We are going to recess as the City Commission and reconvene as a special session of the community redevelopment agency.

And as the community redevelopment agency, we have also approval of minutes from December 2nd, 2024.

Move approval of the minutes of the special um community redevelopment agency minutes from December 2nd, 2024.

So moved.

Second, I'm sorry.

Any uh Commissioner A.

Hercouch moved approval of the December 2nd, 2024 minutes.

Uh Commissioner Batty seconded.

If you all vote, Commissioners Is that your vote?

Yes, yes.

All right.

The motion passes.

Next item is item CRA to community redevelopment agency.

And it is uh concerning the financial statements into the CRA financial statements, independent auditors report, and required auditor communication letter from independent auditors, Forbes Mazar's L L L P for fiscal year ending September 30th, 2024.

And I'm going to call upon our financial administration director Strickland and Jeff Wolf partner at Forvus Mazar's LLP to make a presentation.

Good morning, Commission.

My name is Kelly Strickland.

I'm the director of financial administration.

And with me today, I have our auditor, Jeff Wolf from Forbus Mazars, and he is going to give you a presentation on the CRA financial statements.

Thank you.

Good morning.

You may or may not be aware, but the CRA financial statements are included in your in the city's Act for financial statements and really include in that audit.

This is really more about compliance.

It's a state requirement to have standalone financial statements for the CRA, but these numbers have always been included in the city's financial.

So they've always been audited.

So really the importance is compliance.

And when I say compliance, I mean really are the revenues being calculated correctly and then are they being received and recorded correctly in the CRA?

And then of course, are the expenditures being spent in accordance with the CRA plan.

So that's really the key of this audit, not so much the financial information, it is whether it's really whether the CRA is in compliance with uh Florida statutes, which you'll see there really is no issues.

Um this is kind of one of those presentations where no news is good news when it relates to compliance.

So I I will keep that keep it brief.

Um you do have a handout, which is our required required communication.

Um government auditing standards requires us to communicate certain amounts of governance, basically our responsibilities, management, responsibilities, um, significant disclosures in the financial statements, whether we had any difficulties, which we did not.

Um so, but since you have the handout, um it's kind of standard driven.

I won't go into detail, but just we know if you have any questions on it or would like to discuss at any time, you could always reach it out to me.

Um so with that, I'll go into the reports.

Um independent R report, and that really is whether the financial statements are materially correct.

Um we had an unmodified opinion.

That is the highest level of assurance you can receive that your financial statements are correct.

Um our next report is our yellow book required report on internal controls.

Now we don't test internal controls to render opinion.

Um we do it really help plan our audit, meaning if we saw weaknesses in internal controls, we would adjust our procedures.

Um but if we did note any significant deficiencies or material weaknesses in controls, we would report that to you in in this report.

But again, um no findings, no issues noted in this report.

Um our next report is the um Reneral Required Management Letter.

Again, this report is really more geared towards compliance, um, whether there's any financial issues with the CRA, um, if there's any recommendations or findings that didn't quite meet that level of material weakness or significant deficiency, we would record those in this report.

Um, but again, no findings, no issues noted with that report.

Um our last report is our independent accountants report on um compliance with Florida statutes as it relates to investments and the the compliance rules related to CRA.

So this is really the the meet, the important report, you know, whether the CRA is compliance.

And once again, um no findings, no issues noted.

So really um in summary, it was it was a clean audit.

Um the CRA remains to be compliant um with Florida statutes.

And at that point, if there's any questions, I'd be more than happy to answer.

Okay.

Uh Commissioner A.

Hernkoch, and we have 10 minutes in the first round.

Yeah.

It's uh not so much a question as uh just uh I wanted to speak to this because um, as you all know, there was a bill to basically do away with CRAs.

And one of the impetus and the the reasons for that bill was um because they're serving as sort of slush funds and and not monitored uh capricious spending by municipalities.

And this work proves that that's not the case.