##VIDEO ID:N_zZLvPqdcA## good good evening everyone welcome to the Sebring city council meeting Tuesday October 15 2024 calling this meeting in order if you all stand with me the mayor's going to lead us in a prayer and a pledge please bow with me Lord thank you once again for the city that we live in thank you for the staff that we have and really appreciate the work they've done and holding the city together under a tragedy uh that overtook us the responsiveness the way our systems are running kept up it kept the city moving and kept our our residents um much safer than than some other places we ask that you watch over our um citizens in our entire County especially those that got hit hard and those with the tornadoes that came by and and tore apart their residences and we ask that you watch over the people that are still without power without food uh without homes and just take care of them and and also not only here but on the coast and also up in the Carolinas which are still there we ask that you continue to watch over us push the weather bad weather far away from United States and and just future Healing Hand over those that are suffering we ask that all we do in your name Jesus Christ amen amen amen pled allei to the flag of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands one nation God indivisible with liy and justice for all call the rooll please may here car here here here Stewart here Bishop here uh business from the audience procedure if anyone has something they would like to discuss that is not on the agenda if you'll fill out one of the forms here on the front table and hand it in to clerk Haley she will get it to me and we will get to at the appropriate time mayor's report uh other than uh cleaning up and helping around the city and neighbors and that stuff I really have nothing to report everything the city have really uh the city really lucked out if you ask me um I know there's people still suffering out there without some without power some without food some without homes and that stuff that you know we need just reach out but I watched neighborhood by neighborhood people uh helping each other which was really kind of comforting to see what kind of community that we live in but other than that I really have nothing else to report okay all right all right Miss Carlo well I just want to thank all the city employees you know we we think of First Responders we think of the fire I think of the police department but our water department they were out there our street sanitation department so they're all in my eyes First Responders and I just want to say thank you for the great job each and every one of you done because our city the mayor said our city come through it really well they had the drains all they drained and nobody I don't think I don't know if anybody flooded or got flooded so thank everybody and I'm glad everybody's safe um good evening everyone and I I too I just want to say thank you um thank you to God for sparing our County and our city and uh of course lake plet has some real damage in that mo mobile home and you know we're just not used to tornado striking anywhere close around us but it was so comforting to know that the city was on top of the situation and our directors of uh utilities and public works and and the police and the firemen and the others uh and Scott natley keeping in touch with me and uh just appreciate how everybody worked together it was pretty amazing and it was also amazing how quickly disaster can come on you and you're cut off with no electricity and uh no phones well I think we kind of had phones for a while but you know it's just wonderful to know you're in a good safe area in our country so thank you to all the city people that make that happen and and we appreciate you all thank you Jos just want to Echo those comments it was great to see how um the city responded you know working very hard right up to the storm and and right after um I think I was cleaning up my yard at 7:30 on in the morning on Thursday and Public Works in the fire department were there by 8 uh to clear the road so it was really good response and we have a great City yeah same same all of you and going downtown you don't even think that there was a hurricane with what Public Works did and talking to fire department beforehand with all their plans their action plans um team effort couldn't do it without it without everybody coming together um very grateful for everybody I think we're just have one one of the best cities the best responses very grateful so thank you everybody all the department heads all the employees all the team all right thank you all right next up is the consent agenda I will ask that you remove item 8D and we'll address it new bus yes any questions or comments on the consent agenda I make a motion that we consent agenda by removing 8 second pul the board yes yes yes steart yes M yes moving on first up is Jose Silva he wants to hold a special event downtown uh the piranda or the First Baptist Spanish mission church is he here no all right I'll entertain a motion I think's going to come no she not call okay anybody want to propose a motion make a motion we approve the event as presented conditioned upon providing the appropriate insurance certificate Shing at least $1 million of liability insurance and name of the city and naming the city as an additional insur at least 10 days prior to the event I second I have a question okay it uh they want to hang banners on Circle Park for the event but that's when the circle lights circle of Lights is up okay is that going to conflict with that or will the banners be between the palm trees yeah that's where they usually put those Sebring sign so okay I mean we can choose a different it's intering I mean if it's interf I would I would am I'm GNA suggest amending the motion that if it doesn't conflict with the circle lights okay well I'm in my motion uh if the banners don't conflict with what's already there okay and I amend my second all right good catch all the board yes Avery yes M yes Stuart yes Bishop yes next up is first of public hearings number 1530 I will open the public hearing and hand it off to Mr Swain title of proposed ordinance 1530 reads an ordinance of the city of Sebring Florida changing the future land use classification for a partial that total is approximately 19.84% staff report that addresses both in my PowerPoint presentation will um address both as well but these will require CH separate public hearings also the applicant is a present to answer questions if want we get um to that point next slide please so the property is owned by Beacon of New Hope um it is described essentially at the southeast corner of the intersection of Panther Parkway and Beacon Avenue so you can see Beacon Avenue along the north Panther Parkway on the west and then Cowboy Way comes up the South and and then turns away from the property the property is just under 20 acres in size the future land use is currently County medium density residential um and the request is to change that to City medium density residential the zoning change is County residential R1 to City multiple family District R3 this is an image I took off of um Google Maps so the property is on the right side of the screen as you can see the property is um agriculture mostly mostly Groves um and then across from Beacon Avenue is the residential project that's currently uh development and then this is the view looking up caloy way which you can definitely see the orange trees there's also so um a power line that runs through that property so that will be addressed as a project is uh going to move forward so this map is the existing future land EES map you can see the red lines show what is in the city limit so everything to the north west and south is all in the city limit a lot of it still has County designation on it that will be changed at some point time and then the properties to the East are in unincorporated County as you can see between County and City both sides are are generally residential medium in nature there is a residential high and an a piece sign as well um the request is to change it to City medium density residential which allows between five and 12 dwelling units per acre with a maximum surface uh surface ratio of7 and a maximum Building height 50 ft and it's described as mainly for single family development and multif family development up to 12 units per acre um looking at the impact the Highlands County um categor is allow is eight units an acre and then the cities is 12 so the impact would be potentially an increase of 80 dwelling units per acre as a total number keeping in mind when roads come in and storm water and and open open space and all the requirements to meet the code are developed into a prod product it's very hard to actually meet that threshold next slide so this is the County zoning um as you can see this property is R1 the zoning is a little bit more mixed than the future land use was there's R1 to the south r1a in the and R2 and egg in the unincorporated lands and then you have um R3 on the bottom and and then the property to the north is M2 in County at this time the zoning requested is for R3 R3 does allow for single family and two family dwelling units it also allows for um multifam units and if you're going to do a multif family unit product there is a whole set of conditions that has to be met which I included in your application package for your information um from discussions with the applicant up to this point the um the intent is for a single family development to be put on this property however when you are resoning to straight zoning it's important to look at all the options that could happen under that straight zoning District slide so again the incre the increase of 80 dwelling units um next slide with the change in the zoning it's a similar this is looking at the land use analysis all the property suring it um is currently agriculture except for the property to the north which is under development for the residential development um portable water lines are located along Pampa Parkway um being they are being extended for the project that's under development so this applicant would uh potentially tie into those water lines um any any extension work or or cost would be would be uh on the developer to pay and um all actual analysis of what those impacts would be would be done at a development approval time and there is a letter from the city utilities verifying that capacity is available to serve the development at its maximum potential same for sewer the sewer lines are in the same place and all those same comments apply um Solid Waste there was a letter provid from the um Highlands County assistant the critical infrastructure director that um was earlier this year that since the county does have capacity to um accept this the solid waste from this development the property is as we pointed out adjacent to Beacon Avenue on the North Panther Parkway on the west and cowboy on the south the roads are shown as operating at level service b a traffic full traffic study would be required at site plan time and OB obviously coordinating with the the county for um access points Etc onto County Road um the applicant did provide information related to Emergency Services to show that the project is within a um less than six minute distance to the different emergency facilities uh surrounding the property or nearest to the property um the schools did what we call an initial um analysis of the property or the project and they have capacity at this time but per requirements they wouldn't actually issue their capacity until the development plan was under review um Recreation and open space would be provided at time of development the table provided here shows the different um levels and requirements of recreation open space that would be needed in um project oops next slide um it is not in any environmentally sensitive areas it is not within a special flood Hazard area and then any analysis for impacts to other environmental issues but there wasn't an area that's specifically identified for um environmental species or issues with that but that would be fully vetted at a time for development approval Slide the proposed request is consistent with the proposed future land use request as and it is consistent with what is allowed currently on the surrounding properties in that area um this is what the future land use map would look like with your change slide and this is what the zoning map um would look like with that change happening this um was scheduled to go to plny and Zoning Board on October 8th but because of potential impacts from the hurricane that meeting was rescheduled so it will go to them on October 29th and any um comments or recommend for recommendation they may will be included in your next package I do just want to say I think I kind of glossed past this but under the um maximum development potential of the for the site they would be allowed a maximum of 238 dwelling units and again looking at how that works with roads and waste water and all the open space and all the different things that have to go in that that number may not be able to be achieved I am happy to answer any questions you may have and as I mention the applicant is here okay thank you and you state state said Green Space has to be just over five acres correct like yes so looking at the different requirements there um you know open space and Recreation space there's just there's the different requirements there we would have to look to see how these are actually applied in terms of development um at times of development based on what they're apply actually applying to be done and you stated that the applicant was looking at single family residences here as the plan yes is this the same property that we looked at before that was going to be multif family yeah didn't you guys Dana I think you guys presented that okay is it the same owner that had that you want to come on up and speak good evening Dana Rell the stone Heng Land Development Consultants uh representing our client speaking of New Hope this evening um at this time when we did come with our initial thoughts we had narrowed it down to a plan development zoning um so we have slightly tweaked our development plans in terms of uh what we're asking for tonight we ended up going for just a regular R3 zoning um because there was some uncertainty we wanted to be able to leave it open for the future development of the property so so the applicant that we have is interested in act still pursuing the multif family but we wanted to have the ability and flexibility that the R3 zoning offers in case those development plans change kind of covering all your bases okay I'm just concerned about the density issue you know I think and I know you can't put the 238 units there but if you put 2 38 units and there's two and a half people per unit or even two units there's that's 500 residences on basically 15 Acres so or 500 units so people to me that's pretty high density so understood um it sounds like there might be some concern regarding traffic with that number of uh residents in the area correct in this instance we have a little bit of first mover Advantage because Panther Parkway is such a new road and Beacon Avenue probably could use some improvements you know there's some major increase in density and intensity and things of that nature uh but we don't expect that there will be a change to the level of service based on the increase in density to this particular property just a little takes a little of the edge off okay the purpose of the public hearing is to allow public comment is anybody from the public have any questions or comments no all right I'll close the public hearing and open the floor to councel anybody have any questions or comments no I'll entertain a motion are you still concerned mayor about the amount of people no potential I mean that whole area is just going to Blossom back in there but I just think that many people in one piece is a lot it is it so the only other option then would be to make them comeb back with a plan development zone right and I think I just got to go through pnz anyway so and and this is the first reading there's always there's going to be P meeting pz recommendations I figured out at our second reading right you guys good with that yeah I am okay yeah I'm fine that okay then I move to approve ordinance 15:30 on first reading and schedule second and final reading for November 5th 2024 second hold the board please yes yes yes Ste yes yes me understand you're saying you're approving it for still want to hear what PNC has to say about density before a second read I'm just making sure okay thank you all right next up is item 10 C it is public hearing and ordinance number 1531 I will open a public hearing and hand it off to Mr Swain ordinance number 15 or proposed ordinance 1531 entitled an ordinance of the city of Sebring Florida changing the zoning classification for a parcel that totals approximately 19.84% from the public I assume there will be none I'll close the public hearing and open the floor to council I move to approve ordinance number 1531 on first reading and schedule second and final reading for November 5th 2024 second by lard call the board har yes yes yes St yes Bishop yes all right thank you Marissa uh next up is item 10d we have another public hearing for the small cities Community Development Block Grant application so I will open the public hearing and Mr Fox thank you sir good evening I'm David Fox Fox Enterprise this is an advertised second public hearing for a 2023 2024 develop block gr application this category for the application is a neighborhood finalization application it address two service areas or two projects the first project including the application of service area number one which is Mary Tony Park improvements the construction of the additional amings will include new swing sets playground equipment new sidewalk playground Turf and shade cover the second service area project address any application be gab white sorry gab White White Park service area construction additional amends will include new swing sets playground equipment new sidewalk playground Turf and shade covers the application amount is for $750,000 the $750,000 a grant amount requests include $690,000 in construction parks and playgrounds and 60,000 of admins the city is looking at putting in $50,000 towards leverage for 25 additional points in the application total project amount would be $800,000 740,000 being going in parks and playground 60,000 going in admin the funding source will be 750,000 cdbg and 50,000 City ma see all right thank you the purpose of the public hearing is to get input from the public does anyone from the public have any questions or comments no I will close a public hearing and hand it off to councel I make a motion we approve staff well I got a a question is is it in that order where we're looking for Mary Tony Park improvements first and Gabe white second these are both primaries in the application so both will have to be addressed okay all right that answ my question second call the board please yes yes yes steart yes yes let's address the resolutions support yep okay up next is item 10d part two that we pulled from the consent agenda um want to give us a rundown on that Scott or how do we need to address this I have penny come up and do it she prepared the okay evening with the Grant application there were three resolutions that are required one of which is the implementation of the long-term short-term objectives of the City Community Development plan second one was to authorize the use of the leverage dollars which were included in the budget from the infrastructure fund budg approve for time one and then thirdly is uh resolution to authorize submission of this application for theg okay does anybody have any questions for PNY not all entertain a motion motion we approve resolution 202 24-33 resolution 202 24-34 and resolution 20 2435 right yes yes yes yes yes thank you Mr Fox you too next up is item 10e Mr bogas come up and tell us about the uh sidewalk on Memorial Drive it's been a while since we talked about this fact it was last April last year I've been waiting on pens and needles everybody um just kind of recap a little bit of this the county received grant funding to construct 8 foot wide multi-use Trail on Memorial Drive has to be on the west side of Memorial Drive which is also the side we have a 8 in water line this water line is in direct conflict with that prod we asked civil serve uh several years ago to give us their their best estimate on what it would take to relocate that water line they gave us the price of$ 242,655 24 now that goes back several years and we've had some pric increases so so I would be very surprised if it could comes in at that price I would expect it to be a little higher the uh the county is their interlocal agreement just to kind of give you give it to you in a nutshell they're uh they've structured this the same way we did the parkway phase three um which they they take this as part of their project they go ahead do the competitive bid bidding for us of course the city is free to select or not select whoever the L bit is so we have that control uh but uh it it just makes it Neer to have it packaged that way the parkway went went very well for us uh and they are also saying they will contribute a sum of $11,340 12 which is exactly half of the estimated construction cost that we received from civil Ser the downside of that is that the price is higher than our Prof our cost is going to be more 50% just want to make sure everybody understood that uh it's just one of those things that you run into when you're using whether it's the county or State Road rway this is sometimes an issue that you have to deal with in my opinion it's still better than trying to work with private property owners and try to secure e that way so this doesn't happen very often but it it does happen from time right anybody have any questions I do okay um where exactly does the water M where do you relocate it to is it across the street or no I think it'll be on the same side uh and basically the path itself is not the problem it's the it's the storm water uh infrastructure that they're going to install along with this project is where our conflicts come in civil serve has already done engineering on this can't recall I think we're having a it's going to it's going to probably look like a snake time it's all set done working around these these complex but U but it's it's from I probably should have mentioned this in case uh forgot it's from Papo all the way to uh the parkway MH so it's long stret pretty long stretch so there'll be a sidewalk going all the way from the parkway to Memorial element I think that's so great so just to clarify I know I had a lot of heartburn about this one when it was last year we don't have a choice and the county doesn't have to cost share at all they could tell us we're on our own so right we don't have a choice we got to vote for it and say thank you for the 120 Grand they're GNA give us right okay that's it like kind of feel the same way um any other comments questions all right I'll entertain a motion make a motion we approve the inter local agreement between holls County and city of sing to relocate the city 8 in watermain located within County row of Memorial Drive second all right board yes yes yes Ste yes yes thank you we'll see you again shortly next up is item 10f the cottage Market Mr Andre Corby is going to come up and tell us what he has planned what is it yes sir it's been a year since we this already yep um so basically we're trying to continue on to market the same way it is but we did have some one of the things the market does it's through the food stamp program so people come Market they bring their food stamp card process a transaction and we match them up to $40 per doll so if they put $20 on their C process transaction down in the summer but normally normal farmers markets you guys usually run seasonal they'll run up until like May and they'll shut down but we had vendors that decided they wanted to commit because we did get the place for the entire year so people will come during the summer not as many but then those are the ones that keep Market going because now we're back in season the market still had a presence from the few people that stayed over the summer because we have some people there that this is literally their first business they started and they kind of helped them economically get themselves like their breed lady for instance she never had any Bo and she's one of the ones that stayed there throughout the whole summer we have the honey guy Paradise H soap guy he doesn't come now because it's still too hot for he makes soap so his stuff will just it just melt yeah so we we're flexible with them because we understand your product is we're not your conditioned so okay all right and we reduced the cost of to $10 per month per essentially just enough to cover our insurance because we wanted really wasn't for us make money suppos to bring people into the market and we partnered with um know Partners in progress state so it helps promote small businesses entrepreneurs and like we wave the fee completely for anybody under 18 so they're operating not their parent is coming there doing all the work the person under 18 has to be there operating your boot to show you know it's like you have your child coming you're doing all the work and the child is sit ideal is for the child to learn how to small very good doesn't cost in their time and experience I'm pretty impressed that you would go through the summer months with some vendors there so lot yeah we we well depending what they sell they'll stick through it yeah because I go and I bring spices and stuff like I wouldn't go certain times it's raining yeah because I can't get the spices wet M but other vendors will stay throughout the year and we have a on average we have about 30 people on the roster but not all 30 are there every time to rotate out and it keeps it you know that when you come this week might this guy only here one Saturday at so you have to catch it out you see anything on the Saturday this is a great project for our city thank you very much and it does we like it because it brings a lot of traffic where we're set up originally original apartment Mark used to be right here but that was only one road but now we have the two roads and I do it I don't if you ever seen this on Facebook I did the Facebook live and I promote the downtown area in the Facebook live for two reasons promote the area and also people know where Market is is when you tell them downtown I'll tell you a little story I lived I never knew Sebring this was Sebring I always thought where Walmart is that until one day I have to drop somebody back here they're like they're going to see oh this right down the street driving like where where are we going this is the actual town over here that's the new where the Walmart is it's not the actual original SE bre so most people if they never lived here they don't know they don't know that this downtown exists so that's one think the market does bring awen okay I'll entertain a motion it says approve as presented second P the board yes yes yes Stuart yes Bishop yes thank you oh I will need those chips back they treated as cash dang it I your wow thank you next year all right next up is item 10g thanks for coming her idea creates the ideas ites work way to go item 10 G we have our chief and Al extraordinaire coming up to tell us the possible future of the fire department good evening uh Carl Lieutenant s fire department uh can't believe I'm up here actually talking about this it's been a very long time in in the making uh I think you guys have the program or the packets in your agenda what I'll do is I'll just go ahead and summarize through it think you want me to read all 25 pages of it no thank we here a very long time but if there's any questions that come up during the summarizing of it just stop me and I'll answer what I can all right so a little bit of background SE fire department we operate as a two-tier uh system which means we provide BLS service and Highlands County fire rescue shows up with an EMS unit we get there we try to stabilize the nation the best way we can with what we're allowed to do and then they show up they start Advanced life support if that patient calls for it and then transports them to the hospital uh during the calendar year 2023 we responded to 21 2,153 calls uh 76% of that was all EMS related calls so the volume of calls that we are running are ems related more than fire related uh and that's just something that's happening uh across Nationwide a lot of building codes have been implemented over the years um fire inspections and stuff like that so the amount of fire calls have dropped and EMS calls have gone up uh we'll go into the proposed plan a little bit it's kind of it's just the background uh into the plan itself So the plan started it starts with with you guys approving everything uh moving forward uh so step by-step approach it starts with Council approval that's going to allow us to start sending staff to paramedic school which we do have sub interest currently within the department people that do would like to go to paramedic school how many are currently paramedics uh So currently I am a credential licensed paramedic so that means I can if we if you guys started this and the county approved it and we were good to go I can act as a paramedic tomorrow we do have one more licensed paramedic who just became certified he would have to go through credential and then we have one other firefighter that just started August in school and he'll be done before August and then moving forward we try to see what interest there was from additional members and right now I have two additional members that are looking to start school in January potentially three okay uh we would we need to have some more conversations with uh Highland County fire rescue uh they have to approve a copcn for us and we've had several meetings several conversations already about what that looks like um the state requires you to have PC uh in order to apply for an ALS license through the department he so we we will have to go through that they list down requirements that are set forth in that copcn as far as um guys guys would have to credential as EMTs they would have to credential as paramedics they would be required run a full call by you have to utilize the same Reporting System we would have to utilize the same medical director which is an easy one because we already to do that and then we would have to adopt their medical uh protocol so that everything is uh streamlined and certain Medics aren't doing certain things one way and other Medics aren't doing things another way everybody's all working together for the same goal to provide a healthier Community Carlos um that c PCN does that have to be renewed annually every two years two years okay thank you uh we're looking for this is going to kind of be a step stepping process so we're looking to implement this at Station 14 first uh that's going to require six paramedics and one paramedic coordinator once we get everything up and running with Station 14 we would go ahead and follow that with Station 15 which would be additional third paramedics additional three paramedics so we would be looking to have a total of nine paramedics and one par one par coordinator that' be responsible to R program uh looking way further down the line if we decided to expand or look at any additional stations or anything like that at that time the council can give us a direction to expand the ALS per if we have one that's included give you a summarized ver version of what paramedic school entails uh the employee is going to be taking on a big uh chunk of responsibility uh they're looking at 1200 contact hours in the school which is 11 months full-time on top of that they will be also working at the firhouse so it's all shift based so if I was on shift today that means I'm going to school the next two days that I'm off so I have a full full load of work uh schol work uh out of the 12200 hours 468 hours they'll be on an EMS unit here in Highland County Running With The Paramedic doing uh Advanced life support skills learning the way that they are supposed to be operating in the field which is convenient because before they get done with school they're already learning what those processes are for the county and at that time if we had a program that would be the way we' be operating as well so it kind of gives them a little bit step forward when they come out of school they'll have to go and do the credentialing still even though they perform on those EMS units doing a whole lot talking yes but will you all right uh cost so cost of ALS startup estimated repair and maintenance cost was a really hard number to figure out what that was going to be and it's hard to figure out what that's going to be is because you don't know what calls you're going to run this year we can run 2,000 calls next year we can run 6,000 calls year after that you can run 3,000 calls is that based on using the engine or the cruck that's just the that's the whole this number based off of the whole Fleet the repair maintenance budget was for the whole is the primary vehicle used going to be an engine or is it going to be the primary vehicle that's going to be used out of Station 14 will be the brush okay that's not going to that's going to continue the same way you ever see this leading up to us have have ambulance I don't think this is ever going to get to that I don't believe that yeah I mean uh Dustin FID uh hopefully he's watching somewhere right now uh he's one of the Chiefs for Highland County Rescue and the the county has no reason to want us to ever transport but we're going to grow and the copcn specifically says that you will not transport okay that's the answer thank how often how I know typically when there's a call you guys show up first I mean probably 98% of the time a good portion of the time okay we we'll say 90% of the time from the time you show up to the time EMS shows up about how long is that you know I I know I know there's not a number but what's an average is it five minutes 10 minutes um I think I think it's really hard to narrow something down like that just because there's higher call volume time frames throughout the day than so like at 5:00 in the afternoon is a is a high call volume time so during that that time it could be a couple minutes or they can be there at the same time as us it's really hard I've tried to narrow that down but because the fluctuation of calls happened and there's such a variable amount that I can't I can't put a time frame on that well is there any time that would be 10 or 15 15 minutes well that's right on a sitations well so it's going to be a longer time right the reason I'm asking this question is because I had someone call me and was telling me some stuff and they said if if someone has a heart attack you have about four minutes to get those people you know where they won't have brain damage that's that's my point uh if if they're there in two minutes that's great if they're there in 10 minutes it's not you know that's that's the point I'm trying to make so everybody realizes there's not a I knew that you couldn't give me a time but I asked U you know and and I believe this is for the betterment of our citizens even though it cost a lot average and on average you're beating the ambulance there on average yes it's anecdotal but I'm you know' both of those units are busy both of those units are in the station we're probably going ride those units are busy so I guess to the point that lonard was getting to is how often are you going to be deploying um ALS versus the ambulance being there to do it for you so how often is it going to be critical to uh helping somebody in a in an emergency situation I know again you can't give it a number but is it going to happen 10 times a year you know does that is that a lot more than that okay so 100 times a year here anecdotally you're guesstimate that's the thing we're asking for numbers and I and I knew I was asking for numbers I could give I think what we're trying to to shape for the public seeing the price tag is we're talking about potentially 100 life saving um respons the service right for the cost of a couple hundred thousand a year that feels like a good deal to me if it saved one life it's right that that person definitely worth a cou you put that cost them perspective that's less than 4% of our current budget to head this to head improved service for our citizens right so so compared to the budget it's a small dollar amount whenever you first started and you probably can't put a number to this one too but we'll try whenever you first started you said that you begin to service the patient if you're allowed to out of the 1645 EMS Rel at ated calls how many would you say you can't even touch because we're not ALS certified uh if that is the 2023 correct volum that that would be all of them okay that's our current call criteria which is a high that's got to be so hard every one of those calls is an yeah to get to the scene and not be able to administer all that they need until the other folks get there and even then you have to hand them off to the ambulance yeah can you explain roughly the difference between basic life support and advanced life support what that means so basically in layman's terms please Advanced life support behave yourself you're GNA carry um some medications heart medications some breathing medications and some Airway stuff with a heart monitor BLS you're not really carrying medications you carry oxygen so in the lamest simplest way to present this to you guys if you if you had a little girl at home that had asthma and say she had an asthma attack well you know that she's having Broncos spasms so her Airway is constricted she needs a butol right because everything is all constricted say we get there and we're waiting for EMS EMS or Highland County fire rescue they carry the buol to nebulize and open up those Airways I carry oxygen I can I can give oxygen and that's that's it what the problem is it's the airway is constricted so I can pump all the oxygen I want but it's not going to go anywhere because it's constricted what that child needs is a butol to open up those Airways and allow the floor but it's not only children there's no adults that have asth I have asthma I don't know what it's like yeah very scary has there been a situation where you did show up and could not administer the help that they needed because we didn't have the the services available and it could have gone another way than what it actually did it happens quite often okay diabetics we go to a diabetic that's unresponsive you know that it's a sugar problem but I don't have a way to to fix it and every every minute that they're unresponsive is time that they're losing on their brain right I'm so glad that you went to the trouble to see is through because it definitely will save lives so thank you very much and I'm not I don't know anything about medical stuff but like I do watch on TV but like do you have the thing where you can shock the heart so we have uh an AED right now which is automated so we put it on a patient that is in cardiac arrest and the AED tells us yes or no it says for what for to to defibrillate somebody that's the the shocking of the heart the machine interprets that wow so if it's there's been times in the past that if it shows like a a fine V FIB it reads it wrong and it won't allow you to shock it when we go to an ALS program and we have these heart monitors we're going to see those rhythms for ourselves so we're going to be able to make the determination of whether we shock it for them or not we're not leaving it up to a computer and just to ask um this is a little different but like at our schools you know we hear on the news about young people that are out in the Heat or whatever or suffer that you didn't even know they had a heart thing so do our schools have equipment that uh that's a defibrillator thing right uh so I believe the schools do have uh schools libraries a lot of the common places I think the mo even and who would admin for that and make those whoever certified whoever's certified in the area that something happens if there's nobody certified or knows how there was even one in my office at one time I don't think we have wow well I think this is just great and I'm glad to see we're starting the program you have more to cover there's like 25 question mhm have any questions if we got into this so I know you're you're estimating 100,000 year for repairs and maintenance to go to increased call volume um if we got into it and it was cost prohibitive we could wind it down by not renewing the copcn is that right if we got to that point and it was just too extreme of a cost just for comparison what is our current repair maintenance budget so yeah I get it so this is your projected maximum we spent 100 Grand on that brush truck we got some other issues need a new brush c yeah we need to buy a new one 100 Grand that's a waste of money so you you have people that sounds like that are very interested in taking part in this because it'll definitely save lives yes ma'am so very excited about it all right does anybody from the public have any questions or comments no will say this is a massive undertaking amount of work that has gone into this program the amount of research and meetings of due diligence U what Carlos and Bobby have been able to do to make one of the most instrumental impacts for the fire department and for our community this is a very exciting very good day for for the city for the fire department for really all the residents um I'm just I'm the happiest councilman you could you could ask for right right now so I would love to make a motion to approve the implementation of this program and Grant permission for personel to start Paramedic program in january2 and I second it all right hold the board yes yes absolutely steart yes Bishop yes thank you thank you thank you job Carlos all right next up is another public hearing item 10h is resolution 202 24-32 I will open the public hearing and hand it off to this you have anything to read just this is the resolution establishing the rates from this point forward and you'll adopt a new resolution if you wish to change the rates in the future okay Mr Bas yes sir uh let me start out by explaining this is not if we said rate increase this is not water sewer per se my wife was eating me up on evening she saw the the bill we have to give public notice that we're going to have a rating for this hearing we automatically assume my gosh the water sewer is going up again that's not the case and I assured her that was not the case what we're talking about is new service tabs where a new home is being built we installed a new water meter or we installed a new service connection to a sewer line but that's primarily what we're talking about and it's going up to 3% on those uh those those connections we're also looking at increasing the security deposits here again we found ourselves in the unfortunate position that we are right El we're quite a bit higher this go around uh we've had some commercial accounts fail on us micsy that sort and uh more and more I guess the economy being what it is more and more people just U you know end up leaving without paying their final bill so to kind of stop the hemorrhaging we're we're suggesting to council that we increase the deposit on the uh deposits we have two different tiers the residential tier uh for owners if you own your home it's less than a tenant would pay their renting typically that's where we lose the most money as own rental property uh but we're we're suggesting to council that we increase the uh the owner uh homeowner from $70 per service to $100 per service and what that translates to if you have both Water and Sewer you will go from paying $140 to $200 on the tenant side uh it currently is $100 per service so if you have water and sewer it's a total of 200 we're recommending they go up to 150 per service for a grand total of both services to $300 questions on any of that the other thing that we're proposing to increase is fire protection these are dedicated fire lines without Meers uh we're we're suggesting Council that we increase that by 3% there was one other thing that we discussed when we were in our budget workshops and that was uh unauthorized use of fire hydrants Bob had to leave for just a moment but uh Bob and I discussed that we really feel that that's probably better or more appropriate to address in an ordinance rather than a rate resolution so if if that beats what approval we'd like to proceive that and our plan is to have something to come back to you on the first meeting in November you want it as an ordinance so that it's like criminally enforcable is that why yes sir that that's primarily where and we have we have service tampering right now which if somebody unauthorized turns on their own water we have that in the rateb solution but this goes kind of a Step Beyond okay and I think that's needed that's called for it it it is I I hardly agree we don't we don't find it very often but I'm sure a lot of it's going on okay all right the purpose of the public hearing is to get questions and comments from the public does anybody have any questions or comments uh Mr is it Fritz did you have a question on the the utility rates come on up to the podium if you wish and express your concerns apprciate the opportunity to talk to you folks looking at the budgets and all business transpire here tonight got an important job and I appreciate you doing that anyhow uh I've been tracking the uh water bills for the last four years and uh last year my bill in increased by 16% and over the last four years it's increased by 34.6% and last year according to the Florida your statistics cost of living was only 4.1% which is Big description between the two so part of my question is uh why has it gone up and I I saw that also that you had in the utilities fund you had a increase of 22,5 42,900 and I wonder what that was all about maybe I maybe I'm at the wrong time asking these questions I see now that maybe I should have been to some other meetings when you had discussions so the the item on the agenda tonight is just for rate increase for new hookups not for not for your mon not for your not for your monthly bill it's only for new hookups well I I just saw what was on my bill and it said sir we're having a me on a rate increase so yes sir you just I think you took a phone call or something whenever he gave the you just stepped out for just a minute whenever he gave the the the rundown of what we were going to be discussing tonight but um but yeah sorry no it's okay it's fine did you catch what it his question was or about the um I'm sorry I'm yeah yes so correct me if I'm wrong but I think that's related to Grants that we're receiving okay to do projects so our budget's obviously increased because we're going to be doing a project that's Grant funded and our budget has to reflect that increase so I'm not sure that it's the entire 22 million but it's the bulk up yes well there was a item in there uh that that was 17 million change as a grant and that was another question I'm saying you know I see these things from a different view than you folks probably do yes sir and I'm saying to myself why do we need a rate increase if we getting a grant of $17 million so the grant is for kind of new infrastructure okay yeah and and you know too is your name m Mr Fritz yes you know I think the city council you know I came on city council and I'm not like knowing everything about how all this works it's been quite a learning process for me but I think that's very uh uh um I think we should congratulate you for coming forward and asking your questions and that's what we want to be here for the whole thing is I'm concerned about the amount of increase what everybody is doing accounting commission did the same thing they went had a add in a paper they were go up 16% and I tracked that I went back and looked their records and they had 2.9 they had uh 7 11 last year and now they want to go to 16 what did it end up to 17.9 the last day they stuck in another $868,000 so I'm just concerned about you know it's getting are these things sustainable for us keep going up like that I think a matter of fact I put a thing in the paper about and I should have sent it to commission but I'm just saying you need to sharpen your pencils and if you can't come up with a better B budget then you need to go to your departments underneath and make them come up with a better budget because it's not all you folks here you know you're all working as a big team we all got to work together yes sir understood but you know too I I want to say that after I got on this side of it looking and I see how much infrastructure work needs to be done and repair work and the prices have just gone through the roof I I looked at the budgets and all the different things that bring out the budget and it's got a lot of thing to do a lot of things to take care of and I I I I congratulate you on that but one thing I will say is I really have a lot of admiration and Trust in our finance department and in Scott and the mayor keeps a real good on things and you know I've learned a lot and mainly I I don't know how they even are able to keep the budget going with how things have gone up so high right and and ordering like a fire Tru you know and you don't even go like to the fire truck store and buy one you have to order it way ahead I saw and it's a huge amount of money and you wouldn't even think it would be that much but all of this development in our city and in our County too that that requires moving around of like a water M all that so we can have a nice sidewalk all of that so expensive and that's one thing I have learned I won't say that I know everything about everything but I have learned that I can trust our city people they really are trying to do the best they can well thank you very much for thank you for getting yourself educated before you came in here we we really appreciate you doing your homework all right uh if there's nothing else I will close the public hearing any other questions or comments from Council if not I'll entertain a motion I make a motion make a motion we approve resolution 20 24-32 establishing the utility rates effective November 1st 2024 as present I second it all theard yes yes yes yes yes all right okay we have no business from the audience we'll get to your question um Mr attorney nothing further sir all right Mr dlck agenda item 13A is Project report the only thing of substantial change here is I have spoken with uh fish Wildlife Commission um just before the hurricane um and I will be getting back to them this week to try to set up uh a workshop okay with Wild Life Commission on the Illinois Palm then I think yard trash yard trash so um so just so everybody knows we have an interlocal with count for collection of thebr um so that includes yard trash that includes construction debris that type of stuff um and we have an inter local um that allows us to utilize the contractor they obtain through an RFP process and since we were one of the counties that was declared and we have to meet a monetary threshold which we have subsequently learned that we've met the monetary threshold for debris um we can get FEMA reimbursement for the expense of picking up the debris so uh starting next week and and what the instruction from the county is is for everybody to have their debris by the curb by this Sunday that essentially have given them two weekends to do it they're looking to try to get this done for one pass it was not near as bad as like Irma or Ian so in theory folks should be able to get um their debris out to the curb and the debris contractor will start next week um some of the instruction is don't commingle you don't co-mingle construction with yard debris um you separate uh what I will also say is also separate leaves and Spanish moss and you know small clippings and stuff like that from the large tree debris branches um you know cut up tree trunks uh that type of debris as well place um the clippings that type of stuff in uh plastic bags and the city will pick those up and the debris contractor will be picking up the larger debris um they will not pick construction debris up at the same time necessarily as the yard debris uh I suspect what's going to happen and and the discussion was is they'll pick up yard debris first and they'll come back for for construction debris um the intent is to try to do this in 90 days because one you get we get fully reimbursed if it is done within 90 days uh they suspect we can make that time frame I know during Irma and stuff like that it was a long process don't we don't anticipate that it's going to be as long but it really depends upon how many crews the debris contractors able to get out in our County and keeping in mind that they're also working in other counties not only in our state but other states yeah so I think that's the synopsis of debris do you have any questions well I think you had shared earlier with me uh I asked what do they do with all this stuff and you said they do mulch it up and they take it it doesn't go to our landfill it goes to different so it goes to there's three designated sites in the county that the debris contractor will be taken to the debris that we pick up which are being the bags uh goes will go to our TR so if we don't get it picked up within 90 days do we not get full reimbursement from Fe it's a tiered kind of system okay but we don't we really have no control over that it's rather the Mery of the feema driven yeah okay I'm saying the speed yeah there could be an exception okay because one was granted I think for Irma but I don't anticipate for our County necessarily that ex exceptions would be granted only because we were not impacted the same way we were in Arma or we not in facted the same way other communties have been ined okay so all right that your question okay information perfect Missy second P the board yes yes M yes steart yes fish yes all right