got to be someone who can approach the department of interior because the new land we have an Administration that firmly and totally agrees with disposing of federal land and that's demonstrated in the previous stance of an incoming Administration and because we have Administration that firmly believes in disposing of federal land we got some and I believe that we ought to be aggressive and a part of the mission of our next federal team is to secure dirt that uh has no connection to the Civil War uh there's no same basis to reserve the federal land uh there's not going to be no Military Base No Air Force Base nothing like that it's just there there and it will be there for the next 3,000 years because the object at rest uh will remain at rest unless acted upon by some outside and intervening Force we ought to be the interveners and I'm asking Commissioners that you remember the way we tie the ask of uh Faith Community is to incorporate and have the vision that that federal land should be a part of what we're trying to do to make affordable housing a affordable thank you very much commissioner thank you commissioner Proctor um we got a couple minutes to take a vote on this and get to our public hearing so is there any other discussion okay hearing none we have a motion on the floor by commissioner Maddox for staff recommendation options one and two the second was commissioner Miner uh all those in favor signify by saying I I all those opposed and I'm sorry yeah and I was going to be I as well so uh you have some more comments on it yes uh Mr chair I I think we can get through got two minutes I make a motion 20 and 21 uh I'm I'm willing to entertain motions for 20 and 21 we have one person on 21 I think that needs to be reappointed right yes so if if you guys are okay with that let's do it call I'll make a motion for staff recommendation on item 20 and to reappoint Michelle person on item number 21 okay we have a motion and a second on items 20 and 21 un Readiness um Madam County attorney I'm I'm um these are separate issues I'd like to see them as single uh voted matters okay we can revisit it commissioner Proctor after the public hearing if that's okay with you so okay motion is resed we have passed item 19 uh unanimously and um thank you for your debate commissioner proor we'll come back to you on those issues after just separate them sing um station okay all those in favor of Staff recommendation on option 20 on on item 20 signify by saying I motion was Commission madx second was commissioner O'Keefe all those in favor of Staff recommendation option 21 motion was made by commissioner madx second was commissioner Cummings uh all those in favor say I I I all opposed okay P both pass unanimously 20 and 21 and at 6:00 we're time for our public hearing let a rock and roll thank you Commissioners thank you Mr chairman item number 22 is your first and only scheduled public hearing consider abandoning a portion of Singleton Drive RightWay this item uh requests the board to conduct this public hearing to formally abandon the portion of Singleton Drive a platted unapproved RightWay located within a residential subdivision as requested by the adjacent property owner to incorporate a portion of the RightWay into their property Commissioners we are recommending option one there are no speakers on this item happy to answer any questions you might have uh any motions move option one okay we've got a motion for option one seconded by commissioner all those in favor signify by saying I I I all those opposed showing none passes unanimously we are on item 23 thank you Mr chairman item number 23 is the first and only public hearing to consider an ordinance to amend chapter 6 of the Leon County code of laws related to hearing procedure and administrative fines and leans and chapter 14 of Leon County code of law laws related to appeals uh again this item requests that you conduct the first and only public hearing uh and we recommending option one and we have no speakers on this item all right do we have any uh commissioner Proctor would you like to make a motion on the item uh no not yet I wanted to comment sir you you have the floor commissioner thank you Commissioners I'm um um apologize that I my notes uh I I um don't have before me have another unmarked book the um concerns that I have yeah uh with fines and lens uh first of all I believe that um um I don't like um J section J on page 3 of six uh that whole new paragraph um I'm I'm I'm I'm dealing with the uh ordinance now J on page three of six and at the bottom there the findes established by the order imposing fin shall constitute a lean against the property and upon any other real a personal property owned by The Violator I think that goes too far uh I think the property that is in question I think that the lean should go there it should stay there and not um uh magnify out to other what what are we trying to do as a county um other than to bring compliance but this for me goes too far it's too wide it crosses the line and I'm I'm I'm I'm pondering who's great thinking uh is this new paragraph then at the bottom there um the o d under section 6-3 4 I don't know why we are eliminating uh what to me is a a notice and it may be relocated someplace else and it seems that the appeals process uh has been um compromise against the violators the language of Staff keeps saying this is goody goody goody goody but the reading here uh does not in my opinion uh I don't see how it complies and then with the um the nuisance abatement uh and the code enforcement board um combining both these entities make them judge and jury and due process is a problem when they are both the judge and they are also the jury I have other concerns but I wanted to ask staff um uh more specifically uh as to what policy are we upholding that we want to take more from people and place a lean against their property and not stop there but why would this County Commission be well advised to also subject people's other personal of the real property uh to be included under a lean can someone from staff advise this commission commission proor I believe the County Attorney uh has answers for you please you recognize thank you Mr chair uh so under our current ordinance that's permissible that is consistent with state law and what is permissible under state law uh so even if the board doesn't adopt this new ordinance that will still happen under our existing ordinance the only thing this change in ordinance does is really fundamentally three things one it provides for additional due process an additional hearing uh at the code enforcement board level if requested before leans begin to be imposed on property so it actually increases the due process and opportunity for a potential violator to be heard and to argue that they are not that they are in compliance and that they should that that a fine should not be imposed and ultimately potentially a lean be filed against the property uh in terms of the nuisance abatement board the only change to that provision of the code is to allow twice as much time for someone to appeal a decision of the nuisance de batement board that's the only thing this ordinance does how is the notice to appeal and the burden placed on the Violator to make uh the steps of appeal are they notified are they told what steps cuz I imagine some of these people are not loyal they are told they are told and they given Specific Instructions correct on what to do yes um the fact that the state has a law um to draw blood and to seek people's um everything that they have with aine there's no reason that and we're not compelled as a commission to do the same I believe that the spirit of uh code enforcement is to bring compliance and for Community violators to merely be brought back up I believe that when you dump uh too much threat and you uh apply or lean more broadly to everything that people have I believe it frustrates them uh it places a psychological and emotional burden that's not required and in terms of when you've fallen and you don't believe you can get up because the magnitude of these legalities appli to all of your possessions uh sometimes is very weighty and people don't have the psychological emotional strength Commissioners I like to see us eliminate uh the addition of all personal property and all real property because of one real estate piece of property that City may have they shouldn't have to be subject and lose and then when that lean applies it strangulates them they cannot uh refinance uh they cannot get enough mortgage anything like that until those leans are taken care of we're going too far and I know the State of Florida don't give a damn about poor folk in what happens in many ways in many cases but we're not the State of Florida we're the county of on and we do and I think that we should stop that period mark uh right there against property and delete and upon any other real personal property so I make that motion um um this motion to adopt this with the modification of uh our not adding and upon any other real or personal property that we not be that Draconian in our Outreach over uh cutting the grass um thank you Comm Comm Proctor commissioner Miner are you in the queue I'm still learning this whole system over here so I'm going to just clear that out of there um okay so commissioner o'keef wait wait wait a motion oh I'm sorry uh I'm sorry I made a motion to adopt this with the deletion of lanss expanding beyond the subject property is there a second to commissioner Proctor's second seconded by commissioner O'Keefe for discussion go ahead thank you madam chair thank you commissioner Proctor for catching this don't let it be said that I'm the only one who does home work thank you um and uh so I uh for periods of my life my family's home would have been one that would if if our neighbors called code enforcement that would have been put through this because what was going on there so a lot of times when you're talking about a personal home nobody gets code enforcement issues because they just don't want to deal with it and they hate their neighbors for the most part they're in the middle of some kind of Crisis so I want to always stand by giving them as much opportunity to good faith correct it and so so um if this truly does add a new ability to put a lean against other real property or personal property that is why I would do this um and that's my understanding but I want to confirm that's the case that this isn't just a rephrasing and we've always been able to attach a lean to other real and personal property and say you know personally my limit would be different if it's I I would go to all real estate if you got multiple real estate it's fine but when you're going to other property bank accounts that's not the case so um I second is for discussion and I just want to find out is this a new end of sentence or is this always been what we do Madam County attorney thank you Mr chair this is what we've always done okay okay so we have a motion on the floor by commissioner Proctor seconded by commissioner O'Keefe okay uh yeah go ahead commissioner Maddox this is a public hearing correct Madam attorney yes ma that's correct if we decide to change language in the public hearing does it have to come back for another public hearing not if the board doesn't want it to that's what the public hearings for almost commissioner pner public hearings in my opinion are the opportunity for us to put out policies that we are going to to make uh volti and purposes law and give the public the opportunity to come and speak their mind on it um I I'm not I'm not sure I'm I'm I'm comfortable approving this today without another public hearing so what I would ask commissioner proor is is that we ask staff to bring back that you would that you would modify your motion to ask staff to bring back the language that you're asking for and for us to have have a a another public hearing at another date is this is this time sensitive mam attorney we like the portion of the proposed ordinance that provides additional due process MH I mean that's to us fundamentally legally our biggest concern uh to the extent we delay it and hold another public hearing we wouldn't be necessarily doing that under a new ordinance but it's at the discretion of the board the the the portion that commissioner is modifying does not affect that du Pro the additional does it he's a he's he's talking about another whole another piece correct that's correct right so um commissioner PR if if given what the attorney has said what I would ask is that you modify the motion for for this to come back with the language that you have asked for at the next public hearing if not I'll approve it tonight I just believe it's it's our duty as Commissioners this being public hearing that we would have that we give the general public an opportunity to come and speak on the changes that we've made in the moment so so um I withdraw the motion and adopt the one fashion uh by commissioner Maddox as a motion okay so commissioner Maddox um Madam County attorney are you okay with what he stated in terms of we want to see this come back for another public hearing but with the language that commissioner Proctor has asked to be added or deleted or whatever exactly considered that's fine it's the discretion of the board do you want to continue this to a date and time certain uh commissioner p in short motion I would ask that you continue this continue this to our next board meeting um with the language that you've asked uh for us to consider including the changes that the County attorneys made offic has made for more due process if you would accept an amendment sir commissioner Proctor sure absolutely sounds like we're going in the right direction anything that would um not uh for this County to make more honorous upon citizens for anything from the grass is Too Tall uh there's a car around the back of the yard or whatever code enforcement includes uh that the penalty I mean there's an eighth amendment issue here cruel and unusual punishment wherein the fine uh or the punishment should not exceed the level of offense that's been committed so in my guesstimation to be able to see and place lean on all of a person's properties personal or real estate um is a cruel uh Outreach and uh I think the punishment uh more than uh it gets the attention but what we have to think about as public policy makers is the psychological Crush that a full-blown lean of the county of Leon places upon average joblo citizen um it's very intim intimidating and I think that it it goes too far just my feelings of people in district one I can't speak for your districts and how people feel about but in my district this would be very um painful for people thank you commissioner Proctor commissioner Maddox we've got a motion is there a second second no I asked commissioner proor to amend this motion okay commissioner Proctor it's your motion I accept it okay the second is commissioner O'Keefe on commissioner Proctor's amended motion uh any further discussion just for clarification ma'am Mr chair is to to uh bring it back for another public the next meeting I believe was the direction okay but not to take away any of those protections or procedural protection included in there right uh commissioner Cummings I'm being told and and Commissioners uh by the County Attorney we're not going to have time because we have a our next meeting is December 10th so can we say January that's fine okay commissioner Proctor is okay with that so we've got a motion to uh to table this uh to come back uh at our January meeting to consider the language that commissioner Proctor has suggested any further discussion commissioner O'Keefe uh thank you uh thank you Mr chair since the next public hearing again commissioner madx is right is not meant necessarily to make changes but to let the public hear I would like to ask if the County Administrator the County Attorney would like to explain to us what they think the importance of that section is that uh why they put it in so that we can know um this since before that that draft comes back okay County attorney do you have any uh instruction that you need or Direction I'm good okay so County attorneys all good uh seeing no further discussion all those in favor signify by saying I I all those opposed I am also an I so passes unanimously uh I think we are now on to citizens to be heard we have one speaker under citizens to be heard Robert dial thank you Mr dial you have three 3 minutes uh please state your name and address for the record Robert dial I'm a member of the Capitol area Justice Ministry affordable housing committee I reside at 2394 Carefree Cove and now reside in commissioner Welch's District Carefree Cove yes sir I am here to uh reiterate the message my Kim colleagues presented earlier we're calling on you to have the will and the courage to break through the impediments to providing more rental housing that can be afforded by our Working Families whose children are most at risk of homelessness and the emotional and academic tolls of unstable housing that Shay Smith addressed in her remarks that Reverend Jones delivered to you earlier to reiterate specifically we're asking you to vote to direct staff to prepare an agenda item in collaboration with Capital Area Justice Ministry with a proposal and implementation plan for amending the 5-year Capital Improvement budget to set aside 20% of the County's annual blueprint search charge revenues beginning in 2026 and continuing uh for the duration of blueprint 2020 to fund an affordable rental housing land acquisition and leaseback program modeled on the penny for panella's land assembly fund I ask you not to prejudge the outcome of the analysis that we are asking you to direct staff to do by making any simplistic assumptions um such as suggesting that reallocating any of these funds uh would that would otherwise be appropriated for Road resurfacing and improvements would result in unsafe road conditions in response to a public records request that we submitted in March we were informed that projects are listed only a few years in advance and quote these projects are subject to change based on road conditions funding availability weather and other actions it's evident there is considerable flexibility in scheduling these projects and that deferring some of them to allow reallocation of 20% of those funds is not likely to pose an immediate threat to Public Safety some of whom with some of you with whom we've spoken have also uh said you can't support the idea without knowing what the impacts would be we're asking you to create an agenda item so that you'll know what the impacts will be before you make a judgment about whether or not this is a good idea Now's the Time to act we're asking you to take the first step forward towards making a meaningful debt in the immense deficit in rental housing that families with extreme low and very low incomes can afford we hope that one of you will make a motion tonight to do so and that all of you will demonstrate your commitment to taking serious action by supporting it thanks very much thank you Mr dial um we are on to uh items for comment discussion anything from the county attorney no Mr chair thank you madam County attorney anything from the County Administrator I have nothing Mr chairman thank you all right we are on to discussion items by commissioners we'll start uh at the end of the Das and work our way around commissioner Proctor you recognized uh thank you uh Mr chairman uh Commissioners we enjoyed I believe the 40-year anniversary of the bond Community uh Health uh service that was a wonderful celebration uh those of us who had opportunity to attend and I wanted to ask um uh board if we could get an agenda item uh that looks at uh the bond Neighborhood Health Clinic mobile unit and Second Harvest uh going to the Woodville Community Center for residents who are in need and that we uh facilitate um food uh Health which is mobile um the food being brought in and that we somehow institutionalize uh the presence of Medical Care uh down in the Woodville area not like uh uh an agenda item uh brought back that we can um can see how to put bonds and tentacles uh with 40 years of experience and their reach to Woodville um that's the desire my motion okay we got a motion uh from commissioner Proctor seconded by commissioner command any discussion okay do you understand the okay seeing none all those in favor sign saying I I all oppos none and passes unanimously commor Commissioners I want to U thank Mr Andrew Riley and the members of the Leon County Public Works uh Department who joined uh with our office Rachel holes um on October 26 we gave away about 30,000 lbs of food um it was wonderful beautiful morning uh Sheriff M uh McNeil's office was a co-host of this event and um the men of the beta new chap of alpha alpha fraternity the Florida state Caribbean Association students and Leon County clerk of courts were all um persons who volunteered and we're very very um pleased uh by that effort I want to underscore um I don't know what index that we use to measure hunger but I um don't want this commission to go to sleep uh that hunger exists uh one of the speakers tonight told us that there are 1,000 students uh who are homeless in Leon County schools and um I I imagine that if if public education is dismantled in the United States of America um as it has been discussed I just imagine that without a a a School free lunch program that would be more than a thousand children uh who will um languish in hunger So Hunger is real we need to keep our eyes on it and in every way that we can um fight uh it and make food accessible um I ask our Collective thought in that direction and then I want to uh be did a very very um um Pleasant um welcome best wishes to our incoming chairperson um those comments that you said about each of us were um astoundingly good and those ones that you said about me was just I'm glad you couldn't know but my heart was stopping skipping beats so I'm like why he want to play me like this you know why this dude buttering me up and teasing on me like this right here that was some good stuff and if you got notes on that you know I just think that I like a cop we can probably get a transcript to you commissioner Proctor oh that was beautiful man meeting minutes repat absolutely just make sure that raelle we get some of that that's Christmas greeting this year was worth and then commissioner kaban you um um man we excited to um see you as our co-chair we know it's going to be a great year and certainly uh to our outgoing chair um you have been uh Regal uh just absolutely Royal in representing this board uh great work and to all of my colleagues um as we reup and recommit to the goals of U of um this community um hearing The Voice Ask of those who come and I want to wait because I don't like to be greeted and H hog it up but no um I know Bishop McAllister personally I guess it it falls on me that the faith community has come tonight and I'd like to ask um in the spirit of what they have asked us not only tonight but in previous times that we would um afford and I make the motion that we ask our staff to review U every possibility of what we would need to do to assist affordable land lease buyback plan and that um we do the planning and come up with a proposal of how to make it happen uh I know that Rome was not built in a day and even if we made a um a um a u gradual implementation of a phase one phase 2 Step four all like that but bring us some modeling capturing uh what we've heard tonight about affordable um housing and Rental all of that so that would be my motion commissioner Proctor would you mind if we move through the commissioner time and then come back to your motion so we can just end the night on that cuz I assume there will be some discussion uh on that item is that okay certainly I will withdraw my motion awesome thank you um are you all good commissioner Proctor yes okay commissioner Miner thank you Mr chair um at our October meeting I mentioned um during items for discussion that I would distribute a a letter that uh we would intend to send to Governor DeSantis and the legislative leadership this is something that I'm working on with with um other County Commissioners from other counties in the State of Florida urging um the governor and legislature to join the southern rail commission and if you remember our discussion from the from last time there are currently three states that are members of the SRC Alabama Mississippi and Louisiana uh is formed in 1982 and they've been working diligently to draw down federal dollars for the restoration of Passenger rail through those Gulf States um last year they were able to obtain $178 million to fund the restoration of a of a passenger rail route that would go from New Orleans to Mobile Alabama that new route should be operational in February of next year um once that route is operational it's going to be ever more apparent that we don't have passenger rail going through North Florida from Mobile to Pensacola through Tallahassee all the way to Jacksonville and then connecting with the rest of the country so um the southern rail commission is really the the first best step that the State of Florida can take to explore ways to draw down federal dollars so that we can restore passenger ra through North Florida um yesterday I sent all of you upon advice from the county attorney um I I couldn't go to you individually outside of a public meeting and ask if you'd be willing to sign this letter so uh upon her advice I wanted to go ahead and and pass this letter around to you you should you may have had a chance to read it yesterday want to send it to you um but if you would be willing at this moment to to see if you'd be willing to have us add your signature to the letter uh we'd be really grateful this letter is consistent with what we've already adopted as a legislative priority uh so it's something that we've all discussed and voted on before and it's going to be part of our legislative priority agenda for the coming session it's also something that has been proposed within the Florida Association of counties as a proposal uh for the next legislative conference that we have in early December it's already been um recommended for adoption by the fa staff and it's scheduled to be on the consent agenda in the federal committee at the legislative conference at faac so that's something that fa as a body has been um uh at up to this point looks like it will pass as one of the agenda items for for fax legislative agenda um don't know for sure yet but it looks like it's on consent for approval at the December meeting what we intend to do with this letter is to get Florida local elected officials from around North Florida and and Central and South to sign this letter send it to the governor and legislative leadership um probably in January uh prior to them meeting for the next late of St session what is required for to for Florida to join the SRC is simply a resolution from the legislature passed by the legislature and then approved by the governor and then at that point it then goes to the SRC for the next step um the cost for Florida joining the SRC is $70,000 a year which is a lot of money but in the big picture uh in terms of the millions of dollars it might bring down from from the federal government for restoration passenger rail we think that's a a rather uh reasonable amount so I just I'm going to go to a couple other things here so if you hadn't had a chance to read the email that I sent you yesterday feel free to take a look at the letter I've got a couple more things real quickly I'm going to go through and then I'll ask you each of you if you'd like to sign on to the letter um number two I wanted to thank uh Brent pel and the public works department and County Administrator for working on agenda item 11 this is in our consent agenda but I didn't want to pull it to slow things down I did want to thank uh the County Administrator and Brent and his team for working with Florida gulf and Atlantic the railroad company to work out the repairs for uh seven remaining railroad crossings that we have throughout the county uh if you all know I'm sure you some of you have these in your districts uh the repairs and and some of these Crossings are are uh are needed and so I'm very thankful for Brent and and Vince for working with Florida gulf and Atlantic to um expedite the repairs of those Crossings and then the other thing I want to ask you is uh want to request EST or make a motion for a proclamation for Ricardos this is a family-owned restaurant um in District 3 that's been open now for 25 years and when I called uh the owner John esito and and and basically said I'm going to make this proposal to my colleagues he couldn't contain himself I mean you know the F they work Blood Sweat and Tears at this restaurant every single day they've been doing it for 25 years they've got a very devoted clientele it's a great restaurant the article covered them uh the Democrat uh did an article to cover that 25 year anniversary just a little bit ago and we want to recognize him with the proclamation so I'd like to make a motion for that second all right so we have a motion in a second um to honor Ricardo's 25th anniversary uh any discussion all those in favor signify by saying I I all opposed all right passes unanimously thank you and then um there's really not a motion necessary for this but I did want to do it at a public meeting just ask all of you would be willing to would you be cool if we just sign this piece of paper and gave it back to you what I'd like to do we're going to actually format this into a different version with um signatures from all over the state from local officials so if if you all are willing to to be signatories to this letter what we'll do is we'll work with your AIDS uh to if it's all right with you to take your um image of your signatures and put those along with the others want like deal with the AIDS individually or do you want us to like sort of enshrine this right now by saying we're cool with it commissioner Cummings I just have a question sure is this something that we as individual Commissioners can decide on or is it should the board vote to support this uh Madam whatever whatever prefer I think we would probably vote unanimously but it's up to the board I mean I think what commissioner Miner has been doing is getting individuals Commissioners from different jurisdictions but if the bo wants to us collectively that would be fine I think if a motion would be in order and just say we're cool with it absolutely okay well I think commissioner Maddox made the motion I'll second that with with uh with enthusiasm why don't we go backwards commissioner Miner you make the motion commissioner Maddox will second so moved boom any uh any discussion commissioner uh caban thank you Mr chair um my my recommendation was going to say is can we just get this as an consent agent consent agenda item next meeting with like an outline of analysis of the background the details um I'm will to support this right now but I just obviously when don't like getting a letter proposed at the meeting and then jumping out and supporting it um I'll do it if it's the board's will but if it's a consent agenda item next meeting be all the background my this an option I understand I mean I'd like to try to move on this expeditiously and I did mention it at the October meeting and um I I sent it to you yesterday which is I know it's not I mean we're all busy right um and it is part of our legislative agenda uh for leyon County for the next session so um if you don't mind commissioner command I'd like to move forward uh and and see if the you know the individual Commissioners would like to support this motion all right commissioner Proctor um there's no doubt that we support this this um motion um I think that with the realignment of the federal Administration we have a new Transportation secretary and that's why we need to look at our lobbying firm all of that um we have seen Florida the state of Florida reject federal funds for highspeed Rail and rail uh connectivity um when Obama was present um it matters who's present and we should act quickly as possible before we have the right alignment of the Senate the house and the executive branch and because um your letter indicates the SRC currently consists of Alabama Louisiana and Mississippi well if that ain't way down in Dixie what can be so this is the moment uh to strike uh we want to be all down in Dixie and secure uh from from this brand brand new Administration along with uh Florida's legislature which is also way down in Dixie um I would suggest that in the first paragraph that we would strike um resurrection of pass passenger service I would take through North Florida with connectivity to the rest of the state I would take out through North Florida with with connectivity in the rest of the state I would just suggest that the restoration passenger rail service to the state and Nation I think that the bias uh of uh our being a blue County we don't want to talk about North Florida like that and the majority of the money and the people who going to ride is in the rest of the State of Florida not North Florida if you say North Florida it doesn't warm my appetite so I think that we enhance it by taking that limitation out but we do support it and now is the time we need to move quick Mr Miner thank you Mr chair um I appreciate the the comment and I I understand the motivation behind it um this letter has already been going out to some other County Commissioners and uh uh some other local elected officials theyve reviewed it um and so there we this letter has been reviewed by the representatives from the southern rail commission uh who've been working with us on the the content of this as well as um fact staff I think with some of the work that there's there's already some connectivity in Central and South Florida now with line as well as another am Trak route that goes from Miami through Jacksonville Jacksonville up to Washington DC so some of that connectivity is already there if you take a look at a map of the state of Florida in terms of Passenger rail routes there's a big gap between Pensacola and Jacksonville and you've got some some other routes that are going um from Jacksonville along the Eastern Seaboard down to South Florida so you've got some connectivity with that it's mainly having North Florida connect with with that Connection in Jacksonville as well as going west in Mobile once we have that um that connects the rest of Florida with North Florida and it connects us with the rest of the nation so I hear what you're saying um and I I I don't discount it at all I think the the target of this letter is is to to add that connectivity which right now does not exist in North Florida whereas the argument could be made that it does exist in Central and South well I agree with you and those people way smarter than me so I I concur with u SRC and I think that the rest of it is um um some um putting our feet on the on the on on on the street and walking across the street as the chairman has said and um the governor and the uh president these other other people uh walking across the street and and and and looking them um in the eyes and not sending a sheet of paper following up I think thank you commissioner Proctor uh commissioner Miner we've got one last thing I'm sorry but one thing I wanted to add is that um there are elected officials in North Florida that are from very very red counties that are very much in favor of this and so I I think the fact that it says North Florida doesn't necessarily designate as a as a blue issue or a red issue um because there there's bipartisan support um throughout this region in support of this of this letter and this this request to join the SRC all just more rers and more money okay so I think we've got alignment commissioner o'keef let's close it out and we vot on this thing awesome thank you and I just want to uh thank you commissioner for getting this on track and I'm glad to vote to punch my ticket and come on board all right um any other discussion um seeing none all those in favor of commissioner miners motion seconded by commissioner Maddox to support the southern rail commission's request to add North Florida signify by saying I I I all those opposed seeing none passes unanimously commissioner Miner you got any more one last thing just want to wish everybody a a terrific Thanksgiving thank you very much Mr chair thank you commissioner Miner commissioner o'keef you're up thank you Mr chair uh it's neat to be able to say that for the first time for you um first um I want to thank Carrie post and the entire visit Tallahassee team for landing our own Tallahassee hero T pay at the aderly Amper theater a few weeks ago um a few of my colleagues Comm Miner um commissioner Cummings I think I saw commissioner Proctor there but they were in my row just blame it on alcohol we had um we we had a blast and um for those who don't know Tain throws an annual Wisconsin Fest in Wisconsin and he mentioned at the concert he would love to bring that annual Wisconsin Fest here I emailed Carrie post from the concert and I just want to put on record that I want y'all to pull out all the stops to get that annual Wisconsin Fest here um the uh the other thing is uh I want to thank Kum for bringing this propos the proposal they brought and I really think they've been a model of informed and purposeful Community advocacy they always do their research bring everyone together bring experts and they come they do their homework as been said um and I really appreciate I also appreciate when they bring 80 people they don't all speak uh that's also very helpful and so um this is one that um I I'm I was excited to make the motion about and to make it very specific in working with them um as I have and so uh they are I think they have developed this specific motion and initiative because we have had workshops and we have a committee that look at General ideas and things we can do and I think they are really inserting a specific previously successful program that I think it's worth specifically asking um what they're for in this and so um with respect to commissioner Proctor um if you'll allow me um I would like to make the motion to direct staff well commissioner ke the the point with commissioner pker was we'll come back to that okay so let us get through commissioner time and then we can come back to either one of you can do that motion and we I imagine we'll have a lot of discussion okay thank you so much all right then um the last thing is um so it's a sad topic but I don't think it's one we can not talk about our community is yet again dealing with a tragic and preventable death of a neighbor of ours who was struck by a truck and killed when they were just crossing the crosswalk um this one happened to be out by me but it is not unique to anyone District it is a thing that um we do we are we do have sidewalk programs we do have life programs we have ctpa we are doing things but um I think that we need to increase the urgency of this because unfortunately the likelihood is that we'll have at least had one more by the time next time we meet um and so I believe and I I have seen other examples of governments that have decided that traffic death and severe injuries are preventable and so I want to copy other communities that are doing more and being successful in preventing these deaths uh for example just I just Googled and we found that's horrible when a commissioner says that's what they're bringing up they just Googled but um Hoboken New Jersey set a goal and a plan put an action plan uh to get to Vision zero which we talk about but they actually achieved zero traffic fatalities within four years and they have continued to have zero traffic fatalities in hobok and New Jersey for six years now they have their own unique characteristics but they have I believe a million people they're they're no um small town uh America they're they're big too and so I think we should follow examples of cities like that there's no reason if hobok and New Jersey can do something like that that Leon County can't do something like that um and so their action plan they did new things that required a perspective shift that human error is inevitable so our transportation system should be forgiving speed is recognized as a fundamental factor in uh crash safety and human life and health are prioritized in all aspects of Transportation I'm not saying we don't do this but I'd like to focus more not and see if we can increase our Focus um and a lot of these things are not high cost they use many lowcost tools and new policies and changing new um behaviors for their Community to achieve that zero traffic deaths and so I I'm moving to request an agenda item identifying new actionable ways to prevent pedestrian related severe injuries and fatalities in all of Leon County incorporating lessons from successful example governments all right we got a motion by commissioner o for an agenda item dealing with uh traffic fatalities pedestrians uh second commissioner Proctor any discussion um Mr Madam yes Mr chair yeah I previous past chair is there a may I ask the County Attorney is there a jurisdictional issue uh Madam County attorney as far as traffic in city limits outside I know most of the fatalities and the one most recently at the corner of Capitol Circle and appalache Parkway is within the city limit so is there a jurisdictional issue potentially depending on we would have to identify what we could and couldn't do within our jurisdiction in response to the request and the uh request for the agenda item certainly I mean some of these roads are state roads some of these roads are City roads we don't have jurisdiction over those so that's something that would have to be considered by staff and addressed in the agenda item that's brought back they'll be analyzed okay I understand okay uh any other conversation discussion Comm O'Keefe um that's excellent important I just wanted to add that um I have that in mind if when the analysis comes back in the agenda item and it tells us like we would need to coordinate this with this group or this area but we could be the leaders to pick up and identify possibilities and then if that leads to agreements or workshops or whatnot with other entities I think an agenda item hopefully is the good kickoff Point that's my thought thank you all right any other discussion seeing none all those in favor of the agenda item uh signify by saying I I I was opposed and passes unanimously uh commissioner O'Keefe thank you uh that's it chair all right thank you commissioner uh commissioner Cummings uh thank you uh Mr chair um I've just got a couple of items we received a thank you letter from Reverend Quincy Griffin as you all know we donated to the shoes for schools kids school kids and I think he donated or gave over5 to $10,000 perir new shoes um this fall and so I'm not going to read the letter but it it's to the commission and and I think it says a lot whenever we Embrace um you know certain items or functions that benefit our our children and then the beneficiary turns around and and writes thank you letter but um I'm not going to read the whole thing but he just says thank you once again for your continued support we are truly grateful for your partnership and eagerly look forward to the positive outcomes of Your sponsorship as well as potential for future collaboration so that's from Reverend Griffin and I certainly hope that we will continue on an annual basis contributing to the choose shoes for schools um I also just want to Echo uh commissioner minor when he um congratulated oh excuse me our B Centennial uh committee uh and last weekend last weekend we dedicated the replica of the first Florida capital at Cascade uh Cascade Park and as part of that uh dedication the mayor presented me with um with this particular plaque and I'll I'll pass it around to everybody and I told him I said well I'll present it to the County Administration he said no it's for you for participating in the Centennial celebrations all all year long so it actually has a copy from the Pensacola Gazette back in March 8 1824 wow wow okay and it's hard to read but it's really um indicating the first legisl legislative uh meeting that was held once Tallahasse was dubed as the capital of the state of Florida uh and there's another article from the St Augustine East Laura heral Herald November 27 1824 so it's very very very historical so I uh I thought that was really nice and of course we certainly want to commend uh Carrie post and her uh her committee for all I mean they've just had what over 200 um activities this year to commemorate uh the B Centennial of of Leon County in Tallahasse so thank you again caring your committee um I want to request a proclamation for the 30th Church anniversary for pastor Gerald and Judy mandre um their church is Life Changers Church of God in Christ and they have uh just been great parishioners here uh in Leon County faith-based leaders so I move that uh we issue a proclamation to the husband and wife for 30 years okay um Madam con attorney can I second a motion or no as a chair I can't hey can I second that one because Dr Judy Mandel is my LT classmate I love her to death so I will second that motion um commissioner Cummings if that's okay with you commissioner madx your Mr chair thank you man I appreciate that uh all those in favor uh signify by saying I I I all oppose passes unanimously uh and then of course I look forward to our discussion uh about affordable housing and I appreciate cun for you know for coming making their presentation to us and then finally I think we had a great reorganization congratulation on our new chair he was a fantastic Vice chair so we look forward to your Le your leadership uh this next this next year and just thank all of you all um audience included County Employees included for your presence and all of your support so thank you thank you commissioner Cummings commissioner Maddox thank you Mr chair first things first I want to congratulate our new chair um thank our immediate past chair for the service that she's given our our uh commission over the past year we enjoy your leadership uh want to also congratulate our new Vice chair um and all those who were reelected this campaign season uh as as I know how big that is to be able to come back and sit with us and make policy um wanted to thank commissioner Miner um your efforts at fa uh and and running things in between fa and us and bringing those initiatives to us for us to be able to take on as our own uh does not go unseen uh so we appreciate those efforts um Mr chair I I would be remiss if I didn't again congratulate my daughter Nyla on her Proclamation today that I had an opportunity to present very excited about that and then um wanted to to tell everybody happy uh have a Happy Thanksgiving and look forward to seeing you guys after the holidays thank you Mr chair awesome thank you commissioner Maddox uh Mr Vice chair Mr chair before he speaks can I go back and congratulate our vice chair absolutely absolutely I apologize he's going to have a great year you you guys will make a great team so congrat congratulations to the chair and the vice chair thank you yes sir thank you U actually I want to start by saying thank you to everyone um thank you to all my colleagues for the support um I don't take that lightly and I I'm excited to be the vice chair I'm excited to work alongside you um commissioner welchin Mr chair um and I would be remissed if I did not also give a big thank you to my my neighbors and supporters in District 2 who uh reelected me without opposition and that is um a probably one of the most humbling um um Gest that our community could have have done and I'm very excited to continue to to fight for them and deliver more wins um for our community over the next four years um I don't have any business to discuss um I I do just have two quick questions for the County Administrator um one can we get just a quick you know earlier we had two speakers um two public speakers to discuss the sand mine in Woodville I I know an email was circulated um there may have been some confusion can we just kind of hear where the County's position is on this sure M um Mr chairman yes sir you recognized very briefly the uh the sand mine that was at issue tonight was one that was previously scheduled for a board of adjustment and appeals uh hearing and um so people were noticed uh in as a result of that um and we had subsequently pulled that back pull that item off the board of adjustment and appeal so that we could do more due diligence on that item we'll do that to the extent that that gets rescheduled uh for the board of adjustment appeals we'll be sure to let the board know and to of course advise neighbors that sort of thing but it's just to a little too early to say whether it will be adjusted that sand mine just consequently was for very limited use emergency use only related to storms uh but uh that not being uh well that that that being said again if it is rescheduled to the to the board of adjustment appeals we'll be sure to advise the board and of course the neighbors okay yeah thank you we could we just get some um work alongside with the neighbors as we can navigate that process absolutely thank you um next in agenda item number 11 we have the railroads that we that we discussed across the on County that we're going to get repaired um I noticed Hartsfield road is not on there and um unless I miss it in the agenda item sure let me just ask let me ask uh Brent to come on up or Charles either one they've got more familiarity with the list of uh improvements and they'll be able to respond to that guys if one of you could come on up and address that question good evening commissioner uh Hospital Road I don't think it's a count Mainer Road that's right is not on the list um is it can we include it I personally just drove that that road this week and that the the the railroad crossing goes right through it and it is it's it's pretty brutal I mean cars almost have to come to a um a I mean a stop to cross over it's it's in pretty bad shape we can look into that and and coordinate with fora Atlantic okay thank you and the timetable for those repairs are in q1 of next year correct timeable time for the the the seven Crossings in this agreement and the we Rec with for the go Atlantic and tomorrow they will place the order for the materials which is on the critical pass they will take a longer time the material will come from Canada they expect the materials to be delivered by the end of this year by December and then they will start construction in January and they estimate each Crossing will require two days for the repair okay fantastic thank you I also want to thank commissioner Miner for for drawing attention to this um this is a huge need across Leon County um clearly there's several roadways and and railroads that need repair and um folks you know there's did do some damage to some folks cars when they go over those things so um I wish everyone a Happy Thanksgiving congratulations again Mr chair I'm looking forward to serving with you thank you everyone thank you commissioner command I've just got uh a few things um I'd like for someone to help me request a proclamation for uh the Montford Middle School uh football district Champions thank you guys uh Montford Middle School's football team beat the PowerHouse Nims Middle School football team for like the first time in a million years and won the city and District Championship this year so real proud of them uh we've got a motion in a second all those in favor signify by saying I I I I'll opposed passes unanimously uh I'd like to also request a proclamation or have someone request a a proclamation for the child's high school girls volleyball team this won the state championship last week um I second yes thank you commissioner Maddox and commissioner Cummings uh only one of like maybe two team state championships ever won by a child's high school team so huge accomplishment uh coach Caitlyn Jan and her her her her girls really a Powerhouse team this year and uh and won a big state championship 5A State Championship uh all those in favor uh signify by saying I I all opposed passes unanimously and I'd also like to request a proclamation recognizing all or have someone request a proclamation recognizing all of our Leon County Sheriff's office staff that were deployed to our recent disaster responses second thank you uh all those in favor signify by saying I I and I'll oppose passes unanimously um thank you guys so much I just want to reiterate um you know again I I only get to do this with your blessing you know the consent of my colleagues and and and I'm I'm grateful for it it's a gift I appreciate it uh I appreciate all of you so much I'm excited about working alongside commissioner caban as Vice chair and I promise you I will do everything I can to represent us well because the last thing I want to do is embarrass anybody up here because I have the most respect for all of you so thank you so much uh uh Madam Mr County Administrator Madam County attorney thank you guys so much for for all the blessings that you've bestowed upon me and and I look forward to work and help here with you guys as well and on that note we will Circle back to commissioner o'keef to make your motion about uh the Kum proposal thank you very much and especially thank you very much Comm Brer um the uh I definitely I think I'd like to make a motion to direct staff to collaborate with Kum to prepare an agenda item with the proposal and implementation plan for amending our 5-year Capital Improvement budget to set aside 20% of the County's annual blueprint search charge revenues beginning in 2026 for the duration of blueprint 2020 to fund an affordable rental housing land acquisition and Lease back program modeled on the penny for pel's land assembly fund okay thank you commissioner Keef got a motion a second by commissioner Proctor now just so I'm clear I've got this thing is I don't know what's going on with this thing I think it's still got me over here as Brian Welch um because it's so who who pushed the button okay y'all aren't showing up here so I don't know what's going on with that um okay I'm going to let the County Administrator weigh in first and then we will get go to discussion if you can kind of give me a a hand signal to know because this ain't working for me uh go ahead thank you Mr chairman and just a a recommendation from from our standpoint related to this motion I would strongly recommend to the board that maybe we break this up in a TW stepper um first I think it's important that the board receive an objective analysis before you consider doing anything related to this and so if should the board after you consider that agenda item come back decide that you want to implement and and you make that decision then of course we would work with Kum and bring you back an implementation schedule but I think you've got I know you have some very important U policy considerations to make first on this item so I'd recommend that we first bring you back uh an an agenda item on this and then should the board decide that you're interested in implementation then of course at that point in time we would work on an implementation plan matter for K uh yes I would amend my motion uh to read uh to prepare an agenda item analyzing this proposal and remove an implementation plan uh that would follow if we decide right okay commissioner Proctor do you yes okay so just so I'm clear we're asking for an agenda item to come back with the with the potential impacts before we ask for an agenda item to come back to implement right got it okay any discussion uh commissioner Cummings I saw your hand yeah I just um I support the motion but just for clarification I believe um commissioner Maddox it asked for an agenda item to come back on affordable housing uh it hasn't come back yet I'm not sure how close that is to what's on the table right now but there was some concern or some articles where there were some successes in some areas of counties and if if Mr County Administrator could I just just clarify if we are working on an agenda item in that area anyway and I'm just wondering if what we would do here might be duplicated Mr administrator just defer to shankton in terms of the timing on those issues yeah actually at your next board meeting we're bring in an item at the board's um request regarding transitional housing specifically um uh for um those who are experiencing homelessness so we will be bringing that at their meeting in December and as far as this item is concerned th this we will not need a whole lot of time we we'll we'll push we'll we'll see what our timelines are like but it could be between the next or very latest January in terms of this next item so the two doesn't really overlap then not we'll make sure they talk to each other mated yeah point of information um hold on one second commissioner o'keef uh commissioner madx were you in the queue yeah if it's a point information I could M okay go ahead commissioner o'keef the item as mentioned uh from prior was specific to transitional housing based on other cities examples this uh proposal is specific to uh land leaseback purchases that support multi- inome uh developments right uh two different styles and he said they would be bated two separate okay I'm clear thank you okay commissioner MX you're right thank you um so this is probably discussion that will come back during during the meeting but I I just want to make it very clear that um I appreciate the efforts that K has made in this way of and and trying to to get us to address affordable housing I think you made some some efforts at the city you made some efforts at blueprint now you're making efforts with us uh I I believe that and the reason my support was there for blueprint was because this is a countywide problem uh this is something that I think that all government should be involved in when it comes to create comes to solving the problem um when it comes back I'm not sure I can go to 20% fully I can maybe go to 10 if it if we get there but I do believe that and I and you know what before I go there I ask some questions if you don't mind Mr sure uh Mr administrator those dollars that we have that we use for those road projects um just right up top of your head 20 20 million they say is about $1.3 million correct correct okay um within the 5year plan that we have how much of that how much let's say the two-year plan that we have how much of those dollars do you have already programmed we need to take a look at that commissioner something we bring back I need to let you know obviously that's a that's it's a considerable amount of of money it's probably I think last time we looked at it at something like 20 road projects 20% eight per year right um these are small road projects we're talking about shoulder repairs we're talking about potholes we're talking about intersection improvements right commissioner just talked about um intersection improvements related to pedestrian safety the this is the money we use for that uh to be clear right and so it would be substantial like I said the board would have a lot of policy decisions to make based on the information that we bring back to you this it was asked that you commit funding this would first require you to uncommit funding from previous commitments that you have made and so again all of that would be involved and and again we'd be happy to bring that all back very clearly for your consideration so well I guess what I'm saying to to the cinjun group is I'm not opposed to going down that road of of of seeing where we decommit funding and we commit funding here because I do think it's worthwhile and a very uh a big initiative that needs to happen here in Leon County um what I'm saying is that just as much as we have to we have to dig down deep and try to find that funding and and do the hard work there I'm asking that our partners in the community do the same and if we're going to do if if if the ask there is 20% I'm I'm settled on 10% and that we would ask that our partners try to find other 10 now if the board wants to go with 20 I can get there too I just believe that at the end of the day if we're going to share in this in the struggle of trying to find the dollars that's that was a great part about it bling it being at Blue print we all shared in that in that in that in that in that struggle it took it took Sacrifice from blueprint which was everybody's money there whereas we've got things that we budgeted we budgeted for that that would help uh with our road with our road projects and now we're looking at it like okay well County we're asking you to sacrifice those road projects that you have for this bigger cause which I'm not I'm not I'm not opposed to at all it's just that if we're going to make those kind of sacrifices that may have to decommit and change some policies shouldn't shouldn't our other partners have to consider the same that I mean that's that's so and and and I say that now thinking in my mind that I could get the 20% I could I just I just I just would like for us all to share in this opportunity that we have to address a big issue here in Leon County I don't feel like it's going to take a lot I want the board to understand it's going to take a lot of Shifting and I think the the county ad minist kind of downplaying it it's going to take a lot of Shifting and policy changes and and and thoughtfulness and and all this kind of stuff that we that we're going to have to take into account to make this happen the items don't want us have to do it by ourselves that's all I'm saying so I look forward to the item coming back and Analysis coming back but I I would ask that the cjun group continue to try to work on our partners in town to see if they be willing to consider coming on board with us if they don't they don't uh if we got to take the whole Freight we got to take the whole Freight but but it's it's it's my hopes that if we take the leadership position to say okay we're going to go that we won't have to go it alone thank you Mr chair thank you commissioner Maddox I think commissioner caban was next and then uh commissioner Miner then commissioner Pro okay commissioner Proctor can it wait I'm just saying he broke his mind oh your I've been there man do you remember that mine went through the table um you okay if we yeah I'm good saying technical difficulty okay you want to defer to Miner okay commissioner Miner you're up thank you Mr chair I appreciate it um when I met with with Kum last week and I think some of you also did uh we discussed this at length and and I told them I would have an open mind you know in my previous discussions with the County Administrator um we talked about the you know the the the trade-off between maintaining safe roads and maintenance of that uh pitted against deportable housing and uh I know some folks in Kim have discounted that as as a as an accurate comparison but that really is the trade-off here and and U I told them last week I would have an open mind about this about the agenda item coming back um and so I I reserve judgment on when that agenda item comes back and and we actually see the analysis in the agenda item but I am planning to support this motion because I the the county and the city together uh do quite a bit of work on trying to to cultivate more for of housing units and uh it we just do we we we we see the problem everyone here on the on the dis cares very much about affordable housing we probably spend more time talking about affordable housing than than most of the other issues we talk about uh both here as well as out in the community um so it's not from a lack of concern or a lack of compassion with the need the need is out there we see it it's one of the you know we didn't run for the County Commission just to sit here and keep the seats warm we're here to make things uh uh to to improve things and and help people find affordable housing so um I'm going to vote for the motion I look forward to the agenda item coming back we're most of the discussion will happen when that agenda item comes back and we figure out what that trade-off is between maintaining safe roads and affordable housing you know we need to do both but we're forced to make that decision on on how we we achieve those both and as commissioner O'Keefe just said with that tragedy that happened a few days ago our road safety is critically important uh we've got to do both and so I'm going to support the motion U commissioner ke thank you for bringing it up and I look forward to the agenda item that comes back thank you Mr CH thank you commissioner Miner commissioner caban Vice chair caban thank you Mr chair um I have an an abundant of thoughts when it comes to affordable housing um I know we do a lot as a board but um Mr County Administrator if we allocate uh 20% of the of our blueprint funds right um designated for affordable housing would that impact um our budget for Road improvements um and capital budget improvements in infrastructure yes significantly so we're talking about Road Safety right which we was an issue and so we're saying we're going to take we're going to pull money um that's allocated for things such as road safety and then we're going to allocate it for affordable housing um what I'm getting at is when we're when we're looking at the landscape of where our issues are as a county we're pulling from one issue to help another issue so it's not a net positive right it it's it's flat across the board and I'm going to support the motion because I want to see an analysis let me say that but I also think that our approach here to affordable housing um I don't want to say is not working because I know where where we are we are delivering units but I don't think it's we're getting the best bang for our buck um I'm very much in the when I use the analysis I use this with my businesses all the time with my managers you can get the carrot or you can give the stick right I'm very much a carrot first kind of person um but I think how we approach affordable housing we we're often times putting the stick forward and what I mean by that um correct me if I'm wrong Mr County Administrator but you know when when folks are coming or developers are coming to our community to build um single family homes or residential units we mandate that they have to have a certain amount of affordable housing units that's correct okay so to me that's a stick what I would like to see and this is something that I'm willing to explore with the board is an incentive program for developers to come in and build affordable housing in our community and and what I mean by that is we have vacant land across Leon County that's generating little to no property um property taxes um we have vacant buildings that are sitting there with no investment put in them pretty much bringing us no real property um no real property value to to our adum um assessment I have an idea to where why don't we look at a program that can coincide with your proposal by the way um commissioner Keef and U what got my wheel spinning on this is I did meet with Kum earlier this week and um we kind of looked at each other like okay there's a affordable housing crisis we know um but what's the solution um and I think the solution is taking more of a carrot mentality why don't we look at giving developers a u rebate or a tax break if they build properties with x amount a unit of affordable housing an example I'm this I'm don't hold my feet to the fire on this but let's say ex again we have a vacant lot and we say hey as a developer if you we we come up with a game plan and we say as a developer comes and builds 100 affordable housing units then we come up with a a calculation or a formula to give them a discount on their property taxes for x amount of years so what we're getting we're getting we're getting a affordable housing for our community and they're getting a discount on the property taxes so it's a win for the developer it's also an incentive for them to come in and build in leyon county and now we have more affordable housing units for our community this is what I call a cared approach right um I think if you look at developers most developers want to go places where there are tax incentives you know they want to go and say okay can I get this is an opportunity Zone so I want to develop an opportunity Zone because I'm not going to pay capital gains tax after 10 years when I flip that property right so when we look at a proposal no that gives them an incentive to come into our community and build affordable housing I think it's a win for everybody and I'm not saying this also can't I'm not saying this is either or but I also want to say you know let's look at every Avenue and let's be creative and let's make it incentivizing for developers to want to come into our community and build affordable housing um I also will say I think that we need to make some adjustments to the comp plan I think when we look at zoning in city limits I think we should be looking at increasing densities wherever we can in city limits um and even certain pockets of of of the communities um in the rural community uh I think we need to have a joint work comp plan with the city I know we try to do that last spring and and it got canceled but I think every Avenue when it comes to affordable housing from zoning changes to looking at how do we incentivize developers to want to come to Leon County and build affordable housing because I will say this I have met with affordable housing developers who have vocally said that they do not want to build in Leon County and some of the feedback I've gotten is permitting property taxes and us just being not as easy to do business with and so um I know there's a sentiment that's very anti-development development in our community what I'm saying is we need developers to want to build affordable housing here and let's look at ways to incentivize them to come to our community and build affordable housing thank you Mr chair thank you Mr Vice chair uh Mr County administrators wants to provide some clarity thank you mad Mr chairman I'm going to do this Madam chair thing for a while but thank you Mr chairman the uh yeah I just had to clean up one thing that I said in response to commissioner Cab's question he was asking about what we require of our developments for affordable housing and I answered too quickly my answer had to do with those developments that we approve through the HFA for conduit financing and the requirements that are on those we don't require our our general developments B for for development approvals to have a certain portion of of affordable housing just our affordable housing deals and um but commissioner caban to his larger point which I think is something that we will look at closely when this agenda item comes back it has to do with with what uh kum's proposal is on this land leaseback program and it goes to to commissioner Cab's issue of what's really the problem and we and not withstanding the good work that Kim has done we have not seen that the land issues are the hold up on affordable housing deals in Lyon County uh these affordable housing deals are all done a very specific way this is a industry there are people in this business who are very successful they leverage existing uh tax programs that are in place at the federal and state levels in some cases there are Gap financing the gaps in the financing that need to be made up and and you've seen a lot of those and you've approved a lot of those so this would give us the opportunity too to take a look at this and say what what are our challenges here locally we recognize in pellis County they may have issues related to land lease backs not an issue that we've seen as a challenge thus far in our community but we would uh this would give us the opportunity to bring that back to you uh just quickly on point commissioner comman Vice chair so for point of clarification you're saying so there's not um so zoning zoning in Leon County is not an issue it does not pro with affordable housing no I was just saying that we we don't require a certain number of of affordable housing units um uh on our existing approvals respect to our development approvals in in the analysis could we look at programs to incentivize developers to come into Leon County to build affordable housing yes we can that's you guys okay with that Commissioners M okay so I hold on one second um I don't know if that was a rhetorical question but can we get to commissioner Proctor and then commission Dramatics and then I've got some thoughts on it and we'll my life has been on for 20 minutes has it I can't doesn't show up I'm sorry it doesn't show up uh commissioner Proctor's been waiting a second do you want me to you going to defer Madam Madam immediate past no just very briefly um U Mr chair I um support the motion and I support the fact that it's going to be in a bifurcated process we're not going to initially look at anything specific until we get the analysis and the impact of the specific request about the 20 20% I appreciate uh Cajun coming before us I I know I have met with them several times as well as other Commissioners I know have have met with them and I think we all share the same sentiment and that is to address homelessness uh in our community and I don't think any of us are closed mind about it but I think we have to look at this from a holistic standpoint get the analysis from staff and then decide if we going to move to the next step in the process and I'm not trying to prejudge I want to wait I want to wait until we get the analysis back from staff if it comes in January or or December and then I think I will be able to make an informed decision about 20% or as commissioner mad said 10% or no percentage maybe from that particular area but we might be encouraged to look at some other area based on the agenda item that commissioner Maddox requested a couple of months ago and they're working on that now but I think this certainly opens up the conversation I think it it shows that we are certainly as Commissioners are concerned about affordable housing homelessness and we are certainly concerned about families that are spending over 50% of their monthly income on housing and utilities which leads very little um to live the American dream they they clearly are not living the American dream and I think we have to be concerned about about the least of these so I'm I'm very uh patient I don't want to prejudge our culate I'm just looking forward for that first step to come back from the County Administrator and we're looking at the ramifications of transferring any funds or reallocating any funds and what that would do in the whole scheme of things and certainly uh I know funds have already been allocated in our budget for certain Road improvements and what have you so I think from a commission standpoint we have got to be holistically concerned about adverse effects well thank you Mr thank you uh commission commissioner Proctor your recog thank you Mr chair Commissioners first of all commissioner madw is such a uh unique listener and here and I'm I'm a little nervous to to step out and dare not say that he he has not heard correctly um I dare not uh and I'm willing to say that I have not heard correctly but I've never heard heard Cajun uh Target a project I said they want this road stop but I've heard these people saying that any surplus money new money that comes in from the from the tax that what we share uh out of $ what we put 20 cent aside they have not targeted one project this is not their request versus those things that are sitting and already funded they've not ever approached that but I'm willing to say that because of how you think you've heard them uh maybe you all heard correct I didn't hear all that I've been listening to them um over at City Hall blueprint um they came in a couple times um Talk they have never asked to take food off the table of any existing project where y'all get that from point uh where does that come from that's not what I've heard yeah so so when we were having a conversation at blueprint where they were asking for any excess money that came in every year would go towards this pot of money what they're asking us here for today is that we would take 20% of our allocation and put it towards it's not it's not new money it's 20% of our allocation and that will go towards the proposal that they're that they're that they're asking for so it's not new money it's 20% of all the money that we have coming in okay I I didn't understand that and um anything dealing with real estate uh Council you knows if it's not reduced to writing it it it ain't worth the Papers written on until I see a proposal all of this is hot air if they got something to write down on a sheet of paper I'll deal with it I don't want to think about this no more Cajun all y'all preachers you write sermons you write this that put something in writing because all this verbal remembering of of some me until another one I ain't studying this until we get something in writing so my understanding they're not asking us to kill a project to create money and take that money I've always understood their their um Spirit to be if you all receive any additional dollars would you share uh one5 of it with uh affordable housing which leads me to um in this conversation I don't like working with no paper and you want to say something to us policy write it down we should stop talking about this until we get something definitively written down cuz we all here quite different but in the area of affordable housing what what what is it that the Tallahassee Housing Authority uh and Miss Brenda Williams have that's so much smarter than all of the rest of us put together their performance uh them taking a project uh returning it I I mean I'm not trying to be funny but to me we should hire uh Miss Brenda Williams as a consultant and put her out front to do affordable housing um she's demonstrated capacity to do it uh working with what she's working with finite margins in producing excellence in the categories of housing that we want and I I think that we would be wise if possible to um create a partnership uh with them being the lead uh operative in securing the quality of housing that we want nobody has done this the way tallas housing authority has turned this around over the last 3 four years and I think that from what I'm able to gleam in observations in this community the expertise we not committed moreover this goes back to the federal land affordable dirt uh what we need uh people crying out for uh um but if our heads are buried in the in in the sand U and we don't make the ask nobody's going to do squat unless we're asking demanding pleading imploring doing something other than going around in circles talking about something we need that Federal dirt we ask about um and I don't know when it's coming back the banking CRA uh Community um um I think it's a reinvest investment Act and the performance of our banks and red lining Vince is that coming back to us um before doom day yeah yeah that that is coming back as a a retreat item per your request okay that needs to be incorporated if banks are not I don't care what housing we put out there if the banks are not going to back these people or create unique expanded approaches for them to qualify um y'all we we we still you got to get the banks to the table that's why I've been begging us to get them here to sensitize them to this market and not just the uh upper upper levels of people who make as much money as we make but for folk who don't make the money that all of us up here make um the banks need to know who they are and look at the demographic that shinon has already um captured so Vince is the the tow truck ordinance coming back um anytime before dun Day January yeah J January it'll be back to you okay very good very good thank you very much Mr chairman y'all Mr D Mr par commiss par you done yeah I need something I don't want to talk about this no more Mr chairman okay I'm going to walk out of this meeting the next time this come up we ain't got a sheet of paper that we all looking at the saying we shouldn't even bring this up well thank you commissioner Proctor and I'm I'll close with a few statements and then we can vote I think there's going to be enough support for the next step I'm going to say to the Kum folks I am skeptical I am skeptical I'm going to say to our commissioners I am skeptical for all of the reasons that we have outlined it this feels a lot like if you don't know where you're going any road will take you there we have this is money make no mistake about it that is allocated to the county that is siloed at the county to deal with problems precisely like pedestrian safety and intersections commissioner o'keef precisely like that and I've made all kinds of uh I've requested all kinds of improvements in my district at pedestrian roundabouts and flashing beacons and all kinds of pedestrian safety and we all recognize the problem so this is the delicate balance that we have to strike as policy makers is you're Robin Peter to pay Paul you are taking money that is committed by our County and you are going to pull a percentage of it and redirect it to something we don't even know that we need in terms of a land lease buyback program we have FHA partnership programs where we draw down federal dollars and we work with lenders and developers that's exactly what happened at South City Columbia Gardens with Miss Williams that those Pro those programs exist all right we do we we find ways to to meet the matches and the federal programming that we need to already facilitate massive affordable housing programs in the county we already have that so this is talking about taking money from from what we already have allocated for a distinct purpose in roadway improvements Paving roads intersection improvements you know repair and washed out ditches and stuff during hurricanes this is taking money from that and putting it in a pool of money for something we don't really know if we can deploy in our community because we don't have the same needs as panel's County it's not like we're going to build affordable housing with that money so that is why I'm very skeptical I will support the next step but I got a feeling that the analysis when we come back is going to say exactly that it's going to say this is going to cut 20% or 10% or 5% from your road your Capital Improvement budget to put money in an account for affordable housing that you don't even know how to deploy into the field all right so we're doing a good job in Leon County and we don't take enough credit for it providing affordable housing units to the best extent that we can I think commissioner Cab's idea is very worthy of exploring in terms of finding ways to incentivize but you know we we already don't um punish people so it this is this is a delicate situation we need thousands and thousands of units I definitely would not be willing to go in on this without the city or blueprint going in on it too why would we carry that burden at the county when we're a third of the size of the city's budget I imagine their blueprint per percentage for Capital Improvement is much bigger I don't know but we'll see that in the analysis so I'm skeptical I'm just saying right now I'm skeptical for me I agree with you commissioner Proctor I want to see exactly what the plan is if I give if we dedicate $1.3 million a year to affordable housing I want to see how that's going to be deployed to build affordable housing I want I want a developer to stand at that Podium and go if you give me $1.3 million for 10 years that's $13 million we're going to build x amount of units and that's what I'm committing to it's not all this conjecture and wishcasting is not good public policy and that's going to be my problem so I'm sorry I'm sorry I thought you were on your point I'm that's all I'm going to say about it uh we commissioner Maddox you can speak on it and then we'll have a vote thank you um to your point commissioner command's Point um and because commissioner parner too you spoke about um the Housing Authority piece um when I met with Kum a while back I think they recognized that the problem is the gap that exists between the cost of development and the um prices you had to come out on the other end in order to make a profit and so the way the Housing Authority did it was tax credits and that's why we gave money the city gave money in order to help them achieve that that that that closing the Gap per se that happens between development and profit where the real problem lies because I'm actually diing dabbing this in my other job is when you go up for a tax credit piece you got to have a local match from from local government they want to see that local governments have some kind of matching program or you you're going there and they're giving something towards it for you to go then access the bigger pot of money that's coming from Florida High Housing Finance now land land helps because then you don't have to go buy the land which means you can put more money towards towards the capital side of it and the building side of it but if we really want to be honest about what what organiz ations need and what developers need in order to get access to close that Gap they need money they need funding they need money on the front end to close that gap between financing that happens when that happens between building the project and being able to turn a profit on the other end so some of what commissioner caban has talked about maybe gives some of that but it would be idea that and and I think some of the things we talked about with blueprints we couldn't do it if there was a program created whereby you know there's a pot of money that let's say the housing when the Housing Authority needed that one point how much we give Vince we provided about $6 million like in the last about $6 million the only way we were able to do that was because of arpa funding correct correct without arpa funding they still be looking for those $6 million correct those and many of those projects do not require Gap financing when they're done right I'm PA to say they don't require Gap F uh financing so again it just depends on the project uh Chamilia Gardens is a very expensive expensive project great project but it's a very expensive project and so but again as I said when we come back this will give us an opportunity to unpack really what the needs are there there's a half a dozen projects in the pipeline right now good uh that that you guys will that you'll be seeing so again but we'll we'll take the opportunity to bring this all back to you so you can consider all of it I guess the point the point is is that we do have to be open-minded with this they have come with a great idea but I do think that there are different things that were different challenges that we have as a community when it comes to it and what if what if the analysis comes back and we figure out that land is not the issue but then what do we do then do we do we approve the program knowing land is not the issue it's something I think we're all will to consider but for the Kum group is the is the op is the is the is the is the idea here for us to come to the table and figure out uh ways to really solve this problem or to Simply come to the table and agree and and and and move forward with the program that that pelis is done because it's something that you guys have you guys believe in so I think what I'm asking for here is as we have our conversation and as Kum comes back and forth to the table to have the conversation with us that the focus be if staff comes back with analysis that says hey this is this this and this is the problems that we see happening and this this and this is the way that we can we can we can attack those problems then that we be open to saying that those are solutions that everybody can entertain we can have a conversation about it back and forth I don't I don't want if we're going to be open-minded about about entertaining the program that kjun brought forth what I'm saying is I life occasionally to be open-minded to the analysis that staff has come back and then we have a open conversation about what actually works for us and what the problem actually is cuz I think you would agree with me as well that that that that Gap piece of funding cuz we when I met with you we talked about it is a huge problem but remember when we had the conversation we said well but the problem was blueprint blueprint funds could not pay for that Gap funding so then that's when we went in the direction of okay what about the land so if you're not paying for the land you can use the money to go the other way so that's that's what I'm saying just you you km has been hard set on the idea of the lease back program all I'm asking last time I say Mr chair is that if we're going to have a open mind about that that you have an open mind about the analysis that comes back and then we can have we can have a real good conversation about how we really deal with this problem way we we deal with it is that fair thank you thank you Mr chair all right thank you commissioner Maddox um we ready to wrap this thing up commissioner Proctor M Mr chairman I concur with you it's time to wrap it up but if our staff does not have a concrete proposal from cinjun uh to react to then what are they reacting to conjecture um I think it's we should not send St out on a nly willy Loosey Goosey um I thought they said this I thought they said that no I think we should require Cajun to give us a definitive uh U paper outlining the county administrators tell me he has their proposal and he will include that you got that I ain't seen it all right commissioner Miner last word and then we're goingon to vote on this thing and commissioner coming I'm good I was I was going to say that uh we met with Kim this County Administrator and I met with Kim uh couple weeks ago and had a I think we have a very clear understanding of what they're proposing and that will be in the next agenda item so well we should have got that all right uh so Mr  you good okay uh so seeing no more discussion we have a motion for staff to bring back an analysis but not an implementation of kum's proposal I think what we'll get from that is an understanding of what they've asked for and then options for whether that's feasible or what we can do to Pivot off of that whatever to move forward with something that actually puts rubber on the road um okay so all those in favor signify by saying I I all opposed passes unanimously um thank you everybody that's the end of our agenda chairman for the good of the order I forgot one thing to ask okay commissioner Proctor one last thing um commission do like you when when there is a construction do we require flag persons to operate around construction sites like when road traffic is stopped County Administrator and all like that we we do all of all of the County bid jobs uh that would require uh traffic controls do require it as part of our contracts and the it is requirement of the contractor and if we think that we see sites that don't have uh flagman patrolling the traffic count what do what do we report to we we have contract compliance within Public Works we have contract managers that respond we don't always see it so we're we're thankful when people bring it to our attention it's coming down it's com hey great meeting everybody I love you all thank you for the opportunity we are adjourned