Good afternoon.

Welcome.

Welcome.

Commission, come on up.

Welcome.

That's for the minute.

For the minute.

Welcome, welcome.

Welcome everyone to the June 16th, 2026 joint commission workshop with the budget advisory board.

Thank you for being here.

Before I ask to the city clerk to call the role of the budget advisory board and the commission.

Just wanted to announce the mayor is away on business and won't be participating in the meeting today.

So I'm filling in for him.

So thank you for your indulgences and grace as we uh navigate uh in his absence.

Mr.

Clerk, if you'd call the role of the budget advisory board, please.

Chair Brown.

Vice Chair Milroy.

Melinda Boker.

Olivier Culley.

Rich DJ Relamo.

Anid Matellas Thompson.

David Max Mortolani.

Samantha Perriman Jones.

And Jason Jeffers.

All right.

Thank you, Mr.

Clerk.

If you'd call the role for the commission.

Commissioner Herbst.

Here.

Commissioner Glassman.

Here.

Commissioner Beasley Pittman.

And Vice Mayor Sorensen.

Here.

Thank you very much.

And now we'll move into the agenda for today's workshop.

I'll turn the floor over to our city manager, Raquel Williams for some initial comments.

Thank you, Vice Mayor.

Thank you, Commissioners.

I want to take this opportunity to highlight our budget advisory board.

This joint workshop couldn't have come together without all the diligence and hard work of each and every board member led by Chair Bill Brown.

And they will go into a discussion about some of the work that they've been doing and focused on over the past several months.

Then we will dive into a discussion of property taxes as well as the preliminary budget.

So at this time I'd like to turn it over to Chair Brown.

Thank you very much, City Manager Chair Brown.

David, is this the for the slide?

Okay, I have it here, but it's okay.

Good afternoon, Vice Mayor Sorensen, Commissioners.

Uh Bill Brown, Chairman of the Budget Committee.

Well, we've uh time-wise, I think our presentation we're gonna try to keep to about 15 minutes, then allow for about the city manager and her staff to talk about the proposed preliminary budget, and then we'll have uh some time, about 15 minutes, hopefully, to uh address the property tax referendum issue and the educational and how the budget advisory board working with Stradcom can get engaged so that the we can educate the public and the community and our residents on the pros and cons of of the referendum and keeping it uh mindful of your time since you're starting a half hour early.

We don't want to run in too late into the conference meeting, but in order to do due diligence to cover all that material, we're trying to keep it each segment to 15 minutes, if uh agreeable.

So, uh let me just give you some highlights since we what we've been doing uh as a as a board since uh this budget process back in March.

We uh looked at all the accomplishments from 2026 FY budget.

We met with uh all the the directors and they came in and talked about their project and the projects that they would like to move forward with in 2027, what initiatives, what keeps them up at night, some of the challenges and opportunities that they're faced with.

We spent uh about three hours that meeting in March, had a very good discussion with all department heads, uh, and they both recognize going in to that meeting that we had some challenges looking at FY27 and 28 and future years out.

So they were mindful of that, and we did have some healthy discussions, and then back in May, uh starting on May the 6th, to uh the 13th and the 20th, is where we bring them all the departments back in individually, and they give their budget request presentations to us.

Um we sit there, we asked to have good dialogue about what they want to move forward with in more detail in the 2027 FY budget, what they're asked are, the reasoning why they need that, and then we asked for performance measures on some of the issues.

Response time has always been a big one.

Return on an investment on some of the departments, how many when we get into developmental services, you know, when we see a decrease in uh permits, you know, we ask questions, what's the trend?

So it's a very good dialogue of questions back and forth of the of the BAB.

And then uh we asked that uh what are what are some of the enhanced funding that they're going to need, and as I mentioned previously, they were very mindful going in with their budgets and with clear direction uh working with the city manager and OMB that uh they had to really come in very lean and looking at not fluff into their budgets, and they I'm happy to report as as you'll find out later today.

They have done that.

Another thing that we've talked uh as a board, and I've talked to brought this to the attention of the commission for about the last eight months.

We've we focused on reviewing topics and that would have impacts for FY27.

Keeping in mind that we wanted to look at we understand that affordability and cost of living is a big concern for the taxpayers, not only for the homeowners, but also the renters and the people that live here in our community in a lot of the downtown rental units.

We looked at we also dove into what AI artificial intelligence can hold for the future in efficiency operation uh opportunities, as you know, and Commissioner Herb's we've had some good discussions about the future of AI, and yes uh it will affect jobs, but it there's more efficiency, there's a way to handle those job losses through attrition, not filling vacancies, perhaps buyouts.

There's other opportunities we move forward, but this is the trend in the nation of all municipalities as we move forward incorporating AI and especially the larger municipalities such as ours.

We also recognize that uh there's revenue loss, but there's also with some revenue losses come opportunities for for additional cost recovery and enhancements, which we've looked at, and we are putting together a report in more detail that when we come back in August, we'll report back on some of our ideas.

I'm pleased to report though that some of those uh the city manager and OMB and department heads have already taken the taken some of those comments and they're leaning forward to start working towards with this commission to try to recapture some of those enhancements and some of those additional revenue sources, and then our budget approach is always is to work with within our means and a balanced budget with balancing strategies, and then my the millage rate and uh benchmarking on the milly tree.

As you know, we're we went 19 years up to this year with no millage increase.

We've been fortunate enough to have assessed values increase.

However, when you look at historically now, uh those assessed values are trending downward.

We're not in the double digits like we were three and four years ago.

We're in seven percent, eight percent, and with the downturn of the how uh housing construction market and commercial, there's a possibility that for the next two to three years until it makes the industry makes an adjustment, we're gonna see that downward to trend.

So the board has taken all these projects and broken it up as team, individual members and dove in, and we'll come back as I mentioned in August with a more detailed report on that.

We are facing a turning point in our budget.

Uh, the expenses are far out exceeding the revenues coming in.

As you know, sixty-one percent of our budget is is public safety and salaries and benefits.

I think 63 percent, maybe a little high slightly higher as the rest of all city employees.

And that's out of the operating budget.

So we're mindful of the fact that you know the pie is only so big, and it can only be sliced so many ways, and those slices have to meet the goals and objectives set out of the priorities of the city commission.

And as I mentioned, the uh the downturn in the real estate development, and then uh with the microeconomic uncertainty of the cost of goods.

We're seeing an increase on projects that we had budgeted for in the CIP that are having to do change orders because of inflation and everything that weren't anticipated when they were designed and planned five years ago.

So that puts a lot of strain on the budget as well as we move forward in 2027.

Just some of the insights that I've I've talked about is on the uh keeping the operating budget and personnel cost.

Currently, we we understand that the uh city is in negotiations with public safety unions, police and fire, uh for a contract that's gonna have some impact on the FY27 budget and future years, depending on the length of term of the three-year budget.

So we have to have some budget reform and recalibration of salaries for other departments as well.

Currently, there's uh we've been informed that there's a study being done by HR for salary alignments.

Um, one of the big concerns that I can tell you that we hear from the residents is there is a perception out there that the city's kind of bloated with the number of employees and our salaries.

Um, and so hopefully once we have the salary study done, we can take a good look at it, dive in with additional information.

At the same time, we have to make sure that we're competitive in the workforce market so that we can track attract young, bright, new employees that can also incorporate AI, but at the same time making affordability for the long-term financial stability of our city.

As I mentioned, the budget uh the millage rate, and uh we have to, you know, some hopefully the if if not hopefully, but if the tax reform homestead uh pass if the referendum were to pass, that will give some relief.

But then there's as we'll we'll talk about later today, there'll be some uh challenges involved with that as it pertains to our budget, and then looking at the new city hall, we have not actually had the opportunity to dive in to that.

Uh we're waiting until your July meeting, and then you have additional information uh as to the fundancial impact uh on a new new city hall versus a retrofit building and the finances involved with that whole package.

We will look forward to your direction on weighing in after that meeting as to what direction the commission goes with and the funding mechanism.

Historically, that has been on uh projects where it's involved bond money.

That's the point where the budget advisory board has got actively involved working with uh OMB on moving forward those types of projects.

So, in the interest of time, we come to you to communicate that we would recommend the following that has to be determined by the of July.

I think it's July 1st or July 3rd.

I don't hold me correct to that date, but you have to set the maximum millage rate and then establish a fire assessment fee.

We are recommending support for the fire assessment fee to be raised to four hundred and forty four dollars.

That's an increase over last year, and then we recommend that we keep the millage rate the same for the 20th consecutive year.

And with that, uh, I'll entertain any questions.

Bill, maybe just one question on this slide, and then I have others, but later uh the millage rate that was a five to two vote as opposed to the seven to zero vote.

What were the arguments uh the negative arguments on that five to two vote?

Uh one of the board members felt they wanted to see a decrease, and then one of the board members felt to to help with rental costs he won and thought the best would be an increase to help offset uh any property tax reform that could be coming.

Okay, thank you.

Just to add to what Chair Brown mentioned, I believe the context around the board member maybe wanting a decrease was that uh perhaps there was a feeling that it was premature to make an evaluation and assessment of the village rate at this point.

Great.

Thank you.

Thank you, Chair Brown.

Thank you for your work.

Um Commissioner Herbs.

Sure.

So when we're talking about the fire assessment fee going up to four forty-four, uh again, I I haven't seen the study, the cost study that supports that.

So uh assuming when we're looking at this, what portion of the new fire stations that are being constructed goes into that increase up to 444?

So 444 represents full cost recovery uh for the fire assessment.

It will generate about 8.4 million dollars in revenue, of which we anticipate needing about 7.8 for the holiday park fire station.

Okay.

So I just want to make sure that we're not capturing any of the EMS cost in that.

That's all.

No, and the board also felt that by the increase, it's more transparent to the taxpayer on the fire assessment and full cost recovery.

As you know, we do it the official studies done every three years, but internally they look at full cost recovery every year.

No, that uh understood, Bill.

No, my my only question is just uh to to staff making sure that as we're looking at this, as you probably are aware, we cannot capture the cost of EMS in the fire assessment fee.

We can capture certain costs, it has to relate to the value of property, and so as we're adding new facilities, I want to understand what portion of new facilities is being baked into this, or is this strictly operational costs?

I want to understand is there a capital overhead cost.

Um I wanna curious about for example the fire boat.

You know, is that being captured in here?

Because that's really designed to patrol the waterways and protect boats and not property.

So I just want to understand what we're doing with this.

Yeah, and we're fully aware it it has to add value to the delivery of service other than as you mentioned EMS.

EMS cannot be a component of the delivery of service of this assessment fee.

It's not even just delivery of service, it has to relate to real property, uh house.

Correct.

So okay.

So good afternoon, Laura Reestructure of Office of Management and Budget.

Um good afternoon, Laura.

So Stantec Consulting is our partner on the fire assessment fee.

They did the full cost allocation last year, and then we updated the fee.

We have index codes that are broken up in certain ways based on that analysis.

So both operating and capital costs that are included are allowable.

Um it includes the operational costs and for each fire s new fire station, the capital costs over a three-year period, we recover those.

Um, but the fire boat um since we hold on back up.

You recover the cost of a fire station in three years?

Yes.

That does not sound realistic to me.

We have a 40-year lifespan on a fire station.

You're recovering the cost in three years.

Because the city chose to cash fund them versus um financing them through debt, that's the mechanism that we have through the fire assessment to recover.

I don't believe that's realistic.

You have a weighted average cost of capital that you have to utilize when you have debt outstanding and you use if you are using cash funding and you also have outstanding debt funding, you have to use a weight of the average cost of capital methodology for determining that.

Mr.

Auditor, have you looked at this study and are you comfortable with this?

Because I'm not.

I do not look at the specifics of that.

Would would you please do so because I'm not comfortable with this?

Okay.

I I I do not believe this is gap accounting.

So this is the same study that we brought forward last year, it's just updated um with new information.

Perhaps I should have looked at it a little bit more closely last year as it related to capital financing.

Yes, and we're happy to share it with the auditor.

Thank you.

Appreciate it.

Commissioner Beasley Pittman.

Good afternoon, everyone.

To this board, thank you for what you have done, the time that you have put into this for us.

I'm always amazed with um the time and how you do your due diligence, you all really go in hard and and I appreciate it because some of this is um I don't want to use the word Greek, but yeah, it's kind of greek to me at times, but I do follow dollars, so I understand that part of it.

Um, but what one of the questions I have is about um the conversation about the millage rate.

We we have this conversation from the dais um throughout the year, not just at this time.

Um, yes, we've had that um consistency of not changing the millet rate, but I would like to even have a conversation among us to see about changing it, um, elevating it to see what it would do.

Um also when I look at it overall, even though our millet rate is staying intact, the other items that are coming alongside it are being increased.

And how do we make a balance out of this?

Because what we do know, um, the increase overall affects everyone in the city.

So are we really balancing this?

Are we just kind of holding a placeholder?

And are we able to do this where there is a increase that helps also offset what we're looking at?

I we hear you.

Um, you know, it's a delicate balance, especially for some of your constituents when we raise the millage.

Right.

And commissioners can absolutely know the the other thing is depending on the outcome of the property tax reform, you know, the perception if you raise the mill age going into next year with that looming in the November election.

What's the perception of that?

Uh however, I think everyone would support we are, as I mentioned, we are at a turning point.

And that turning point is our expenses are far out exceeding our revenues.

And you're gonna hear about that later, I'm sure, in the in the Stan Tech report.

So, with that keeping in mind, you know, rather than to get hit a year or two years down the road with a larger percentage, sometimes it's a it's a softer, gentler approach to the taxpayers to do it in minerally at small amounts versus one big percentage fee, whatever.

The challenge here is for for you as commissioners is you have to set if I stand corrected, please.

But that has to be set by the maximum millet rate by July 2nd, which is fastly approaching.

So whatever decision a commission makes, it has to be done before July 2nd.

Right, understood.

And and with that, you know, being responsible, commissioners also.

I just I always when I think about these items that come before us, I always operate in the realm that how I survived in my home.

Because I'm I'm I'm from that class where I've worked all my life.

My family's worked.

We had to adjust to whatever is going on.

So how I stretch those dollars, how I have to sit down and say, you know what, this has been nice for the last five years, but for me to survive the next five years, I need to cut back.

There's some things that I need to approach and maybe eliminate and maybe shave back some.

And um, I'm believing as a commission, that's something that we need to also consider.

So that's where this thought is coming from.

Um, because that delicate delicate balance, I believe will make whatever we need to do um moving forward, um, a little more softer to embrace.

Correct.

Okay.

And as as a growth, um, I've always kept and I think some of the fellow board members.

When you look at the increase in assessed values, irregardless of what that percentage is, be it seven percent, eight percent, the first five percent every year assessed value, roughly covers salaries and benefits.

If you give a three percent raise, then you have health insurance costs, you have increase in pension plans and everything.

So that's why as we're with them, you use about five percent.

So that just covers five five percent of any assessed value.

It's just for salaries and benefits going for future years.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Again, thank you to the board.

Thank you.

Uh Commissioner Glassman, and I shared initially if you no, I I'm I'm good.

I also want to say thank you very much for the work, and I look forward to you know further discussions on this.

So thanks so much.

Appreciate it.

Thank you.

Great.

Um I have some comments, but city manager, did you have anything you wanted to share at this point or?

I'll reserve my time uh for when we talk about the preliminary budget proposal.

Okay.

Great.

Um thank you.

And City Manager, I have some questions about some of what um Chair Brown mentioned in terms of salaries and staffing.

Should I wait till we go into the the budget proposal for that?

So right time.

At your discretion.

Okay.

I'll wait till till then.

So thank you.

Um, for just for clarity around the fire assessment fee.

So, sounds like Commissioner Herbs would like some further information, which is sounds good, makes sense.

So, city manager, I'm just thinking from a timing perspective.

Um, when we have to make that decision, that's also July 2nd.

Is that our aim for fire assessment fee as well?

We can have that information provided to the auditor and do any follow-up necessary before or on the July 2nd date.

Okay.

Commissioner, do you think that's okay?

He's saying it's quickly as well.

As quickly as possible, I guess.

Expeditiously.

Great.

Okay, so we'll engage in that conversation then as a body at least, and and we'll all be provided that information.

Fantastic.

For the millage rate um conversation, again, we have to make that decision by July second.

Commissioner B.

Would you like us as a body to talk about that a little bit more now as a body?

Um, yes, because if we're that's what's gonna be my question, um, by July 2nd, that means that they need to know before we meet.

That we can make that decision on July 2nd.

Oh, we can.

But okay, I think to your point, I think it'd be healthy for us to start that conversation now if you're interested.

I would love to for us to have that conversation there.

Great.

Commissioner Hertz, do you want to sure?

Um, so last year I advocated for a military decrease.

I would advocate for a millage rate decrease again this year.

Um, holding it steady is acceptable, but not as preferable to me.

Uh a military increase would not be acceptable to me, and I'll tell you why.

We're moving forward with a referendum that is designed to reduce property tax burden on our residents.

It seems to me that it flies in the face of that referendum to go ahead and increase our millage rate to offset what the taxpayers are trying to accomplish, assuming that that passes.

So I I would not be in favor of it for that reason.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Go ahead, Commissioner.

Um, if you could um we can have this conversation in the direction of decrease, um, what amount and what would that balance explain a little bit more for me so I can understand how the decrease would also get us to that point for a balance of keeping that a soft acceptance.

So what I would like to see is an attempt for us to reduce our millage rate.

Um, even if it's just a nominal amount, again to show the tax papers taxpayers that we understand the economic stress that they're under.

Um, again, this was done by the county last year.

Uh it should have been done by the city, I believe.

We didn't do it.

I think we missed an opportunity to show that uh that we recognize the stress that our residents are under.

I would like to see us do that.

I think we can I think we can debate what that number ought to be uh and what the impact of that might be.

Um again, I've I've always said I think there is I think there's room for reductions in our city budget.

Um and I I still believe that's the case.

I I'd be happy to go through the budget line by line.

I've done it for you know the better part of 20 years and point out where I think those reductions should be, but I I really think that's the responsibility of the city manager, not the city commission to micromanage the budget.

I certainly don't want to do it on the day as well.

Commissioner Harps, when you think about possible millage decreases, what what number percentage, what comes to mind for you?

I think we can get away with at least a a point one decrease in the village.

Uh again, I'm not looking to slash and burn, but I think we can make a a step in the right direction that again shows the taxpayers that we take the financial distress that they're experiencing seriously.

Uh oil prices have battered our economy.

Rising insurance rates have battered our homeowners, and I think moving uh in a direction of trying to reduce the impact of taxes on our residents just shows that we are empathetic and recognize the challenges that they're experiencing.

Thank you.

City manager, what could could we have a sense if just as we're uh contemplating possibilities of point one decrease?

What what impact is that on the on the budget?

Thank you.

I'll see our budget director coming forward.

We just quickly flip to the page in the budget.

So um six around six million dollars based on the 2026 budget, so a little bit higher than that for 27.

So point one would be seven million.

A little north of six, yeah.

I don't have a little north of six.

But no more than seven for a decrease in in revenue.

Correct.

Okay.

Thank you.

Commissioner Glassman.

Yes.

Thanks.

Um I don't think this is the right year to look at a millage rate decrease, so I'm not in favor of that at all.

I think we have enough challenges that we need to face head on uh without also adding to those challenges.

Uh 19 years at four one one nine three, I think we can hit twenty years.

I'm also not in favor of an increase uh to the millage, but I I think we should leave it alone and focus on how we can make cuts and how we could do things in a leaner way.

I'm looking forward to that discussion.

Uh we have a lot of things on our plate right now.

So I I just think this is the wrong year.

We had other years where we might have looked at a millage rate decrease and we did not.

Um, but I just think I am I'm very much opposed to a millage rate decrease heading into the next fiscal year.

I don't think it makes any sense with everything else that we're facing.

Everything else that we need to do, um I would have if it was my preference.

I think the state legislature should have not deflected with this bill.

I think they should have taken the real challenges head on, like property insurance, premiums, things like that, uh auto insurance premiums.

There are ways that people could have saved money uh without this drastic approach to what it will do uh to cities and counties.

So I again uh I just wanted to basically tell you that I I don't think this is a good year to look at a millage rate decrease.

Thank you.

Great, thank you.

Um I am uh I definitely at at minimum want to keep the millage rate exactly where it is.

Uh it's my view.

I'm open to the idea of of a decrease.

So I think uh city manager maybe for our next meeting, could that be that point one possibility be laid out a little bit for us uh with greater maybe a little bit of greater um um kind of depth to it?

Yes, we can do that, Vice Mayor.

Would the commission also want to see some variation to that reduction, some other um points where we could look at some savings?

Chair Commissioner VZ Pittman, I turn it over to you if that's um yes, I'm in agreement with that i'm i'm pondering um what I'm hearing also.

Um, understanding that the majority is um leaning in the way of um either staying or a decrease um even though we've at that place, can we also look at what that one point increase would look like for the conversation for the increase?

Are we okay with that?

Sure.

Sure.

Yeah, I'm gonna have fun with that.

Again, what I'm thinking of is even you know I know we don't want to see increases but if it gets us to a point where we are a little bit more balanced that's the whole goal if this decrease or increase wherever it is that we're being at the best um responsibility for our neighbors I think we should look at both sides of it we can provide that information thank you great so in other words if I'm hearing the commission right it's looking at point one increase staying the same point one decrease that yes yes thank you okay great thank you um for the fire assessment fee we'll further that conversation with the additional detail provided um at our prior to our next meeting but we'll have the discussion at the next meeting vice sure yes I think could um commissioner could you um uh redefine what you specifically you were looking for the the calculation or how we were so so two things one um I would like you just to look over their methodology and and just opine as to whether you're comfortable with it um and then more specifically uh the idea of recouping the costs of new facilities in three years so typically we look at a 30 year useful life of a building and we would apportion that cost over the 30 years the thing I'm trying to devoid uh avoid here is the issue of you know intergenerational equity where we're basically having the taxpayers of today pay for a structure that's going to benefit people for the next 30 years.

I mean we're passing the cost along and that's unfair it's inherently unfair to do that.

And the idea that we're paying for for cash and we're not bonding it is irrelevance.

Is irrelevant from a financing perspective so cash is fungible whether we use cash on hand or whether we use debt is irrelevant to the question of how we apportion costs from an equitable perspective especially when you have existing debt so um when you look at for example how you capitalize the cost of a building under gap if you pay cash for it you still have to impute the value of interest if you have any outstanding debt.

So that's that's that's gap accounting right so it's the same concept.

You can't ignore the cost of financing just because you happen to have cash on hand if you have any outstanding debt which we already do.

So same concept applies thank you.

Thank you.

Great thank you Commissioner Herbs um if you're here for the 1 p.m city conference meeting we're just in the budget advisory board joint workshop so apologize for uh the delay to the start to the 1 p.m but uh obviously our budget is a critical discussion point so um thank you for bearing with us okay uh thank you chair brown i'd now like to give an opportunity for individual members of the budget advisory board want to give you a chance if you'd like to share uh feedback ideas any any individual commentary you might have want to make sure you have the chance to do that yeah please go ahead come come on up yeah you hear me yes vice mayor commissioners um I bought a house 18 years ago moved in um uh with my husband I'm invested in the city uh we've been community leaders and working with the rest of the community I joined the BAP to make a difference and in mind uh the interest of the residents of voice of the residents and I think it should be uh part of our focus at Bob um so I did a dip dive that I shared with some of you uh in terms of analytics and the diagnostic in which we are um the the key is among some board members there are different views.

And as a single board member, I'd like to um come from my analytics uh background uh professional and also what I did um going back to three years behind and seeing the projection from Stan Tech is that we're in a critical situation, and I think the idea that um cost saving optimization could lead, according to uh an approach that I shared in championed with my uh colleagues for the past six months, could lead to sixty million dollar savings, and I have the receipt for that.

It can be disputed that it would be 50 or 30, but that would probably allow the city to contemplate non-generally uh lots of budget uh uh cuts that are drastic, maybe coming back to a level of general fund that we had uh in fiscal year 2025.

Um what do we do with those savings?

We don't go ahead and spend it again because we continue feeding the beast, and we don't have the revenue to justify that anymore.

We were at 11% a few years ago of uh uh growth um and in real estate development at Valorem.

It's slowing down.

Um, like the chairman shared, and there's more to it.

Sixty-eight dollars out of every hundred dollars that we generate in revenue go to salaries and fridge benefits, and it's gonna get worse and worse.

So I was trying to have a dynamic picture of what's happening, what has happened in the past three years.

Those numbers are all uh um I just you know Excel doesn't make mistakes, only people, but just looking at the dynamic picture.

I think it's time to empower your city manager to do the dirty job that probably had or should have been done a few years ago, um, and stop the bloating and the growth of our city government.

Make an effort.

The city manager can do that.

She has the talent.

She's a lead uh transformator transformation agent.

She's not here to justify what's been in the past.

I would actually empower her to say, let's be serious.

Heads of department, let's do real budget cuts uh without reducing service level too significantly and being aware of that.

And then with that, let's consider not what I heard 10 minutes ago, a decrease of 0.1.

And I've got uh uh the receipt for that too, if you uh look at my presentation.

Let's take a look at what the Alvalorem um loss is gonna be for the next two years, uh about 44 million dollars.

Let's take a look at what City Hall new or um uh existing refit would cost, and let's make a uh um a holistic decision as to what uh millage rate uh change we should consider.

And according to my calculations, and I'm sure OMB City Manager staff will do that much better than I I did.

You can then make an informed decision and not do a knee-jerk reaction about oh, let's do uh 0.1 um relief, because you might need another 0.3 raise in three years, and we'll hear from Stantech soon.

So let's do something that's sustainable that leads to real uh savings and budget cut and optimization.

Let's get on a diet, and let's provide a reasonable possibly um relief for the residents, even symbolic.

Remember the school board, the Broad County School Board, uh Miami Dade, and Broad County have all considered that in the past two uh fiscal years.

So if they can do it, and other municipalities in Broad County uh that are smaller than us have done it too.

Let's take a hard look at that.

So I would say um empower your city manager to look uh into that um uh holistically uh with those um three parameters structural uncertainty and sustainability of our budget that we were here uh last year um already with.

Uh second, the Ad Valorem uh loss, and third City Hall, whatever its impact is existing or uh new.

That's all I have to say.

Thank you very much.

Olivia, by the way, I just want to thank you.

So I uh I did some light reading over the weekend.

Thank you for sending out on a Friday.

Surely what the city does, so why not?

I I I appreciate it.

So uh but no, it it was it was incredibly valuable information.

I want to I want to just thank you.

It was incredibly detailed and uh and and I did I did get a lot of value out of it.

Is there anything in particular out of that presentation that you would like to highlight or bring to our attention?

Because there's a lot of a lot of dense information in there.

I think I gave you the overall thinking is.

No, I'm thinking more for the audience.

Is there anything out of that that you want to bring to the you know that you would like to highlight from that?

The idea is that our city government needs to be considerate of affordability for our residents.

I think we all experience I live in district one.

Um I'm fortunate, but I know neighbors who are actually uh are considering to sell their house because they can't afford it anymore, not because only uh of the millage rate constant.

Uh by the way, the millage rate is constant, but we tax uh people on fire assessment uh increase.

That's been uh 30% in the past uh two years, uh, not you know, this recent increase only and the sanitation stormwater.

So if you look at holistically the taxation from our city, it adds 1.43 to the 41193.

And by the way, the 4193 has been constant while we increase the taxable value uh 245 uh percent uh since uh 2007, 120% since 2015, 16.

So uh we get more and more revenue, we feed the beast, and I think we need to reverse that logic for the sake of residents.

We need our residents to continue to be able to raise their children um and and grandchildren and still own their house, affording their mortgage or affording everything.

I think the uh tax property reform can give some relief.

It doesn't mean that we can't show as a city that we can do that a little bit too.

Uh and the taxation doesn't work the same way.

Uh the tax valor m uh relief will go to the the more modest uh people for whom the tax value 250k, lots of people, 46%, I think, uh in our um county, I think, uh, of the properties are uh about that level, 250k.

It's a huge relief for them.

So considering that relief and keep our city affordable is key, and I think should be central to the BAB.

That's our core mission, but also to the city commission with all due respect.

Thank you.

Great, thank you.

Any other questions?

Um City Manager, any comments or questions on on his feedback or suggestions?

The feedback is appreciated, it reflects some of the conversations that the budget advisory board has had over the past several months.

So nothing that was shared as surprising to me or to the Office of Management and Budget.

Uh, I do think that there are opportunities for additional strategic reductions, and I'd like to float those concepts to the commission uh today and in advance of me bringing forward a proposed budget.

Great.

And if I may, uh Vice Mayor.

So I'm I'm gonna touch once more on AI.

I'm an evangelist for this.

So I have consulting clients that I work with.

I just finished up a project that would normally have taken me about three months, and produced a 38-page document, McKinsey level uh work product, and I got it done in a week.

This would have taken months to do, and I got it done in a week using a combination of co-pilot and claude and chat.

That is the level of productivity that you can get through the utilization of LLMs.

So if we're not incorporating this into everything that we're doing, we're missing a huge opportunity.

I keep telling everybody I talk to, in five years, your job is going to be taken over, not by AI, but by somebody that uses it.

So every single department in this city has to find ways to incorporate these various LLMs into everything you do all day, every day.

Just just saying it.

The productivity gains are astronomical.

Yep.

Thank you.

I agree.

I think AI is amazing tool.

So and City Manager, I'm I'm assuming that how are you implementing that as Commissioner Herbs mentioned into what staff members do day in and day out.

Thank you, Vice Mayor and Commissioner Herbst.

So in last year's budget, with the support of this commission, we incorporated resources to have training with co-pilot in a pilot phase, and then we rolled it out to most of our employees.

What we're going through right now is identifying specific use cases for AI in different departments.

So it's not enough to just say we're using co-pilot or chat GPT, but how does that equate to efficiency or cost savings?

So for each department, we're looking at what can AI be used for that is actually going to turn into savings for the taxpayers' residents, stakeholders, savings of time and effort.

So while we know AI in general will allow increased productivity, it doesn't always equate to a financial gain or savings.

So for example, in our development services department, we're looking at how to incorporate AI into our plan review process so that we can turn over those plans faster for our customers.

In human resources, we're starting to utilize AI for screening for employees who are those wanting to become an employee within our city.

So every department is going to be a little bit different.

Not every department is going to see a significant savings by the utilization of AI, but I think we have to approach it more strategically while we're also looking at the broad and general view of how we apply AI across the organization.

Can I flip that script?

The best way you're gonna do this is not a top-down approach.

It's to give everybody the tool and tell them to go play in a sandbox.

Okay?

The ingenuity of the staff is going to be a lot more productive than having managers say do this.

I'm I'm telling you, trust your staff and let it bubble up from the ground.

Top down never works when it comes to doing stuff like this.

Again, it's a sandbox, tell people to go play.

They'll find out things that you never even imagined it could do.

I have a question.

With um AI, how does that lie with um the security of things that we're trying to do, privacy um areas?

Um, I'm trying to think back when I went to um National League and City, there was a conversation about AI and there were some points, you know, that positive negative and how to balance it.

Um, but how do we approach um research and um uh reports that we're putting out and still have that level of security that we would need in our agency?

So copilot is part of our MS 365 platform.

So it's an internal one.

If you're if you're using Claude or if you're using GROC or if you're using chat, that's external.

So it depends on on what you're doing.

So when I'm doing something for a client, I'm working usually on co-pilot because that's within their platform, or we have our own in-house agents that we utilize.

So all of our data is fenced in.

So we're not putting it out there.

If you're using chat and you're taking personal information, you're essentially making it available to everybody.

So, but if we're using co-pilot, which is what we have here, it's tied into our MS 365 platform, so it's essentially fenced off.

So it it kind of resolves that to a certain extent.

And Commissioner, we have Ron McKenzie, our IT director.

He was actually instrumental in developing our AI policy, and so I'll turn it over to him at this time.

Good afternoon, Commission.

Uh Ron McKenzie, Chief Information Officer IT Director.

Uh, much of what you're saying about the learning language modules that we have are important as we learn, but we have to do it safe, as you're also saying, uh, Commissioner Visa Pittman.

Um, we definitely have to do a safe as we roll things out.

Co-pilot, as he said, is both internal and external as we're looking, as we were rolling it out through the pilot, we learned some lessons to make sure that things are safeguarded.

We're in the process now of reviewing how we're going to roll it out to PD to make sure that things are safe and to make sure that people do not have access to things that they should not have access to.

So as we talk about AI, it's important.

It is a very, very, very important tool.

But what's important even more so is that it can reach out.

It has wings to reach out and to grow.

And we have to make sure that as it reaches out, it reaches out very safely.

Each tool that we have, we are rolling out to make sure that it's safe.

Some of the things that we have is we'll that'll be presented to you, is our AI platforms, and some of those things are voice AI.

We want it to be able to that when you call the city of Fort Lauderdale, you say, Hi, uh, welcome to Fort Lauderdale.

And it says, okay, when is the next commission meeting?

It tells you that information, and it tells you, okay, listen, the next thing is uh I'd like to make a uh uh um I want to permit what type of permit would you like?

So we have various tools that we're looking to, but we're looking to make it efficient and effective, so to make sure each and every person that's using it in each and every department has that tool and they're able to do what they do better.

Not as much as a reduction in staff, but to make sure the staff that we have are using it better, and I think that's how it makes a better Fort Lauderdale because each way that we're able to do it, we provide a better asset to each one of the residents, the businesses, etc.

That's the way that we're trying to roll it out.

But but there's other things.

Let me give you a really good example, right?

So on today's agenda, we've got a discussion about the federal uh courthouse.

One of the questions that has come up in some of our conversations is about what's the GSA's requirements for consideration of historic properties as it relates to the disposal disposal of properties within their portfolio.

I don't need to worry about um whether that's private, confidential, or privileged information.

I can go into chat or Claude and say, pull up the CFR code of federal regulations and tell me what GSA's requirements are for historic properties.

I could even list a specific property, and that is research that would have taken a staff member at least a day, if not more, to put together, and it's back in 10 seconds.

And then I take that one and I drop it in the chat, and I say, Chad, please verify what Claude just told me.

And then I take that and I drop it into Grok and I say, grok, I don't trust either one of these two.

Take a look at it and tell me what you think.

And within five minutes, I have a complete analysis, again, that's a consultant level review of everything that has to do with the historical requirements for GSA to dispose of property, and I know and I got it done.

And that would have been at least a day's worth of research for somebody to put together and type up a memo for distribution to the commission, if not a week.

And I can do that in five minutes.

And I can even tell it by style of I want you to write this as a city commissioner to my colleagues or to staff or something else, and it knows my voice and it writes it in in that format.

So these are the kinds of time-saving things that you can do that that don't get into the security issues that you're talking about.

You are correct, Commissioner.

Uh, one of the other things that we do as it relates to that, you're right.

And that's why we teach co-pilot as we're rolling out co-pilot.

We are telling them to do that, to roll it out to make things better.

And co-pilot, you can literally say, I want a 10-page PowerPoint on this particular subject matter, and it will do and it will produce it.

One of the things that I want to make people safe and sure about also is that hallucination aspect to make sure that even though that document is produced, that we check that document over to make sure that it's right before we send it out.

So I again AI is a very important tool.

You can increase efficiency and effectiveness, but we have to do it properly.

So safety must always be the first thing that we do because once you put it out with your name on it, it is yours, and so we own it and we're responsible for it.

Well, that's why I tell Claude, watch out because chat lies.

You know, the war there's uh they go back and forth.

And by the way, if you ever use Grok, it is profane.

So I don't want to tell you what Grok has to say.

Trust me.

You probably heard this from the term AI slop, uh, is one of the one of the challenges we have to navigate and use effectively.

Uh so yeah, I think all great points.

City otter, yeah.

Yeah, I just wanted to say that you know we used to copilot all the time that it's it if the efficiency of things you can do that take you like uh Commissioner Herb said, like, take a lot more time to do is really good.

But I I think uh, like as you say playing in the sandbox, I think the most important thing is to really for everyone out there is to is the prompt um getting the prompt right.

That is like the key to getting the best information that you want, and I just you know wanted to reiterate that point.

Yep.

Agreed, thank you.

Thank you, Ron.

Appreciate it.

Olivier, thank you for your comments.

Thank you for what you've emailed us.

Very helpful.

I completely agree about the pushing for efficiencies, being aware of what's coming down the road.

So thank you very much.

Uh Chair Brown, go ahead.

In regards to the report that you received this past weekend, uh the consensus was the BAB not to release that just yet, but it was we won't be coming back with a report from the BAB at the August meeting because there are some discrepancies in that information that you received, and we wanted to make sure you had adequate information.

Okay.

Thank you.

Great.

That sounds good.

And correct.

Thank you.

Um, other members of the budget advisory board, anyone else like to speak?

Okay.

Great.

So at this point, here's what I'd like to do, and commissioners, if this is all right.

We have more to do in the budget advisory board because the city manager is gonna present.

Uh is that I have that right.

Um, but we also going into our conference meeting, we have many elected officials that have come here to share with us a legislative update.

That uh many of them are just some very tight dial deadlines where we can only have them just for a little bit.

So, Commission, what I'd like to do if it's okay and okay with you all, BAB, is just pause our our BAB meeting, uh, allow that portion of our conference meeting to partake for our legislative update, and then we'll reconvene with the BAB meeting.

Is that that okay?

How much more do we have to do with the BAB meeting today?

We city manager.

There's a discussion of the preliminary budget as well as property taxes, yeah.

So it's a it's a healthy city manager's presentation.

This might be a strange question.

Why did we change the conference meeting to one o'clock and schedule the BAB at 12 30 and think that everyone was gonna be here and on time and that we were gonna be efficient?

So we moved the conference meetings to one o'clock going forward, so that was the resolution.

But that doesn't answer the question though.

I'm why did we think that that was gonna work today and scheduling BAB at 12 30?

Sure.

Then we were supposed to start at one.

We have everyone here.

I'm just wondering why we did that today.

I'm just curious.

It's just a maybe it's a rhetorical question.

Um, thanks.

We'll start.

I think when we have a joint workshop, I think it's a good point.

I think the joint workshop maybe now we start you know 11.11.

Yeah, I think 11 or 11:30, we should start early.

So yeah, I think it's I think earlier the the better.

We gotta do a better job of that.

So agree.

Um, thank you.

So um, is that okay, BAB members?

If we just if if you have to leave, I understand, please.

Um, but would love to continue our conversation.

So, city clerk, what I'd like to do now is recess if that's an appropriate word.

Uh recess the BAB meeting, and we'll uh begin the city conference meeting, the 1 p.m.

meeting.

And let me just see Daphne Sandville.

Just want to make sure.

Daphne, is that a do you have everyone here to begin the legislative update or is that you're good?

Okay, great.

So let's so now if you're following along at home or in person, we're gonna go to the 1 p.m.

city commission conference meeting.

We're gonna uh skip to CF1, CF1, which is a 2026 end of session report, uh, city manager's office.

City manager, thank you, Vice Mayor.

And you've already teeded up.

So if Daphne St.

Vill, our division manager for intergovernmental affairs will come forward, and I know various members of our legislative delegation are here as well as our contract lobbyists.

Uh, so definitely a team effort.

Thank you.

All right, it's on.

You can hear me.

Good afternoon.

Um mayor, uh, commissioners, uh, and city manager, uh, executive team.

Uh, this is the 2026 end of session report with the presentation.

I have our contract lobbyists as well as our members of the legislature, Senator Rosalyn Osgood, Representatives Campbell, Representatives Cassell, Representative Chip Lamarca, Representative Rosenwald, and Representative Dunkley.

So, as they make their way up to the front, I will just briefly recap what happened in the 2026 um legislative session.

So, at a glance, the session adjourned without a state budget, and therefore there was a special session.

There was actually three special sessions.

The first to address congressional redistricting, the second to address the state budget, in which they passed a 114.5 billion dollar budget, and the third session was to address the property tax amendment.

In our city appropriations, we secured 3.7 million dollars, and I would like to, you know, give a special thank you to our members of the legislature for working hard with the governor's office to do that.

In particular, the Galt Mile Street Safety Improvement Project was fully funded at our requested amount of 1.25 million.

Fire rescue fire boat replacement was fully funded at 643,000, substance abuse and mental health housing treatment program was also fully funded at the requested amount 250,000.

We also received partial funding for the Los OLES Mobility Project at 500,000 and our aviation technical training program at 500,000, as well as our roadway resurfacing project at 425,000.

Unfortunately, we lost three projects, but we will look towards next session as to how to strategize to get those into the budget.

The next topic, which is our exciting topic, property tax.

60% of the voters on November 3rd would have to vote whether or not to adopt this constitutional amendment.

In essence, what it does is it's very small, but it would raise the non-school homestead exemption to 150,000 in the first year, and subsequently in the second year raise it to 250,000.

The new Florida residents as of January 1st, 2027, would qualify for or be eligible for the 50,000 normal exemption.

After five years of residency, they can increase that the exemption to 250,000.

It lowers the assessment cap on non-homestead resident, residential, and other non-homestead property from 10% to 5%.

It restricts the county and municipal advalorm revenue to specific uses, which is public safety, education, infrastructure, natural resources, debt services, retirement benefits, and core operations.

It also allows local governments to increase the exemption further by general law up to all remaining assessed value.

And finally, what it does is it has a working waterfront properties assessed at current use and our save our homes portability is also maintained.

The city impact for fiscal year 2028 is uh estimated to be 17 million, and for fiscal year 2029 is estimated to be $27.3 million, and the path to the ballot.

What we are considering doing is having a robust education and communications plan in which the city will communicate with residents what property tax does for the residents all the way to the November 3rd election day.

On January 1st, if the constitutional amendment does pass, it would be effective, and then we would look towards the fiscal year 2028 budget and making any type of modifications and confirming with the property appraisers' office as to what we need to do moving forward.

There were some key enacted bills that affect the city out of the 250 that we followed this year.

There were about 1800 bills that were filed, so it was a significant amount that we worked on.

The first being the local government DEI ban, in which cities are barred from funding or promoting DEI initiatives.

The second is the land use development regulations bill.

It ties development fee for actual costs and requires objective compatibility standards.

The third are building permits and inspections, where there's uniform uniform state application inspection fees tied to actual costs.

Next is the local government finance, which is the fiscal Transparency act.

This is something that we already have implemented and are already doing, where it mandates expanded online posting of budgets, quarterly compensation uh reports, and annual budget reductions, uh workshops, and where there are impact fee changes.

Next is the electronic payments for local governments, where it requires cities to accept uh credit card debit, EFT and online payments, and the last one is micro mobility devices.

So that's the e-bikes legislation had passed this year, which caps e-bikes at 10 miles per hour, near pedestrians on sidewalks and shared pathways.

It also creates a task force for future recommendations using the data.

Next is verteports.

It authorizes 80% of FDOT funding for public vertifort projects and up to 100% if there's no federal funds available.

The sovereign immunity bill, after many years of coming through, finally passed, where it raises tort claim caps from 200,000 to 300,000 per person and 350,000 to 500,000 per incidence.

The next bill would prohibit net zero governmental policies.

So it bars governments from adopting and enforcing net zero policies or funding.

House Bill 1451 is the utility services, where any outside city customers eliminates the 25% outside city surcharge and caps outside rates at less than or equal to 25% above the city rates.

And it is tied to bond covenants.

And finally, what we were looking at that passed are the local government cybersecurity protection programs.

This piggybacks on the grant program that the Florida Digital Services and Cybersecurity or Cyber Florida agencies are promoting.

There are some bills that failed.

Post-disaster land use, which is the SB 180 fix.

It would have softened the regulations in 2025 that limits local mortatoria.

I always have trouble with that word.

And post-storm regulations and the restrictions remain.

The local government enforcement actions would have created an exclusive exclusive judicial mechanism to challenge city code enforcement.

Prohibited use of public funds would have barred most city funding for Florida nonprofits, HOA reform, the Florida Starter Homes Act also failed, the drinking straw and stir preemption bill failed, as well as the public records exemption for city managers.

So looking ahead, we are hoping that we the well, the governor has not yet signed the budget into law.

So that the 3.57 million that we did get for our six city projects still remains in limbo until he signs the budget.

We're looking at the constitutional amendment, what we're doing as we move forward.

It's the largest revenue risk.

Home rule has been narrowed with the DEI ban and other net zero prohibitions.

There are further preemption bills that were filed, however, they failed, and then there's some compliance work with ULDR updates, e-payments, budget transparency, and utility rate changes.

And we're just gonna watch for next session what to do.

And with that, I would like to welcome our members of the delegation, beginning with Senator Osgood.

Thank you, Daphne.

Appreciate it.

Senator Osgood.

Thank you.

Good evening, commissioners, vice mayor to my commissioner, Commissioner Pam B.

City Pittman certainly want to say good day to our amazing city manager and all of you.

It's good to be here today.

So thank you, Daphne, for all the work that you continue to do.

I'm gonna talk about a couple of things that were not per se city of Fort Lauderdale, but I think that are important to this county.

The one budget we did pass during the regular legislative session is we were able to get $30 million gap funding for the ADAP program, that's the age drug assisted program.

I'm gonna ask all the legislators to stand, all the members of the House of Representative, if you could just stand.

Thank you so much for your work in Tallahassee.

You may be suited.

We can't do anything with them on the Senate on the Senate side without them on the House side.

And we work in a very bipartisan way to represent you very well in Tallahassee.

So we were able to backfill the gap with the ADAP funding to make sure that people that are HIV positive continue to get help for their medication.

That's very critical to us all throughout Brow County.

And in the budget that went to the governor, that program is funded all except for managed care assistance, which we should be able to manage.

I'm very, very proud of that.

Also, want to say that the budget also contains 20 million dollars to start the initial phase of tearing down the horrible horrible detention center that we keep our youth in that is right here off Broward and 595.

So I'm very excited about that program and moving forward with tearing that facility down and bringing two facilities together to give us efficiencies.

And finally, the homeless safe parking program, which is taking place at Mount Olivet uh church on 15th Avenue.

Homeless families are able to go there and park overnight with security so that they are safe.

We were able to get $300,000 in the budget for that program, and that's something that we need to pay close attention to.

I was happy this legislative session that I ended up with about $32 million of budget appropriations.

So it was a legislative session and six special sessions.

It was a lot of back and forth, a lot of work.

But you know what?

I believe the residents of Broward County are worth it.

So I am happy to be here today.

I'm not gonna go into detail, I'm gonna kind of pull rank and let my house members do the heavy lifting today.

But thank you guys for giving us this opportunity.

Thank you, Senator.

Thank you for your work.

Do you want me to introduce?

I have Representative Cassell.

Great.

Thank you, Representative Cassell.

Hello, Mr.

Mayor, Commissioners, all city staff, thank you so much for having me.

So I always like to start with statistics.

I think something that often gets lost in times is really how often we are working together in Tallahassee.

So this year in particular, we had about 300 bills that passed, let me just get it specifically.

We had 381 bills that actually passed this legislative session.

236 of those passed unanimously with support of all members of the Florida House.

And overall, 84% of the bills passed with bipartisan support.

So more often than not, we are all working together for the betterment of Florida to make sure that we are passing legislation that is beneficial to Floridians.

So what you often hear sometimes in the news really isn't accurate.

You know, how often do they dedicate to local to state politics?

So they're gonna highlight the things that make it seem um more divisive than it is, but 84% of the legislation that passed this year passed with um bipartisan support.

So I always think that's something great to highlight for members of the community to have a better understanding that we really are working together in Tallahassee for you.

Um I think my job as a legislator, I have two main functions.

First and foremost, it is providing constituent services, making sure that I'm there, answering calls, and being there for my community, and second, I think it's bringing home money because at the end of the day, so many of our cities and programs that are offered here specifically in Broward County need the help of the state.

So I am honored and humbled to um state that I secured 48 million dollars in this year's budget, 30 million dollars will go directly to House District 101 and uh various projects in Broward County from stormwater management infrastructure, expanding Broward College, uh providing veterans assistance.

So I am so pleased with that because at the end of the day, that's really what matters to be able to impact my community the most by bringing back dollars that are going to continue to help the can help the community grow, whether it be from a city perspective or helping organizations that are in need that provide direct resources to the community.

Um, obviously, we had six special sessions, so a lot of things occurred.

I as I walked in, you guys were talking about AI.

I am the only person to pass any legislation related to AI.

Unfortunately, it won't make it to the governor's desk.

It did die in the Senate, but it's an AI bill that um was to put is to protect consumers from the use of AI in denying insurance claims.

We know that there are some pending civil action lawsuits where allegations have been raised that 90% of claim denials where AI is used had a 90% error rate.

So those of you that know me know insurance is really my passion and really one of the things that I fight primarily for in Tallahassee.

So I was proud that the House saw the significance and the need of that legislation, and I hope to bring it back next year from another policy standpoint.

A PASTA bill that is gonna allow our micro schools to have more of an opportunity to use our commercial mixed use space.

Obviously, we know since COVID, our businesses, our brick and mortar businesses are failing.

We have all of these opportunities, and we have this need for micro schools schools that help children on the spectrum, children with disabilities, um parents who want to place their children's into more STEM-based programs at we as we increase our uh uh ability to invite the tech space into the state of Florida, which is I know something that we want to grow here.

So creating that bill and passing that, the governor did sign that.

Mental health is also a priority of mine in anticipation of the future speaker of the House uh Sam Garrison.

Mental health is a huge priority of his.

I've had the honor of running two pieces of legislation that really focus on making sure that the dollars we're spending in the mental health space are actually getting people better.

So last legislative session, not this past one when the before, we focused on our schools.

We've spent almost a million dollars a billion dollars since the tragedy at Marjorie Stoneman Douglas, and we aren't actually tracking the metrics to make sure our students are getting healthier.

We passed that two years ago.

This year we followed up with that and expanded it and are focusing on our community courts, our drug court, our um juvenile courts, and um our court system to make sure that the programs that we have in place are actually getting people the help they need.

So that is my legislative update.

I think it overall it was a successful session, and it's always an honor and privilege to be here.

Great.

Thank you very much.

Thank you for being here.

Thank you, Daphne.

Representative Chip Lamarca, great representative marker.

Thank you, commissioners, vice mayor, city manager, city attorney, everybody else that's here.

Um I would say welcome to District 100, but it starts at the train bridge over there.

So we're in I believe we're in Darrell Campbell's district, great district ninety-nine.

Uh I too want to share a few things.

I think as you want to went through some of the the Daphne went through some of the bills that did not pass.

I do believe the Broward delegation was all on the same side of one of those bills that we got a lot of emails uh from not just the commission but members of the community here in Fort Lauderdale.

Uh on the the process that you've heard.

I don't want to uh be repetitious, but uh there was there were six special sessions, and sometimes those were within when we were already up there, just kind of diverted our normal weeks' work, and then sometimes they weren't because we were to go back up for the budget and property tax work.

But uh none of that could be could have been uh possible without our staff.

And I want to thank Justin Sasarczyk, who is somewhere here in the room.

Raise your hand, there's right there.

And I want to stay thank uh Commissioner Glassman's new uh aide Kiara, uh Coleman, who was in our office during that entire time and uh took all the phone calls from our uh eager constituents on specific issues that they had concerns with.

Moving on, uh, with respect to the process there, your lobby core, your lobby team, your contract lobbyists uh were in the halls very frequently helping with a lot of these projects and getting some of these across the finish line.

I do want to uh take a moment to kind of talk about two of them that were very important to me.

And uh I know that uh I know that uh one of our favorite constituents, Richard Walters, listening.

So I want to make sure he knows that over the last six years we've brought in eight point three million dollars for the city of Fort Lauderdale alone.

So when he holds up his as long as I get those through the finish line, when he when he holds up his next check, I'll be right next to him.

Um but look at all benefits of City of Fort Lauderdale and constituents.

Uh in this year's budget were were the final dollars of the Gulf Miles Street Improvement Project, safety Project for 1.25 million dollars, which would close that project out as the state is a partner of the city, which is very important, and something that was very important.

I know the senator didn't mention it, but she and I partner on a lot of projects uh over the years.

Uh one that is holds a very special place in my heart was the uh Boys and Girls Club project in uh the townhomes that we just opened up BBI Village, and this year it was the reserve fire boat that I know that uh Chief Golden's gonna be very happy uh to see.

And I uh was able to see him in the airport last week before I was heading off to a trade mission to Canada, and we talked a bit about that.

But uh truly this process in Tallahassee is um it's about working together, it's about working together across different political parties, different neighborhoods, people that you've worked with over the years and finding out what's important.

And certainly we had uh community activists in Tallahassee this year on the ADAP funding.

Uh it was a team effort.

It was talking to the Health and Human Services appropriations chair who sits next to me uh on the floor.

It was talking to the governor's office and things like that.

So things like that that aren't necessarily on your radar when you fly up there to take your, you know, do your uh first swearing in or you know, starting the next legislative session uh are the things that we end up working on quite a bit, and and some of these things are also stopping bad ideas, if you will.

And uh don't believe for a second that something might seem partisan one way or the other that we don't get together and try to work on those issues together because that's what we did on a couple things this year.

Uh as you know, this will be my uh last legislative update here.

I do believe I'll miss you too.

I do believe uh I will have a big check here to bring here in a little bit after the governor signs the budget.

Um I told them that these two do projects here in Fort Lauderdale are my top priorities, and uh, but I want to thank uh the folks that worked with us on those throughout the the time I was there.

And uh stay tuned for anything in the future, but certainly uh being here in Fort Lauderdale full time now has been uh a blessing and look forward to working with you all in whatever capacity that is.

Thank you very much.

Daphne Chip, just on behalf of District One, I just want to say in the Gulf, we we really appreciate everything you've done for the Galt.

You've been an incredible friend to to all of us up there, and and thank you so much for what you've been able to do.

Thank you, and I appreciate the AI uh lesson I learned on the way in, listening to the YouTube.

Anytime you want to just stop by, we we do private lessons as well.

Representative Lisa Dunkley.

Representer Dunkley, thank you.

I guess I have to do a whole setup.

Good afternoon, everyone, to the commission, mayor and commission, and the team here at the city of Fort Lauderdale.

It is a pleasure to stand before you today, just to give my version of update um to what the Senator says, we do have to work across the aisle.

Try to adjust, because I feel like I'm taller today.

I don't know why.

We do have to work across the aisle to get anything done.

And this legislative session, not to be labor, um, how we've had to do a very special session that I sometimes felt was quite taxing to be honest.

But it is always my pleasure to serve this community.

And I just want to report this session, I was able to secure approximately two point seven million dollars in the budget.

A lot of my projects was with our senator.

Um also outside of that, I carried a project that is very dear, and I know Senator is also championing a long way for that aviation project for Fort Lauderdale.

It was a tremendous effort by both us and our lobby partners in order to feed us to the finish line.

And so grateful for that, along with another project that uh bill that we carried together with Senator uh myself and Senator Osgood is a home hardening uh bill that the bill died but ended up in the tax package.

So we were able to get that to the tune of over forty nine million dollars.

Am I correct if I'm correct over the next three years that we're going to be able to see through that bill um in the tax package also another of my bill that I have been championing for a few years through picking up from where our previous representative Umfroy did in Uterine fibroid for women because women's health is important um we did pass the bill for urine five fibroids the de-identifying bill continued from piece of legislation that she carried but what was also special was I was able to get a nine hundred and ninety-four thousand dollars in the budget for the research and data for that particular bill so those I'm just gonna be brief um just to share those were some of the highlights for me in the staff session I know my representative behind me will give you another deeper dive but I just wanted to share that and thank you again so much for always the support that you give to me and for us carrying the load in Tallahassee thank you.

Thank you very much representative Rosenwald representative Rosemall thank you.

Good afternoon Vice Mayor and Commission great to see you all and Daphne you stole our all our thunder but everyone it's a pleasure to represent you all it's you're so large large city of five of us in the house and two in the Senate.

But happy to be here for my second year and to carry uh once again the second piece of the Los Olas um safety appropriation so I know we have 500 uh with the governor right now so we'll just continue to carry that forward.

Want to just talk about a couple bills that I passed that um do I think have relevance to all of us not just in Fort Lauderdale but the state and then some other items so um was able to get um just signed by Governor DeSantis last week I think or a few days ago whatever it was a housing for veterans um pilot program.

One thing that I know there's great bipartisan support on obviously in the House and the Senate some of you I know uh Rob Dunkley is a veteran and and many of us I'm a grandson of a veteran there's so many connections to veterans they're one group that they're um hard to house there's a shortage of landlords and what I've discovered and what I'd like to continue in the Florida legislature is landlord incentive programs to house various populations and we're gonna start with veterans so what this is is it would be we're gonna do the fiscal next year but this is the policy framework to provide incentives to landlords to hold their rental units for up to 45 days the state would pay them the prorated rent the person gets discharged from the military or they've been out for 20 years they come and they and they rent so it's held for them paid by the state and then when they're when they leave as I say discharge when they leave what have you even evicted or just leave on their own if there's damages you know the security deposit is kept but if there's the damages up to another two thousand with receipts with receipts the state would pay so this is a way to just address the landlord um shortage for veterans um and so it's a pilot program including of course Broward County or the best county around another uh bill that uh governor that uh passed uh unanimously with the governor's signature the other week or month is a very simple idea called the callback act and we're starting with unemployment and this is going to be an agenda I continue for the next my time in the legislature just like when we call American Airlines or Comcast cable for a service issue we're not wanting to be on on hold for an hour they say do you want to provide your phone number we might opt in we put our phone number in we wait 30 minutes they call us back that's great.

The state doesn't have that but now it does at least for unemployment claims so starting um starting very soon for unemployment people not just in Fort Lauderdale but around the state when they're calling about an unemployment claim.

They can put their phone number in, how novel and the state will call them back.

I really want to get this expanded to department of children and Families for SNAP benefits um veteran benefits, etc.

So just two items there I wanted to just again um follow up on what uh Senator Osgood and Repton Marcus said with the eight app program and Michael Rainier, who's a uh community activist who while lives in Wilton Manors is sort of known in I think throughout Broward County.

He and Senator Osgood and Senator Smith and actually a bipartisan group of senators as well as a bipartisan Trumbull and um and others, as well as in the House, a bipartisan group.

Um we got together because the surgeon generals cut ADAP very quickly.

And this is what Repli Market was saying, how we can pivot.

None of us thought about ADOP in January or December, but we were able to pivot.

So I think that's the nimbleness that you that I appreciate in my colleagues um, you know, across the aisle and obviously in the Senate as well as in the House.

So we're able to restore a good amount of funding.

There's it's not perfect, but we were able to get 75 million for next year.

Um two items that we did not get to pass that were co-sponsored because affordability is an important issue for all of us, whether we're red, blue, or purple, is affordability.

One of the bills I co-sponsored that was not passed was about property insurance.

I'll leave property taxes alone because you're all gonna discuss that I think later this afternoon, and there's a lot of conversation on that.

But we we didn't have any meaningful legislation passed on property insurance.

One bill that I didn't sponsor but co-sponsored, rep Skidmore sponsored it, was a bill to have Florida join a national risk pool.

There's already a number of states in this, so the more people that join across the states, we have we have um obviously um hurricanes, but Kentucky has tornadoes and California has earthquakes.

So if we can join a national risk pool, we spread the risk.

I know property taxes are certainly a concern for folks, but but a lot of us what I hear certainly is that property insurance is even more of a an affordability issue.

Um so I'll just keep that brief for today.

You've heard from uh all of us.

I'll give let Rep Campbell finish us uh carry the the end today, but I continue to be um appreciative to serve everybody here in Fort Lauderdale.

Um Brian Sievet is my district aide.

Can you and Joey Ibolete is my new legislative aide?

So uh my office is right in Oakland Park, but of course we'll come and meet you wherever you are.

Thank you, Commission.

Thank you.

Thank you very much, Rep.

Daphne to round out our legislative members.

I have Representative Campbell.

Thank you, Representative.

Thank you.

Thank you, Vice Mayor, Commission.

Um, so let me go ahead and start out with my report.

Um, first in starting out, um, when we started this process of appropriations, we were able to get one, we applied for 1.1 million dollars in for the budget on behalf of the city of Fort Lauderdale.

Um overall, I was able to bring um for the city alone six.

Oops, sorry, sorry, lost track.

$675,000 uh for the city of Fort Lauderdale.

Um, where those appropriations would focus on uh our substance abuse housing.

We got home, we got two hundred and fifty thousand dollars towards that.

Um, for anybody who uh who knows anything uh or has people that are dealing with substance abuse issues, this is uh uh strategically important for our community because uh, you know, mental health is is a is a thing, and substance abuse is a thing, and uh we want to make sure that we have the dollars in place to to continue to support those who may be suffering uh with substance use um as well as substance uh as well as mental health issues, and this focuses on challenges challenges to getting housing um in their right.

And so uh this was frankly important to me in uh looking at that.

The other the other uh amount of money that we got in the appropriation was uh $425,000 dollars for the Fort Lauderdale Roadway resurfaced resurfacing.

And this fund uh has four pre-existing uh roadway projects that we have here since my time in the legislature.

Uh it has been something that we have uh been working on and been finding uh year in and year out, and so I'm happy to have continue that that fight and getting that appropriation in.

Um as we as you heard my colleagues share, you know, this process is an interesting process.

Um, you know, we we talk about the bipartisan system that we that we work against, we work with to ensure that we get our our stuff done, and definitely that is something that we do um day in and day out.

You know, that's the moment that I was elected, um, I served to help serve with another uh the other 119 members in the house.

But I I stand here before you today uh frustrated at the process that we are in today.

Uh it's the second year that we passed the budget after the 60 days.

Uh, for those who may not know, our main objective is to pass a balanced budget.

That's all that we are set up to do.

All the bills, all the infighting, those are extra, extra things.

We're we're there to ensure that we are passing a balanced budget.

And the fact that we for a second year in a row haven't been able to complete that within the days that we're allowed in a part-time legislature is a waste of tax people's money.

Uh, and I say that because we talk about affordability.

Everything that we we hear folks say in Tallahassee is about affordability.

How are we helping Floridians?

How is that looking for Floridians?

And so I can't sit here with straight face with you right now and tell you that I feel that the state is looking at things in an affordable way.

Um as you as you saw, we went back up for uh redistricting.

Um we went back up for redistricting and redistricting, we that particularly impacts my district.

Um we see that while it is a target along party lines, it is also a target to silence uh black voters, and I represent a good chunk of those voters, and it is frustrating and it is maddening as a representative to have to have to show time and time again the numbers of what how that impacts us as a city down here, and and frankly, um if I'm to be honest, I feel like my cities are being targeted.

Um, and so we had that bill.

We had an election bill that that we put through um to make elections even more harder to vote for people that may be apathetic or have the ability to vote, but they're uncertain of where they stand.

Um, you know, we got we got anti-DEI bill that impacts you all sitting here before us.

There are certain things that you cannot even do now that help provide support.

We are a diversity melting pot here in Fort Lauderdale.

There is I love to see that I have white, black, Caribbean, Haitian, all the different diversities here in our community, and the fact that we're putting a bill through and people are supporting this type of bill, it's it's a shame is shameful to say.

Um, you know, and so we talk about anti-DEI and how that impacts what you're able to do in supporting a lot of the the events that go on in our beautiful city here.

Um, you know, property taxes.

You all did such an amazing job in warning us about how this would affect us.

Before we got there, while we were there, when we came back home, they warned us.

You I can I can honestly say this is the hardest working issue that you guys worked on in making sure that we stayed up to date on how this would impact us, and yet we still go up there and we know what this bill is going to do.

We know the impact that is going to that is going to make.

And then we say we're going to let the voters make the decision.

Well, how do you let the voters make a decision when you're informed yourself?

And so this is the frustration that I feel today standing up here and speaking out for my community because now my district, my community is at a loss because they think property taxes is going to be ended.

They think they're going to be saving.

Well, I'm sorry that sorry to let the voters know, like you will not be saving with this bill.

You're going to be paying more.

This is not a property tax cut.

This is a property tax shift.

And so, you know, it's it it's it's frustrating.

Um, you know, it's also is also something that I try to let people know.

Recognize that when you hear that 80% of us are voting on bills that we all agree upon, that's that's by no surprise.

Of course, we're going to agree on certain bills, but recognize who's at who's who's pulling the levers here to make sure that certain bills get heard.

Uh, when you talk about when we talk about certain bills, we passed the bill for gold.

Like, when have you ever used gold to pay for anything?

Like, tell me.

So it's it's frustrating, but I I'm still hopeful.

I'm still prideful.

Uh the people elected me, and they re-elected me again to go ahead and speak out on their behalf.

And I look forward to continuing to work with you uh here at the city commission.

I look forward to working too with my colleagues and all parties, stakeholders involved, to ensure that we are continuing as a as a as a collective body representing our community in the in the means and the ways to ensure that it's affordable living here and not just affordable for some.

Thank you.

Thank you, Representative Campbell.

Appreciate it.

Daphne.

I would like to say thank you to the members of our Fort Lauderdale legislative delegation again for their hard work this session in fighting for the policies and appropriations that we put forward.

And to finish the presentation, I'd like our lobby team to stand up so they could be recognized for their hard work.

Uh, when we couldn't be in Tallahassee, they were in Tallahassee fighting the good fight.

So thank you to Eric's consultants, Candice uh Eric's can't be here, but we have Lauren Joxon from Ruben Turnbull, we have Sharonda Wright Placid from Capital City Consulting, we have Jared Rosenstein and from Ron Buck LPA, we have Ronna Brown and Ron Book.

And in the essence of time, we will have one spokesperson to you know get the perspective from our lobby team, and that will be Mr.

Book.

Thank you.

Let me first of all start by thanking Daphne for all the leadership and driving the team because the team as a whole is nowhere without a director, and you were that director, so thank you.

And to the manager and the entire staff, the level of responsiveness this session was significant and substantial.

I'm here to answer questions.

Daphne asked me to make sure that if there were questions, we answer it.

But I want to follow up on the obvious elephant in the room, and that's the aggregate property tax uh constitutional amendment on the ballot in November.

I would simply say that I heard several of the lawmakers speak.

Sometimes folks do things just because they can.

And while we started with an amendment six weeks into the regular session that would have repealed all adverbed property taxes for residents, which did not get picked up by the Senate, uh then the special session with the 150, 250, CPI, five-year residency to qualify.

I think the damage is clear to all of us.

And I think that if we don't begin to get creative at how you spend on parks, how you spend on libraries, the things that you can, if you will, fold into the things that are prohibited from being spent on from an agile one perspective.

We have to just get creative.

I'm one of those who believes that it's a long way between now and November, and I think the taxpayers are smarter than a lot of people may think they are.

With that, Madam Manager, thank you for your leadership and for making certain that things we needed along the way were done.

But I'm happy to take questions.

Great.

Thank you, Ron.

Thank you for your work up there.

Um let's see, questions from the commission?

Ron.

Great.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Daphne.

All right.

Seeing that there were no questions, that means this presentation was amazing.

Yes, it was.

And with that, I close the end of session report.

Great.

Thank you very much, Daphne.

Um, I'd just like to thank all of you.

Thank you, elected representatives, for the work you're doing in Tallahassee.

Thank you for bringing home amazing projects, initiatives across the board.

Also just thank you for what also did not happen this session, which was continuing to fight to protect home rule.

We appreciate that, whether it's vacation rental or otherwise, that matters, so we think we can do a good job here in the city of Fort Lauderdale leading as we uh residents uh uh encourage us to lead, and so uh empowering us to do that really means a lot.

So, so thank you very much.

Um, I also wanted to just recognize all of your staff members, legislative, could they stand up for a moment um and just give you a give you a hand for the whole legislative team that's up there?

Thank you to you all, and then representatives that the representatives electeds would stand.

So we can just thank you one more time.

Elected, thank you very much for what you're doing.

Thank you.

And then Daphne, I know you're talking right now, but thank you, Daphne, for your work and your leadership.

You give Daphne a hand.

Thank you.

Thank you all.

Keep it up.

Thank you.

Um excellent.

If no other comments from city commission, then we'll close that item if that's all right.

So we'll close that item.

We're gonna recess the city conference meeting.

We're gonna now go back to the budget advisory board meeting.

At this point, city manager, you are going to present uh your your presentation in the budget advisory board meeting.

Thank you, Vice Mayor.

I think we should start with the preliminary budget uh that has been shared.

I know we talked a lot about property taxes, and we can go into that, but I think we've covered a lot of the uh the facts on property tax reform.

I want to remind the commission that we started off this budget year uh with a mindset that our environment may be changing significantly, and at our February budget kickoff with staff, I shared with them uh some ideas as to how we should approach this budget development process for this year.

I asked the team to think of fiscal prudence, resourcefulness, and innovation.

I asked the team to think about investing rather than spending.

How can we think about plans for the future?

How can we set the tone for uh what we believe may be a challenging uh outlook?

And although the team heard what I shared, I think uh shifting the mindset is probably something that we're a little bit challenged with, and so even this year with that guidance, our staff, our departments came in with requests to the tune of 22.8 million dollars and 92 new positions.

Thankfully, thankfully, I am presenting a preliminary budget with a net of one new position.

We have looked at strategic reductions.

The budget advisory board has supported us over the past year with some revenue enhancements, so various projects throughout the year we've shared with the budget advisory board, and that is gonna yield us about 3.2 million dollars.

We've cut positions, uh six to be exact.

We are now budgeting for attrition across various departments that have some challenges with vacancies.

And we're really looking at the bigger picture in terms of how we invest.

This preliminary budget reflects prioritization and a focus on public safety, infrastructure and capital projects, and technology.

We think these are the primary areas where investments need to be made, not just for fiscal year 2027, but beyond.

So all these factors have weighed into our approach in what we're recommending for this year's budget.

As discussed earlier, we have shared that maintaining the millage rate is something that is viable for the fiscal year 2027.

We've also shared a recommendation, which has been fully supported by the VAB, to go to full cost recovery for the fire assessment.

We have also allocated some resources for the parks bond program that has been a topic of discussion amongst our team and the commission and residents for several years and months, and we're taking the approach of identifying gap funding in a pot for parks bond projects that may not have enough funding based on the timing of the project and the progress on the overall bond program.

I want to highlight the Office of Management and Budget.

They have been diligent in their efforts this year, as in other years, but this year was a little bit different because of our reorganization in fiscal year 2026.

We do have more departments that the OMB team has to meet with and to do a deep dive on.

In every meeting that I've participated in, our focus has not only been on the dollars, but also on the outcomes, the programs.

What are we doing?

Are we being intentional?

What are the deliverables and how can we improve that?

So, along with looking at expenditures, revenues, how does our work add meaning and value to our community?

And we've looked at every single department from that lens and perspective.

This year's increase to taxable values is modest, as Chairman Brown mentioned before.

We're not looking at double digits like we saw in 2022 and 2023.

So our expectation from this point forward is that growth will continue to be modest.

Although there are some things highlighted in terms of revenue expenditures and strategic reductions, there are some additional opportunities that we can take this year to start to become more lean as a government, and to also anticipate future one-time expenditures that the commission may see fit see fit to move forward with.

We also have Parth Patel assistant director and Yvette Matthews as well, is available, and she has been championing this group from the city manager's office.

So thank you.

Thank you, City Manager.

And could the entire budget team just stand up and let us give you a hand?

Thank you, budget team.

Very nice.

Thank you for your work.

Thank you.

Thank you, Laura.

Go ahead.

Thank you, Manager Williams.

Thank you, Vice Mayor, Commissioners.

Laura Reese, Director of Office of Management and Budget.

I'd also like to acknowledge the budget advisory board for their partnership, and I always share that they're hard the hardest working board in the city.

They met with us, I believe they're planning to meet with us 15 times this year.

It's usually 14 times this year.

We had one extra special meeting.

So they're really hardworking and put in a lot of time.

We spend time together every Wednesday night in May.

So we um lots of together time recently.

So thank you so much for your partnership.

So as Manager Williams mentioned, um, she spent a lot of times a lot of time in budget meetings this year as well with the expanded portfolio of departments.

I'd like to thank her for all the time.

We can't move on with the budget process without that leadership and direction.

Thanks to Evat Matthews for all of her direction and leadership.

Um I'll be presenting today with my co-presenter, Parth Patel Assistant Budget Manager for OMB.

Um we're going to be talking to you today about taxable value growth, fire assessment update, rate adjustments on the tax bill, and then I'm going to be turning it over to Parth, who's going to get into the details a little bit with you about key expenditure and revenue changes, homelessness response, sustainability and waterways, proactively preparing for the future, the CIP and replacement plans, and then based on the manager's recent request, I'll come back and share some additional ideas that we've developed as a management team of additional reductions we may explore between preliminary and proposed to set us up for success in 2028 and beyond.

So with that, just as a reminder, the reason this city does a preliminary budget, most cities do not do this.

It's because this commission challenged us to provide a lot of detail, a lot of information before you set those millage rates in the month of July.

The commission goes on a summer recess after your July 2nd meeting, and we're required to have to the property tax the property appraiser all of the non-advalorum rates and the millage rate by August 4th.

So that's the meeting where we make recommendations and you all set those rates.

And so we were challenged to provide a lot of information before you get the proposed budget with the agenda.

So this memo was released on June 10th to share all of the information on the general fund preliminary budget ahead of that July 2nd meeting.

So as of June 1st, the property appraiser gives us taxable value growth.

They shared that the taxable values increase by 4.5 million or 7.16% above the final valuations for fiscal year 2026.

In the adopted budget, we're going to need to use the July 1st values, and then there's a value adjustment board process.

So the numbers you're seeing for the final 2025 are slightly below what we had adopted in the budget for fiscal year 2026.

So the increase in revenue above 2026 is 6.1% or 15.2 million dollars based on those values.

And as we've talked about with the budget advisory board and the manager just shared, the preliminary residential rate of 444 dollars is what the full cost recovery for the fire assessment fee is this year, and that's a 10.17% increase from last year.

One thing we'd like to point out, and we talk about it every year, is that having the diversified revenue base is important to the city, particular, particularly as we approach property tax reform.

As if property taxes go down, this is one of those revenues that won't be impacted by that reform.

And it can continue to be used to be dedicated to fire suppression activities in the city and to support those needs.

So it'll continue to be important over the years.

And when StanTac talks to you later about our long-term forecasting models, that's something they'll be talking about as well.

With the fire assessment at full cost recovery for fiscal year 2027, it will generate 70 million dollars in revenue, which is around 12% of our general fund budget.

So with those rate increases and the stormwater assessment that is on the bill in voter approved debt, there would be a hundred and eighty dollar increase in a tax based upon a six hundred and four six hundred and forty thousand dollar taxable value.

So that's the thing the value of a single family home in fiscal year 2026.

So the average taxable value of a single family home in Port Lauderdale is six hundred and forty thousand dollars.

And so the total increase for that home would be a hundred and eighty dollars or five point two percent, which equates to fifteen dollars per month.

With that, I'll turn it over to Parth Patel.

Thank you, Laura.

Um afternoon, Vice Mayor and Commissioners.

Um now we'll kind of pivot and go over uh what's changed since the adoption of the FY2026 budget.

And before we dive in, like the next few sections are data heavy.

So I will be focusing on uh the key variances or new initiatives that are being proposed.

Uh, but feel free to stop me at any point if you would like to dig into something particular.

All right, so starting off with the key general fund uh expense changes since 2026.

We've seen an overall increase of 33.9 million dollars, with salaries and wages uh being the largest component at 14.6 million dollars, and a transfer out to support our capital projects at 6.9 million dollars.

Um now, if we shift quickly our focus to the expense changes by function, um, our public safety is our largest governmental function, that's seeing an increase for about 17 million dollars.

For revenues, we've seen an increase of 38.8 million dollars from FY2026, the largest increase being in Avalorum revenue at 15.2 million dollars, uh the fire assessment fee at $8.4 million that Laura spoke about earlier, and the other notable increase that occurred was in franchise fees and utility services taxes at $7.9 million dollars.

And with that, we're seeing approximately $4.9 million dollars in available funds to support uh key city initiatives for FY 2027.

Um, and that will be transitioning to see the key areas of investment, with the first one being in public safety and enforcement at approximately sixteen million dollars, eight hundred and fifty thousand dollars uh geared towards new community initiatives uh from need from the new harm reduction opioid overdose prevention program, which primarily uh focuses on NARCAM placement throughout the city, as well as an expanded group violence intervention program, which focuses on individuals at the highest risk of gun violence, connecting them with targeted services to reduce harm and make neighborhoods safer, as well as increasing coverage at schools on a rotating basis through the new public safety aid traffic coverage program.

Uh moving on to personnel, uh we're seeing an increase of about 1.1 million dollars, which equates to about six FTEs.

Um and this ranges from expanding the nighttime code enforcement services to providing additional oversight for beach operations, as well as additional resources for prior for fire prevention services, as well as additional administrative uh support stuff for the police department.

And lastly, um I'm gonna quickly touch on the some of the key notable equipments here, uh, and we'll talk about the replacement plans uh that are part of this towards the end of the presentation.

But overall, we're seeing a $13.9 million increase, $8.4 million for funding for $81 public safety vehicles, including three fire pumpers, 1.3 million dollars for new marine response vessels and both police and fire rescue, as well as an expansion of the license plate return coverage uh program citywide at $560,000.

The next area of investment is homelessness response at about $14 million, a general fund supported side is about $3.7 million dollars with the two with two key notable um additions.

Um one is an expansion of the access, uh one's an expansion for the shelter bed access program of an additional 15 shelter beds, and the second one is funding for an additional dedicated bus service in partnership with with rotary connection, which provides transportation and relocation assistance to those experiencing homelessness.

Um the next uh tranche is the grant supported side, which is about 10.5 million, the bulk of that being uh HOPWA funding or housing for opportunities with persons with AIDS for facility-based housing, rent programs, mortgage assistance, and then the other two million dollars, really focusing on other grant initiatives through our ship uh funding, home investment partnerships, and our community development block grant funding.

Another area of investment is our sustainability and waterways initiatives at approximately $14 million, $3 million in our sustainability initiatives.

Again, here like the two key notable ones are the expansion of the urban forestry program with an additional $200,000, which aims to enhance the tree coverage citywide and achieve 33% canopy coverage by 2040, as well as the um administering the subterranean termite treatment program, which is a comprehensive uh termite treatment program and forest protection program as where as well.

Uh the next tranche is the public enjoyment of our waterways at approximately 11 million dollars.

A few key notable items here uh are both again the marine vessels for both police and fire, as well as the waiver of living seawall permit fees, which is a new incentive program to offset permit fees for residents and businesses, and then a waterway traffic skimmer to enhance canal cleanliness and improve water quality.

Question on this, thank you.

Uh compare the dollar allocation FY27 versus 26 on this, please.

Sure.

Overall category back to you on that, Commissioner.

Um guessing there is a delta there uh in a positive direction.

Just these are, I think, some of the great initiatives that uh this commission has been driving towards.

So I just just want to highlight and appreciate that.

Thanks.

Thank you.

The next a key theme in our budget process as well as the manager's message has been proactively preparing for the future, and below are some of the strategic budget balancing strategies that the manager has already highlighted for us, uh, $3.2 million in revenue enhancements, about $770,000 in reducing six vacancies in the general fund, as well as $650,000 in payroll payroll attrition in the areas that have uh that have had a history of vacancies, uh totaling um about $4.6 million in efficiencies.

Next, we're going to talk about some of our capital programming that we have in our capital improvement plan.

Uh in 2027, we're slated for about 36 projects, totaling 23.2 million dollars.

Um, the more notable ones being 7.8 million dollars towards the holiday park fire station, $3.4 million for the parks bond project for funding gaps, and then a little north of uh $500 million for seawall replacements.

There are no questions.

We'll kind of move on to what's on the horizon.

On average, there's about $26 million in in capital investments over the four years of which spans from about $18.3 million at our lowest in 2028 to $31.7 million uh in 2020 30.

And this largely focuses on being uh the large focus being uh on bridges and seawall replacements and then followed by mobility and parks projects.

And then lastly, rounding us out is the replacement plans that I was talking about a little bit earlier, um at about $26.2 million, $21.3 million dollars being for our fleet vehicles, 10.6 of that impacting the general fund, 1.9 million dollars for our fire rescue equipment, 1.7 million dollars for police equipment, and then about 1.2 million dollars for all other equipment replacements.

And if there are no questions, I'm gonna turn over to Laura Reese to round us out.

Thank you.

All right, so um, as manager Williams indicated, we are continuing continuing to look at additional ways to set ourselves up for success for fiscal year 28.

Um, understanding property tax reform, additional costs are coming online.

Um, one of the things we're looking at is um we're really focusing on things that don't impact operations to our neighbors, but perhaps take advantage of our current funding in different funds and levers that we have to pull.

One of the areas we identified was um that our pension obligation bonds um have six years of life left, and we currently keep a reserve for that payment because we pay monthly into that fund from the other funds.

So by way of example, if the police department owes 10% of that, there'll be a budget in their budget that goes into the pension obligation fund 112th for cash flow purposes.

Our cash flow is really strong now.

We believe there's an opportunity to spend down that reserve and transfer the full payment into the fund as of the beginning of the year to take advantage of the fund balance in that fund and to reduce the city's payment.

That could result in 2.1 million dollars in reduced contributions annually to smooth that over the years of life.

The next item that we came up with was $2 million.

I'm sorry, Laura.

So you're gonna spread that over the remaining years of the outstanding bond issue.

Correct.

To smooth to take advantage of the reserve because our cash flow is very strong right now in all of our funds that can support that.

So that would be something we could do to alleviate um the burden on current taxpayers by taking advantage of a positive cash flow in our city funds and in the pension reserve.

So we're kind of looking at each of the funds and what levers we can pull, that would be one of them.

The other one is our CIP fund as we've funded more and more cash-funded capital.

Um we have additional interest that we continue to earn in that fund.

By way of example, we got the PFAS money and we spent down fund balance to that 25% threshold in the last year.

That grows our fund balance and interest earnings have been increasing.

Um we believe we can start budgeting for $2 million in interest to offset our capital costs each year.

And we've seen that over the last three years, that's been a sustainable trend.

So as long as market conditions hold, uh, two million dollars is in a reasonable way, so we wouldn't have to tax taxpayers.

We'll just take advantage of interest that we're now earning due to the higher balances in that fund.

So that's the second option.

Um the third item is um so we have a health administration fund.

Um, the city's self-funded for health insurance, and so it's funded through employee contributions and city contributions, and the unions have negotiated the city's contribution per employee with we call it a kicker.

So it's based upon an actuary report, and then we add a percent to that because our our health fund was not well funded years ago.

Um, as that fund is performing better, um, the city historically has subsidized staff on the back end.

So if there's by way of example, I think it's 1.4 million dollars in operating costs for that fund that the city was subsidizing by charging like the water sewer fund and the general fund and other funds, we don't believe that's necessary anymore.

So the general fund portion of that with keeping rates the same for employees, uh the general fund could um contribute $850,000 less into the fund and keep that fund still healthy.

So that's another lever that we could pull without impacting any services to our community and without impacting employee rates because the fund is in a healthy position.

Uh, the next item was um, you know, Parth and Keith talked or Parth talked a little bit about fleet replacement.

Um we each year um we have an internal service fund that's our fleet service fund.

And each year, if uh by way of example, if there's a Tahoe in the police department, if it has a useful life of six years, we're paying into that fund one sixth of the amount we're gonna need to replace that in six years.

And what we found is that the trade-in value for the vehicles has been coming in higher, or the auction value has been coming in higher, and the interest earnings have been coming in higher.

So we believe we can lower that amount to be 90% instead of 95% replacement that we're budgeting for, and that would save the city's general fund seven hundred thousand dollars per year um by implementing that strategy.

And the next just two more options I'm gonna throw out there.

So um before you before you jump to that, so in the past we had lengthened the length of time between replacements um back in the 2010 2014 time frame and then we started replacing them more frequently again any uh any look at that vehicles last a lot longer these days than they used to so are we taking a hard look at the necessity of replacing them on a shortened time frame as we've been doing that that is a great idea that's not one of the proposals that we've looked at now um what we do look at um every year when we go to replace vehicles and the actual cash goes out we look at mileage and we look at vehicle use to see if we even need that vehicle and if it needs to be replaced based upon miles but that's another option that we could pull in the fleet fund as well um we'll look at that as well commissioner okay because we we've just gotten into a habit of replacing them just on a cycle whether they need it or not and so it's something we should take a look at again we've done this in the past and it was very effective at reducing our cost we don't need things where the wheels are falling off but again vehicles today last a lot longer than they used to the the useful life is uh has been greatly extended by virtue of improvements in technology thank you thank you um and so and the next item that we're sharing as fire rescue has really been amazing at controlling overtime um under Chief Golan's leadership and we think that maybe a lever we're also able to pull and you know discussion with the chief we need to discuss that a little more but um we think maybe up to three hundred and fifty thousand dollars in reduction there um based upon the current year trend but you know that'll be a discussion um the next item is two hundred thousand um that we've identified we budget 25000 dollars so that our departments can partner with technical experts when graph grant opportunities come up but what we found is that in the past year we have only really used about fifty thousand of that so we think we could reduce that budget by two hundred thousand as um the final solution we're gonna share today and all of those are strategic ways of looking at the city's finances and how we maybe do things a little bit different um without impacting our community and that totals 6.2 million dollars.

Great thank you I think those are all great ideas to pursue to continue to operate more efficiently I I definitely support that direction is that commission any feedback on those six.

Okay.

Great I do want to add vice mayor that our recommendation would be to take those savings and look at one time uh capital expenditures or put it into our capital fund uh as a set aside for any major project that we could anticipate for a future year uh so that's the recommendation as to what we do with those savings at this time yeah I think that makes sense and and that's basically reinvestment in our infrastructure as I understand you articulate is that right infrastructure capital projects any major initiative of the commission that requires a significant uh revenue source excellent I think that makes sense thank you uh commissioner good in agreement yes great thank you thank you Laura appreciate it city manager so if you still would like to we can go into the property tax reform portion of the presentation I think the only major new element is to talk about uh how we communicate with the community I think uh mayor trentalis asked that we include that as part of this discussion with the BAB so that staff can have direction as to any outreach that we need to do uh going forward.

Great so I think we're pretty well versed on the property tax and possible impact but I think the communication could be helpful is that Commission okay we we just talk about communication Commissioner Bees of Feminine.

Yes, the communication piece um as we move into that direction um when I was at our meeting for the Broad League of cities, there was a conversation about um in a sense, re a restriction as to what we as city commissioners or electives are allowed to say in regards to this conversation.

So if you would also be able to include those limitations, what that looks like, so we are not um written off from this commission.

That may be for the city attorney.

Thank you, ma'am.

Yes, Commissioner, with regard to communication, the uh city and and city representatives of all kinds, including yourselves, need to be very careful not to advocate a position.

We may educate, we may lay out facts, we can do that in detail, but we need to be very careful not to advocate a position either way.

Vice Mayor, we have Kevin Palito, Director of Strategic Communications for any questions on our communications plan.

Yeah, thank you.

And and before we get to Kevin, uh city attorney, just to kind of give us even more specific guidelines.

If someone asks us at a neighborhood meeting, what do you think, Commissioner, Vice Mayor, Mayor of the property tax reform?

What are we able to share there?

Again, I think you need to be very careful when you're speaking in your pro in your official capacity.

Okay.

Acknowledging that you you need to realize that you're you're speaking when you're out and about in community as the vice mayor, and you need to be very circumspect about how you talk about your opinion and your position.

Okay.

That's helpful.

Thank you.

Kevin.

Good afternoon, Kevin Polito, uh Director of Strategic Communications, uh, Vice Mayor and City Commissioners.

So we're going to quickly go over our property tax public education campaign.

Uh the purpose of this is to educate our residents on the different services that are funded uh through property tax revenues, so that our residents uh throughout our community understand uh what is currently funded, where are the levels we are today?

Um this is a flyer uh that is going to be distributed uh distributed, excuse me, uh through city facilities uh as well as email social media through our websites, newsletters.

Uh we'll be happy to share with each of your offices uh if you would like to have it as well on the back side of that.

Um there is also going to be different diagrams for people to understand uh where their dollar goes.

Um the idea is to have uh flyers at city facilities.

Uh we're gonna have our next issue of FTL Connect coming soon uh in there as well.

Uh we're gonna have some information on what property tax is, what it does it fund, where it is today.

Um, and then we're also gonna have um some self-identification language uh just for people to understand that when they're looking at their favorite program, uh it is funded in partially part by our property taxes.

Um so the idea is for all the communication to really be transparent um and to try to use all of the different means that the city has available um to just educate on what your property tax is, what does it fund?

So with that.

Excellent.

Thank you, Kevin.

Questions, comments from the commission on communication feel good about this.

I mean, okay, great.

Thank you, Kevin.

City manager.

That's all.

We will begin to do the outreach.

Uh, if at any point the commission or any individual commissioner has any feedback as to how the outreach is being rolled out, please let us know as soon as possible so that we can make any modifications necessary.

Okay, fantastic.

We will do that.

Um so uh Mr.

Chair, anything else from a budget advisory board standpoint?

Just that we would look for some clarification and guidance as we work through this with strategic communications on the public outreach of the property tax.

Um is there any desire to hold webinars?

So people can call in other than just doing the the mailings and the hands out so that the budget advisory board could facilitate some of that discussion with the with the community and to get some feedback on questions that they might have.

It's kind of hard once you hand out a flyer if you can't get questions answered.

Sure.

Uh I know for myself and then I'll turn it over to you all.

I know I'm gonna be doing this on my agenda review meetings and neighborhood meetings and so forth, so uh I'm gonna be doing a lot of this, but Commissioner BZ Feminine, any thoughts there?

Yes, um, I am concerned about the um restrictions that's been placed through um the love of the government from the governor.

Um I too can do this, but I believe it really has placed us in a position where we are at a stronghold where we cannot express just feeling reserved, I'll say that way.

Um I would appreciate if we could also include if it's through a webinar, a um a recorded message that will give the facts as well that could also maybe even dive a little deeper since I cannot what you said, advocate?

Is that the word you use?

I can only educate.

So, but in those conversations, we all know those conversations begin to go deep, and our neighbors want questions, and I don't feel comfortable where I'm sitting before my neighbors, and I have to say, well, I can't answer that because, but if we had a little bit more sustenance, something to back us up that could say it for us, if I can't say it, can the board say it?

Is that my question?

The board can't say it either.

Okay.

Whatever we can do that's within those guidelines, um, if we could also be um a product that's produced through AstratCon.

Okay, that's what I'm asking for.

Yeah.

Great city manager, is that so we can develop multiple types of collateral, some that are more high level, some that do the deep dive, and then based on the uh the medium, maybe we can determine hey, which audiences this appropriate for uh maybe we hand out something at events and maybe we have something different that's on our website.

So I think we can approach this from multiple angles and have the level of depth that it sounds like you're requesting, Commissioner, uh, but not necessarily have that throughout every type of collateral that we might want to use.

Okay.

Let me let me just comment on this, and so to the city attorney, just for clarification.

And I I think this is to what Commissioner Beasley Pittman is asking.

I believe that there is an exception in state law where an elected official is allowed to give their personal opinion pro or con.

So if if asked a question, do I support this?

I have a First Amendment right to say yes I do or no, I don't.

There's a difference between expressing my personal opinion and advocacy.

So I I think it if I if I hear you correctly, you want to be able to express your opinion that you think this is a good idea or a bad idea.

That's not necessarily the same as advocacy.

That is correct, but one needs to be careful in what capacity they're saying this.

Right.

Okay, thank you.

Great.

Because I know my opinion.

Yes, yes, we did.

And I favor say aye.

And vice mayor, yes.

If I could just add, I think in the pros and cons of the education piece, you know, what what departments are gonna be most affected if they have to make some strategic cuts?

You know, one I one thought I can, and I don't have the answer, but we're spending 200 million dollars to the parks bond revenue.

But where's the sustainability to maintain that those new improvements in the 200,000 200 million for the next several years?

These are all things that we have to inform the public on that could be impacted.

Thank you.

Yeah, thank you.

Thank you, Chair.

Um, now I just want to open it up to the public for any comment in the budget advisory board.

If anyone, you don't we don't have comment cards in the budget advisory board.

So if you'd like to comment, you can please come up to the podium and stand in line at the podium and then introduce yourself.

City manager, while they're doing that, can I just ask you a question?

So Bill just brought up a point about you know the cuts and how we're gonna look at cuts.

So anywhere in our educational campaign, are we gonna be laying out as we go along what we what we believe might actually be those cuts so folks know what it is we're actually looking at cutting?

Uh in terms of uh and if they do vote for property tax reform.

Are we are we allowed to do that?

Are we permitted to do that, or are we all are we gonna share as we go along what we're looking to cut so people know what we're thinking about?

I would hesitate to do that without having that full discussion with the city commission and identifying those opportunities for strategic reductions or cuts, but that's something that we could certainly do.

Uh maybe at the August meeting if if the commission saw fit and then we could update our collateral to show hey, these are the thoughts in terms of what could be cut if this gets approved.

I mean, I think it's worth thinking about.

I think it's worth maybe going through that as an exercise because we'll we'll be dealing with the budget by September, right?

We'll be done, but we'll certainly be having extensive conversations at the August meeting, and then this will come before the voters in November.

So there is time to at least say, you know, this is how we're preparing, at least let people know what it is we're going to be thinking about doing in terms of how we're going to cut and how that might impact services, how that might impact quality of life issues, how that might impact, you know, basically things that people take for granted at this point in time, just thinking about what we might do.

I agree 100%.

I would love the benefit of having the city hall discussion with the commission.

One of the elements that we intend to bring forward in that discussion is a budget approach as was requested, and we've shared that we've been developing that.

So I think once we have some feedback on that, we can fine-tune our approach as it relates to property tax reform.

Okay, good.

Because I think I I'm already getting questions in terms of well, what are the thoughts about cuts?

How's that going to impact our parks?

Are we gonna have to pay every time we go to a park?

How does it impact our libraries?

We have to pay every time we go to a library.

In other words, the county is saying that the average savings will be about two thousand something dollars on the property tax cut if this passes, but you might make that up in fees and services of maybe having to go to some of these places and pay or but I just I really want to have an all-encompassing picture.

I'm not believing me, I think that we can cut and I think we can find efficiencies, but I still want to make sure that we're communicating with the public um, you know, what that level of cuts and efficiencies is and what how we might have to go deeper uh if we're finding it to be an issue.

That's all I want us to be very transparent in what we're thinking about.

I want to make sure that the public knows as we go through this little journey uh everything that we're thinking about and also how it might impact their everyday life.

That's all.

If you'd like, Commissioner, we can have a full list of opportunities for reductions at the July 2nd meeting as you're contemplating the milled rate and the city hall project.

We can share with you some of our preliminary thoughts and ideas uh as it concerns uh both property tax reform and city hall, and then I I think that will help equip the commission with giving us direction.

That'll be very helpful.

I know that my office gets lots of calls and communications, for instance, if there is a water break, uh uh a line breaks or whatever.

Our staff has been so amazing, public works, utilities getting out there like as soon as possible, fixing things.

So if we make cuts to departments like that, will that impact?

Well will people have to know, hey, you know, if there's a if there's an issue, we might just not be able to get there as quickly as we can.

I just want us to be honest with people so that they know that there might be an impact in in terms of service.

That's all.

Thanks.

Yeah, I agree.

I think that's a great idea.

I think having that on July 2nd is fantastic.

That way we can make decisions holistically, and then as much of that information as we can get as soon as possible to share with others, I think it'd be fantastic.

Thank you.

Great.

Excellent.

All right.

So now if and if you'd come up and if you'd just state your name, uh sir, you have two minutes to speak?

Go right ahead, test it.

Uh Paul Renaissance, District 1, 311 Northeast 57, the court.

Um just following on the commission's recommendations there that you just heard.

I'd like to know.

And I think the city manager can get this question, this answer prepared for in the future.

How many uh employees will be furloughed and how quickly will that furlough occur once that referendum, if it does pass, takes effect.

So it's it's important to know that the it's gonna be a dramatic cut for this city.

So I'd like to know the numbers and specific numbers and how quickly those furloughs will occur because that will affect services throughout our city, especially in district one.

Thank you for your time.

Yeah, thank you very much.

Great.

All right.

If you'd come on up and state your name, you have two minutes.

All right, Douglas meet district one, and I wasn't planning on speaking, but I just want to respond to this that most citizens don't know the difference.

You all know what a general fund is or this is, all we know is we pay taxes, okay?

And we know everything that comes out of the city comes from money we pay.

So sitting in big things saying 60.4% is almost fear-mongering, and what we should be sending out to the people is yes, it's going to be this, you know, at whatever percent we think it's gonna reduce it means this amount of money, and maybe we can put it in relation to what's the budget for StratCom, or what's the budget for the mayor's office, or put it in context somewhere, not just throw out our budget and say, well, look at this we pay for, and we're gonna have no parks and have no this because that's what people think.

So I think we should be you know tempering down people's fear, not you know, acting it for a reason that we want you, you know, your your fear mongering with this particular thing.

But what I really want to say is as a citizen, you want to believe that the commission is always looking out for the city in the future, and sometimes you learn something that's a little disheartening that with the whole City Hall project, which I know has been discussed ad nauseum over and over again, and it's always been a question on why we can't get a developer to do a real P3 that puts up a huge building, it's profit making to them with apartments.

We get free office space, and you know, why would someone say no to that if we made the right deal only to find out a couple weeks ago that that question's never been asked?

So I think before we go ahead, I know we spent money, but sometimes you just need to you know backtrack and start again for a good path forward, and if we can save 200 to 700 million dollars, whatever the number is, I think we should at least investigate that because I have a hard time believing the developer will not say, hey, this is a great piece of land, and with the right deal, I can put up 25 or 30 stories of apartments, give you 10 stories for office space, and we can do something that doesn't cost the future of the city a lot of money.

Great, thank you.

Yeah, thank you very much.

Good thinking, thank you.

Next up, if you state your name, you have two minutes.

Um I'm Barbie, and I just want to just uh go as far as what uh Commissioner Glassman had said.

Um let the impact statement, you know, besides what's right here, make a general impact statement of how this is gonna affect the taxpayers in more defined terms, but a general newsletter to go out as well as this.

Um, and then the other thing I was thinking is um the League of Women Voters, is they always give both sides to the issue.

Is there something that that could be um as an informational type thing that could be brought up beforehand before November before the election?

So those are just some thoughts I was thinking of.

Thank you.

Thank you very much, appreciate it.

Yes, sir.

Come on up.

If you state your name, you have two minutes.

Uh District Three, um, Lady Jordan, uh Dilla Park Home Association President.

Um, I just wanted to know um the process of uh the new property tax and um in general the education of how this is gonna work.

And you know, we have a lot of things going on in the community, and it takes uh a lot of time to get things done over the last 30 years.

I see how long it takes things to get done.

So I'm wondering if they cut the property tax, how will we get these things done?

If it takes so long to get them done now?

If you cut it out, then how are we gonna get things done?

So I I feel I don't know how it's gonna work.

So I would like to know the education of how this is gonna impact the community.

Not only the community, but the city in a whole.

I just want to know you know, I don't know if you give me the email me what's gonna happen or you can sit down and we have a talk about this, what's gonna happen, how it's gonna come out and what's gonna impact us as a whole.

You know, we have a hard time now getting things done.

It's like, so if you took cut the money out, then we're gonna get the money from if we don't pay the property tax.

Yeah, thank you.

I think very good questions and and spot on, and so that'll be part of what we'll be working together on, your commissioner, all of us, and the education.

And if you have questions that you feel are not getting answered, just please let your commissioner let us know, and we'll work to the solution because you may have questions that we haven't even thought about, right?

So great great points.

Thank you.

Anyone else here to speak on budget advisory board?

Okay, great.

Well, budget advisory board members, thank you so much for your time and your energy, and um really look forward to continued conversations.

Um, just want to give you all a hand if I could again.

Thank you for what you've done.

And anything else, commissioners for the budget advisory board.

Okay, great.

The budget advisory board is now concluded.

Thank you very much.

That was a long one.

Now I'll reconvene our city commission conference meeting.

And commissioners, in the interest of time, we have one item that some of the participants have just a limitation due to travel.

So if it's okay with the commission, I'd like to move to business two, which is a presentation of the I am cis trunk cis trunk talk series, that's okay.

And want to turn it over to our community service department.

Hi, good afternoon, Vice Mayor, Commissioners, City Manager.

I'm um Sabola Fraser.

I'm the economic recovery core fellow uh placed here in the city of um for Lauderdale Economic Development Division, and I spent the last two and a half years embedded in the assistrunk corridor um in this district, and today I want to share just what was accomplished in this time and what we've learned and what was built and what I believe is an opportunity for the cities next.

And so um the fellowship was designed to bring in about 65 fellows across the United States.

So the city of Fort Lauderdale had an opportunity to be a part of a nationwide um initiative where we had over 65 fellows that were selected out of 1500 applications across the United States and over 600 projects across the nation, which is significant to show that the city of Fort Lauderdale was was selected.

So inside the government support um of this initiative was really around economic development, and I was placed here specifically in the Cis Trunk Corridor, Northwest Quadrant of the City of Fort Lauderdale.

My role was really initially to look at how the gaps can be closed between uh what the city is doing and what the community is actually seeing have access to and connected to.

Um, and that uh mandate really shaped what you all are about to hear.

So the charge here that we see was, you know, looking at some key things that before I came into this work, this particular area was uh disinvested uh disinvested area of the core of the city of Fort Lauderdale.

We had CRA funding that was coming forward.

It was actually approaching to be sunset and it was extended in 2025 December to 2035.

But we also recognize that there was some needs for a stronger system within the corridor and unification between residents and business owners.

And so the assignment was to listen first to build community voice, the strategy to strengthen the ecosystem overall, and to evaluate what works and then to bring that back here to present to commission.

And so what we built started in, as we said, it's been a two and a half year journey.

Started out in around February, March of 2024, with our listening tour going to key stakeholders across the corridor.

And what began to develop during that time was this need for community identification, which is where the IM Sys Trunk planning session started, where we met with the homeowners association and businesses and continue to push forward an initiative that will resonate with the community itself.

The idea here was to really center this work around community voice.

As you can see, there were several initiatives that took place.

We hosted a survey where we went out into the community as well as a summit and a series of community talks to hear from the community to advance this work overall.

And so here's what the community told us.

We got over 10,000 data points from the community and touch points, over 3,000 touch points, and heard from over 900 community responses.

We had six different events: the summit, the talks, two surveys, one done internally with myself and the economic development division, as well as an external survey that had been done for 2024-2025 through a consulting agency, Dickie's consulting agency within the corridor.

And in that, in that at the end of these talks, we had the community say their likelihood to further their participation went from a 2.5 to a 4.5 out of 5, which is significant.

And some of the key things that were raised was that we needed to understand how to navigate programs within the city.

Increasing the visibility of district three and helping people to understand that there's value there and then workforce alignment as well as cultural identity, which I think you'll know that we started addressing with the IM Sys Trunk campaign itself.

And so now I have here a party from the National League of Cities to talk about this from a national perspective.

One of our national partners.

We actually had six national partners as a part of this work, and we have uh Tamika Lee here from the National League of Cities, and I'll give her an opportunity.

Thanks everyone.

I'm really excited to be here to support the IM Cis Trunk project.

Like Servola mentioned, I uh serve as one of the National Well, the National League of Cities serves as one of the national partners that supports this.

So over the last two and a half years, we've been really excited and proud to support the city of Fort Lauderdale.

We approach, well, I work for the entrepreneurship and economic development team for the city for the center of municipal strategies and programs.

And the way we approach our work is looking at quality of life, and what we've seen now is that economic development is evolving.

So, before it was how many jobs can you bring to your city?

But now it's more about housing, it's about workforce, and also all of that leads in infrastructure to quality of life.

So, with this project, what we've seen is just the transformation, the outcomes, the community outreach.

We've seen there's been a shift from top down to community up.

So really connecting with the communities to make sure that we're identifying and creating solutions that are relevant to our residents.

Through this work, we were able to award the city of Fort Lauderdale with an economic mobility rapid grant because we saw just how well they were doing.

We are of course sad to see that the program is sunsetting, but we want to continue our work with Fort Lauderdale with this project.

We've utilized Servola and the city for several things.

She served as a program expert during our city summit conference, and then also recently, she served as an informal program expert to really get city leaders to think about how they are shifting the narrative for economic development and focusing on their residents.

So super excited.

I wish I could stay longer, but really excited to support her in this.

Happy to answer any questions.

Thank you very much.

Thank you for your work and your support.

If I could say I really appreciate everything that's been done, we we never had the opportunity to meet, but I'm commissioner just um Commissioner Beasley Fitman District 3, and this is the heartbeat of what we're desiring to see in the district as well.

You know, it starts here and it spreads out.

So thank you for everything.

And Shravolo, you know, I'm just so excited for what we have seen as an output.

So thank you.

And overall, I'm sorry, but I just couldn't let the moment pass.

Thank you.

Thank you.

And just to share the strategy that we use here within this particular corridor was community first, and we call this the aligned framework.

So it's advancing local impact through growing neighborhoods.

And so we looked at community first, and then based upon the community's voice, we then developed strategy, which provided us vision, priorities, as well as planning, and then turned that into programming initiatives and activations that we then utilize to create outcomes and impact.

And so this particular strategy helps us to have this in a sense downward upward reaction from the city's perspective.

So, in essence, the community is involved all the way through, and everything that you do within this type of an impact in economic development ensures that the community is always at the center of the work that you do.

And so, off of this particular piece, the community generated a some key things that they wanted to see come forward where we generated a roadmap of some key strategic things in the near term, mid-term, and long term that they wanted to see to continue to stabilize as well as revitalize the CisTrunk Corridor.

And these things were not necessarily things that I pushed, these were actually came organically out of the community voice, the community talks, and the community summit that we actually push forward.

And these were also anchored by the community.

And you'll notice that we do have owners assigned to every single action that has been established, and these partners have also agreed to take ownership of this work and moving it forward.

So I want to just commend those partners in this space.

Um, Invest Fort Lauderdale, the CRA, the Urban League, the Black Business, I'm sorry, the Black Business Chamber, and so on.

We've had a lot of partners throughout this work to supporting this initiative.

And then finally, the recommendation to the commission as we look at actions authorizing the implementation of the phase advancement of this roadmap within itself to ensure sustainability across the CisTrunk Corridor and revitalization efforts, implementing the aligned framework as a community-centered economic development approach for economically stagnant and emerging corridors, as well as directing staff to evaluate citywide activation or application form by upcoming studies.

And so we've seen nationally that there are examples across North Carolina, Riley.

There's also examples in California and other examples across our United States that help to anchor what we've done here in the city of Fort Lauderdale, but they are continuing to lead the way in this effort.

So thank you all so much for your time.

Any questions?

Excellent.

Thank you, Turner, Commissioner Grossman.

I do, thank you.

And first of all, thank you for your work.

It's really important and congratulations on what you've achieved here.

My question is actually for city attorney and city manager.

So when we see the proposed uh tax uh bill that folks are going to be voting on in November, correct me if I'm wrong, but the state has said that there are just very specific categories where you could spend ad velorum taxes.

So my question to you is will programs like this or what we do as our next step, will they be impacted by what might be passed in November when you look at those very specific categories of how you can spend ad velorum tax dollars?

Sure.

So yes, there are specific categories or eligibility buckets for uh how we expend those dollars, but we do have other revenue sources uh that support other programs and services in our city, and so we would definitely weigh the priorities and get that feedback from the commission.

And so I would consider that every existing or potential new program will be evaluated against the priorities of the commission.

And I think that goes back to my conversation earlier about how I want to be as transparent as possible with our residents about possible impacts because I personally, when I look at the buckets that the state is telling us in this legislation that folks are going to be voting on, uh it's very specific, and so as you said, we might have to go back and look at other priorities that we've had, or maybe we can't even make room for a priority like this.

I'm just concerned that's all I'm saying.

But I want to make sure that when we educate the public, not advocate, but when we educate, we do such a good job of educating that people must understand what might happen to programs like this when we've already established a whole line of priorities that have been waiting now for years for us to plan.

But I just want us to be able to explain this and make sure that people understand the consequences of how we might have to shift priorities or how we might not be able to do the necessary help that we see recommended here.

That's all.

Thanks.

Um, to add to this conversation, um, with this, yes, this is a um initiative that started within district three, but the overall goal is to expand it citywide.

Um, with that aspect of it, does that put us in a position where it would fall under a category where we would not be able to fund it?

It's for the whole city, it's not specifically only for um the six trunk quarter, which is um historically known to be a community of people of color.

So, would that would be my question?

With the way we promote this and move it forward, would that eliminate the opportunity where this would have to be stifled or defunded?

Um that's the question.

So I think one of the benefits that we've seen from this program is the knowledge and the expertise uh that Ms.

Frazier has shared with our existing economic development team.

So there could be opportunities to implement some of these initiatives through staff members.

Uh we would definitely want to gauge any expansion of this framework throughout the city.

Uh we have uh lots of commercial corridors, and I think we would need to identify maybe what's the next appropriate area for a potential expansion before we talk about having a citywide type of rollout.

So I think that there are opportunities for us to leverage what has been gleaned and developed through the aligned framework, and then we're always looking for grants, uh, which is how we got here.

And so maybe there's an opportunity for external funding that could help support this initiative.

Okay, all right.

And with this, this um, we do have a brand new director for this department.

Hey Maggie, how are you doing?

I'm looking forward to our conversation, and I'm sure as um the commission that's here to be able to move this forward and figure out a framework that make this possible.

So I have um a lot of confidence in the direction that we're moving, and I'm I am very hopeful that this will grow and not fall into a crack where we can't move forward.

And um again, thank you, Servola, the entire team.

I see Bon back there, some of the others, yes.

Um thank you, my dear.

Um, yeah, I know I get with names.

I'm sorry, but you, Amber, there we go.

You know exactly who I'm speaking to.

Everyone who knows me now, I'm not the best with names, but I'm the best hugger.

I know who you are, so thank you for that.

Um, however, again, I want us to um be able to manager to hold on to this, move it forward.

There is true evidence that this is feasible, it will work, and we need to do what we can to make sure it moves forward, and it will again be a beneficial be beneficial to um the city overall.

Overall, so thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you, Commissioner.

Thank you all.

Um, and Commissioner, quite a question for you, Commissioner Bees.

I think this is maybe best for you, but maybe city manager can chime in too.

What's the in that vein of working together and realizing this is this is important for the entirety of the city.

How can we uh on the commission best support you or support this effort?

I d I don't know what that is, but just want to open that up and you don't have to tell us right now, but as this unfolds, how can we continue to support this?

Maybe it's I don't know if it's being at events or if it's shared.

You know, so whatever is appropriate.

Um that's a uh you said it being involved, being also um a part of this, because so many times what the interpretation is um events, initiatives, programs that are in a sense scoped around district three, it becomes a silo for only district three, and one of the things we must keep in in mind, everything that we do, it encompassed the whole city.

So what benefits district three also benefits the other districts, and if we stand together in a whole, we can make it happen.

There's things that can be brought in for different purviews that um that the tunnel vision we may have could also be brought into the conversation to make it heightened to another level.

Great.

Okay, that's that sounds great.

Thank you.

Excellent.

City manager, good on that one.

I I think that was perfect.

Yep, okay, fantastic.

That was excellent.

So, Commissioner, if you don't mind, let's just continue in this progression, going next to business three, and then we'll come back to Commissioner Comments, Business One, because we have some folks that are signed up for um, let me just make sure I cover everyone that's signed up for business two.

Then I'm gonna go um we have folks signed up for some of the next items.

So, business two, let me just make sure I I you are included here.

Tamika Lee.

You good, okay, great.

Uh Jim, James Harris, did you want to speak for business two, which we were just talking about?

Okay, come on up if you'd like to come up, Jim.

And then Bernadette Norris Weeks, is Bernette here?

Oh, there you are in the back.

Okay, fantastic.

You'll go after Jim if you like.

Fantastic.

Jim, thank you for being here.

You have two minutes.

Go right ahead.

Good afternoon, Vice Mayor and Commissioners.

Uh, for the record, I'm James Karras.

Uh, recently appointed as the interim executive director of Invest Fort Lauderdale Inc., and I'm here to support uh of the 2026 Sys Trunk Empowerment Roadmap.

First, I want to recognize the focus and diligent work of the city's economic development department and the economic recovery fellow, as well as the support of the National League of Cities.

This roadmap reflects months of careful listening and and planning, and it shows it sets out a clear, achievable ecosystem path, one that ties housing, small business, and community capacity building into a single coordinated strategy rather than treating them as separate efforts.

We're proud, Invest4 Paul, Fort Lauderdale is proud to be recognized as a partner in implementing those housing small business and community capacity building goals and objectives.

We're particularly interested in issues uh that were mentioned earlier about capital access.

As you know, the Greater Fort Lauderdale Chamber of Commerce had a capital access summit last fall, and there's a very specific roadmap in terms of uh more equitable capital access in our community.

We belong, we long believe that access to capital is the foundation that everything is built on for housing and small business.

The roadmap gives us a framework to address that directly, and Invest Fort Lauderdale is ready to put it to work.

Quickly today, Invest Fort Lauderdale is ready to prepare to play that role.

Since we last came before you, we've made real progress.

We were recently with our development partner uh at the ribbon cutting for the Sys Trunk Apartments.

We've seated a new independent board, 11 member boards, drawn directly from the neighborhoods this work uh effects.

And in closing, all of this is we've also created a strategic plan, and we expect to have our 501c3 within the next 30 to 60 days.

Uh we're ready to be a partner, and uh the board is enthusiastic and asked me to be here to share that with you.

Thank you, Jim.

Really appreciate it.

Thank you for your role.

Uh yeah, give me feel free to give Jim a hand.

Uh for those of you who might not know, Jim is just an amazing guru around affordable and workforce housing and a host of other issues and invest has has languished a little bit, I think to say the least, and so glad you're at the helm helping drive it forward.

Thank you, Vice Mayor.

Thank you.

Yeah.

Bernadette Norris Weeks.

Thank you, Vice Mayor.

Yes, um, city commissioners.

Um, first I rise today in support of IM Sys Trunk and the initiatives that were um that were gone over uh with you all by staff, the economic development department.

Let me first say, as a longtime business owner in the area, a longtime resident of the city of Fort Lauderdale, a former homeowners association president for more than a decade, a former chair of the Greater Fort Lauderdale Chamber of Commerce.

This speaks to me.

And um, and one of the things that uh Commissioner Beasley Tom Beasley Pittman said a little bit earlier with when when the city one part of the city rises, we all rise.

And it and I see that happening right now.

Um, Mr.

Carras is correct in his representation to you that we are humming.

We have a fully um seated board now for the first time.

We've uh we've adopted a strategic plan.

We recently took a tour of the area where it was really beneficial.

Um we recently um we had a meeting just yesterday.

Um, pretty much all of our meet our members were there.

We're very, very engaged.

And thanks to you all for seating the people that you appointed, in addition to the folks that we were able to um get on board.

They're all very engaged people in the community, and I am here to tell you that we're prepared in any way that we can be a great partner to you all to make sure that the recommendations are achieved.

Um, we're here.

We're all we're all here for it.

And so thank you all for the support that you've been giving Invest Fort Lauderdale.

We have some other requests that will be coming um to you uh before you soon.

Um, and um, and let's let's get this going.

Thank you.

Excellent.

Thank you, Bernadette.

Thank you for your service.

Excellent.

No one else has signed up for business two.

Now we'll move on to business three proposed film permitting fee structure and public property use fee.

Community services department.

We have Josh Cardinal Chief Cultural Affairs Officer.

Thank you, City Manager.

Josh.

Thanks, City Manager.

Good afternoon, Vice Mayor and City Commission.

Thank you for having me.

Joshua Carden, the cultural affairs officer for the city.

I'm here today to present um some information about our current film permitting in the city of Fort Lauderdale.

So the city's film permitting process plays a critical role in attracting high value productions that support local employment, enhances the city's national and international image, and drives economic growth across multiple sectors from hospital hospitality to transportation.

This presentation will provide a comprehensive overview of the county and city's current permitting process, highlight key achievements, summarize the direct local economic impact, and present a proposal to introduce the modest film licensing fee aligned with national and state best practices.

So the city of Fort Lauderdale collaborates closely with Broward County's Film Commission through Film Lauderdale to support and facilitate film, television, and commercial productions in the city.

Film Lauderdale serves as the official film commission of Broward County and offers production companies location scouting, permitting assistance, logistical support, and the help to liaise with services and local agencies.

While this has been a long-standing relationship, the city of Fort Lauderdale and the County's Film Commission entered into an official interlocal agreement in 2025.

This allows the city commission and city of Fort Lauderdale to apply for film permit applications for productions through a newly launched user-friendly film app system powered by Apply 4.

The City of Fort Lauderdale continues to oversee the permits within its jurisdiction and collaborates with the film commission to facilitate the productions.

We have the right to approve or eject applications for any reason, and the fees and costs of city services associated with film permits, such as off-duty police officers, transportation and mobility for road closures and MOT, parks and recreation for facility rentals, and the fire department for off-duty fire services or required inspections.

Productions are responsible for paying all of these departments directly.

However, there is no currently no film permit fee or film licensing fee, excuse me.

So some of our key achievements.

I've been overseeing our film permitting program for about three and a half years now, I believe.

Fort Lauderdale this year was named uh the number two best place to live and work as a filmmaker by Movie Maker Magazine, and Movie Maker Magazine touts Fort Lauderdale is a booming film and TV scene with diverse and dynamic location, strong local support, and a thriving creative community that makes Fort Lauderdale a major hub for storytellers.

We are also by far uh the most utilized municipality in Broward County when it comes to films.

Um this slide gives you our achievements by the numbers over the last few years, but the main takeaway is just what an incredible economic engine the film production um film productions are for the city of Fort Lauderdale.

Every year we have anywhere between 120 to 136 uh film permits issued, so about 10 or 15 per month, uh which also underscores tens of millions of dollars in direct local expenditures, and every year it supports thousands of local workers.

And so, Josh, and just on that, it looks like we're projected to possibly have more this year than any other year prior to.

Is that right?

Am I looking at that right?

It has been an incredibly busy year for film.

Um the reason some of the permits issued is lower in numbers is that the new apply force system allows us to consolidate some permits, whereas before we would need to have a permit for each location of shooting, now we're able to roll them all into one permit.

So even though it's you know at 67, in reality, based on those other numbers, it's probably closer to about 100 right now.

Okay.

Great, thanks.

Um these are just some examples of the productions that we do attract in the city of Fort Lauderdale, everything from reality television series uh to major sports brand commercials and photo shoots.

We've also had several celebrity athletic campaigns shot here.

Uh FIFA just finished shooting a FIFA commercial for the World Cup with Lionel Messi.

We also have had many documentaries as well as accessibility focused productions, um, mini-series for television as well as film.

Hey Josh, just to point on that last slide.

If you look at that last category, I will tell you I hear from a lot of people that RJ Decker series on ABC and Hulu has so many really nice images of Fort Lauderdale, you know, in between scenes, before and after, even some of the locations.

That one I I would love to know like how much that one had in terms of an economic impact.

Because I do hear from a lot of people that um they really enjoyed just seeing that series just for the way Fort Lauderdale was portrayed.

Yeah, it really it was really nice.

They did a good job.

Thank you.

Yeah, I agree.

There's some gorgeous beauty shots of Fort Lauderdale throughout the entire series.

They were on site here for over a month.

Yeah.

Uh they worked with everyone from local homeowners that uh received funding or were paid uh to rent their properties through mods that was paid to use uh their facilities for equipment storage.

So they really did impact the city as on a very large scale.

I believe the direct uh local spend for that was four million.

Um, but I won't get back to you on the actual funding.

Thanks.

No, they did a good job, and it was really it was really nice to nice to see uh throughout that series.

It was great.

Thanks.

Thank you.

All right, and of course, uh productions, it's the direct local expenditure is not just what is actually used by the film, it's the employment of local casting crew, it's the lodging that that requires so that they can be close to their base camp for filming.

It's also the catering and dining.

Um, these productions spend thousands of dollars a day through local caterers or coffee shops or restaurants.

They also try to rent as much equipment and vehicles here as possible to cut down on any sort of shipping costs.

They also pay restaurants and facilities and all sorts of venues, including schools, parks, uh stores, private residences, and office spaces to use their facilities for filming and to generate revenue for them closing for uh the duration of the production.

City services and permitting uh productions also pay for off-duty police officers, MOT services, metered parking reservations, and facility rentals, which provides direct revenue to multiple departments in the city.

And then, of course, the marketing and long-term tourism impact that comes along with our city being in major movies and television shows.

So the current permitting framework, um, they're coordinated through the Cultural Affairs Division in collaboration with Film Lauderdale.

So, depending on the intensity of one of these productions, it will travel the permit itself will travel through cultural affairs, risk management, transportation and mobility, parks and recreation, the police department, and strategic communications.

Uh, the three that are non-negotiable for every production are cultural affairs risk management and the police department.

So, as I mentioned earlier, we do not currently charge a fee for film permits, but productions are responsible for all associated city costs.

They must provide uh certificate of insurance, naming the city as additionally insured.

Um in most municipalities, permits or production companies are required to get at least five days' notice for a film permit.

Uh one of the things that is made Fort Lauderdale so film friendly is our rapid turnaround time.

We typically are able to turn them around for production starting the next day.

We oftentimes even have productions requesting permits on the same day.

And that's just the nature of the film industry I've come to find.

Um we also occasionally have to coordinate with some of our external partners at the Florida Department of Transportation, uh the FDBC.

If a production is within a residential area, we do always get approval from the HOA president so that their residents are notified ahead of time.

We've also started uh notifying code compliance as well as parking enforcement, just so that they're aware that there is a production going on within that area.

Josh, I need to know your contacts.

You can get in touch with those people in one day.

You say most of it is a one-day turnaround.

Yes.

I need to know the secret.

Okay.

I'm very do.

These are some comparisons uh for film permitting or licensing fees by municipalities throughout the state of Florida.

Um we would, if given directions today, be the only municipality in Broward County that would charge a licensing fee for our film permitting.

Um you can see in Miami Dade County, they charge a 150 permit fee, but that permit is valid for 28 days, so they could shoot for 28 days straight for a hundred and fifty dollars.

Um, they of course charge for all city services, but then they also implemented park fees.

So I would say probably at least half of the productions that shoot here in Fort Lauderdale do utilize one of our parks or our beach.

Um, and in Miami Dade County, they would charge a fee of $300 for every single one of those assets that the production would like to utilize.

Um overall fees are pretty nominal statewide, um, anywhere from $2,500 all the way up to uh the town of Oakland in Central Florida, which is $500 a day to film.

I will say that is an outlier.

And typically these are what most uh municipalities would charge.

Uh, the city of Hollywood is probably the most comparable to the city of Fort Lauderdale's film permitting program.

They do not charge for a permit, but they do have hourly charges for any uh public asset used by production.

So anywhere from you know $30 an hour to run a gazebo to $100 an hour for a gymnasium, um, all the way up to I think uh $3,000 an hour to rent their amphitheater.

So today we have a film permitting fee consideration for you all.

Uh we are presenting a tiered licensing fee of $500 to $300 per production.

Uh, this fee would help to offset staff time spent reviewing applications, coordinating interdepartmental approvals, and ensuring public safety.

The estimated annual revenue based on the historic permit activity would be 15,000 to 21,000 annually, and we would also like to propose allowing waivers or discounts for nonprofits or student productions.

We do have lots of those, as well as charable charitable PSAs or tourism promoting shoots during the off-season.

Again, uh city staff will also develop a fee structure based on site attributes, including location, local significance, interruption to use by the public, and the amount of time requested to be used for production.

So while we do charge for some of our parks and gymnasiums and uh the aquatic center and things now, there are some uh parks and city properties that we do not currently charge anything for productions to utilize.

This is just a closer look at this tiered system.

I would say probably 75% of the productions in the city of Fort Lauderdale fall into tier two or tier three, so that would be a one to two hundred dollar um administrative fee for the licensing to shoot in Fort Lauderdale.

We probably only have a handful of tier one and four productions every single year, so it would you know average out to be about a hundred and fifty dollars per production.

And this was a way to scale some of the uh staff time based on the production um needs.

If it's a tier one, it could be as easy as a family's Christmas shoot.

Um they still require uh permits for their photography sessions.

Um tier four, we again probably only have about two or three a year major productions that require uh major MOT plans and road closures.

And I'm happy to answer any questions you may have.

Great.

Thank you, Josh.

Commissioners, Commissioner Glassman.

Yes, thank you, Vice Mayor.

So, Josh, thank you for your work on this.

Um, those fees, though, they seem considering budgets of a lot of these productions.

I mean, is it just me?

Those administrative fees seem really low.

I mean, I don't know.

I it just seems low to me considering the budgets that that these productions have.

I don't know.

What are your thoughts on that?

Yeah, something we were very cautious of in working with Film Lauderdale, is that we want to remain film friendly.

We don't want to put productions off and have them go to Hollywood because there just is no permit fee.

Uh one of the first questions that productions ask or location scouts ask is there a permit fee for your city?

And if there is a lot of times, I think that kind of just puts the thought into their mind that it's not as film friendly, and we may not be willing to work with them as much to get across the finish line.

Okay, well, that's fair enough, but maybe you could just quickly say there is, but it's only fifty dollars.

Yeah.

It depends how quickly you give the rest of the information.

And that's why we're proposing a licensing fee instead of a permitting fee.

Yeah.

Um, so this will allow us to still market as Broward County having no film permitting fees, it's really just an administrative fee tacked on to staff or to offset staff.

I I understand what you're saying.

It just seems a little low, but that's just my opinion.

Thanks.

Thank you.

Josh, if you could for two one um still photography, um, small production.

Is could you elaborate a little bit more?

Because you know, I my family we like to go out and take pictures in front of that big oak tree.

Do I have to pay fifty dollars for a minute?

No, it's really only if you've hired a professional photographer.

Um, again, this is not I wouldn't say that anyone's going to enforce a Christmas photo shoot with your family if you don't have a photo or a permit, but we do get a lot of small productions, um, even for large companies like Puma that shot at the basketball courts on the beach.

Um, they might still only have you know a model to wear the shoes and a photographer.

So those um do require a uh certificate of insurance as well as a permit.

Can we separate that from commercial versus non-commercial?

So a wedding has, you know, a professional photographer out there and all kinds of lights and videography, and it's a major planned production, but it's not a commercial shoot.

Right.

So uh I wouldn't I wouldn't encourage us to get a permit for a wedding or a bar mitzvah or a birthday or much of anything else.

So can we separate that?

Yeah, absolutely.

And weddings, bar mitzvahs, birthdays, as long as they're in, you know, in spaces that are not utilizing uh public property that they don't require permits.

It's really only a well they they typically like to do them in public property, like parks.

Where trees are there, you know.

That's that's a that's a very common location is someplace in nature um is where you're typically going to see people want to take their wedding photographs, and that's going to be most likely in a park.

Yes.

Um so I I think I think I would separate this from commercial versus non-commercial.

Absolutely.

Um I agree.

Most of the uh productions that come to us are for commercial or marketing purposes.

Very, very rarely do we have someone coming uh for their own private use seeking a film permit.

Okay.

I I want to raise an issue though.

I have one of my constituents who um lambasted the city uh quite extensively because he was woken up by a film production that took place adjacent to his house very early, very loud, very consistent, blocked the street.

Um you may have heard about it.

Uh, he was pretty pretty vocal and and and let everybody know uh we had film crews smoking weed all up and down the street, they were blasting music, there was all kinds of uh obnoxious behavior taking place as a result of this.

Uh suggestion was that they may or may not have been filming pornographic material there, don't know, don't want to know, I'll leave that up to other people.

What's our what's our control over the invasiveness of this into communities?

Yes, because they were told, you know, call the cops, sorry, can't do anything.

And that's an unacceptable answer.

So when they're blocking the street, parking all over the swales, parking in front of people's driveways, impeding access, fire trucks and garbage trucks can't get down the street.

They're out there banging up a crown, seven o'clock in the morning.

We need better protections for our neighborhoods or residential neighborhoods than that.

Because if that's what film is to Fort Lauderdale, I don't want it.

I don't want it in District One.

You may want it in the rest of the city.

I don't want it in my neighborhoods.

I agree.

Um I'm very familiar with that situation as well.

Um I will say film and productions do have to abide by all city noise ordinances.

Um based upon that complaint, we've also started um informing code compliance as well as parking enforcement when we have productions and residential areas.

We have also asked if that neighborhood in particular would just like to not have any production at all, and we just don't film or we don't permit anything to be in that uh area.

So how how are we doing that?

How are we going out to a neighborhood and asking if they want film production in that neighborhood or not?

Because I've I've never I've never heard of my neighborhoods being approached and saying do you want this or not?

So what's what's our process or mechanism for doing that?

So we do reach out to the HOA president uh with the full permit package and ask if it is approved, if they have any issues with it, and they do oftentimes come back and say, Yes, but please add, you know, no parking on the street, or cannot block driveways, or you know, are they?

Are they soliciting the neighbors immediately adjacent to where the production is?

So if we're gonna go out to the HOA presidents, I want it more than just an HOA president says, okay, yeah, we think film production is good.

I'd like them to go and talk to the neighbor immediately adjacent who may or may not be a member of the HOA, right?

Right, right.

So we have a lot of non-we got a lot of folks who don't feel like paying dues, and so who may or may not be a member of an HOA.

I encourage everybody to join HOAs because it's a way to get your voice heard.

So it's a good mechanism for communication, but not everybody does it for variety of reasons.

So is there, let me rephrase this.

Not is there?

There should be a requirement that the HOA talk to the impacted adjacent property owners, not just that it is the HOA president or HOA board's opinion that filming in the neighborhood is a good thing, absolutely.

And so productions that are within residential areas, they are required to notify all homes within 500 feet.

Okay.

Um, for feedback, at least I believe it's 72 hours prior.

So they do have their buy-in.

Um we've never had a resident have an issue with it as long as they're informed.

Um again, most of these productions, or I would say all of the productions in residential areas do, uh, we do require an off-duty police officer to be on site, so there is someone there to enforce the actual rules.

That police officer is also empowered at any point in time to shut down production if these production companies are not complying with local uh city regulations or ordinances.

So it's well within the right to fully remove their permit.

So we know that didn't happen last time.

We know we had rampant drug consumption, we know we had violations of noise ordinances, we know that the police officer on there did not shut anything down.

So, where did that break down?

Did that break down that the officer didn't know he had the authority to shut that down?

Did he think that that the city's permit overrode his authority to shut it down?

Help me understand.

Yeah, I could not speak for the police officer on duty that day.

I do know that uh PD did look into it and they were going to review for further training for their off-duty police officers that are on site at productions.

Okay.

Again, we we just we can't have this be a burden on our neighborhoods.

I agree.

Uh I've I'm, you know, just the the neighborhood comes first.

Okay, thank you.

Josh, could you go back to the last slide before that?

Thanks.

So the final bullet there, you're going to be coming back to us then to talk about things like the park fees, like you had mentioned earlier.

That is that coming down the pike for us?

Yes, sir.

I'll work with uh the parks department as well as other city staff to facilitate uh public property use fees for all of our facilities.

Okay, when do you anticipate something like that maybe coming back?

When would you like it?

Well, no, when can you do it?

Um I think the commission break would be a good opportunity for us to start exploring it.

I won't promise August, but shortly thereafter.

Okay, because I do hear sometimes not that it ever really has risen to an issue, but we do get a lot of production in district two along the beach.

Absolutely, and in some of our parks.

So I'm just curious about that one.

That's all right.

Thanks.

Thank you.

Great.

Thank you.

Thank you, Josh.

So my view is I like the permit application fee construct, I like the tiered licensing, I agree, the focus on commercial.

So my understanding is there is this component of it, and then the additional secondary component if you go to the next one, which is in addition to the application fee, that second component.

Is that am I understanding that right?

Yes, the par feeds.

Fantastic.

So I think we have consensus of desire to move forward, city manager.

I just want to add that this is part of our approach in terms of cost recovery, identifying opportunities for uh revenue, and just making sure that we aren't leaving anything on the table that doesn't need to be left on the table.

So thank you.

Yeah, appreciate it.

I think it's the right approach to take.

Okay.

Fantastic.

Thank you, Josh.

Thank you for your work.

Thank you.

All right.

Now we'll go on to business four.

Business for is consideration of the future use of the United States Post Office located at 400 Northwest Seventh Avenue City Manager.

We have to present today, Chris Cooper, Deputy City Manager.

Good afternoon, Vice Mayor and Commission.

So this presentation today will seek to provide some information about the state of the current post office at 400 Northwest Seventh Avenue, also known as Avenue of the Arts.

The post office's plan to relocate from that site and then seek the commission's input and feedback on what the feature of that site may look like.

So I'll go into a little bit of the history of the post office because it's important for the context of what your feedback and what your direction may be in terms of how to use that site going forward.

The post office itself was part of a larger redevelopment project in the area from 1994 to 1997.

What I found interesting, the post office itself was named after Sylvia H.

Alridge.

Miss Alridge was a very notable figure in Fort Lauderdale and in the Northwest area in particular.

She actually founded the first Broward Employment Agency, a uniform company and a taxi service.

She owned many rental apartments, was a landowner who donated land for Provident Hospital in St.

John's Church, and she was the first president of Dillard High School's PTA and donated all the original band instruments to the school.

So very important person, very worthwhile to name this site after Miss Alridge.

The city actually funded the property acquisition and development of the post office using CDBG funds in the mid-90s and then leased the Postal Service to lease the facility to the Postal Service for $160,000 a year for a 30-year term.

And that lease amount stayed consistent from the start all the way through to when that expires next year.

Later in the presentation, I'll share how that use of CDBG funds may affect the decisions we make in terms of the future use of the site.

Another notable feature of the site for U history buffs is that the site includes a memorial to John H.

Hill II.

Mr.

Hill was also very notable in Fort Lauderdale's history in the Northwest neighborhood.

He's considered the first black millionaire and one of the largest property owners in the Northwest area.

He owned a number of businesses, including Hills Grocery, a hotel, the Windsor Club, several funeral homes, and several housing developments.

We intend as we move forward and consider redevelopment of the site to preserve and protect his monument, which is at the northwest corner, northeast corner, I'm sorry, of Avenue of the Arts and Northwest Forth.

So a little bit more about the site development and the history of the site.

Again, it was part of a larger Northwest area redevelopment effort.

It includes the City View Town Homes, Regal Trace apartments, the shops of Avon on Avenue of the Arts, the Broward Health Facility, and the Sistrunk Entryway Park.

The postal service lease expires on December 11th, 2027, and that gives us the opportunity again to think about how we reuse and redevelop this site.

This facility is not just a retail facility, it also includes mail distribution services.

So their intent was to downsize into really just a retail facility.

We did have conversations with the Postal Service early on about the potential for redevelopment of the site and the potential inclusion of that smaller retail facility within the development.

But per letter we received from the Postal Service, their intent is to relocate somewhere within a I think it's a two-mile radius of the existing site.

Looking at the potential redevelopment of the site as we consider how to move forward, the site's about three acres, and for context, that's roughly about the same size and shape of the Adderley development, which is at the corner of Sistrunk Boulevard and Avenue of the Arts.

It's also about the same size as the adjacent shopping center that includes the Kimchi supermarket.

So just for an idea of what could be done on this site, two different developments, but both similar to what could be done and what could be redeveloped on the site should the commission choose to go that route.

The zoning is Northwest Rack Mixed Use East that allows for variety of development, including single-use residential or commercial as well as mixed-use development.

It's very permissive.

There's no density cap.

It's really just based on the form and overall dimensions of the building and what can fit on the site, and it can go up to 110 feet in height.

We did recently appraise the site in May of 2026, and it appraised for about $13.5 million.

So, what for the commission today?

What we want to focus on are the potential paths forward for the site.

Again, we have until December of 2027 when the Postal Service moves out to really have an opportunity to redevelop it, but this is a good time for us to start thinking about what that path looks like so we can put those things into action.

Most of the paths forward are require us to follow the city charter with the exception of retaining the property for city use.

A couple of items to note when you're looking at these options.

Are all of the options require a needed identified public purpose except for the option to surplus and sell to a private entity?

If the commission decides to surplus and sell the property based on the current appraised value of 13 and a half million, the proceeds should at least be 10 million based on the 75% of assessed value requirement in our charter.

At least 15% of that per policy would go into the affordable housing trust fund, and the rest would be available for whatever use the city determines.

Lease first sale is also something to consider to do a land lease to redevelop the site that could potentially be a reoccurring revenue.

A sale of the site is really a one-time revenue source.

And then going back to the HUD funds that were used to purchase and develop the site, there may be some restrictions on how that's used moving forward, or there may be requirements for the city to repay the CDBG program at least a portion of the value to comply with federal regulations.

We don't know that answer yet.

That's something that we're still pursuing with HUD, but it is something that we should consider as we redevelop the site.

One option would be to redevelop the site within a national objective of CDBG, which includes affordable housing, removal of slum and blight, and something that benefits low or moderate income populations.

Another thing to note is with the charter amendments that the city placed on the upcoming ballot.

Should the commission's decision extend past those charter amendments, and if those amendments pass the vote thresholds for some of these options may come into play, whereas now they're a majority.

Potentially could be a supermajority vote requirement past November.

So lastly, these are some key considerations to help the commission in their decision making on what to do with the site.

From a revenue perspective, you know, lease is a reoccurring revenue source, potentially.

Whatever the commission's desired use may be, whether it's residential, market rate, affordable, workforce, uh commercial, mixed use, the site can accommodate all of those types of uses.

One pathway is the city could transfer the property to the CRA.

The CRA could issue an RFP for the city commission's direction for a use that's consistent with the CR Northwest Progressive CRA redevelopment plan.

And again, the federal compliance with CDBG could become a factor.

We don't know that answer today, but we can certainly factor that into any decision the commission makes today.

Great.

Thank you, Chris.

Appreciate it.

Commission, we have three people signed up to speak.

If it's all right, maybe hear from them and then we can talk further.

So, Jim Karas, you're signed up.

Burn Bent Norris Weeks and Dody Keith.

So come on up, Jim.

If you want to come up first, you have two minutes.

Good afternoon again, Vice Mayor Sorat and City Commissioners.

Thank you for allowing me to speak on this item.

As I indicated before, I'm now the interim executive director of Invest Fort Lauderdale.

This is a critical site, needless to say, as was evidenced by the presentation just now.

There are a number of approaches and alternatives.

I have to say the priority approach has to be based on uh the community and what the community uh believes that should be there.

The site was purchased with community development block grant funds, those are the community's funds.

CDBG, as you all know, is isolated to communities with low moderate income.

And these funds were uh expended to help redevelop the SysTrunk community, and we could argue about the impact that the post office has had positive, negative, neutral.

I don't I'm not necessarily want to look uh backward, but I think this opportunity is not to focus on the appraised value of this land, which is quite enticing in these days of budget constraints.

Um what we ought to be looking at is a robust community engagement process before any of these decisions are made or even considered.

So I would argue that Invest Fort Lauderdale in conjunction with the CRA could play a very active role in conducting a robust community engagement charrette process where we engage the community very similar to what we heard earlier in business too in terms of the pathway forward for Sys Trunk is bring the community in from the beginning let them decide or make a recommendation to you in terms of the reuse of this property in terms of affordable housing, wealth building, small businesses, arts and culture this is a community property that should be uh guided by the community itself.

Invest for Lauderdale is ready to play an active role to do so.

Thank you.

Great thank you Jim appreciate it.

Bernadette Norris Weeks.

Vice Mayor Commissioners, I am speaking today in my personal capacity as a longtime business owner, my office is actually located just across the street from the site and I can throw a rock at it literally.

For those familiar with the movie Green Book, this site represents much more than a current post office.

It occupies land associated with a period in American history when African Americans were often prohibited from staying in many hotels and um and so this site really represents um quite a significant a significant although not designated historical presence um this is more than just a um a site it's actually a visible gateway into the Systrunk community and I um not standing here supporting any one thing other than saying that this should be an RFP process it should be something that is um goes out for bid and that the community has uh has a has a uh a chance to voice um what they believe they'd like to see in this community and and a project I understand that there have been long um term discussions that have been going on I'm glad that this has been put in the public um domain so that folks like me can come over and comment and let you know that we what we'd like to see I've spoken with several business owners in the um nearby area and I think we are all um of the same belief that this should be something that um is aesthetically pleasing is um speaks to our community in a way that there is involvement I do like what Mr.

Karas said a little while ago with there being a charrette or something that will engage the community and allow us to come out and and uh and tell you what we'd like to see and so with that thank you for your time today.

Thank you very much.

Dodie Keith Good afternoon Commission Doty Keith I'm actually here um representing Broward partnership today.

I am the co-chair um along with Debbie Orshevsky who couldn't be here today of our real estate development committee uh for broad partnership and Jerry Gutierrez was here earlier as our president and chair of our association and longtime Fort Lauderdale our engagement a lot of you know what what we do there and but but the the affordable housing aspects of what's needed in this community and that low to moderate um income level is so important to create opportunities for people to live that have jobs and that are they just want to stay here and work in our city and and be great great assets to us and I think what's so important when you look at this what we what we'd like to challenge and I'm sorry Debbie's not here so I'm gonna play attorney a little bit is we believe there's another process and I was at your CRA advisory board meeting recently a number of months back where they did vote to go ahead and move this forward and move it to the CRA and begin that process of taking it um looking at it for redevelopment and we believe that there's a process that would shorten the R fee process when you're dealing with with this low to moderate income you definitely need community output.

You need all that.

We've shown to do that as broad partnership here in the city of Fort Lauderdale and in the city of Pompano Beach where we're doing another project.

And it's really important you have community buy-in, but it's also important to try to figure out a way to do these projects real efficiently and save dollars.

So there is a process through the Florida Redevelopment Act, Chapter 163, which Debbie is has put forward, which has an element in there that allows for disposition of real property through your CRA.

And it allows it.

It's still an open procurement process.

It's somewhat similar to like an unsolicited bid process, but it allows for a project like this to move forward simply, not extended lengthy RFP process.

So we would really encourage, yes, they should move to your CRA.

It needs to do go quickly.

The opportunities here where they talk about leasing it.

One of the challenges we found, oh my goodness, is when you have that um the 50 year lease does not allow you for financing.

So that option doesn't work for a lot of developers.

But we really encourage you to move forward with what you've got.

Thank you very much.

Debbie appreciate it.

Excellent.

Um let's see, let's uh talk more about it.

Commissioner Glassman, your district.

Yes, it is.

Thank you.

Uh first of all, thank you to all the folks that spoke.

Um I I've been I've been talking to a lot of people about this for a while now, and there's always been a lot of interest on this site.

My preference would be that we actually choose the CRA pathway, and I like the I like the state statute that gives us that uh opportunity to go about it perhaps in an expedited fashion.

Um, but I really believe I actually think those HUD restrictions will come into play uh if we were going to try and sell this property.

Um but I don't think that's the best thing for us to do for the for the for basically for the corridor uh and for the city as a whole.

Um so I'm agreeing with what I've heard from the speakers.

Um I think that we should move to transfer this to the CRA.

Uh let the CRA dispose of it.

Uh obviously with all of that public input.

Um do do that, um, you know, do that RFP, um, and get moving on it.

But I I think by far that is that is the best path uh when we look at all of our options here.

Thank you.

Thank you, Commissioner Glassman.

Commissioner Herbst, any further feedback?

I I would concur.

I I support anything that brings more workforce and affordable housing to the city.

Thank you, Commissioner BZ Pittman.

Um with this um direction that we're going, I want us to remember also the history part that was given um added to the conversation about the legacy of the land, um what was going on in the area, who um even the post office was named after.

Um, I believe even in this process, we do need to include the neighbors um in these in in the area so they could be a part of the process, have a conversation to add input.

Um, we do know um we are in desperate need of housing, but also whatever we do there, we want to make sure the neighbors on district two, district three, we're all in harmony of what what is coming.

Um, so we cannot alleviate that part of the conversation.

So uh with that including opportunity for the surrounding associations, neighborhoods to be in a space to share their comments as well.

Right.

Can we do those with parallel paths?

I think we can, yeah.

Okay, I think we can do both.

Commissioner Glassman is that reason.

I didn't I didn't hear what he said.

If we can do have the public engagement um participative process of this while we're exploring moving it to the CRA, sure.

I see no reason why.

I think it makes perfect sense, and plus we'll have the CRA board doing it, those are all public meetings as well.

Right, so sure, no problem.

And and also if we can add to that, you know, um the transparency of everything we're doing.

This is the reason why.

Um I had shared that just conversation I've had I have had with neighbors from district three, um, not knowing exactly what's going on.

Um, Chris did address the fact that because conversation I had was that we the city was refusing to renew the contract with the post office.

And that's not true.

Correct.

But that is the conversation um in the community.

So when we begin to hear things like that, we do need to address them, um, bring the facts to the table, so um we do not feel like um things are being done behind our backs.

And so um with the education with that, let's make sure we're being um transparent in every area so everyone is comfortable with the decisions that are being made.

Without a doubt, it's hard to believe that there's misinformation being spread.

Um just hard to believe hard to believe.

I but we'll we're gonna address that head on.

Yes.

Thank you.

Thanks, manager.

Just for clarity, there's consensus to do a conveyance to the CRA, and then have an RFP process via the CRA to also have a public engagement or outreach component on a parallel path.

Yes, but the RFP will be done also with input from the commission.

Yes, I would I would certainly think that would be required, yes.

It would be input through you as the CRA board because when it transfers over to the CRA, we would bring that back to the advisory board, but also to you to have that conversation, and and we're lucky because we're doing this very early.

Again, the post office isn't scheduled to move out until December of 2027, so we do have time to do all the things you've asked for in parallel and bring that back in a timely manner.

And Chris, are you familiar with the statute that Dodi had mentioned in terms of a possible path for us?

Um yes.

Uh Debbie Orchevsky had brought that up to us before, so we'll work with the CRA and see if that's the right path that the Commission or the CRA board would like us to follow once that property is transferred to the CRA.

Have you had a chance to look at that?

I haven't recently.

Okay.

So I'd like to spend some more time with that.

Okay.

Thank you.

I can give you a little bit of a high level overview of that.

So with a disposal process, uh, essentially the CRA could say, hey, this property is available.

And it wouldn't necessarily have any specific requirements as to what the CRA board uh may want to see included in the redevelopment of that property.

Uh it's uh as Dodi mentioned, it's a very simplified sort of um process and it can move rather quickly.

And so I I think trying to find a balance between what I heard, that's why I wanted to get some clarification as to what the steps would be to incorporate the feedback, do a process, uh, but also expedite it.

Uh I think I think we would need to maybe come back to the commission via a letter to the commission, just explaining what uh that provision is in chapter one sixty-three part three, and how that might influence the the avenue and approach.

I was gonna ask, I was gonna ask this Miss Week to come back to the podium, and um, because I know you've been speaking with on many of the uh business owners and even some of the neighbors in that area, if there was anything additional you wanted to respond to that was said.

I appreciate that.

I appreciate that, Commissioner.

Thank you.

And our position is, or at least my position is, and that of other business owners, and I believe Mr.

Carras expressed something similar, is that we should take the time that's needed in order to ensure that the community is heard.

So when we talk about having an expedited process, that is not achieved that goal.

And so that would be inconsistent with what uh what I've said, it will be inconsistent, and I'm sure Ms.

Keith, you know, it's further along than a lot of us, but we're just coming, many of us are just coming to the table.

This is a huge piece of land for this area.

It is one that um had previously been in your district, uh, quite frankly, and I think that it is one that um we should take the time needed in order to make sure that we're heard and it and it is respectful of the community.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Sure, yeah.

Dodi, come come ahead, come on.

And I apologize, Commissioner.

When we talk about an expeditive process, um we in never we do anything that would alleviate community outreach and the community input.

And one of things great is is Bernadette and I just got together on Friday.

I didn't even realize that there was any concern in the community at all.

And that's one of the things that for our partnership.

I think you know from our 25 years here in City of Fort Lauderdale, we highly proud the the years we've had four homers associations surrounding our seven on seventh project that are fully supportive of us.

We would never shortchange that process, but we would certainly ask you for the RFP process is a very extensive procurement process where this statute, as Debbie has pointed out and provided the information to staff a number last year, actually, that it's a process that simplifies the process, but it does not alleviate the project from providing everything you need in it, the historic aspects, the art Avenue of the Arts.

Everything about this, and if you look at 7 on 7th, which we were one of the first buildings.

Now all the new affordable housing projects are coming.

7 on 7 was the first one on Avenue of the Arts to come out of the ground.

And our board spent hours, countless hours to come up with what should the murals look like.

What should the exterior and how to how do our residents engage with the communities?

So we are very, very engaged in that process with those associations, with those businesses, and we would just look forward to be able to have the opportunity for staff to look into it a little farther, that statute before you just lay out there it's gonna be an RFP, because it really helps us as a nonprofit be able to not go through that extensive process, but follow the process and include everything you want in it and everything the neighborhood wants because we need to be good neighbors because we live there too.

Thank you.

Thank you, Dodie.

Go ahead, Commissioner.

Commissioner Glassman, as much as we can, let's work together to ensure that the neighbors are heard, the process is I'm gonna say respected, where if we pace it in a way that voices are heard and that everyone's um input is considered.

Um I did get when I heard expedited it did kind of give me a little alarm um with that, but we do want to be able to pace this where everyone has an opportunity to sit to the table and have the conversation.

Without a doubt, and we have the time.

Um we know that that least is till December 2027, although in government speak that can easily go to December 2027 before you know it.

Uh we tend to, as a commission, love to explore all options.

So sometimes we we're we're just going forever.

But no, I agree.

I think we have the time, and I'm more than happy to work with you on this.

Thank you.

All right, thank you.

Great, thank you.

So, City Manager, I think the direction is moving it to the CRA, which I also fully support, and then once in the CRA, then exploring options through the new statute through it it may be through RFP, but at least looking at the options we have and then coming back with recommendations for us.

Absolutely, we can do that.

The conveyance will require action by the commission anyway.

So we could bring the additional information on the disposition route, and and maybe the commission would give us that direction at that point.

Excellent.

I think that sounds good.

And the as Commissioner Pittman and Commissioner Glassman um burned that there will be good public engagement outreach and so forth.

So the more you all can partner with us uh to do that absolutely, I think is is the right thing.

And if I could just add one other suggestion, is city manager out of or commission as we just think about this.

I think having a memorial of Sylvia Aldridge and John Hill in the building, if this does become a building, so some significance in the building or next, I mean, something that really honors would be my suggestion.

Just that goes with us.

So if you don't think about it, but it's thank you.

It's good to have it within the records as well.

Um, because as we heard the history, the um the opportunity that was has taken place, what they have contributed to the city.

Um, I'm sure this was the first time in aduction to a lot of us here in the room, but this aldridge is a definitely a um inspiration for me.

Thinking about a the time period, the area era that she was living in, being a woman, being a woman of color, and was able to execute what she did, not only for the the community she lived in, but it went also for the city.

So I am excited that we will be able to continue her legacy and let it be known for um generations to come.

Perpetuity is the word, right?

Yeah, exactly.

Um, thank you.

Completely agree.

There may be even be a naming component of whatever this becomes uh in her honor, but uh we'll we can talk more about that later.

Excellent.

Anything else on business four?

Fantastic.

Okay.

Business five, holiday park parking update.

City manager.

Thank you, Vice Mayor.

Uh, we will have Ben Rogers assistant city manager as well as Quentin Pugh assistant city manager, and we have outside council available as well.

Yes.

And so I the commission authorized negotiations of an interim agreement, and we wanted to share some feedback as to where we've arrived in our negotiation process to date.

The term sheet that we'll be discussed today, as well as the overall project uh parameters reflect where we intend to land with the interim agreement, subject to feedback from the commission and any guidance that might uh allow us to update uh the interim agreement before we bring it back to the city commission for approval.

So this process has been one uh that is inclusive of various members of our team, and we want to update you not only on the terms that we've negotiated to date, but also the thoughtful approach that we've taken uh as it relates to this project.

So I'm gonna turn it over to Quentin Pew at this time.

Thank you, manager.

Good afternoon, uh Vice Mayor, Commissioners Quentin Pew, Assistant City Manager.

The following presentation is an update on the holiday park parking project and the proposed interim agreement term sheet.

Uh, the intent today is to brief the commission, uh, receive feedback and incorporate that direction before any binding agreement comes before you.

This project began a little over a year ago in March 2025 when a city received an unsolicited proposal.

A few months later, the city opened the required 45-day solicitation window, which resulted in three proposals by the end of August.

The city then engaged outside council to assist with the process, followed by proposal presentations in December of last year.

In January 2026, the City Commission ranked the proposals and authorized negotiations with the highest rank proposer, Holiday Park parking partners.

Since the project kickoff meeting in February, the developer, its team, and city staff have held regular implementation meetings to advance the project.

Staff has also met with representatives from the Parker and the Panthers, and it's coordinated future outreach with the YMCA, uh, Flagler Village and Victoria Park uh civic associations.

Holiday Park is a unique community destination in the project would anchor the park with several major components, including an approximately 1,000 space parking garage, a embedded fire rescue station, and a vertical port on the rooftop.

Um, the initial project vision for the surface parking lot featured 300 spaces, but as the design advanced to 60 percent and refinements were made, the surface lot was reduced to 292 parking spaces as of January 2026, as shown on the next slide.

The developers project team is shown on the left and includes a strong bench of experienced uh firms.

The verteport has no capital costs to the city, and a proposed total project estimate shown on the right is approximately 41.9 million.

That price reflects the developer's proposal.

It is not a final or locked-in price.

The final cost will be refined during the interim agreement process as the design matures and the scope becomes more clear.

Additionally, the figures shown are construction estimates only and exclude financing costs and city overhead, such as project management fees and inspection services.

Several work streams have been moving forward concurrently to get this project to this point.

The city manager's office, city attorney's office, and the core construction team have been negotiating the business terms in parallel city departments and the developers team have been meeting regularly to pressure test this project.

That includes looking closely at the real site conditions, confirming what each department needs to operate effectively, reviewing parking demand, advancing the design, and making sure the work scope and project deliverables are clearly defined.

The surface parking lot is nearly designed and in permitting, both of which we expect to finish by the end of the year.

Right now, the parking lot count is tracking.

Let me make sure I'm clear on that one.

Right now, the surface parking lot count is tracking between approximately 275 and 285 spaces, depending on final design refinements.

A few items are still being worked through, including accessible parking and landscaping updates, stormwater approvals, and inclusion of a partition wall to separate the parking area from nearby residential properties to the west.

A parking study has been completed for the garage, and that study suggests that the garage width should have no fewer than 1,000 spaces.

Based on the work completed to date, the scale and complexity of the garage may trigger a level 4 DRC review, which would influence the overall timeline for this project.

The verteport component of the project is still being developed and remains dependent on pending FAA guidelines, regulatory direction, and required approvals.

Additionally, the fire station layout will be finalized after the site survey and geotechnical work, confirm the boundaries, access, and soil conditions.

We are estimated approximately 12 months from the execution of the interim agreement to complete the design and negotiate the comprehensive agreement.

But that timeline will ultimately depend on the final vertical port direction, garage programming, site survey, and geotechnical findings, as well as permitting.

ACN Ben Rogers will discuss the proposed IA business terms and what they actually commit the city to.

Thank you, Quentin.

Good afternoon, Vice Mayor, Commissioner's Ben Rogers, Assistant City Manager.

So as we look towards the framework for this interim agreement, we really broke it up into two phases.

The first phase, as Quentin said, is a surface slot, and what we're looking to do there is define it.

As we've worked through this process, the cities own the design process, and so what we'll be doing is delivering the design plans to the development team.

They will then provide the cost estimates, the backup, the support for that, and then we'd move forward with the construction of the surface parking lot.

And we envision that that would be funded through a cash payment from the parking fund.

The second phase would be through the pre-development efforts for the parking garage, the verteport, and the fire EMS station.

And we kind of separated the Verteport conversation for you today, just because there are some nuances and uniqueness in the business terms for the Verteport.

So as I said, as Quentin indicated, the parking lot is looking to be towards 275 parking spaces at this point, based off of the enhancements that he referenced with landscaping, pedestrian facilities, upgraded drainage, and so on.

One thing to note that the process for the construction of the surface lot is expected to be nine months, but that is from the completion of the notice to proceed.

That is not tied to the execution of the interim agreement.

It would be nine months from when the city provides the final plans and the permits for the project.

As for the parking garage, a thousand spaces, and this would be 12 months, as Quentin said, for the design efforts, the negotiations to bring forward back a comprehensive agreement for City Commission consideration.

That 12-month period, we would refine the design, work through all the elements that uh would be embedded or included inside of these uh structures and then have that not to exceed cost for city commission consideration.

The verteport uh is part of phase two.

Um, but again, we pulled it out uh for conversation for the city commission because there are a lot of moving parts with the verteport, uh, not having federal regulation uh clear at this point uh or state uh approvals.

We want to really make sure that we understand the what ifs uh in the verteport.

Uh, what if the project's ready to move forward, but the verteport doesn't have uh the approval to move forward, and so we've structured the vertiport in a way that the city has the ultimate determination that if the verteport would be included in it and it ours our intention to have the verteport in it, that the development team would provide all of the plans, the financing, the potential uh long-term arrangements between the parties uh to the city, and the city would have 30 days to make a dis uh determination if it wants to incorporate the vertiport or not.

The next steps uh today we're here to get city commission feedback.

Uh we'll take that feedback and we'll work to uh interim agreement.

Once the interim agreement is approved, uh then we can start the construction efforts for the phase one once the design of the permitting is completed, and then start the pre-development work uh on the phase two components uh and ultimately bring back a comprehensive agreement uh for city commission consideration.

Excellent.

Thank you very much, Ben.

Appreciate it.

Uh city commission discussion, go ahead.

Commissioner Glassman.

First of all, excellent.

Excellent work.

Thank you.

Thank you, Ben, uh city manager, development team.

Um I had a chance to go through it.

Uh I have a question, Ben, for you though.

What do you see as that last string?

How far till uh roughly the comprehensive agreement would get actually executed?

What do you see as the timeline between the IA and the CA?

So as uh ACMPU referenced right now we need to go through the permitting process uh to to understand that timeline and so I think that it's probably 10 to 12 months out before we make a comprehensive agreement because we want to have that guaranteed maximum price, the fixed price for the city commission that would be all encompassing within the comprehensive agreement.

Great.

And based on if we move forward with the term sheet today, next step would be interim agreement, and then you would have that nine to twelve months between interim agreement and comprehensive agreement to get into the weeds and work out all those details.

That that is the uh process that we're putting forth, correct?

All right, good.

I I like what you had to say uh about the vertiport.

The vertiport I do believe is a very important component, but there are there are some ifs.

We we are relying on others.

It's not under our control.

Uh but I I like what I hear out there.

I like what I hear in terms of the funding from FDOT uh for this project.

Uh I like what I hear uh in terms of how people are excited about this technology, uh this new form of mobility.

I know in speaking with Flagler Village Civic Association and also Victoria Park Civic Association.

Uh those neighborhoods are very excited about that possibility on top of the garage.

But that should not in any way, shape or form uh get in the way of us still moving forward with the garage.

I mean, after all, the Verde ports on the roof, right?

So we still need that AMS station, we still need the spaces.

I'm also very concerned because I think we're really far behind in providing those surface parking spaces.

I hear from the Broward Center where we're located right now all the time about the parking that we were supposed to deliver a while ago.

Uh that surface lot of roughly 300 spots is really important.

We've got to get going with that.

So I'm very eager to move forward with this term sheet, get on to the next phase and then get going with the surface lots, uh, and then also coming back and hopefully by July second looking at an interim agreement and then having nine, ten, eleven, twelve months to get to the comprehensive agreement.

But I think you guys did a really good job.

Everybody who worked on the term sheet.

Uh it reads well to me.

So I just want to say thank you.

That's it from me.

Thank you, Commissioner.

Uh anyone else?

Yeah.

Just want to iterate great work.

Let's keep going, you know, as expeditiously as as possible.

I think is is the right uh right mode and completely agree.

So thank you.

Great.

Commissioner BC Pittman.

Yes, thank you.

Uh um again for this um presentation, giving us some more clarity regarding us moving forward.

Um, in regards to the um verteport, um that is the developer's responsibility overall, correct?

So if something changes with uh funding or um any I'm not gonna name anything, but anything changes, it has no bearing on what we're doing moving forward with the garage itself.

That's correct.

That's correct.

Okay, all right, thank you.

Just to add a little more color there, the developer would be responsible for the financing construction operations and maintenance of the verteport element of the project.

Great.

Thank you.

Thank you, Commissioner.

Commissioner Herbst, I think good.

Great.

Thank you.

Fantastic.

Thank you, Ben.

Thank you.

All right.

That concludes business five.

Now we're gonna move back to the start of the city commission conference meeting.

So that's gonna bring us to business one.

So business one is presentation of the city of Fort Laurel's fiscal year twenty twenty seven, twenty thirty six long-term financial plan, office of management and budget.

I I see our consultant from the Stan Tech made it to the podium ahead of our director.

He's but nimble.

He's he's very familiar at that podium.

So as Laura makes her way, I'll give Kyle a quick introduction.

So Santech has worked with the city for many years.

They're very familiar with our processes, and what they do is they do a look at our revenues and our expenditures to make sure that we're really positioned for financial sustainability over the long term.

Um so Kyle will be here to talk about some of our major funds, and we'll also provide some information on some of our other funds, such as the parking funds and airport fund.

So with that, I'll turn it over to Kyle.

Perfect.

Thank you so much, Yvette.

Good afternoon, Vice Mayor, Commissioners, and City Administration.

Uh, as you've got mentioned, Kyle Stevens with Stan Tech Consulting.

And what I'd like to do today is go through this update.

Uh it's been another year, so we're here to talk about the updated financial outlook.

Uh with this first slide, I always talk about uh the value that this process adds.

And so first and foremost, why do we conduct this analysis?

We conduct this analysis to get the latest and greatest data from the city under the umbrella of financial sustainability.

So not only thinking about the budget process that you're thoroughly talking through right now, but then also the implications of that budget process in the next five and ten years, and thinking about the structure of the financial structural component of that that will show up over years, and we want to be able to anticipate that so that we can plan for that in the future.

Importantly, down on the bottom of this slide, as well as the process that we go through.

So this process starts back in the April and May time period, and we work at uh the level of the business managers and directors with the various funds and the utility at the city in order to get an understanding of on the ground what's happening within those utilities, not only today, but anticipate what's going to happen in the future.

Uh, the Office of Management and Budget does overall run the project, and then additionally toward the end of the project we interface with city uh administration, the city manager's office specifically.

Uh so some of those data sources that we'll be looking at today that are included within the analysis.

So the source data is the FY2025 unaudited actuals, FY26 amended budget, and then the FY27 draft budget as of June 8, 2026, and we've included also in there the decision packages.

With regards to the cap uh the capital improvement plan, uh we have included fiscal year 2027 and through fiscal year 31, so the latest and greatest data with regards to investments planned in the future.

Uh, key assumption that'll be across all funds today would be the new city hall.

So right now the assumptions within the models is 15.8 million dollars of annual expenditures for the next 30 years uh starting in 2028.

This will of course be updated as as new numbers are available, but that is what's currently in the analysis.

And then, of course, within the general fund and utilities, there will be subsequent rent reductions across most of the funds uh for lease space uh beginning in fiscal year 2029.

Uh, so with that, I'll I'll jump through the next few slides.

I've put over here the eight funds that we'll cover today, starting with the general fund.

And within the general fund, I've got two slides of assumptions that we've got to go through real quick before I get to the updated outlook.

The first slide here is talking about the revenues, and so quickly on the revenue side, fire assessment.

We've talked about that quite a few times today within the analysis.

We uh have included full cost recovery in fiscal year 2027, that's 70 million dollars of revenue uh to be updated uh as part of the study we did last year.

It's an update of the study with the full study uh for the fire assessment we did last year.

And then importantly, we're including future true ups to the fire assessment as well.

So a 12% uh increase in 2028 and then a 10% increase placeholder for 2029, 32 and 2035.

Is that to achieve full cost recovery in each of those years?

So that's the thought.

So in the near term, we've seen a bit more cost pressure, and so we've seen those annual up uh updates would be needed, but then we've gone in the further out future years to the uh cycle that we've had in the past where it's been every three year uh true-ups.

Got it.

And then for the taxable value uh from the property appraiser, we have included a 7.16 increase over the 2026 amended budget for those ad velorum revenues.

Um, we have updated accordingly current year and near-term assumptions for that.

Uh and then down here on the bottom, we've got the Los Olas Marina revenue.

That is an additional revenue sharing of 300,000 that starts in fiscal year 2028, and then BAMR uh annual revenue.

Uh so in the near term, that's a $900,000 revenue reduction.

That's from fiscal year 2028 through fiscal year 31.

And then as we get to fiscal year 32 through 36, you would see revenues in the range from 17 million up to 24 million.

And let's just pause there for a moment.

The when you say first of the Los Alas Marina revenue, additional revenue.

What do you just mean 300?

You mean addition into what's already estimated?

What give me context?

That's exactly correct, Commissioner.

From what we've shared in the past in the analysis.

So that's the update this year would be a $300,000 increase.

Which gets to what of a total for FY28?

Don't know if I have that number right off the top of my eye.

I'm sure if that can.

No rush of that, but just okay, great.

And then the BMR near-term revenue reduction, just uh for the public to understand that more.

Why are we making that adjustment?

And that might be a vet question too.

So don't want to put you on the spot there.

Thanks.

Good afternoon, Vice Mary Vet Matthews, assistant city manager.

So we're making the Bahia Mar revenue adjustment based on what we've heard from the developer.

So part of that $900,000 was an anticipation that the hotel would come offline.

And what they've shared with us is they're delaying the timeline in which that hotel will come offline.

So we'll continue to make online.

Well, offline.

So we currently have a hotel at that site that provides.

Right.

And build of a new one that will come on now tracking.

Um, and so once that hotel is no longer active, um, then we will no longer receive revenue associated with it.

Makes sense.

And then our FY, that just to explain to the public the FY 32 through 36, why does that then become 17 million?

Just so.

Yes.

So that is the anticipated condo sales associated with that property.

Um, at that time, as part of our agreement, we received a certain percentage of those sales.

We push that timeline out because part of how those condo sales were occurring was the demolition of the existing hotel, and then they would build a new facility there.

Um so we still need to update those revenue projections.

Those are from our initial um projections, which the real estate market has changed significantly since that time, and the developer may be making some changes to their plans.

So we'll continue to update and refine those numbers, but we wanted to make sure at minimum we push them out to be reflective of the timeline that we're aware of right now.

Understood.

And Laura Reese has just shared that Los Alas is 1.9 million.

1.9 for 2028.

2027, sorry, great, and then it'll get to 2.2 for 28.

Sorry, okay.

I'm tracker.

Great.

Thank you, Kyle.

Go ahead.

Absolutely.

Uh and then on the other side of the ledger, the expenditures.

And so a couple notable expenditures to go through the city's annual required pension contribution.

That is 600,000 annually for police and fire pension, which will reach the 7% target rate of assume in fiscal year 2028.

We also have the annual GERS COLA contribution, that's $2.2 million for seven years, which started in 2025.

And then, of course, in the model, we also, as we look over time, we're including uh service enhancements related to growth with the idea as the city grows, there would be some additional costs.

Right now we have 0.12 uh percent of salaries and wages and fringe benefits.

So that comes out to about a half a million dollars in fiscal year 2029, which will then escalate by 2036 to 4.9 million.

For the swimming hall of fame, we have $300,000, which begins in 2030 and going forward.

And then for the police headquarters and infrastructure special obligation debt service, that is $3.2 million in fiscal year 26, but it will increase to $6.4 million in FY 2027 and ongoing thereafter.

And then finally down the bottom, we've got just notable ongoing cost increases these are typically items that decisions were made in the in the past that now have uh come up in the future which will be included in our analysis and so the notable increases here total 20 million we've got 6.4 million from the safer grant expiration that includes the payment for 28 firefighters 3.1 million for the Los Alas downtown garage the Heron lot fire rescue staffing 2.1 million for the cops hiring grant which is six police officers and 11.1 million for the new city hall that's the general funds portion of the overall 15.8 million cost I mentioned a second ago and also related to city halls we do have some rent offsets there so that's 3.7 million in rent reductions beginning in fiscal year 2029 and going forward.

With this next slide now that we've gotten through all the assumptions we can look at the dashboard output of the current general fund model.

So this is our baseline or diagnostic run of the model in this particular case I'm gonna walk through some key elements of the analysis.

First and foremost on the very top of your screen you'll see the millage rate assumption by year.

So the 4.1193 mills in this particular scenario is maintained throughout the period and then next if you go down you'll see a box that is the cashless surplus or deficit I've highlighted that a couple key dynamics there.

So first in 2026 immediately to the left of the box you'll see 42.8 million dollars in deficit spending what that represents I just want to provide context there that is the pre-funding of some capital in 2026 as well as the PFAS spending there.

So that's why that looks so negative it's just because of the financials in 26 and prepaying that capital.

The real value of this analysis however comes to my mind as we look forward from 27 to 2829.

As it sits in the projection right now we're showing that deficits would evolve in a manner by which in 28 we would expect 8.9 million growing to 16.9 million in this baseline and then continuing out in the forecast period to grow the growth year is driven fundamentally again by inflation and then also those assumptions that I just went through of future costs that will impact the city negatively going forward.

The other item that I didn't mention I just wanted to note in this the property tax value assumption.

So while the millage is flat we have assumed in this base run of 6.5% overall taxable value growth going forward.

What this will mean is on the first graph to the left the end of fund year balance if the city continues on this path here what we would see is that fund balance stays above the minimum target within the general fund through fiscal year 2028 and into fiscal year 29 you'll be right there but we would expect going forward due to the deficits it would go below the target here.

As we always update this we tend to see this evolve over time right these deficits from spending the real value I see here is because the city goes through this annual budgeting process like you've been discussing today it's really the magnitude that we see here that 8.9 million going to sixteen point nine million going forward.

In these next few slides I want to show you a couple other scenarios so this next one is a structurally balanced scenario for the general fund.

What this shows here is looking at a millage increase and what I'm trying to calculate specifically is the magnitude that would offset those forecasted deficits that I just showed you in the models update this year what we're forecasting is an offset against those deficits would be a point two five percent millage increase in 2028 followed by one in 2031 of the same magnitude would provide structural balance over this period and what you'll see now is on the end of year fund balance in each and every year we are above our minimum targets in these next scenarios what we've done is a tax reform scenario so a good amount of discussion as I've been sitting in the audience today about the tax refund that comes up on the for the vote this fall.

In this particular scenario, we've integrated those reductions in ad valorum revenue that the city would see if that referendum passes.

And what that would mean is in fiscal year 2028, we would add an additional 17 million dollars to the deficit, followed by 10 point three million in 29 as that's fully implemented.

That would move the deficits in those years to 25.3 and 44.8 respectively.

So it would significantly grow the deficits in those years.

And I would also point on the end of fund year balance now.

You'll notice in 2029, we are below the fund balance, and then each year going forward, we would be actually at below zero going forward here.

So what I've done in just this next run is calculated again the magnitude of the offset in millage in order to offset those deficits we just talked through.

And what that would be is effectively a doubling of the analysis I just showed you.

So instead of 0.25 mils, it would be 0.5 mils in 2028 in fiscal year 2031 to fully offset that deficit.

Of course, the commission has as been discussed early, has a number of decisions, whether that's in revenue enhancements or expense reductions as you go forward.

This is just presented to show you that rep full revenue offset to the losses that are expected.

This last slide here on the general fund is a survey we update each year that just tracks within Broward County the millage that is levied for the municipalities within the county.

We've tracked this over 20 years in this particular slide.

And there's a couple key things that I'll point out here.

So first and foremost, down at the very bottom, we've got the average millage rate.

What's important there that I see over time is just the growth.

So from 2027 through 2026, with the updated information we're seeing the average millage rate within the county has grown 36% over that time period.

Another key item that I've noticed from the update this year is in fiscal year 26, we had a number of reductions as well.

So you'll see those arrows point to millages increasing or reducing.

There were eight reductions in 2026, and the average millage rate actually dropped a little bit in 2026.

So with that, I'll move on to the water and sewer fund if there's no questions.

Yeah, Kyle, thank you.

For sure.

This is great.

So, commissioners, I just want to check in with you all.

But Kyle's, you know, a lot of good information in here.

I'm sure we've all reviewed it just in interest of time.

Are there do you want to just get catch some quick highlights?

Do you have any questions in particular?

I just want to get a sense of of timing.

Do you want Kyle to continue to go through the entirety?

That's a desire of the commission.

Keep going.

Keep going through the just at this pace.

Okay, great.

Go ahead.

Thank you, Kyle.

Absolutely.

So the next utility we'll cover is water and sewer.

And a couple key observations and considerations.

Within this utility fund, the city targets three months of operating reserves as a minimum in each year.

Some of the key changes to expenditures for the prospect lake water treatment plant.

As that comes online, we've been anticipating this over time, but now we've arrived at the year next year.

In fiscal year 27, we anticipate 15.6 million dollars of additional cost for chemicals, electricity, and personnel.

And then in addition, we have subordinate debt and availability payments of 29 million in fiscal year 27.

That will increase over time to 41 million by fiscal year 2036.

Capital investments excluding Prospect Lake, we're targeting within this fund roughly 40 million dollars of cash funded capital annually from 2027 through 31.

And then in addition to that has been the practice of the city over time to use debt as well.

And so there's a hundred million dollars in fiscal year 2027 expected, 100 million in 2029, and then 230 million in fiscal year 2033, and that's all in current day dollars.

Additionally, the city's currently undertaking the implementation of the advanced metering infrastructure project or AMI.

There's 1.1 million dollars in contractual savings for fiscal year 28 going forward within the analysis.

And then additionally, as you replace older meters, what you'll typically see is an increase in the build consumption, and we've included that in the analysis of 1.75% in both 2027 and 28 as those meters are rolled out citywide.

What this next slide shows is the updated financial dashboard for the water and sewer forecast.

I've highlighted at the very top for fiscal year 27.

That's the last of the three-year adopted schedule of increases that the commission adopted.

It was a 9% and 5% that was adopted for water and sewer respectively.

And what we're showing going forward is annual increases of 5% per year will provide a sustainable financial future for the water and sewer fund.

So effectively, we've gotten through the period of higher increases for both water and sewer, and we'll be moving back to what I would categorize as more inflationary levels of increases.

And inflation in the water and sewer industry tends to be a little bit higher than uh inflation as we measure it, say by the consumer price index just due to the infrastructure heavy nature of it.

And Kyle, just City Manager, the what's our remind me of our projected date of completion and integration for AMI.

We're targeting summer of 2027 and doing everything we can to try to advance that.

Okay, great.

Thank you.

Thanks, Kyle.

Go ahead.

Absolutely.

And so the important charts down here on the bottom of revenues versus expenditures.

The definition of financial sustainability is seeing those two lines on top of one another, the expenditures coming out and the cash coming in.

We will see that with this 5% plan as we project it.

And then secondarily, off to the right is the end of year fund balances.

And what you'll see there is we have a plan with those 5% increases to build reserves back to the target level, the three three months of OM over this period and maintain it throughout this entire period.

And additionally, as I mentioned a second second ago, this will also preserve access to capital markets and the ability to fund debt service going forward.

A couple slides on just the surveys for water rates that we typically include with this presentation.

I've got three of these.

And so what we're doing is essentially looking at the current rate schedule as it sits in fiscal year 2026 and looking at other peer municipalities and how it compares.

You'll notice at this particular slide, this is a low volume user of 3,000 gallons per month.

Fort Lauderdale is right in the middle to uh slightly below average at $66.02 for that 3,000 gallons monthly usage.

However, as usage increases due to the inclining block rates that are in place, the more you use, the more you pay.

Um you'll notice that the position on the survey will change.

So this is 5,000 gallons of usage, and at 5,000 gallons of usage, the bill jumps up to 116.79, which will put you in the top 25% of peers here.

And then finally, at a high volume, so this is uh 8,000 gallons of usage.

That bill goes to 192.87, which on this survey will put us in the second position here, only behind Wilton Manors.

And next I'll move on to the Stormwater Fund.

Um, couple key observations on the stormwater fund.

And so this fund is pride uh is driven primarily by the needed capital investments uh that have been discussed over many years.

And what we have included within the analysis right now is 230 million dollars for the completion of phase one projects.

That's a new bond in fiscal year 26 year, and then in addition to that 230, a hundred million dollars that's going toward the planning to design and some construction for phase two projects.

And then as placeholders in fiscal year 29, 32, and 35, we have 350 million dollars for future projects to continue to address the needs that were outlined in the master plan.

Operations and maintenance uh costs, so those new investments will lead to increased operations and maintenance cost over time.

We in our analysis put placeholders to anticipate those changes over time.

So we have 1.1 million in 2027 and 1.6 million in fiscal year 2030 as placeholders uh that will be true up over time as those investments are made.

And then, in additional, outside of the large bonded projects, we do have recurring capital investments, and so the watershed asset management plan has three million dollars in fiscal year 2028, 3.75 million in 2029 through 2030.

Uh we are targeting additionally overall in the fund 12.6 million dollars in cash funded projects.

Um, those mainly address more the neighborhood level projects, and then uh those will be funded by utilizing available fund balance or annual revenues to cover those costs.

And so this dashboard now shows the updated model and analysis with those assumptions included for stormwater.

Uh importantly, the plan of increases up there that I've highlighted with the orange box shows the continued need for a 20% increase in fiscal year 27 of the revenues that are generated by the assessment, and in 2028, it then drops down to 15% through 2032, and then we see 10% after that.

That is the exact same plan that I showed one year ago when we updated this analysis.

So we're showing a very similar level of increases going forward, and with that level of increases, the real key part here is that this utility will be able to support those new debt issuances.

So as we borrow that money over time, the revenues are adjusting to make sure that we can pay back the principal and interest on those bonds throughout the entire forecasted period here.

Including in here just an updated survey again of peer municipalities that have stormwater services and have a fee associated with that.

Currently, for a single family home in 2026 in Fort Lauderdale, the annual assessment is $375.75.

And you'll notice across here a number of different dollar values for the peer municipalities.

However, what I'll note is I go along and do these presentations for a number of these communities that are on this list.

We continue to see a lot of pressure on these rates.

So it's not just Fort Lauderdale seeing double digit increases on Stormer.

Many of these other communities are seeing that, and we've even added a few that are higher than Fort Lauderdale this year as folks have increased well above just 20 30%.

So some of these have done 50 or 100% increases over the last few years to try to get ahead of the needs on this particular utility.

Fourth sanitation fund, this particular fund has a reserve target of 1.5 months of operating costs, a target level of three months overall for the maximum.

Notable updates from the recent contracts and service changes.

Contract costs, we're assuming to inflate, so that's the single largest cost here in the utility, assuming to increase 4% per year, and disposal costs we've assumed a 5% increase per year.

Additionally, as part of uh commercial service within the city from private haulers, the city receives uh franchise fees, and so 13.8 million of those are transferred in fiscal year 27 as projected in this analysis to this utility, and then we're escalating that by 4% each year.

This uh dashboard right here shows the updated analysis.

Uh, what we're showing is a continued need uh for 5% increases for the sanitation fund over time, and what that will do again as we as we've talked about here today, provide ongoing sustainability.

So we'll match our cash in and cash out and be in alignment with keeping reserve targets above the minimum throughout the entire forecast period.

We've created a peer survey here that's been updated this year for the annual or the monthly sanitation bill.

Uh, Fort Lauderdale is currently 5249 in fiscal year 2026, and I've included a number of other peer municipalities here.

Fort Lauderdale tends to be on the higher one on this survey.

However, I'll always note that in this particular utility and all utilities, there's big levels of service changes between different peer municipalities, which can often change or dictate the overall level of the monthly bill.

Just a couple of other funds to get through as we've gotten through the major utilities, parking observations and consideration.

So we just talked through, and you just had a presentation on the holiday park garage.

We have included that within our financial modeling in fiscal year 2028.

So we have $35 million of capital cost to be funded.

Uh that would begin in 28, but debt service would actually begin in fiscal year 28, the third quarter of that year, and then 200,000 of additional expenses that we we just have a placeholder for that cost in fiscal year 2028.

And importantly on holiday park, no additional revenues at this point forecasted.

For the federal courthouse, we have garage operations beginning in fiscal year 2028.

With that's $7 million of capital cost to be funded, was funded in 2026.

And in this particular case, we have net revenues after expenses based on a $3 per hour rate that would be projected currently at $409 dollars, which starts in 2028 and goes forward.

And then in the Los Olas downtown garage, the Heron lot, we have that one operational in fiscal year 2029.

That adds an additional 475 dollars of revenue.

It's a net change above the H lot that it replaces.

With regards to the parking fund, the forecast here on the dashboard shows a couple dynamics that I'll highlight.

So for the annual increases right now, we have a projection for 3% in fiscal year 2028 and 3% in 2029.

That is necessitated by that additional debt service that I just talked about that's it would be issued in 2027 with the debt service starting in 2028, as well as the additional cash funded capital that occurs during that time period.

And again, a highlight that doesn't include any additional revenue for holiday park.

And then as we go through to the next fund uh to talk over observations and considerations, this is the building fund.

So the building fund has uh a few different limitations on it.

Florida statute uh limits how much fund balance can be retained in each year.

So we can't carry any more than the average operating budget for the previous four years, and we include that within our analysis.

Additionally, uh additional building permit revenue.

So as we update this model, we have a good conversation with uh building services staff to understand the projects that are in the pipeline and what's going to occur over time, and we include those within the model.

So BAMR annual revenue we've included a $4.4 million in fiscal year 2029 through fiscal year 2034, and then we have additionally other anticipated permitting revenue of 3.6 million in 2028, 1.8 in 29, 2.7 in 2030, and 1.8 in 2031.

So that represents a number of other projects that were identified as part of the analysis and additional revenue that would come in in those years.

What we're recommending here is I get to the updated dashboard is a continuation of the annual uh inflation adjustments uh that are currently in the city's ordinance and tied to the consumer price index.

Uh what this currently looks like in this fund is the you'll see the 3.3% increase starting in 27 going forward.

That's the annual assumed inflationary increases.

And then what you'll see here is the fundamental goal is to manage between the orange line, which is the statutory maximum that I just discussed, and the reserve target in black in the minimum.

And it's very often in this fund, as you'll notice as it goes forward, um, we see activity trail off, and it's you see device uh deficit spending.

That in this particular fund is not necessarily alarming to me.

That's really fundamentally the idea that we have a really good idea of the projects that are happening in the near term, but as we get on the backside of a 10-year forecast, we don't yet have visibility into what projects may be occurring then.

And as we go forward and this gets updated, we'd likely see projects come in and fill that gap over time.

Kyle, question on this and and part of your modality throughout, is as you're, for example, here projecting increases over FYI over FY, right?

Is that in your process, do you say to yourself, okay, here's what we need to do to stay where I think we need to be?

Do you are you working with city staff to say, hey, I think we should increase this percentage, city staff.

What do you think?

Is it a collaborative?

What does that look like?

Yeah, absolutely.

So each fund's a little bit different.

Uh, if you're speaking to this one specifically, uh, right now the city has a practice of doing inflation that's set by ordinance, right?

So I think this one's a little bit different in the sense that we probably have an overall idea where we're headed, and then we see the results of that, and that's what we're showing today.

When we get to the other funds, though, it's much more of a collaborative effort to make sure that we've got all of the assumptions correct in there right.

Um, typically the way that I like to run the analysis, we've we put what we showed you last year in.

We say we we presented and we updated the funds and we had a forecast of what we thought we needed to do.

We update all the assumptions to see where we're at, and if deficits occur of the financial forecast looks like it's no longer going to be sustainable, we look at what the additional increases would need to be and the particular timing of those increases to get back to sustainability.

So it's absolutely uh a discussion, but it's really fundamentally driven by this update process.

Okay, great.

Thank you.

And in the central uh sewer fund, so the city has set aside an additional enterprise fund that just covers the central regional fund and its large users that are participants in that, given their agreements with the city.

Um the city of Fort Lauderdale, however, is the largest user in that, so they're 80% 84% of the current flows to the regional fund uh from a wastewater flow standpoint.

The other users included here are Oakland Park, Wilton Manors, Tamarack, and Davy, which make up the remaining 16%.

Some additional assumptions.

In the near term, there will be some additional debt issuance within this fund.

127 million dollars in fiscal year 2026, and 60 million dollars is currently a placeholder in fiscal year 2033.

One of the main drivers over time that as we update this fund, we're watching is the renewal and replacement expense growth.

And I've included a table uh below that shows how that's increased from 9.4 million in fiscal year 2018 all the way to the anticipated fiscal year 2027 amount of 24.3 million.

This is set uh formulaically within the agreements with the large users.

It looks at the 20-year replacement needs out of the plant and determines the deposit that needs to be made annually in order to support those needs.

And of course, as we know that plant's been aging over time, and so we've seen uh it aging and the replacement cost has gone up, which leads to an increase in the annual deposit.

Uh this forecast here uh shows the dashboard for the updated regional fund.

What we see here is near-term pressure.

Uh, and so in fiscal year 2027, you'll notice I've got an increase in there right now of 16.

uh one five percent.

And so those increases uh from the replacement needs as well as operational cost increases uh do show a near-term need.

Uh and then in 2028, we again forecast uh an increase of 5.77.

This will ultimately get set per the contracts and get updated over time.

So the way to think about this as you look at it is more directionally than the actual rate that we're calculating here.

This gets calculated per the large user contract.

However, once we get through this period in the near term, we anticipate that this will be uh more stable over time as we get uh the revenues up to a level that support the full cost of the utility.

And then finally today, just the airport fund to cover.

So the airport fund is a little bit different than the city's other utilities in the sense that it has a very stable base of recent uh leases, aviation leases and non-aviation leases uh that support the utility over time.

New leases uh in changes in leasing activity are really the fundamental drivers of additional revenue over time, and so uh as we update this, we look at all the current outstanding leases and have discussions about properties that are coming up in the near term and what those new leases may be.

Additionally, on the expenditure side of the equation, is really fundamentally the capital and the funding sources for capital.

And so while there's a uh uh an amount of capital that needs to occur out there related to airport activities, a good portion of the funding comes from either Florida Department of Transportation, FDOT, or uh FAA grants, which offset some of that cost going forward.

As we show this particular one, uh we see in the future here for the airport um continued continued financial sustainability.

Um there will be positive cash flows going forward and reserve balances we expect to grow over time for the airport.

Um I think the key key item here is this gives the city a lot of flexibility.

So if grants uh do uh get cut potentially in the future for any reason, um the city would have cash reserves and a buffer available to continue to uh engage and deliver on the capital projects out there at the airport.

And with that, so the final slide, but happy to go back to any of the slides today and answer any questions that may have come up.

Great.

Thank you, Kyle.

Thank you for this presentation.

Kyle, how long have you been working with us?

Uh, my first year of the city of Fort Lauderdale is 2013.

Okay, wow.

All right, so Kyle, can we blame you for everything?

Or just part of it.

Okay.

Do you mind?

I will take the bullet, sure.

Okay, thank you.

I appreciate it.

Well, that'll be in our next newsletter.

Thank you.

Uh thank you, Kyle, and thank you for your work.

And in my neighborhood meetings, these your presentations are very helpful.

So it's very helpful.

Captures an effective way, helps folks on their folks understand where we are, where we might be.

So as I appreciate it, and appreciate your ability to kind of go through and analyze and working with staff.

So this is, I think, a very helpful planning process for us.

I'm assuming it's a helpful one for staff as they work with you, that I'm seeing a vet nod that it is.

Okay, great.

Um, so city commissioners want to turn it over to you for questions.

Commissioner Herbs, anything on this?

Great.

Commissioner BZ Pittman.

No, I'm good.

Thank you for your work.

Yeah, thank you, Kyle.

Appreciate it.

City manager, I had some budgetary specific questions around staffing and some other pieces.

Um I can ask you that now, or I don't know if you have anything else you're sharing in the context of this presentation.

Nothing further from me.

Okay.

Fantastic.

So Kyle, let you go.

Thank you very much.

Thank you so much for your time and and keep up the good work.

All right, um, City Manager.

So, few questions I wanted to run through from budgetary perspective uh for your proposal.

Um, okay, staffing.

So, when there's various kind of data points I just want to walk through.

So, one of the things is I see is a 14 million dollar increase in staffing in FY27, I think.

Is that sounding right?

And salaries and wages.

Yep, and so and so what so I hear that, and then I also hear the just adding one new position in FY27, right?

And then the reduction of six vacant positions.

So just help kind of uh how can all those things be true at once, and what is that what does that all mean?

Uh would be helpful.

Understood, Vice Mayor.

So, in terms of salaries and wages, we typically have growth in that area year over year based on either contractual agreements or the cost of benefits, uh, merit increases, cost of living allowances.

So that is pretty typical that we would see an increase in that area if we maintain the same level of staffing.

Uh there has been uh recommendation thus far to add some new positions as well as to eliminate certain vacant positions that we have, resulting in a net increase of one position that would be impacting the general fund, and that is in the clerk's office.

Okay, fantastic.

So, how many total new positions have been added to the city during your tenure?

Well, that that would be difficult.

Um I think the net increase to the general fund last year was six.

Six new last year.

Ivet is nodding.

Yep, yes, net of six.

Net of six.

Okay, great.

Um, the just a couple of the budgetary highlights I just want to uh emphasize my appreciation for expansion of the PSA programs at schools to help with traffic mitigation just across the city.

Love it.

Thank you.

Um very happy about that.

Uh expansion of the code compliance officers to cover times and days when we don't have current staffing is again across the city.

I think is very positive.

That would take us from four days to six days of staffing with a focus on the vacation rentals.

Great, excellent.

I think that's that's much needed.

Uh I'm also excited about the LPR uh program and and expanding that to I think it's a 175 or so LPRs across the city by 2027.

I'm a big believer in LPRs, and this growing the program, I think is great.

So just wanted to uh appreciate that.

One of the concerns I have is adding additional police district.

So we have been talking about a new police district, district four in downtown, which would cover parts of uh at least a couple city commission districts, and we've been talking about that.

We were moving forward with that, and then all of a sudden, I I'm not clear what why we're not moving forward with that.

So can you help me understand what's happening?

Thank you for that.

And you know, we shared a little bit of information uh in the backup as it relates to the creation of the fourth police district, which was discussed at the January 13th Commission prioritization workshop.

Uh at that time, the approach was to realign existing personnel resources as identified by the police department to assist with the creation of that fourth police district to focus on the downtown area based on calls for service and the need.

Since then, the police department has done some additional uh due diligence and evaluated this option, and at this time it's not being recommended to uh go forward because it is anticipated that there would be a significant uh increase to personnel in order to facilitate that fourth police district.

It should be noted that uh the police department did put forward a request for roughly 45 employees uh on top of their existing personnel complement.

Uh those employees were not focused on the creation of a fourth police district, and so they had identified some other opportunities as priorities, and I'm fully supportive of the new direction to not explore the fourth police district at this time based on uh their current recommendation.

Okay, it's just different than as we had been talking about this, including in January we've been talking about, and what I was hearing, but maybe please correct me if I'm wrong.

I was hearing this is not gonna be a revenue increase requirement.

This is not gonna be a a cost increased requirement that this will be budget neutral by creating a police district for to allocate just readjust is what I was hearing uh staff members and so forth to one of the areas in our downtown where we have some of the greatest need.

So I'm just trying to understand what changed from that analysis that was happening, which seemed logical and rational, and I'm assuming police were have done their analysis to now.

So Deputy Chief London is here acting on behalf of Chief Schultz who is out of the country.

Sure.

Yes, Deputy Chief Victor London.

Thanks, yeah, you're good.

Thanks, Chief.

Vice Mayor, uh, once we did the analysis of the calls for service volumes, as well as the citywide view of what would be required to do a fourth district, we knew it would we would have to change the boundaries in more than just one district.

So when we looked at that process and the number of personnel that we had to stay at not increasing the need of uh full-time sworn officers to effectively staff a fourth district, we realized this wasn't the time to do it.

We need more time to do the analysis and uh ensure that the city manager can support the personnel in order to do it for fourth district.

Okay.

So it sounds like we did do any of that analysis before we started talking about this possibility.

We did we did the analysis.

Yes, we did the initial analysis.

We actually did a staffing change.

We went from um one staffing model to the current one.

We thought would allow us to have more officers available to make it happen, okay.

And once the reality of calls for service, and then trying to figure out the boundaries, it wasn't feasible.

Okay, okay.

Vice Mayor, if I if I may add, thanks.

Uh, just want to look at the overall context of it as well, you know, as we're considering um the impacts of property tax reform.

You know, I also did not feel that it would be appropriate to push for that increase in staffing based on the current evaluation that um has been brought forward.

So I just want to share that that was part of the consideration also.

Okay, all right.

Thank you, Chief.

That helps me understand a little bit more of the context.

So, city manager, this should just I think be helpful as much as possible, and I know things change, but whether it's police district four or the regional training facility, um safety facility, we have great ideas, and we start communicating out to the public, and I start working with, and I'm sure many of us start working with other elected officials on other bodies to help line up and and support these initiatives, and then we do a deeper analysis and realize oh, you know, District four police district is not a good option, or the regional safety training facility at Seagull is not a good option.

Okay, I get it, and things change and we allow grace for for change and so forth.

But as much as possible before we start um advocating for positions, as much research and uh confidence would be helpful.

Fair on both of those.

And I'm I'm looking forward, I think it's later, but I'm looking forward to hearing what changed about Seagull, because this was again something we've been I've been working on in the community for a while and working with other elected officials and other boards.

Very fair and well received.

Uh, we endeavor to bring forward information that is as accurate and reflective of the existing environment and the existing needs as possible.

And you know, I agree that we could uh communicate more effectively and perhaps do a little bit more due diligence before socializing some of the ideas, and so we will strive to do better at that.

Okay, and then when there are adjustments as much as possible, if we can just have that, you know, kind of in real, I'd love to have like real-time intelligence, just real time.

Okay, um, you know, this department's coming back with some changes, uh, here's the immediate feedback, or if they can get me that immediate feedback.

We just did analysis.

Here's the immediate results.

We're analyzing further, but here's what we're looking at.

Just things like that, so I can start to process, would be great.

Okay, thank you very much.

So that is I think all for budget that I have.

Great, we're good on that business one.

Thank you.

Fantastic.

Alright, now moving on in the city conference meeting.

We are now going, we've done CF1s, we did it as end of session report.

Now we're going communications to the city commission.

Um, and the first one as we progress here is I had it open here, sorry.

Great.

So the first communication is from the affordable housing advisory committee.

And uh, correct me if I'm wrong, city manager, what I have is the motion made by Chair Condon, who's here.

Thank you very much or was here.

There he is.

There you are.

I knew you were still here.

I was like, um, to gain approval from the city commission to allow for the creation of three subcommittees under the affordable housing advisory committee.

Uh three subcommittees are zoning ordinance and accessory dwelling units, then finance and developer incentives, and then AMI standards and affordability accountability.

Uh these would be staffed by current members of the Affordable Housing Advisory Committee, and that is the suggestion.

Did I have my capturing that right, Chair?

Thank you for your time.

Thank you for being here this long.

We appreciate your work.

Um fantastic.

So, city manager, want to get your feedback and city attorney of the appropriateness and so forth for this.

Staff has no concerns with this request.

Okay, fantastic.

Makes sense to me, city commissioners, I I just have a question.

So I'm just wondering, as opposed to having to set up three separate subcommittees, why isn't this able just to happen in terms of the work that the committee does ongoing?

Ask people to just tackle these things, report back.

I'm just I'm I guess I'm missing the need to actually restructure when I can't figure out why it just can't be part of an agenda, part of their discussion.