The Dunedin City Commission held a workshop on March 31, 2026, covering the Arbor Day Proclamation, the Duke Energy System Reliability and Clean Energy Connection Program, the 2026 Citizen Survey Results, and the 2026 Legislative Update. The meeting included presentations, public input, and extensive commissioner discussion on city services, sustainability goals, and state legislation.
Pledge of allegiance by Jen or City Attorney. I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America which is chance one nation under God. Okay, we have a presentation today, Arbor Day Proclamation. I'm going to turn that over to Commissioner Sandbergen. Good morning to all three of you. Whereas in 1872, the Nebraska Board of Agriculture established a special day to be set aside for the planting of trees. And whereas this holiday called Arbor Day was first observed with the planting of more than a million trees in Nebraska. And whereas Arbor Day is now observed throughout the nation and the world, and whereas trees can be a solution to combating climate change by reducing the erosion of precious topsoil by wind and water, cutting heating and cooling costs, moderating the temperature, cleaning the air, producing life-giving oxygen, and providing habitat for wildlife. Now I therefore, Steve Sambergen, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the mayor of the city of Dunedin, and on behalf of the entire city commission, hereby proclaim the observance of Saturday, April 18th, 2026, as Arbor Day in the city of Dunedin, and urge all citizens to support efforts to protect our trees and woodlands and plant trees to gladden the heart and promote the well-being of this and future generations. Uh went with the same trees, you know, basically we ordered the year before, and then last year, pretty similar, and what we found um was we actually had a hard time giving away some of the trees. You know, after the hurricanes and stuff, people were sort of gun shy, and um I guess understandably so they weren't in a big hurry to want to plant some big shade trees and stuff. So we were you you might recall we were you know, it's like you can't give these things away type of thing. So we um still encourage it. We still got a lot of the same trees we got last year, but we added uh our we wanted to make a big push this year to get some different stuff out there, you know, try to figure out what the the people want and what we really want to see more throughout the city. So as always, a big emphasis on Florida natives. Um we added seven new species in addition to the ten that we had last year. So we're gonna have a lot more diversity of of the trees going out. Um all the ones we added are Florida native. Um all are a minimum of of moderate salt and uh drought tolerant. In fact, most of them are high. Uh drought and salt tolerance. So we're gonna really promote that. Um typically more sort of ornamental trees that can grow into shade trees, you know, 20, you know, 15 to 30 feet overall height on some of those, so they're less I don't know, daunting for for folks to want to plant. So I think we just um and still we're gonna encourage oaks and pines and all the things we have in the past as well, but we need to uh we just want to get more canopy out there. We want folks to be excited about what they're planning, what they're picking up. And uh we're really excited about the you know, Joe and I and and Tony and uh Pete Wells, you know, we got together and talked a lot about some of the trees that we've seen over the course of our you know time in this industry, what does well in this area and uh we're really excited about it. So um I guess that's it. You know, we're really excited to be a tree city USA again. Um want to get this canopy re-established throughout the city. We're losing a lot of, you know, obviously we lost a lot of pine trees uh through the bark beetles and other things that are going on lately. I've seen a lot of uh sand live oaks. Um a lot of people uh hard to distinguish between southern lives and sand lives with the untrained eye, but if you see trees that you think are live oaks and the ones that are looking really poor right now, those are most likely gonna be sand live oaks. Uh this drought really hit trees. So we're uh we're making a real conscious effort to uh encourage the Florida natives to do things that are gonna be well in our in our tough conditions that we're faced with on a fairly regular basis, and uh we're excited. Yeah, you guys did a great job last year. I really admired the folks that pulled up and they told me the tree they wanted. Right. So the residents are knowledgeable and they knew what they were there for. So I have this proclamation for you guys. Alrighty, thank you. Are we doing a picture? Yeah, Sue's right there. I didn't see her. There you are, Sue. Hiding out back. Even in pink. Let's do our pick. All right, let's see. Oh no, this is another one. I know.