Order the charter revision Commission for Monday, June 10th, 2024. Roll call please. Doctor. Ruth, I'm here, Mr. Pollyanna's. Here. Who was that? Here. I didn't hear you here, Miss Jennings. Here, Mr. Here, Mr. seaman is absent and excused. And Mr. Terrapin here. I just want to say I watched the meeting last week. Y'all did a great job discussing things, and I provided you with an updated score chart, so to speak, of, pending decisions. We need to make. I'm just trying to keep this so we know where we're going and all issues get addressed. So thank you very much for all you did last week while I was out. I'm going to open the floor for public comments. If anyone has anything to say that they'd like to say to us. All right. I also liked what we did last week in terms of, when we were discussing charter sections, asking people if they want to comment on that section as we go, I'll plan to do that if I forget to invite the public. Can someone here give me a big nudge, at and, I'm going to go ahead with the since there's no one to make a comment , let's go ahead with the approval of the minutes. And these are the minutes for what did I do with them here? So the minutes of May 20th. So this was the one that I think I had I made the update to. Right. So moved second second. All right. We have do we have any discussion on this. No discussion. All right, roll call please not roll call. Yeah. Call the vote, doctor Boukouvalas. Yes, miss Jennings? Yes Mr. Lewis? Yes, Mr. Penny. Yes, vice chair. Yes, yes. All right. Next on the agenda is we have we have a very heavy load today of invited guests. And so we will start with Vinnie Vincent from Planning and Zoning. She's director of that. Then Janina Lewis, procurement services director, and then Tom, function. Did I pronounce that function? Okay. Public services director, and if we have additional time, Ron Herring and Scott Young is here, so, if we can do it, let's see if we can't get our questions addressed from all the above. Okay. Renee, the floor is yours. Thank you, I believe Irene handed out the draft strikethrough. This one, yes. That would be it. And so, we were right. Now, the way this reads, for review and update of the comprehensive plan, it says every three years, the, the so the state requirement, the state has the state of Florida has a, a seven year evaluation and appraisal report and then follow on amendments. If, if you find that you need something, to be changed or updated. So so, so we kind of have two, two different schedules there. We have a three year and the state has a seven year, what I was looking at was, you know, I understand that, you know, we want to be, you know, responsible to the comprehensive plan and make sure that it's updated and everything. But my first thought was, is there a way that we can align this with the state review cycle? So and right now we are aligned. So the update that we're doing, the three year update that we're doing right now, per the charter, is also lining up with the comprehensive plan. The major evaluation and appraisal report, Comprehensive Plan Update. So but moving forward, we're in a three year and then a four year. And so it's I'm trying to bring these things marry them up a little bit. So my initial thought was to just, you know, have an interim review at the midpoint of the state review requirement, and, you know, that may or may not result in any major changes. I'm not, you know, so I'm kind of looking for input on what I wasn't here when that charter section, when this was updated to include the comp plan and the charter for review. So I don't know what the thought process was at that point in time, so I'm just kind of here for discussion and get input on what you're trying to achieve and how we can marry that up with the state. I I'm looking for comment. I have some questions or comments. Go ahead John. Okay, so Renee, I believe to help answer your question is the reason it was put in the charter. There had been some you know, how the pendulum swings. It had gone so long before there had been an update that they wanted to put it in so that they knew there would be an update. But I see that the efforts, what it takes for you guys to do a full blown comprehensive plan update that, I would be okay with the seven years because otherwise you guys are meeting yourself, coming and going on these reviews. So the one thing was they put it in because it it was not being done. So then they swung it too far back to where it was a three year review. So I think that you're pointing out that it's that the state requires a seven year review or their schedule is a seven year review. Seems we should line things up so that you're not just overtaxing the staff doing these constant reviews and things don't change that quickly. A review is one thing and an update is, you know, or a full blown, you know, update is something else. And I think that's the maybe the fine point of it, right? Yeah. I'm okay with the seven year. Yeah. Yeah. I, you know, being on this most recent, review, committee, it is a lot of work. It's an awful lot of work. And, my, my problem, my problem without an interim. And I like the fact you had mentioned an interim without an interim. You know, right now, we live in a volatile arena with regard to change land use, you know, price, whatever the whatever the case may be, you know, five, seven years ago, there may not have been a housing problem, you know, or, or affordable housing problem. Now we have an affordable housing problem. So waiting too long doesn't allow you to make adjustments because it's too long to wait to make adjustments. So what would if an interim review is in place, what would that entail? Because you know it. You do a comprehensive evaluation and analysis for comprehensive land use. What would an interim. Review consist of that? I mean, if it's almost as, intensive as a y y, you know, so I don't I don't understand how to define what an interim would be, I think it would be a good opportunity to at least make sure that eyes are on it. And, you know, some, you know, I can put out. I'd have to put a little more thought into what that interim review might consist of at this point. Obviously it's not defined as to what that would be. We know what the state requires, but even the state doesn't require the, the state requirement now is that every seven years you have to do an evaluation of your comprehensive plan. And if you do an initial evaluation and you basically say, we don't want to change anything, you can now send a letter to the state to that effect that says, we don't need to do any updates. And I believe that's exactly what maybe of what happened as to why we have it in the in in the charter now because I think it was a little less because the state has made it less onerous. You know, in the past it was you will evaluate, you'll do an appraisal report and you'll do updates. And now a local government can simply say, hey, we've evaluated it, we like it. We don't want to make any changes. You can send that into the state. So I think there needs to be a, some kind of a, a better, I think defining the scope of it. Interim review is probably important. Before looking at a seven year, you know, stretching it out, you know, once every seven years because if you need to pull the trigger, if you're doing it for seven years and you're just doing an interim view, does that allow you to pull the trigger? I don't know, because, I mean, we can update the plan, frankly, you can update the comp plan any time you want. Mike. That doesn't the seven year full blown evaluation doesn't prohibit the planning zoning board or the or the board of commissioners from making changes to the comprehensive plan anytime they want. And I think that interim review is maybe a checkpoint along the way. Okay. These are the things that we need to look at. These are my you know, let's let's let's take, you know, let's step back. Let's look at changes in state legislation. Let's look at what our local situation is. Do we need to make some changes or not. You know, that's something that I think the Planning and Zoning Board would probably take a lead in of, you know, obviously with the planning and zoning department, you know, so that's how you define the interim review is being not necessarily handcuffing yourself, but also the ability to like John said, right, react to changes in a three year window if necessary. If you like, I can like wordsmith that a little bit and bring it back to the board, I don't know how long y'all are meeting, but I'll be happy to wordsmith that a little bit and send it back through Irene. And then if I need to come back, I can do that , just for me, John, really, I think, you know, the point of the changes we want to do, one of the things we want to do is help make the wheels of government turn more effectively . And with so that you're not. So the staff is not constantly stressed, but that their time is effectively used. And I think you've just suggested a fairly elegant solution, you know, to this problem. So my question is, all right. So if you do an update every seven years, does that mean you start the update at the six year mark because it's taken an entire year to do it? Generally, yeah. You'll you'll generally will start before that. Seven years is up. And to do your evaluation often, there's a point where you have you have to provide a letter to the state indicating that you're and we did this about a year ago , a letter to the state indicating that, you know, our seven year period will be coming up. There's a point where you have to send them the letter to state what you're going to do. So in our case, we're doing a full blown repeal and replace of the comp plan, so yes, you do have to start a little bit earlier for, and that, you know, having that interim review probably helps set us up for the full blown seven year cycle. So I think we can mesh those. Did that answer your question? Yeah. Okay. Have you read H, I and J on this page? H I and j yes, ma'am. I have updated ones. Okay. Those are the. Yes, sir. I'm sorry. Got. That's okay. Those are the ones that we would want you to look at and, and try to tie together so we could make a decision then. So for so for I, you know, that's the strategic plan I think every three years is a little aggressive there. I had recommended five. Again it took a good you know, year and a half to get through that process. Maybe it wouldn't be as onerous, on a redo if we' get people to sit on boards. What else? The, the I was the strategic plan I talked about. Yeah, yeah. And there the red. Oh. All right. I'm looking at two different things here. So I. Yes okay. To review every five years from the date of adoption, all the city master plans and action plans, plans may be reviewed, updated, retired, abandoned or deemed complete as part. Again this was looking at these. Are you know so we have we have stormwater action plans. We have we have you know, we have a sustainability action plan, I think an all encompassing if there's something that's going to the board and being adopted at some point at least, you know, every five years, let's, you know, and maybe it's not five, maybe it's three, I don't know, you know, let's come back to the board with an update on what have we done, what are we going to be doing. You know, is it complete. Is it out of date. Can we abandon it? I'm just trying, you know, a lot of things just, you know, we adopt them and then we move on to the next thing. And we don't know how things are going. And so I just think, you know, from the from the, you know, the elected official standpoint, having that information is just good information to have. And it's it shouldn't I don't want it to be completely onerous on the department heads either, the people that are responsible for these plans. But you know, I think every five years is a reasonable you know, maybe it's every 3 or 4 if you want a little more often. But we do have a lot of, a lot of, a lot of plans out there that people may or may not be aware of. Having a lot of plan is my worry. Yeah because it's fragmented. You guys are everywhere and you have these plans to do. And I would prefer that maybe we could get them all at one time. I think the Board of Commissioners would appreciate seeing everything at once, trying to understand it. So yeah, I had put from date of adoption just because. So I think you would rather regardless of it, you know, pick a point and then maybe go every then every so many years to provide an update. I mean, yours is the hardest, of course, but still the others are just as important. So if you could do that as your sharp penciling this, yeah. There's, there's the plans that are put in place and then there's the action against those plans and the status. Are you providing annual board updates against the planning? Yeah, I guess that's the thing. You know. And then how what kind of what kind of cross fertilization between the comprehensive and the strategic and the sustainability, etc. I mean, what, what kind of integration is happening across those plans? So they're not just completely stovepiped. So. Yeah, we have so much cross connection between I mean, really the comprehensive plan, you know, it integrates the sustainability plan. It's now integrated with the strategic plan. That's good. The vulnerability assessment is recognized. And, you know, the stormwater action plan all that stuff is really kind of pulled pulled together in some way into the comprehensive plan. So in a lot of ways, you know, the comp plan updates would may pick up some of those things, you know, I don't know, the thing that I, I don't have a good grasp on is, you know, I mean, how many, how many of these plans rise to the level of something that you want in the charter? I mean, certainly I think the comp plan, the strategic plan are things that you want in the charter, you know, whether or not you want all these other plans into the charter. I wrote this as a kind of a catch all, because I was getting kind of feedback that there was talk about wanting to have some of these things, these other things in the plan. Well, how do you pick and choose what they are? So I took the default and put everything, if it's something that comes with the board of commissioners and is adopted, that's a plan that needs to be at least reviewed, and the board informed on where we are with it on some periodic timetable, whatever that may be, maybe it's three years. Maybe it's five years that. I think basically what we're interested in is not how you do it, but that it's in here, that it's going to be done and it's going to be done. Yeah. Okay I have another question. When when y'all look at these plans, the existing plans, do you look at it through budgeting as well. Yeah. Especially things that, that like a stormwater action plan or, you know, capital improvements or those types of things, you know, if there's dollars tied to it. Absolutely. They get looked at, because nothing will happen if it's not being budgeted for. So yes. Okay other things that are a little softer, things like, you know, you know, the sustainability action plan. Well, they've got an action plan, things that they need to, to do. And so if it requires a, you know, a budget allocation to, to perform something, then then it gets looked at obviously. So okay. Proceed pretty easy wasn't it. Can I, can I ask about one other thing that I just, I came across when I was doing a little deeper review of on page. Let's see on page in section 12 under zoning powers, on the board of Adjustments, it lists special exceptions. We don't do those, and we haven't done those since. Probably 1990. I don't know if it's too much of an ask to just have that struck out of there or stricken from. The board, the board of adjustment used to do special exceptions. They're no longer in the land development code in any way, shape or form. So it's just something that and it's not it's not good practice to have special exceptions being done by boards of adjustments. There's really are conditional uses that get reviewed by the Planning and Zoning Board now. So if it's not if we can do clean up, this would be one that I would think would be a good a good clean up right there. So you just want the comma for special exceptions comma removed. Correct. Oh. Makes sense okay. Anything else I, I do have something I forget which section this is but it's talking about the threshold at which items have to go out to bid. And. That's Janina. Oh, okay. All right, all right. Well, okay. So that. Does that affect you? Well you do put things out to bid. Your department does, we follow the same threshold. So if it's like a planning study or something that needs consultant input, we kind of have the same threshold as that. You know, that procurement puts out. Yes Do you feel in your in the function of your, work duties that 25,000 is adequate before it goes out to bid? Because I know once things go out to bid, we're talking another probably a couple months down the line before something actually gets done. So do you feel that you. Well, so that's you know. When I do my budget I will put I will put things into professional services that I think we will need for the next budget cycle. We one of the things that I'm working now with Janina on is because our, our, our designated planning consultant that's been on board for quite a while is that that contract is expiring. What my preference would be to be would be to go out and pre-qualify by a handful of planning consultants across various fields of planning interest things that we could possibly need and have them basically then be able to just work a scope of work and not have to descend every little thing out to out to bid. We'd be able to do a scope of services for a task. Now how that falls into what would still have to go back to the to the Board of Commissioners for thrash pricing threshold is a different matter, but that that's the way I would like to work moving forward, so that I don't have to put every individual project out for, you know, if I want an economic development element that we go out to bid for every one of those, if it's something you should always have, the option to do that. But if you have a good consultant that's been pre-qualified and has that skill set, that you can do a scope of services with and get it approved by the board, and that's a lot shorter path. So what do you think would be, the best level at which, you know, after which you would go out to bid would be would you have a preference? I don't think I think it depends on, you know, if you've done a good pre-qualification process and you've got, you know, you know, 2 or 3 good planning consultants across a broad range of disciplines, if you're comfortable with their services and you can go to them and get a good scope and get the work done quickly, I would go that route. But if you look at them and you're like, you know, or if it's just a project that, you know, it may just be better to go out and just get, get put it out for everybody so that, you know, then you do that. I mean, that's almost a case by case basis. I have a I'm sorry. Let me know when you're done. I was going to say that, it's become a matter it's more common practice to go out with basically broad agency announcements where you line up the specialists you need on multi year contracts. You're not having to do that. They get pre-qualified. So if she has a need and it's budgeted she puts it in. She has it. It's the time frame goes basically to zero. And the 25,000 no longer applies . It doesn't apply. Well there's still a threshold for what the Board of commissioners may have to approve that. Those are well it's and that's approved though in the budget. Exactly, exactly. Just just to just comment and this is probably for legal as well. To the extent you have, like you said, you're you're utilizing a vendor that you're really happy with. And the contract comes to, to an end. But you need to continue services, this would be part of the negotiating process when you enter into the contract. Is offering the option does it would an option to extend the contract it existing in the existing contract where that require for you to go back out, or is that something you could just. I'll defer to Janina. The reason I say that because if you're going to spend, you spend the money to go to put something out for bid. Okay And so if you're dealing with a vendor and you're satisfied with the vendor instead of going back out to bid, which costs money, and you're happy with the performance of the vendor when these initial contracts are negotiated with an option provision in there that that you have the right to exercise the option, because if you're going to have to secure those services, in any event, would it require having to go back out if and that's if it's a contract legal. And for if it's a contract for a specific project that you're already underway with, you can do no, you can do extensions to contracts regardless. But you said contract comes to an end. But and I don't know what type of contract you may be referring to, but if you've got something, you have a plan. We have a contract for planning services with Calvin Giordano that is ending in July, I believe. So if I had needed to do a scope, a quick scope of services for maybe a technical task or something that I can't do in house, I don't have anybody that I can go to right after July. My goal is to go out for a request for qualifications, prequel, maybe three, you know, or so planning firms across with across a wide range of disciplines and they may not qualify for every one of them. They may only say, all right, we want to we want to, we want to be in the hopper for this set of skills. So that so that I can get a comprehensive set of you know, plan consultants out there with across a wide range of services that I can go to. So and hopefully those would be like five year contracts if possible. So this is probably more of a conversation for the moment. But thank you, one other question. We've been speaking a lot on the section about the powers, the fact that, planning and zoning has one set of powers, but Board of Adjustments actually has much more decision making authority. And there's concern with that. Do you have anything to weigh in on that? I mean, I you know, the powers that the, board of Adjustments has is very common across I mean, every board of adjustment just about operates in that manner. And then those so they have decision making authority that gets appealed to the, you know, to the court, you know, it planning and zoning boards and commissions are there. It varies from from locality to locality, I you know, I think with some minor adjustments, you know, you could if you wanted to have the planning and zoning board to have approval authority for certain things like, you know, permitted uses by. Right. You know, I don't have any issues with that. Or I think there was a suggestion about maybe putting those over to, you know, onto the board of commissioners for consent. I mean, I think those are all very doable things. I think it's a matter of, you know, how how you want it to operate, or give them approval authority with an appeal to the board of commissioners for certain things. You know, I think the things that when you're getting into conditional uses rezonings and land use, I think that's squarely in the Board of Commissioners wheelhouse and should be, but for things like permitted uses by right. You know, I, you know, at the county, those are done by , you know, a staff driven development review committee, you know, and so there's I mean, you still have to be able to, you know, defer to the attorney here with this, but you know, things that are quasi judicial, it's a pretty broad range of things. And so, you know, as long as we're operating correctly, then, you know, then I think, you know, we can we can get there. But I'm not you know, I don't have any I don't have any opposition to that at all. Yeah. I what I've been hearing is concern that maybe the Board of Adjustments has too much decision. I mean, that's just a very you know, that's a the board of adjustments. You know, 90% of what they get is I need a setback variance for a pool cage or a side yard or something like that. It's a usually they're single family residential. You know, they're they're it's just something that to clutter up frankly a board of commissioners agenda with something like that I think is just not a great use of the board of Commissioners time. They have so much they have to deal with already to throw that into the mix, I think is, is, I just, I just I would not support that. I don't think that's a good practice, I had something one other thought that just went in and right out of my head. Oh thank you. That's. These are the questions that have come up and we've discussed John. Mister chair, penny. Renee, Mister has brought up John. I can't hear you. Yeah Mister Curtis brought up the idea. I think it was to save time, maybe save money for applicants. Save some that if an application was approved by the Planning and Zoning Board and if it had staff recommendation of approval, that that it could be on a consent agenda with the right to pull it, and that way the applicants wouldn't have to make a second presentation. The staff wouldn't have to make a second. Right Second presentation. Do you see any value in that? I mean, I do absolutely as long as we can check the box from a quasi judicial process. And I'll look to the attorney on that. I mean, yeah, I would go for that all day long. I mean, I, you know, we're we you know, we do a very good public hearing process with the planning and Zoning Board. They're very thorough, you know, and like you said, if you've got a staff recommendation to approve and a planning and Zoning board approval, if you can shorten that process when it hits to the board of commissioners, it also, you know, it also gives the applicant a little bit of an incentive to make sure they're not in the I's and crossing their t's in front of the planning and Zoning board, if they know that, if they do what they need to do, by the time it hits the Board of commissioners, it should be clean and should be, you know, you know, nothing's ever guaranteed. But as long as it went to the Board of commissioners, I don't see it as an unjust, delegation of legislative authority because any of the commissioners could say, I want to hear that. Well, in legislative, there's the key word, you know, site plans for permitted uses by right aren't legislative, but I'm talking about a full blown zoning application. Oh, okay. So what you're saying so you know, somebody came in for a rezoning, they got a staff recommendation approval. They got the planning zoning board recommendation of approval. It could be on the consent agenda of the Board of Commissioners with the right to pull it. It's going to the hearing for rezoning and land use. That makes me a little queasy. Yeah, but for a site plan for permitted use by. Right, or. Yeah, it was right. Yeah. That's what I was thinking about. Site plans. You were thinking about Rezonings and land use amendments. And when you when you different. Yeah. When you get a, you know, approval by the P and Z and recommendation by the by by the staff to have the same presentation done again quite honestly wastes, I think, waste valuable time because you're spending 20 minutes on a presentation. That means you're going to spend 20 minutes, if not more, at a commission, at a commission meeting, for a presentation, when the result, unless they want to pull it, is the same. Okay, so let's look at streamlining the commission meetings. You know, where they could spend more time on things that they don't have to wait till midnight to get home. And I think, I think the staff would appreciate the fact that they don't have to do a presentation twice. So I don't so that's, that's where the thought was that if it would be on a consent agenda with any commissioner who had a, you know, an issue with, it could be pulled and heard. So you're saying if it's quasi judicial, you can't do it? No I'm saying if it's I'm saying the legislative piece, which is land use, is definitely something that is reserved to the Board of commissioners. I guess they're still technically being reserved, but don't they have the right to pull it? Yeah. They don't. Yeah I would I would have to talk to, you know, chat with with Andy about that a little bit and see where see make sure that we're and I'm not this is not charter stuff. I'm not a I'm not opposed to it. I'm definitely not opposed to it, I just I think your time is more valuable than having to do everything twice. Yeah. So I'm looking at, at, you know, different options. Okay. All right. Well I do we have any other comments for Renee? I'm good. Thank yes. Did you, I also had one item down. I don't know if y'all still need that answered about the building height restriction. Oh that's right, that's right. We had a commissioner come in, almost made a clean getaway building height restrictions. Sure, the suggestion was, well, we want to keep tarpon. Now. I'm the messenger, okay? We want to keep tarpon the way tarpon is. And one of the ways to do that is to restrict building heights and be very specific and put something like that in the charter. So we wanted to hear what you would have to say about enacting something like that. My first choice would not to be put building height into the charter. Having said that, if there is an overwhelming desire to do so, I have found four examples of how it has been done, the city of Key West has it, the city of Sanibel has it. Mount Dora just put it in two years ago. And then I found another example. I'm sure there's more, one up in, just came up Traverse City, Michigan. But sticking with the three that are in Florida, the approach that I like, is it actually Key West and Sanibel are kind of similar in this. It says building height restrictions in the city's land development regulations and building code, in effect, as of the adoption of this charter section, are subject to change only upon approval of a majority of the qualified electors. So it doesn't specify a height. It just says if you're going to change the ordinance or something to that effect, that how height may be, how it's measured, or what your actual land development code says, that that has to go to a charter referendum. So it doesn't specify a number. Now, Mount Dora does specify a number. And they actually took a the approach of, they have two areas that I guess are they have a building height impact district. And one of those is the city's historic preservation review area. And then the second is lands within 100ft of the normal high water control level of Lake Dora. So they specified two height limits for those two areas in their charter and basically said nothing could go over that, without going to a vote, essentially. So if you want, I can I can send these to Irene and send them out to you so that you've got them for reference. That would be, thank you. But yeah, my if you're going to put something in it, I mean, I, I think we've done a good job with the land development code and with the smart code, we recently amended those again in smart code where there were some concerns and made those conditional uses for those extra heights that are available via for hotels only, so, I mean, I think we have good controls in place, if you're going to increase those or change those, then I think if you're wanting to put something in the charter that then you maybe that would be the way to do it. I'm just queasy about what the height would be if you were going to try to specify something. Can I mean, so what could it be? Your thoughts of maybe a supermajority of the commission instead? That's another way to go. As the putting it out for referendum makes it very difficult. Yeah. It does. Yeah And so that makes it more difficult. But even a supermajority if, if you didn't feel that that was something or if this board did not feel that that was something that should be in a charter, it could be in a charter that any and any, any change, any change would require a supermajority of, of the commissioners. And that way, if it was a really it needed for whatever purpose, you know, then, then that actually affords without having to go to a vote. The onus falls on your elected officials, but more than just the majority. So, yeah, I'll, I'll send these out again and again if you once you've had a chance to read these three examples, I'll be happy to if you want to come back and rehash that again, I'll be happy to come back and do so. Do any of those examples contain a highthe, yeah. Mount Dora does, they have so no building or other structure shall be constructed, erected, situated or located in the building height impact district which exceeds 35ft in height, excluding certain structural appurtenances, that's in their their historic district area. And then, no building or other structure shall be constructed, erected, situated or located within 100ft of the normal high water control level of Lake Dora, which exceeds 25ft in height. So they've got a real low threshold around their lakefront, apparently. And this was this was adopted in 2022. So it's fairly, fairly recent. Sanibel does not I'm sorry. Take that back. Sanibel No. Sanibel does not have a height limit. There's is just you had Key West and Sanibel had a referendum right. If you yeah if it's going to be changed it's gotta go. Exactly. And then Mount Dora has a referendum. If you're going to exceed a certain height, Renee, would you say that most of them restrict it to a certain geographical area, like some kind of historic district or something? Not citywide, I have two. The only example I've found so far that has an area attached to it is Mount Dora. The other two are just citywide. And if you're going to change the ordinance, it has to go. But those two don't have height limits. Those two do not. They refer back to their existing codes and stuff. The reason I ask you that question, there's two schools of thought. Evidently some people want it height citywide, you know, the whole town. Right. And then there's some that say, well, okay, in the historic district or the Greek cultural district, those parameters would be it's already a defined area by maps anyway, right? That you could pretty well deal with it. So you can certainly do it by district. Absolutely. What would you if it were going to be done, what would you think 1941? I mean I, I just, I my, my personal opinion, my professional opinion is don't put this in the charter. I just think for the long haul, you're just really creating. But I think if you are going to put it in there, honestly, you can you can do it either way. You can do it by district if that's what people are concerned about or if you want to create an allowance district where you can go above it with a supermajority vote, you know, maybe it's within 600ft of the US 19 corridor or something like that. Then I think that's but I mean, honestly, you know, we've got, you know, our plan, the comp plan as it's been updated, calls for it recognizes these transitional areas. And so like us 19 is one of them where you know, we you know, we recognize that we need to do a specialized planning effort for the whole US 19 corridor because it's going to be a major. It's where redevelopment is going to happen most likely. And so, you know, certainly, you know, we would height would be something that would be addressed during that. So that's my concern with putting in these height limits, kind of, you know, without a little bit of forethought before we do it. Do you think it's better in the land development code? I do, or a special area plan or some, you know, something to that effect? Yes, I do, I just I think it's better there would would your recommendation be to initially when it's drawn up have a height requirement in it in in the in the paperwork somebody comes in and they say I want to I want to build a seven story building on US 19. What paperwork are we going to put in that says seven seven stories or ten stories? It's too tall for that. Would that would be in a planning process. I mean, so it'd be an up front planning process. You'd have a development agreement that would lay out all the terms and conditions. Okay. The development agreements, great. But what is the limit for anybody wanting to come in and go? Yeah, depends on where you are in the city. Yeah. So it's in the land development codes. Now as to what based on based on your zoning district, if you're on US 19 and highway business. Based on the setbacks, based on the property size, I don't think it's I think it's. I think it's only 50ft. And there might be a special allowance for a hotel or something for, like, 60ft or 70ft, but it's very specific. Okay. Yeah. There. You know, we have I probably need to do a height map for everybody. One of these days so that, you know, what the what the permitted heights are throughout the city. I tell you why that might help. Because you take you take the historical district, you take the sponge dock district. You know where height it matters. Sure and those certain areas that it may not be impactful, like the US 19 corridor where you can you can charter a restriction with regard to those particular areas. And also include that any, you know, as far as US 19 corridor would require a supermajority. And I think that that that swings the, the pendulum both ways. It gives protection for those areas in tarpon that need protection, but also allows commercial development or commercial development would, would need possibly more of a height, allowances. But only by a supermajority of those, commissioners. And that way we have our I think we have our cake and eat it too, by protecting what we want to protect and allowing, the commercial use in those areas where commercial uses is, is centered. And that's okay. Well, I'm that stuff is that stuff would be chartered, I think. I would think, yes, I agree. Let me just say this back to Mike is that I'm good with the I'm good for leaving it out. But based on Renee's comments, I'm good for putting it in. If we put it in, I'm good for the geographical areas already described as a preservation districts, cultural districts. On 19 last week there was a presentation there talking about putting 30 foot tall, roadways. So you are we going to give them 30ft above the road or 30? Are we going to stay below the road? I don't think we should mess with 19 on height. I mean, it's just it's going to be what it. Yeah. It's crazy out there. What it's going to happen to businesses. So but I'm good with the intown scale. Scale it down. Keep the scale of the historic district and the cultural districts and, and see what happens on 19. I'm not saying don't know. I don't I don't like the let's go ahead and push our, our debate among the board to when we get to that part. And go ahead and thank Renee for her time today. Run, run, run, run, I appreciate you being here. Do you have anything else, any closing statements? All right. Well, thank you very much. Thank you for having me. Appreciate it. We will go on to Janina Lewis, procurement services director. Thank you very much, Renee. Thank you. Renee, you don't get to leave. Yeah. You have to stay for the whole meeting. No But I'm in the building. If I need to come back. Good afternoon. I'm Janina Lewis, the procurement services director, this afternoon, what I want to bring forward is, three possible revision requests that I'm recommending under article four, purchasing and finance section 23. The general comments , first, I want to talk about the threshold limit change. Currently, we're at $25,000 for formal bids and solicitations. Now, I don't know the actual, prior decision date of the $25,000, but I have provided some just some little notes in the back up here that you can see the power of $25,000 compared to 1970 is not the same as it is today. And given what we've just experienced in the last four years, given 2020 2021 with Covid and moving forward to today's date, inflation has run amok. We've come to a point where it's kind of leveling off now, supply chain is coming back in order, but I feel that to keep the limit and the threshold at $25,000, really limits the power of the staff being able to accomplish more, more efficiently, and also takes time away from the board having to see all these items, like time after time, when these are just our typical operating and maintenance procedures that we go through, and I'll stop there at that one and ask if you have any questions about that. I do. When you go out for bid on these things that you're required to, are there associated costs in the bid process? Number one and two, the labor involved, the cost of labor involved in such a low threshold, yes and yes. So every, every, procurement action has an administrative cost. It doesn't seem like it because we work here every day and yeah, we're we're doing the paperwork as it is, but if you take into account, you know, the hourly rate of an individual, and each individual that touches the, let's say, the scope of work, so the department comes to us, let's say the fire department comes to me and he says, oh, I want to redo the coop, which is the emergency operations plan. So just to get to a scope takes, you know, let's say a month's worth of time, to narrow it down exactly what we're looking for in a consultant to be able to bid on this, so right there, you know, that's additional time, then the time it takes to put it out, there's a required time frame, minimum 21 days. And it also depends on the funding. So we have to look at funding. If you have grants, that's another individual that's involved, so all speaking in a typical just one purchase order, we're looking at maybe $250 to $500 administrative costs, for a bid, it could go anywhere from $500 and up. That's just to get to the one purchase order that we put out. Like you said, your average time is over 21 days. The average time for an RFP solicitation 21 days. A bid document, let's say construction in our guidelines, minimum is ten days. Thank you. But I've certainly seen examples where it's taken 2 or 3 months to get. Yes, ma'am. And again, that could be funding source, could be complications if we put the bid out or the RFP. And there are questions, then we always have to allow for a time period of whoever to adjust to the new whatever was brought up in that situation. So if there was something like a change in the specs because someone brought it up in the questions, then we have to allow for everybody to readjust their numbers based on what came out in an addendum. I think there were also issues of staff time and the burden of yeah, that just delayed. Correct. So also with an RFP, RFP takes a little bit longer CNA type, which is our qualifications. The competitive consultants negotiation Act, which is state of Florida law that we have to use for any type of architect, engineer type contract. So those require an evaluation and that requires staff time. So getting all the staff together, we have to do a public meeting. We have to do the presentations. We have to get all these set up and allow for the vendors to have enough time to come into an oral interview as well. So it could take anywhere from 1 to 2 months for a typical solicited portion of that nature. So if I can understand what you put forward to us for the section 23, you're suggesting that the number 25,000 be updated to 50,000 and a minimum 50,000. Okay. And you're also suggesting that it's not just the city manager that is authorized, but also to the mayor or the designee? Well, that's in that sentence. Is that what you're asking, that's part three, that will be in my part three. Okay. All right. I didn't mean to jump ahead. That's okay, first I, you know, I just want to get out there. The threshold, what we're looking at right now and how much administrative time that takes away from us and the board being able to conduct meetings in a timely manner. And, you know, they're seeing the same O&M contract year after year after year for, let's say, $25,000. It's something they know that the staff continually buys. So those are the kind of the items that I'm I'm saying if we're looking at the threshold now that we should increase it and think forward to inflation. And, you know, five years from now, what's it going to cost? So what's the number, my ultimate goal was to go with 75,000, at a minimum, and I'm leaving it up to the board to make that determination, my recommendation is 75,000, minimum to 50,000. Thank you. Okay. Any other questions on that part or. No, I mean, it makes sense. You're showing the number that was put in in 1970 would be equivalent of $2 million right now. So I understand all of that. But that's what if I want to talk about what's now okay okay. If the city manager has to spend so much money, it's in the budget and your time and your staff's time is already taken care of. I know it goes up and it takes you longer to do that stuff, but what I'm interested in is how much is the city manager need to run the city on a daily basis? Well, I think that's more of a budget question, but that's what we're looking for. Okay, well, that kind of goes with my number three, number three, which is not part of the charter that I would like for consideration to be part of it is that you do give the city manager or the mayor or a designee, some sort of leeway, once the board does approve a budget threshold, that he can authorize a change order not to exceed a certain dollar figure so that we can continue to operate without delays. And I'm not quite sure. So let's say let's say you approve 75,000 as the dollar figure. Then I would recommend that up to $75,000. Again for changes to any contract item you would give the authority to one of those individuals. Okay Before it would have to come. Currently though, when the city manager is not here, he assigned somebody to take his place. Who has that right. That would that would either be, whoever he has authorized as city manager, designee, and then normally I just typically am an advisor on those situations. I, I work with that person to determine what they would authorize. But all those actions still have to go to the board. The city manager doesn't. Technically, his limit is the $25,000, right? That's me . And that's the one I'm. I'm with his approval, signing off on those. So if it went to 75 and the city manager designated somebody, they would still come that somebody would come to you. Correct. Okay. But or it would be me. Let me see if I can get this straight on this number three. So there's a bid and the bid comes in at $100,000 and there's lesser bids, but the greater bids. But the winning bid was 100,000. There was a bid for 125,000. They didn't get it. The award of the bid was 100,000. The way in my understanding, that what you want to say is that the city manager, the mayor or a designee can increase that bid to 175,000. No, he could not increase it more than it wouldn't be able to double. That's not doubling. Well, the way you have it written is up to the new dollar threshold limit. Okay. And you're proposing the new threshold dollar limit to be 75,000. So if a bid was awarded at 100,000, even though you have several bids, 135, 150, the way it's written, the city manager could tack on $75,000 to the bid, correct. You have it written? Yes. Yes. And I bring I bring that forward because there are instances where the contingency amounts don't help or there is a situation in the drawings that should have been or could have been or would have been better if we had the authority to go ahead and move forward. But at the point we now have to stop the construction and wait and come back to the board, I, I understand, change orders. You can't have construction without a change order that costs you more money. And I think, and I agree with John, the concern is if I potentially under bid to get the to get the project knowing that I'm going to get paid more right by because it's, you know, that's done by government all the time, you know, change orders, change or whatever. I under bid the contract, then it actually, penalized those that actually came at a, at a, at a correct bid amount knowing what the changes should be, or what the price should be. So I under bid so I know I'm going to pick it up on the back end. I don't have a problem, with the change order. But the question becomes, let's say there is a change order currently. What's the process versus right now? Is the process that it has to go in front of the commission to approve any increase? Yes. Okay. If it's over the dollar budgeted, what's wrong with that process then, I don't necessarily think there's a problem with it. What I think is there's a delay. Okay so let's take for instance, this is just in construction. Okay. But, take for instance, we're in the middle of construction, and then all of a sudden there's a water line that wasn't in the drawing. Okay But now it needs to be fixed or moved. It happens all the time. Yes. So at this point, technically we if it doesn't fit within the budget, the work should stop. And we have to go back to the board and get the proper increase. But if we don't take care of it right then and there, it also suffers because it could leak or it is leaking and we have to emergency stop whatever our emergency funds to correct. And in some cases there are we have we call it contingency. There is contingency funds, but there are some cases where maybe the contingency is 20,000, but they needed an additional 5000. So if so, what would you expect. Well I see you. You said 75 doubling what that is or up to 75. But what would be a reasonable amount? My goal would be to start at 25,000. No, no no okay. For a change order. Yes okay. So I want a threshold increase. That would be a recommendation. And then to just to get this language into there to allow whoever ability to increase the contract up to a dollar figure that you deem appropriate. But my recommendation would be 25,000. Well, why did you want to include why did you want to change it to the addition of the authority of adding the mayor? Where did that come from? That's just something I thought was it could be anybody. This is my first time doing a charter review, it could be any individual. So the form of government we have is the city manager form of government. Now, you're making the mayor an administrator by putting him in there. So I have an issue with that. It probably won't be in there anyway. I'm personally I'm for taking three. Try all together. You're doing a great job for your first time. Don't We're just we have. We got all the questions for that you've never heard before. So it's okay. This is this is this is an idea. I make sense it would streamline their process. Clearly, it's a great idea. And it's better to continue work as opposed to have fees for work stoppage, especially if it's little numbers like 5000. But you know, it's our job to figure out, well, gee, does the mayor belong in there should only be the city manager or designee or should it just be, etc. We have. I think we pretty much agreed that we're going to add an assistant city manager and so I mean, I have an issue with separation of church and state administrator versus elected officials that that's kind of right. Well, but the bottom line is it's a it's a it's a it's a good idea. We need to hash out the specifics as far as how it would operate in here. And the question, do we understand now how that would be used and why it's being suggested to us? I don't think I have a problem with with it. I have a problem by saying that you can raise a bid by $75,000, I mean, Mike, Mike supports the same. That's okay. That that we wind up discussing, we may do a no action on it. You're assuming under the scenario that the bid, no one comes in at the bid amount, someone comes in at the bid amount, then we just award the bid as it is. You're correct that we have change orders. We understand that. But that's, you know, those the emergencies and contingencies is the concern that obviously Janine is looking at this from. Right. But Andy, I said from the very beginning, my thing is everybody's nice until there's not a nice guy that can you speak into your the protection is I mean Mike sees it the same way I do you you have a loophole where someone voting to accept it. Now we're just hearing her ideas. Okay. So the question is, do we understand the why behind this is being suggested? And one of the reasons in Shanina can correct me if I'm wrong. But you have to remember, the mayor signs all contracts so that could be one of the considerations. I understand it's different, but that's one of the considerations. I mean, the mayor signs them after the Board of Commissioners votes on it. This is not any vote of anybody, right? No vote. I understand. That's that's my robe. All right. I understand it's a very valid concern. And it's a good point. That's three. The question is, do we understand the why and the how do maybe more questions for Janine on this. No, I understand it okay. Janine. The only thing that do you want me to talk about it. The only thing I would offer you is so it's not a surprise is in my terms of doing this job, the public is always turned down, increasing the city manager's spending power. So it's when that if that happens. And I hope it doesn't don't take it personal. Oh, I'm just here to do a job. These are just things to put out there. And believe me, my goal is not to change any transparency or deceive the public, there are still checks and balances and everything we do, these are just thoughts that I've seen and things that have occurred. And as far as, like the change orders, it's not just bids and construction. We have services and goods that we buy. And sometimes maybe the price increase by $50. Well, now I got to take a $50 thing back to the board and take up their time, that that is kind of some of the other issues with that. It's not just construction. So I hope we can work this total out for you before it's over with, or it's a long time to go. All right. Thank you, so my last one is if you change the threshold on number two, then you have to amend that paragraph to reflect the whatever dollar figure we would decide to go with for the bids and the solicitations. Any other questions for Jinney on this side? Well thank you. We appreciate your time today. Okay, Irene had mentioned something about emergency purchases that were brought up is another concern. Yeah. Okay. So currently, the way it works is the city manager has authority up to $100,000. During emergency declarations. And then once, if he has to enact that power for, at the next board, then the actions have to be ratified and, the dollar limit right now, again, on inflation, I. I couldn't see us getting, a whole lot for that dollar figure for let's say, tree service, so if the trees went down, you know, everybody is going to be busy. Yes. We have designated debris removal, but it's helpful to have those other little the little mom and pop shops on hand that can come out and help us out as well. $100,000 may not get us very far in the scheme of things, I don't have a dollar figure for you to go off of on that, the way it's enacted is that 100,000 period for an emergency or 100,000 per issue, or per action, per contract, per contract. So he could, in theory, spend 100,000 for tree removal and 100,000 for sewer work and 100,000 for water and 100,000. So, okay. Run Janine. Run! Any other questions for Janine? Okay. Thank you, thank you, thank you all right, next up is Tom and public Works director. I don't know, sir. Oh, yeah. Maybe more. Maybe more good afternoon. I don't mean to, step out of bounds here a little bit, but I know I just heard the last conversation you had on, on the funds as the city manager can control, and a lot of that stuff falls on a lot of my responsibilities here. And I'm sitting there thinking, well, $7 amount. Why not a percentage amount? Maximum of 25% and 10% increase. So if you need to do an emergency, if you have to do a change, order 10% once 10% twice, 5% mixes the max of the percentage of the of the contract. But for me that would make a lot. I see this all the time, so that's why I think something like that would make sense. Just a suggestion. So I guess I'm here to talk about, sidewalks. Talk about. That's your first topic. Yeah. Yes. That's my that's my first my first, first subject. Okay, I had make a I know who I made the recommendation to, but as you know, we have, approximately $1.7 million in the city's, sidewalk fund, and have every year now, for the last four years, we've taken $100,000 a year out of that fund to match the $100,000 operating expenses I do every year on sidewalks, and my recommendation in this case here is to relook at that and use a larger amount of that money, six, seven, $800,000 and do a citywide program over a couple of years. Of course, and that would do a couple of things. One is, as you know, the prices of everything in the world is going up a huge amount of money with the inflation we have here, matter of fact, my sidewalks at one time, 2019, I think I was figured about 20 to $22 a lineal foot to replace the sidewalk. And now it's is at 45. It's probably even higher than now, concrete has gone from $60 a yard to $300 a yard. So it gives you an idea, and anytime you get a buy a yard of concrete, you have to add that labor cost, which is almost equal now. So it's kind of a lot. So it's hard to control it, I probably do about the same amount of sidewalk right now with 200,000 that I did when I first got here in 2002. For a hell of a lot less money. So, so my recommendation is that the look at the charter, see if we can utilize those, funds as, as a city wide project, short term, over a couple of years. We're not going to do $800,000 in one year, but maybe 3 or $400,000 directly out of that fund. Now, the other benefit about doing that is that we also, set aside every year, 100,000, every other year, $100,000 for sidewalks, and every other year, $100,000 for paving. And my recommendation is take that $100,000 every year and put it to paving. Then use the sidewalk funds to complete a lot of sidewalks in the city. Can I ask you a question? Sure You said earlier when you started that take $800,000 and take you a couple of years and you could do every sidewalk in town? Well, every sidewalk. I don't know if I can do every sidewalk. I'll be honest with you. I have a list. I have a list right now. Right now. The last time we had done an upgraded list, I have what I'm doing this year is 200,000, the list I have right now, city wide list is probably about $690,000 right now. That was probably figured out about a year and a half ago. So I'm sure that's up at least 10, have we have we, we look at every sidewalk when we can look at every sidewalk. There's no doubt about it. And the list changes, too. You know, we have construction. You have new developments coming in, traffic changes, utility, issues, so we need funds for that all the time, too. So $400,000 will give you a good jump on it. Without a doubt. Okay If the city's contributing 100,000 and the fund is contributing 100,000, right. That should do a lot of sidewalks every year. And in four years, there's your $800,000. I you I can't understand why you'd even want to change and take the money from the sidewalks and put it into the paving. I don't want it. No, no, I think you misunderstood me, and I apologize if I did. Every year. Every other year, the sidewalks, for example. Odd years. We get $100,000 into the general regular fund and then match that with $100,000 out of the sidewalk fund. If we use the sidewalk Fund, totally use all that money for sidewalk repair. The hundred dollars that we were at one time designated for sidewalks can go into paving and help that fund cover the paving. And that's the only resurfacing. It's not reconstruct. Often there's a difference. So how much is in the sidewalk fund that you can only take $100,000 out a year? I think it's 1.7 million. Ron Yeah. Okay. So How could you come back to this board and say, I can do every sidewalk in town that needs it? And we're not just talking about fixing sidewalks or because somebody's doing construction. We got to do a sidewalk. I'm talking about the sidewalks in front of people's houses. And they have been waiting for 20 years to get sidewalks, and they still don't have them. That's what initiated the fund to put it in here. And it was to hopefully require the city to use that money to do those things. And we have been doing those things, but we're still we're still quite a ways behind. How did you get to $1.7 million if you have been doing them? That's probably a question for Ron. You've been collecting money for that, that that developers and builders put it into the sidewalk Fund, and that fund is built up to one point. It's not just the 100,000. No no, the 100. No, it's not that's not just the 100,000 that the city is supposed to put into the fund. Right. That's separate. Are you still putting in 100,000 a year for Sidewalk Fund? Yes. This year, this year, no. Every year I'm asking every other year they put money in that into the sidewalk fund. So it was every year we don't. Do you supposed to be every year. Well Ron could probably speak to that better than I can. Well, somebody somebody. Ron Herring, finance director. How are you doing? You're talking about money being put into the sidewalk fund, okay? The only money going into it now is an interest that's earning within that 1.7 million right now, right now, we're using if there is a sidewalk project for 200,000, we take the 100,000 out of the sidewalk improvement fund. But we also have 100,000, what we call our capital project fund for the 200,000 total. If there was a 200,000 total sidewalk project, I'm not sure if that's helping out. I understand that, Rhonda, but we're for the Sidewalk Fund. I don't know, maybe it's not set up the same as it used to be. It was set up to where the city would make a contribution to the Sidewalk Fund of 100,000 per year. It was a charter request element. Correct. Is that being done? Not anymore. One part of that original charter thing. In fact, I was here back in 86 when we were still trying to build it up to $2 million. We did $100,000 out of the general fund sales tax money into the Sidewalk Fund. Correct. Once it got up to 2 million, we weren't obligated to put in that 100,000 a year. You're not at 2 million. Well we were over 2 million. But since the charter allowed us to go underneath the 2 million, we've been using it. We were down to 1.9 million a couple of years ago. Now it's at 1.7 million, just a little over 1.7 million. So you're not putting 100,000 in at all? No, no. That's why we don't have enough sidewalks. Yeah, right. And the, let me think about it. We did this. How many years ago, and now you're not even putting 100,000 back in there. But that's what the purpose of it was. So that we could get those sidewalks so the people who don't have them, something's got conflated because the you guys have what's happened is you've conflated the contributions from outside sources, developers or whatever, and you're putting those funds into the sidewalk Improvement fund, where the restriction on the sidewalk improvement fund was to be just on the money that was put in by the general fund. Contributions So, I mean, which is which? How much is the sidewalk improvement fund and how much are these contributions that Tom was talking about? Well, the 100,000 $200,000 I have this year is 100,000 from general fund and $100,000 out of that sidewalk fund. That's how we get the 200,000. I got that part right. But you said that the developer had contributed into the Sidewalk Improvement Fund. Is that true, Ron? Yeah. Developers contributed to the sidewalk improvement. That's what, Mr. Funston said. No, the only the only thing that went into it, as per the previous charter, where we did the $100,000 a year right up until we reached the 2 million, and we weren't obligated to do anything more with the 2 million. But back in the previous charter, we were not allowed to invade the $2 million. The previous charter revision, 4 or 5 years ago, allowed us to go below that $2 million to try to do more sidewalks with the $100,000 a year. Where did all that language go? I've never read that language in the charter yet . I mean, we're where is the language? Ron? That's that that I mean, we have this thing sidewalk Improvement Fund, and we're looking at the charter, but it doesn't say anything. Like what? It doesn't say anything. Like what you're saying. Are you talking about bringing it up to $2 million? Any of the language that you're talking about is not here. I'm what I'm looking like. Was it three, 17, 20 is the last ratification? Is it what section is that? John 626 2626. Yeah. Wait a minute. Okay You're talking about. Yeah. If somebody does not want to put in a sidewalk, they can ask for a waiver. And that money goes into the general fund. We've got I think about 148,000 sitting in there. That's the general fund. Correct. We're talking about the sidewalk increase pavement fund. Chapter 26 of the charter. Ron Right. Could somebody put could put, Irene. Thanks. Thank you. Irene, where's the language that Ron's talking about? I believe they have to go back, but I believe they changed a lot of it, and that's why they changed the name of that as well. That fund, because it used to be different title. It used to be the Street and sidewalk Improvement. They had the word street in front of it. I got that part. Yeah I saw that, Ron. But this stuff about the 2 million and it doesn't even say in here anymore that the, the, the there'll be a contribution of $100,000 per year. It's right that was taken out. That part was taken out. The 100,000 right when the previous charter was done. This was originally written in. It may be good. It may be bad, but it's not what's in the 2019. And then and those were the only two changes. So I believe it was at the last at the last charter we had, which was in 2020 voted on 2020. James 20. You did that March. I'm, I'm remembering that we had over $2 million and the reason the boards really wanted to be able to expend those funds. And so the words were written so that they, they could expend it on sidewalks, improving existing sidewalks. And it could not be used as negotiating points with developers. Developers had to do their own sidewalks, you know, because it was a big concern with the apartment complex going in that the city money, would be anyway. So the way, the way I read this now is if, if, if they took this, if they took the 100,000 out in 17 years, the fund is at zero. The way you guys have rewritten it. And then, yeah, I remember that discussion and the thought was, well, when it comes down then, well as it nears coming down, then, then it would be we'd put language back in to replenish, but there's nothing that says it gets replenished in here. No, not today. I mean, we've got $1.7 million. That's so in 17 years you're going to be broke again back. You're going to be back to 19. No, I think of it this way. In ten years, when it gets to, you know, 700,000, you start requiring them to put how do you do that? That doesn't say that because the Charter Review Commission will sit. We'll have this discussion again and they'll say, all right, it's time to replenish this. We're going to put reinvent this thing every five years. I mean, to me, that's just that's good. So let me you're you're bringing forth an issue that you'd like to see addressed. I think we're all open to discussing that. There's no reason to go back and look at history. What needs to be there today going forward. And I mean, the sidewalk paragraph. I remember we spent days on this one. And what's that? That section in the summary, I just pulled up a few light. I don't think it's necessary in the right now. We need to get an internal how they're using it and what we need to do in the interim. I have some questions. Okay. So what I understand and maybe both of y'all probably need to be there, is the fact that let's say you've got a sidewalk repair that's 200,000. Not all of it comes out of the sidewalk fund. Some of it comes out of capital. Your capital expenditure. Correct. We have a capital project. Okay. So in essence, let's say they start to withdraw the money just from the sidewalk fund. You could deplete the sidewalk fund quicker if they say, you know what, I'm the city. We're not going to take our capital dollars and put them into sidewalk repair. We're just going to use the money from the sidewalk fund until it's till, you know, that's what I'm saying. So it's you could play with both pockets is what I'm. I guess what you're kind of doing. You're not invading the sidewalk fund totally. Because you're using capital dollars to subsidize the sidewalk fund. Is that a fair statement? Correct Okay, but that's not a and I'm trying to I'm trying to get my wrap my brain around, the utilization of the sidewalk funding. Because there is no language that says it shouldn't go below a certain threshold as far as the funding is concerned. But but that's something. Yeah that's something that I think would be would be good for discussion that the Sidewalk Fund shall not not be less than X number of dollars, but so what you're what your plan is, is to take maybe half of the sidewalk fund and do a comprehensive of sidewalk repair over a two year window. Yes, sir. Okay, so how much money have you budgeted this year between the general fund and the sidewalk fund to do sidewalk repairs? A total 200,000. So you're doing the minimum? That's the maximum I can do. That's the maximum they can use of the sidewalk fund. But you're doing them. You're doing the minimum by matching Mac, matching the maximum of the sidewalk improvement fund. There's nothing that says the general fund couldn't have had 400,000 or $500,000 into it. Now you're asking us, Tom, to take the take the cap off of the sidewalk Improvement Fund and deplete that so you don't have to use the capital improvement fund. That's what you just ask us and you and you've and you've mixed. You know, the intent all along was. I don't have to read it to you, okay? The intent all along was that the capital improvement fund would take out no more than $100,000. The city would take out no more than $100,000 of that to match the city's. If the city put in 50,000, then you could only take 50,000 out of this. It wasn't. There's nothing in there that say you could take these contractor money or anybody else's money and mix it in there, because then you never know what money is being spent. But if you have more money in the put it in the budget, the city budget and spend it, if you mix it because somebody doesn't want to put up sidewalks in front of their house when they build and you get that money and put it in the sidewalk fund, right? Ron, you said it's in the general fund, right? 148,000. Well, I think we're talking two separate pots of money. You're talking about the Sidewalk Improvement Fund. And then I thought, what you're talking about is another issue where we're talking of capital improvement, sidewalk money and sidewalk Fund, how it functions. And it's been rewritten to where it's been emasculated, basically, I think. So it needs to be I feel it needs to be rewritten myself that to reflect what the intent was. I I'm very I'm really surprised to hear what I'm hearing tonight, because we were really proud of this when it happened, because we were getting sidewalks. And not that we're not getting sidewalks done now, but if it takes $1 million to get them, is there $1 million intertwined already? Can the city make up the difference? Can you do them all? No, I, I think what he's saying is he's going to identify. You've identified because if you're if you're only spending 200,000 a year, you're putting a Band-Aid where you need stitches. Yes. And so what? You're what I hear you're telling us is that you're going to put stitches by having a whole comprehensive plan to address the sidewalks that are going to take more than $200,000 that. Correct? Correct The Tarpon Avenue alone is 307,000. Okay. So, so the question that we have to address is a charter review is how do we make sure that we, instead of having a sidewalk fund, that is used for its intended purpose, do pleated. And how do we protect that fund from being depleted, I guess I, you know, one of the things that I always look at when we budget stuff and we have a lot of money sitting aside for a purpose, is you're not doing the purpose if you're just sitting on the money, and so the money's intended to be spent. Spend the money. If it took 1,000,007 to make sure all the sidewalks of Tarpon Springs were repaired, and that's. You don't have to, you know, it's important for us. I think it's a it's a two edged sword. We want to make sure that these sidewalks are addressed in the future. And you have the you have this you put this charter provision in here to make sure that that they were addressed in the future. But in the interim, the sidewalks aren't being addressed. So we're sitting on a bunch of money that could be spent for a comprehensive plan. So it's, you're you're right, John, this this needs work. Yes, but I don't I reluctant when you when you said you had $2 million, you know, the intent over the old charter, $2 million setting aside for sidewalks. Well, that's doing you doing, you know, good at repairing sidewalks because somebody's just sitting there, so I guess that that's something that we would we would have to. And I don't know whether you agree or disagree. I just, I, I, I hear you and I don't disagree. The reason I believe it was a $2 million. They were started at zero. And we're going to build it up to 2 million. Okay. And they couldn't spend it before they got to 2 million. Then they could spend the interest. The theory then probably 83, 85, 86, 87. Remember what interest rate it was easy to get 10% interest. So they were thinking that generates a couple of hundred thousand dollars a year for sidewalks. The city puts in money for sidewalks. But here's a perfect example of what why it happened this year. They budgeted $200,000 100,000 from the from the Sidewalk Fund and 100,000 from the general fund. If they had $500,000, $600,000 worth of sidewalks to do, they should have budgeted and 500,000 in capital improvements fund and 100,000 out of the Sidewalk Fund. It's a perfect example of why that fund was created because of the lack of attention to sidewalks. They they made their own case for me, and they made my case for me, I've got a question. Sure, Tom, you've been doing this job a long time. 22 years. Yes, ma'am. And before that, to New York was in my own business. Yes, if, if in your ideal world, how much do you think the city should be spending per year for the maximum effect of ultimately really cleaning up the sidewalk issues, that's a kind of a loaded question, you know, to, you know, a couple of years ago, $200,000, you know, three, four years ago, when we first started, 200,000 seemed, you know, reasonable. Yeah, we did, you know, we got 20% increase in cost plus probably, I'm not doing the same amount of sidewalks I was when I was doing it ten years ago, inflation is hitting it and money in hand now is better than money in hand down the road, I may be right now. I look at my list here right now is about $690,000. And that's not all the sidewalks trust me, it's not all the sidewalks, some of them don't have to be replaced. But, you know, next year, it's probably going to be, you know, that same list is going to be $800,000 or $900,000. And I'm not getting anywhere with it. The sidewalks on Typekit Avenue are a prime example. They're falling apart with a lousy job when they put it in back in 0203 was pretty poor design, but they need attention. But right there, right off the top of my head is $390,000 for the sidewalks now, and I'm not even sure if that's correct at this moment. And I don't know. This is it is this do you hire outside contractors or is this done in-house? The sidewalks, a combination of both. That's another issue I do hire on this on a sidewalk projects I do every other year is outside contractors. We do quite a bit in-house too. I have an excellent concrete crew, and you know, as long as so much money going around for everything, I know that we have to cut the money down. But we're order for me to do the job that that you like me to do. I need the funds to do it. How? The funds get there. Be honest with you. You know, take whatever route you want. As long as we have the funds. I can do the project. I'd be happy to do it. So would you be happy with 500, 600,000 a year? Or would that be adequate for you? I was thinking 400, for, for a couple of years. But I also believe that I don't want I'm not looking to spend a whole .1. $7 million. That'd be crazy. No but at least a good portion of it. So you can get somewhere down the road, there's a lot of sidewalks here. The other issue is I got sidewalks, and we talk about this all the time. In the last list is there's spaces. We have sidewalks and no sidewalks. Well, there are vacant lots. Theoretically, they should be sidewalks in anyhow. And lean and lean in properties to get those monies. But, you know, we put sidewalks in all over the place. But we're not filling in where we need to fill. Also have the responsibilities of safe, passage to schools. I have to take that into consideration, so the costs are going way up. You know, 1980, whenever we did this over here, I could buy a new car for $7,000. Well, I can't I can't get concrete for 30 bucks a yard anymore. If you had just this need of 5 or $600,000 for sidewalks this year. Tom, why didn't you. Capital improvement budgeted you have to ask those. Approve the budgets I asked for. I asked for money all the time. I do you in your budget request. You asked for 500,000 out of capital improvement. I asked budget time. I asked for 100,000. I know I get a matching fund of 100,000. Am I guilty of that? I guess maybe I am, but but a couple of years ago, $200,000 got me quite a bit. Doesn't get me that today. So is the $200,000 you're requesting just to repair existing sidewalks, it's filling and repair in place. Yes. And just a question. What kind of budget do you have for putting sidewalks in? To create, you know, safe walkways where we have existing roads. But in order to the best way I can explain it and I'll explain the best way on the project, the $200,000 I do every year, we usually try to fill in bigger areas, and schools are prime, and we do quite a few of those over here. Small repairs we do in house, we do do in house. And there's a budget. There's a line item in my, my roads and streets department over there. Now, that gets expanded pretty fast. So we probably do at least $100,000 for the sidewalks in house alone . And they're just mostly those 90% of those, 95% of those are probably just repairs, you know, broken sidewalks, trees, pick them up. I spent probably $30,000 a year in Oakleaf Village alone because. Because their root system. So. But how about do you do you ask for a budget for infill sidewalks where you really are missing them, and it's falling outside of this because it's a new sidewalks, but it's not like a new development area where somebody else should be responsible for funding that. We look at it as a holistic over here, like out on the, Riverside is a prime example. We had complaints about no sidewalks there. There's a lot of sidewalks there. The last one I did, I did fill in some spots there a vacant lots that we end up filling in. There's no use to having a sidewalk on the. Nowhere does it make any sense. So we try to evaluate them as closely. Is it your responsibility to do the vacant lots or do they in general get done at the time that the lots are built on? Usually when the lots are built on, but in some cases you have vacant lots out there that people have that just keep them on the property and let them sit there for forever. Somewhere along the line I got to, I got to fill those in. I mean, I could build 1000ft of sidewalks on one street, and if they dead end in places, they're not going anywhere else. It's not worth it. So somewhere along, you got to make those decisions that fit in. And how much do you request for that, it all comes out of the same funds, and I don't put any. It all comes out of the same 200,000. Well it depends. Some of the stuff is actually done in house. If I have one 50 foot section in between a couple lots, we'll do that in house. My concrete crew are very capable of doing that kind of work. Sometimes in the bigger ones over here, if I can, I can fill in if in the same neighborhood, because these are I do these all over the city and we actually online we have maps of the areas we've, we've completed in the last five years, and depending on, on where they are, sometimes I will use a contract for filling in, sometimes I won't. We'll just do it in the house. So. So let me ask a question and maybe you. Maybe it's something so, so because like vacant lots that are close to school, you're going to want to infill the sidewalk. Yes. Okay. And so and I know there's a lot of people who own property who will, you know, sit on it for ten or 15 or 20 years before they give it to their grandson to build a house. Right, is there a way that that would be a if we had to put in a sidewalk, that would be a sidewalk impact fee that we could collect at a later date when they go to build a house that they would be required to reimburse the city for the sidewalk and I guess I don't know if that's something that, that, that, that'd be illegal right there. Right. I don't know the question. That's, but I don't I obviously, I'm going outside the charter, but but you're talking about creating a sidewalk impact fee along. Yeah Police fire and all that. Yeah. Yeah, we currently don't have one. As you probably know, but yeah, that's why I. That's why I brought you up. Is there something that would that would be contemplated that would allow the city to recoup the cost of, of the sidewalk, it's, you know, putting in a sidewalk on a vacant lot because the city felt that that was necessary and it would be a sidewalk impact fee. Okay Well, that sidewalk would give that lot some value as well. But it's not going to make the value of the lot go down. Yeah, but if the city has to put in a sidewalk and typically when a builder has to put it in, if you do it before you're doing it for the builder, you should be reimbursed. And that's and that's not a charter thing. That's something that y'all need to look at, internally. Number one, number two, what as far as budgeting for the city is concerned, and I know I'm taking you out of out of out of out of order here, but it has to do with the sidewalks. What if the city, could only get $100,000 from the sidewalk improvement fund? What is the max? Has the city, budgeted for sidewalk improvement over the course? I mean, you can give me a five year running average or, you know, three year running. I think that's more of your. That's just been the 200,000 a year. Okay. To 101 hundred run. Yes. Okay And did go over are there I remember a couple of years ago we did went over by about 40,000. Okay. Are there economies of scale I know I really know what the cost of concrete is. And you're right. It's gotten stupid. Yes. All right. And but are there economies of scale because when you do one sidewalk, I mean, I know the cost of concrete for small job is a lot more than when you get a lot more yards. Do y'all are y'all, you know, something like this would where you would, would get everything prepped and poured within a short window of time that you could order a lot more concrete to reduce your, your your, cost. Yeah. You're like, you know, if I'm doing my crews do mostly smaller ones. We'll do a couple a few yards of pop over here. But if you're doing a type, an avenue and you're talking, you know, few hundred yards of concrete, probably 4 or 500 yards of concrete. Oh, yeah. The economy of scale comes down. Okay all right, I just these are just questions have to do with the charter, but but I which which part of Tarpon Avenue do you think needs to be redone? I would take it from a minimum yearly all the way up to a ring avenue a ring. Okay. There's a lot of there's a lot of bad sidewalks. I think talked about this before. Yeah. No, I was just curious. The pavers in them, it was a poor design. Be honest with you. Very good. Some. Yeah You half paver, half sidewalk. Yeah. It's horrible. The design was horrible. Yeah. I think the intent was esthetics more than it was practicality. I agree with it. Yeah, it definitely needs the attention. I just think we need to rewrite this whole thing. And the other the other thing too, not only the concrete going up. The regulations on Ada. Ada is big too. And that throws the cost way up. So all right, I think I thank you for coming. I I you're a brave man when you come in this room. We're not done with them though I don't we're not we're not done. You can't release it yet. I'm pretty tough. The next question we had for you is, how is the city addressing Brazilian peppers and other invasives, on on spot issues? We don't get too much into it. We try to get grants for it. I know I've talked to, the PGA about a couple of times, we do on our own properties, cut them back when we can treat them , they are a nuisance. Oh, my God, they drive me crazy, but again, as where the funds are and the time to do it, that's the whole thing. Okay not not as much as I'd like to, that's for sure. Okay. One of the things and I, and I apologize if everybody thinks I'm, I'm taking the floor too much. Tell me if I'm correct or incorrect. Because I heard this, that obviously a developer is required when they develop the property to remove the Brazilian peppers. Correct? Probably I believe so. They're probably better. But if they, they're required. Yes, but if it's a lot, let's say I plat a subdivision. I'm a developer and I have wetlands and the wetlands are platted as lots, even though they're not buildable, but they're going to be eventually abandoned because they don't issue or build on that lot. They're not required to remove the Brazilian pepper because it's not. They're not requesting a Coe for that particular lot. So when they take a large property and then reassign the value of that one place, they have, they have a wetland that they allocated as a lot, okay. They're not going to build on it, but it's allocated as a lot okay. Because you're not building on it. There's not a requirement to remove the Brazilian pepper. And that's how the developer can get by without eradicating. I think that's accurate. I that's very accurate. It's very accurate. Look at the look at the projects you guys have approved lately. They have to take all the invasive species. Yeah, well, I'm just telling you, there are certain subdivisions right now that were that that the that the wetlands were owned by the development. Right. And they're full of Brazilian peppers. They were never required to remove the Brazilian peppers from those wetlands. That was before the new laws went in. Okay. But so, so one of the things that we were discussed last week is adding a, a charter, and it's, it's basically it's an allocation of personnel. Okay to require the charter to require a section that calls for the removal or eradication. I just Brazilian pepper, but invasive species, specifically Brazilian peppers, because that seems to be what, what is eaten up the wetlands because we're required to protect the wetlands, etc. But when you're losing them to Brazilian peppers, there's got to be a plan in place to have a program and, so would it be an allocation of personnel that all they do from 9 to 5 Monday through Friday is to go with a couple of chainsaws, a wood chipper, and start cutting down Brazilian peppers and treating them so they don't grow back on public property, on city property, property. I don't know about using personnel. I'd be a contract worker. They're going to do a much better contract, is going to do a lot better job on Brazilian peppers as far as the mass, the mulch we have here. Okay. Again, as I'll do as I, I'll make a simple little statement. Show me the money. I'd be happy to do it. Okay but yeah, you're right on on those numbers. We have quite a bit of property over here that that's not city owned. Has it? Have been plotted for houses over here that just overwhelmed with Brazilian peppers. But eradicating them is not as easy as it sounds. I know that, but you can't. You don't eradicate anything if you don't cut it down. You don't. Right, right, right. You're 100% right. And if you don't treat the stump. Yes Okay. You know so there's ways to do it. And it's, it's, it's going to be if you don't do anything, you don't have the wetland anymore because it'll just be a Brazilian pepper forest. And we would do the same program like we do with the mangroves. We hire a company to do the mangrove trimming. We do a little bit in-house and that's that's been a great success. Do you know if there are grants available for invasive species removal? I've been asking for that because we have some, Australian pines too, that need to come down. So. So yes. All right. All right. I said my piece. Thank you. You're welcome. Okay. Well, I think we are a question. Go ahead, so. So, Tom, if I remember correctly , you're pretty involved when there are emergency periods in the city. Yes, I am, I handle those contracts. Yes Okay. Well, well, one thing you know that has concerned me is the $100,000 limit for goods and services on an emergency basis. I thought you might be. And maybe even Ron might be a good person. We heard it from Janina. Do you know what is your take on this? Do you think 100,000 is adequate? Well, I think that's for supplies for internally. I have contracts of course, over here. And that's FEMA reimbursed over there. I think that that falls under a different guideline. That and everything would go through my contractors. So, so let's say we have hurricanes and you need some emergency piece of equipment. You're going through. Well we have those that's already built in. Yeah. And that's you know, I can call my contractor up and say, listen, you know, they're here anyhow. And they help us evaluate over here and what equipment we need and that all goes through that, that single contract. Okay. So that's got quite a large number on it. Declaration, emergency declaration. Once that's kicked in over here, the city manager can purchase. Yes. As far as FEMA related and emergency related. Okay. Plus my contract also covers that from anything from from chemical to spills to sinking boats to buildings coming down. That's all part of that, that contract. Okay. So once it's that kind of emergency situation, you aren't limited by the 100,000. Okay Thank you. That's it. That was easy. So when are you guys going to ask the city manager to give us some money to get rid of those invasive plants? I always start with Ron first. With Ron first. The money, then I go ask for it. So yeah, he says no to me a lot. So it's going to be the charter we, we got. We got some writing to do. Thank you. It's good to see everybody again. Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you. Oh that's mine. That's his. We're just warming up when it's your turn. For Scott. Thank you. Okay, well, we are now to our last VIP. Well, we have a support person. I I have here to assist. So you've been assisting, correct. Are we in? Then? At some point, just a little while before the meeting started, he did have one thing that he wanted to bring to the charter. Oh, okay. Okay. Sounds good. It's a quick thing. You want me to bring it up now? Yeah. It's up. It's up to the board. Bring it on out. Well. Thank you. I just I was asking, I saw Irene, I was looking over the charter this weekend and stuff, and I saw one under section 23, after the $25,000 limit set, Janina went over. There's a section there. It just says monthly financial statements shall be made available in the office of the city clerk and collector and quarterly financial statements shall be made available in the public library. We stopped doing that when we had. We've got the website and we electronically put all our financial statements monthly, which include our revenue report, expenditure report, our trial balance onto the website before we did this, we got with Irene, we got with with the with the library. And they all agreed, you know, because usually we we'd be binding these books together. You know, they're about this thick about 300 pages and putting giving a Irene one the city clerk's office. And then I think we were two of them, one for the press, two. And then one at the library. So instead of that, we've been putting them on the website, downloading the reports onto under the document library and the city's website. Yeah, we had marked that, you know, if somebody needs some I do like paper. So I do have 2 or 3 copies in my office. So in case it's needed, so the bottom line is you do have monthly financial statements that are available. Yes. And you're posting it on the Tarpon Springs website? Yes. And that would be a good thing to update. Good thing to update. I want to ask him if they have any budget for invasive species. All right. Well thank you. What chair. Yes. Can I ask, do you have anything in the budget for invasive species removal? Oh. Good point. Yes. I think Tom does have some in his in his budget under his. Yes, he has some in there, but I don't know if it's like a big dollar amount you're looking for. If it's he's I think he mentions a different types of trees. I think one of them is the invasive species. I can't remember if it's 40,000 he has. That's that's not even right. I don't think it's what you're looking for. Yeah. That costs me half that much just to get them out of my yard. Yeah. So Okay, all right, Fire Chief Young, please. I understand you have some at it and tell us who we need to have in the event of an emergency. Well as you can see on the screen, that's that's the essential people that come to the EOC. Those are just the people that work in the operations center. That doesn't include all the employees that come in that aren't in the operational center. Public works has crews, public services has crews, the fire department, police department. We all have our own crews, but these are the people that come to the EOC center that work inside the command center, we are looking at the number of people because that building over there gets very, very crowded. When we call people in, we have people sleeping in closets everywhere. They're scattered throughout the building. So we're trying to whittle this number down. And we in fact, we had a meeting this morning on on some ideas. So, so what you see up there isn't all inclusive. So it is a working document all the time. Depending on what we feel we can do. So and they all have, you know, certain functions within the emergency operations center. And you have to remember there's two shifts. You know, they come the command center works on a 12 hour shift, day shift, night shift, so people can rest and any event that we get hit that we have fresh people working at all times. Well, this directly translates to our discussions on on residency requirements, emergency response and where people should reside. Do you have any insights or opinions on that? Yes So myself, the police chief, we both currently live in town. I've been living in I've been with the city for 35 years, I've lived in town now, I think a little over 12 years, possibly, but the problem that I'm seeing is the affordability for people to live in town currently, myself and I think one one administrative assistant secretary works lives in town, her and her husband. But they've lived here for many, many years. A lot of the firefighters can't live in town. It's just too expensive for them to live here. The problem with the current rule, in my opinion, and is the fact that there's pockets within tarpon Springs that are considered a Tarpon address, but they're unincorporated and three, you know, three, four, six, eight, eight. So technically, by charter, you can't live there. There's a new subdivision going out on Old Coachman Road that's been annexed into the city. But right across the street is Cypress Run. I could live in that neighborhood right across the street, but I can't live on the other side of the street. Okay I have my one of my deputy chiefs who is possibly the heir apparent to replace me someday. We don't know. For sure yet. Built a house up there maybe eight years ago. Ten years ago. Right on the other side of Anclote. Beautiful home. Just put a real nice pool in two years ago. If he was to take over my job and all. Police department, fire department, most city departments do a succession plan. We try to prep our people coming up to take over our job someday, and take over the role. He would not move to town. He's not going to move across the street. So we really back ourselves into a corner that way. I know the no name storm came up as Mr. Trapani brought up. I was working here when that happened. I wasn't in the role. I'm at now. That was the 93 when that storm hit. I was in Colorado skiing. Okay, I go to Utah every year to ski so that storm could happen any day. The police department fire department. We are set up today to have people in place to take over in our absence if needed. Okay. Now a hurricane, of course we know that's coming. In fact, a couple of years ago, my wife was out in Utah and I went out to visit her. I checked everything, there was no storms coming, nothing on the horizon. Four days into the trip, something pops up. I immediately get on a plane and I can get back here, which I did. So those types of things are going to pop up. We handle events daily on an emergency basis of things to be handled. We had a big apartment complex on MLK a few years ago. I was at a meeting down in Saint Petersburg. By the time I got back up here, they pretty much had it handled. We've trained people. We have people in line and our org chart to handle situations throughout the day. So with that being said, I think I think it needs to be more of a radius thing to help out to action. So if the person that may take over from me isn't the person and you do have to go outside to hire, it's going to help you bring in a bigger candidate pool. Some examples. The Lago of the chief, fire chief of Largo lives out at the north far end of Jasmine, North Jasmine. He built a house out there about eight years ago. The fire chief for Safety Harbor lives in Tarpon Springs. The fire chief for Clearwater lives over on the far side of Tampa. We the fire departments, are so more complex today. I have six divisions in my department with people handling things. It's not that the fire chief is sitting around anymore waiting for that big fire to come in. I have people to take care of those issues and handle major problems for me. In the event I'm not here. So those are the types of things I think that you really need to think about when you think about residency, I don't want us to be backed into a corner where we can't get people within to work for you in the future. You know, I do a lot of extensive training with these people that are on my succession plan, making sure they have classes and education and what they need to do and teaching them the ifs and the what's and all and how things are done. You know, we do extensive training on that. So I hope that helps a little bit. Yeah, I know you were at a board of commissioners meeting and you just kept jumping up and down because you got, you know, messages on your cell phone, the police chiefs and the chief's phone are ringing pretty much nonstop and middle of the night. Whatever. So Right. And you can we handle it? Yeah. Yes. But if I'm not here, why, you have a little bumper? No, that's. That was, a little thing I had taken off today. And it's stinging this minute, but hopefully it's nothing. But that was really to distract you from what was really being talked about. So, so, so the personnel that you've listed, is there a mobilization area that you recommend? I look at it as a mobilization area, area of mobilization, where these people could be within your within the city, within a is it a 15 minute, 20 minute. Do you have any anything in place now? Well, again, if as a if it's a hurricane coming I understand you'll do that hurricane. If it was a major emergency, I think if they can get here within 20 to 30 minutes, we're good. I'll give you an example. My wife was worked for the fire department. She retired. She also worked at a cardiac cath lab on call. So now we're talking life and death. When somebody was having a heart attack, when she was on call on a weekend or evenings, she had 30 minutes to get there. Now there's a there's a time frame that somebody has before that's damaged. So they were giving them 30 minutes for a major event. So I kind of always judge things off of that. We have again, the people that are on duty, there's always a district chief there are trained at a level of command operations handling chaos to organize that chaos until, until or if he needs additional help. So we always have people on duty 24 seven that can handle all these situations. So I would say 20 or 30 minute window on a major thing that would be reasonable to me. So that's why I go back to that radius. And that's for your second or third tier. Yes. People Yeah. Let's talk about your first tier people. Well that would yes second tier. First tier would be me. Second tier would be the. Well you've got deputy chiefs. I look at them as a as a at first like the assistant chief. Yeah. Because like you, like you said, if you're, if you're gone you're not first tier because you're not available because you're in Colorado skiing. Right. All right. But who's your your next first tier person. What's the mobilization area would you consider I would say within a ten mile, 12 mile radius I'd be comfortable with which is a good distance when you to get here. So you know, I mean, I don't think it has to do with the, the love of the city or anything like that. Like I said, I've been here over 35 years. Most of my time I lived in Safety Harbor. I committed myself to the city way back. You know, this city is my city. I consider it. You know, my love. I'm going to retire here. I have a home here. So, you know, it's not a matter of living in the city. I always look out for the best interests as they do too, because they're coming in on their days off, doing events and everything else to make sure things are running smoothly. So that's kind of where I'm at. Well, sounds like you've got a fantastic department. You've got a whole redundancy plan in place. Yes, the radius makes that much more sense, especially , you know, we've spent a lot of time talking about economy and inflation and, you know, the cost of living and, you know, everything's gone haywire. So I could see how somebody can afford to, you know, move to Tarpon. And, you know, obviously , by your very profession, you're dedicated to the city. Yes Thank you. What would you consider? I mean, you've got obviously it's some duplication you've got because Jeff Young's got his first year. Your first year would be your deputy fire chief. Yes The two deputy chiefs come in, but they handle different things. So the police and fire are probably the bigger, agencies within because there's multiple things happening with them. They have operations, they have staffing, they have EMS that they're handling. So there's they're a little bit bigger and broader. Pick apart to public works where they're handling the trees and stuff like that. During the event. So police and fire have a little bit more going on in those situations. So and like I said, we are looking at some of these, especially in the support staff area that those people, we may not need to have them come in right off the bat. It may be be a post-storm thing. Try to whittle our numbers down so we have a little bit more room in the building over there. These storms, you know, can last for days. And we're kind of cramped up. So yeah, I'm looking at some of the support staff and kind of scratching my head. Yeah, there's a few on there that we would probably need. And again, like I said, we just had a meeting this morning about this as we gear up what we're doing. So most people to feed to. Yeah. That's a that's yes. That's a, that's an operation within itself over there. What would your what would you require if, one of your top people didn't live within this 10 to 12 mile radius? Well, I guess if they if they don't live within that ten mile radius, I can't if they're already working, it's going to be really hard to get them to come here. I think the current charter has a date attached to it, as if you lived here for. And if it's a 2000, if you were hired, if you were hired prior, then you your grandfathered in. Any new hires? I it's just it's really tough because it's not for it's not for your every day employee. Right. But I think there's a, there's a gentleman in my department that, a couple of them just got promoted to the district chief in the last few weeks, and both of them don't live. One lives down in, the southern end of Palm Harbor, I believe, on 19 out that way. And the other one is, a little bit farther out. Those, again, are the secession that I'm talking about, that they could eventually ten years or so, 15 years, be the guys that are sitting up here talking to the next charter board about what's going on. You know, it's hard to get some of these people to move into town when they've already established their homes to try to live in town. I think it's about money. It is. I'm sorry to say, but the economy, the home prices, are you know, getting up there and it's tough. I mean, that's why I have a lot of them living in Pasco. I would say the majority of my department, they're very young. They're all trying to find homes in Pasco County a lot. You believe it. There's a few of them that are in their 30s still living at home. So my I didn't explain myself very well. The current list or the leaders of this city. Okay If you retired in the city manager decided he wouldn't use either of your deputy fire chiefs, but there was somebody else who had plenty of experience whatever within the department. No, outside, outside, outside. I would. I would go back to my radius and say that they need to be able to get back in the town within the 20 or 30 minutes. I think that would be advisable. Okay. And that's quite a ways out, really. I mean, when you think about it, that that can be out a ways. It's and that gets to the question of how is that measured ? Is that measured at 2 a.m? Is that measured at rush hour. Is that true? That's very true. And in an emergency, there's going to be a lot of cars on the road. If it's 30 minutes more cars than there are right now, that's and that's probably going to happen. You're probably right there. Yeah. Live on Mears and once you were talking about a physical distance not a time distance. You were talking about a physical distance, right? I think we'd have to look at it to see how that really plays out. If. Is it a time, 30 minute issue? Because I think 30 minutes from one place could go, you could get here quicker if you were coming down Keystone and if you were coming from Saint Pete up 19, you know, there's a lot of variables there. So time is such a subjective thing that it would almost have to be a physical, like a 15 mile radius, a physical. I think that's I think you'd be safe there on that. That's 15 miles. I think that would be very safe. You know, you go back to my wife talking when she was working at the cath lab, she worked at countryside at cath lab at the time. But we were living here and she had to, leave that job, go to work at advent because she couldn't make the 30 minutes to Countryside hospital in time. I mean, I live at sunset Bay townhomes right out in Riverside. It takes me almost 15 minutes to get into town. So, you know, through the traffic and now all the streets are blocked. And so it's can be a challenge. There too. So. Well, the other thing is, is you you're talking about measuring from the outside where the city limits are. Right? Or you're talking about measuring from the center of town. Where do you measure from? I would probably put the center point at the emergency fire and police. The center? Yeah, fire and police center. You're talking about the center point. Well, I guess you'd have to come up with a point because I have a station out by the high school. I have a station out by the R.O. plant, and then, of course, the downtown station. So you know, the guy that's got to drive out to the high school station. It's going to take him a little bit longer than it's going to take him to get to the downtown station. Time isn't enter into my equation. It's a distance. So where do you measure the distance? The center of town or the perimeter of town, or the or the or the EOC headquarters could use you could use the Huey address, I suppose. Headquarters. Yeah Or the EOC. Is that located at the EOC is at the Huey Center. But so but but they go out to the stations they're assigned when they get us called back in headquarters. Yeah, that's my days of Dick Tracy. I think you've articulated your position pretty good. I appreciate that. I was I think I mean, times change. I mean, tarpons used to be tarpon was tarpon and everything else was woods. And now it's all yes, it's grown in the years I've been here, it's grown. So it used to be that that's why we wanted people to live in town. Because there wasn't anything else out there. Yeah And again, you know, I've. When I'm out of town on vacation or whatever, my phone still ringing. It's not like the I go off grid, you know, the phone's still ringing. I still handle issues, you know, but I do have somebody here to handle those things, so things are going to happen while I'm gone. I understand that, and the biggest problem we have is, is that naming those employees who have to do that. Right. So we may call you in for that. You can't tell. It won't be any of your people, but you will have somebody to blame for the others. No Yeah. And part of it too, chief, remember, wasn't just the time for, say, you or chief, or Jeff to get in. Was or other employees. But it was fabric of the community. I see you everywhere. I mean, you know, if I had a question about some building code or something, I see you around town. That's a building. Building community. So there's some of that works into the equation for me, too. But I think that I would hope anybody that hire John Wood in these positions would have a vested interest in the community and be involved in the community doing things all the time, regardless. Again when I was living in Safety Harbor, part of those years when I wasn't even in the management staff, I still came in and worked arts and crafts festivals. I still did all those things, but but. This generation is changing. Yeah you know, I've seen it with the people I'm hiring today. That generation is changing. It's a 9 to 5 job to them. And so finding those diamonds in the rough like the old timer that I am, it's tough nowadays. It's tough. I mean, I people don't want to work overtime. They don't want it. You know it's time life work balance type thing now today. So you know well I'm willing to change. I think we should be flexible and change it somewhat. I'm not sure exactly what the change needs to be today. We got some good information we can go forward with now. Yeah. No, this is very, very helpful. Okay. Do we have any further questions for the, for the you guys have mentioned in the one meeting, I think maybe Jim brought it up about an operational plan you guys were concerned about. You remember? Okay Never mind. We've had a lot of ideas here. I don't remember it. Okay. That's not unusual for my age, though. I know I'm there. I can't remember if I had lunch or not. It's for emergencies and stuff like that. I think you wanted to know if the city had an emergency operation plan or something. Well, that was more because we were really looking at who should be right. It rolls right into this, okay. And we do. We have a who should be here when we need them. Yeah. But you've given us great input on that. So thank you sir. Yes thank you very much. And you have that cool new truck that can come and pick me up. Say that again. You have that cool new truck that can come by and pick me up. Yeah. Okay You know what? I forgot to ask Tom function. When is that roundabout going to be finished? Okay, okay. Yeah MLK, the roundabout is going to be finished. I forgot to ask. I think I think I heard the other day it should be anytime they're just finishing up some final things at MLK and, spring. There Yeah. Yeah, I think they, I think it's soon next week or two. I believe is what I heard. Don't quote me on that, but I think it's close to a peak on that about every third day. And yeah, they're not setting the world on fire. No thank you, thank you. Okay, well, we're going to move from the, from our invited guests into, review and discussion of charter sections. We've got about 50 minutes to go, I think we can probably hit at least one section. Where did we leave off last time? I'm sorry. Is where we started with. Where did we leave off? You started last time with the Civil Service Board, right, I think what my notes there were that, we're either going to eliminate slimmed down or leave intact, and I think that there was some information that had been requested in from Mr. Salzman. Yes. We were going to bring the. Yes, she'll be back tentatively. Oh, the HR person. Yes. Okay. Yeah So we're I'm I'm going to jump ahead. I you went through sidewalk improvement fund and emergency fund. So I think that that put us up to section 30 right. Initiative and referendum I think. So Irene, can we put in a request to have Jeff Young. Is that a I know it has to go regarding the same. Yeah. The same type. Yeah I will get yeah. Both. Department Yeah. Both departments were created by the charter. So it makes sense. Oh you know we forgot to ask him what his funding limit is. He operates under the 25,000 or he has a different limit. Oh. Could you find that out just by an email to him? Yes, also on the 17th, next week, I have the CEO scheduled. As far as I know, he has not, Ryan. Oh yeah. He's coming. Okay. And I also have Commissioner Collins and possibly the, Miss Sniffen. She was working on the city manager stuff, so she would possibly be the 17th or the 24th, and then I can invite Jeff at the following one if you'd like. You'll be right here with us. No, I was, I was leveraging off the last week's conversation about finding out what the limits are for the police chief and the fire chief in terms of their spending limits. Do they have additional, you know, rules and guidelines? Do they have do they fall under the city manager's limit of $25,000 before bids? I want to say they fall under the same right across the hallway. Yeah, I can come back in here. Yeah. And ask them. Could we talk about 24? I know we talked about it earlier, but I, I guess starting on 24. Okay. I thought we had hit that. Yeah We can start on 24th. I talked about the $100,000 and somebody brought up and said that it would be $100,000 for each. Yes I have a question. Yeah, each each contract. Write that in here. Okay. Because I don't see it in here. Okay. It doesn't say we it's not very specific as to who can get away. Elevators too slow. Yeah. So there's a requirement in the, the charter that the city that the city manager has basically signature authority up to $25,000 without having to go out to competitive bid. Do you are you do you have a similar requirement? Do you operate under the city manager's limit or do you have your own limit money? I go outside any contract amount that I might have, I would have to go through the city manager procurement process to get that money approved. I can't I don't have any authority to spend extra money above what contracts I have out there. Okay, so you don't you don't have a $25,000 discretion like the city manager has? No, you don't have a discretionary fund. I think what you're you don't have any discretionary fund allocated in your budget? No. Right. No All right. I think that's what, he said he doesn't have. Yeah. So if I have a contract that's $100,000, I don't have $25,000 of discretionary that can add to that contract on my own without going out through procurement and going through the process to get approval. Okay. It would be to me doing that. So I know when the fire station, out by the rail plant was built, there was a lot of change orders, but that all had to go through the process to get approved outside the contingent. Thank you. All right. Five minute break back at, 416. There's a lot different. Yeah So your request for to look at emergency purchases was to, address whether it was $100,000 hard limit or what section is that per item? So 24. I'm reading this that he's got some flexibility. No, I think it does. The way it's written, we you know, goods and services. Yeah. I would read it in the description. How it was also was per contract. And I think that that language is okay. Yeah. So I don't think we need to change this. Do you feel that that's needed. No. Okay All right. So I'd make an order that we accept a motion that will ask for a motion that we accept section 20 for emergency purposes. Yes Second, as is. Yeah. As is. Do we have the motion? Yes. Yes. Jim I'll second. I'll second. Discussion. Yes. Do we need any further discussion? No. Probably not, can we call the vote, please? Yes. Miss Jennings? Yes. Mr. Yes, Mr. Chair, penny. Yes. Vice chair. Colonies. Yes. Yes All right. I'm going to let the, sidewalk improvement fund sit and sizzle for a while. Okay? I don't know that we need I think it's going to take more than the time we have. Yeah. Allocated. And I'm looking forward to seeing, Mr. Chair rewrite on that for what needs to be included to take it back. I don't know if you if you realize that a 5% on 1.7 million, that's $85,000. Well, I realize that, and I don't mind adjusting it. But what caught me off guard was how dramatically it had been changed and how there was no, No contributions in the future. And I think it could be kicked up to where they take more money out. But I think Jimmy recognized that too, is they're only putting in a match to what's coming out of the sidewalk fund, which is crazy. I mean, they could contribute any amount they want, I mean, they they could put in the 500,000 that if they thought that it was a $600,000, need for the city for the year, they could put in 500 and still get 100 from the committee. Now, do we want to maybe adjust the take? Okay, fine. But it just needs a rewrite, I think. And I'm happy to take a stab at it. Well, you you you seem very concerned and I think you should have you should have, you know, time to do that instead of having to do it in real time right now. So I think once I get to the paper that Jimmy had, Ron's got it, he's gonna make us all a copy. We can probably pick it up on the way out. Okay. Yeah, it's very interesting. Yeah So I think I think that's a I think that's a good plan. We'll just. We'll. Yeah. Those guys in 83 were pretty sharp. Yeah Were you, did you do this in 83. Yeah. Yeah yeah. Who was there. Who was there in 83. So if we jump ahead to initiative and referendum, what section? Section 30. Section 30. We did have a comment for Mr. Delacruz when he came to change the language to piggyback on existing elections versus the 90 days driving in new election. He did. He left us with that comment. I just want to remind the board of that, there was also an email from Craig Lunt that I sent that's in section 11. Okay. For the qualifications . Right. Okay. That I'll be bringing back with the other, information on elections. Okay Yeah. What is that? Was that the proper procedure? If you get an email from. Okay, just send it to you. Yes. Okay. That's what I did. Okay Really? The only, you know, initiatives and referendums are a little different, the only thing we might want to look at, and I to be honest with you, I haven't had time to search other charters. But I know in speaking with the supervisor of elections, it used to be that you could have a an election 90 days or 120 days. Now it's whenever they support it, so, it might be something that we take and maybe Attorney Salzman could, also let us know if he knows of any. It might be something like we do for the appointment, you know, at the next city or county election, instead of saying a day limit in it, restricting us, because if they don't support us, to be honest with you, I don't think I would want to run that election myself, because of all the so instead of the 90 days, you're going to, you're going to put the next election cycle. Well, like, if you look at the last sentence there, it says so instead of 90 days, it would be the next election cycle, whatever that is. Yeah. The next city or county election, city or county election. Because the county election we could piggyback and that's every two years election cycle. Yeah All right. Well, there could be a special election. That's the only reason why I wouldn't necessarily say election cycle. Okay I mean, we don't there may not be, but if that opportunity arises, we would want to piggyback on that scheduled, next scheduled election. Be adequate words for that. Then should we say next scheduled election, we can do it like we do for the end of the appointment. And section 11 that says the next city or county election. That way it would cover consistent right. Any election that we could piggyback on or the city, if the city had an election, whichever came first. Yeah, that makes sense, because the city can call their own election if they so choose. Yeah. Even though it is expensive and you have to do it yourself, which is very hard, I will say a referendum is expensive if you're just running this. Yeah On your solo. Yeah. 4040. Yeah A standalone election is about $40,000. That's just supervisor election costs, not city costs, for example, the special election we're doing now is about $3,000, depending if it's a 1 or 2 card ballot, so. So do you want a motion changes suggested to that. We've got. I have a question, yeah. Irene, how many registered voters we have? It kind of goes up and down. I think the last, election , it was about 20,000, something under way, under 20. And a half thousand people. So I thought we had a population of about 30,000. So you you have about 20,000 registered voters. 7020. That was as of the last election. So I guess the reason I asked that. So, talking about the 15, 15, 3000. Yeah That's like, yeah, I, I find that absurdly high. Strong. Yeah. Because and I looked up how many people voted in the last three, referendum elections in on March 23rd, 25% of the people voted in November 23, 19% in March 22nd, 28. So this is just for the petition process. Yes, I know, but you expect to expect 15% to sign it. That's 3000 people. Well, right. It seems really high. And I think the average of municipal. Yeah. Other municipalities has been 15 or higher. Yeah I mean, for a petition. Well, how many people do you know the general population of Clearwater? Not offhand. Well, because theirs is 10, but I'm sure there are 10. What is that? If they have 50,000 people, that's 5000. It's I mean, it's a fair highly. It's a high number. Yes. Usually to get something in initiative or referendum. It's so, so. Well I think there needs to be a balance. You don't want to make it too easy. So you have every. So you're talking about 3000 but you can't base it on a false assumption that everybody votes because they don't. So but it's no, we, it's, it doesn't say who votes. It doesn't say who votes. Well it says it says registered voters, registered voters. The registered voters are 20,000. 15% of 20,000 is 3000 people. Yeah, but that's not the number of people that pay any attention to the elections. Well. They better pay. You're talking about if you wanted to if you thought something was wrong like that. The city passed a thing. They did. They passed an ordinance to do away with the Greek cultural district. And you thought that was terrible. And you wanted to go change it. As it is written today, you got to get 3000 people to sign a card that says, we agree with you, Tina. Right right. I, I know, I think 10% would be a fairer number. Well, that's getting better. By the way, there are 117,000 people in Clearwater, 10. So about 11,000, 11,000, 700, 20,000 voters in Tarpon Springs. It varies. When our population is like 27, it varies, believe it or not, are very active. Our yeah, our total people are about 26, 27. I think we probably only have like 15,000 or 18,000. No no no no, I mean percent. Oh ten I think 10. You they got to have some skin in the game. Yeah. Okay. But but like you said, it doesn't have to be onerous. You know, if you can get if you get 10% of, of your voting, voting block to sign a petition, then that's hard to do. That's still 2000. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I don't have a problem at 10. I'm good with five. I'm good with ten. You don't want to make it too easy. Otherwise there's still a thousand votes. No. But you know what? The thing is, John, if you make it two, you know, you'll have an ordinance. You'll have a you'll have a referendum every six months. I understand that, but have you ever tried to get 1000 people to sign something, to stand outside? Got to talk to 4000. Right. Well, let them talk to 4000. So I'd like to make a motion. I asked for a motion to change 15 to 10. About. Is that. Yes. Yeah. It's a motion to change 15% to 10% and to make the referendum shall be held within the city or county be, what election is the same language? Yes. 11. Yeah. Okay. My question on that one was going to be, do we get rid of that or as soon thereafter as the city supervisors election shall permit? Or do we let that section stay? In other words, are we replacing the. Well, if you had to have a special election, days of the date of filing thereof, is that what's being right? We're changing that to the next city or county election, right where the 120 days as well. I think the last sentence as well. Okay. So that's that's two places. We're just on 30 though right now. Right? Right We're looking at the end of paragraph two and the end of paragraph four to change those to the next city or county election. So it's also up here. Yeah. Where it says 120 days. Right, right. Yeah What is the definition of an initiative election initiative ordinance initiative. Election initiative is to propose an ordinance. So that's not a special election. That can be one thing. Well, it could be language was next city or county election. What about if it's a federal election? And we. Well, that's covered the primary, presidential election. Okay. Yeah. Every they're every two and four years and, you know, it might be on our off year. So that's what I'm saying. Whatever that next one is, we can get I'll get you the language. I can find the same language as we had. An initiative is actually. That's how I mean, that's how it's presented. The individuals come out and. Okay, so the proposed initiative. So that's replaced in two places. And then the question is do we also do we retain or remove the last part of the first sentence in the last paragraph. Well what that would make after as the supervisor of election shall permit is that come out? Well, I'm trying to think that through. So we go to the supervisor of elections and that's easy. But I guess the problem is, if you wanted the city wants to hold their own. And the supervisor says do it on your own. Is that is that permission? Is that a permit under that sentence? Because they're not they're telling us to do it, but they're not stopping us. So I'm I'm just thinking out loud. I think you can leave that language in. Okay. Yeah. In the, in section 11, for the other one, we have until the next regular city or county election, and it would cover all all the above. Do we have that same language as the supervisor of elections shall permit? We do not. And I would recommend. No, it's on both on 11. It's on 11. Oh I don't know about 11 but it is not on 11. I would recommend that you're consistent with your language. So. Right Do we add it to 11. We added to well whatever you so choose add it to 11 or remove it from 30. Irene. So is the approval of the as as long as they're having a an election, then we can piggyback on it. Okay. But is that mandated by the state or is that, you know, I mean, are we redundant by having that in this section? I mean, I don't think it hurts either way. Right? I would just that we're consistent on both. I agree with that. I'm trying to think of a scenario where the supervisor of elections would not permit us to hold an election, right? You know, if it was too close or well, then in this case, she she could tell us, do it on your own. But you pay for it, right? Yeah, but that's still a not stopping us. Right. So I don't know if that language is necessary if we're amending this section and not amending 11. Okay, then I would recommend removing it because we're going to have a question on this section as it is. So we don't if we're not if we're not changing 11. We'll take we're taking it out of 30. Is that it? Yes So such referendum down to conflict is going correct. Yeah. Let me just summarize so we can get the motion amended, so we're going the motion needs to say at least 10% instead of 15. The motion needs to say, replace the no later than 120 days after such certification or as soon thereafter as the supervisor of elections shall permit, that needs to be replaced with shall be had at the next city or county election, and the last paragraph needs to be amended to where it says within 90 days of the scheduled date of filing thereof, or as soon as thereafter is the Supervisor of election shall permit be replaced with at the next scheduled election. City or county election regularly. So I amend my motion to include everything you just said. Okay. Thank you. I'll second. All right. Any further discussion? Let's move for a vote, doctor Ellis. Yes, Miss Jennings. Yes, Mister? Yes, Mister. Chair. Penny. Yes, vice chair. Collins. Yes, chair. Ruth. Yes. Things are approved. All right. Thank you. That was great. All right. We're down to 20 minutes. I'd like to, We don't have any public here for comment, so let's go ahead and let's. Yeah, that's right, we have the upcoming agenda items, where did I do that piece of paper, Irene, would you mind reviewing his. Oh no. Next week, June 17th, we have Brian Quattlebaum, who's the CEO of AdventHealth. Coming in, we have, Commissioner Koulianos coming back, and I believe that was talked about price restriction. And then Jane and air director, either the 20 17th and 24th, I believe we would like her to come on the 24th. Correct. That was your request. Koulianos. I would like to have on the 24th, if possible. Well, he's already scheduled for the 17th. Is he going to push him? I can check with him originally. Yes. And then you didn't. You didn't have. I'd love to. I'd love to see. Jane on the 24th, too, but I just put both of those on the 24th. The other thing I would like to do, since we've got Karl Böhm coming in and we just read the section, 33 so that we covered it. And so when he comes in fully aware of what the, what that paragraph is, is, section 33 on the City Hospital Board of Commissioners shall require an all leases of city owned property now known as AdventHealth North Pinellas. That advent North Health, AdventHealth North Canal and all its successors. And the signs may, may, may not unilaterally amend its articles of incorporation without a ratification of the electorate of the city, and the section shall be required to be referenced in any lease or agreement between AdventHealth North Pinellas and all its successors and assigns of that property and any third party. So I, I, I won't be here next week and, I think I'm, I would be conflicted out regardless because I'm the vice chairman of the board. Okay, so but I do have I do have works out. Yeah. Well I have a comment, but I just and I'll, you know, but I don't know if it's I'll share it, you know, the hospital has, you know, many leases throughout Pinellas and Pasco County, you know, medical office buildings, etc, because they've had to, spread their, you know, the platform of delivering Medicare, delivering health care throughout. And I don't know what it's meant by any third party on their leases because, you know, if they've got a lease with somebody up in Pasco, I, I'm just trying to figure out what what the intent of that that is on, on, on, section B. Oh, I see how you're reading that, in other words, the third party that's not associated with the physical plant in Tarpon Springs, correct. And any third party, it's pretty broad. The intent of this was, like, we know where any of the info we had that when they took over the hospital, there was nothing saying that that property in the hospital belonged to the citizens of Tarpon Springs. And that's why this. Okay, first sentence was put in there. Okay. Just so everybody knows, they don't own it. We own it. I understand it, but I'm talking about section B. I know you are, but, Mike, it's the header says of the city owned property. Yeah And then then so A and B come under the header. Right. The section shall be required to be referenced in any lease or agreement between AdventHealth, its successors of that property, and any third party, that property being the city property, that property. Okay. So, so it would just would it just to make it cleaner to say city, the city property does that makes you happy? I think it I think it, I think it adds clarification. I think that clarification is necessary. That goes to city. Yeah. That of that property should be the of the city. City owned property. The city owned property. Right. That's that's that's fine. Yeah. That makes sense. So all right. This is also a minor scrivener's error. AdventHealth doesn't have a space between it. I can't remember if it's supposed. Hold on. I'll let you touch it real quick before I do my. I left them in the car. Yeah. All of their literature, everything. AdventHealth is all just one word with the H capitalized, I think, to try to save ink that that that I'm sure. Okay, well, I'm glad we took a minute to do this. Okay, let's postpone a vote until we have a chance to hear from him, and in the meantime, can we go ahead and do, board and staff comments? I'll start with you. Also, just just for clarification, would you like me to have Police Chief Young on the 24th as well, with Commissioner Collins and Mrs. Kniffen at that same time? Okay. That's fine. So we'll get we'll get through the rest of this and probably start going back through our issues next week. All right. And to close things out. All right, do you have any no comments? No comments, Mr. Chair. No comments. Really? Okay. I'm the one who would say if I said no comma, you'd say, really? But I do have some comments. First of all, I want to thank you for you. The thing that you put together to give us that, that that's really helpful, that the, the spreadsheet you have that recapped what we've been discussing. So I want to say thank you. I'm going to be gone for the I think the next couple of weeks I'll be traveling. I think I already that's been noted, the other thing that that we talk about in this charter is having certain financial requirements. The city must, whether it's the sidewalks, whether we if we talk about, Brazil and peppers that require funding. And one of the things that was brought up last week is, is requiring the, the, the budgeting process to review the charter. I think that is so important to make sure that they look at allocating the necessary resources to effectuate the charter because, like you said, if it said 100 grand and they stopped, so, all right, I entered that, okay, I must have missed that. So yeah. And by the way, anything that's bold is a change from the last one I issued. I unfortunately won't have this meeting done. And for two weeks as I'm getting on a plane again and I don't get back home, I'm not taking this with me out of here. You have to wait. I know, I know, you really can't wait to read the next version, but it's really have to wait, so thank you. Anything else? Well, I'll have fun next week. I will. All right. Mr. Collins? No, nothing. Nothing Nothing. Well, sooner or later, we'll have to figure out. Some way to get the city to put money in for these species that we want cut out. Nobody. Nobody up there said. Well, yeah, let me bring that up to the city manager or or to Ron, I mean, somewhere along the line, they got to start putting money in there to get this out. They can't just say, yeah, we know it. That didn't work. $72 million budget. That's all. I don't know what the answer is to my own thing, but that was no comment. Okay. Well first oh miss skipping me. Well I was starting. Oh okay. Fred. Nope. Nope. Nothing. Okay, first I want to thank, as usual, Irene and Michelle. I mean, what would we do without you? And secondly, with all this talk of money and you know who gets what from where and matching funds, I know this might be asking a lot, but is there any way we could get some kind of spreadsheet that has, you know, like budget figures of who who gets what in the budget? Maybe not something Ron could do just to sort of clarify where, you know, if you're talking about a lot of money here. Yeah, the budget is on the website. It is on the website. Oh, okay. All right. And tomorrow night is the first budget hearing for the public. So if the public has any request, tomorrow is the night that and you won't need you won't need your Ambien. If you start reading that at night. Okay. I would also like to I think somebody show appreciation for our city staff members looking at. So I think we're making excellent progress on here. I was sad to miss last week, but I'm really glad I have to throw something at you guys. Can I throw something to you? Did. Did we not respect you in, you were talking. You throw the gavel, you move the gavel to this side. I got your message. No just. All right. Well, no, I'm right handed. That's why it's over here, anyway, next week, my plan is to. We'll we'll hear from the, the president of Advent Health, and then we're just going to finish up our, our readings and start addressing the hard topics and just crank through that. Did you say you're not here next week? Correct. We'll make lots of mic decisions next. There you go. Because Mike will be here to take up your time. Now we'll think a lot. Think long and hard. I mean, I think that the invasive species and the height thing is going to be a conversation a lot like the Sidewalk Fund, where we wound up having the sidewalk fund discussion last time because the city, I mean, the fund had grown to $2 million because they weren't really expanding it. It's interesting. It was interesting to have him say, yeah, we put some money aside for $40,000. And, and, I mean, I'm serious. When I had to clear a lot, it cost me over 20 just to get rid of, just to get rid of the Brazilian peppers. So that's no money. And you know, I know this this is what we're discussing. And obviously the voters have to approve it. But if they're talking about their budget process tomorrow night, this election or the adoption of these, the charter amendments won't impact next year's budget. It's the following year's budget, right. Well, they weren't even. We won't be voting on this until now. So. So it'll be the following year's budget. So, take a ride down Roosevelt Boulevard if you want to see invasive species. Maybe there's if it's not going to be in this budget, maybe we need to make sure it's in this charter. Yeah. That's you know what what we've seen is when we wind up putting things in the charter, it's to address a problem. And then when the problem gets addressed, then it comes out of the charter, which isn't really what you're supposed to use the charter for. But if you, you know, it sort of become a, I would say a passion of mine. But I didn't realize what, what how impact that these Brazilian peppers have had until I started paying attention. Driving, driving down mirrors, either way, to 19 or down towards Florida Avenue, those wetlands that were all wetlands that I remember and even even coming across a, where I live, there's a wetlands in the front. Ashland. Okay, that they disappeared. The wetlands are disappeared. You don't you don't even see the water anymore. But they're still wetlands because it's all peppers. Yeah. And so. All right, last thing on the agenda is, adjournment. So I've got to pay for it, though. I'm taking a page from Jim and letting y'all out early, so thank you very much for your time and.