##VIDEO ID:KUBrvfUQFjs## e e e e calling the meeting to order at 5:30 p.m. uh let's pray together uh father thank you for our gathering here on this evening I pray that you would bestow us with your wisdom your knowledge and understanding as we make these decisions that are critical for the livelihood of our citizens here in Lin Haven I um also ask that you would give great comfort and peace to all of the families that are impacted by the memories of today um and what this day represents in the history of our country in Christ's name we pray [Music] amen States Mr Rich Walker good evening uh I hope people remember where they were on September 11th it was my last day of working for the US government is not a nice day um I'm here on two points I have two points in a summary and a possible answer it's deals with the meeting on 17th August a and August 27th uh 222 no information is also considered no misinformation here my point no information is considered misinformation if portrayed by somebody omitted in the minutes in the complete verbiage given by Mr Walker at a public commentary on August 27th meeting there was a lot of information that was omitted that I said the Commissioners have agreed that during public commentary agenda items will not be discussed until they are called by the chair this commentary has been moved on different occasions on the agenda have hazly over the years mostly as an experiment to see which one would work in my opinion the recent staging of this has not worked I realize that public speaking is not a right however once Allowed by the board chair There are rules for the speaker and the governing body some of which cannot be a bridged by the US Constitution during public commentary August 27th meeting I stated that the agenda item 12 as listed would have to wait for public commentary per the commission's directive mentioned previously and not talk about something that's on the agenda until it comes up at this meeting August 27th there were a large number of attendees who came to express their views on item 12 on the agenda the Commissioners have often discussed the lack of its citizens not paying attention to attending meetings Town Halls budget readings and in general any ongoings of the community when called to speak at public commentary they heeded my words and begged off on addressing number 12 until it was addressed in numerical order the chair called on the item scheduled gave the floor to commissioner Warwick for the floor and who stated his case quite well with a motion the chair passed the discussion to the city manager then to commissioner pebles then to the the City attorney for advice which was the Commissioners can do the following they can direct the city manager however it is still her decision alone there was no further discussion recorded in the minutes chair said they should consider the motion there as being requested in the agenda items motion on the agenda item was the senta the city manager and it was made by commissioner Warick it was no second to the motion so it died on the floor right thank you sir Miss Jerry Parker good evening commission I doo want to discuss the last um commission meeting very disappointed in our commissioners each one of you were given factual information about Remy's past discrepancies I met with each one of you individually and gave you factual information each one of you these weren't my opinion these were facts of his past discrepancies y all ignored them you did nothing um in reference to what Mr Walker just said I don't feel like discussion should have been given on item 12 last last Commission meeting um there should have been discussion after a second none of you stood up and gave a second not a one of you when you knew there were at least a half dozen people that had requested to speak on item 12 everyone of you knew that but you allowed peop to have discussion when it shouldn't have been done due to no second motion there could have been discussion in paly however once again the public was prevented from speaking on an agenda item that people wanted to express their desire to speak on this item again the public was stifled commission y'all got to start getting your stuff together there's things that Remy has done in the past that are not right they're wrong and y'all are allowing it to continue and then miss Gainer she makes the decision to put him on 25 days without letting y'all discuss it in a commission meeting again y'all were stifled this is is not right people y'all aren't working for the citizens y'all are working for you people up there thank you thank you right Mr Smith there Smith M Smith I'm just here for a simple reason I have R sewage coming from my next door neighbors I have contacted code enforcement no resolution I called Public Health Department over on Jinx Avenue no resolution it is a public safety issue I need it addressed and I need attention immediately with it could you give us uh your name and address I mean I have your name but we need your address and phone number my address is 1702 Massachusetts Avenue all right thank you and we'll be sure to follow up with you what and we also need your phone number if you could give your phone number to Mr Lightfoot there the address where the breach is happening is 1704 and I do need some immediate attention on it it is a public Hazard thank you Cory Langford finishing up with what Miss Parker was talking about we wonder why there's no uh or a lack of public participation um so I wanted to come tonight to to discuss a couple of things and I'll we we'll talk through the storm water stuff a little bit later but uh um the last commission meeting I asked at least the elected officials to to address really three things um specific to the chief Ry whatever we want to call it at this point right because there's a lot of people that want to move forward there's a lot of people that want the city to heal um and I think part of that healing process is that we take it again we look at ourselves through an evaluative lens to determine what are two things that we could have done better as elected officials again this is specific to that scenario what are two things that we could have done better as an individual and what is one thing that if I had it to do all over again I would do it again and why those are those are three things that I asked for I had one individuals reach out to me specifically with that information and I appreciate that um the rest of you all I'll stand by um the other thing that I wanted to discuss tonight was is and again some of you uh the ones that are involved um are already aware of this um but there was an individual who um I guess her water meter was broke for like three years and she was paying the base rate um for water sewer um so I guess her our water meter ended up getting fixed and then now she's actually paying what she should have been paying to begin with so as I'm reading through this again through an evaluative lens like how can we do things better okay I just remember um I don't remember how many commission meetings ago was but there was a request for money uh to make repairs to I don't I believe it was the sewer plan or something sludge hauling I I don't remember what it was all right um and then I remembered that uh just not long ago there was a vote by you all on to set the the fees that we pay for for water and sewer and I remember that there was discussion oh well we got uh City X over here they're paying this amount and City Y over here is paying this amount we should be aligned with our sister cities okay I don't agree with that approach just so everyone's aware we need to look at our own requirements within our own City and we set our own rates based off of those requirements but we can't even do that why because now we've got inaccurate data you all have inac inaccurate data in which to make a decision on we've got individuals and I this may be an isolated event there may be one individual in Lin Haven who's had a broken water meter for three years and has been paying the base rate but guess what that individual has been taxing the water and sewer system just like the rest of us who are all paying our fair share sweep off your porch first before you start looking at other people's porches thank you Jody Moore good afternoon first I want to um well Jody Mo on Amherst Street in the beacon Bay County Florida on Facebook um I just want to first of all say I'm very glad that the city is having a 911 ceremony that's um very great I I don't know that other cities are doing that so that's a wonderful thing the city is doing I would like to ask and I did post this on the Facebook page for the city um that the city consider doing a memorial day service um that's something that other organizations in the city have have done with the assistance of the city but I think it that would be an important thing for the city to do we have other festivals but why don't we do anything for Memorial Day um and I have a few other comments um this regards the last meeting you know no matter how many friends you get to come up here and say otherwise I'm always going to stand up for what is true and what is right I'm not the one creating problems I and others are pointing out the issues that other people are creating in this city I didn't originate or manufacture the problems that exist that you are are not dealing with a few comments about the last commission meeting number one when no one seconded commissioner W's motion on item number 12 about Vicky Gainer there were people on both sides of the issue who wa wanted to speak and did not get a chance um and I think that's shameful number two uh future or past employees like Monty odm can now sue the city if they were fired and didn't get uh quote due process employees who have been fired for violations of employee policy can use the Ry situation in future lawsuits and is that looking out for the best interest of the city or the citizens there are already multiple lawsuits against the city and some people aren't even aware of that but there are multiple lawsuits right now and quite a few were because of Vicky gayner and Ricky Ry number three Vicky Gainer made a statement quoted by wjhg regarding Ry that quote any further infractions would lead to termination unless Ry has had a true conversion on the road to Damascus moment he will commit other violations of employee policy I wouldn't be surprised if he did and when he does Vicki needs to come to this commission and let you know immediately which she did not do last December and if Ry does do one more thing just one more thing you need to hold her to a promise and hold her accountable if she doesn't take the proper action I still think Ry should have been already fired and I'm far from alone I know there's people on the other side of of that issue but there are plenty of other people who think he should be gone in spite of what some might think I don't want any of this stuff that has happened in linh Haven the past few years I want a good police chief a good city manager a good mayor and a good Commission in ly Haven for the citizens thank you Carolyn Miller Carolyn Miller George Avenue I have watched this Ricky Ramy situation as long as I can stand it without saying anything you know and I know and all of Bay County knows that he should have been fired and I am appalled that we have elected officials that care nothing about ly Haven and its residents that have lived here for so many years I've lived here 73 years I've never seen anything like this some of these people have lived all their lives here just like I have we have put trust in the people that we elected to run the city and I don't care that Ricky Ramy was adjudicated I don't care about that he needs to be terminated along with a few others and you know who you are that will come um why can't you just post a position for the chief of police of the city of Len Haven get somebody with integrity that's honorable that you can be trusted and fair to everyone remember your children are looking at someone who broke the law received no punishment a slap on the wrist a 25 days suspension or whatever with pay but for since December he was here with no gun no badge and still got paid we all paid for that and y'all let it happen these Commissioners up here Mr War I got to give you a 100% on what you do for the citizens of ly Haven God bless you y'all need to take note and look at what's going on here anyway with that being said the mayor and the Commissioners all need to be ashamed of what you've done to the city of Len Haven mostly to James Finch Margot Anderson they truly loved this city y'all have drugged them through the mud but their day is coming and another election is coming and when it does I can't wait because I see all your seats being refilled by somebody else and I know you won't be up for reelection so you should be standing up for more of what's going on in this town yes you should Mr Peebles tried but he get shut up direct your comments to the chair please thank you thank you so much you handsome mayor you thank you thank you God bless any additional public commentary all right if not uh moving on to the mayor's report um thank you to all that were able to attend today's uh 911 um memorial service certainly a a sobering moment um for the city of Lin Haven for our entire nation uh this year I know we had an additional um change or something that really enhanced the ceremony where we um had someone to actually speak um that had Direct experience with 911 and so I'm hearing Mr aras's uh Reflections today from that day um something was certainly uh heart moving and and very reflective that we should all be uh grateful that we're still here to keep those memories um from 911 but it's certainly a day that we should never forget um so again thank you to city manager and all who coordinated that um that effort today uh in regards to responding to some of our public commentary uh with Miss Jerry Parker stating she met with all of us I didn't meet with Miss Jerry Parker um to get any information so uh not sure about who whoever else met but I I didn't get a chance to meet with you um also uh in regards to to Mr Langford and the water meter rates I know one of the things that we are doing is updating the actual water meters so that we can get a better reading um on the water meters um in regards to increasing our rates I think when we show what sister cities are doing it's not for us as a uh as a decision-making procedure to say okay hey Panama City's doing this or cway is doing this so it seems okay for us to do this we um a couple of years ago the question what really drives the water rate increased the question was asked if the water department needed to stand on its own or did it need to continue to take money from um another Enterprise fund so what was happening is that our water and sewer were borrowing money from sanitation so water sewer and Mr Lightfoot or city manager correct me if I'm if I'm wrong in my statement I believe water sewer and storm water were actually all being supported by sanitation and so each year each department was having to borrow money from those particular departments in order to function the way they were supposed to so it was a hard question that was asked and I will say it was something that was not taken lightly you know there was a lot of discussion quite frankly a lot of disagreement um because I was in some of those initial discussions a couple of years ago about increasing the water rates and although it seemed like hey you know we debated over 15 cent I mean so it was something that that was that was looked at very deeply in regards to increasing um or even proposing an increasement for water rates because the idea is okay we're already increasing storm water so that's a that's one additional rate for our citizens and now we're talking about increasing water and increasing sewer but the question was do we want to continue to drain from sanitation so that water and sewer um if they keep taking from that what will happen to sanitation and to the sanitation fund although it's healthy we don't want to keep taking from that and so um it's also the finance Review Committee as well which is composed of five citizens um from Haven and so before the water rates come to us uh sort like what the planning board does for developments and such um the finance Review Committee they met with the finance department uh chair or the our director finance department city manager I was at a couple of those meetings initially um to discuss what proposals could be made so there was a plan laid out to say okay in five years if you increase these increments then water will be on its own be able to stand and sort of fund itself and so that's really the um sort of the the Catalyst behind the increase of the water rates um is how can we make sure that water is able to pay for itself and not continue to take from um the sanitation department and it's and in essence that's really what the storm water assessment is about so any times there's as I'm understanding it as we're increasing these rates at the moment as we're proposing these increases is certainly not to create any type of extra funding um or even for somewhat for the sake of even future developments is really for or future task or projects is really to say what can we do to make sure that um we're properly funding these departments so that it won't keep borrowing from another department um because then over time in 20 years sanitation won't be healthy if we keep taking from that and and we're saying borrowing we talking about anywhere from half a million to a million dollars you know each budget cycle so um I don't think any of us are fans of the increases because all of us are having to pay for the increases and we are trying to keep in mind inflation and so we are thinking of how does this impact our citizens and even in the discussion we think about you know our our senior citizens that are living off of fixed income that is certainly different and doesn't you know increase at the same rate as someone else who may still be working now so we have taken all those factors into consideration when we did talk with uh the finance department the the finance Review Committee about those increase rates proposals so just wanted to clarify um the sort of the Catalyst behind why those proposals are being proposed um but we we still do check what the rates are in other cities um and I do know what you're referencing I believe in regards to say hey we're behind other cities so we can't increase to try to catch up but I think it was saying that okay for so many years we didn't increase while other cities did and it's caused us to fall behind um but that's the reason for the proposal of the water increases so that water can support um support itself and finally um I I don't know about any of the other Commissioners I don't think any of us have anything uh I know commissioner perno was he's our senior commissioner but even with himself none of us have anything to do with uh the Margot Anderson or Jame Finch trial so none of us have anything to do with any of that um we we we don't so whatever's happened there was that happened before we came along um I know that started um with commissioner perno when he was here but he has nothing to do with that either so none of us have anything to do with uh with that no man there's no there there's no response to that but there's we have nothing to do with that so whatever's happening with that that is not in our our purview so all right uh commissioner pebles thank you mayor I just wanted to say thank you to the city for putting on that ceremony today it was it was fantastic um and to those that came out during the rain uh that was awesome um I was 12 years old when that happened and uh I still remember that day um I was sitting in my living room I was homeschooled at the time sitting in my living room and I didn't really when it first happened you know as a 12-year-old kid you don't really grasp what's truly happening uh until you're sitting there and you see the second plane hit and everyone uh reacting to it but um man I I got to say the one thing that did the lesson I learned from it was um the way that uh as deputy chief talked about earlier is the unity that came from it um and so I just want to encourage that that sense of unity um as we think about that day uh in 2016 I was able to go up to New York and um went to the memorial and the museum and uh you know you you saw what you saw on the news but once you go up there and see it in person and go in that museum see the people's faces uh it really opened your eyes so if you ever get a chance to go up there up to New York um is free uh I mean obviously you got to pay to travel up there but if you're up there um I believe it's free for military to go into the museum and then they ask for uh suggested donation type thing to get into the museum and then the memorial is free if if you ever get a chance to go up there it's worth the trip just to see it so um definitely think about that uh really if you thought I mean just thinking about about that kind of thing makes me emotional so adding the the monument in the museum if you get a chance highly suggest it um and I just wanted to say thank you to all the First Responders and everyone that at the city for what you do thank you to the staff for all you do and what you did today for the ceremony um for those people out there picking up chairs after the ceremony was over and and to all of you um thank you for making that happen and with that that's my report thank you commissioner perno thank you mayor um like to thank everybody for coming out and thank you for your comments um um I'm sorry I'm not doing enough for you ma'am I'm I've been here five six almost six years now but um I'm I'm s serving the city the best I can that's all I can tell you um and if I if I haven't done enough fell short in your eyes I apologize um I am on the EST program uh for the St Andrew Bay St Joe Bay and uh I think I mentioned in the previous report that on September 28th the uh estra program is doing a 5k for The Bays um I got the I got we we had sent out an email to all the Commissioners and I don't I think everybody got it um uh it's um it's going to be 8:30 it's going to be at the wetlands Conservation Park in Panama City Beach um it's a it's a fundraiser for the EST program the EST program is getting started um they're going to be looking for people to join the EST program um they might get into potentially into a license plate program or what but um EST programs are kind of the control of the waterways like we don't want our waterways to become pollutant or or or um infiltrated by things that would cause people not to want to come enjoy our water so to speak so they uh there are National Estuary programs all over the country um and this is a a beginning a start to hopefully having the St Andrew Bay St St Joe Bay EST program become a national EST program as is the Escambia Bay EST program as is the Indie River Lagoon Estuary program um there's several Estuary programs in the state of Flor that that have have gotten the the recognition and become National EST programs it's good for funding it it brings it brings good research it bring it brings the the um um I guess the U the fail safe of protecting your waterways so I wanted to make sure that everybody knew about that um I know we're going to talk about the budget tonight we're going to talk about the millage um I did have I did did have a budget meeting with city manager and finance director I explained some things that I was thinking about um we're looking at spending a bunch of money uh on a on on redoing our our water treatment water sewer treatment plant um and uh we we're already making the steps to do the engineering for that uh we're looking at the a a huge huge expenditure for the uh for the uh for the for the head increase of that plant we have an opportunity to to possibly get away from that in the future uh I I I just hope that um an Avenue opens up where where we we we we may be able to uh to to engage in a in in a in a joint venture with the County and create an create the uh the ability to have a water treatment plant away from the the edge of the bay you know kind of goes hand inand with the EST program we're going to be doing a vulnerability study and I already know that that vulnerability study is going to show where our water treatment sew plant is right now is not a good place for in in in the way of a disaster or a flood it's going to be going away um I've talked to city manager I've I've talked to department heads um I just think that we really need to to get it out there and and talk about the the potential there's a there's a water treatment plan up off 388 um we we we've uh had the county come to us before I think the U I think it's it's ripe and it's time that we get into negotiations with them hopefully to to if we're going to expand a water treatment plant why not expand the one that they have and do a joint venture and get the one that we have off the off the bay it means us going going to County rates but I can only imagine what we're going to end up having to charge people when we do do the head expansion on that water treatment plant so uh I'm thinking way down the road now you know kind of like the TP does but this um this this is um this is really eye openening if you get to study this particular situation so um the right now in the present and near future we have an opportunity set the path for for way into the future where our our descendants or don't have to deal with a a water sewer treatment plan on the water's edge so that's my two cents on that um I'm I'm hoping we can we can progress there um and uh that's my report thank you thank you commissioner wart yes so um just echoing the words on the 911 um thank you for the city putting on the event today um I'm sure everyone remember what they were doing when they're when they happened um a lot of people were affected by that and uh a good time to remember our First Responders and Veterans and things like that um speaking of which um I wanted to give kudos to Lin Haven Police Department um I'm sure a lot of you heard about um there was a fugitive in the area uh that was tracked spotted and uh Tracked Down by the linhaven police department and there are other agencies that were involved and uh we always worry about a day like that happening in our area and uh appreciate them keeping us safe and uh glad no one no one got hurt so um the only other thing I have is I do uh time with a commissioner once a month um my next one's 21 September at 11:30 uh it'll be at tacos way this time um you know any residents want to come out and speak about whatever and uh if you can't make it and you just want to contact me you can always call me 850 3911 1217 i' be more than happy to talk to you or you want to meet for coffee or whatever um I'm more than happy to do that so um please feel free to reach out to me um that's all I have thank you and commissioner Vander Griff so mayor I'm going to keep my marks really short because we have a public Workshop that I'm sorry have I been putting time out school is in session up today I was sitting by commissioner peoples and I happened to ask him at the 911 ceremony I said Sam H how old were you when this happened and he said I was 12 and I was thinking back at that time I was principal at Surfside Middle School and I had a thousand Sams and when the tragedy happened parents were panicky all they could think about was getting their child and keeping them safe at home so we started the day out with around a thousand students at the end of the day we only had a few hundred because the parents were coming in droves because they were so afraid they didn't know what was going to happen but they knew they wanted to have their children close by so 911 to me it's a reminder that um someone's after us and they're still after us um they want to destroy our Co our our country but one thing we have to be careful of is we don't want to destroy our comp our country from within we don't need to be divided you know that old saying divide and conquer so it's a reminder to me 9911 of that there're still out there after us but we also have to be careful what's going on within our country right thank you and I guess to follow up on commissioner Ward's comments regarding uh Lin Haven Police and the um and the individual that was apprehended um I believe it was actually Lin Haven Police who um actually spotted the individual um and so uh deputy chief if you like to make some remarks on that mayor it was one of our younger officers that actually spotted that guy in his vehicle he backed off um the guy wasn't compliant with him so he called for backup he did absolutely perfect and in response everybody about uh Mr peoples being 12 the officer that caught that guy I asked him today how old he was when 911 happened he was eight months old all right thank you thank you and so although we can't give like a a medal of valor we certainly want to give some public recognition um to that officer and his efforts so we certainly appreciate all the the work of our police and fire departments and keeping us safe and secure in the city of Lin Haven city manager are you ready is it my turn yet just a couple of things um before we get into budget uh fall concert series begins September 20th they asked me to remind you of that sidewalk project is now complete on 8th in Florida I have sever several sidewalk projects that are going on that'll be finished I want to really thank our marketing and Communications Department they do a lot for the city and putting together these events uh making sure they run smoothly um and um thank Community Services Department which is Tai's department for setting up fors police department um fire so many people help to make events possible we had a great turnout today people were standing in the rain for this event because we love our country we love the sacrifices that people make and we want to recognize those sacrifices as the speaker said today are we were fighting for for and we are and so um just just thank everyone for coming out today uh do you want me to make my remarks now or do you want to wait until yeah good evening do you have questions about the warrant list okay so next our budget one of the reasons we put it inside the commission meeting is because people had a hard time coming into two meetings listening to budget meeting one day then coming to uh budget workshops so we thought we put it all under one uh today we've been working on this budget probably since about May right after we passed the um mid year budget I want to thank Kiki and Don for working with all of the departments and pulling all of this together all the many changes um for for putting this entire budget together um we're going to just share some highlights from 2425 budget first we're proposing a 4.05 Mich rate the tenative uh avalor that we proposed back in July was set at 4.2 so it's gone down but a little bit up um to get to where we are there are people that work hard to get to ensure that um the citizens don't have to pay more than what all of us can bear so the budget has decreased by 19% and that's simply due to the fact um that we've taken out many of the grants for construction our grants usually don't uh always yeah guys can you stop that because Kiki is going to go over all of those things thank you so a lot of times our grants don't always complete are completed in one of those years um so um it's taken us a while for some of these grants that are construction related to even get the money or get the okay to start those so we took those out um we intentionally made that decision to take those projects out until we're in a phase and we get the okay to start those Grant projects uh another point at the end of 20242 fiscal year the city's total debt will be $ 35,6 77,000 that's the end of fiscal year 2425 in comparison to fiscal year in of fiscal year 2018 um the city's total debt was 3 1,734 580 the city is really on the right track of cutting debt our debt has been cut in half since 2019 when the city debt was 66,9 69,000 we added four positions those positions were surely needed in sports and Rec fire department and Grant wrer to general fund and we had no additional positions in u the enterprise we had $125,000 to Community Services Department to permanently fix the seaw wall we've been maybe repairing the seaw wall and it's it's costing us just as much to repair so it really needs to be fixed once and for all uh with impact fees we will buy three new police cars a truck for the fire department and a truck for Community Services in the Enterprise fund we will purchase two knuckle Boon and we will again lease a new garbage truck in the Enterprise fund for water sewer and and sanitation commercial the budget includes increases approved by the commission storm water Ebu uh for this year is $169,000 and so excuse me $169 not $169,000 , $169 but with all of that said those are just some highlights of things that we uh wanted to bring to your attention and now Kiki is going to go over the budget Page by Page good evening for the audience's sake I want to remind everyone that we have met with you individually so you have had the opportunity to ask uh me and the city manager any questions that you wanted uh this is the first time I'm presenting to the body as a whole as I've explained uh previously the first few pages are exactly the same as they have always been it details our history on where the money comes from um and the utility rates as of this year the budget for 2024 as um the city manager stated does include a millage of 4.05 and the Water and Sewer increases that you approved last month those increases are included in this budget where the numbers start to change are on page 10 this is our debt service calendar it tells you every payment that will be made by the city on the date those payments will be made the debt service for fiscal 25 will be 4 Milli 97,000 age 12 highlights the same $497,000 but tells you how much we are paying on each of the bonds or notes and you can look and see that we're paying on the on Disaster Recovery bond for example $2,757 th000 so again this is the same $4 million page 13 just breaks down those same $4 million for the accounting department so they know how to put it into the budget page 14 again is my most favorite page of the budget it gives you everything in one quick snapshot each of the columns is a fund in government accounting a fund is a designated a term that tells you that those monies can only be spent for specific um things and and they're restricted to those funds we cannot intermingle between the columns as city manager said the is now at $2,100,000 this is 19% below where it was in fiscal 24 again primarily because of the reduction of the grant funded projects the revenues start on page 15 of course the very first line item is the ADV velorum the millage rate which uh we budget 95% per statute uh of what we believe uh this 4.05 will bring in so uh the adorm will be $6.4 million this year anything with a dark shaded green background are numbers that I get from the state I have no leeway on those numbers everything else is my best estimation on page 17 you'll see the ground total for for general fund will be $1 19 million $600,000 then become comes the impact fees for the general fund $224,000 and so on going through each of the different funds until you get to page 22 and again $52 M100 th000 total revenues for State Statute the revenues have to balance against the expenditures so you'll see that number for expenditures as well there only three ways to do that one is to spend exactly the same amount of money you bring in you from dealing with home budgets no that's nearly impossible to do the other is to take from your savings account to fund your deficit that's called Cash carry forward in our world or if you are lucky enough to underspend your revenues you put money in your piggy bank for later on that's called Reserves in the case of the general fund this year we will use cash carry forward of about $78,000 certainly within the uh Realm of the size of this budget I have absolutely no concerns about that at all pages 23 24 and 25 give you some graphical representations these numbers are a little different city manager asked me to reduce these by the disaster uh monies so it's only 47 million rather than the 52 but this is the same money just represented in different graphical form page 25 tells you all about Personnel expenditures we're actually only at 2% from fiscal 24 which I think is fabulous um we will have additional staff uh we had some long-term employees leave us we've uh hired newer staff with so that's it all measured out to a 2% increase over 2024 pages 26 through 31 tell you about each and every department where we're changing positions we're adding here we're taking away there uh it Nets out to adding or we will end up I should say with 204 a half full-time equivalence and 17 part-time staff members that's on the bottom of page 31 32 describes um the grant fending projects and you'll see that it's less than $2 million this is the significant difference between fiscal 24 and fiscal 25 we had believe it's $16 million in uh fiscal 24 but again a city manager said those projects are not ready they're not shovel ready as the term goes uh so we're waiting for them to get uh through the process at the Govern higher governmental level and it's entirely possible I may come back to you at mid year and say these are ready to go we need to adjust the budget for those projects keep you informed page 33 and 34 are the capital outlay items we'll spend $8 million on different vehicles and Equipment uh some land that you already heard about at the CRA meeting um several of these things are being funded by impact fees then we get to the heart of the budget which starts on page 35 the legislature Department which is your department will increase by $3,300 that's a marginal increase the executive budget will be at $494,000 there's a marginal increase here of 177,000 I will say um as we're all aware there has been significant inflation Countrywide we reflect that in our budget there's a cola for staff we've increased several items that are coming to us with increases so we've increased those in our budget to pass on to our customers is just a fact of life here so when I talk about marginal in increases a lot of that has to do with a state of the national economy having said that uh the finance department is on page 37 which show shows a very large increase and as we discussed we will be hiring a deputy Finance director with the idea that um that person and I will work together for a period of time until that person gets comfortable and they can take over the responsibilities and I will leave you then so that's why we've got a large increase here is because we've got two uh salaries tandem planning department has a marginal increase of 13,000 public works as we've discussed we've taken all the employees out of Public Works and allocated them out to the uh Enterprise funds so it looks like we're saving $45,000 here not really the case the money is actually going into the Enterprise fund so that we can get a better handle on really what the utilities cost to run AG 40 is the general fund Debt Service this is one portion of one uh 2016 sales tax bond that bond is split between the general fund the water department and the sewer department so that's just a portion of one Bond AG 41 facilities maintenance we do have an increase here we've got additional staff coming in they will be getting a vehicle um and that's primarily the increases for facilities maintenance administrative support we do have an additional staff member in here the grant writer we were able to get into this budget so I'm thrilled to death with that that's an excellent move uh in towards the future is my personal op opinion my professional opinion excuse me that a grant writer will pay for itself over the course of that person's tenure with the city uh having said that it looks as if we're saving a half a million dollars on this budget that is um primarily because we are do not have reserves this year you'll see the very last number in fiscal 24 we hopefully going to put a half million dollars aside in biggy bank that will not happen this year in 25 Information Technology we were able to save some money here and that was uh from computer software support Police Department we do have an increase and as city manager explained to you it's primarily because we will be purchasing three patrol cars and we'll be using impact fees for those that purchase fire department has an increase of proximately $123,000 that is primarily because of increased staff we were adding two firefighters two firefighters the code enforcement as I um explained to you before we are fully staffed with two individuals there so we only have a minor increase to that department protective inspections which commonly referred to as the building department actually shows a savings of $115,000 Human Resources um I did mentioned to you that the liability insurance came in a little lower than we had thought it did was going to so we have a savings in the HR department ly Haven Bou Park and preserve as you are all aware this is Grant funded project we try and keep this budget at about three and a half sorry $350,000 a year um money is going to run out at some point so I want to make sure everyone is aware that once that grant money is gone this is expenditure that the city will have to plan for in the future customer service um does have an increase here we are planning to do some um construction work on the customer service building which is part of this campus a city manager wants to have the exterior reflect what this building looks like and we also have some interior things that we want to address so we've we've added some budget for construction over there the streets department this has a savings of nearly a million dollars again this is projects that we had um primarily it's the legislative Paving money that was not awarded in 25 we will roll approximately half a million dollars from fiscal 24 to 25 but that's the 24 um allotment from the state there is no more money in 25 from the state for legislative Paving fet management has a small Savings of $15,000 Economic Development which is one of Mr Jen's budgets um you'll see a de decrease on his salary we are not decreasing his salary we are reallocating between the CRA and the economic develop velopment so cra is paying more of his salary this year than it did in 24 he keeps a wonderful detail C calendar that he gives me every year to substantiate how we come up with this allocation Sports and wreck uh basically a flat budget for them they are getting some equipment uh and we're using impact fees to finish off the K Griffin parking lot that's rollover project from 24 we'll have about $150,000 that we'll use in 25 to finish off that project parks and grounds has a small increase of $43,000 primarily for a vehicle that we will be using impa fees to purchase Communications of marketing will have $573,000 next year which is is above about $45,000 more than this year it's a little bit of everything Animal Control also is going up $444,000 that's primarily for uh staff increases you met Courtney uh couple of meetings ago she's doing a wonderful job her staff is doing a wonderful job we've made some adjustments to their salaries that is the end of general fund everything after that is um has its own balance sheet and uh profit and loss statement or income statement however you phrase it in your business Community I'm starting with something that's called general fund impact fees I know that's confusing it's not part of the general fund but when that money is used it's transferred into the general fund we will spend $721,000 of impact fees and each of the projects are listed there for you to see sidewalk projects the police vehicles the fire vehicle and so on then comes the CRA again its own fund as Mr jenie explained to you we've budgeted a, $274,000 as you are aware he uh gets a certain amount of money every year and that money is meant to be spent he's in the enviable position of having to spend his money so I have no concerns about this budget at all the water department starts on page 68 and continues on to page 70 again I have included the um the increases that you approved here last month I am comfortable with the water department the sewer department also includes the increases that you approved last month as I have told you many times in the past the sewer department is my biggest concern for the city we do have a little money tucked aside uh in reserves $381,000 um we are going from an $1 million budget in fiscal 24 down to a $7,300 th000 budget in fiscal 25 most of that has to do with projects that are being put off uh because of the not being ready in the uh other governmental agencies the storm water department starts on page 74 and 75 this also includes the the assessment increase that you'll be discussing later on in the meeting tonight uh it also has a reduction of a million 7 um this is primarily for the legislative storm water that was a down $600,000 and then the uh cdbg uh Grant is a decrease of almost $600,000 so just between those two projects being pushed that's bulk of it the sanitation department comes in at 3 million4 I'm perfectly comfortable with that number then we get to page 78 again this is a separate separate funds unto thems however these monies will be transferred into the Enterprise fund we will take a million dollar out of impact fees and use it for the um the Expansion Project we'll take $85,000 out of the impact fees and use it for the Aline Parkway we'll take 225 ,000 out and use that for a bush ax in the storm water department and then we'll tuck aside $172,000 in the water fund for their reserves Disaster Recovery is on page 79 as you're aware we're pretty much getting close to the end we still have the facilities Maintenance building to do we still have some wrap up to do on this building and of course the debt service for the disaster fund will continue for many years to come Debt Service runs $2,700,000 again we're wrapping up on the disaster recovery as of last week the report that I got from um the State of Florida was we had $ 6,300,000 due to a still from FEMA that money will come in in dribs and drabs city manager works on this diligently trying to get them to release These funds it's Yan's work it's very difficult to do uh but when that money does finally come in and the projects are completed we will have a de deficit and the general fund will have to take over the debt service on the disaster Bond page 80 is the covid expenditures we have $31,000 tucked away this was money that got from the county several years ago I just throw $5,000 in there just as a placeholder because we never know what's going to go on with covid and then lastly is the sir tax fund we will spend $250,000 on the senior center $700,000 on Street Paving and then we're going to save for the following year $3 3,994 th000 that is the budget we have any questions any questions for finance director want to start with the commission then we'll go to the public any questions from the commission I have one sorry so with this grant writer um that's that would potentially be coming in this position what all type of Grants are we envisioning focusing on what type like what are we looking the cover well I won't be directing the position but my recommendation would be the expansion of the sewer department okay but it surely will be a little bit of everything it just won't be one department so that grant writer is going to be specifically looking for grants for the city uh right now we have someone that does grants and contracts we have them a lot of contracts and then we have a lot of grants that we really have to manage uh reporting every month and you're trying to report you have 20 grants and you have to report those to several different agencies so we really want to get back to looking for those grants that will help sewer dep Department um there are grants out there for uh Parks Community Services uh water grants that are out there uh this person will be specifically looking for those grants that will help us to again um increase to to Really increase and and renovate our infrastructure so that we don't have to use money from our funds I mean that's the great thing about grants if you can find 100% funding it's a wash you haven't lost any money from any of your funds that's our goal My Hope Is that with this grant writer position that over time like you said pay for it itself but also it'll allow us to do things to potentially lower the millage rate in the future because we can use grant funding to cover things um or look at considering changing How We Do storm water or whatever if we're able to get more grants focus more on grant money uh that we can get in that we don't have to uh you know get charged the citizens for usage and uh so I'm really hoping that the grant Rider is going to be a good thing I think that it will be ultimately as is always the case we charge just the very bare minimum on the millage that we to be able to um balance the budget yeah that's the way the statute is written is it's meant to balance the budget sorry right and so my thought process is if you have grant money coming in towards the budget right then that means potentially the millage rate could go down because you don't have to pull from the millage you can pull from the grants a to secure grants that help the general fund absolutely yes you are correct any additional questions from the commission I have a couple on the um you mentioned on the Enterprise impact fees that we're transferring money into other areas the water department the water department will took aside $172,000 the other monies above that on the page that are going to purchase specific either items or projects so I take the money out of that fund and I do a journal entry to move the money into the Enterprise fund to pay for whatever it is that you've agreed to here today and you said on the Disaster Recovery expenditures that at some point in time our general budget will have to start picking up would you explain that again I'm sorry I missed it of course you're fully aware of when the hurricane hit the city did not have enough money to handle the debris removal and the city floated a bond for $31 million in change it was the right thing to do you did not have a choice it was the only way the city got through the hurricane over the course of these nearly six years we have spent $1 million on the city on all the projects we have brought in approximately $100 million give or take through the insurance money through FEMA through interest on the money we have about a million six in the bank today we have have 6 million3 as a receivable coming in so that gets us to 7 million in change right budget this year is 4 million that leaves us with $3 million in the disaster fund The Debt Service annually is $2,700,000 that buys us one year of debt [Music] service so some my best projection today is sometime around fiscal 27 is when the general fund will have to take over the responsibility for that debt service on the disaster Bond and it will be somewhere in the neighborhood of $18 million um I have another question about the scada I know it's a software is this a new or update it's 550,000 no ma' this is uh intended for our lift stations currently the lift stations do not have any SCA on it and that is so that we can remote them or monitor them remotely um so this is to and start on our major stations and then work down the list as we go we will still have the strobe light for warnings yes also um I noticed that your Department's one of your departments has taken a big hit so we're postponing a lot of our projects um are you referring to the storm waterer project or the stormw budget sewer sewer so we did we the headworks project uh we had 3.6 million I believe in the budget this year of course it's 12 million to build the project so we removed that 3.6 from the budget so it looks like we are you know decreasing the budget significantly however we're just not being able to complete that project yet all right any other additional questions here for me just going to restate um based on my meeting with the city manager and the finance director um and and I don't know if we we could help it or not but I'm just going to State what I was came off my brain that day we have another year going on in the budget um we're looking at a 4% Cola increase and I don't personally don't think it matches the inflation rate it could be a cola of less than 4% our millit rate is going we're looking at 4.05 um it is one of the tightest budgets I've ever seen and um you're talking about Debt Service but there's not money in the in the budget where we're looking at forecasting what our debt service is if we had a little more to work with say a 4.1 millage there'd be more in the budget so we can extend The Debt Service a little bit that being said um we talked about disaster funds and we've going we're going another year without saying anything about a library we promised our citizens a library and we've we've kicked it around a little bit but it's rubber not meeting the road in a budget another year if we don't put anything in there about what what are we going to do about a library okay and then um also I I mentioned it but I was told you know it's a very expensive project we're still looking at Phase five of the sports complex we've dished out a lot of money for the sports complex City Hall and whatnot and there's phase five of the sports complex where we have the the football fields and soccer fields and they're what I'm told is just not there now do you know did we did we not know we spent a lot of money you know that that building's nice and everything but again we don't have the ability to forecast something like that to finish those utility Fields football fields soccer fields um I know lacrosse is a is a is one of the fastest growing Sports in the country and if we don't have the facilities for it you don't you know you miss out it goes to another town you know the County's building a nice facility up the road you know if they have lacrosse and football fields that's that's where it's going to go you know so um 2025 I know we're looking at putting it to putting it to rest and putting it out there but I just want to bring it to everybody's attention that there's there's room to decrease increase and get some stuff in the budget that we can that we can uh get things going and kind of live up to our word kind of thing so we and that's work to do for us so I don't it's not really a question it's just I'm just stating what we said that day and that's that's basically my sentiments so just for those in the audience the last number that I heard about the football fields which is two years ago was $3 million so take that for whatever it's worth um busy Grant Rider um uh the other the Library there was a design done several years ago I don't recall what the estimate was on it then but I'm pretty sure whatever that was is probably just as good as that $3 million estimate the liaries U that entire plan is finished and we did bring it before the commission before didn't make a decision on it it was 1 point9 million project for the library again that's in yesterday's dollars I just wanted to point out that if you look at how much we're paying towards bonds every year that's $4 million so ultimately our goal should be bringing down the which we are the debts going down but just to put it out there for the audience and whatever our goal truly should be lowering the debt so we don't pay that $4 million every year because that's $4 million that we could go towards a library or a football field or whatever so truly our main goal should be right now since the debt was used to be 60 million or 66 or whatever now it's down to 39 if we can get that I believe if I read it properly we're paying like a million dollars in interest or so every year cor so that's a million dollars that's literally going in the toilet because of debt because we're paying interest however it's not all general fund there's only 155 of, of it is general fund everything else is for Enterprise or the disaster truly the bulk of that 2 mil7 is for the disaster Bond that's the you know 2.7 out of four million right and I guess uh one question for clarity is in regards to the disaster bun I think initially um many of us thought that so we have this disaster bun we get reimbursement from FEMA it covers a disaster Bond but as I'm understanding it there are certain uh you certain things that we paid for out of the disaster bond which FEMA did not cover could you identify some of those things that were paid out of the disaster bond that FEMA won't cover well the easy thing to think of is the ECS invoices that have been discussed endlessly they were at 4.9 or 5.2 million yeah 5.2 million somewhere in the 5 million range um clearly we can't ask for that the one of the last conversations we've had with tetratech they suggested we might submit our legal expenses I think the exact quote was it doesn't hurt to ask but I can't put that in my calculation so we have a half million dollars worth of legal expenses that the city had to um foot the bill for I can't assume that the feds are going to say yes we'll send you that half million dollars um those those are the big ticket items we're still negotiation about the temporary facilities um they're very specific about how the money can come in they identify a project they assign a dollar value to it this is what you're going to get for that project and then the economy does what the economy does or we change the scope or you know there's lots of moving Parts here they like for the library they gave us $61,000 that's it $61,000 for the library so now we're talking about a million n budget that's years old basically what's going to happen is whatever decision you make about the library it's going to have to come out of general fund and mayor can I just picky back on that as well um we were calculating that we would actually get $23 million from our insurance we did not anticipate the fact that we would have to go through litigation to get that money and you know of course paying over a million dollars in in litigation feeds um not getting it all close to it so we came out below what we thought we were going to get um had we you know taken uh the money at the beginning of the disaster and um that insurance company had paid us out at 23 million that would have been much better but the administration at that time decided to go with a public adjuster and uh so it was very difficult for us to get money out we we did collect 188 million eight in insurance money 18 million 8 again I think I described to you before they wrote us that final check and said we're settling with you we're done this is the end of the discussion well FEMA doesn't work that way they want to know how much of that money went to this project and how much went to that project and how much and our Consultants are working very diligently trying to come up with a rationale so that female will agree that the 18 million 8 can be assigned to the proper projects it's it's a very laborious process right thank you um questions from the public we'll go row by row Mr Langford I got a small brain so you have to done this down for me um so you mentioned you were concerned about the sewer department but it looks like there's a 36% decrease and the funding um SE is obviously part of the the Enterprise fund we just increased the rates for water and sewer sanitation so I'm curious as to how do you how do we increase rates to an Enterprise fund but then we reduce the sewer department by 36% which is should be our top concern I share your concern you some of the projects that you you took out and then also some of the grant projects that we also took out as well like we discussed um earlier the 3.6 million that we reduced from this year's budget is because we do not have the entire 12 million to complete that project so it looks like we're significantly reducing the budget however we're just pushing the projects down the road that need to be done uh for the budget so it's not that we're reducing the budget and saving money it's that we're not able to complete everything we we must do or we need to do because we don't have the adequate funding for it so we're reducing the budget because we can't do it but the budget is still not enough to complete what needs to be done they provide any Clarity for you Mr Langford all right next row it is the intent uh that we review each of the increases every year so if we're able to stay within the $7 million budget and either I or my replacement do the analysis then that would affect whatever we do um recommend to the commission for the following Year's increases the idea of the utilities is they are supposed to stand on their own two feet as mayor suggested earlier uh and that is my goal to be able to tell everyone what it costs to run the sewer department Miss Walker and at Walker 1106 Michigan Avenue is this the first time that the Commissioners have had the ability to question no we've as she stated in her opening statement we've all had uh individual meetings that probably last an hour and a half to two hours so this is not our first time reviewing it no was the public invited to that particular in no that's what we've done since I've been here is that each year city manager and finance director meets with the Commissioners individually if the commissioner decides to meet meet individually and then we come back and have this public form as we're doing now so no it's it's never been open to the public for the commissioner the director the city manager to meet down and discuss it so if I take these 81 Pages home digest it Page by Page and line by line I can come up in the next commission meeting and question and ask questions because it's on the agenda for the next commission meeting that correct if that's how you decide to spend your evening [Music] sure right anyone else on that row so just a comment I I believe I heard the city manager talk about the 2019 budget and of course you know you can't compare those two things that she referenced the debt not the budget well that was right after the hurricane so if you're talking about the debt which is part of the budget I think um you know I I just think that that's uh I like this word disingenuous because I mean it was Disaster Cleanup Kiki already talked about how you know much money had to go for um you know pickup do you have a question for the budget I do um I would like to well first of all I want to make a comment about Pat I want to thank him for bringing up the library and the sports complex and bringing up those issues um how much was and I believe that the uh building across the way there The Old City Hall that still needs to be repaired how much was spent on this building what was the total expenditure so far on City Hall you can either one of us but this building right now we're just talking about this building um Co Pepper's bid was $13.8 Million that's the construction part of the building construction part of it the demolition design and Furniture we're at $18 million okay uh the other question I have um are there uh I'm glad that the debt has gone down um from 30 uh that from 65 million or whatever it was to was it 35 million or 39 million that the city is currently in debt I heard two different figures and I want to clarify that this is at the end of this fiscal year okay okay so that's that's the clarification on that um are there any estimates and I know this would change the total cost for the upgrades to the sewage treatment facility and the rebuild what would be the total estimate right now and I realize that subject to change you know depending on you know I know it's a process and depending on um you know the cost of supplies and uh you know construction and so forth the latest number that we have used um inhouse is $50 million thank you all right I did want to clarify um in terms of the debt for uh Miss Miss Moore I did give you a comparison in 2017 and I think city manager then was um Mr Schubert the total debt not budget total debt was $1,734 th000 that was in 2017 of course we had the hurricane in 2018 and then we borrowed $30 million $31 million which took the debt to 66 million and additional right anyone else on this side have any questions about the debt or about the budget all right yes ma'am the city was projected to receive like 17 to 22 million I just want to know how much they have received how much of the $10 million bond has been paid back and who they've paid using the funds it's supposed to be a sweep account paying the bond back with whatever amount comes in from the state each quarter it is only two and a half years until the sir attac retires and so we should have collected more than 10 million to pay back the bond by now it should be paid off thank you and what's the 17 and 22 million where is that supposed to come from I believe she's discussing the sir tax fund okay but there were two bonds for the sir tax one was for 6 million the other one got us to 10 million both of those Bonds were paid off in full last January all right any additional questions from the commission right to next time thank you all right moving on to our city attorney's report I have been working with staff to prepare um a handful of ordinances that should be coming to you in your next few meetings all right thank you all right public hearing 6:58 p.m. discussion and a possible approval to adopt the tenative Community Development agency budget for FIS year 2024 2025 this is resolution 2024 9437 and it is a resolution of city of L Haven Bay County Florida adopting the tenative community redevelopment agency budget for fiscal year 2024 2025 providing for an effective date all right thank you are there any comments from the public all right is there a motion to adopt this resolution all motion to approve second motion by commissioner pebles second by commissioner Vandergriff City man if you call the vote commissioner pebl yes commissioner Vandergriff yes commissioner perno yes commissioner War yes mayor Nelson yes motion passed public hearing closed at 7:00 p.m. public hearing opened at 7 p.m. discussion and possible approval to adopt resolution 2024 9438 ten millage rate for 2025 tax roll uh city manager if you read the resolution and the trim rate yes thank you resolution 2024 9438 a resolution of City alen Haven Florida adopting the ten tenative leving of an appal taxes for Bay County for fiscal year 2024 2025 and providing effective date the taxing Authority is the city of Len Haven the roll back rate is 3.75 N4 the percentage of increase over the radb back rate is 7.72 N9 the millage rate to be levied at 4.05 all right is there any comments from the public right are there any questions from the commission all right is there a motion to adopt this [Music] resolution all right make a motion to adopt the resolution for the tenative military 4.05 right is there a second for this motion all right motion dies for lack of [Music] second B discussion and possible approval to adopt resolution excuse me mayor I'm I'm going to need some direction from the commission of what they would like me to do because have to redo the budget all right so commission what would you want her to do commissioner Ward commissioner pees commissioner perno well just like I know you're Sam I know you want to lower the mill rate I'd like to see the mill rate go to 4.1 um I just think that we've we're we're leaving money on the table I'd like to see the cola rate go down and the mill rate go up so like to see more more more money in the budget for for things we need to accomplish and blow through but that's just me um we talked over our strategies and whatnot that's my only hangup right commissioner work in comments All right so is there all right so we don't like the 4.0 five so either we're going to go up or go down right now we can't go above 4.2 because that's the number we voted on so we can't go above 4.2 um and seemingly we can't survive if we go to the roll back rate from the budgets that we've seen um because we did receive I think was it three different budgets um so we did receive three different budgets uh with with three different rates so I believe when we looked at the lore at least in my meeting looked at the lower budget there were certain projects that were being cut out that we we just couldn't see the city you know surviving off a a rback rate from what what I saw in the uh in the budget discussion with the city manager and finance director so um and I guess the question would be if we do the 4.1 um exactly what projects or what would be able to include in the budget at that point nothing if memory serves moving to 4.1 this is from memory so I think it'll bring in another $70,000 but if you give me a moment I can I fire up my machine here and tell you oh I have it at the right page and everything $4,547.43 [Music] $49 half a point either way I'm never I'm just going to say it I'm never going to be Pro raising a millage rate because it's a percentage and it should be based on the millage rate is a percentage of the property tax of the homes and so if more homes are coming in then that Kate takes care of itself and we do have more homes coming in because our accounts are going up that being said I'm not anti-g Grant Rider I love the idea um I do think though that we should find a way to get a grant Rider and cut $774,000 somewhere else know that's a lot of work but there are areas where we can um I know there's a lot of great events that the city does maybe we can look at those uh because at the end of the day we a grant writer could bring us in money to pay for those events um we do have the grant writer in the document you have in front of you but if I understand properly the main purpose to go from 4.0 to 4.05 was to fund a grant writer that was a big chunk of it yeah it wasn't all of it but it was a big chunk of it okay um yeah I just I I I I was I'll be honest I was considering it the 4.05 like heavily but I just my I just consciously can't vote to raise the millage rate it mathematically if you have more people coming to the city the millage rate shouldn't go up my calculations are based on the property Assessor's document that is prepared on June 1 so if they were if the house was completed and they were occupying the house on June 1 they're included in my calculations so whatever happens between June 1 this year in June one next year will be calculated in the following years's we say to I will add that the legislature has approved several more um exemptions um particularly to homesteads that affect the math not in your favor right but every year even if you have a homestead exemption your taxable value goes up 3% so if you bring in more houses plus the addition of 3% if you do the math it's still 4.0 makes more sense as far as the number of houses coming in the 3% increase I guess the question is could we get a better statistic as to what our accounts have increased by is that a Stephanie question oh the utility account that's what I think that's what he's counting as the utility account yeah if if you have more utility accounts that means you have more people I guess this year compared to last year yeah so the utility accounts are um not going to reflect the amount of um increases just because we have like Master meters and things like that so we have um apartment complexes with 280 units and not to me that's one account um of course that property size reflects it but I want to think it was around 10,300 um last time I checked but I can absolutely report back tomorrow with a more accurate number now the 10,300 when you're saying apartment complexes at 280 you know 280 apartments and you're saying that's just one account so if we take away one apartment complex are you saying then it would be 10,299 is that how you're counting that correct and in that 10,300 is also the irrig meters so I want to think there's about 9500 um residential and just asking for approximate numbers can you approximate what that residential number was last year around budget time approximately I would I would hate to give you an incorrect number right now um I would definitely say it's gone up a few hundred just because of the um amount of customers moving back since the hurricane um that doesn't necessarily mean new build though um so I I can absolutely get that number tomorrow though thank you can I ask um just how much money are we talking about on a $250,000 house with um homestead exemption at05 I can tell you cuz that's exactly what my my house is and I've already done the math so we're looking at like an extra $16 a year a year mhm looking at 32 if we go to 4.1 mayor I need some Direction please all right so right now and another motion then yes I'm I'm just continuing our discussion and we um mayor um commissioner Vander her her motion was for the 4.05 am here says he wants to take it down to 4.0 right well I wanted to go up to 4.1 right I mean I feel like we're playing poker here but I'd be happy to uh make the motion or let commissioner Vander Griff um go ahead and make her motion again and agree to 4.05 so all right if that's where we're getting if we're not going to if we're not going to swing swing up sure as heck not going to swing down so basically you're suggesting split splitting in the middle pretty much it's what where it is yeah just come just going back to what the it's just me and you talking here anyway anyway so yeah right all right is there a a motion for this go ahead yes Mr Mayor I'd like to make a motion um the motion is to um accept the proposed budget um with um millage rate of 4500 is there a second for this I will second that motion all right motion by commissioner vandagriff second by commissioner perno city manager if you call the vote commissioner Vander yes commissioner perno yes commissioner sorry pebles no commission war no mayor nson yes motion passed uh discussion and possible approval to adopt resolution 2024 9439 tenative general fund and Enterprise fund budget for fiscal year 2025 there any public comments all right no comments from the public is there a motion to adopt this resolution would you like for me to read the resolution mayor a resolution of the city of Lin Haven Florida adopting the tentative budget for fiscal year 2024 2025 and providing an effective date is there a motion to adopt this resolution [Music] or if you like to discuss changes you would like to see in the budget we can do that as well is there any make a motion to adopt the resolution second all right city manager if you'll call the vote commissioner perno yes commissioner Vander yes commissioner perno excuse me Commissioners pebles no commissioner War yes mayor Nelson yes motion passed public hearing closes at 7:14 p.m. consent agenda approval of minutes 8272 24 regular meeting minutes approval for for a final RV extens extension for an additional 6 months on property 1212 Texas Avenue for delayed reconstruction post hurricane Michael and approval to declare asset bushhog 1 3883 Surplus and auction off there motion for the consent agenda I would like to motion to approve with the addition that we add Mr Walker's comments that he made to the minutes he said I believe if you can correct me if I'm wrong wrong Mr Walker but didn't you say there were some things you said in public commentary on 827 that were not reflected in the minutes I don't think anybody's comments are verbatim in the minutes though I mean when I review the minutes my comments aren't verbatim no one's comments are verbatim so if he's referring to his verbatim comments nobody's comments are verbatim I think um CJ does a great job of summarizing with the comments or and highlighting those but I don't think anybody's comment Ser verbatim is there a Mr Walker is there something that like like a key item that you didn't see in there or is it just that you didn't see the ver verbatim comments in there this has happened before if you realize that when you are keeping a log I had this discussion with Mr Jackson the only thing you rely on is the fact that you can go to your records and prove it comment that was made in what I made was the statements that I made were not fully explained this has been done before can you be more specific to the specific part in the minutes that you're referring to beginning because she said Mr Walker said following he didn't okay didn't include the whole thing okay so it does sound like it's just that it was not she didn't put in verbatim but um okay I understand thank you but like I said this has happened before and it's supposed to get it from the all right so it does sound like um it's that the verbatim was not listed and based on uh that how we've been doing it uh I'll resend it in just motion to approve and then um any time anyone has issues with uh if they feel like they didn't say get in the minutes um just bring up a public commentary specifically um that way that'll help a little bit better help us figure out what it is that weren't in there so what's the motion again motion to approve as is all right is there a second second all right City manag we call the vote Comm commissioner pebles yes commission perno yes commissioner vandagriff yes commission War yes mayor Nelson yes motion passed moving on to new business discussion and possible approval of resolution 2024 9436 setting the storm water service assessment role and storm water assessment fees for fiscal year 2024-25 City manag if you read the resolution resolution number 2024 9436 res res olution of the city Commission of Lin Haven Florida providing the fiscal year 2024 2025 storm water service assessment role for storm water related Services facilities and programs thatting certification and assessment role and collection pursuant to the uniform assistant collection act confirming notice imposing leving storm water service assessments providing Direction and providing Ive date right City attorney all right um are there any questions regarding the storm water service assessment fees any questions from the commission for um the storm water department if we keep the rate the same what would our short Falls be that would be my question as far as what would we not be able to accomplish correct so the storm water non-ad is what pays for the salaries of the Personnel that runs the department or that works in the department um the maintenance the ditch digging contract the co replacement um you know repairing inlets Etc so again the budget looks like we have reduced it significantly um we have not reduced the the budget for you know MoneyWise we have just reduced the projects that are not ready to bid out yet so if we continue to either stay steady with the non-ad as it is today or if we increase it um all we are doing is taking in the um million five million 7ish um for the maintenance that we will run the storm water department day-to-day with and also try to help build a reserve for the future if you recall um I think two years ago we had the the box cover at 19th in Maine that we had to to replace that was rotten luckily we had the arpa money to help cover that project if we had not had the arpa money we would have either had to borrow from sanitation or go out and get a bond on the project to be able to build it because we did not have the money so the non- adval arm is helping fund the day-to-day and helping build reserves in the storm waterer Department so that we can eventually take care of those projects as they come again we are not able to build any of the master plan projects or any of the future CIP projects with what we take in it's only the day-to-day operations the day-to-day maintenance also the equipment that you see in the budget um that is not purchased from the non-ad war that is purchased from Storm waterer impact fees so if we continue to keep it the same we will always have to go to the impact fees for equipment always have to go um other places hopefully grants or or Appropriations for the projects and we will not have the reserve in case something happens we would have to go borrow from sanitation or an srf project or a bond we promised o we promised the citizens when we passed this last year that we would take a look at it every single year that it wouldn't be an autom atic increase so you're telling me uh that we still need this money that we've come a long way yes ma'am but there will always be maintenance to accomplish um I've been here this month will be four years uh prior to that I believe they had $10,000 a year budgeted in r&m infrastructure right now we're able to to budget anywhere from 245 to 200 $65,000 just to repair storm water coverts inlets dig the ditches um and in the the past four years since we've had the non-ad we've been able to dig almost every ditch in the in the city we've been able to purchase the concrete canvas um repair inlets that that have been failing uh replace coverts purchase new equipment um and that kind of stuff so it has been a huge help on maintaining the storm water um we have seen a reduction in the structural FL fling um we have had some Summers that haven't had as much rain so that has helped as well but we can see a reduction in the structural flooding um that we had before and now I guess the question is are we I know four years ago when we adopted this and this is also to I guess part of commissioner vander's question or as I'm seeing it as well I know four years ago when we adopted the storm water assessment we were going off sort of a a in inreasing scale that was presented by stantech that would get the storm water to a place where it could be independent and not again taking money from sanitation and so have we reached that point yet I guess is you know part part of the question that we've stopped that a couple of times but have we reached the point to where we don't need to borrow money from sanitation and if we don't increase this will we have to take money from sanitation the from what stantech originally presented if we continue on this path we will have a shortfall longer because we didn't have the higher increases that they projected from the get-go we still have a shortfall in cash because of the amount of the increase that we have not done we have slowly increased it this the year two I don't think we increased it at all if I remember correctly and then we had a smaller increase last year and then we have a smaller increase this year than what was originally projected from stantech so we still will not hit the the goal that they anticipated in year five we will still have the the shortfall and Kiki can correct me or elaborate more on that if I missed that but that is little let me embroider a bit when stantech did their initial analysis they told us a certain percentage over five years and at the end of those five years we would um uh receive x amount I don't remember what the grand total of x amount was but because we pushed off one year and we did some adjustments along the way over those five years we will receive a million dollar less than what stantech told us we were going to receive in five years so just pushing off a year and making some adjustments I understand they were difficult times it was covid the economy is bad we thought we were doing what was right for the uh residents but in the long run we're going to have to make up that million dollars as of today today the storm water department is in the hole they have a negative cash position of a half a million dollars we have taken the position that we're not going to take money from sanitation anymore but I report to you that they are in a deficit position of about a half a million dollars today and if you do not approve this increase that will only make that situation worse so I guess the other question would be if we're negative half a million what are we doing to cover um that negative line item where we where are we getting that money from to cover that we're not we're taking from reserves or we're cash carry forward remember how I discussed that at the beginning of the meeting we're using a cash carry forward we're taking from yesterday's money to um apply to this budget it sto storm water needs these uh non ad vorum assessments is there additional questions I see you yeah um any additional questions from the commission are we going to have like a discussion period or just questions I just wanted to talk about it a little bit um if there's a motion and second and that'll move us to discussion okay I don't okay so I didn't really want to talk about this I like the vote on this item I just wanted to bring it up that um that uh I I'm not a huge fan of the not non- out of alarm method um but I respect that you guys have done your research voted on it and have decided on that and that was even before I was here so with that um I kind of dug into the tier system as I talked about a few weeks ago and um I've done the math and I know it's too late to adjust it to like a uh a major adjustment tonight obviously but because it was on the agenda and we talked about it I did all the math um I've created uh options that could be we either adjust the three tier move to a four tier move to a five tier that will make it more fair among the citizens because the math just there as I said a a month or so ago um there's as far far as like the average home versus the tier 2 cost is like a 12 a half% variance that's not fair if if if there is a true three tier system then the average home should be paying close to what tier two is when you average all the homes and so I've done all the math I've created a slideshow um I send it as city manager so if any of you want to see the math uh this would obviously be for a future budget um just to put it in our heads uh for the future um I think that there needs to be some tweaking to the tier method if that's what we're sticking with like I said I respect that you guys have done uh the research I respect that you guys have decided um that and so I'm not going to push back on it I just ask that um you consider the math that if we do stick with a tier system uh non out alarm that we adjust the tear to make it more fair among the citizens uh as well as potentially bring in more Revenue to the city if you change the math up a little bit it'll make it more fair plus it'll bring in more money to the city so it's a win-win uh so I just wanted to throw that out there um so if you're interested in that you can ask uh the city manager for the math that I did uh of course it's not a voting item um it's just math for consideration in the future it's not for tonight it's not for this voting item it's just so that we have a better idea if anyone out there wants to see the slideshow send me an email I'll send it to you um I just uh like to like I said last year I just want to talk about this more refine their approach um and you know that's all that's all I wanted to say all right is there a motion for this just ask quick question if with this increase how much extra does this bring in if compared to if we kept the rate the same believe it's $300,000 okay thank you here if I me yes sir no um it Sam um if we could share your math that you gave the city manager city manager has to share it with us so we can't ask Sam to share it with us right share correct if you wouldn't mind sharing that with all of us okay I sure will can I double check with the city attorney that's okay to do if I give the city manager a slideshow of just math so if anybody wants to discuss it it needs to come back on the agenda if anyone loves your fourthe plan or at least wants to discuss it more it does require a change to your methodology which may require um stantech to update their reports and I haven't reviewed your initial assessment resolution or your ordinance to understand what changes may also be necessary there yeah I was more so asking can they just ask for the slideshow and look at it they can it's if you submitted it to her it's a public record okay um they just can't talk to you about it except in a public meeting okay thanks right is there a motion for this I think we've kicked the can enough I'm going to make a motion that we approve this year's increase right is there a second for this second all right motion by commissioner perno second by commissioner V Griff comments from the public Mr lenford that time of year storm water come back around I'm going to ask you for the same two things I asked for every single year one why am I paying more for a vacant piece of property than I am my house with a pool deck driveway Etc makes zero sense you guys were just talking about an adjustment to the millage rate that equated to $16 year okay I'm paying $57.79 more on a piece of property with nothing on it than I am my house I'm going leave that one alone the second thing I'm asking for is when does this thing stop right which leads me to my next point the lady came up here tonight and I believe she said that there were roughly 10,300 accounts I think is what she said so quick math if we did 10,300 accounts and everybody paid $8 which is what we were paying before on our water bill that would be $82,400 now that may be 10,300 accounts consisting of both house and irrigation I'm not sure bottom line here's where I want to draw the comparison what was happening before this special assessment occurred what was the budget for storm water I want you to take that number okay annually and I want you to compare it to the number right now which is I believe 1.7 and some change okay I'm not going to sit here and do the public math on the percentage increase that is to operate a department but it is astronomical okay now here's the way I want to close when we were paying $8 on the water bill we were robbing Peter to pay Paul we were taking money from this department to fund the storm water okay you all said well we need a special assessment we need $1.7 million a year in order to fund this department we're going to do X Y and Z in order for for us to fix the flooding in L Haven 1.7 mil is what we agreed on essentially every year and it would be re-evaluated every year okay now I'm hearing that out of the 1.7 mil X 100% increase from what we were operating before is still not enough we're still robbing Peter to pay Paul so my question to you and and your question to everyone else is is what is enough how much money is enough to prevent us from robbing Peter to pay Paul to fund a department you guys really got to understand this where were we where we are now and where are we headed that's all I want to that's all I want to figure out I mean we're we're it's a substantial increase the money that's going to that department so I it's got me scratching my H I don't understand it I don't understand how it happens and I don't understand how it's still not enough and every year we want more and more money thank you mayor can I address some of that the first year storm water brought in$ 1.2 million that's the first year assessment the second year it was not increased so it was $1.2 Million um the third year is when we changed the uh changed a little bit and it was 1.5 somewhere along in there $1.5 million so as Kiki was saying that 1.2 the second year that we did not change we're making up for it we really are not we're just in the hole basically because that that second year where we didn't follow the plan of of stac now we're behind now that we're back on trap we still have to play catchup and that's just where we are so this year it's going to bring in $1.7 million but y I will just say I I know uh commissioner perno was here when I came in the city has and had some very bad storm water even our former mayor knew it she was out there with all the rest of us it was bad we were night and day when it rained there were neighborhoods that were literally all underw water that is not happening so I think that we can see the storm water is working I just don't want to see this city go back to where houses are really being flooded and we can't improve our infrastructure because we don't have the money I remember the first year city manager we had to borrow a million do from sanitation because there was only about $800,000 maybe no $400,000 in storm water so that just gives you an idea of where we come for from with storm water to be able to help the residents uh that had very very bad flooding the one thing that we need to remember is when you're talking about how things were years ago before the hurricane all those trees were helping us with our storm water flooding even with all the trouble that we were having the trees were helping us now the trees are gone the same amount of water is coming down they're not being absorbed by the vegetation so until that growth comes back which will take decades we can't count on that and I share the city manager's opinion here we don't want to slide backwards we've made great strides we have a rain event the phones don't ring like they did before several years ago we would hold our breath when the rains came down we didn't know how many people were going to be impacted that has been drastically reduced so I I understand that it has Financial impact on all the residents uh but as far as the city is as my professional opinion is we need to continue forward progress with this and don't let it slide back through disrepair like it was in the past Mr wer we've been at this for I've been at this for 20 years you weren't here you weren't here you weren't here you aren't here you aren't here you aren't here you aren't here from the staff we not not here we paid into storm water for 20 years I was asked at one time to do a survey and find out where that money was going that was put on our water bill did find out was put on the general fund and the general fund it disappeared nobody could find it for 20 years we paid into storm water when this first came up where we got involved with it Mission War got involved in it you guys went and got a company give you outside information one time we came in a meeting with that company up there with a big sign Lin Haven you cannot support storm water period Then you open Pandora's Box by going with a assessment now every village town going with assessments you opened it you just had a variance committee meeting where it was proven that the people could not adapt to your storm water rules variance committee gave them a variance on it you know why the water table is 3 Ines below the ground at that meeting I said the water table at my house is three in above the grass you're not going to solve this you were told the only people that have ever solved this is Galviston Louisiana Holland you can't solve it right now Galveston they had to take the whole city and evacuate it and build it up the island just recently they had a rainfall and guess what Galviston went underwater you know Louisiana went underwater you can't solve it you passed the resolution to that syntax I think that's the name of the company take over and tell you what to do uhuh War has made a suggestion once can we get another company you're throwing it against the wind not working that's why you're going to have to continue to raise this every year let you get people that know what they're doing and solve the problem people in this town citizens are going to have to bear you out every time is there any additional public comment see minut if you call the vote commissioner berno yes commissioner V GFF yes commissioner peoples yes commissioner War yes mayor Nelson yes motion passed discussion and possible approval of of development order extension request on the development order to expand the Eminem Market located at 121 Ohio Avenue just briefly I don't have a um presentation for this because basically if you recall uh &m um Market who are on the corner of 12th in um Ohio were given a development order a year ago so that they could expand their business expanded store and also put in storm water and more parking uh and Landscaping they have asked their their development order actually expires tomorrow because it's only good for one year and so they have asked if they can have a six-month extension and they said the reason is because their engineer has had health issues and they've had some deaths in the family and it just hasn't been top priority we discuss I just like to say I'm I'm that's my that's my convenience store right there at the corner of 12th and and the 77 Vick and Sheila and uh you know they're really good folks they are wonderful people and and and you know Circle K is nice big shiny place but mck and Chila you know their folks always greet you they know you by name you know it's a really really good warm feeling when you go in there and I know theyve they've had the best intentions of getting this going but and I'd also like to tell you the property their property is also where um the American s is is you know they're they're they've staged their gravel and whatnot and VI let them come on their property and do the the the shoulder extension for 389 so I mean that would have pushed them back a little bit too if it was at another time so they they've had they've had to overcome some things so just to let you know and uh I as far as expart communication they had brought it up to me and I said we'd talk about tonight and just want to let youall know how I feel I we've extended development orders before I know that and they're they're they're the type of folks they're going to get it done so although they're only asking for six months um could we actually consider doing it for another year yes sir you can so I would just probably instead of the six months just as we consider do it for another year I would definitely uh make that motion so let's let's give an extension for a year and I'd like to make that motion right motion by Commission commiss perno is there a second a second second by commissioner pebles any discussion from the public all right City manag you call the vote commissioner perno yes commission pebles yes commissioner War yes commissioner Vander yes mayor and Elon yes motion pass meeting adjourn