The Gulfport City Council held a regular meeting on Tuesday, April 18, 2023, at 6:00 PM at Gulfport City Hall. The meeting lasted approximately three hours and covered a wide range of topics, including committee appointments, code amendments, budget discussions, and public concerns. The meeting began with the presentation of the Spirit of Gulfport Award to Brian Liggins and Phillip Bailey, followed by public comments, consent agenda approvals, and discussions on recreational vehicle regulations, council meeting rules, and the fiscal year 2023-2024 budget.
Our invocation this evening is given by Councilmember Christine Brown, followed by the Pledge of Allegiance. Please join us in rising. Thank you all for being here. Um, this is a prayer for springtime for flowers that bloom about our feet for tender grass, so fresh, so sweet, for song of bird, for hum of bee, for all the things fair we hear we hear and see, for blue of stream and blue of sky, for pleasant shade of branches high, for fragrant air and cooling breeze for beauty of the blooming trees, for the new morning with its light and the rest and shelter of the night for health and food, for love and friends, for everything your goodness sends. Father in heaven, we thank thee. Ralph Waldo Emerson. I pledge allegiance to the flight of the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands under God, indivisible liberties and justice for all. All right, thanks everyone for being here. Roll call, please, City Clerk. Councilmember Brown. Here. Vice Mayor Ray. Here. Councilmember O'Hara. Here. Councilmember Thanos. Here. Mayor Henderson. Here. Attorney Galastegie. Here. City Manager O'Reilly. Here. Deputy City Clerk Carico, present. All right. We have uh two two presentations in one this evening. So I'm glad to see both of my awesome neighbors here tonight. Uh, we're presenting the Spirit of Gulfport Award to Brian Liggins and Philip Bailey this evening. So the spirit of yes. You give the Spirit of Gulfport award to those Gulf Portians who who would go above and beyond out of their way uh to be a kind positive part of part of the city that we live in. And these two gentlemen exemplify that um beyond all doubt. I've been lucky enough to have them as my neighbors to the throne known through my time in the restaurant industry. Thank you for vice mayor for bringing that up as a suggestion. Um so the Spirit of Gulfport Award has a representative symbol of star, your value to Gulfport. The sailboat, Gulfport's ties to the sea, the rising sun, ever looking toward the future, and winging birds, the soaring concept of spirit. And we here by present these awards to Philip Bailey and Brian Liggins. I got I have a lot of enough ways. Um this is all started with Fawn Weaver. Bless her heart in heaven. We love you, Fawn. We miss you, but it's because of Fawn that Brian and I decided to make golf port home. We were coming to Peppers and bothering her all the time, and she said, You guys should just move here already. So we did, but she had a plan. She got us here, and then she said, okay, now you're gonna come help me. And I want you involved in anything you can get involved with. Dining out for life, the gecko ball planning committees, getting involved, getting active with golf port. I'm so glad she did, and I'm so glad we did, because all of you have changed our lives for the better. You have made our lives so rich and so full. We have found happiness and content and peace here in this great town. We love golf port so much, and it's because all of you live here, because all of you make golf port what it is.