Good morning.

I'd like to call today's meeting of the Jacksville Waterways Commission for Wednesday, May the 13th, 2026.

I'll begin with introductions from my left.

Good morning.

Jerry Pinto, Jacksonville University.

Shannon McGillis, Opposite General Counsel.

Jim Super Waterways Coordinator.

Andrew Fraden Waterways Commission.

Rick Hartley Waterways Commission.

Mike Barker Waterways Commission.

Jay Hobson Waterways Commission.

Matt Jones, Waterways Commission.

Thank you, gentlemen and ladies.

Let's stand for the Pledge of Allegiance.

Thank you so much.

Our first order business is the approval of the minutes from the April 15th meeting.

Could I get a motion, please?

Thank you.

All in favor.

Any opposition?

Motion carries.

We have the St.

John's River Status Report on Water Quality and Manatees by Dr.

Pinto.

Dr.

Pinto, the floor is yours.

Thank you.

We're still in a drought.

I'm sure everybody knows that by now.

Water management district has declared water shortage.

We have very high salinity as a result.

We've had some rain recently in the last few days.

It's hardly put a dent in it.

So the salinity levels in the river in all areas are running slightly elevated.

We've had a little cool down of a degree or so.

We're about 77 degrees.

Still, although we've had probably a couple of inches in the last few days.

Mixed algae in the area, but no toxins, no harmful algae blooms.

In terms of manatee deaths, we've added two since our last meeting.

So there was a another manatee death at the Queen's Harbor Lock in Duval County.

And that's a situation we probably need to keep an eye on since we've had two now so far.

Actually, near the Coast Guard station.

In terms of manatee flights, I managed to do a flight in April, and there's a map attached there.

It shows you we had 88 manatees in the area.

So they're definitely back, and I'm getting calls from everybody and people are actually using our manatee app to uh take pictures and and upload their sightings as well.

Uh so that's that's going very well.

Um with that, I'd be happy to take any questions.

I know we have a uh and uh Mr.

Suba will probably talk about this later, the um Manatee and Voting Safety Press Conference, but I'll let him talk about that.

I'll be happy to take any questions.

Thank you, uh Dr.

Pinto, Mr.

Freden.

Thank you through the chair.

Uh two death one death is pretty bad at Queen's Harbor, just a small little lock.

Two is pretty much a tragedy, I guess.

Uh is it because when it's opening and closing, or how is this happening?

Yeah, so so typically manatees use that inner coastal waterway as a travel corridor.

So they're coming into our area up the intercoastal and they'll branch off into these various tributaries, and Queens Harbor is one of those areas they like to take a rest.

Um the lock uh master there.

There's three folks that operate that lock.

Uh let those animals in and out.

They take a lot of trouble to keep an eye out for them.

But sometimes when the lock is opening and water is rushing through it, sometimes animals will get dragged into that uh if they're close enough, and sometimes uh the lock gates will shut on them as that or as the water is is rushing, it'll that helps to close the gate.

Sometimes it'll it'll help to they get trapped in that invariably.

Sometimes I get up behind the gate when it's open and they get crushed behind the gate.

So there are supposed to be sensors on those on those uh uh gates to alert the lockmaster about that.

Um it's it's unfortunate it hasn't happened in a long time, but it seems like we've had a couple now uh in in since the beginning of the year, and so that's a little concerning.

Is there any other community with locks that has a solution?

You know what?

Well, there are locks throughout Florida.

Um, you know, if we go down towards the Oklawaha, there are a number of locks there that were in the um uh across Florida Barge Canal area that have been operated in the in the same way.

They have sensors and they they're they they pay attention to manatees, but invariably sometimes uh there are there are problems that have that occur.

Uh and it's unfortunate.

We need better technology, hopefully, that is that um mandated for the tech for the uh sensors or is that just on their own?

No, I think that's required by state law and the Indangered Species Act that requires them to have that that on there.

But sometimes those systems break down, they malfunction, they you know they have their their quirks and uh and sometimes when that happens these these problems occur.

All right, thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Freyden, uh Mr.

Barker.

Uh through the chair, doctor.

Um, when you see something like this happen, because this could be, you know, two and then 10 years and none, and the average is uh sometimes you just get hit by lightning.

But when you see something like this, is there any mechanism anywhere, whether it's J U or the City, to have somebody run out and just take a look and consult with the lockmaster.

Yeah, um, when the first one happened, I contacted them.

Uh usually what happens is FWC is contacted and they go out and they recover the animal and they do a necropsy and they determine cause of death.

Um and then that triggers various things at the state level and at the federal level regarding manatee protections.

Umce the second one has happened, I've I've I've made contact with them, and I'm gonna try to go out there and and and see if there's a better way to monitor the situation.

They do keep a log and they do keep good records of it.

Um I've just had trouble getting out there being being uh we've had the state go out there and talk to them about manatee protection, but when I've approached them about it, they have been more reticent, I would say.

So I'm still working on that, and hopefully I'll I'll I'll get out there and talk to them.

So through the chair, it's you volunteering to go out there and kind of consult with them, but it's not a formal response.

Right.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you, uh Mr.

Barker, um, you know, Dr.

Pinto, thank you for your report.

Uh when you were speaking of rain, I I uh I chuckle within myself.

Uh I love the rain, don't get me wrong, but um for the first time, and I've been around meteorologists uh for decades.

For first time I keep hearing this resounding chorus of beneficial rain, beneficial rain.

But uh it's a terminology that clearly uh paints the pictures to how severe the drought is.

So uh thank you for your report.

Um I want to acknowledge uh or recognize uh commissioners uh Hardesty and uh City Council Member Pelusa who are now with us, and uh Matt Jones.

This is his uh first meeting, correct?

Uh thank you, Matt, for uh stepping up and serving on the uh the waterway commission.

We now have a uh presentation from the uh Jacksonville Sheriff's Office Intelligence Unit.

Um gentlemen, floor is yours.

And it's gonna be more than three minutes.

Yes, sir, it is.

I could go on for a long time.

Well, I I saw three on the clock.

I just didn't want you to get scared by that.

Uh good morning, Chair, members of the waterway uh commission.

My name is Lieutenant Kevin Kilcoin with the Jacksonville Sheriff's Office Marine Unit.

It's an honor to speak with you today about the work the Marine Union officers do on the St.

John's River and the corresponding waterways uh throughout the city of Jacksonville.

The Marine Unit is responsible for ensuring safety, enforcing state and local boating laws, and responsible for answering emergency calls for service across one of the largest, most active waterway systems in Florida.

From routine patrols, port security missions, search and rescue, supporting and integration with state and federal enforcement partners is crucial to protecting the lives while keeping the waterways safe and accessible for everyone.

Today I will provide a brief overview of our operations, current challenges, and how we are working to enhance safety and coordination across our area of responsibility.

I appreciate your time and continued support.

Uh before I begin, I'd like to introduce my boss, Chief of Homeland Security, Mike Shell.

So I'll start with a uh an overview of the uh the marine unit itself, go over some statistics which have been printed out for you, and uh we'll talk about these subjects as as we go through them.

So personnel, we're on a 11.42-hour patrol schedule.

Uh, we have four officers on each schedule uh monitored by a sergeant.

We have two officers that come in at 6 a.m., and we have two officers that come in at 1230.

That way we have continued coverage.

We train once a month where all the officers will come together and train a wide variety of of subjects, whether it's towing, port security, uh taking individuals into custody, traffic or vessel stops.

So we're responsible for 75 square miles of navigable waterways within Duvall County.

Uh we're staffed year-round.

There are some positions uh like the beaches will have positions with officers where they're not staffed year-round, they'll pull them to other duties during the winter time uh when it slows down.

Most of our um enforcement comes from Florida State's uh statute chapter 327 and 328.

So this is our uh facility location.

We're located in the Arlington area, kind of the dead end of University Boulevard.

We're right next to the uh Lions Club boat ramp.

We have to drive through the boat ramp.

Uh we have a secured gate there.

Uh the entire facility is secured, and we have a corresponding dock right there.

So the building's about 6200 square feet.

We have eight boat lifts and two floating docks.

One of the floating docks is on the outside, uh, one is on the inside.

Uh so this is the uh front of our building.

As you can see, there's a uh roll-up door on the left hand side.

There's a corresponding door on the backside, so we can actually pull in a pretty large boat and store it inside.

Uh to the right of that, you'll have the uh standalone generator.

They have a 600 gallon tank up there.

So during hurricane season, we'll stage JFRD assets there.

We'll stage, you know, dive team members there should they have to deploy uh in the Arlington area to help out with you know swift water operations, flooded rescue.

Uh we're pretty self-sufficient with the generator system that we have.

The officers, one thing that's a little bit different with that building.

The officers are responsible for uh for cleaning it.

They're responsible for coordinating, you know, getting the grass cut, the bud guy coming, the maintenance of the building that's a little bit different than your typical patrol officer who's not responsible for that at a uh you know a district substation.

Uh this boat was seized as part of a narcotics investigation, but that just shows you like how large the interior of the building is.

Uh that's a 32-foot boat, so from you know, the tip of the trailer all the way back to the outboard motors, you're probably looking at 40 feet.

Uh so we can store a pretty large vessel in there, especially if it sees as evidence.

The property room is not gonna have that capability.

The building has an alarm and has you know CCTV, so it fits those uh Calia criteria for storing of evidence inside there.

These are our typical patrol boats.

Um, so kind of what happens when officers show up in the morning, they'll come in there for their shift, and you notice the boat on the right is about halfway down.

So they'll come in, lower the boat halfway down, uh fill the coolers full of ice, make sure their backpacks are on there, get ready for their shift.

That way it provides a quicker response.

They can just walk out on the end of the dock should they get a call for service and immediately launch.

All three of these boats in line were purchased through the uh port security grant uh funding program.

This is our largest boat right here.

This is uh what's called a landing craft.

JFRD has a couple of them.

You see on the front of the boat, it has two knees where you can push up against a structure, stabilize it, and that front door will come down.

We've utilized this boat for um homicide investigations.

We put entire teams of homicide detectives on there.

Uh medical examiner's office has gone with them, crime scene units.

If we have a death on an island, we can take everyone out there.

It's not really a pursuit style of patrol boat.

It's more of you know allocating tons of resources on there.

We can also use it for mass rescue operations.

Uh we've delivered we've probably put 35 firefighters on there to take them to a barge where the barge was on fire before, so it's that's been a great tool.

Um, here's a picture of the boat in the parking lot.

It's too big to take down the road, but we can take it from the parking lot to the Lions Club boat ramp.

That's the great thing about the marine unit being next to a public boat ramp.

Is that we can launch it there immediately.

Uh, here's just an exterior picture of our dock that has all eight lifts on there.

And this is a 2010 silver ship, 28-foot.

We actually have two of these vessels.

We have a 2011.

Uh, but this is our workhorse, it's an aluminum style boat.

Uh if you notice it has a soft-sided collar around the outside.

We prefer uh vessels with soft-sided collars.

So it's air in there on the outside's foam, and then you have a protective barrier.

So that's really beneficial when you do a vessel stop, you pull up to that boat.

Um, you're not having to put out fenders, you can just tie up with a with a fiberglass boat.

If you pull up to another fiberglass boat, it makes a very unique sound when that fiberglass starts to crunch, and that's an expensive sound too.

Uh so it helps reduce liability and claims of liability on the city.

Right behind that boat is a uh a 30-foot um silver ship, it's a similar style boat.

We recently added armor to that boat around the center console uh for port security missions or taking uh violent suspects into custody.

We do have two jet skis.

We use these primarily for Fort George.

Uh, we'll do deployments out there.

Uh, right behind that is a John boat that's a typical 15-foot aluminum job boat.

We use that, that's a great tool.

We use it for very shallow water.

Uh, probably once a year, twice a year, patrol will call us, they'll chase a suspect into the water and a retention pond.

He won't come out, he might be armed.

So we'll put that on the back of the pickup truck and and go out there and coordinate the response with our uh SWAT team.

So I have some printed out calls for service for you.

Uh so you can kind of look at at the calls for service, the volume, the time frames.

Uh so we're close to a thousand calls for service a year.

I pulled the last three years, and then if you notice on the days of the week, um, we're typically busy starting on Friday, Saturday, Sunday, and then the calls will slack off, you know, during the week.

So we structure the maintenance of the building, we structure the maintenance of the boats, the boat lifts themselves for during the week, ensuring those officers are spending time on maintenance during the week, that they're out on the water being more visible on the weekend.

Uh, to the right of that, if you look at the calls for service by hour, you know, that covers our time.

There's not a lot of calls for service in the middle of the night.

They really start to roll in at 6 a.m., really, 7 a.m.

is when they they start to pick up.

Uh, we do have officers on call for when we get a request in the middle of the night, which does happen from time to time.

So the next slide, I pulled the top 25 addresses.

If you notice the correlation there, a lot of bridges.

So we got a lot of jumpers.

Not everyone that goes up on the bridge jumps.

You know, luckily we have good officers trained that can talk them down.

Um but that does happen.

You'll see a lot of addresses with bridges and then boat ramps.

Boat ramps and bridges are the two common themes of where a lot of our calls for service generate from.

That's the latest information on the FWC website.

The 2025 report is not public yet.

So I include the surrounding counties because a lot of boaters.

If you take Fort George, for example, you get a lot of people that come from Nassau County, they'll come south into the county and go to Fort George, get a lot of people that go to Fort George from St.

John's County, so they'll go north.

Uh Clay County, get a lot of people that come out of Clay County, come into Duvall.

So that our total area is about 65,000 boats.

Uh St.

John's County ranked number nine for um as far as most boating accidents.

Our number is going to come up for 2025 because we had the boating accident where the uh the family left the Lions Club boat ramp, they went towards the Dames Point Bridge.

Uh there's an accident there where they lost four family members.

So there's four deaths that just that one incident.

So that number will come up for 2025.

Um here's some more key findings.

The one that I would really highlight is lack of boater education remains a major concern.

65% of operations involve fatal accidents, had no formal training.

And then we'll kind of get into to more of why that is.

So I provided each of one of you with a pamphlet.

You know, education is really important to us.

Uh, I really encourage the guys, you know, not to sit out there and do stops all day long and just write tickets.

You know, educate uh the boaters of the waterway.

The waterways really aren't marked as far as speed zones, manatee zones like the roadways are.

So when you're operating a boat, it's sometimes it's hard to read those signs, so that's where the education part of it comes in.

We also are very fortunate that the um the Jacksonville boat show provides us with a free booth during the boat show.

So we'll share that with FWC.

We brought our JSO recruiters there before, so we'll constantly engage the public as far as education.

These pamphlets, which are in front of you are on every single boat.

Officers hand these out daily to stops that they make.

We'd rather hand out something like this, explain to them what they're doing wrong than hand them a citation, and then we just have more information.

We have the map on the inside.

So things that have uh changed and affected us is obviously the boater freedom act of 2025.

So now we have to have probable cause to do a vessel safety stop.

Another issue that was kind of buried in that bill that a lot of people don't catch on to is uh we have to have probable cause to do a marine sanitation equipment inspection, and that's a fancy word for checking a toilet on a boat that's over 26 feet that's out of dock to make sure that the Y valve is turned off and that they're not dumping their waste overboard.

So we used to do that a lot.

All officers have these green tablets, they make contact with the boat owner, they go onto the vessel, um, they dump the tablet in the toilet, they flush, and if you look to the outside of this picture right here, the water is bright green.

So if you go to the next picture, the entire marina is pretty much green.

So this is out in the Trout River.

Uh vessel safety.

So there's a lot of uh laws under vessel safety in chapter 327, but two of them that we get asked about the most is what's the deal with life jackets for kids?

So under six, under 26, you got to have a life jacket for a kid.

So where that comes into play is let's take, for example, that 32-foot contender I showed you a picture of that was in the bay.

If that boat's riding down the river and you got a four-year-old sitting in the seat, they're not required to have a life jacket.

So you're not gonna be able to stop them.

The Coast Guards rule is 13 and under unless they're in a berthing uh area with inside the vessel.

It's kind of a strict uh rule with the age.

You know, the state statute is 26 feet.

So really boats have gotten a lot larger, a lot bigger, a lot faster since the COVID area.

Uh so 26 foot boat used to be a pretty decent sized boat.

I would say it's probably average, if not small now.

Um the next question or the next issue that we arise a lot is uh boater safety education.

So if you're born before January 1st, 1988, you can literally go to your boat dealership, throw your Amex platinum down, and walk out with a 400, $500,000 boat with quad motors.

You know, some of these motors are up to 600 horsepower each, and there's no formal education.

So that can create problems on the waterways.

You know, it's different than a car.

You gotta have a license to drive a car, you gotta take a motorcycle class to drive a motorcycle, all the training that's required to go through to fly an airplane, but for some reason we have a date, a birthday for a vessel.

Another uh issue that we get a lot is bow riding.

In 2016, they took the bow riding uh language out of the careless operation.

Um, so we get people that point out, hey, those person's bow riding, you need to stop them.

Uh we can't do that anymore.

This is bow riding.

So they're sitting on the front, the boat's going fast in motion.

Uh, if that person falls off the front, there are no brakes on boats.

So uh the operator is pretty much gonna run over them.

Um, so that's you know, definitely a safety issue that we still see a lot.

You'll see a lot of kids riding up on bows.

Um, so that's another challenge that we face.

Florida State Statute 328 does a lot with uh titles, hen numbers, transfers of ownership, uh registrations.

We did a lot of that probably four or five years ago when we were doing a lot of shop inspections when uh the whole boat theft ring was was really popular.

You get these groups that come up from Miami.

You know, they were stealing boats, taking them back down to Miami, ripping the motors off of them.

So, you know, we're doing inspections on the serial numbers of the motors, the hens, uh, you know, transfers of ownership through the uh department of um or through our David program where we look at uh driver's licenses and titles and all that.

That's kind of slowed up.

A lot of those theft rings have moved more towards uh just ripping out the electronics in the vessels, so they'll go up to some of these boat barns and they'll they'll walk at the middle of literally, you know, a $5,000 GPS unit, it's four screws, and you just unplug it in the back, and they you know, some of these boats have four or five of them on there now, and they can just wipe out an area pretty quickly.

So they don't really aren't going after the outboard motors and the whole boats themselves like they were five years ago.

Port security is a uh is a big mission for us right now, uh especially since the wars popped off.

Uh we work with the Coast Guard a lot, we're working with Jack Sport.

Uh we're trying to ensure that we have a multi-layered approach to the threat scenarios that that come up.

You know, we're working with the area maritime security committee doing those tabletop exercises, uh talking about mass rescue operations.

Right now, at the request of the Navy, um officers twice a day are going down to NAS Jacksonville, looking at the security zone at the end of the runway, making sure there's no suspicious persons down there, and then we're also doing uh ship escorts through uh NAS Mayport.

So not every single ship that comes in will provide an escort for, but if there's a threat, if the ship was involved with something high profile recently, then uh two boats will go out there.

They'll meet the boat, the ship at the uh the seaboey.

They'll escort them in.

They move pretty fast, so it's not like it's an all-day event.

And then we also uh have officers going out to Jacksport, checking on sensitive ships that are coming in, and then the cruise terminal as well as a sensitive area for us.

Here's a picture of a ship escort.

They move, like I said, move pretty quickly about 20-25 miles an hour.

So we'll just go out and make sure there's no suspicious vessels in their way.

Here's another one with the cruise ship just going around the cruise ship, making sure no one's tucked in there underneath the dock or between between the cruise ship and the dock.

Our waterborne response team is a uh critical mission that we train a lot.

It's for we use it for active shooters, we use it for uh taking suspects into custody on boats.

Um, you know, that's kind of more of a dynamic uh platform than typical on the roadway or a house.

So right here, you have SWAT members.

There's a training scenario.

They're working with trying to take the guy at the front of the boat off there, making sure he's not armed.

But in the background, you look, there's a big weight coming, right?

So that's gonna throw those guys off.

They're they're not used to that.

So that's kind of why we we do the training.

Uh we have a boat operator on there that's communicating with those guys, and then the SWAT operators got to figure out how to get that guy off the boat.

Um, you know, typically it will make them sit on the gunnel of the boat, and you just kind of bear hug them and pull them straight back and take them into custody.

Uh, this is why we train for that.

So this call came in.

This was a 9-1-1 call of a female on a sailboat out in front of Atlantic Beach, probably a mile off the beach.

Uh, my boyfriend's holding me hostage.

He's got a rifle to my head.

Of course, Atlantic Beach.

They don't have a marine unit, so they're gonna call us.

So uh an officer and a sergeant went out there.

Luckily, they were able to get her off, talk him down, uh, take him into custody and uh get the rifle off the boat as well.

So he went to jail that night.

We took him back to Mayport Boat Ramp and turned them over to uh to Atlantic Beach.

But going out of the inlet at night, there's not a lot of cover for officers, so it's it's a pretty dangerous situation.

Second question I get asked a lot is when we take someone into custody, how do we transport them?

So it's a little bit different than a patrol car.

We always put them in front of the center console so that way the officer can maintain visibility of the individual.

We don't want them for officer safety practices behind them.

If that person were to fall out of the boat or something to happen, we want that officer to be aware.

So we always put them in front of the center console.

Uh, this is another armed guy on a sailboat.

Um, so these two officers were primarily on the marine unit, and then sometimes what happens if we don't have enough people to put on the boat, we'll we'll call it into patrol and meet us at this boat dock.

We'll put the patrol officers on the boat and then go out there, stabilize the situation, and then um, you know, if we're gonna take them to jail, a lot of times we'll just transport them to the back of Bergman Plaza.

There's a marina there, so we'll go to the back of Bergman Plaza, we'll tie off right there, and then we'll just walk the suspect up to the back door of the jail.

So we're not tying up control resources.

Special events is a uh a big heavy lift for us.

Um, I'm sure I'm missing some special events off there, but we work every single jaguar games.

The sea and sky air show is a big lift, especially when it's in the river.

Uh we were working Fuhrerkin Friends, but New Year's Eve fireworks with the fireworks shows, we'll go meet the barge uh south of the Fuller Warren.

We'll escort the barge in, make sure that they're set for the fireworks, and then we'll escort them out.

Make sure there's no boaters underneath the bridges that they do fireworks off the bridges.

Uh the Greater Jacksonville Kingfish Tournament's a big one.

The boat parades are also a heavy lift, and then we also assist other counties with special events because they're gonna come help us with our special events.

So it's a mutual aid thing.

Uh we don't bear any cost of them coming up here and assisting us.

So we put uh signs at each end of the main street bridge and the heart bridge.

So officers before the special event, uh they'll go turn on these signs, they flash the lights, lets everyone know to slow down the area.

The reason we slowed them down is because the water taxis are running at high volume.

We want to ensure that boats aren't going through there, waking them.

We get the remotes from Captain Suber, he gives them to us usually the night before, and um the officers will just go out there, turn them on.

When the special event's done, they'll turn them off, and um we'll go about our our day.

And speaking of special events, we have the Iron Man coming up this weekend.

So the we're gonna shut the entire river down, pretty much from Metro Park to the full worn, and it's gonna be a huge lift for our marine unit.

Um we can't enforce a safety zone by state statute.

So it's important that uh we work with our partners with the Coast Guard and get the captain of the port to establish that safety zone.

And then here's a map of the outlay of the different units.

So I'll start from right and to and go all the way to left.

So at the right, you'll have the U.S.

Coast Guard, they're gonna bring out an 87-foot boat and another smaller boat.

Next to them, you're gonna have Nassau County's gonna bring all their marine unit assets, and we're gonna have a line of jet skis.

We'll have eight JSO boats.

Then St.

Augustine Police Department's gonna help us out with a boat.

We'll have more jet skis or more boats on the uh the opposite side of the FC FEC Railroad Bridge.

Clay County's gonna bring all their boats.

St.

John's County is gonna bring a majority of their boats, and then we'll have FWC.

So you can see from this one picture, there's a lot of interagency cooperation and ensuring that we all can communicate effectively.

And then, of course, you'll have JFRD staging boats throughout the route as well.

But um, this will start at 7:30, is when the swimmers are scheduled to jump in the water, they'll be given a max of two hours.

Uh, but you know, really from 6 a.m.

to probably noon that day.

That's it's gonna be a lot of work for our officers shutting down the entire river and not letting any vessel traffic uh come through.

So here's a statute that we can uh enforce for for safety and security zones once that's established by the captain of the port.

Here's another example of a special event.

This is air show, doing the same thing, the safety zone.

I mean, these blocks, you know, the north side is probably two or three miles long.

They're basically trying to push all the boats around the uh the outside of the safety zone.

So again, we'll ask all the other counties for their cooperation, help us out.

Uh, we'll do detailed maps, we utilize our uh communications with through our social media platforms with JSON putting these maps out, educating the public as much as we can.

Uh hazards to navigation is a big thing for us in the river.

We pull a lot of stuff out of the river, to be quite frank.

There's a lot of hazards that are just floating in there.

Uh, we typically pull them to the nearest boat ramp, and then we'll coordinate with with uh Jim Suber about removing them.

Um the amount of concrete floating docks that gets pulled out of the river.

I mean, it's probably a monthly thing.

Some of them are bigger than others.

I have no clue where they come from.

Um, but if you hit that at night, especially with a low profile to the water, you know, it's it's gonna be life-changing to say the least.

Um, here's another one floating down the river.

As you can see, it's headed towards a line of docks.

You know, that gets into someone's dock, it's gonna cause damage, and they're probably not gonna be able to identify the owner and recoup any compensation for that.

So we usually grab onto them and tow them to the nearest boat ramp.

Um, so each one of our trucks is equipped with a winch on the front, so we'll when we get it to the boat ramp, we want to get it up the boat ramp as much as we can so it gets it out so we don't have a high tide that will come up, lift those floating docks, and then wash them away.

Some of the floating docks we can get out, some of them we can't, just depends how big they are.

Uh, this is a giant piece of carpet that I was on a boat that we hit going about 30 miles an hour, and it literally stopped our boat into place.

Uh just floating down the middle of the river and a dark, dark water, big giant piece of black carpet.

Uh, it was probably thrown overboard from a ship, but that's a pretty big uh hazard to navigation.

So, again, we remove it, take it to the nearest boat ramp, and try and get it out of the waterways.

One of the things that we really train a lot on is inlet navigation.

You know, our Mayport inlet, especially depending on the weather conditions, can be pretty hazardous.

Uh, if we have to go offshore to help out the Jacks Beach or Atlantic Beach, you know, typically the weather, when we get those calls, the weather's not going to be very good.

So we try to avoid a situation like this below the picture where boats flipped over and up on the beach.

This is our inlet.

We'll go through at different times, ensure that officers are aware of the markers.

Misjudging the markers as they going out or coming in, can be can be life-changing.

Uh, this is a father and son going out the inlet.

They misjudged the markers, they took a right-hand turn, and um it was high tide, early morning.

They probably couldn't see very well.

Luckily, they were okay, but that boat sat up there for you know, probably a few weeks before it was removed.

The Jose Fernandez death, he was a pitcher for the Miami Marlins.

Uh, him and three others were killed when they went out the inlet.

Um, I always put this picture up because if you see the red marker in the background, if they had gone around that red marker coming back in, he'd still be alive today.

They hit the rocks going 65 miles an hour.

Here is a route that he took when he went out the inlet, and as he came back in, he misjudged the turn.

So going through this training, explaining it to the guys that it's extremely high liability.

Here's another picture of his boat.

Um, and then this was last week.

This was north of us.

Again, someone misjudged the inlet.

So it can rip the hole in the bottom of your boat, and then that boat's up on the beach.

Fort George is definitely our party area.

Uh for Jacksonville.

It's huge.

There's about 8,000 members on the Facebook group.

Umficers are required to go out there and ride through on the weekends between calls for service.

We do a lot of training.

Fort George takes a lot of training because the sand in there constantly moves around.

So there's there's kind of like these natural channels that form that people go in there on.

So we're constantly training officers to go in there, you know, remove all the lines to the markers they have on their GPS and put new ones in.

We'll find a dead low tide.

We'll work with our drone unit to go in there, find those points because the reality is we're gonna get calls for service in there.

We had, you know, one death in there last year.

Uh we get fights in there, you know, people flying through there, disturbances.

It's just a hot spot party area.

Um, and then you know, not to throw other units under the bus, but this is a call for service we got where um where we went into Fort George for a depth, and you can see three different agencies are up on the sandbar.

They can't get to them.

Um, and that comes back to training, getting your guys out on the water, getting them training, making sure they're you know they have that local knowledge and that area familiarization because we were the only ones that could respond that day.

Those guys are gonna have to wait six hours until a tide comes in and lifts them up.

Uh we do work a lot with the manatee protection zones.

Uh we work uh anytime there's this is a manatee in Ortiga that we followed around for a couple hours until uh the manatee research team could get their boat together, get their volunteers together.

This manatee had suffered some type of uh distress where it couldn't get down underneath the water.

Everyone's calling 911 about it.

Um, so the manatee zones are kind of confusing.

Um, this is all the Duval County.

So, south on the intercoastal, you see right here, right above Chick-upit Bay.

That's actually a manatee zone.

That area is a very high traffic area.

So you get a lot of boaters coming up from the south, going north, going towards probably Fort George, uh going out to the St.

John's River out the Mayport.

We've been working for years to get markers put in there.

They'll put markers in there and they're out two weeks later.

The current just rips through there, or they'll put markers really far to the sides where it looks like you have to go into the interior of Chick-upit Bay.

It's just we'll we'll sit there usually on the weekends.

Um, I encourage my guys not to write tickets right there because it's really not with that well marked.

We do more education than anything.

As you can see, you come around Ready Point, the manatee zones get a little bit more confusing.

So you got a thousand feet on one side, you got 300 feet on the other, you got middle of the channel, 25 miles an hour.

And then you get down by the hard bridge, it's just the middle of the channel, 25 miles an hour.

You get south of the the county, they kind of get more consistent, uh, and then all the way down to uh to Doctor's Lake.

Aviation accidents, they come and go.

Um I had three in one year.

Uh this guy crashed his plane back in the back of Mill Cove.

You notice there's a lot of water around that he he did it on a uh direct high tide.

He when I pulled up to him, he was standing on his wing, he was ready to get off and uh no injuries, but Mill Cove, because of its proximity uh to Craig Airfield, we have seen air uh aviation accidents there before.

Uh this is the 737 that went off the runway uh at NAS Jacks that pretty much landed close to the water.

Uh as you can see the firemen, that's a landing craft there, same boat we have, they'll push up, put those knees on knees on there, and then that way they can start pulling people off in large numbers.

Uh this is another helicopter crash back in Mill Cove, he actually landed on an island.

Um, this guy walked away without a scratch.

I don't know how.

But this is a common, we do get these in waves.

Excuse me, Lieutenant.

How much longer?

Um two minutes.

Thank you.

Sorry.

Uh, we do a lot of search and rescue.

Um this is a uh the I would say the new thing with search and rescue is drone unit integration.

So we just had a recent um uh drone unit uh training.

Uh training scenario with uh all the surrounding counties, our federal partners launching drones off boats, how the drones communicate.

Um that's definitely the way of the future.

This is just a um uh search and rescue we did with the fire department for the missing firemen.

Uh our capabilities for search and rescue are about 90 to 100 miles offshore.

Uh about that, we're kind of outside of our our range.

And then I can kind of fly through this.

Um I put a little orange tab up there with your with your pamphlet.

These search and rescues for um for kayaks, we get these a lot, and these pose a lot of challenges to us because kayaks are not required to be registered in the state of Florida.

So part of our education is we hand these out to people like, hey, put your name, your number on here, so we can contact you one if it's lost, two to determine whether this individual is missing.

Did they fall off their kayak or did high tide come and get it and wash it away?

So we got to call the air unit out, the drone unit out, we got to go through our whole list.

Where if we have a boat that's registered in the state of Florida, that provides intel for us.

We can uh you know, send an officer to that house, identify family members, emergency contacts.

Like, hey, you know, is your husband home?

Did he lose his boat, or did he go out and hasn't been heard from since all right?

Any questions?

Thank you, Lieutenant.

That was uh uh eye-opening for me at least as to the uh the vast role that that uh of service that you provide.

Uh we have a couple of uh commissioners, uh Jimmy Peluso.

Would you uh thank you, Chair?

Uh I appreciate thank you for the presentation.

Um so you did mention the uh the bow riding uh as one issue.

I find that a little bit odd that the legislature would kind of not not continue to pursue that, at least at certain speeds, perhaps.

Do you know if that's been no?

I think it's kind of been shelved to be honest with you.

Yeah, and then the other one is you mentioned you know, and you're right, you got a license for a car, you got kind of a license for these other things.

Um when it comes to boat training or whatever else, is that common in the state of Florida?

Are we allowed to do that in the state of Florida by county?

Or do other states kind of pursue that sort of model of license for something else?

Yeah, I've never seen so in Florida, it used to be the opposite.

I mean, Jim, correct me if I'm wrong, but I think everyone used to have to have a boat or safety card, like years ago.

But I at some point the legislature changed that.

I think I see a butter safety card in the back.

Yeah.

Go ahead go ahead, Captain Super.

If you don't mind.

Just to educate me, I I'm not familiar.

Well, basically the rule was there was no rule.

And then it became a a phase in process to where uh it's now it's phased in to the point where it that date has has been that way for a long time.

And matter of fact, since that date.

And so um it's progressively turning.

Um the Florida Boating Advisory Council with FWC has asked them to draft legislation to get the the uh commission to um give permission to do legislation next legislative session, okay or the bow riding issue, and as well as making it uh all boating uh well required license.

Oh, all right.

So this is something that's at least moving in the right direction, it seems like.

Yeah, I would agree.

I mean, it definitely needs to move that direction.

Yeah, all right.

I I just got educated.

Thank you so much.

Uh Ms.

Fraden.

Thank you through the chair.

Um when you're talking about the life vest for the children.

I heard two different numbers, so I'm a little confused.

You said under six for under 26 feet.

Then I heard 13 and under.

Yeah, so that's a Coast Guard rule.

That's a federal regulation.

So what is the law is it every Florida State statute is uh um under 26 feet and under six years of age, they have to have a life jack.

So if you're eleven, twelve, thirteen, you don't have to wear it?

No, sir.

Okay, thank you.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Uh through the chair.

Um you had pictures here of the May port jetties and several boats, you know, on the rocks there.

It at low tide, there's a good portion of those jetties that go underwater and sometimes barely underwater, uh where they're not visible.

Uh I have actually worked on several efforts to try to get a marking uh where there's that identifies the end of the jetties, even when they're underwater.

Uh and it turns into a sensitive issue with the, you know, the Coast Guard is says that you know the channel was clearly marked with the seaboys and all that.

But for the maybe non-professional uh boaters and all that, the end of the jetties at many times, especially during the times of year with the high tides and all, they don't know where the end of the jetties is.

But every time I've done this, I've kind of hit a brick wall.

Uh I think it's something that this the waterways commission should look at, uh, but before we initiate anything like that, I wanted to see what your thoughts are.

Being you respond to those boaters in uh as you showed before in South Florida, there was a death of baseball player.

Uh sooner or later, somebody somebody's going to get killed in one of these accidents on the end of the jetties.

Now, over the years, this is counterintuitive for me because I've made a pretty good look living in the shipyards repairing those boats and ships that hit those rocks.

Yeah.

But it is a very dangerous, in my opinion, unsafe condition.

But what what is your thoughts on some marking at the end of the jetties?

Is that something?

I don't think it's a bad idea.

Uh you got to make sure the marking is gonna stay there, especially with Mayport because there's so much water that flows out.

So that's what I see a lot with markings in the river.

There's a little the contractor put a marking in there, and you know, two months later it's halfway down the river, so it's not really marking the area anymore that it's net is part of the issue because whatever is put there would have to be significant, something that would last uh with the weather.

So it's not it's not a simple thing.

Yeah, I mean part of part of it for me is training.

Like I want my guys to be trained not to cut the corners, to go out all the way to the end of the C buoy or uh into the markers and then make your turn, whether you either go south or north and follow that same route back in.

Because like you said, if it's a high tide and it's at night, those rocks are gonna be difficult to see.

Some inlets are better.

Uh St.

Mary's is definitely very notorious for having you know having rocks that are extremely difficult to see even during the day.

Uh people have hit them.

I think most inlets, there is some sort of a board.

Through the chair.

Okay.

I'm sorry.

I just say that most of the inlets similar to that.

There's some buoy that's closer to the end of the the jetties than what ours is.

And yeah, I mean, it's those those things disappear even in the daytime at at high tides.

Yes, sir.

It's it's high liability.

Thank you, sir.

Uh Mr.

Hopson.

Through the chair, thank you.

Uh thanks for being here.

Appreciate y'all uh coming in.

I just want to say uh dealing with them firsthand experience.

Um I work district one, so we work both sides of the river, and and the four bridges that we got to deal with.

So we get a lot of jumpers, we get a lot of deceased persons in the river and things like that.

And uh, it's a very valuable team that we have.

They're a very good team, they're very responsive.

And if y'all have need anything or you're seeing things on the river that maybe it's not being addressed, um, please let me know or any of us know and to be see what we can do about it.

So appreciate y'all being here.

Thank you.

Thank you for your support.

Thank you, Mr.

Jones.

Uh, through the chair, I just wanted to offer a personal thank you for you and your team and all the stuff that y'all do for the river because there is no way we can preserve our resource without a good relationship with the FWC and the JSON Marine units.

So just wanted to say thank you.

We know you got your hands for, at least I know you got your hands full out there.

I've been a boater on the river for about 30 years.

So, seeing a little bit of everything.

Just wanted to say thank you.

I appreciate your support.

Mr.

Gay.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

Through the chair, to the lieutenant.

Um the Fort George uh sandbar out there.

Uh I totally understand, and uh uh I've been out there myself, so I know what's going on.

I know what y'all are I know what y'all are up against.

So I appreciate all the effort that y'all have to the challenge there that y'all have to deal with.

Um I would like to request a little more as the weather warms up and we get more boater activity.

The Shad Creek, that cut through there, I get a lot of complaints about the we have somewhat of a uh uh slow zone through there, but it's totally ignored.

Okay, and so I I get constant calls and emails and text and uh so we can kind of get that on our radar as well to try to help curve curve the speed through there.

Uh greatly appreciate it.

Thank you.

Yes, sir.

We'll uh we'll put that on our list.

And Mr.

Hardesty.

Through the chair.

Um I see the red stickers that you were referring to earlier and your pamphlet.

Um I have a bait and tackle store and to have contact with most of the other bait and toggle stores in town.

Are there extra are there extra uh stickers and pamphlets that we could potentially use?

I mean that's that's a great point of of use uh uh that we could capitalize on through the bait and tackle stores.

I was wondering if there's been any thought in uh attempting to do that and a drive with uh the red stickers for uh the safety identification.

Uh yes, sir, that's something we can definitely do.

The pamphlets we definitely hand out to all the uh the boat rental places.

That's part of our education program too.

So we'll just go to these different boat rental places around the Jacksonville area and give them a stack so we can we can make that happen.

Great.

So you would you guys be coming to the individual stores stores, or is that something we could arrange to pick up from you or you can come through me, we can arrange either either one.

I can I can stay after and get your information.

We can go from there.

Great.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Hardesty.

Lieutenant Kilcoin, thank you for what you do.

Uh I've just in the uh 20 30 minutes that you've shared with us.

Uh it's remarkable given the uh uh small number of personnel that you have uh to accomplish what you do.

It's clearly without some collaborative effort uh from the uh adjoining agencies, you uh I don't think you'd get it done.

Uh it's just remarkable what you guys do.

And so thank you, uh A for sharing, and thank you for the service that you provide to our boating community, which uh clearly uh uh needs a little bit more attention.

Thank you, sir.

Thank you for your time.

I appreciate it.

Yes, sir.

Uh we have some announcements.

The uh define Duval County um outreach event invitation that's gonna be Thursday the 14th.

That's tomorrow from uh 6 until 7 30 at the uh there's a waterway tour on board, the St.

John's River Taxi departing from the Hyatt.

Uh I don't know if you need to sign up for this or how how would you uh if you're gonna participate, apparently you have to be there by 5 45.

The uh the fine board meeting is on this coming Friday, the 15th at 8 a.m.

at the Hyatt Regency.

Uh there's a nomination uh committee meeting that will begin at 8 15 and the board meeting begins at 9.

Uh as you heard um uh Lieutenant Kilcoin said a second ago, the uh St.

Johns River will be uh closed.

There's a closure notice.

The Coast Guard sector is issued at uh for the Iron Man uh competition.

And on Monday, I'll have uh Mrs.

Suber speak on this.

The uh safe boating week and Manatee Awareness will have a press conference, Mrs.

Suber.

Thank you, Chair.

Through the chair, uh just wanted to everybody knows that Monday uh at 10 o'clock on the 18th, we'll be doing a uh satisfying our manatee protection plan requirements and having a press release about the uh manatees returning to the river as well as this safe boating week starting Saturday this Saturday, and so we'll uh we'll talk about safe boating as well as uh the uh Manatee awareness issues.

It's gonna be at the uh St.

John's boat ramp to the west of the St.

John's boat ramp on the new deck that has just been completed there with the backdrop being on the north bank across the river and also we're gonna have it there to uh get it away from the cleanup of the Iron Man on the North Bank.

So uh be plenty of parking there available, and if you're more than welcome to come and uh participate.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mr.

Subaru uh Mr.

Peluso.

Thank you, Mr.

Chair.

I just want to give one more announcement.

At 11 o'clock today, we will be doing the ribbon cutting at the um at the music uh uh park right on the riverwalk, right next to River Walk, Riverfront Plaza.

It's also going to be the ribbon cutting for um the the bridge over in front of the the Brooklyn section of the river walk.

So we are reconnecting the river walk.

Point being is as the waterways commission.

You know, this is this is part of our mission.

How do we make sure that we are getting more and more of our residents and other residents tourists as well to come to our river?

These parks are going to be central to it.

Um and it's obviously uh great for our own residents in terms of healthy living.

That's at 11 o'clock today.

I'm actually speaking at it, so I'm gonna have to run out of here in about 15 minutes.

So hopefully our agenda can move quickly and everyone can get there.

Thank you, Mr.

Hardesty.

Just a quick announcement uh regarding the artificial reefs.

Um, we have made great headway um and gotten a contractor uh moving forward.

We'll be deploying the reef.

We estimate uh in August.

Uh it's a 500-ton uh rubble reef that will be deployed uh in the Harms Ledge area.

It's the first uh artificial reef that this community has um backed um in about 20 years, and so this is a a great start.

The Jacksonville Offshore Sport Fishing Club has uh done some really heavy lifting along with uh Jacksport that has provided us Buck Island to stage uh the materials and uh JEA is providing a a lot of rubble uh that they would otherwise have to pay to um uh get rid of and that sort of thing.

So it's been a great community effort.

Our own uh Melissa Long has done a a great job pushing this along, and so it's been a big team effort on the artificial reef uh committee, and I'll have some pretty exciting things to share with you.

And we're planning a uh a big deal when we um when we deploy this reef.

It's a hundred and twenty thousand dollar um uh state FWC grant that we have not applied for as a county, and uh we're looking for many more of those to come.

So we have now an organization to make this happen, and um I want to thank the members of your waterways commission for backing us on uh on getting this deployed uh to this point and look forward to more help as we go.

Thanks.

Thank you, sir.

We now move to public comment, Ms.

Hobson.

Do we have uh only three cards and three minutes?

Uh we'll start with Mr.

Carnell Oliver.

Name and address.

Uh, yes, my name is Carnegal.

I just want to get straight to the point.

I'm not addressing Carnell addresses on file.

I'm gonna get straight to the point.

Uh there's been a lot of words salad being used on this commission, but what is actually the work of the community being done?

And uh in the function of consolidated government, there's only three entities, a three-headed serpent that's been operating consistently and not really being reflective of the needs of the community.

On the books, we have the neighborhood bill of rights, but does that really have any enforcement?

Consolidated government has really failed the perspective of black American communities, especially.

I feel like with the expertise, the people that have the insights of every institution, every gatekeeping institution, especially our business partners that represent commerce need to work within the confines in a disciplined approach, working with the neighborhoods that have access to our waterways, the power and structure is too consolidated, and in my mind, I feel like the CPACs should not be appointed because on the legislative side and on the executive side, there has failed to provide clarity to the people in neighborhoods that they show solely represent people like John Nooney has been coming out here for a long period of time talking about waterways, access to public waterways, but one of our biggest problems is these NGOs being a lapdog of the corporations in the city and also our educational institution.

You cannot tell me I don't see things clearly, because all of the furniture has gotten broken so fast, I see all the development projects are moving faster because a lot of things are getting exposed.

And when I look at that war in Iran, and I see all the broken process in this city, you take out the critical infrastructure, and I'm getting better at it because I know how I hit my target that I need to hit, and a lot of the politicians on city council seem not to understand that.

Because partisan politics don't do nothing piss everybody off.

We need to bring the power back to the people.

8356 Baskum Road, you know, Jacksonville, Florida.

And uh, you know, waterways, you know, I've been coming to the waterway commission meetings for decades.

You know, yeah, find you that uh get togethers tomorrow.

Pat Callaway is our fine representative, and find, you know, that's our Adbalan property tax money.

Millions and millions of dollars year after year after year, and there's so many parts that comprise the mission of find.

And you know, one of them, you know, is uh public access on our waterways, and you know, I'm just out of two minutes, but uh, you know, FWC, you know, it's the Fish and Wildlife Commission, and you know, uh I also honor you know our chair, Denomaro.

You know, it's you know, uh, you know, with the hat, you know, uh fishing with Crady.

You know, there's so many acronyms you can have with this fishing with council, fishing with Congress, fishing with class, classrooms, and speaking of classrooms, you know, underneath the shirt is the Duval County Public School Superintendent Christopher Bernier, FWC fishing with Chris.

But uh what I want to do is I have three handouts that I'll just submit.

You know, one's the mayor's disability council.

Here's the minutes.

The next is the true commission, taxation revenue utilization of expenditures.

This is billions of dollars.

You can go into them.

But here's the other one, and this uh you know you hear the declaration of independence.

This is the declaration of education, the 2025 0867.

That was the joint meeting of the Duval County Public Schools and the City of Jacksonville, had to do with our CIP, capital improvement projects.

You know, Nick Halland, you know, gets super, you know, bonus points for this one, and CIP, you know, classrooms in Pottsburg.

You know, when you talk about downtown, you know, you you got this thing.

Here's the downtown Jacksonville visitors map.

You know, you had Kayhaas, you know, at the last waterways commission meeting.

Called me out twice.

You know, I went uh took the kayak out yesterday, you know, under McCoy's Creek, right underneath the Emerald Trail.

18 seconds.

Here's the map.

And you know what?

Kayak Launch isn't on there.

This is only five months old.

And we want to tell the world to visit Jacksonville, but you're not gonna find it.

Thank you, Mr.

Nooney.

It's not on the map, Mr.

Jake Roberts.

Good morning.

Uh Jake Jacobs, 14155 Pine Island Drive.

Uh, I'm pleased to uh say that Councilman Diamond has committed to introduce uh a line item in the budget for the watershed study analysis, uh Hog Penn Creek, and doing what he can to get it pushed through.

Uh I've received the support of a number of city council members, and just today, the Jacksonville today uh reported that the mayor's office stated that the administration will execute it uh if council adds it as a budget line item.

So please I ask for your support of the study, which is essential for determining the uh sources of the sediment buildup and determining long-term solutions.

Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

Moving along on the agenda on the new business.

We've got a couple of legislation, but I don't think uh action is required.

I'll have Miss McGillis' uh opine on this.

Um 2026, 332.

That came before this group last month, um, before it was filed, and this, and I advised and I stand by the advice that that this body did not have any um footing to act on it.

Now it's before you today, having already been filed, and the council president has assigned it to be reviewed by the JWC.

So now you have grounds to act on it.

So this is a approve or disapprove vote.

Go ahead.

Thank you, Chairman.

Again, this is the contract that I present.

My name is Eric Hinton.

I work with the planning department.

I administer the manatee protection program.

Um again, this is uh what I presented on last month uh to address one of the questions that came up regarding uh cost-sharing funding opportunities.

I was spoken with FWC, and there aren't a lot of grant opportunities specific to manatees.

There are, I believe, uh grants for habitat restoration and things like that, but it's tangential to the vanity protection program.

Thank you, Eric.

Uh, do I need a motion for approval?

Second.

All in favor?

Aye.

Any uh opposition?

Motion carries.

Thank you very much.

Thank you, Eric.

Uh, next item is uh 2026 uh zero three forty-nine, Miss McGillos.

Yes, um this item 2026 349 was actually on the consent agenda at last night's uh city council meeting and was approved.

I spoke to legislative services who uh once the council president assigns it to this commission.

What happens if it's already been passed is now the second one that's come before this board, and um, but it's still on the agenda, and that's just a matter of um how quickly this type of resolution goes through, it just can't catch the JWC calendar.

And so what we're going to do in the future is um this was moved, this was an action item, and we've had it just administratively pushed down to just informational.

So it's information that last night uh 2026 349 it passed unanimously.

Thank you.

And it basically uh supports what the Mississauber uh was saying about the press conference on Monday.

Um the uh JWC has received uh emails in reference to the St.

John's uh Mariner Ramp extension on public access.

Uh we had invited the the email sender to be here.

Uh I don't know if he is or he isn't.

Um but uh we also had Brian Burkett to uh come and give us a quick overview as to what is taking place with that project.

Good morning, Brian Burkett, Parks Department.

Uh so I don't know if you everyone's had a chance to read Mr.

Ritterbush's email, um, but he's been uh making the rounds um throughout the city trying to raise awareness about his concerns for the uh boat ramp.

Um give a little background the uh St.

John's Marina Boat Ramp, that's the one on the south bank right next to where the old River City Brewing uh used to be.

That boat ramp was built back in about 65, so that ramp is um you know 60 plus years old now.

Um originally it was built at 42 feet long.

Um, and because we're on the inside of the bend of that river, uh it tends to silt in, you know, sediment tends to collect in that area, so going back 60 years.

I wish we would have put it somewhere else to be quite honest.

It's not the most optimal location.

Um, but you know, that's what we have today, and that is our only ramp in the downtown area.

Uh the next closest would be over in Arlington.

Um in 2005, we did extend that boat ramp 12 feet.

So we went from 42 to 54 feet, because that was a little on the short side.

54 is is are pretty much our standard at our typical for our other boat ramps around around town.

Um, but the issue is again because it's on the inside of that curve, uh it tends to to uh build up with that sediment on a fairly regular basis.

So what's happening is the end of the boat ramp is getting buried in sediment.

Um and we do clean outs.

Uh, we've done dredges throughout the years every every so often.

Um but it's been it's been a number of years since we've we've been able to do it.

Um, in 2017, we received a fine grant to do a dredge particular to that area and to consider the lengthening of the boat ramp you even further um that project was put on on on pause uh because the adjacent bulkhead uh was of unknown uh design criteria and it was quite old and aging and there's a restaurant there at the time and the thought was if we did any dredging we could potentially fail that bulkhead and you know the restaurant could collapse into the river you know catastrophic scenario no engineer would touch it would we couldn't get any sign seal design for dredging in that area so fast forward into the future uh into current time now um that bulkhead has now been replaced you know that site is being redeveloped we have replaced that bulkhead we did receive a fine grant for designing multiple places downtown if you recall you all approved and supported a dredge project for spot dredging throughout the downtown area wherever we have uh access docks in the boat ramp area as well uh that project is now moving forward to construction we have a pending fine grant for the construction phase so I fully expect that we will receive those dollars uh at the end of this year um with that said if that's successful in 2027 probably sometime during the summer we'll be doing those dredging projects throughout downtown which will include this area which will unearth the buried end of the boat ramp and again that's right now at 54 feet um there's uh there's still a a strong interest from mr rhetorbus and um he states that other other folks as well uh would like to see that that ramp lengthened another 12 feet uh we do have a preliminary concept for a 12 foot extension um but uh we don't have any funding for that project right now the funding we have from find is and we can't change the scope at this stage is for the dredging so our recommendation is to move forward with the dredging project see and then reevaluate is there a need to uh consider a lengthening that boat ramp because I think the biggest issue is it's just buried.

We have other than Mr.

Redderbush I don't think Jim we've received any other complaints about the ramp being too short but he's very vocal about his concerns about safety and damage to uh trailers and such and and there and it might be true it's uh um if you had a bigger boat uh you might fall off the edge of that ramp but it is signed where the edge of the ramp is which again is very typical for our other ramps around the city so it's uh if it's not working for a particular vessel there's other ramps that you know they can be displaced too um but if there's a strong interest from the uh city council and and the mayor's office to move forward with funding you know certainly we you know we can do that um but one word of caution again we lengthen it 64 to 64 feet now we've got more ramp that's going to be likely be buried uh with the sedimentation over time you know probably three to five years we would have to do a maintenance dredge to really make you know if we're gonna if we're going to lengthen that ramp we really need to commit to uh regular maintenance dredging otherwise we're going to have a ramp that's you know buried you know for uh and not provide that benefit that he's seeking thank you brian uh when do you see that happening in 27 as far as the dredging uh I would expect to get the grant at the end of the year then we have to go through advertisements and contracting so it'll probably be summer of 27 when we actually do the dredging is my expectation okay thank you we've got a couple of uh commissioners in the queue uh the barker through the chair um mr burkett uh yeah I remember two things one that we were gonna do some dredging to address the problem but then number two am I misremembering or was there a redesign that was kind of proposed but we were waiting to see how the rest of the redevelopment of that area happened, and then we're gonna build in um marina slash boat ramp changes at that time.

Am I not remembering that right?

I seem to remember seeing schematics or proposed schematics.

Right the the property next door uh the old river city Brewing was um sold, uh the city's sold it to a uh a new development company that has I think changed.

I've not um not sure where the current status of the project is uh DIA and public works is uh managing that with uh coordinating that with the developer.

But um, as part of that redevelopment of that adjacent site, there was commitments for the developer to build, uh, restore some of those docks that used to be there that had the fueling on it.

So my understanding is that that is still a commitment that you know needs to be fulfilled.

So it'll roughly follow the same footprint as the previous docks that were in that area, um, and that was another recommendation.

Mr.

Rudderbush's uh email was to also add uh boat slips uh with in this in the uh vicinity of the of the boat ramp.

Um and he was some emails he talks about transient slips and other ones, he's he talks about long-term slips that you know he could put his boat in with the lift and electric power and all as the city we have no long-term slips.

We allow the private industry to to handle that, and that's what we uh um you know foresee happening next door.

So I think slips will be built eventually.

Um I don't know the timeline of that, but the boat ramp we're really kind of pinned in between that development and then the Acasa Bridge, so we really can't widen it.

Um we can lengthen the ramp a little bit, but it is kind of inset from that the bulkhead area, and it's it's just gonna be prone to to um you know set uh for that sediment to be dropping in there.

So I think regular dredging is kind of key.

Whether we lengthen the ramp or not, but it's more so gonna be a factor if we do lengthen it to get the benefit of that extra length.

If I may, through the chair, there was also a parking problem.

There was limited parking or the parking wasn't delineated, and since you didn't have the restaurant design or the the redevelopment design, you didn't know how many parking spaces you could get.

Didn't you speak at one point about there being a very limited amount of parking there?

So there is uh I believe it's about 13 or 15 around there, 13 to 15 spaces at the existing facility.

With the redevelopment agreement for the property next door, the entrance area uh to the entrance driveway to the boat ramp is going to uh be transferred to that owner because that'll be the entrance to their parking garage.

The public works has a project that I believe is already been bid out and they're in contracting now.

The traffic flow to the boat ramp will be that existing parking lot that's underneath the Acosta Bridge, and that's being reorganized to uh move the uh boat trailer spaces over there.

I believe we gained a couple of spaces at the end of the day, and we included some flexible spaces depending on the time of the day and you know what events are happening, those could be potentially available for additional trailer spaces.

Um, but the traffic flow for the boat ramp, you come through that parking lot and then um come in from the west uh in front of the boat ramp, and then you kind of do like a hammer turn.

You go to the south and then back in.

So, so yes, the parking is going to be reimagined and and and uh um to the property underneath the Acosta Bridge and I believe uh we're in contracting now, so I think by the end of the year you should see some uh activity construction wise, and because of that construction and the once the developer next door is under construction, they're gonna have tall cranes, they're building a tall vertical structure.

Um the boat ramp will need to be shut down periodically, you know, to accommodate those uh safety concerns when just construction in close proximity.

Do the chair.

Just one more quick question.

Is this person this respondent?

Is he aware of all this?

That the a lot of this is in the hands of the development the developers.

Uh we've tried to communicate that.

I don't know to what level he understands all the moving pieces, but um yes, we we've met with uh him and uh uh councilman Carlucci's office and uh the mayor's representative was there.

So we we had a whole powwow and talked through all his issues and basically there's no commitment to the funding of it.

We wanted to do this staged approach.

Let's move forward with our dredging project, see what we got, and we're simultaneously looking at what those costs could be.

So we if we wanted to uh if there is an interest by the council to fund that project, um you know, we're look working on getting those numbers, so we you know we'll see what this um what those costs are.

Thank you, Mr.

Burkett.

Yes, there the record reflects Mr.

Barker that there had been um uh meetings uh with the administration and and this individual um to to some degree to explain what all is taking place.

I think, just from reading the email, part of frustration is that things aren't going uh swiftly enough and but this is government.

It's government and it's grants.

Yeah, we're we're tied to grant timelines.

Yes, sir.

Funding, funding, funding.

Uh Mr.

Hobson and then Mr.

Hardesty.

Thank you, Mr.

Chairman.

Uh, through the chair, two things.

So we're going forward, would it be better to focus on the funding of the dredging rather than funding a whole new project?

Would be my first just to address that.

And then two, with that bulkhead issue and the new project going in, do we have a lot of safety concerns with that bulkhead on that area?

And is that going to be addressed with the project?

Correct.

So the new bulkhead is completed.

Um, and it's now the the issue before was it was old and we didn't have as built drawing, so we don't know how deep it was.

So no engineer felt comfortable, you know, dredging next to and uh you know uh questionable bulkhead.

So now we know how deep it is, and it's pr plenty sufficient.

It won't be a hindrance for any of our plans.

Um, and the funding for the dredging is pending right now.

It's it's uh um we submitted an application earlier this year to find to fund the construction of the the dredge project.

So again, that's not just this area but multiple spots throughout the downtown area.

So um we've been very fortunate, uh, we're getting almost everything that we've asked for in recent years.

So I fully expect that we will get the funding uh for the dredge project.

So that will, you know, there shouldn't be any uh hurdles for that moving forward uh in the summer of next year.

Just when we're through the chair.

So that's great for next year, but then what about five years down the road?

We have to do the whole process again.

Or is that something is that something we need to look through the city council for funding as hey, every three years, every five years.

That's correct.

So the uh is a developer.

There is no funding set up currently for maintenance dredging.

Uh the grant program that we're using for this project, um, while they do so certainly support their f their funding this project, um they don't like to see requests for like maintenance dredging, like a continual thing, you know, keep coming back to the well.

If it's once every 15 or 20 years, they understand that needs to be done every once in a while.

But if it's if it's truly a maintenance dredge that needs to be done in a frequent um turnover, then they kind of expect us either to uh fund that ourselves or um try to design a solution that would um minimize the the frequency of dredging that would be needed, like building some groins out there and you know it's uh that would be quite expensive and challenging in that in that tight area.

Um so yes, that to answer your question.

There is no funding set up um for that maintenance dredging, but uh, but we can you know when that can be certainly a conversation we can have, particularly for this area where it's more troublesome than others.

Through the chair, um one observation is is where that's located, uh it's pretty constrained as far as ingress, egress, uh, with boat trailers and that sort of uh any sizable boat, and I think that makes it a show stopper right there to extend the ramp.

There's be no reason to extend the ramp if you were unless you were attempting to accommodate larger vessels, let's say 26, 30 feet and up, and with the roundabouts and that sort of thing, it it just makes it uh quite frankly a a traffic mess.

Uh and then when you limit the number of parking spaces that you have, uh and there doesn't seem to be a a good horizon for more, uh, I think quite frankly, you'd be just pouring good money after bad to extend the ramp that makes honestly no sense.

We're trying to shove a square peg in a round hole, it just does not fit there so maybe there's another site near downtown to create a facility that would work uh but but trying to band-aid this quite frankly seems like a folly okay thank you thank you miss burquettes for your time and thank you uh commissioners for your comments and uh moving to some old business we've got uh Shad Creek uh resolution update from uh council member gay as well as the George Crady bridge.

Thank you Mr.

Chair um as far as Shad Creek um still working uh with Captain Subert uh and um to be able to get get all the information pulled together that the uh FWC and all will need so uh that's being being worked on and so hopefully we'll have something soon on that uh the George Crady uh bridge uh unfortunately the state went our representatives went back in session and have uh uh we're unable to meet in May like we had thought we were going to be able to so as soon as we can get a clear time with them when they'll be free to to be here uh we'll get that meeting uh back on the schedule uh but that that's that's all we have for right now thank you.

Thank you Mr.

Gay uh is there any other uh business to come before the uh commission this morning again uh lieutenant kilhor kilcoin uh thank you for your presentation this morning is there any other business to come before the uh Mr.

Hobson are you reaching for the mic go ahead through the chair I just want to say um uh noticed we had a newsletter go out I thought that was very informative and like thank uh Barbie for putting that out and uh and uh getting that moving uh for us and then and for the committee good catch on that I uh I commended her uh in person uh if you guys haven't seen the uh newsletters yet she uh she's done a marvelous marvelous job and uh she is committed to uh to do it again and again and I think that in this uh generation of um uh different communication vehicles uh this is something that not only helps inform the public as to what the Waterways Commission is doing but it also engages them so I I think that uh the newsletter is just fantastic so you're right sir uh she's done a marvelous job with that with that said uh if there's no other business we stand adjourned until next time