All right, everybody.

It is Monday, October twentieth, twenty twenty-five.

So I'm calling to order our regular Sarasota City Commission meeting.

And if you haven't done it yet, if you want to turn off your cell phones or put them on site, and I'm going to ask the city elderly clerk for the invocation.

Yes, Mayor, thank you.

Um, please remove agenda item number six point two, approval rate, authorizing mayor and city auditor clerk to execute the collective bargaining agreement between the city of Sarasota and the citrus cannery, food processing and allied workers drivers, were housemen and helpers affiliated with the international brotherhood of Teamsters local number one seventy-three per the request of interim city manager bullet.

And that's all the changes that I have, Mayor.

All right.

Thank you.

Um we have a uh motion to approve the changes to the order of the day.

So move.

Okay.

Second.

All right.

Uh Vice Mayor moved to to approve the changes to the order of the day.

Commissioner Ulrich.

Seconded, and Commissioners, if you will vote.

Is that your vote?

Yes.

Yes.

All right.

Um the changes are approved.

Okay.

So, Commissioners, we have a uh uh a presentation this morning.

So can we just need to approve the proposed agenda schedule?

Oh, I'm sorry.

I did yes, since we approved the changes.

Okay.

Um uh approval for the proposed agenda schedule, Commissioners.

So move.

Second.

All right.

Um Vice Mayor moved approval of the proposed agenda schedule.

Commissioner Bath T seconded, if you will vote, Commissioners.

Is that your vote?

All right.

Then we can now do the presentation.

We have a legacy business, and I would like Commissioner Ahern Koch to come up and do this presentation.

Well, thank you.

Um this is uh legacy business proclamation, uh whereas the City of Sarasota Legacy Business Program recognizes the contribution of local long-standing businesses as an important part of the growth and prosperity of the city.

And whereas on December 8th, 2002, Madison City Grill opened for business as an upscale European style outdoor cafe.

And whereas for 23 years, Madison City Grill has operated as a chef-owned local restaurant, and whereas Madison's City Grill has been a city fixture and a contributing asset to the vitality and the prosperity of downtown Sarasota since 2002.

Now, therefore, the City Commission of the City of Sarasota, Florida, and on behalf of the citizens of our community takes great pride in recognizing Madison City Grill as a legacy business.

And uh Mr.

Paul Madison, would you please come on down and accept the legacy business proclamation?

Would you like to say a few words?

Um Thank you very much.

It's it's um it's humbly and an honor to um be recognized.

Um it's been a great twenty-three years.

Um love Sarasota, love the city, appreciate all of your hard work and everything you do.

Um and those before you that uh I've interacted with many times over the years and putting this restaurant together and and uh and it's been uh it's been a win.

It's been a great uh home run for us.

We've loved being here, and we look forward to many, many more years in uh in the city of Sarasota.

There's anything we can do to be a part of the community to support anything of all of your efforts and uh and everyone's in the city, we're our door is always open.

So thank you so much for the honor.

I appreciate it very much.

Um I I would also just like to say uh a few words about uh Madison's full disclosure.

I worked for Paul for twelve years, uh PR in marketing when he uh was just starting out uh in downtown Sarasota, and I'm very, very, very proud to have worked for this man who is not only a talented and incredible chef, but also a very smart businessman and a very, very kind community contributor.

It was actually um Paul Thorpe, Mr.

Downtown, as everybody knows him, was um scheming to figure out how we were gonna get our downtown revitalized.

And he got a hold of Paul Madison, he got a hold of me and some other folks and said this is somebody who can really get this done.

And um through Paul's uh design and working with the community, managed to create a very important corner of the city of Sarasota and turn it into a vibrant, welcoming, open space.

Aside from Say Levy, this was I believe the only only the second place in downtown where you actually sat outside.

Back in the day, nobody thought about sitting outside in downtown Sarasota.

And so uh Madison's uh having officially haven't have been a part of the business.

Um I would I always say credit with uh at least a major part of turning downtown Sarasota around into the vibrant place that it is today.

And Paul's an incredibly responsible uh business owner and uh just a very uh very good um human being.

And I would also like to state for the record, I have always recused myself on any votes uh involving Madison's, even though I don't work for him anymore and haven't for over eight years.

There's still something that you know makes Madison super special to me.

So thank you, Paul.

Thank you.

I just want to add a a quick remark.

When I uh moved back to Sarasota in 2002, of course you were already open at that location, and it's one of the things with the tiki torches and the outdoor seating that I was like this is the place where I want to live.

It was very, very magic magical.

So thank you for what you've done, Commissioners.

And thank you for revitalizing that corner.

You make that corner.

Thank you very much.

And that's where I go with my family whenever they come.

Thank you.

Thank you everyone.

Congratulations.

Okay.

Um I'm going to ask the uh city auditor and clerk to read the pledge of public conduct, and then we will have our um citizen comments.

We have three four people signed up, and you have three minutes each.

And when you speak, be sure to state your name and whether you're a city resident.

Thank you.

Thank you, Mayor.

We may disagree, we will be respectful to one another.

We will direct all comments to issues, we will not engage in personal attacks.

Thank you.

Okay, we have Martin Hyde, David Lowe, Chris Johnson, and Sean Patton.

There you go.

All right.

Mr.

Hyde.

Indeed.

Well, obviously I remain that very same one.

Um for those people that don't follow these things, was a consent agenda item removed from uh today's agenda.

Um does tell some what the story about what making assumptions about agreements being made turns people into.

Uh the assumption was per the consent agenda that the Teamsters Union would agree to a proposition that uh was made to them that in part uh gave no raises to those people that were already entitled to so-called step increases, leaving 27 percent or about eighty-three of them to uh to be offered not a raise but a thousand to fifteen hundred bucks, which in practical terms is about two percent, which essentially is a paid cut.

Um I guess the question here is you know whose idea was it?

How did you ever think that that was ever going to pass?

There was no way that anybody is going to agree to uh to a pay cut.

It's really not the staff's fault that you'd already spent the money.

I told you months ago that your budget has to include salaries, because it's your biggest ongoing commitment.

Uh you chose not to do that, and now what you're facing by way of your payroll is about a two and a half million dollar black hole.

As another FYI, the part of the negotiation that was in that consent agenda too was some allusion to the fact that the health insurance wouldn't go up uh after this year for another uh two years.

That's a blank check.

You you can't possibly have any idea what that would be.

In practical terms, the city's increase over that time is likely to be collectively several million dollars that staff wouldn't be asked to participate or in that's something that you need to budget, something you need to include.

And then lastly, more general point.

Um you know, you have over doubled your budget over a period when inflation was uh 35 percent.

And then this is always how it was going to end.

But it's not fair to put Stacy Mason, the H.R.

director, out as a sacrificial lamb for the folly and the mistakes that uh that you guys have made.

And it did culminate, and just bring it to uh to the fore here, in a rather disturbing two-page anonymous email.

It wasn't from me, because I don't do anonymous, but uh anonymous email detailing in part sexual harassment, cronyism, and misuse of opiate settlement funds.

And uh, you know, that's a relatively serious set of allegations.

And my last thought here is if you don't want another Natalini gate, a couple of you were here at the time, I'd suggest that you investigate this prong time.

Thank you.

David Lowe.

Yes, David Lowe, a uh Rosemary District uh resident in Miles.

Can you put that on the screen, please?

I'm gonna present just a couple numbers today.

Why?

Because I know you have your strategic planning session in about nine days, and as a workshop residents may speak.

So that's one thing.

The other thing, uh the housing authorities having a board meeting this Wednesday, and I know that on their agenda is the possible parking there.

So just a couple things.

Uh here's the Rosemary District.

I don't expect you to read this, but those shown are in the number of units in each of those buildings.

You can see how the rosemary is kind of filling out.

Um the orange are uh under construction, the yellow are planned and the red are existing.

So what this amounts to is there's around 3300 dwelling units in the Rosemary today.

And depending on your math you know, how many people per unit I know Vice Mayor Trice and I have talked about that.

I use 1.5, you pick a number, but it's a lot of folks.

Now, here's the thing.

With the about 500 under construction today, and give or take another 500 on the pipeline, we will have uh over 3,000 dwelling units in the Rosemary in five to seven years, and again, whatever your math is, around 5,000 people.

And the other number, that number 36 down there, is the number of people estimated per acre.

And think of that density and what that can do in terms of helping support public transit and other needs that a dense uh kind of uh neighborhood have.

One good bit of news, uh still on the left-hand bar there, 26 percent of the dwelling units in the rosemary, according to my projections in 2032, will remain senior or attainable or affordable, whatever you want to call them.

So we are building stock, whether it be loss and lemon or two, and I mean it just shows you what a why I think the rosemary is great, including our first tattoo parlor now, I might add, so which has come in.

Here's one vision of McCollin's uh apartments that the housing authority is thinking about.

This is my particular vision, and I know to Mr.

Bullock's point, aspirations have to meet reality.

But here's one way of thinking about structured parking in this building with retail on the ground floor, with experiential making the rosemary, the 15-minute city.

And the final slide is Astor and Lynx is testing out one of the I'll call it IRIDE 2 concepts.

So that's another uh element here.

As you go into your strategic planning session, some things I respectfully suggest you keep in mind.

Thanks.

Thank you.

Uh Chris Johnson.

Afternoon, Commissioners.

My name is Chris Johnson.

I'm the Chief Operating Officer at the United Way of South Sarasota County.

We are the lead agency for both the long-term recovery group for Hurricanes Ian, Idelia, Debbie, Helene, and Milton, as well as the community organizations active in disaster.

Also recently the recipient of the disaster case management program funding through FEMA and through the State of Volunteer Florida.

I'd like to give you an update today on what we're doing countywide with the long-term recovery group and with the DCMP, the disaster case management program.

To date, the LTRG has completed 120 rebuilds on homes, helping families impacted by these five storms, returned to safe, secure, and functional housing.

We uh continue to actively raise additional funds for reconstruction, every bit of the funding that we've used for reconstruction we have raised ourselves.

We're thrilled to share that we have succeeded to the continued support for world renew for another two years.

World Renew offers volunteer skilled labor force that comes into our community.

They have already contributed about 1.2 million dollars worth of labor in the past two years, and we're blessed to have them continue to support those recovery efforts for Hurricane Helene and Milton over the next two years.

In addition, we have secured partnerships with several other volunteer labor groups, including the Minnonite disaster services, praying pelican missions, and Presbyterian Disaster Assistance.

These greatly expand our capacity to rebuild homes.

The long-term recovery group has also secured the purchase of a 16-foot box truck so that we're able to transport building materials and appliances to work sites.

However, we continue to have an ongoing need for a warehouse to store construction supplies and donated materials.

And that's something that we continue to work with other agencies to try to find a partnership to do.

Currently, the long-term recovery group has 78 active cases spanning from Hurricane Ian through Hurricane Milton, and our case managers are in the process of making the first initial 540 outreach calls to those that are on the FEMA ISIL list.

There are 70,000 people on that list, and as part of the disaster case management program, it's our responsibility to make sure every one of them is reached.

On that note, uh the United Way of South Sarasota County has been awarded that 2.2 million dollars of the disaster case management program for Hurricanes Helene and Milton.

This is through Volunteer Florida from FEMA.

This marks a first of its kind pilot program within the state, where an LTRG, a long-term recovery group, is administering the disaster case management program directly.

Normally that's done through a third-party nonprofit that is hired in to do that.

We are grateful to be a first uh to be part of this pilot program.

Um and it required approval at both the state and the federal level.

And we're only one of two counties in this program, us and collier, that are piloting this innovative approach.

And again, the DCMP is case management only, does not consider construction money.

There is no funding available for that, and so we have to continue to raise those funds ourselves.

But we are still responsible to reach those 70,000 folks, and we will do that over the next few years in our processes.

So we thank you uh for all that you do in disaster recovery, and I look forward to uh giving you updates as we go forward.

Thank you so much.

Thank you for that.

Okay, Sean Patton.

All right, good afternoon, Commissioners.

First off, thank you all for what you are doing.

You all have done a lot of work to support the environmental community in Sarasota, and we see it.

I just wanted to give you all a quick morning shout out as someone who advises quite a few towns and cities across the state.

I know how hard your job is.

And I might be one of the few people who truly does.

So thank you for that.

Unfortunately, I wish I could be here on better terms today, but as a small business owner in Sarasota who employs dozens of young people, I was very excited to sponsor and support the Sarasota Chalk Festival.

Long time running event.

We put thousands of dollars into helping support the event, advertising, cleanup, and for a lot of my staff, it was the first ever project that they put money towards that we help sponsor.

So it's exciting.

And then when you see the Sarasota Chalk Festival art, including the permanent installations, you often think of the businesses that support them.

That's one of the reasons why, as a business owner, I support these art installations.

And they were great.

That's one of the reasons why I was a sponsor for the Chalk Festival.

So imagine my surprise when a few months after the Chalk Festival, everything's pulled up, no meetings, no notice, no calls, nothing, no pushback.

What is the City of Sarasota's plan to reimburse or to help alleviate damages for the businesses and the communities that had direct losses due to the removal of all this public art?

Why should I continue to sponsor art events in Sarasota County or Sarasota City if they could be destroyed at any moment?

That's it.

Thank you, Sean.

I just wanted to make the point that this is just comment.

So if the you know Commission is going to respond to anything, we generally do that at Commissioner Comments at the end of the meeting.

So it's not it's not interactive.

All right.

Let's uh move on to the approval of minutes, item 41.

And are there any corrections to the minutes of the special Sarasota City Commission meeting of September 9th?

Move approval.

Second.

Second.

All right.

Uh Commissioner Ulrich moved approval of the special Sarasota City Commission meeting minutes of September 9th, 2025.

Commissioner A.

Hern Kotch seconded.

If you'll vote, Commissioners.

Try it again.

What?

All right.

Okay.

Is that your vote, Commissioners?

Yes.

All right.

Passes unanimously.

All right.

Now we move on to the minutes of the regular Sarasota City Commission meeting of September 15th, 2025.

Any corrections?

Commissioner Ahern Koch.

And a mayor, I submitted some non-substantive questions corrections and one substantive that I will let the city auditor and clerk elaborate upon.

Hey?

So Commissioner A.

Her and Koch brought up under the September 15th and 2025 minutes.

Regarding page 15.

It's the second line and it reads, and the Commission discussed the word neighborhood being removed from the city's comprehensive plan along with city documents.

This is a comment based on citizens' input.

I believe the discussion was not about us looking to remove the word neighborhood, but as to why it was already was already removed.

I think, and I am not sure what is meant by other city documents.

May I suggest adding in the context a little like in response to a citizen input?

Commissioner Ulrich spoke about or something simple to add context.

So from our standpoint, we we get what Commissioner Ahern Koch was trying to state.

So our answer is this is this is under Commissioner Ulrich's remarks.

So that's why we put it there like that.

I don't know if you wanted to chime in on because it's about you.

Speak into the mic.

Oh okay.

Um so the closed caption is um Commissioner Ulrich statement interpreting how she understood the citizens input received and then minutes reflect um Commissioner Ulrich statement.

So that's basically we were just reflecting what Commissioner Ulrich was stating in case it came back up later in uh it was context to what was being discussed.

So um we agreed with some language movement and um that will be reflected.

So I don't know.

You have any more else you want to say?

No, that's uh it it it's you know when you read sometimes you read these out of context and um you know we were there, but if somebody would just read this, you know the statement says that we were discussing removing neighborhoods from the com plan.

Um it just it read a little different to me.

So I thought if we added just some sort of com context and um and uh uh Ms.

Greggs and Ms.

Johnson came up with uh a solution that I thought was very simple, just a one-liner that it wasn't context of citizens and that we discussed it as a body, so um so we just can um have a motion for the updated move approval.

Approval which is the direction I move move approval of the minutes as changed.

Second.

Okay.

Um Commissioner Ulrich moved approval of the uh regular city commission meeting of September 15th as amended and um Did you second it?

It was Commissioner Ahern Koch seconded, and so if you'll vote, Commissioners that your vote?

All right, the motion passes unanimously.

All right.

We are now at item 4-3, which uh the special city commission meeting of September 15th.

Any changes?

I have none.

Okay.

Move approval.

Second.

Um Commissioner Ulrich moved approval of the special city commission meeting of September 15th, 2025.

Commissioner Ahern Koch seconded if you'll vote, Commissioners.

Is that your vote?

Yes, yes.

All right, passes unanimously.

And item 44, uh last minute.

And these are the minutes of the special Sarasota City Commission meeting of September 16th, 2025.

Man, we've been meeting a lot, haven't you?

Okay.

Any corrections?

I had none.

All right.

Can I can I get a motion?

Move approval.

Second.

All right, Commissioner Ahern Koch moved approval of the special city commission meeting minutes of September 16th, 2025.

Commissioner Ulrich seconded.

If you'll vote, Commissioners.

Is that your vote?

It is all right, passes unanimously.

Okay, we go now to consent agenda number one.

We go now to consent agenda number one.

Are there any items to be pulled from consent agenda one?

Yes, Mayor.

Commissioner Aher and Kotch wanted to pull item 6.3.

Is that correct?

Oh sorry.

Oh I put it wrong.

Sorry, 6.2.

Oh no I'm sorry, 6.3 I was saying I I thought I saw.

So just 6.3 correct.

I just want to make sure.

Okay.

And I also have a um citizens input for an agenda item on consent one that is not pulled.

So if you want to still you can hear that after item is that that is for item number 6.5.

Okay.

All right let's uh let's pull it out then.

Okay.

Okay.

Do we have um approval of the balance of the consent agenda which eliminates 6.3 and 6.5.

Move approval of the balance of consent one.

Second.

All right Commissioner Albrecht moved approval of balance of consent one.

Commissioner Aaron Kotch seconded if you'll vote Commissioners.

Is that your vote?

All right passes unanimously.

Okay let's go to item 63 am I asked that this item be pulled just if we could have uh Miss Kelly come down second.

I just asked that this be pulled so that uh Ms.

Kelly could um just make a brief presentation about the grant program and some of the grants that she received and I think it's important for the community and especially the neighborhoods to understand that this program is available and you know that the neighborhoods do apply and it makes a tremendous difference for them and their outreach in a lot of the programs they put together for our community.

Thank you for the opportunity Nancy Kelly neighborhood planner great time to ask this me to come up here because we have a record number of um submissions this year 18 neighborhoods applied and our budget is 4000 with the 18 uh grants it equals about a little over 36,000 the remaining balance we've already had about 15 community building grants which each neighborhood is entitled to one community building grant for 250 to hold a neighborhood event I've already received about 15.

So I'm almost out of money of the 40,000 this yeah as I said I've been doing this for 21 years and I am it's just so thrilling to work with all these neighborhoods to help them you know they're all volunteer boards they're they give their own time and they just want more and more people to be a community.

So this helps these neighborhoods postcard mailings newsletters events landscaping it it brings um all the residents together in the neighborhood and I think it's valuable.

Anything else?

I I would just like to take a small point of privilege and say that I'm you know as a neighborhood leader before I was on the commission I worked with Ms.

Kelly and in a variety of other capacities and she has always put the neighborhoods first and the interests of the citizens in the community first.

Whenever I go to a any neighborhood meeting throughout the entire city she's almost always there and the neighbors always thank her for her help her guidance and her service.

So I just wanted to say thank you.

I appreciate that very much they all love Nancy Vice Mayor yes I I want to thank you also as someone who was a neighborhood person.

A question how many recognized neighborhoods do we have in the city?

Currently ballpark a little over 50.

So already we're giving to 18 you can only do one a year so we've got what 32 that we might be buying for the 4,000 that's left over.

Correct and um oftentimes um some of the neighborhoods that didn't apply weren't part of the 18 have already um gotten community building grants they didn't need the full 2000 but they applied for the 250 and they've already been awarded that.

Well, I'm I'm really enthusiastic because so many of the grants were for communications, whether it was sending out notices of meetings, doing a website, doing newsletters, bringing people together.

And I'm hoping that leading up to next year's budget hearings that maybe you suggest that we increase the grant funding so we can improve you know extend the benefits to even more.

But thank you for everything you are doing.

Oh, and one more thing.

Um neighborhood services in the past had a neighborhood gathering for Manatee County, Sarasota County, and the city, and that was such a worthwhile event.

So I'm hoping that you will look into doing something like that again in the upcoming year.

Yeah, the summit.

Great.

All right.

Thank you.

So much.

Thank you.

I have one more.

Sorry, I'm sorry.

And I saw you there.

Sorry.

That's all right.

So the good work that you do is evidence that we have not removed neighborhoods on the comprehensive plan.

Amen.

Yeah, I I was thinking of saying that, so I'm glad you did.

Um we have to uh I move that we approve this.

Approve the uh grants in as proposed.

All right.

Uh I'll give this to um Vice Mayor moved approval of item six three, Commissioner Batti seconded.

If you will um vote commissioners?

Yes.

All right.

Um passed unanimously.

Now we have item six five.

Um and we have one person signed up to speak on this.

Uh Mr.

Martin Hyde.

You want to hear that first?

Okay.

Well, none of the commissioners pulled it, that's why.

You only pulled it for We only pulled it for you to be able to speak.

Oh.

Well.

My name obviously remains Martin Hyde.

It's uh it's a de facto no-bid contract extension by stealth.

Um first question.

Why put a $370,000 cleaning contract on consent two months after the original contract expired?

And why after four years isn't it re-bid?

Um because they are asking for a 20 percent increase.

Now it does stipulate or state within there that these are additional services, but if things have changed, then things have changed.

And uh one might reasonably say or hope that uh someone would ask the uh the the question why none of you ask about it when you're already looking at a deficit, despite a nine percent millage increase, obviously only you can answer.

It is, as I said, a 20 percent increase on the current contract, so it does merit bidding out.

Um question I I I rhetorically asking, obviously, uh is this actually your decision or one which suits staff?

Because for staff it means no work and no consequences for them.

Um but under your current budget crisis, one might hope staff would be instructed to look for savings.

Yeah, that is what a city manager for 20 plus grand a month should be doing.

Overall, this is very similar to the story of Blockbuster and Netflix.

Blockbuster thought the good times would never end, and Netflix was sending out their videos by mail, and uh they decided if they were to survive, they would have to innovate and adapt.

The uh the last blockbuster store is actually still open in Bend, Oregon.

Um but it's the only one.

The other 449 are closed.

Meanwhile, Netflix market capitalization on the positive side is 527 billion dollars.

So the moral of that is fairly clear.

You have to adapt to new realities, or you have to face the inevitable consequences.

So you know, the simple point here is a fairly obvious one, and I would hope that you'd be grabbing every item of uh of cost.

Looking for savings at this time isn't just good sense and good housekeeping.

It's an absolute necessity, uh unless you want to become the municipal equivalent of blockbuster.

Thank you.

Okay.

Commissioners any discussion or questions or a motion anybody?

Everybody right I'll move.

I'll move approval of agenda item 6.5.

Second Commissioner Ulrich moved approval of agenda item 65.

Commissioner Ahern Koch seconded if you'll vote Commissioners.

Is that your vote?

Yes.

All right the motion passes unanimously thank you.

All right let's move on to consent agenda number two.

Any items to be pulled there.

Yes Mayor Commissioner Aheron Koch pulled item 7.3 and 7.4 and that is all I am aware of that.

Okay.

All right.

Is there a motion to approve the balance?

Let me gotta read them.

Sorry.

Let me read I'll go ahead and read all of them then.

Resolution number 20 26 R 3358 resolution of the City Commission of the City of Sarasota Florida relating to the Florida Department of Environmental Protection State Revolving Fund Loan Program, making findings authorizing amendment one to loan agreement DW580250 providing assurances providing for conflicts several and an effective date.

Resolution number 26R 3359 a resolution of the City Commission of the City of Sarasota Florida relating to the Florida Department of Environmental Protection State Revolving Fund Loan Program, making findings, authorizing amendment one to loan agreement, WW580260 providing assurances, providing for conflicts, several and an effective date I don't like that Resolution number 25-557 an ordinance of the City of Sarasota, Florida amending the comprehensive plan of the City of Sarasota, the Sarasota City Plan, to revise the text of Action Strategy 4.15 of the future land use chapter to provide that the zoning code rather than a downtown master plan is a document that contains the official map of primary grid streets and to relocate the modified text of set action strategy from objective four downtown master plan to objective two land development regulations, repealing ordinances in conflict, providing for the several, providing for reading by title only and providing an effective date.

Ordinance number 5525 ordinance number 5580 sorry an ordinance of the City of Sarasota, Florida to rezone that certain vacant parcel of real property totaling approximately 1.35 plus minus acres located at the southwest corner of Aspenwall Street and Rhodes Avenue with a street address of 351 North Rhodes Avenue from the Office Regional Zone ORD Disc Zone District to the Urban Mixed Use 1 MU-1 Zone District.

Approving site plan application number 24 SP 11 to allow construction of a 17 unit single family attached town home development to be platted as individual lots upon the rezone real property all as more particular set forth herein providing for reading by title only and providing for an effective date thank you very much the balance of agenda number two which is item 71 and 72.

So move.

Second okay Commissioner Batti uh moved to approve the balance of consent agenda number one which include items 71 and 72.

Commissioner Ulrich seconded point of information that is consent agenda two.

Yes.

Oh I said one consent agenda two yeah thank you.

All right and also be roll call Aher and Koch?

Yes.

Albert yes Metty Yes.

Ulrich yes Trice Yes.

Okay now going to is that your vote Commissioners trying to finish by five item 73 Commissioner Aherncotch you pulled that.

I pulled this to have an express vote on it and unless anybody has any comments I would move approval.

Ordinance number two five-five five seven seven second Commissioner Aher and Coch moved approval on item 73 Commissioner Ulrich seconded if you'll vote Commissioners Albert Ulrich Price?

Yes.

Aaron Kotch Yes.

Is that your vote Commissioners?

Yes.

Passes unanimously item 74.

Uh same to have an express vote on an ordinance unless there are any comments I would move approval of ordinance number 25 5580.

Second.

And I would like to make a comment, Mayor.

Sure.

Yeah, I just want to say it's very important for us to be supporting Habitat for Humanity and their support for the people of Sarasota in helping to provide low-income housing and ownership of that low-income housing.

So can I get a motion or did we already have a question?

We already did.

Okay.

All right.

And then also, um, sorry, roll call.

Batty, Ulrich, Trice.

Yes.

And Kotch.

Yes.

Albert.

Yes.

All right.

Motion passes 50.

Motion passes 50.

All right.

City manager search update item nine for unfinished business.

Thank you.

As of right now, today we are thank you all for meeting with the strategic I mean the search firm, I'm sorry.

Um he definitely stated that he got a lot of feedback.

And we our goal is to have the advertisement for you all to review at the next city commission meeting.

So hopefully we can get all of that compiled and you can get that done and have an official advertisement ready for you all to review and hopefully approve so we can kind of forward the process.

Yes.

Okay.

Well, as soon as we get it.

Yeah.

Yes.

That will be on the agenda for formal approval.

Yes.

Okay.

All right.

And that's all the updates we have, then unless you have anything else.

All right.

If there is nothing else, we'll move on to Legislative Public Hearing.

And I'm going to call upon the city auditor and clerk to administer the oath.

Anyone who plans to speak at this public hearing today, please stand and take an oath.

Item 101.

All right.

Do you swear affirmative evidence or factual representations which you are about to give or present to this commission during any public hearing held this 20th day of October 25 are truthful?

Thank you.

All right.

So I am going to open the public hearing on proposed ordinance number 25-5583 and call upon the city auditor and clerk to read the title.

Okay.

Thank you, Mayor.

Please be patient with me.

This is a long one, everyone.

So ordinance number 25-5583.

An ordinance of the City of Sarasota, Florida, amending the zoning code 2002 edition, Article 2, definitions and rules of construction to modify a definition of dwelling unit and protected tree and delete definition of commercial parking lots, Article 3, decision making and administrative bodies to remove the City Commission and Planning Board authority to approve and review subdivision plates consistent with state statute and eliminate and eliminate the requirement that the building official be appointed by the city manager.

Article 4, development review procedures to establish the ability for the historic preservation board to grant variances or adjustment to the maximum density when a locally designated historic structure is reloaded, relocated to a different zoning lot, and modify subdivisions slash platz standards.

Article 6, zone districts to modify building design standards in downtown zone districts.

Eliminate storage requirement in single family zones.

Modified development standards in downtown zone districts.

Modify landscaping plan requirements, modify development standards in urban mixed use districts.

In the men's staging plan requirements, Article 7, regulation of general applicability to modify pool and pool cage setbacks, clarify bicycle standards, clarify that the parking is prohibited in waterfront setbacks, modify recommended tree lists, clarify grant tree permit requirements, clarify tree protection standards during an emergency, modify plant material and installation standards, clarify window sign permit requirements and standards and modify how height of structures less than 30 inches are measured within the waterfront setback.

Article 8 enforcement proceedings and penalties to add certain agreements to be enforced by code enforcement for celebrities of the parts here of providing for reading by title only and providing for an effective date.

All right.

Thank you very much.

Now we're going to call upon our planning general manager Chapterlin and Chief Planner Dobbs to make a presentation.

Thank you.

Good afternoon.

I'm Ryan Chapterlin, General Manager of the Planning Department and Brianna Dobbs, Chief Planner, with us this afternoon to go ahead and give you an overview of the ZTA batch that Ms.

Griggs uh just read off.

So what we're gonna uh do here, we we do this on an annual basis.

Uh so this is the one for 2025.

And uh we have uh roughly 22 individual items.

We'll we'll give a quick overview over that.

And um September 10th, 2025, the planning board heard this and they recommended uh approval for all of these but two, and uh that's number eight landscape requirements and number 15 uh maximum building length, and we'll get into a little more detail on that as part of the presentation.

Uh one other item I wanted to mention there was a there was a ZT item that the planning board heard that has since been withdrawn for for this uh public hearing at the uh uh based on the guidance of uh interim city manager Mr.

Bullock.

Uh it dealt with uh how the building officials appointed.

There's a slight conflict between the zoning code and the city code.

Uh we believe this city code is probably gonna be the more appropriate document uh in which to make that amendment.

So um that'll be coming forward um sometime in the future, but that's withdrawn uh for for this particular hearing.

So with that, we'll go ahead and get started.

Um first one that you have before you here is uh regarding rooftop mechanical equipment.

And this is an amendment that clarifies that equipment uh be fully screened from all sides.

It allows decorative panels including metal to be used, promoting visual compatibility and addressing any confusion related to permitting uh permitted screening materials.

Uh Mayor.

Uh should we ask questions after each item or at the very end?

Uh I I would prefer we wait till the very end so they can get through their presentation.

Um the next item is the dwelling unit definition.

Uh we've received a lot of permit applications for a pool bath.

Someone's redoing the house or building a new house with a nice pool, they want a designated pool bath.

Um currently in the code, the the definition of dwelling unit requires that all the rooms have an internal connection.

This would simply modify that definition to allow uh an attached accessory room to not have that internal connection to the primary residence.

So you see in the graphic there a pool bath that you know wouldn't connect into the interior of the house.

Uh a utility room or storage room could could also have that same type of uh component.

Next item is commercial parking.

Uh right now in the code we have two commercial parking definitions.

Um is a little more restrictive and not as encompassing um as the other.

So we're just gonna go with the uh more encompassing definition to minimize uh confusion and just really clarify how commercial parking lots and garages can be used.

Um it can be four fee or not for a fee.

So just creating that more over-encompassing definition or going with that particular definition.

Setback requirement for pools.

Uh this item really just clarifies that a consistent five-foot setback requirements for swimming pools and pool cages.

Um it helps streamline streamline the permit review and um prevent site design issues.

Um we just want to make sure that you know people going into this when they're building a pool uh that they know that is a five-foot setback.

So if the pool is five feet, you want to erect the cage later on, that may cause an issue.

So it's just making it very clear in the code uh what these requirements are.

Bicycle parking, uh, this simply is just uh clarifying that it applies to all developments or non-residential developments, I should say, either in the downtown or outside the downtown.

Um just just providing that clarity within the code.

Location of parking and waterfront setbacks, again, more of just a clarification within the code, uh enumerating it specifically in the code that it clearly states that uh water uh parking is not allowed in any required waterfront setback.

And I'm gonna pass it over to Ms.

Dobbs here.

Yes, thank you.

Again, Brianna Dobbs, Chief Planner, for the record.

Um item number seven of the zoning text amendment proposes to remove the two-story limit in the RSN 9 district, which is in Laurel Park, while maintaining the 30-foot maximum height.

Eliminating the number of stories is consistent with all the other single family zone districts that currently are only measured to the height and feet.

Uh additionally, there's an amendment to Section 6-1005 development standards.

So that's being updated for consistency with this change.

Item number eight.

Um eight allows lots with a front width of 20 30 feet or less, which is typically an attached single-family home or a town home to plant an understory tree when it's not possible to plant a canopy tree to meet the landscape plan requirements.

This approach is consistent with the zoning code's right tree ripe lace principle, which requires site evaluation and species selections based on factors such as utility conflicts, building proximity, soil conditions, root spacing, and mature size.

And in the zoning code, an understory tree uh does reach up to 35 feet at mature size.

Just a couple more graphics.

All right.

Item number nine uh removes invasive and misclassified species from the protected tree definition.

The reclinata is considered a class two invasive by the Florida Invasive Species Council in a solapal meadow does not meet the protected tree definition due to its typical trunk height.

For item number 10, pink Tabibouya is being removed from the city's recommended tree list because it is now considered a class two invasive species in South Florida, again by the Florida Invasive Species Council.

This amendment does not prohibit planting the tree.

It simply means it will no longer be promoted as one of the city's preferred options since it's now invasive.

Item number 11 reinforces the existing requirement that tree removal permits for grand trees must be posted and grand trees must be clearly identified with an orange ribbon.

Trees that are not properly marked will be subject to a fine.

And item number 12 clarifies that the suspended tree protection standards only apply to trees that are dead, storm damaged, uprooted, or down, and it does not apply to healthy trees.

Um item number 13.

Um existing regulations in the zoning code allow three palm trees planted at 12 feet high to equal to one required canopy tree.

This is the zoning text amendment proposes to remove queen palm as is now also considered a class two invasive, and then it replaces it uh with a ribbon palm to count towards the canopy tree requirement at a three to one ratio.

And uh ribbon palm is considered a Florida friendly.

Item number 14 modifies the existing 12-foot finished floor to finish ceiling height requirement at the sidewalk level to only apply for a minimum of 20 feet in depth instead of the entire depth of the building.

And this is uh similar to the habitable space and finished floor requirements for the downtown um downtown core and downtown bayfronts, balancing design consistencies with primary street standards.

Um we have seen some developments having issues meeting that 12 foot height um throughout the entire depth of the building.

Many times we'll see a liner building and then uh that would be lining a garage in the garage wouldn't need to still meet that entire height standard.

It might be a necessary to have the 12 feet height.

And item number 15 uh proposes to increase the maximum building length from 200 to 250, which allows more design flexibility while still protecting walkability.

This requirement is only applicable to the urban mixed-use zone districts, uh, which can be found along the city's commercial corridors.

One example of a building that exceeds the 200 foot length is Citrus Square Phase 2, which is uh provided an image on the screen.

And item number 16 relocates existing language about construction staging plans for clarity and reinforces that these plans are required for non-residential buildings, all residential construction greater than 5,000 square feet, and major renovations greater than 5,000 square feet.

Existing language and standards are not being changed.

Uh this is simply being relocated to the appropriate location and for the applicability of this section.

Item number 17 allows the historic preservation board to grant densities, uh density variances or adjustments when relocating locally designated historic structures.

The proposed amendment provides relief that may incentivize preserving a local designated building.

Uh and this is going to be used with the McAlpin House, so I'm excited to hopefully see this one get passed.

Um, establishes an expedited permitting process that allows issuance up to 75% of residential building permits based on the preliminary plat prior to the issuance of final plat.

And Senate Bill 784 requires a plat or replat to be approved, approved with conditions or denied administratively rather than going to the planning board and city commission.

So these two changes uh line the city subdivisions and plat process with these newly uh newer Senate bills as well as the new state statute.

All right.

Just a few more to go here.

Uh exterior finished materials.

Uh on primary streets, only specific exterior finished materials are allowed.

Cementitious finish, which is similar to stucco is a common material that should be included as an allowed exterior finishing material.

Additionally, typical window surrounds are made of metal and should be permitted on primary streets.

This item essentially just adds cementitious finish and metal window surrounds as permitted exterior materials on primary streets, expanding modern design options while preserving quality standards.

Enforcement regarding violations, penalties, and remedies.

This relates to just kind of another layer of protection for the city.

Currently, affordable housing agreements related to density bonuses and historic preservation, transfer development rights agreements currently allow the city manager to enforce these agreements through the building division and code enforcement proceedings.

The proposed language codifies this in the zoning code that the city manager may enforce affordable housing, density bonus agreements, and historic preservation transfer development rights agreements through code enforcement proceedings.

Again, the both of those agreements that were mentioned have default provisions in them, just again as another layer of protection for the city, one that we worked with the city attorney's office on to make sure that was uh incorporated in the zoning code.

Uh window signs, this is pretty simple.

It's just clarifying that existing additional window sign regulations applying specific uh commercial zone districts and obliged districts, and essentially just including a cross-reference, if you will, in the zoning code, so these additional standards do not get missed.

And lastly, uh this relates to waterfront property and seawalls.

Um there was a zoning text amendment uh recently that permitted uh the height of seawalls, uh increase the permitted height of seawalls to support long-term soreland protection and resiliency.

Um to do that, property owners may be required to bring in additional fill to help fortify the seawall, which would then increase the natural grade above 30 inches.

Um the proposed amendment will allow for the height of structures no more than 30 inches in height in waterfront setbacks, um, you know, make it maybe a pool or or a deck to be measured from the finished grade versus the natural grade.

And that is it.

Thank you.

All right.

Um we have three people signed up to speak.

So we'll take them first and then we'll get commissioner questions.

All right, we have uh Kelly Brown, Brooke Fleming, and Chris Gallagher.

And I believe you get five minutes, and please state your name and whether you are a city resident.

Sorry, I wasn't paying attention to who was first.

All right, Kelly.

My name is Kelly Brown.

I'm the president of the Sarasota Coalition of City Neighborhood Associations, better known as CCNA, which represents over 25,000 households within the City of Sarasota.

With respect to C CNA member focus on participating in neighborhood development plans, we are asking the City Commission to pull the zoning text amendment request to modify the maximum length standard for urban mixed-use zone district from 200 to 200 feet from the batch for discussion and ultimately denial.

According to city staff, a zoning text amendment is to resolve an inconsistency or make a correction.

We do not believe this request falls into that category.

This is a significant zoning change request that should be considered accordingly.

The standard, the current standard of 200 feet has been in place for one year.

With the original standard was presented last year, asked for 300 feet for development use.

City leadership did not approve at that time.

When C CNA reviewed the recommended batch with city staff weeks ago, we asked for clarification as to where each request for change originated.

Per staff, this request is a development architect request.

Their stated reason is the difficulty working with the 200 foot.

It is our understanding there are projects underway that were able to work with the 200 foot rule.

C CNA did not support the staff request to increase to 300 feet.

City staff then adjusted to 250 feet after our conversations.

We were upfront with city staff that we did not support 250 foot.

C CNA does not support a change from the 200 foot standard that is only one year old.

Current code allows administrative staff a 25 percent variance leeway, whereby if a 250-foot increase is approved, the result would be over 300 foot buildings.

CCNA spoke to this issue at the planning board meeting, who ultimately denied unanimously.

With the reality of SB 180, the city and our residents will be obligated to this requested increase for an unknown amount of time.

Do we even know how many properties could in effect build football field length buildings adjacent to neighborhoods within the corridors?

We believe the request to increase the length of buildings in the urban mixed-use zone district is unnecessary and in conflict with the Commissioner's direction just one year ago.

Please deny this request.

Thank you for your time and your support.

Appreciate you.

Thank you very much.

Brooke Fleming.

Good afternoon, Commissioners.

For the record, Brooke Fleming.

I am a certified planner with Kimley Horn.

I'm here on behalf of our client Orange Pineapple LLC, the current owners of the McAlpine House.

We wanted to express our support of the batch amendment, specifically item 17, which will authorize the historic preservation board to permit a variance or adjustment in relation to density permitted on a lot.

This amendment will allow flexibility for the movement of the McAlpine House to a site more suitable for its preservation.

We applaud for the city for taking this on and the planning department's willingness to improve the city's land development code.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you.

Mr.

Gallagher.

Chris Gallagher.

Could you would you mind putting that in the middle of the phone?

Yeah, of course.

I sent uh Mayor, Vice Mayor and Commissioners, I sent you all an email this morning.

I'm not sure if you got to see it.

Maybe we would up.

Thank you.

This is about the 200 foot long building.

One of the other speakers just said there are they understand there are some in the process.

There may be, I'm not aware of them.

I do know that I uh we, I think, I think had the first one that was a uh hotel up by the airport where we had to get an adjustment for a um I don't know what is maybe a two hundred and thirty uh foot building.

We did get the adjustment.

Um, but it still it still was, you know, provided limitations on that site.

But we've got a lot of other different sites with long blocks on them.

Uh the email I sent you this morning listed five different buildings in downtown that all have well in excess of 200 feet.

Arcos is 587, Lofts on Lemon, which is an entirely affordable project, is 383 feet.

The district is 418 feet, Astro on Main is 319 feet, City Side is 444 feet.

And as described earlier, even the two phases of Citrus Square, north and south are both longer than 200 feet.

The city's Palm Av parking garage is 257 feet.

State Street Garage with its 1,500 State Street, the small condos right at the end, totals 349 feet.

Palm Ave and State Street, as you know, are places that we have regularly hold city functions because they are considered to be attractive streets.

Um I submit to you that the problem is you you know you are not going to get good architecture necessarily because you make the buildings shorter.

Um I also in the package I sent you, uh I uh gave a couple more examples.

If you've ever been to London, I mean one of the most walkable cities in the world, and it's got you know uh block upon block with uh townhouses that go far in excess of 200 feet.

And I also included a building from my own hometown town of Lowell, Massachusetts, they refurbished an old mill building on what is now a beautiful street.

The mill building is 700 feet long.

Just a very simple building, but very pleasant walk as well.

Um again, I'd suggest that uh again you're not going to necessarily get good architecture, better walkability just because you have a break uh your ten-foot break between buildings.

Uh think of all of Main Street, we'd do our best not to have any breaks between the buildings that they continue on uh forever from from block end to block end.

Uh what I that exhibit I put up there, B is what uh the limitations would place on us.

Could you move that up just a tiny bit so you can get off the prompt there?

So if you are over 200 feet, you have to have a couple buildings.

And what that means is and with a 10-foot uh space between them.

My sense 10-foot space is really kind of a silly thing.

Uh it, you know, imagine a four-story building with 10-foot space, but it really doesn't do the job either of making anything pleasant, but you end up with four staircases and two elevators.

As opposed to a single building where you could put a stair at each end and as an A, single elevator, and if you did alternatively do some kind of a recess, um, if you if you know the building, the Arcos building, which is on a primary street is actually a bigger than that, but they they recessed it where this where they do their loading where the park garage entrances.

And what it allows them to do is their apartments along the street, and then it falls back to the corridor, which is uh I guess probably about 25 or 30 feet back.

So if you had a recess in that sense, you really get, you know, you get a dramatic, you know, much better than 10 feet, and you get the desired effect, I think of people trying to accomplish in not having a uh a full wall of buildings.

So uh again, my recommendation to you this morning, my recommendation again today is uh and I give the other thing I would say is we do have several projects on the boards that are in these MU zones.

I can tell you it is a struggle when you have a full block that is, you know, over 200 feet and you are trying to make an efficient building or a sufficient set of buildings.

Um it does inhibit the uh flexibility on it, which leads to costs, and the whole point of these MU zones was to encourage affordable housing, and that goes in the wrong direction.

So um again, if you cannot see past the 200 feet, I do recommend that you consider another alternative, which is what I'm proposing in A above, where you do some kind of recess, significant recess, more than 10 feet, that actually makes it feel like you've you know you've got something substantial going on.

Thank you.

Thank you all.

All right.

We will go to uh Commissioner questions, which I suspect there will be a number of them.

Commissioner Ulrich.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um just so I can get things figured out in my head.

How do we want to do this?

Um want me to ask all my questions for everyone?

You have 10 minutes.

I have 10 minutes.

Yes, excellent.

Um for item number one, has the planning board clarification been added?

They requested a clarification at their meeting?

That's correct.

And it has with respect that the parapet walls is a required uh screening technique, and we have clarified that in the in the language.

Thank you.

For item number two, um, there's no reference to a kitchen in these dwelling units.

Uh should there be should it be explicit that there is no kitchen in these units?

No, I think that um this is appropriate.

It does say in other locations of the zoning code when there is a kitchen, then it is um considered additional unit.

So that's how I differentiate between an accessory dwelling unit and then a dwelling unit.

Okay.

And this is something that we talked about when we met.

Um, what about a garage or a carport that has been enclosed and made into uh a living unit?

Um is that included in this?

That would be an accessory dwelling unit.

So it would be different.

Different from this, but it's accounted for in our code somewhere.

Yes, correct.

Okay.

Um item number 13, palm trees.

Um I understand the rationale for having three palms equal one uh canopy tree.

But if the palms are spread out, they seem to me to equal three trees, not one canopy.

Is there something included in this about proximity to each other for the palm trees to make a grouping rather than three individual palms?

We spoke with the City Arborist about this, yeah.

That's a good question.

And generally they're going to be clustered, depending on what you know might be underground or what you have if there could be conflicts, but generally the palm trees are clustered.

Well, is there wording to encourage that?

That's the arborist's uh mission that she strongly encourages that to the when she reviews these on a case-by-case basis.

Yeah, if we don't have it in words, it's just one person encouraging somebody to do something, and they can say no.

It might they they could.

Um that's generally been the practice.

Again, this is an existing uh code standard.

We're just simply replacing uh what is considered invasive tree now with a different uh palm tree, but that's been the practice.

Um requiring that we could look at it just making sure that there's not a potential 180 conflict.

Is the arborist here?

She is.

Good afternoon, Jackie Hartley, City Arborist Development Services.

Um, Jackie Hartley, Development Services.

So today we're just asking to replace the Queen Palm with the ribbon palm.

Because the Queen Palm is a class two exotic.

That doesn't seem to me to be what it says in the third fourth column general description.

On page 11 of 85.

It says permits three prom palm trees of a certain species to be considered equivalent to a canopy tree for landscaping and buffering standards.

That language is already in there.

We already do consider the additional palms here.

Three palms for one canopy tree.

It's page 34 is the actual text that's being revised, proposed to be revised in your backup material.

And I don't have page 34 in front of me, will you?

Is it long?

The three three of the following palms are equivalent to one required canopy tree when planted at the required height of uh 12 feet.

And as stated before, the queen palm is now considered nuisance exotic.

So we'd like to take that off, and we needed to replace it.

I see.

Correct.

Thank you.

Moving on.

Item number 15.

So the point that Ms.

Brown from C CNA made is very interesting to me.

That is it true that an application for a 200 uh a building 200 feet in length can be administratively approved to be how long?

There's an adjustment process uh up to 25 percent of that dimensional standard can be uh reviewed administratively if it exceeds that 25 percent dimensional standard, then it would be a planning board adjustment.

So it can be longer than 200 feet.

250.

250 up to 50 is 25 percent of 200.

Okay.

Um just wanted to get clarity on that.

And item number 21, the window signs.

I just wanted to ensure there's a lot of um detail in um your materials uh referencing um zoning code 7-115, 16, 19, etc.

I wanted to make sure that St.

Armand's is included somewhere in this.

It is if you see um CT, that's a commercial tourist zone district.

That's what I thought.

Okay.

Thank you.

Those are my questions, Mayor.

All right.

Wonderful.

Um let's see.

Um Commissioner Earon Coach.

Thank you.

Um I wanted to focus on um the two that were denied by the planning board, item number eight and um item number 15.

If you could just please clarify the um uh the discussion at the planning board and what their reasoning was for a recommendation of denial for those two items.

Number eight, number 15.

Sure.

For number eight, uh there is some discussion.

I think uh a couple of planning board members were looking for some sort of compromise approach.

Um just for some context, this what we're really talking about here are are townhome lots, be simple lots that are generally going to be 30 feet or less in length, and the idea was, you know, if if we were we talked about a can uh an understory tree and you saw the the graphics in the presentation.

Um so the compromise approach that I think based on what we heard from the planning board was the the preference the preference is a canopy tree.

If you cannot do a canopy tree for a variety of reasons, well then an understory tree could be an adequate substitute because at least it's better than not having any tree at all.

Um part of the um I think uh in it was mentioned in the um presentation about the whole right tree right place principle in making sure that you know, in terms of when these you have these small narrow lots, um you don't want the a canopy tree once it's you know it's fully mature of the root system, maybe impacting the structure or the uh the asphalt nearby, utilities, um just ensuring that you know that the root spacing is appropriate and generally these trees I think are planted 30 feet on center.

Um just making sure that if if we are going with the canopy tree there that it can be healthy and thrive in the future and not something that's gonna have to be removed removed in five to seven years.

So uh uh one of my questions has to do with the fact that um a lot of this is in theory thought about for future townhome development.

Um wouldn't it be wise to keep it and have them plan around a canopy tree around the roots that are going to grow instead of saying you can maximize the impervious space and will allow you to plant a tree that has less canopy and and less shade, less less uh mass and less root system uh to impact your building.

Um who wouldn't choose to do that?

Who wouldn't choose to pr to maximize their building space?

Who would choose to say, you know what, I'm gonna voluntarily pull back on my the size of my units so that I can print plant a ginormous uh grand tree.

Do you see what I'm saying?

I I'm curious about the impacts.

If we allow them less, they will always choose less of a tree, right?

Or please tell me that I'm wrong.

Well this is also just for those lots that are 30 feet wide or less, which is most commonly the town homes, all the other single family homes which uh do have to meet this requirement are at least 50 feet wide or larger.

So I think probably when this was originally drafted, it was more thinking about single family homes, not the ideas from the attached single family and just what we've heard from the City Arborist and they can have you speak on it as well, just the distance that is required between the canopy trees is larger.

Well, let me ask you this.

Um our ordinance, our zoning code already, it says it it talks about a grand tree.

And if the grand tree takes up 25 percent of the buildable lot, then we have discussions about taking down that allowing the removal of the grand tree.

But they have to prove that they've tried other alternate designs.

Should we have some sort of language that they have to, some sort of standards that have to be met before we allow the understory tree?

My concern is that if we allow it, like if you can't do a grand, well then you can do an understory tree.

The goal will be an understory tree.

It will never try to be achievable to make the building smaller or make the building, I don't know, curve, do something to allow a grand tree.

If we if we require some sort of steps, measures, proof, exercise taken to see if a grand tree indeed could be had, and if it can't, then at that time allow for an understory tree.

Yes, I think the way this is drafted, the burden would be on the developer to demonstrate that they that the canopy tree is not feasible.

So we have the language in there that you feel sufficient requires them to demonstrate that it's not able, they're not able to build or to put in a grand tree.

I do because of the way this is drafted, you know, again the preference is the canopy tree.

If they can't do the canopy tree, well then they need to explain why they cannot provide the canopy tree.

Okay.

Um thank you.

And then for item number 15 as well.

Can you just exp uh clarify and summarize the uh planning board's discussion on that?

Sure.

Uh they were um unanimous in their um recommending uh denial for this particular item um with respect uh the adjustment process was brought up as as as it was here.

Um they felt with that process that um they did not suggest making the change.

And did they state any other reasons why they didn't suggest like the like the downfalls of super blocks or any of those kinds of things?

No, I mean because 200 to 250 feet generally wouldn't be considered a superblock.

Uh I think it was more just I'm not sure exactly other than that they just felt that the number that was in place today was sufficient with the ability to provide that adjustment process if necessary.

Okay.

I'll respectfully disagree that 200 feet is not a more than 200 feet is not a superblock uh but anyway.

Okay, thank you.

Those are my questions.

Anybody's mear trace?

Okay, thank you.

Um I want to confirm I happen to see on page 34 of 85 an answer to Commissioner Ulrich's question at the very top of the page.

This was about the grouping of the palms and the very top of the page, it says um that they the by grouping the same so as to create the equivalent of a crown spread of 15 feet.

So that would be right there, and I believe that addresses concerns.

Yesterday, was it?

I don't I I mean I think that we did selected 200 arbitrarily last year, and I was the one who said no more than 200.

Um so I appreciate Mr.

Gallagher's concerns.

Um I'm not interested at this point in going above the 200, but my question is as opposed as I am to modifying these line items from the dais.

I mean, uh what is your opinion of removing that line item versus trying to amend it here?

Is it better to remove number 15 if we can't support it as is, or is it better to uh negotiate changes from here?

Well, um it's certainly at your pleasure, we it's not a problem if it's removed.

I mean that's that's certainly fine.

So I I will be I I don't uh while I appreciate Mr.

Gallagher's uh input, I think it would be better for him to work with you and come up with something an alternative to propose rather than us coming up with something here.

So if if that makes sense to you.

It does.

Thank you.

Okay.

That's all I have.

Okay, Commissioner Aaron Coach?

Um, so on page 27, uh for number eight, again with the with the canopy tree and the uh understory tree.

Can you show me in here where the the language that says that um they should try for a canopy tree, and if not, then an understory is allowed, and that we're gonna ask them to try for a canopy tree?

Sure.

When uh so I'll just read it.

It says for each for each front zoning lot line less than thirty feet in length, one canopy tree is the requirement.

An understory tree may be planted when a canopy tree is not feasible.

Right.

But when i is the is there a threshold or definition of when not feasible?

I mean, they could just say it's not feasible.

Well, I think they need to demonstrate uh as to the reasons why it would not be feasible.

Okay.

It's just that in the zoning code is very specific, there's a number of that they have to try, they have to demonstrate, they have to show that they have tried alternate designs to not take down a canopy tree.

No, we're not talking about taking down.

Yeah.

No, no, no, I know that.

I know that, but we have language in our code already that says if a a grand tree takes up twenty-five percent of the lot coverage or more, then um there's a process to apply to have the tree removed.

But as a last resort, and they do have to show that they have tried alternate designs and that there's no working around that grand tree.

And so we have language that that says to the developers, you must try to keep a grand tree and work around it.

And if you can't, you have to show us that you uh have tried.

And for for me, this this I don't think the language is strong enough in here to say you must try uh when you're building your town home, because this is what it's designed for, you must try to plan your town home around a grand tree.

If it's not possible, then you must show us that somehow.

And then you'll be allowed for an understory tree.

That's not making any sense.

Yeah, because it sounds like that's what this what they're saying that you know it has to be demonstrated that you know that the grand tree, you know, can't, you know, is not feasible or wouldn't, you know, uh whatever the situation is, and you can go to an understory tree.

And and and and it when I spoke to you all, you said that um a lot of it would have to come down to basically if it's in the best interest of the tree itself in in terms of his roots, you know, the the life of the tree and so on and so forth.

So there are a number of like factors that you know that would uh apply to the to that very logic, you know, when you're talking about having to demonstrate, you know, that a grand tree is not feasible or is not applicable to that size of what happened.

Am I correct?

Yeah, let's yeah, right.

Commissioner Aaron Cops are file.

My apologies when I'm just gonna.

It's okay.

I solicited I solicited some some input on this because I I could be reading this wrong.

I mean, maybe in a 30-foot lot, when we're thinking about ho townhomes, grand trees should never be considered.

Maybe we should say they're never allowed, because there's never going to be enough space.

And if that's the case, maybe that's the discussion which we should be having.

But if we want townhomes with grand trees, if that is actually a reality that can happen, and you have a blank slate, like a lot that's completely empty, and you say, I want to build a town home, well, the tree is going to take up this much if it's going to be a grand tree.

That leaves you this much for a townhome.

It's pretty simple.

If you say to them you don't have to have a grand tree, you could have an understory tree instead and an understory tree takes up this much, that means your townhome is three times the size.

Well, who wouldn't choose that?

So we don't want unhealthy trees to be planted.

We don't want them coming down every seven years.

What we hope to be a grand tree turns into nothing more than an understory tree before we have to kill it.

So that I guess that's my confusion is that if we're hoping for grand trees and we want to incentivize that, let's encourage that and let's encourage creative development to allow for a grand tree to grow and develop and become.

And if that's never a possibility, why do we allow it in the first place?

So to that former point, what went before the planning board was just that.

It was just allowing the understory tree and not having the canopy tree.

This is essentially just a compromise approach based on what happened at the planning board.

I think staff would be fine if you wanted to just go understore tree to prevent any of those complex in the future on these neural lots, you're gonna have them.

You just are so maybe um the Arborist can answer the question.

On these lots, could a grand tree never survive?

Okay, so I think we're getting um there's only four species that are grand trees.

Right.

In for the City of Sarasota, yes.

And they're proposing there's several understory trees you can use, and there's several benefits within a lot this small.

And I have some written down.

Um the smaller root systems reduce impact on the underground utilities, foundation sidewalks and driveways, asphalt and concrete, because it's less repair when you have shade trees or understory and shade trees.

Ummunity character.

It's uh creates a quaint, well-connected atmosphere.

It maintains proportional scale with narrow lots and modest homes.

It helps with stormwater recharge.

Um one of the biggest ones is uh storm resilience, safer during high wind events, less root uh pressure reduces risk of uprooting trees.

And then environmental benefits offers the same ecological benefits as larger trees.

For example, they sequester carbon, uh provide shade and lowers heat index.

And then also the right tree, right place, section 7309 of the city um of Sarasota zoning code.

We have to have right tree right place.

Okay.

That's the biggest one, I think is the right tree.

All right.

You have something that you wanted to add so you could clarify this, because we're not talking about grand tree removal here.

Correct.

Yes.

Um for the record, Alice and Christie, General Manager of Development Services, and I did just want to clarify some of the statements made that, yeah, canopy trees and grand trees, two different things.

This is speaking to canopy trees.

And as um Ryan said, I think it's a compromise.

The goal of the language was to compromise.

We do want to encourage candy trees, but where it's not feasible, then we would allow the understory.

And that language is not the same as what you're referencing in the grand tree removal section, but it gets to the same point.

The 25 percent for grand tree removal is they don't have to give us the alternative designs.

They just have to give us the square footage and demonstrate that 25 percent of the buildable area or parking area is rendered unusable by the tree.

So they there's a monetary, or not a monetary, but a numerical value there that we don't have in this language, but it still has to be demonstrated to us by the applicant that it's not feasible that it won't work.

So that's my point.

So you feel like the language here requires it to be demonstrated by the applicant if they cannot put in a grand tree.

So just for clarity, I I'm not confusing grand trees and canopy trees.

I just wanted to say that the language exists in our code to hold the applicant accountable to prove in that kind of a situation.

So I was not mixing the two.

I was saying we have language that holds uh applicants accountable.

Could we have language in here also to hold applicants accountable?

Um because are we encouraging grand trees?

Because if we are, we should have that kind of language.

If we're not, maybe we shouldn't.

Okay, that's your time.

Um Commissioner Batti, you want to you're not signed up to the U.S.

No, I'm I mean, no, thank you, Mayor.

I haven't I haven't weighed in yet, you know, so I'll talk about number eight, the the tree issue.

I think one of the things that has to be considered and kept in mind is that there are setback standards.

And you can't require them not to use the setback standards if the setback is narrow and they're allowed to build up to a certain point, I don't think you can then say, well we're not going to let you know use that setback that you've got to set back further because you can't get a canopy tree planted for a tree that has not been planted yet.

And so I think changing that by saying that you can do a different kind of tree because people have to be allowed to build in the buildable area that they're allowed to build according to our zoning code.

So for me I think this number eight covers that situation which then says you know i if you can't do it then we put in another tree that is also valuable for the environment and for you know uh for uh green in our in our city and then I want to uh go to item 15 that's been discussed as well um I I get the uh vice mayor's point about legislating you know from here when we aren't experts and I think the fact that you know we pick 200 feet you know out of the air we aren't architects we don't have to deal with these things and I think we should take seriously people who do understand design and do understand what's needed I think it would be ludicrous to make two buildings and create a 10-foot alley between two buildings which is certainly not attractive and um so one building with a setback I would you know maybe 300 is the right number.

I don't know but all of the buildings that Mr.

Gallagher talked about are all really attractive buildings and don't take away from the walkability of the city.

So I think uh a 200 limit is way too short.

So um I'm for moving it up or not even having a limit.

All right.

We'll go to uh Vice Mayor Trice?

Yeah.

Since since you just mentioned the um long buildings as someone who lives in those one of those long buildings and has to walk that long, long unbroken up block regularly, I think they're too long.

So and and my other concern would be if we increase the buy right length.

Okay, so we put one building is put here at some point somebody else is going to come along and put another one right next to it by right and then somebody so we will end up with those those uh corridors looking like Midnight Pass Road with you know walls, the length of the wall of the road.

So I think having adjustments will be a better approach and I'm hoping that you guys can work with Mr.

Gallagher and others to come up with what might be better.

And Mr.

Gallagher I also live in a single building which fortunately has two elevators one on each end I would hate having one elevator and I have to walk a block to get it every time I want to use the elevator.

But I want to get to eight and questions for our arborist on the trees I'm imagining with townhouse developments there will be say I'm gonna use the number six thirty foot wide houses because that's under 200 feet.

So suppose we had a townhouse development that applied and it was six thirty foot wide um homes or plots um would we under normal circumstance have the developer saying well each house is going to have the same kind of tree and if that's the case so you know thirty feet apart canopy trees might you suggest that's too close together and might you then even be recommending that understory trees would be a better thing.

And if that's the case, so you know 30 feet apart, canopy trees, might you suggest that's too close together, and might you then even be recommending that understory trees would be a better thing?

Canopy trees are normally 30 feet on center.

Okay.

So if it was 30 feet, but if it was can they can they do less than 30 feet for a townhouse wide width?

They can make I think reduced to 20 feet.

So if it was 20 feet, then you would recommend against the canopy tree.

Definitely.

Okay.

I would recommend against it the 30 feet too.

Okay.

So our arborist would be recommending against what's currently in the zoning.

So you know, that that leads me to think that going for uh the change for understory trees is you know more um it's beneficial.

Okay.

Thank you.

That was needed clarification.

Thank you.

All right.

Commissioner Batin.

Uh yeah, thank you, Mayor.

I mean, you know, just sitting here listening or what have you.

I think one of the more important statements that was uh that was made was that we're not experts.

You know we're not, you know, and it's part of one of the problems, you know, that I've seen with uh with this city from Jump Street is there was no real urban planning in a lot of this stuff that was built, you know, in prior commissions were built by the commissions, not by you know whatever projections what the city was supposed to be and so on and so forth.

But to the vice mayor's point and you know, to the to the mayor's point to try and negotiate like you know, build in length, you know, right here at the dais or what have you without any you know real like comprehensive and in-depth study is to, you know because that that speaks to what the city is is supposed to be, particularly when we are talking about our downtown master plan and all and and all of these different things or what have you.

Um that's that you know, more or less a uh statement than um then asking questions or anything, because I I I just think we need to be uh a bit more mindful uh when we are thinking about these things.

So I don't have a problem with this being removed or what have you, and being looked into uh uh a bit more with a microscope, if you will, you know, speaking to architects and and and developers and and um city planners to try and come up with something that uh is applicable to where we are today and where we're gonna be tomorrow.

So thank you.

Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you.

Commissioner Ulrich.

Oh, I know.

Um took me a long time to get back here, right?

Um I just wanted clarity, and I think I have it, that all canopy trees are not grand trees.

This is correct.

Yes.

Okay, thank you.

That's it.

Okay.

Commissioner Ehernkot.

Um in this uh townhome with the 30-foot lots, could two lots combine and then put a tree in the middle, for example?

Is that is that generally not.

These are going to be you know, fee simple lots and thirty feet.

They can be less than thirty feet.

That's just a you know, it's a standard we put in there, but they could be 20, 25 feet in width.

But you know, they're they're individually owned lots.

But I mean, is that would that be a possibility, let's say if two people bought them and said we're best friends, and we would like one ginormous canopy tree, and we'll put it mostly on this person's on Ryan's lot, and then the tree will grow and be a beautiful um grand tree or canopy tree over both our lots.

What would that do to this ratio of canopy tree, understory tree?

Would they be would that work together?

Is that something that has been done before or I think generally it would just be on the individual slot.

A lot of these, a lot of this is designed prior to these um these units ever selling, so not sure who the end user even is by the time they're going through the DRC process.

Okay.

Because that would be a situation where you would have a grand uh a canopy tree and a understory tree, and they could, you know, live together and make lots of shade.

Um are you happy with the language that is drafted as it is right now for this item?

I think it's uh, you know, based on what we heard at the planning board and today, I mean we think it's it's a fair compromise.

Okay.

All right.

That's uh that's all I wanted to know about that.

Thank you.

Okay.

Um what would you think about removing item 15 for today, since again we aren't experts, and then let's uh give this a little more consideration.

Um would we need consensus or a vote on removing item 15?

Actually, I would probably be a motion.

I need a motion.

Yeah.

Yeah.

I I move that we approve the zoning text amendment batch minus number 15 dealing with the length of the building.

I'll second that.

Okay.

The maker of motion, do you want to uh I'm I'm well the uh I think everything looks good except uh and I appreciate uh the architect's suggestion that they would have more flexibility with uh longer building, yet I would hate to enable that by right and then as we discover during infill if we run into problems, the legislature really would make it impossible for us to uh claw back those changes.

So you because with the th 25 percent adjustment administratively to an that would enable a 250 feet on our current zoning law of 200.

I think at least for the time being, we're in pretty good shape, but I would encourage discussion.

Mayor, can we um can you state the close of public hearing?

Oh, yeah.

Before we go down there.

Yes.

All right.

Closing the public hearing.

Thank you.

Sorry.

Um Commissioner Ahern Kotch.

Could you just repeat the motion?

I'm sorry.

Okay.

Um I I uh move that we approve the uh ordinance 25-5583 and uh petition 25-ZTA-01, with the exception of item number 15.

And do we are we going to discuss item number 15 in a separate motion?

No.

It just gets removed completely.

Yeah.

Okay.

All right.

Um I'll speak to the motion.

Uh I I think staff did uh a great job on all of these and um providing us with the information that we needed and explaining the rationale crossed all their T's and dotted all their I's.

And for item number 15, you know, I understand we are not experts.

We're not the expert, and there are experts, and they are also not the expert on everything city.

But we are informed and we do have information, and a lot of us have been doing this for a very, very long time.

And so we're not incapable of making decisions that um govern how our city moves and grows for and and moves forward.

We're able to read emails and books, and I would have quoted my Jeff Speck book, but I lent it to Mr.

Thaxon over there in the audience who still owes it back to me.

Okay.

Um let it be noted for the record, he said it's in the car.

Um SPD is here if you want to.

I just may.

So uh that one item i I agree that one um it needs to be removed, and I very much support that.

So thank you.

All right.

Anyone else?

Um it does not look like it.

Um Commissioners, if you would vote, please.

Albert?

Yes.

That's he?

Ulrich?

Yes.

Trace.

Yes.

All right.

Yeah.

Is that your vote, Commissioners?

Yes.

The motion passes unanimously.

Um to bring back um item number 15 or to send it to staff to review further for maybe um things like uh requiring after a certain number of feet that there be some kind of a setback or something to then break up along, you know.

Do we need a motion?

Yeah, you guys need to discuss that then how you want to let staff work.

And bring it back in the next set of uh batch CTAs.

Or if they get uh done sooner, they could bring it back.

So I don't want to see it come back, so but let's be careful about what we do here.

Yeah, I uh I'm comfortable with staff has heard our concerns.

Mr.

Gallagher is vocal, so let them work it out.

I agree with that.

Are we all voting?

We're just are we good with that?

Interim city manager you need anything more than that.

No, ma'am.

We'll bring it back.

Okay.

Thank you very much.

I uh some other time.

I'm not I'm with it.

I'm not agreeing to bring it back.

I misunderstood your what you agree.

Okay.

Okay.

I I'm going to move that item fifteen that uh uh staff take a look at it again and um work on it with uh um you know the relevant um parties in this case and um bring it back to us either they can bring it back and say we're gonna keep it two hundred feet or uh you know add to it or add setbacks, whatever it is.

So anyway, my motion is that we send it back to staff to bring it back to us for further review and discussion.

Okay.

Motion by uh Mayor Albert and uh seconded by Commissioner Batti to ask staff to look at number fifteen and bring back their recommendation.

Can I s you want to speak to it?

Yes, you can speak to it.

Does anybody want to speak on it?

I think I spoke to it already.

I may not speak to it, and that is just the the mere fact that um you know, we're talking about the us being experts or not being experts and them being experts and not being experts.

They're hired because of their expertise.

That's why they work for the city and they're respected in this respective uh department.

And when we say that the commission is not experts or whatever or are experts.

Okay.

Anyone else before we vote?

Okay, so we are voting.

Okay.

Okay.

Uh it motion passes three to two.

Is that your vote, everyone?

Yes.

We take a break.

Um Thank you all.

Yeah.

Um we are at new business.

Um Does anyone need to need a break?

Yeah, I think.

It's two fifty-one.

That clock is wrong.

Um Let's be back at at three o'clock.

Yes.

Okay.

Okay, everybody.

I know everybody's having a really good time out there, but it's three o'clock.

And uh we want to get wanna get yeah, get started again here.

Um when we went on recess, um, we were getting ready to start our item twelve one new business.

And that's a discussion regarding the establishment of special districts for lighting and undergrounding.

And I am going to call on I is she here?

Okay.

Um we will call on our director of public works, uh Nick Patel to make a presentation and introduce.

Yes, yeah, right.

And he went into a whole um explanation at uh Leto Key Resonance Association, which is a wonderful way for everybody to remember your name.

So we'll let you I I think you should do that again.

So good afternoon, Mayor, Vice Mayor, and City Commissioners.

Uh I'm Nick Patel, Public Works Director for the Record, and here with me today is Sajikami.

And uh if you beg the indulgence, I suppose I'll tell you a little bit of the history of the name.

So uh spell it like Sage, uh, I think my parents must have been, you know, hippies, and they decided that that was fun.

Uh so I get to spend my entire life uh telling folks that you don't pronounce it like it's spelled.

Uh so I pronounce it Saji.

So thank you for having me.

Uh with that, uh, we'll jump into the presentation.

Um I will apologize on behalf of half of Alvy.

She really wanted to be here, but she's feeling a little under under the weather, so unfortunately you get um the pinch hitting this morning instead of Alvy here this afternoon.

Um yes, this item is about uh establishing a couple of um couple of districts.

Um real quickly, um the agenda includes uh background community interest, uh areas of interest, specifically a couple of maps, uh, city code and state statute framework, a scope for the rest of um today, and then next steps in a recommended motion.

So background and community interest.

Uh the five associations have formally asked the city to explore special districts for undergrounding of um power for um the utility power, and that includes St.

Armand's residents, Lido Shore Property Owner Association, Lido Key Residents, and St.

Armand's Circle of Merchants.

And then the second one is lighting.

The South Point Cedar Park Neighborhood Association has requested that.

Each group polled its members and support ranges from anywhere from 85 percent to 97 percent, um, demonstrating uh clear grassroots momentum to ask for these.

The um areas of interest for specifically undergrounding.

You can see on the uh exhibit A, which uh is on your screen and should be in your packet as well.

Purple is the St.

Armand's residential core.

Your orange is Lido Shores, yellow is Lido Key, and the teal is the St.

Armand's business core.

These outlines are preliminary, of course.

At this point, we'll refine the parcel lines during our feasibility and legal review, but every parcel inside has expressed strong interest in bearing utilities for resiliency, reliability, and of course aesthetics as well.

On to the area interest for um lighting.

Uh exhibit B displays the proposed lighting districts, the south points at a park area.

Residents seek full replacement of the existing fixtures with uniform LED lighting to improve safety and neighborhood character.

Boundaries may shift slightly after the photometric design and cost analysis, but the parcel in blue is outlined that they have uh substantial support for this um project.

With that, I'll turn it back over to Nick.

So the process is governed by um the city code chapter two, Article 9.

Um it's a special assessment area.

It's part of that part of our city code.

Um it's also the process also dictated by the Florida Statues 163.506, which is neighborhood improvement district, as well as the Florida Statutes 170, which is the special assessment, and Florida Statutes 197.3632, which is the uniform assessment collection.

These allow the city to levy non-advilorium assessments, which means no millage for the city, and collect them on the tax bill.

The commission sits as the governing board for each district.

So today we're not creating a district or levying any assessments.

We're asking City Commission to acknowledge the letters, survey, and petition received, authorize staff to begin feasibility and legal framework under the city code and state statutes, um, and coordinate with the city attorney and finance department, engage a consultant for preliminary cost estimate, funding options, and benefit apportionment analysis, and direct staff to return with the draft initial assessment and reimbursement resolution before any cost are adopted.

So if authorized, uh staff will draft both resolutions, refined boundaries and preliminary costs, uh publish statutory notice and schedule public hearings and prepare a full assessment role and funding recommendation.

At the future here and the commission can decide whether to advance to design bonding or construction.

So recommended motion is to acknowledge the community interest and authorize city staff to prepare our procedural documents, retain a consultant and return with initial assessment and reimbursement resolutions.

No assessment or construction contract is approved today.

Uh this simply green lights the detail analysis and maintain the city's ability to reimburse early cost once districts are formed.

Um also want to kind of manage expectations a little bit specifically on creation creation of a special district for St.

Armand's, the undergrounding as well as the LEDO key.

It's going to take about four to seven years, you know, if the commission does proceed in creating a special district to all the way to implementing the project.

For the lighting district, it can take all the way up to from three to four years, roughly, to implement the project if the Commission approves moving forward the special district.

With that, I'm happy to uh take any questions.

We've got um some people signed up to speak, so we'll do that first and then we'll come back to questions.

Um I'm gonna divide this up and bring uh and and start with um there are only five people signed up, but the first four are here on behalf of the special um undergrounding and then um the South Point set issue.

So Chris Golia, Dennis Biskoff, Carl Schaffstall, Bob Kelly, and Alan Pariser.

And if you will, you know, when I call on you, state your name and whether you are a city resident.

All right.

We'll start with uh Mr.

Gullion.

I Chris Golia, President of St.

Armand's Residents Association, and yes, I am a city resident.

Um I'll try to keep this short and sweet.

A majority of my career was spent in what's called marketing research, doing surveys, and we have a saying in marketing research, and that saying is everything in life is a trade-off.

And what I mean by that is if you asked a thousand people, would you like the city to bury your power lines?

A thousand people would say, Yeah.

But if you told those same thousand people, well, you gotta have a metal box on the ground in front of your house, and you got to pay for it.

All those thousand people might not say yes anymore.

Well, we asked our residents, you know, in this year after the two hurricanes put us underwater, knowing this, that property owners are going to have to pay to have this done.

Would you like the city to proceed with bearing power lines?

And uh we had a huge response rate in our annual survey, and 87 percent said yes, we'd like the city to do this.

And when we look at just the survey respondents who indicated that they also vote in Sarasota, which means their primary residence is here in Sarasota, that number increased from 87 percent to 93 percent.

So, based on that data, the uh St.

Armands Residence Association supports this initiative, and we ask you to please approve it and move it forward.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Dennis I uh my name is Dennis Bischoff, and I'm uh resident of uh the city.

And I represent the homeowners of Lido Shores.

I think the key word here is resiliency.

Lido Shores, Lido Key, St.

Armands are on a fragile barrier island, and far more subject to Mother Nature and Mother Nature, and to have power lines underground is obvious and should be a priority for the homeowners, businesses, for the City of Sarasota, and Florida Power and Light.

In fact, Florida Planet Light should be thrilled.

Fourteen times better performance, reducing repair time and cost long term.

Lido Shores Property Owners Association Board unanimously supports and requests the City of Sarasota to proceed with this project to bury the power lines and communication lines on Lido Shores, St.

Armand's and Lido Key.

We believe this will improve safety, resiliency, and aesthetics.

Lido Shores Property Owners Board has discussed and debated the topic.

We reviewed the experiences of other barrier islands, Florida Power and Light, as well as the experiences of many of our neighbors who had had extended power outages in prior year storms.

I personally lost power in every storm since living in Lido Shores since 2002, with five days loss of power from Ian and seven days loss from this last past year storms.

In our recent survey, the majority of Leto Shores households responded, and 97 percent respondents voted yes.

They are in support of this project proceeding.

Underground utilities has already been completed on nearby Bird Key, Longboat Key, John Wangley Boulevard from the city to St.

Armand's Circle, and a single residential street on St.

Armand's Key.

Our constituents have indicated that they would like the city to finish the job and are willing to fund this investment themselves.

In fact, Howard Rook, God rest us all, was investigating this way back for Leto Shores, way back in 2016.

Nine years, and several storms later, we hope the project can commence as soon as possible.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Carl.

Good afternoon, everyone at the DIES.

Haven't seen you in a little bit, but nice.

Everybody's looking good.

I'm the pro uh Carl Schlall, 129, Tyler Drive, uh Leto Key.

I've been a resident out there for 22 years now.

And on Saturday we had our first meeting of the season.

I want to thank the commissioners that did come out.

Um staff did a nice presentation.

These people up here were all here, and we had the mayor of Longbow Key come up and speak about they had just done the uh undergrounding and gave us some uh very, very insightful information on what went on.

I talked about this when the Robert Taylor complex was opened about coming out to Leto and start an undergrounding utilities and the cable, the overhead wires and stuff.

At the time I thought, well, I don't know if this is all that necessary, but uh over the years and this last storm, we were we were devastated.

We I lost everything, or my wife and I lost everything, and we moved out for a couple months, got it rebuilt, no problem, we're back.

But it is now time.

Uh as all of these gentlemen up here had said that uh they did the surveys, we did the surveys out at our place on Leto, and everybody is in favor of doing it.

We're in we're in favor of paying for it, which helps everybody, but it's time to get it moving.

And again, your staff said about four to seven years, we need to make this happen a little bit faster than this.

But I would hope that everybody, because you're going to get it from everywhere in the city.

It's it's eventually going to come that it's going to have to be undergrounding with utilities.

Um let's get it done, gang.

It's that simple.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Bob.

Hi everyone.

I'm Bob Kelly.

I live on uh St.

Armand's uh Key.

Um lived there for about th three years now, and I'm uh I'm on the board of the Residents Association of St.

Armand's, and uh and I'm a former board member of the merchants board as well, so I I know a little bit about both areas.

So um I'm sure you've seen the numbers and you're aware of what's happened to us in just St.

Armand's alone.

We had 200 homes, and uh probably after the storms, half of them or more were uninhabitable.

And we have 150 businesses, a lot of them have come back, a lot of them are gone, and there's a lot of empty storefronts still.

So we have a lot of work to do.

There's a lot of issues, uh, but it but power is definitely a big part of it.

The reality is you can't live, work, or repair anything without power.

And the thing that we really learned subsequent to the storm is those locations that did a really good job of uh burying their power lines before or in the past, like uh Lombow Key and uh Bird Key, they just came back so much quicker if they had any issues, and we were stuck without power, without water, other things for a long time.

So uh big picture is all of Florida's barrier islands have got to become much more resilient.

All of these power lines should be should be buried over time, particularly ours for a whole bunch of different reasons, which I won't go into now, but we're in desperate need of it.

Um one thing about Chris, he is like a fourth-degree black belt in uh in doing surveys.

And the reality is back in uh about four or five years ago, maybe it was five or six years ago, he had the same questions on the same surveys.

It said, Do you think we should underground?

And if so, uh would you be willing to pay for it?

And I think it was about two-thirds said yes.

And you know, now we're at 87 percent in light of what happened.

Uh so the other great thing that's happened since we started to get involved in this and realizing we got to get this done is uh Carl and Dennis jumped in as well very quickly.

The merchants need to get this done as well uh for reasons that are actually more important than for the for the residents, and so we're a team here, and we're all working together, and the reality is we overlap each other and we work and shop and go to the same restaurants and uh and the like.

So uh what we did do up front is um I helped Chris a little bit by doing a little bit of research uh about the pros and cons and the pluses and minuses of the whole thing.

And uh it was uh it was great.

I spent a lot of time with FPL, with Lombo Key, with consultants, construction companies, residents, residents of West Palm Beach, and the CEO of another major power company in the country.

Um it just makes you want to do it even faster and better and uh quicker.

Uh so we'll see how it goes finally, and most importantly, uh We saw the mayor first, so thank you.

And thank you for everyone involved.

Thank you.

Thank you so much.

And Alan.

Uh thank you.

Uh my name is Alan Pariser.

I am the president of the South Point Center Park Neighborhood Association, and obviously I do live in the city on Clemata Street, and I can tell you that I have a very large and not so attractive uh streetlight poll directly in front of my house.

Um I first of all would like to thank all the commissioners for uh reviewing our request to consider the idea of a lighting zone and replacement of uh street lights in our neighborhood for both safety and aesthetic purposes.

Um I would note that we're very fortunate to have had all, I shouldn't say all.

Most of the power lines in our neighborhood were undergrounded by FPNL about five years ago as part of a uh program to determine what kind of cost they would bump into from doing these things.

And that has resulted in reducing the cost of then removing the remaining wooden poles and street lights and replacing them with uh more modern uh and more attractive polls.

So we're very uh fortunate in that regard.

Um we've been working on this project for probably four or five years in our neighborhood.

We did have a survey.

Um we had a very good response rate.

More than 75 percent said they approved doing this kind of thing, but frankly, they have no idea how much it would cost.

They are aware that it will cost some amount.

And of course, we're all looking forward to finding out what the magic number is.

Um we've been in constant communication with our neighborhood.

They remain very enthusiastic, but again, we're still waiting to find out what exactly will it what what will it take from the neighborhood's point of view to get the th things moving.

So I'm looking very much forward to the Commission's approval today to move forward with the feasibility study to determine the legal requirements, the financial impact, and so forth.

And uh I think this will benefit not just the neighborhood, but the city, because I think this can become a role model of how to do things in the future.

I'm sure there are many neighborhoods we found out today there's about fifty of them who have uh a list of things they'd like to do, but they don't know really how to go about getting it done.

So this might be a good roadmap for them to follow.

So I'm looking forward to this very much so.

Um I heard Nick say though, it's gonna take three to four years.

That was a little bit longer than we had anticipated, so I'm hoping we can not only approve it, but maybe accelerate the schedule a bit.

And that's all I have to say.

Thank you very much for uh allowing us a privilege to speak to you today.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Thank you all for being here.

Okay.

Um Commissioner questions, and I see uh Commissioner Ulrich is on the board.

Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you.

So it seems that uh all the neighborhoods who are present here are interested in the project, and they actually would like us to accelerate the project.

Um talk to us a little bit about accelerating the project.

Nick Patel, uh public works director um for the record.

Um acceleration, the challenge associated with it is um uh this this weekend, you know, the the the mayor of town of Lombow Key spoke up and and originally their plan was to get it done in you know roughly about four to five years.

It took them close to seven years to get it done.

The challenge is there's multiple things that can cost some challenge you know, challenges to accelerate it specifically.

It's not just undergrounding FP ⁇ L, but it's also undergrounding all the other utilities, Verizon, you have Comcast, you have multiple different other uh franchisees that uh that meet to underground.

So those are some of the challenges, and you know, I think uh the way the mayor put it was that uh that was adventure of its own, you know, specifically not with FPNL, but for the for the other franchisees.

And then the other aspect is also there's um you have to get uh public easements from property owners, and that takes time as well.

So sure, we're gonna do everything we can to accelerate the project, but there there may be some barriers that may preclude us from getting there as quickly as possible.

Is the city the lead agency in this?

That's correct.

The city would be.

Thank you.

Um one more question.

There's nothing in the language that would prohibit the creation of a special assessment district in any other neighborhood at another time, right?

That is correct.

Okay, good.

Those are my questions.

Thank you.

Um actually would be doing the physical labor after the planning and all that's taken care of, and now you have an implementation phase.

Who would be doing the labor?

So for the lighting district, um there's already been model that has been um done by the county.

Um essentially FP ⁇ L would be the lead on that, you know, as far as um, you know, providing the lighting, doing the analysis, and also uh providing the options of the different light poles and uh for the lighting district, specifically tied to the undergrounding, uh, would have to hire a consultant to to work out the uh the easements and work with FP ⁇ L and then we'll have to put a contractor out to bid um to underground, you know.

And there's there's specialty contractors that work with FPL, and uh they would be the ones that would ultimately um do the work associated with it.

Thank you.

Because the reason for my question is at least for some of the people doing the work, I imagine it's a specialized expertise.

So if we have certain neighborhoods who are saying we have the wherewithal to pay to have this work done, and we have other neighborhoods in the city that also have been asking to be undergrounded or have street lighting, you know.

Are they going to be taking a back seat because they can't afford to become a special district and pay the money?

You know, can there be provide for undergrounding in these barrier islands that are willing to pay and also have parallel projects within the city in neighborhoods that can't afford to pay, or you know the poor neighborhoods get pushed to the back because they are wealthy neighborhoods that go out front.

So if if I can take a crack at that, uh Madam Mayor, uh this specifically deals with the creation of a district which has very defined geographic boundaries.

One of the things before I get to the answer to your question, that the Commission will need to know is once we have the costs, which will be known on a per property basis, you may want to uh be assured that there's enough people who still want to do it now that they know the cost in order to move forward.

And we'll have that queued up for you.

Um when we do it as a district, which is the primary way this is done, having done this once before on a barrier island, uh some first hand knowledge of it.

Um when you move out of that and you say, for example, does the city want to pay for something, you're gonna need to make a policy discuss, you're gonna have to have a policy discussion about that, what where the revenue would come from and so on.

This one will require the resident the property owners to pay an assessment based on the benefit directly to their property.

So it's a very um benefit and property-related uh determination of costs.

Uh if you look for a different model, uh we could have the policy discussions around what that might be.

There are different models for it.

Uh and in fact, you heard one earlier, FPL has done, and you heard from the FPL gentleman maybe two months ago, they've done very um I call them limited undergroundings based on their complaints and and so on.

But there's been enough done now in the last three, four or five years that the costs are pretty well known.

The only variation is gonna be how does it apply to the specific property.

But right now, this is a benefit paid by the property owner.

The city sets up the district, does all of the work, does the contracting, as Nick said.

There'd be a bid for the construction.

We'll do a RFP for consultant that helps us get all of this organized and underway.

I'm still concerned, you know, so FPL has identified, you know, a block here, a block there based on problems.

FPL has moved forward to underground there.

I I'm wondering if doing these special districts will absorb all the available local labor who can do the undergrounding so that the block here, block there in Sarasota that have problems but are not in one of the special districts will, you know, sorry, we don't have manpower to fix you a problem.

I believe that there are enough undergrounding contractors out there.

It's hard to drive very far in this state and not see someone with a directional bore machine burying some type of conduit.

There are a lot of those contractors out there.

I can't speak specifically, but I would be surprised if this project ate up all the contractors.

Uh I I can't and I can't envision that.

And and so I'm wondering, do you anticipate that the city may still go to bat with FPL for some of our other neighborhoods where there are problems with and need undergrounding?

We can certainly we'll be deeply engaged with FPL on this project.

We can certainly understand their criteria, their timing.

Remember, they're operating under a PSC mandate to underground everything within 30 years.

So they're not necessarily time-driven, certainly not as urgent as what you hear from these uh uh residents and businesses, but they are on that long project uh based on the PSC rulings to underground within 30 years.

Yeah.

I I'm I'm just concerned about certain neighborhoods whose FPL polls are at an angle and continue to be at an angle and don't want them pushed off ten years because of you know this.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Commissioner Ahernkout.

Thank you.

What's the approval process needed for this from this commission once let's say the district is you come back with a plan, it's going to cost this much per person, these this is what it's going to look like timeline.

From our end, what is the approval process as far as creating the district?

Is it three?

Is it supermajority?

Is it five?

Three.

Thank you, Bob.

So there will be a financing, and that financing will come to the Commission in the form of a bond issue.

It will be debt, uh, which is probably backed by the I'll say it again, covenant to a budget, the budget and appropriate legally available non-advalorum revenue, but you will repay it with the assessments received from the from the properties within the district.

And will that impact our bond rating at all?

No, it won't.

Okay.

I'd be shocked if it did.

I see no scenario where that impacts it.

These are pretty standard bonds.

Okay.

And conceivably, could every neighborhood in the city apply for something like this?

Sure.

I mean, they would have to get at least two-thirds or majority of their neighborhoods to agree to this, and then we can do the same process for the for them as well.

Okay.

And on the easement situation, um, what if an easement is not granted?

There's you know, there's ways to work around that.

I mean, we will need some some properties we will absolutely have to need it.

It's more of education aspect of it to kind of explain the need for the easement.

Certainly, a property has right to not grant an easement, but uh, you know, that there I am sure we'll we can work on a case-by-case basis on that.

Okay.

Um Mr.

Vilcom, you may remember I it was in my understanding that it was required to have 100 percent agreement on something like this, and they got it?

So uh no, that was not the in Longbow Key, we did two referenda, one passed by about 70 percent and one by about somewhere near 60 percent.

It's been a few years now exactly.

And the Commission simply set uh majority would would carry the day.

You do get to set the because you all have to decide to form the district and then incur debt on behalf of the city.

So you do need to reach a comfort level that enough of the residents want to do this, they now know the cost to do this that that you're willing to move forward.

Your ordinance does set out some um uh uh minimums, but you but you'll need to either agree with what's already been set out or set new minimums uh in order to give yourselves comfort uh to do it.

Because the last thing you want to do is you know, get fifty percent of the vote plus one person, and then you have 49.9 percent that are just very, very upset because this is an assessment that will be on their property bills if they don't pay it all up front um for many years to come.

So it you know it is a significant um cost.

So uh uh that'll be one of the things we can bring forward uh in the next iteration of the process is uh how you want to do this.

It's important for us to get started to start those cost estimates so that the residents and businesses of property owners know or have a decent idea of what their costs would be.

Okay.

And uh Mr.

Patel, um at the presentation by uh Mayor Schneier uh at LEDO on Saturday morning.

One thing he did say which shocked me tremendously, because I've really almost never heard of this, was that the cost was six million dollars less than they were quoted or thought it was going to be.

Do you know what that is due to?

And could any of these other neighborhoods expect a surprise like that too to be given to them?

Can I answer that one?

At the time, the um town manager of Longboat Key added 15 percent to the engineer's estimate.

Because I've never seen a project that did not like this complex long period of time that did not go over budget.

And that I I don't know exactly what that number was, but I tell I can guarantee you that's what he did, and the project turned out not to need most of it.

Okay.

So it was overestimating.

It wasn't that there was economies of scale or um that they purchased bulk in something and no, I guess not.

No.

Okay.

Um and then to the vice mayor's um overarching concern.

Uh a while ago, and uh maybe somebody from FPFPL couldn't speak to this.

Um I was at a Florida League of Cities meeting and somebody from FPNL said that there are in certain circumstances where a neighborhood would like to go forward um with undergrounding themselves and would take a portion of the responsibility.

There are grants available for partial funding, but you have to meet certain criteria.

Um so I don't know if those grants are still available, but perhaps um we can look into that in this situation that you were referring to.

Uh yes, we'll we'll look into the grants for that.

Thank you.

All right, Commissioner Batti.

Uh thank you all for your presentation.

I appreciate it, and thank you, Mayor.

Um, you know, and it I guess this speaks to the Vice Mayor's point, um, especially when you're talking about creating these these districts or TIFFs, if you will, you know, into take care of this type of the situations.

Um how that pertains to areas that, you know, I said is of the utmost urgency out on the Barry Islands, we know that, you know, and uh and even areas in the city that um that flood it um up near where I am, like uh Wittagayou.

But say in District one and uh district three and when that um let's keep it real.

District two has all the money, you know, when that district one doesn't know it is uh district district three.

How does this work with those with those districts in in terms of them finding funding, you know, to uh get these things done.

So if if I I'll take that one too, because funding is kind of in my arena there.

Um it's it's not as neat and it's not as clean as the creation of a district where the property owners agree to pay.

And you're you're secure that one, they want to do it, two, they have the m they just made the commitment and there's uh an assessment placed on them.

You do have some other tools.

Um and I'm not I'm not saying right or wrong advocating for or against.

CRAs have been used to underground in the past.

It's an improvement as an infrastructure improvement that benefits the community.

So that's a method.

The city can explore some other methods that will help you kind of work through their possibly some grants.

They probably won't make a uh a significant dent in the overall cost, but they might help.

I don't know if any of the federal programs might be applicable for they're all part of infrastructure improvements and resiliency, which is getting some pretty decent funding.

So I'm not sure that they'll qualify, but those are the kinds of things that I would start to look at.

Okay, yeah, because that would the first thing that came to mind when thinking about Newtown was the CRA and uh you know how that funding works with the CRA.

But those are my questions.

Thank you, Mayor.

All right.

Thank you.

Um there is no more uh questions.

Um can I get a motion?

I'll make a motion there.

Move to acknowledge stakeholder support and authorize city staff to conduct items one through four as indicated on page two of the agenda request form or agenda number 12.1.

Second.

All right.

Uh Commissioner Ulrich moved um to acknowledge stateholders' support and authorize city staff to uh do items one through four on the administration's recommendations.

Commissioner Ahern Codch seconded.

Um discussion, Commissioners.

I think we've had plenty of discussion.

Okay.

Thank you.

If you will vote.

Is that your vote, Commissioners?

Passes unanimously.

Congratulations.

Okay.

All right.

And we are now at item 122 new business.

Um very exciting.

Um this is a um plan for the Bay Park Phase 3A and design of 3B by the Bay Park Conservancy to be financed in the future with the revenue paid um revenue paid utilizing the Bay Tax Incremental Financing Fund.

And I am going to call upon A.

G Lafley, CEO of the Bay Park Conservancy, to make a presentation.

Thank you all for, I know you've been waiting all day for this.

Thank you for having us.

Hang on one sec.

First, I have to find first I have to find my way into the program.

We get it.

I'm going to get Miles to the Rescue.

There you go.

So right and left.

Get it.

All right.

Jennifer.

Thank you for having us.

I'm Jennifer Compton.

I'm chair of the Bay Park Conservancy, and with me is A.

G.

Lafley, our founding CEO.

And we're happy to be back in front of you for maybe the ninth time I think doing this and more along the way, but for what we're doing today, uh, we're going to give you an update and we're going to seek approval for the next phase of the Bay Park.

Um I'm going to take us from the past to the present, and then A.

G is going to take us from the present forward.

Can you project it?

Once I got it.

I was doing so well.

It's not you.

Ah, there we are.

Yeah, we have to do that.

So we'll go back one and get that.

So this is our agenda for today.

Um we will go as quickly as we can.

We know you've been here a while already.

Next slide, please.

Um the starting point, as always, is that we know that great cities have great parks.

And the Bay Park, in our humble estimation, is our Millennium Park.

It is our central park.

Uh and we've worked very hard to make it the outstanding place that it is and a complement to the city park system.

Every bit of work done on that site is done and driven by three enduring guiding principles that you'll see on the screen.

They inform every decision we make and every dollar we spend.

Uh and I would encourage anyone that's not attended one of our board meetings to come and listen.

We talk about this stuff all the time.

Today we're really going to be focusing on blue and green OASIS for a portion of the presentation.

Some of you have been with us since the beginning.

For those of you who haven't, we'll take a quick walk down memory lane going all the way back to the Sarasota Bayfront Planning Organization.

Um that was the entity that came on the heels of uh Bayfront 2020 and a couple other initiatives that really was the seating ground for this initiative.

From there, we put together the Bay Park Master Plan, uh, which this commission approved in September of 2018.

Then we created the Bay Park Conservancy to help us run implement and operate the park.

Our first project was the Fountain Garden right there on the corner of Boulevard and the Arts in 41.

And that was done in January of 2020, right before COVID, and it really we think set the tone for what it was going to be as a park.

Then we progressed to doing the Bayou mangrove walkway, which is phenomenal.

I'm sure you all have been there.

That was an early initiative and done with the help of one of our local foundations, the Bransick Foundation.

Then we quickly moved into phase one.

And phase one, as I know everybody on the commission knows, is that beautiful piece of land right there along Boulevard of the Arts where we have a lot of community celebrations, including our month-long celebration going on right now.

We are currently in the middle of phase two, and we are coming up with some of the projects being done, and AG will give you an update on all of the phase two updates.

It's going to be really good.

And then we're going to be moving into phase three because we know that our goal is to deliver as much park as quickly as possible for our community.

I think you'll see from the slide, we built momentum.

We have a parallel track of not only doing the project but running the park.

We think that by doing it parallel with each other, we save money and we deliver on our promise to give the community as much park as possible as quickly as possible.

As a conservancy, we have four main roles.

These are what are on the screen in front of you.

We know it's our job to do the master plan, design, plan, and develop each phase of the new park.

Then we have to manage, operate, and maintain it, and raise funds that are contributed in excess of what the city and the county give us.

Those look like four short little sentences, and they're quite big tasks, we know.

We thought we'd share with you funding to date of the park.

This slide will show you on the left-hand side what it is for implementation and operation, because let's not forget we're not just building it, we have to run it.

And then on the right is implementation only.

If you look at what it costs us to have the Bay Park implementation and operations, you'll see that the BPC has done 56% of it with non-city, non-county funds.

We think that's a pretty impressive number.

Where did we start?

This was the beautiful site back in 1930.

Notice the bay was still where it is today when they built the site and they started filling it.

And we ended up with 53 acres on the bay, which became a parking lot surrounding our performing arts center.

This massive parking lot that you see on the left-hand side of the screen that's adjacent to Van Weißel is the biggest polluter on the site today.

It's also our greatest opportunity to make a difference in water quality for our community.

So we set out about making a master plan to change that situation.

What was the plan?

It was to take these precious 53 acres, and over the course of we thought eight to ten years, spend about 200 million dollars, do about four or so phases, and it included four buildings that are on the National Register of Historic Places, which pose their own challenge.

Somehow, with all that, we were going to build a park.

And we did.

And if you look at the park today, we have over 700,000 users that come to the park to do either park-related activities or one of our many site partners.

That is double the amount that was on the site three years ago, and we believe that in another three years, we're going to get it up to a million users a year, which is pretty impressive.

While we set out to build a park, we're actually doing so much more.

And a lot of this is on the blue-green oasis we talked about.

This is cleaning up, it's improving stormwater, it's making it more resilient.

How many times today have we already heard the word resilient?

We're restoring and preserving and adding to the green space.

And in addition to all that, we have some fun while we're there in a really cool park.

The result is that we have a park that has 20 plus acres already with golf course quality lawns, beautiful gardens, a lot of fun activities, and every single day the park looks like it did the first day we opened it, and that's the standard that we hold ourselves to.

We know that there are two essential roles of the Bay Park site, which sounds silly when we're talking about a park, but it's true.

The Bay Park site protects Sarasota Bay from the city, all of the water quality issues that we have.

But the park also protects the city from Sarasota Bay.

It stands as a barrier between the bay and the city.

So we take very seriously our responsibility to help protect our wonderful city.

Resilience was the word of the year last year, and certainly the lessons that we learned in the storms was that everything has to be more resilient.

We knew that we were building a park for resiliency, but even we learned some lessons.

The Bay Park sustained over a million dollars in damages.

Big number.

And this was a park that was built for resiliency.

I would point out our park was open within two days of the last storm.

And that's due to great design, but it's also really due to a fantastic team that was out there working.

Because we knew that the Bay Park had to be a place of respite for our community.

A lot of city parks were not able to open for many, many weeks.

So we were happy to be the place where our community could go.

The lesson was that it was the story of one site with two outcomes.

Because we haven't totally done the entire site yet.

We could see side by side what happens when you plan for resiliency versus when you don't have the opportunity to plan for resiliency.

On the left hand side, you'll see the damage from the storm, and there was damage.

But it was intentionally designed for resilience.

Things were not destroyed.

Things were not torn apart.

If you look on the right hand side, which I would say is 200 yards north of the picture on the left, you can see an area not designed for resilience.

This taught us that we can and we need to double down on our focus on resiliency, which is what we've done in phase two, and we hope to do in phase three.

AG.

If you think back to the black and white photo that we showed earlier, um this picture probably makes sense.

The site is uh is a challenging one.

And uh with six feet of storm surge, everything in blue would be underwater.

All right.

Um obviously the safest part of the site is up against North Tam Miami Trail to the east.

Um fortunately uh Van Weasel preferring Arts Hall's a bit above six, but that didn't protect us from Helene and from Milton because the storm surge and wave action was at eight and a half feet.

This reminded me that from the beginning, from the time we did the original master plan, we looked at the existing elevations which are in parentheses, and we planned for m more resiliency by building elevation wherever we could.

So if you look at the center of the park where the current elevation in the parking lot adjacent to the Van Weasel is six feet above bay level, we planned for 18.

This is our plan today.

Elevation matters.

It's the first line of defense against storm surge, sea level rise.

Let me take you through the phase two update.

I don't know, have any of you been over to the park in the last few days?

We actually opened the promenade and the cultural district on the front side.

Phase two had four has four active projects.

Um they're all designed to improve resilience.

Um, they all improve stormwater and water quality, and they add additional green space.

Um, the resilient shoreline is outlined on the left-hand side along Sarasota Bay.

There are two pieces, one piece south of the boat basin, one piece to the north.

The canal district or boat basin district is the repair of the seawall on the south side, the addition of new floating day docks after we dredged the boat basin as we did the bayou.

The cultural district is on the east side of the park, our new front door to the park.

That promenade is open and has been open for the past week.

Um the Chidsea is about to open, and if you come to the ribbon cutting and uh celebration of the state of the park on Friday, we'll have a tour of the sh of the um of the Chidsea and a ribbon cutting for the promenade.

And then last but not least, uh, and this is important, just as we rehabilitate, renovate, and um and repurpose the park.

We uh we're doing the same with architecturally and historically significant buildings that were entrusted to us as part of the park.

Um wood, two and a half years in, um, we're still on plan, we're still on budget, and we're still on schedule.

We take a great deal of pride in the on-budget piece, um, despite these projects being approved in the fall of 22.

We're three years later.

Um we haven't we haven't yielded to escalation or inflation.

We find ways to manage scope, we find ways to manage plan, we find ways to value engineers so we can deliver everything that we commit to at a very good value.

Um these photos were taken very recently.

If you haven't been down to the boat basin, the new seawall is mostly done on the left, and the floating day docks are in place, and they will be open in November.

Um I mentioned the promenade, this is the new promenade.

It's about a thousand feet stretching from north of the municipal auditorium south past the Blue Pagoda to the corner of um Boulevard of the Arts and North Tammyami Trail.

This is an artist's representation of the second phase of the cultural district.

So we're going to do a town square between the municipal auditorium and the arts center, Holly Hall on the west side, and a connection to the existing park that will begin next spring and be completed next fall.

As part of that, we will have completed the garden club on the right.

We'll be working on the Blue Pagoda and hopefully we'll have some minor renovations there.

You'll be happy to know the restrooms will be upgraded to park standards.

We're doing the Bayfront Community Center right now in the west side of the municipal auditorium, and then we'll turn our attention to the rest of that building.

And this is an artist representation of the resilient shoreline, which the city will be bidding this project before the end of the year.

It should be in construction next year, and we hope to have it completed by the end of next calendar.

Turning to phase three.

As Jenny said earlier, we start with the land and the water, we plan for resiliency, we plan for stormwater management and water quality, and then and only then based on community outreach and feedback from current site users.

We begin to lay in the design and plan for the actual use of new park space.

We also take into consideration the evolving needs of Van Wazel Performing Arts Hall and the future Sarasota Performing Arts Center.

We work closely with both of those teams.

Phase three is to continue to improve.

Phase three A, which I'll talk about first, is essentially Centennial Park.

Centennial Park is the northernmost 11 acres.

It is a park managed by the city.

It is the only park, I believe, or one of the only parks I believe in the city that is open 24 hours a day, seven days a week to accommodate the boating and fishing communities.

And as you'll see in a minute, we focus on all of the key components as we do that improvement.

Phase 3B is the center of the park, and we want to continue to design and plan for that center.

It's a very important piece, obviously, of the total park.

The recommendation today is to invest $20 million, $16 million for design development and construction of Centennial Park Improvements, and $4 million to consent continued design and planning of the center of the park.

We, of course, continue to listen to the community.

We spent a lot of time with the boating community.

I won't bore you with all the details, but there is not one boating community.

If you chatted with them, there's not one recreational boating community, and there's not one commercial boating community.

So you have to listen to all the groups and sometimes all of the individuals to understand the needs.

First set of essentials, everything we needed to do to improve resiliency, restore as much of the green and blue environment as we possibly could, install all the stormwater we needed to treat every drop of water that comes through this 11 acres of the site.

The next piece was to dramatically improve the infrastructure and the experience for the boating community who are the principal users of this part of the park.

So we'll rehabilitate the north and east seawalls just as we did the south seawall.

We'll increase the boat launch capacity at a launch lane, had two lanes, an additional launch bay.

We'll increase boat trailer parking capacity by 50%, rehabilitate the restrooms to park standards and install floating day docks to the east to go with the fixed stage day docks, which the city just repaired and improved to the west.

Phase 3B.

Phase 3B is also built on this kind of layer cake standard.

We started with resilience, so we will build to 10 feet above bay level on the east edge of the resilient shoreline to 20 feet above bay level in the center of the park.

We will install below ground, at ground, and above ground all the elements we need natural and engineered for stormwater treatment and begin to treat all the polluted stormwater and runoff that goes through the center of the site.

We will install build design and build a play area, water features, new restaurants, and most importantly, we'll put in a real garage that will consist of uh a garage on the Van Wazel end and and parking under park in the center of the park.

I just put this we put this slide in for your perspective to give you some idea of how we work from bay level to the resilient shoreline at 9.5 feet to the park restaurants at 22 feet to the top of the parking level at 29 feet, the municipal auditoriums at 55 feet.

A few quick views of what the center of the park might look like.

There will be play areas, suggestions on the right.

The park will terrace up from Sarasota Bay so the play areas can take advantage of the terracing and the playscape, as can the water features.

And these are just some examples.

He turned stormwater treatment into play.

It's a twofer.

Funding, I'm going to turn to City Manager Bullock for the city's recommendation on funding funding, which we concur with.

You said you were going to fund the entire thing.

I did.

But Dave, that was Friday.

Today is Monday.

So what uh the Bay Park has asked for and what was presented at the Bay Park Improvement Board was essentially in total a 20 million dollar request with really a million dollar need in the next, let's say five to six months.

Uh so in consultation uh with the county staff, if the county commission agrees with that request, we would uh we have enough money in our, let's call it our joint checking account that we could accommodate um the million dollars, and A.G.

can invoice against that.

For the balance of it, we would need to do a financing.

Um the other reason why we really well, at least I want to uh just let a few months go by is uh there's some pretty complex permitting that has to take place for some of this.

And the probably the potential for delay is more in permitting than it will be in construction.

That's often the case.

It takes longer to design and permit an improvement than it does to build it.

And that will give us a we'll get a bead on when we can reasonably expect the permitting to come in because we don't want to finance too early and then get a year and a half delay on permitting and run into some spend down uh requirements.

So we think that uh we can take care of the million dollars if the commission concurs.

So this is all contingent on the county also approving the same plan.

Uh and then beyond that, we would look to issue debt sometime in 2026, which would carry the the uh project through this phase uh which uh totals uh in total 20 million dollars.

Yes.

Um the one million is simply design and planning money for the next three to six months.

The um permitting that um that city manager referred to, two principal permits, U.S.

Army Corps of Engineers and Swift MUD.

We believe we can have 60 percent plans done for Centennial Park Project by say the end of January.

We're being told because it's repairs to the seawall that the U.S.

Army Corps permits could come as quickly as four to six months, but we've committed to the city that we'll give them a detailed timeline of planning, permitting start of construction, and uh and um the city managers right, the the lion's share of the construction would occur in the second half or last quarter of 2026 and 2027.

So we don't want to bond, we don't want to finance too early, borrow the money before we we need it.

In closing, um as we move forward and work with even closer with our partners at the city.

Nick was up here.

I don't know if Jerry was here today, but we work closely with Parks and Rack, Jennifer Jorgensen and her team in purchasing.

But these are the considerations we're um paying a lot of attention to in the weeks and months ahead as we plan and work together.

Because as we move into the middle of the park, we're going to have to coordinate and collaborate at even higher levels than we have so far.

So first and foremost is how do we make sure that we deliver on the resilient sea storm water management and water quality that serves the entire park.

Second is you saw in the use that this is a surprising park of 50 acres for the number of different uses and the combination of uses.

If you look across America, there aren't many parks that have a public boat launch, have a garden club, have an art center, have a municipal auditorium, a Holly Hall, a Van Wazel, and are contemplating a new performing arts center.

So it all fits, but we have to work together to make sure that it fits well.

It fits in a resilient way, and it fits in a way that works for all the different users.

So assuming we get an approval with the with the uh with the county tomorrow, I'll be meeting with Tanya and her team on Wednesday to begin to talk about this.

Um how do we work together?

And again, um City Manager Bullock has just encouraged us to take our levels of communication, collaboration, and coordination to even higher levels, and we're committed to do that.

So that's our recommendation, and we we appreciate your support.

Oh, I'm gonna get in trouble if I don't show the last slide.

This Friday is the state of the park event.

I know many of you are coming.

Thank you very much for coming and participating.

Um there's still time to come to Taste of the Bay this weekend on Sunday, and then we close strong with two days of music on November the first and November the second.

That's all we've got.

All right.

Thank you very much.

Um we don't have anybody signed up to speak, I take it.

Okay.

Commissioners, any questions?

Commissioner Ulbert.

Thank you.

Um I have a few detailed questions, but then a couple big picture questions about the money.

Um you said there were four buildings on the National Register of Historic Places.

Who who made those applications?

Oh my goodness, I'd have to go back and pull them all up individually.

Some several were made by the city.

Oh, they've been on the National Historic Register for decades.

Great.

No.

I believe the first one that went on was the municipal auditorium, and then independently.

That's okay.

It wasn't part of this.

No, it wasn't part of this effort.

Okay.

Um I appreciate, I was going to say respectful discussions you've had with the 40 to 60,000 boaters.

I imagine that it wasn't always so respectful.

Not sure we saw all 40,000, but we saw a representative group.

Yep.

Um what is a stormwater treatment train?

Okay.

A stormwater treatment train is the combination of underground catchments.

So think of engineered, engineered pieces and parts.

So in the current park.

We have baffle boxes.

That's the beginning of the train.

We have denitrification trenches under the walkways.

We have catchment areas which capture water that's running from east to west.

All the water comes from the east, higher ground, and heads to the west, except for storm surges, but the normal runoff, okay.

So you want to you want to do as much removal of the phosphorus and the nitrogen and any heavy metals if they exist in that catchment, all right.

Then it moves through sort of the green infrastructure in the train, which is all these trees, all this landscaping, all these lawns, they actually also help filter, you know, the things you don't want to go into Sarasota Bay.

And then last but not least, we use dry ponds and wet ponds and the fancy name is rain gardens, but they're really pond areas that capture water and allow it to, you know, slowly filter through the last seven.

So a variety of sources hooked together to treat the stormwater before it goes into the bay.

Gotcha.

Okay.

You talked about a park over a park.

Park over park.

Park over park.

Park over parking.

Yes.

Some time ago the City Commission directed the city manager to, and I'm these are my words today, come back to the City Commission with a parking plan for the entire area, including the Rosemary District.

Is this that return?

And one piece in the puzzle.

So does that mean that there will be no other parking required within the Rosemary District?

No.

Okay.

If I'm if I might we have commissioned a parking analysis specifically for Rosemary.

You know the question is do we want to try to uh work with the housing authority to include some parking there.

My first question is what's the demand now and in the future?

So that's that's what we're trying to ascertain and that should be ready supposed to be ready by the end of this month.

So this next week or so this is a piece.

Parking over park will fit into that analysis.

Okay.

Thank you.

That answers my question.

One million is contingent upon the Board of County Commissioners concurrence with what we're suggesting here today.

That's tomorrow that you are meeting with them.

Do you want to talk to us at all about any conversations you have had with them?

Well we recall on the Bay Park Improvement Board there are two colleagues, two commissioners from the county commission, Commissioner Cutzinger and Commissioner Smith, both of whom voted for moving forward with this plan.

And Steve Botello, who is the deputy county commissioner and also the essentially the CFO.

County administrator deputy county administrator and essentially the financial manager or CFO of the county serves on the board and he's very familiar with this program.

We won't know until we have the conversation with the county commissioners but as um as City Manager Bullock said, all we're asking them to do is take one million dollars of six to seven million dollars they've already co-deposited as part of the first several years of TIFF increments into the TIFF trust fund and invest essentially their share 5000 with the city's share of 5000 to bridge the design and planning and then once the financing is done and funding is done their responsibility I believe correct me if I'm wrong would be the debt their share of the debt service.

So in a way it's a win-win for them, right?

I mean their principal and interest.

Yeah.

Eventually they have to pay the principal but the um the TIFF the TIFF revenues build in the five to ten to fifteen years ahead so they'll be paying the debt service now and for the next few years they don't have to pay the principal off until there's significantly more funds available.

Got it.

And so after that is when we issue debt right and explain to me how that fits with the TIFF that is the TIFF?

Yes.

So let's clarify we have this let's call it a little um a little prepayment where if the County Commission goes along we we uh make um roughly a million dollars available for the Bay Park uh conservancy to bill against because they we they sent us a bill for work and we uh pay that then the bigger uh concern which I think we want to get and a clear indication from the Commission today is to finance phase three if I'm saying it correctly would be you're not committing to it but you're saying yes you're willing to um when it comes back to you reserving all your rights you're still uh willing to finance the city's part of that that will be an important statement for the city to make uh so that uh AG and the uh county staff can say yes the city has expressed its willingness to to finance the tw total twenty million dollars for phase three at the uh future time next year.

So then now the county knows we're we're in for our half of um every all of phase three and then the ask that he will make to the county commission is for them to be in for their half and if thank you.

And if you oh yeah, I'm sorry.

I should have thank you.

So the way this whole thing works, uh as it was envisioned from the beginning, the tax increment that is collected annually and deposited either in the TIFF fund for the part of the city or held by the county, but they pay their princip their half of the principal and interest to the city.

And and the way the financing works is the city issues all debt and the county pays half of the principal in interest each year.

So uh the it's all uh under the tax increment financing approach that the city and the county uh started back in 2019, I think is when it first started.

Okay, thank you.

Thank you.

Those are my questions.

All right.

Thank you.

Um I wanted to say that uh, as you know, I've been involved in this since the Bayfront 2020, very, very beginning, and have been pretty outspoken about everything, the bay.

And I have to say that I really wanted to thank you for working with Ms.

Brown from CCNA and helping to get the voice of the voters.

And there are so many different kinds and so many different shapes and so many different locations, and to to get that voice heard and uh noted and recognized is invaluable.

So I really thank you for that because that is a Herculean effort.

And thank you to Ms.

Brown as well from CCNA.

Uh so thank you.

Um the other thing I wanted to point out was the uh resiliency factor of the park.

Um phenomenal job.

Yes, there was damage.

But uh from some of the damage that we've seen throughout the city through our own parks, uh other parks, unfortunately.

Umage was significant and significantly more difficult to repair and to get back open again.

And what you all have done for the community is laudable because of that uh extra effort in keeping the community's voice involved, making sure you're doing best practices, and doing exactly what you set out to do.

So I really want to thank you for that as well.

Um and the effort that you've taken towards the um the shifting of the design of the park has also been commendable because it's hard to design something that has moving pieces.

And that is another effort that has to be um noted and and I wanted to thank you for that as well.

And I also appreciate the amount being borrowed, being borrowed or being used, the million dollars requested being used and waiting until the opportune time to go forward with the request for the other, because at the end of the day, that saves money.

Um I just really wanted to say thank you for your work.

Uh thank you for continuing to volunteer your time and for continuing to work with all of the volunteers, for building an incredible group of volunteers, and for being committed to the open accessible, free most of the time, because that's not the way all parks work.

There are parks where it is not free.

So being committed to that and following through with that commitment is really valued by the community and by myself.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Um we have two of our team members here today, Diana Shaheen, um COO, and Adam Gelter, whom was the man that we couldn't see at the Bay Park Improvement Board.

He he he lives.

He does all of our he leads all of our implementation, and of course, a lot of the team isn't here.

And I guess the last thing I would say, this thing's built on partnerships, and we have an incredible number of partners that do all the design and the engineering and help us with the resiliency and the stormwater construction.

We have all of our programming is partnered.

All we have 30 plus nonprofit partners.

So it's um it's a unique network, and it's been it's been terrific to see it grow and get stronger.

But that's how things get done.

That's how things get done.

All right.

Uh Vice Mayor Trace.

Yeah.

Thank you.

Um and and thank you.

The thing in your presentation that I have to commend you on is lots of times when people design and build something and then the storm rips it apart.

You say, okay, I'm going to build it back the way it was.

No, you adapted and said, well, that might not be such a good idea.

So I think I I appreciate that you are taking that approach and saying let's learn our lessons and adapt to the situation.

And you know, hopefully it won't come to it, but after you have adapted, we may discover that there's a need for more adaptation, but at least it's not saying I want to rebuild the way it was in the beginning.

So I appreciate that.

But I have a question for Mr.

Bullock, because the numbers he was throwing out confused me a little because I'm under the impression from uh the Bay Park Improvement Board meeting that your request for phase three was for $20 million out of the combined city-county TIFF fund.

So when it comes this as I understand it, then the city will at some point do the bond issue for the full $20 million, but it will be repaid through the combined county-city TIFF fund.

That's correct.

The way that it works is the city issues the debt, and then the county pays 50 percent of the principal and interest annually, and we pay 50 percent of the principal interest annually.

But it is city debt.

Okay.

And we make the guarantees, and then that's the the revenue flow, that's the flow of funds to pay the debt is 50-50, assuming the county commission approves uh everything that that the city approves.

That's the glitch in there that three entities need to approve this.

The Bay Park Improvement Board already approved it, and if we approve it today, then it will depend on the county to approve.

If on the outside chance the county does not approve, is there a mechanism for the Bay Park Conservancy to come back to us to work something out?

I I would suggest that uh if for whatever reason I don't anticipate that, but if uh something like that should occur now or in the future, it would then we would begin to engage in a in a discussion about a different approach.

Okay.

Okay.

Thank you.

That that was my question.

Okay, thank you.

Uh Commissioner Matty.

Uh question just wanted to say uh thank you all so very much for your continued uh commitment to this this project and uh everything that is going to be in the future to this city and this inclusion and and uh as you know I've been you know a champion of it from jump street and uh am just humbled and appreciative to uh be on the board, you know, um and be a part of this.

So again, you know I I don't think I would disagree with anything that this pertain to this project, you know.

Um and I'm outspoken about it in favor of everything that you do and uh continue to do and uh applaud you and and all that that you that you're doing.

So thank you so very much.

Thank you.

All right.

I have no questions either about um just wanted to just comment.

Um, I saw this presentation at the Bay Park Improvement Board, so I saw it, you know, but I've been you know thinking about it a lot, and I think it's just the concepts are so exciting, and I th and and I think from day one, uh you know, everybody has has come up with just a really amazing park so far.

All of the creative uh people who come up with these designs and way to ways to do things, and I'm looking forward to getting this approved and um seeing that water feature for the you know.

So I think that would you know that that that was a great idea.

I love the park over parking idea to uh provide some parking and give us a hill to climb.

So all right.

Um Commissioners, can we get a motion?

Madam Chair, if I could make a proposed motion.

You all can do with it what you want.

It would be move to approve the concept of funding for phase three of the Bay Park in an amount estimated to be twenty million dollars contingent contingent on equal funding by Sarasota County.

I'll make that motion.

Okay.

Okay.

I'll second it, but do you need the million dollars thrown in there someplace?

No.

I think we're okay.

If you approve that the this is a concept where everything is contingent on the county.

I think we're comfortable that we can they can begin to invoice against money we already have in an account as long as the county approves it.

And um we're you're not approving the funding yet.

I'm trying to I am trying to reserve for you the ability to actually approve the funding at a future date when we have everything nailed down, we know how much everything is.

You'll make the final vote on funding.

But you can AG can make the statement that the city has approved the concept of funding phase three and the amount of 20 million dollars, and you can certainly relay to them that we have the ability, and at the staff level we've agreed with Steve Botello, we can use our joint account for this first uh few months of of their work.

So I uh I I think we're okay.

Okay.

So I I seconded and and Commissioner Ulrich made the motion.

Okay.

All right.

Any discussion of the motion committee?

Um I would like to say something.

Okay.

I remember the day Virginia Haley, Michael Claubber, and I think John Thaxton came to C CNA and pitched this wild idea about a park on the bay.

And we said that sounds like a good idea.

We're all in.

And so here we are today, hopefully all in.

All right.

Okay, Commissioners, if you will vote.

Is that your vote?

Yes.

All right.

Passes unanimously.

Thank you all so much.

And let us know if we need help tomorrow.

Thank you.

Your favorite county commissioner.

Yeah.

All right.

Um.

Do we have any uh anyone signed up to speak?

Nobody?

Okay.

Then uh we go to item 14.

Remarks of Commissioners.

Commissioner Batti.

Absolutely none.

Just Commissioner Ulrich.

Thank you.

Uh two things.

Um I'm on the Florida Liga Cities Finance and Taxation Committee.

We have three areas of focus.

One is Ad Volurum Taxes, which seems to be a big deal this year.

Uh the other is local option sales taxes, and the third is local business tax reform.

The committee has decided to focus on Ed Valorum taxes and will be writing a policy statement that we use to work when we go talk to the legislators in Tallahassee.

Second thing is I'm taking a course from the National League of Cities University on how to become a more data-driven city.

And I hope to bring that information back to this city so we can be more data-driven in our decision making.

That's it, Mayor.

Thank you.

Commissioner Reiherncott.

Yes.

Um for Florida League of Cities, I'm on the Unility Utilities, Natural Resources and Public Works legislative policy committee.

Uh we have 56 members and we had a number of items.

We chose uh as our first one uh enterprise fund transfers because last year, last session, the um legislators in Tallahassee proposed to limit and restrict how you municipalities can use revenues generated from um uh uh utilities such as uh electric, natural gas, water, wastewater outside of the corporate limits.

Um there are often um bond obligations, debt service, and other contractual projects that municipalities use those funds for, and this would limit that.

The bill last year passed the House, but it failed in the Senate.

So we feel that it's we're sure it's going to come back and want to be prepared to um to go to Tallahassee and give good arguments against it.

The second one was the extraterritorial surcharges as uh to for municipalities to maintain authority over establishing uh to establish and apply reasonable extraterrestrial surcharges that reflect the cost of providing services outside of the municipal borders.

Um for example, Longboat Key has an agreement to get they have a sub aqueous line where they get I believe water and wastewater, is that correct?

Just they m take wastewater out to Manatee County and Longbow Key happily pays that surcharge, whatever Manatee County gives them, because the consequence is pretty unappetizing.

So Longbow Key as a receiver of services has no issue, uh as do a lot of folks who receive those kinds of services.

They wouldn't have them otherwise.

Um and so we are um going to be advocating against them limiting uh that increase in in in charges.

Um often the municipality has to invest or the county has to invest in providing that, and so they have to be able to pay for that.

Um close third was one water, and it's a concept we supported last year and we continue to support.

And what one water is, it's an integrated integrative approach to all things water.

So that's water supply, quality, quantity, protection, conservation, um, and uh surface groundwater, freshwater, marine uh marine water, potable water, wastewater reclaimed water, all of it falls under one interconnected umbrella.

And what it does is it basically encourages funding for projects that are not siloed but actually have multiple impacts on the whole global water system because water is regional.

And Texas, for example, spends a billion dollars a year on one water projects because they can s secure funding to say it's not just gonna fit this check mark or that one, it's going to fit 50 of them.

And it's going to impact us in a much bigger way.

So what uh happened last year was that the state felt like they were not the committee was not completely ready to um address this, and so our committee picking two decided we would speak in support of one water and wait until the committee was actually uh you know at a point where they can do it.

Plant City is a big one water uh city, as are a number of cities.

Um there is a conference um Mr.

Bullock in or summit I should say on October 30th in Plant City having to do with one water, and they've got a number of partners, partners that we know and then people that we have as well.

So that was a really it's a really it's it's where things are going for funding and water because that's the most important asset for the city or for the state, I should say.

Um I wanted to share that um I attended the downtown Sarasota Enrichment Association's annual meeting.

Um there were a number of folks there, uh I would say over fifty from merchants from downtown.

They're gonna be having an event uh it during the Thanksgiving Christmas time, and it's going to be to promote local shopping uh in downtown Sarasota, and they're going to be doing all kinds of stuff to celebrate around that, so look for that.

And they're also looking into doing a downtown shopping map.

Um we all attended, I believe that swearing in of the seven new officers, and that was really a beautiful event, so I have to say thank you for, you know, for those of you who attended as well.

Um U.S.

Recycling, uh the group from CCNA and the neighborhood are um meeting and and and uh moving forward with uh trying to get that situation uh to change.

I'll just leave it at that.

Um with that that's that's all I have to share.

All right, thank you.

Vice Mayor?

Yeah, um I'm just gonna be very brief on Florida League of Cities.

I'm on the development code enforcement and redevelopment committee.

And we uh practically had a tie on our two items being CRAs because uh at least one legislator wants to eliminate CRAs.

And then uh there were uh laundry list of housing related things.

So we said housing also um which would include uh Live Local Act and impact fees, uh several line items, so we will probably narrow down which of those we will include in our issue with the legislators, but several bills in that area were filed during the meetings, so it was oh yeah, we can't really give you any details because this just came out.

So that's why I don't have anything solid to say today.

So and that's that's all I wanted to let you all know today.

Is that okay?

Sure.

So you said your number one was CRAs, and then the number two was housing, and I don't know if it was in that order because they were different by one vote.

So then they did a recount, but I was busy talking to somebody when they announced the results of the recount.

So you'll tell us at the next meeting.

With language, yes.

Okay.

Um I guess I'll talk about uh my legislative committee, which seems like a really disparate um group of topics.

Um it's intergovernmental intergovernmental relations, mobility, and emergency management.

So I'm not sure.

So I have to like yeah, so I do have the SB 180.

So we did talk about that there, you know, we're we're promoting um some or you know, the issue came up to uh promote some amendments to SB 180 to provide some clarification, clean up some of the provisions.

Um the issue is um the supposedly the original intent was to be able to have people be able to rebuild where they had already had a a building and not be stopped by local government because you know, if there had if they lost it because of a hurricane.

But that applies now to every everybody, whether they were affected by the hurricane or not.

So um and then um we discussed several issues, and we had to narrow it down to two, and then uh next month we'll choose one.

The uh second issue that uh was chosen was um changing the dates for municipal elections.

Um so essentially the state is wanting them to change the dates of their elections just as we did here.

Um and the the point from the group was that they just they want to make the point that they don't really think the state should be interfering in the local elections and when they're held, because and and the term limits because you make it um you know every year, every even year where you know a governor or president is getting elected, you've got commissions that are have uh three-year terms, so then they've got to change their charter regarding that and how long they serve and so it's just much more complicated, and they just don't feel like that's the state's purview.

So those were the two issues that got chosen.

Our issue uh for the uh art on sidewalks came in third, but that doesn't mean that we can't individually lobby for that.

Um that's that is all I have for today.

So um yes.

Uh first of all I wanted to thank you for doing the art on sidewalks.

Um I I heard it was a great presentation, so thank you for doing that.

Thank you.

Um and then second of all, for SB 180, um when you get that language final, would you mind sharing it?

Because I think that is the our most important one when we go to Tallahassee.

Um that'll be after next month's meeting.

But there are some proposals.

I mean, I can get what they've already proposed, you know, what they're they're wanting to say.

Okay.

I do have a document from Volusha County, what they did side by side as their proposal.

But if you have what what your lead your committee did, that would be great.

Okay.

All right.

And thank you for that.

When you're finished, I do have something else I'd like to add.

Okay, go ahead.

Okay.

Um this is just a throw out and maybe get a sense of the commission.

I, you know, i in light of the removal of stuff on the sidewalks, streets, crosswalks.

I noticed at least one other city in the in the state has painted the rail, the bicycle racks in rainbow colors.

And, you know, I think that might be something if we are in a position to paint bicycle racks in our parks, we might want to consider doing that.

Saw that as well.

Um so I asked how much does that cost?

How much does that cost?

Well, we would there might be volunteers who are willing to do that.

All right.

Um we will go to the city attorney.

Uh nothing for today.

Thank you, Mayor.

Ums Griggs.

Do you have something?

Rarely.

Yeah.

Um I need to make our announcement that we are hosting our second shred stock event.

Yes.

Um it will be on Saturday, November 8th from 9 a.m.

to noon at the Van Weasel parking lot.

Um we will have the same band back, which was they were awesome.

That is the garbage men.

They're performing um 60s songs.

Um this is open to the City of Sarasota residents.

They bring you can bring up to four boxes per household.

Free, secure, on-site shredding.

Acceptable items are paper documents, file folders, staples, and paper clips.

Not accepted.

CDs, DVDs, hard metal, binders, we're not taking any of that.

You will need to show your city ID.

Um we just hope people show up again.

So we'll we're just trying to promote it, get it out there.

We had a great event last time.

We had a great turnout last time.

So hopefully we can have another one.

So thank you.

Yeah, it's a great question.

Oh, I'll get it done free.

Yes.

Also I have one more thing.

I need to bring to you all's attention.

I'm gonna have Miles come out and explain it because this is very important and community needs to know about it, and you all need to know about it if you are asked about it.

So I just have Miles will explain it better than I can.

Thank you, Madam Clerk.

Uh I just wanted to update everybody.

Uh as most of everybody knows, the county is moving out of 1660 wringling.

Um it's quite a moment.

It's been a long time over there.

Their last meeting there is tomorrow.

Uh in the meantime, when until the new administration building gets built out by the salary fields, they are gonna be at uh RLA in Venice.

So what that means for us specifically and our broadcast of the meetings RL Anderson, just so for people who don't know.

Yeah, that's their South County uh uh facility.

Um for us generally so how it works is our signal goes from this room via fiber across the street to 1660, and then that's where Master Control is, and it goes to Verizon and Comcast from there.

Well, 1660 is gone as of the end of this month.

So there's no connection to Verizon or Comcast from the RLA building in Venice.

So not only us, but them as well are not going to be on those TV channels for a period of time.

They're saying January for the build-out to be completed, but there's a lot of moving parts, a lot of different entities, so they're working on that.

So just so everyone knows, if you hear about it, you're not on we're not on TV.

The Comcast feed is uninterrupted.

That's for all our advisory boards is on Comcast live streaming and on demand.

And the City Commission is on Comcast is on um uh Granicus and Facebook Live.

So people can stream it on the You can still stream it.

That's uninterrupted.

Granica still is we'll just uninterrupted keep going.

So just so you all know that Comcast you just we won't have a TV fee.

So we just want the public to be aware of that so that they go and try to watch the good idea.

Yeah, we need to know that.

All right.

Thank you.

Thank you, Miles.

Okay.

Um I'll go to the deputy city mayor.

Nothing.

Okay.

Um Mr.

Bullock.

I hate to say I have a couple things, but I have a couple things.

Um I would ask the Commission's approval to send a letter to Sarasota County under the mayor's signature asking them for first asking them if we can do a presentation on the performing arts uh center and if we could get an indication of where they are as a commission on future funding.

We're we're at a point in our planning where we really need to nail down uh whether they're in with us all the way, partway, a little bit, um, or something else.

So I'd like to be able to craft that letter under the mayor's signature and send it to the chair of the county commission.

Do you need a vote from the commission or a consensus?

It would be best if we if we had a motion just to authorize the mayor to send a letter to the county commission to offer to meet with them and then express our uh desire to know where they stand on this.

I'll make that motion.

I'll second.

Okay.

Any discussion?

Um I'll I'll just say that um you and I have had conversation about this, and um I agree that it's time to do that.

All right and um yeah if you will vote Commissioners is that your vote motion passes unanimously thank you and then uh my last thing and we can do this at another meeting I thought it uh it would be time to update you on the work we're doing on the Van Wazel.

We've got a whole bunch of engineering some materials have come in you know uh so rather than do it now even though I did have Nick's day um we'll uh if if it's okay we'll schedule it on a on a soon to upcoming meeting just to let you know where we are what we've done and what's yet to come.

That would be great.

And that's it.

All right.

So if there is anybody have anything else all right then we are done.

Thank you.