Good morning.

Welcome to uh April twentieth, twenty twenty six regular city commission meeting.

And before I call it to order, I will ask that everybody silence their cell phones.

Thank you.

And that's us too.

I did mine earlier, I think.

No.

Okay.

So first we will have the invocation by city auditor and Clark Griggs.

Those who can stand, please stand.

Heavenly Father, we affirm our faith in thee.

We seek your divine strength, wisdom, and guidance in the deliberations that affect the lives of each of the citizens of our community.

In that name we pray, amen.

Okay.

Well, then may I have a motion to approve the proposed agenda?

Second.

Okay, moved by Commissioner Batti, seconded by the Vice Mayor.

May we have your votes.

Next, we have a presentation, which I will ask the commissioners to join me up front.

Statistics indicate that forty-one point eight percent of women and twenty point four percent of men have experienced sexual assault.

And whereas we must educate our community to prevent sexual assault and support survivors, with leadership and dedication, we can reduce sexual violence in Sarasota through education, awareness, and holding perpetrators accountable.

And whereas Safe Place and Rape Crisis Center, SPARC, provides free services to victims of domestic violence and sexual assault and their children in Sarasota County, seeks to stop the crime of sexual violence through awareness and education, and whereas Spark urges everyone to engage in efforts to discuss sexual violence, prevent it, support survivors, and collaborate across society to address it effectively.

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 April 2026 as sexual assault awareness month, a month of special importance and worthy of the recognition of the residents of the City of Sarasota.

Thank you very much.

And do you want to introduce yourself?

Yes, my name is Nicole.

I'm a sexual assault victim advocate at Spark.

Thank you.

Thank you.

If I can have you all take one second.

Thank you again.

Oops.

Okay, we are now at item number 2.1 scheduled presentations with a presentation regarding the SPD 2025 end of year review.

And I'm calling upon Chief Trochet, Deputy Chief May Forth, Captain Armstrong, Captain Rainey Jr., Captain Todd, Captain Thomas Quinlan to make the presentation, and do we have enough chairs and pull one forward?

Good morning.

Good morning.

We'll introduce ourselves Chief Rex Trochet for the record.

Captain Rob Armstrong.

Captain Kenneth Rainey.

Captain Jonathan Todd.

Captain Tom Quinlan.

Deputy Chief Scott May 4.

Okay.

So up to you.

I will begin.

So uh Ken Rainey will be working the PowerPoint force, so we're here.

Uh 2025.

I'm just waiting for it to come up on the screen.

We have three minutes time remaining.

This is our end of year report for 2025.

Next.

As you can see, we have the violent crime percentages up there.

And if you go to the far right corner and drop down, we are down 18%.

Again, this is an amazing number.

I will I will tell you that police chiefs and sheriffs from around the country would be happy with a two or three percent drop.

And in some cases, a flat.

But we're 18 percent.

So congratulations to the men and women of the City of Sarasota and the community of the Sarasota because we've been working together hand in hand.

Much collaboration has gone on.

Next one.

As you can see in 24, we had a 21.8% drop, then an 18% drop the year prior in 23, we had a 16% drop.

So that's a total of 56% total in the last three years.

So again, an amazing and amazing job by everyone within our city.

Next.

I'd like to focus on the real-time operations center.

This has been technology that we've been able to leverage with the assistance and guidance of uh city commissioners allowing us to move forward with this project.

Next.

We've been able to strengthen our intel and policing in real time with directed operations, and we've been able to support stronger prosecution and higher conviction rates.

And what I want to say real quick about the real-time operations center, it truly is the name that it says it is.

The days of solving crimes in weeks, days, hours are no longer.

In this real-time operation center, we're solving crimes in seconds.

And when we can solve crimes in seconds, we keep other people from being victimized in our community and our surrounding communities.

That's how important this center is.

Thanks.

So here's the ecosystem of the real-time operations center.

And as this center grows, you can see we're only limited by our imagination as far as what we connect to it.

Up top on the left, you'll see the Raven system.

That's been our shot spotter.

And I'll talk more about that in the next slide.

We've been able to go into officer body worn cameras to make sure that they're safe, make sure if they need help.

If they don't answer the radio, we can see what's going on.

We can use it for training as well.

And in the future, the very near future, we'll be in all 600 cameras of our schools within our city.

That will be a major game changer in case we have bad actors that enter to our schools.

We can see in real time on cameras where they're at and go immediately to the threat.

Next.

One case example that we had using the Raven system on September 12th.

We were alerted to gunshots in the area of Watts via the flock system and Raven gunshot detection program.

The ROC analysts immediately determined there were no 911 calls, but officers responded to the gunshot victim who was in a vehicle.

He was shot through the car door and bleeding out.

No one ever called 911.

The only reason we were alerted to that incident was because of the Raven system, and we were able to save this person's life.

So already the system has been proven to be invaluable to the city of Sarasota.

And now I'll turn it over to Captain Rob Armstrong.

Good morning.

The first slide goes over some of our numbers from 2024 to 2025.

Next slide.

What you'll see is a very slight decrease in some of the proactive numbers.

This is really in line with a little bit of a decrease in the number of officers on the road.

But what this does show is that both years were very proactive and the productive police work is still going on.

One of the things that we noted is the DUI arrests.

In the last two years, we've had a 43% increase in DUIs.

This is due to the officers being more comfortable with DUI investigations, the training they're receiving, and the repetitive training.

And we also have in-house traffic homicide investigators doing the training in ship briefings with field sobriety tests and court preparation, and also the body war cameras have completely changed the game for DUIs because the impairment is recorded.

Next slide.

This lets me brag briefly about our homeless outreach team.

Very proud of them.

It is one sergeant, three in enforcement, two in outreach.

We have one coordinator with the city and two case managers.

The primary goal remains outreach, services, and housing.

In 2025, there were 2,805 contacts, which is awesome.

We're still under the three E's, which is education, encouragement, and enforcement.

We are a best practices model.

Our agency is a model agency.

We have agencies from all over the world that actually come and shadow our hot team and learn our processes.

With community care court, we are interconnected with the court system.

Our hot team can help with social services with the same goal of housing.

We also do enforcement.

You can see the numbers are really high.

We have a very proactive unit as a last option.

Those who are refusing services and predisposed of criminal activity.

Next slide.

Pictured here, if you saw from our Springfest, this is our learning center.

Also, that is Whitney Bence of our community relations unit.

This is a state-of-the-art mobile learning center.

This was received through donated funds from a very caring individual in the certain city of Sarasota who just wants to be a part of helping children.

This trailer can be brought to schools and events, and we are partnered with the school board.

It's primarily for elementary age students.

It's equipped with iPads, 3D printers, and interactive learning materials.

This learning center will build relationships with police officers and students, and it humanizes the badge.

Next.

We are partnered with USF, Dr.

Lee and his team of the criminology department, SPD, the crime analysts, and our Intel unit are currently partnered together.

We just completed phase one.

It was a month, one month data collection.

We use 10 hotspot crime locations with directed patrol with police presence.

These were for short periods of time, and officers documented all of their activity.

This information has been analyzed by USF.

It is AI and data driven for crime forecasting.

Phase one results from Dr.

Lee showed a 19.6 crime reduction citywide.

We continue to go down, down, down.

This is great.

Phase two, we're currently collecting data and getting ready to get off on phase two for the new crime spot locations.

The goal is to predict crime locations and placing officers in areas where crime will be predicted to occur ahead of time.

The overall goal is continued reduction in crime.

Thank you very much for your time.

I'll turn it over to Captain.

Good morning.

As Captain Arflock said, my name is Captain Ken Rainey of the Professional Standards Division.

Professional standards influences how we maintain accountability and strengthen our officers' performance.

This division is responsible for ensuring our people are appropriately trained.

Our systems of accountability are functioning properly, and our agency continues to operate in a way that reflects both our professional standards and our commitment to the community.

This slide presents our internal affairs compliments and complaints numbers for 2025.

During 2025, internal affairs handled 173 total investigations, which is an increase over the prior year.

That included 11 formal investigations, 64 informal investigations, and 98 investigative inquiries.

One of the most important points on the slide is that 84 of those 98 inquiries were closed through preliminary review after officers investigated body worn camera footage and case documentation with no policy violation identified.

That matters because it shows the value of having strong documentation, adequate supervisory review, and reliable technology in place to assess concerns quickly, fairly, and with minimal impact upon officer morale.

Accountability is just one component of professional standards.

Recognition matters too.

In 2025, IA issued 75 internal officer compliments, which reflects a significant increase from the previous year.

We believe it is just as important to acknowledge good work as it is to address concerns.

Our people do outstanding work every day, and is important that we recognize professionalism, sound judgment, and excellent service when we see it.

So as a reminder, uh SNAP training is a training that was envisioned by Chief Trochet and uh and he directed me to make it so.

But uh SNAP training is designed to be immediate and realistic.

Officers are called out of patrol and expected to respond to training scenarios without advanced notice, much like they would in reality.

One was held at Sarasota Memorial Hospital, and the second incorporated newly acquired virtual reality headsets.

This kind of training is invaluable because it tests decision making, communication, and performance under pressure.

We also renewed our Axon contract in 2025, and with that came the upgrade to the TASER 10 platform.

All members received certification training, and the department also received virtual reality headsets that can now be used for taser recertification and additional scenario-based training.

This is just another example of the ways that we we remain modern, consistent, and present training in an effective format.

One of the many metrics we continue to focus on is response to resistance.

In 2025, our officers reported 111 response to resistance incidents that were necessary to achieve lawful objectives.

That is a 12% reduction from 2024.

What makes that even more significant is that it follows a 36% reduction the year before.

So this is not a one-year anomaly, rather, this is a continued downward trend.

This statistic is an indicator of both officer professionalism and training effectiveness.

Our personnel continue to do a strong job resolving difficult situations while reducing the need for force.

That is supported by a broad training approach that includes gracie survival tactics, crisis intervention training, mental health first aid, active bystandership for law enforcement, resilient jujitsu supplemental training through the Sarasota Police Foundation, PERF ICAT, and additional de-escalation training built into our response to resistance scenarios.

When you consider the professional standards division's contributions as a whole, the overall message is this.

We are investing in our people, we're holding ourselves accountable, we are recognizing good work, and we are seeing specific, measurable, and repeatable results.

It is not just about reviewing problems after the fact.

It is about building a department that is better trained, better prepared, and better positioned to serve the community with professionalism every day.

And with that, I'm gonna turn it over to Captain John Todd.

Thank you, Kelly.

Good morning, Commissioners.

I'm uh Jonathan Todd.

I'm the proud captain and commander of our criminal criminal investigations division, which is comprised of detectives that investigate property crimes, crimes of violence, crimes against children, financial crimes, and vice narcotics crimes.

The division also has our crime scene investigations unit, victim advocates, and the property and evidence unit slide.

Slide.

There were two homicides in the city in 2025.

That is a that is down from seven in 2024.

In both of the homicides in 2025, our detectives were able to identify, locate, and arrest the suspect within hours of the murder.

As you can see, our homicide case clearance rate of 100% is significantly higher than the national average of 61%.

And that's a consistent uh increase for us.

One of the notable homicides occurred on February 4th, 2025, when a young woman was found murdered in her home at the Lear Apartments on Ringling Boulevard.

This case is noteworthy because it shows how our detectives are able to work with analysts in our real-time operations center to identify and locate criminal suspects.

In this specific case, our detectives were able to to determine that Jaw McGordon, the victim's former fiance, was responsible for her death.

The detectives located surveillance footage that showed Gordon fleeing the apartment in the moments after the murder.

The detectives gave the suspect vehicle information to our ROC analysts, and within a matter of two hours, Gordon was located and apprehended near Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

Within 12 hours of the murder, our detectives were on their way to Baton Rouge to attempt to interview Gordon, seize his vehicle, and other items of evidence of the crime.

This is just one example of how the ROC is changing the way that our detectives are solving crimes that occur in the city.

Next slide.

This slide shows a numerical breakdown of criminal cases that were assigned to our detectives in 2025.

There were a total of 715 criminal investigations worked by our detectives last year.

One statistic that I am particularly proud of is our case clearance rate.

As you can see, our clearance rates for both crimes against persons, which are violent crimes, and crimes against property are significantly higher than the national average, and that's pretty much year in and year out.

Our strategic investigations unit or SIU is responsible for investigating vice and narcotics crimes.

As you can see, they were extremely successful in 2025.

They made 67 arrests that resulted in 206 felony charges and 23 misdemeanor charges.

Over the course of the year, they see they seized nearly $600,000 in cash, 54 firearms, and a large amount of narcotics that are range from cocaine, heroin, fentanyl, methamphetamine, and marijuana.

The pictures on the right side of the slide are just some of the guns and cash that they were that were seized during their operations.

Next.

As you can see by the numbers, they were very successful in 2025.

They made 114 arrests, resulting in 142 felony charges, 43 and 43 misdemeanor charges.

The most important stat on the slide are the 34 firearms that the unit were able to take off the streets of our city.

They also seize a large amount of cocaine, uh, heroin, marijuana, spice, and prescription pills.

I think it's uh worth noting it's it's four officers and a sergeant that do just do tremendous amount of work for us, so we're very proud of them.

Uh one of the most successful operations that our CAT and SI units undertook in 2025 was the shots free and zone three operation.

The operation began on May 25th, 2025 and addressed a notable increase in firearms-related crimes that were occurring within the Newtown neighborhood.

While this area is relatively small geographically, an analysis of crime data revealed that a majority of the firearms-related crimes in the city were occurring there.

As a result of the operation, the neighborhood saw a nearly I think you go to the next slide.

As a result of the operation, the near neighborhood saw nearly 90% decrease in cases where a victim was actually shot from year to year.

As you can see, the area had the unit had 22 cases.

I'm sorry, zone three had 22 cases of folks shot in 2024 compared to eight cases in 2025.

This was an outstanding job by members of our units who work closely with members of the community to address these serious violent crimes.

During the operation, the community action team made 31 arrests, resulting in 73 felony and 25 misdemeanor charges.

They took a total of 19 firearms off of the streets of Newtown during this operation, as well as a large quantity of various illegal drugs.

The hard work and dedication of these officers made a significant improvement in the safety and security of the residents in that community.

Thank you.

I'll turn it over to Captain Tom Quillman.

Thank you, Captain.

Good morning.

I uh I'm Captain Tom Quinlan, and I privately lead the support services division at the Sarasota Police Department.

Our division consists of 16 dedicated units made up both sworn and per and civil uh civilians.

Our operations are organized in two main tracks, each playing a vital role in our mission.

Next slide.

Keep it there then.

Starting from the left, we have our MIS unit.

This dedicated team of one manager, five civilian specialists play a crucial role in computer programming, database management, network development, and by providing essential support across the department.

This year they successfully tackled over 2,000 help desk tickets, added a new front desk check-in procedure, which is compliant with the CEGA standards, which is the criminal justice information services, and programming and distribution of our agency cell phones and laptops.

To the right, you will find our facilities and maintenance unit, which oversees our extensive 300 square foot department.

They take on challenges through various projects and conduct more than 100 preventive inspections each year completed.

And have also completed 325 health desk tickets tickets internally.

They're responsible for maintaining our three substations located in Newtown, Glesby Park, and downtown.

Next slide.

Our records unit consists of six record specialists.

In just one year, they processed an impressive 21,903 cases, processed over 2300 state attorney requests and responded to over 5,183 public record requests.

Meanwhile, our body worn camera unit, which includes one manager and a program specialist, has handled 3,122 body warrant camera public records requests this year by reviewing and redacting videos before their release, which is a 266.5% increase from 2024.

Next slide.

In 25, our red light camera unit processed 27,978 violations across the city.

We added 10 additional cameras in 25, which totals 30 red light cameras in the city.

Our fleet unit replaced 24 police vehicles in our patrol division to include the traffic unit, the marine unit, and the community relations unit, which that funding came from the opioid grant.

Our school zone safety cameras, effectively managed by the real-time operations center, launched in January of 25.

It serves six schools.

It has 11 school zones using 22 cameras.

The program has processed over 51,000 violations, and within one year of the program, there has been a 59% reduction in violations overall, which is a great success.

Next slide.

We actively engage with our community by co-sponsoring this year 11 city events in 25, which requires significant resources in collaboration with city special events team and the public works department.

Our largest event, the downtown New Year's celebration, typically attracts around 30,000 attendees throughout the event.

Thank you, and I'll hand it over to Deputy Chief May Fourth.

Good morning.

Can you hear me?

Yes.

All right.

Good morning, Commissioners.

Deputy Chief Scott May Forth.

I'm here to talk to you about two programs that we are very, very excited to be rolling out later this year.

The first one is a real real-time 911 software system, and the second one is our drone first responder.

These programs are supposed to work together, but I'll explain them individually for you.

The real-time 911, what that does is it allows our ROC analysts to actually hear calls as they are being called in to Sarasota County dispatch.

So no longer do we have to wait for those calls to be dispatched over radio to a zone unit.

Our ROC analysts will be able to hear it as it is being called in by the complainant in or victim.

Fantastic program.

That's going to uh we're estimating give us a one to two to three minute time advantage of getting an officer on scene.

Because when that call comes in and they hear it, if it meets certain criteria, they can get on our police radios and they can let the officers know where it's occurring, what's going on, before the call for service comes over the radio.

So it's just fantastic.

Our drone first responder is a roof-mounted autonomous drone launching system.

Now, what this does, this actually ties into the real-time 911 software.

Our ROC analysts, when they hear a call come in that meets certain criteria, they can upload the information to the drone, push a button, the drone automatically launches, fixes its course, and drives directly to the area.

It has anywhere in the city it can get to in three minutes or less.

It has a top speed of 60 miles an hour.

The batteries last 60, 65 minutes.

When it needs a fresh battery, it goes back to the police station automatically, automatically loans in its containment unit, automatically swaps out the batteries, automatically relaunches, and goes back to the scene.

Once it is on the scene, our rock analysts can take manual control and operate it as needed.

So again, this is going to give us a tremendous benefit as far as officer safety goes.

And just giving us that intel as to what's on scene.

So basically, we're looking at real-time situational awareness to a level that we've never had before by utilizing these programs.

So we think it's going to be fantastic.

One of them we're going to be rolling out here probably in a couple weeks, and that's the real-time 911 software system.

The drone first responder will be a little bit later in the year, probably around October.

That's we're shooting for.

So well, I think that's wraps everything up.

I'd like to thank everybody at this table for allowing us the opportunity to come before you today with this presentation.

It's been a small little snapshot of some of our 2025 accomplishments, which we are very proud of, and we hope you are as well.

Thank you.

Thank you.

That's really exciting.

So now we have uh commissioner questions, and who's up first?

Uh the vice mayor.

Yes, ma'am.

Uh first of all, I want to thank you all for the good work you do for the citizens of our city.

I think Captain Armstrong mentioned the Learning Center, and that it's designed for elementary age students.

I have to tell you, even city commissioners like the planning center.

Yes, ma'am.

And also I want to tell you, in my opinion, the many things you do to build trust, to build community with our residents are really paying off.

Um that Springfest you recently had.

The burgers were great.

And the show and tell for all the units that were on display.

Uh the bomb squad, uh the drone people were there.

Um I would say keep that up and put the same guy at the grill.

Yes, ma'am.

Thank you.

Okay.

Uh Commissioner Ahern Kotch.

Yes.

Thank you.

Thank you for the presentation.

It was really comprehensive.

Um, you know, I think sometimes we don't realize all the various departments and what you all do, and so it's it's important to have this information and this update.

I think not just for us, but also for the community.

Uh my question has to do with the hot team.

Um the presentation information that you gave us, it has individual contacts is 2,805.

And then individuals who successfully completed the community care.

Those the the individuals who completed the community care are those ones that were reached through the individual contacts?

Yes, ma'am.

So out of the 2,805, those are contacts, but it says first-time contacts.

So 361 of those are new folks that never were um reached out to before.

Yes, ma'am.

Um.

And those are of the 2,805?

Yes, ma'am.

Okay.

So if you say individuals who successfully completed were 600, so those 600 were out of the 2,800?

Yes, ma'am.

So that's a really high success rate, wouldn't you say?

Absolutely.

Yes, ma'am.

Okay.

I wasn't sure I was interpreting that correctly, but I I find that incredibly high.

And that speaks to the whole program that we are taking a part of.

Yeah, I mean the community care court changes the whole program because we're connected to the courts.

So even when we're out doing enforcement, it's still a housing-based model.

So the whole thing never really changes, even when we're making arrests, even though we do make arrests, and those are really generally the people that we know deal with every day.

They're refusing services, and they just are kind of stuck in that wheel, but we're still trying.

So those are the ones where we keep trying to get.

But you know, the ones the first time contacts is an amazing program.

Again, small.

It's a tiny unit, but it's, you know, the chief has nicknames for it, which I won't say out loud.

They're not bad, but he can't believe how much they do for such a small unit.

All right, let's keep those names to ourselves.

They're good.

They're good, they're great names.

Uh we we call them tiny but mighty, you know, uh paper tiger sometimes because what's so impressive is we have agencies from around the world that are coming and looking at those numbers that you just pointed out, which are mind-blowing, and it's because we have the right people in the right seat, and we do a great job with retention and collaboration with our partners, just like Captain Armstrong said.

That's why we continuously have agencies coming through our agency to visit our tiny but mighty unit.

And the number of service uh, yeah, the number of services provided.

How does that figure into everything that you're doing?

I mean, it's kind of difficult to do that number, but that really is the hotbeds.

It's how many folks we're getting off the street for lodging.

So there that it's high because there's a lot of folks lodging, but again, we have that first option.

We're not gonna take you to jail.

We don't want you in the system.

We want to make sure you're off the street.

And that's why I hope you've all seen there's a reduction, right?

You're not seeing a lot of homeless folks, and that's great, and that's what we want.

Do we have a pit count?

Uh I don't have it yet because it hasn't come in.

Do we have it from last year?

No, that's the one S.

It would have been on the slide.

I'm still waiting.

I asked.

Okay.

Yes, ma'am.

I would love to see that number of hopeful is super low.

Yes, ma'am.

And this is the hot team.

How many individuals are on this team?

So we have one sergeant.

There are three in enforcement and two in for three in enforcement, two in outreach.

Okay.

Three in enforcement and two in outreach.

And they handle the whole city.

They do, yes, ma'am.

Okay.

And how many officers are trained in if they come in contact with somebody who is unsheltered?

How many of our police officers are trained in talking to these folks?

100%.

100%.

Is that a typical number?

That's what how we do it.

So we're doing it from the onset of agency specific.

So as soon as they get hired, we have a 13-week agency specific training, which Captain Rainey handles.

So they get a full section and full day of hot training.

But I mean, like do they do that in St.

Petersburg or in Miami or in Jacksonville or is it typical?

I don't know, but I think that we're, you know, we're doing it, and I think it's important that we are.

And it's, you know, for the officers that don't know our city, that 13, you know, they don't love 13 weeks of a new academy.

But they spend a whole day.

We also have shadow days.

Also, one of our officers in the hot team is a field training officer.

We currently have an officer in phase one with Officer Jack Grayling, learning everything hot, everything calls for service, and might as well talk about him.

He was officer of the year last year.

So we've got some great people, like the chief said, in a great unit.

Wonderful.

Thank you.

I I had another question over here about a second, let me get to it.

If somebody has another question, we can start.

And I'd just like to add that we do a refresher every two years agency wide.

I think that's very important.

So it's not just an agency specific training for our policy.

I know Joe Paul's act was a big part of this in developing our program.

Every two years we do a refresher for the entire agency.

Thank you very much.

I'm ready.

Okay.

So that, ma'am, is a best practice model uh presented by the police executive research forum.

So they're essentially a think take of all the greatest policing minds uh really nationally and internationally.

Uh but it's all about integrating communications and tactics with your um with your contacts with citizens and the furtherance of de-escalating the situation rather than escalating the situation.

Okay.

So that's a really valuable um skill set to have.

Yes, ma'am.

Um because sometimes a situation could go worse or it can be just in the training.

And that may hinge entirely upon the officers' communication skills, and that's why we invest in that training, ma'am.

Beautiful, thank you.

All right, I will let others ask for questions.

Okay.

Commissioner Batti.

Uh uh thank you.

Thank you, Mayor.

And uh thank you all so very much.

And I can't uh you know applaud you enough.

Um, what one of the things that uh you know I want to bring to the attention um of the utmost importance, particularly like in in my district, you know, the work that you've done in the new town area.

If you could bring up the the slide um regarding the the drop in uh crime and we've had there.

That's what we're gonna put.

Yeah.

And then and just how uh important that is, you know, in the the amount of community engagement that you know our SPD has done in in our community, particularly since you know Newtown was was uh brought to the attention of uh everyone regarding uh all the neighborhoods in this city, you know, is the one that uh had the the uh uh most likely of crimes committed.

Um when you you talk about uh the the amount of uh firearms.

Can you talk you speak about that that that were confiscated?

You know, it was a significant amount.

We uh we had several operations throughout 2025.

One in particular where we partnered with uh our our partners at the ATF.

Uh and they had some assets come into the city.

Okay, and it was uh tremendously successful in getting a lot of bad people off the street and a lot of firearms off the street.

Um I mean you're talking hundreds of guns in in totality in 2025, and those are guns that can't be used to shoot somebody.

So it's just been a tremendous job, and I know members of the community are appreciative.

Uh, before we started the operation shots free in zone three, we had meetings with uh community stakeholders at Judson's.

What would you like guys like to see done differently uh and we took those those words and then put them into practice so it's been it's been a really successful operation.

Excellent thank you so very much and uh the these crimes that were committed in the in the community can you give us an an idea or wherewithal as the like the age range because a lot of people don't understand like you know um who these uh crimes were committed by well I mean you know the majority of them are are younger folks uh not all but the majority um you know anywhere from mid-teens to mid to late 20s but we've also had some some older folks involved as well but the majority are younger folks and from our conversations chief you know I remember when we had you know that that that wave of crime being committed in in Newtown were committed were being committed by extremely like young young folks and whatnot as as young as like say 14 or something like that.

Yes 100% we were looking at like 12 and up and what we needed to really start focusing on was more community.

So we started getting involved with Booker High School the football time football team we started bringing our community relations unit to get more involved with the kids and then we also partnered with juvenile probation and now what we're able to do is if there's a juvenile with an ankle monitor that ankle monitor is connected to the real time operations center.

If that juvenile in the middle of the night who's supposed to be on probation and I can't tell you how many kids we have to check at night to make sure they're home at two in the morning or three in the morning we don't really have to do that anymore because if they have the ankle monitor once they break the geo fence around their house we get the alert in the real-time operations center and so do the officers and we can pinpoint where that kid is within 10 feet so they know this so a lot of this has really helped reduce the challenges that we've had and using our social media to talk about all the successes is really helped us out as well because now the kids know the technology that we have and so do the bad guys.

So I think it's a lot of partnership with collaboration communication great officers and then leveraging the technology that we have in that real time operation center.

Excellent you bring up the the slide again with the um with the firearms or what have you and look like maybe drug paraphernalia money yeah yes you know just to give a a visual and uh you know one of the things that it looks like marijuana over there or whatever um but you know just to give people uh uh everyone a snapshot of you know what you know these these officers have done and the amount of work you know particularly with our deputy city manager Mr.

uh uh Pat Robinson we had an had a a family that um was you know committing violence uh and uh selling drugs right in the central coconut area outside of Newtown but in district one you know I was contacted by the family members that I grew up playing football with and so on you know Scott that's what they call me my middle name you know is they you know what can be done man you know our our our mother's house is being is turned into a trap house what we call it uh a drug a drug house or whatever I go to Mr.

Robinson Mr.

Robinson you know speaks to the chief they put a sting on this house knock down the door uh and and uh confiscate these these guns that money and drugs or what have you and arrest the perpetrators put them in jail they uh speak to the chief because they uh they were coming back to the house once they got out of the jail now just to give you all an idea of what happens and what these people are faced with they get out they they uh sell tell them probate tells them that they have to sell the house you know and they get upset come back to the house and set the damn thing on fire okay that almost lit the house next door to it on fire so I go to the chief I say hey you know chief and you know Mr.

Robinson what can we do?

Can we put a dummy car or something like that immediately within within the hour the chief has a dummy car out in front of the house they never return in the community you know saw the sale of this house or what have you or whatever but it's due to the vigilance and the amount of work that these officers put in you know uh man hours and so on that in community engagement that helped make something like that happen or whatever and it's due collaboration with myself with Mr.

But it's due to the vigilance and the amount of work that these officers put in, you know, uh man hours and so on, that in community engagement that helped make something like that happen, or whatever.

And it's due collaboration with myself, with Mr.

Robinson, with the community, and and you know, with with these officers and whatnot.

Now that community, that neighborhood, Central Coconut is now safe and has been has rid itself of that illicit element, you know, in our community or what have you.

So again, I can't applaud you all enough for the work that you that you've done, what you've done at Pioneer Park and cleaning that up.

We're now what's drug infested right right there at the tennis court of what have you, and we worked to clean that up, and you all did a magnificent job.

Now it's been years, and I don't see any type of prostitution, any you know, drugs being sold over there, um, the amount of violence that you would actually see like right there on the on the I saw a woman when I first when I was campaigning the first time, actually OD right there at that tennis court.

And you all cleaned that up, and and again, the community is now safe because of the amount of work and effort and energy, man hours and so on that you all have put into just that that that neighborhood, you know, outside of you know the the rest of the city or whatever, but I can just speak for for my district and and and uh the neighborhoods within it, what you've done at Mary Dean Park and and so on, you know, cleaning that that that up and and helping to take care of that situation that could have gone national or whatever.

You know, so again, you know, you all uh to be celebrated and to be applauded um for your work for your efforts and your vigilance and and uh in in community engagement and and seeing that uh that our community is uh safe and that the health and well-being of every citizen and uh visitor to this city is uh accounted for and and and uh taking care of of the to to ensure our uh great quality of life in the city.

So thank you all very much.

Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Uh Commissioner Albert.

Um, I I uh I had another question which I will get to, but um to um uh go off of what Commissioner Batti was talking about.

Um the other thing that you have been doing in the new town area is on the positive side, and maybe you can go into how you're working with the community with the youth to stop the violence before it gets started.

What you go with that one around with crew?

Yeah.

So our community relations unit uh really as of a few years ago, we didn't have one.

We had a a cat team that was doing both things.

We had a cat team that was trying to do, you know, what what Captain Todd talked about, all these arrests and the proactivity police work.

You really need a unit doing that off to the side.

So we had a unit that was trying to do everything.

The development of that crew unit, the community relations unit has changed everything because what they do every day is simply engagement with the community, public relations, meeting with stakeholders, meeting with the community, going to schools.

We have uh someone in the career unit who's actually a coach at Booker High.

So that unit is you know, totally engaged with children, working with our youth, and again, we we talked about the crime, the ages, but they're so young.

If we can get to them young, handle these curfew checks, we're we're on the parents, if the parents are there or not.

Uh sometimes we kind of take that role.

But I think that the crew unit has really changed the game.

And if you saw their monthly report, it's super long.

You know, some officers that are not in the crew unit might say they don't do anything, they don't do much, they should come work the road.

They have no idea the amount of work that they're actually doing without handcuffs.

So I'm super proud of them.

To include on the weekend, and I also just want to say a shout out to uh Jerry Fogle because we've partnered with our parks.

And if it wasn't for him and our ability to use the gymnasium and let crew be there to engage, we started our Steam program, our science technology, engineering arts, which we added and math, and in partnership with Ken Phil, who is Monster Trucks billionaire, and we've been able to bring in very high-tech remote control cars where the kids get to design them, understand the engineering related to them, learn how to race them, and then we have a big race at the end of it where monster trucks truck shows up with a big truck and one of their drivers, they get to engage again.

So really for us, the secret sauce is really starts with the kids.

And we knew that.

But the success has been in consistency because when you're a kid and I grew up in the inner city, when you have a lack of consistency, you have that lack of consistency your whole life, you need something to look forward to, and you need someone to trust.

And in order to trust them, you've got to see them when that time comes.

So we have had great success with being consistent with the kids, ma'am.

That's great.

And then also in in gendering the trust of the police officers rather than seeing them as an enemy, I think is really, really important.

Um the program that I wanted you to talk about is the homeless outreach team.

I know um uh Commissioner Hankaj talked about the different statistics, and I know that you know we're doing really, really well with the program.

I think I think there were maybe eleven hundred homeless on the street in twenty fifteen when I first got elected, and now we're down to I don't know, maybe last year it was maybe around two hundred.

Um more or less, yeah, c hopefully it's less than that.

But um can you explain what exactly they do?

Because I I think the public is not aware of what we do to get the homeless off the streets and why you know other police departments come here to see what we're doing.

Yes, ma'am.

So primarily their whole mission, and I know I want to give props to Joe Polzak because Joe really it's an award winning agency and has a lot to do with what Joe and Kevin Stiff did years ago.

So we're really just keeping that train rolling, and again, the primary thing is the training, the officers that we put in there.

The whole mission is that we don't want people sleeping on the street.

So if it's housing driven, and most of these folks have either they've you know gotten here and they don't want to be here, we have homeward bound for that.

We'll send you home.

If you have a caregiver and you're ready to go home, we'll send you back to your home.

At nighttime, the lodging is a big deal.

So I think the community doesn't want to see you know people sleeping on the street.

And uh we don't want that, right?

You know, sometimes we get calls where folks will say, Hey, there's a homeless person on a bench.

Well, it's 2 p.m.

in a public park.

So we also are not, you know, we're not policing lifestyle, right?

We just want folks that can have services, whether it's mental health, drugs, any type of addiction.

So the officers that are in there are perfect, and every day it's about the housing, and then once we get into the enforcement section, so we do have people that just don't want help, and we're working harder to help them help themselves, and they just don't simply want it.

Those are the folks predisposed to criminal activity, deal with them over and over and over, and it's kind of a repetitive cycle.

The good news is that number is really small.

So it used to be much larger.

But now I think the hot team is dealing with the same folks over and over.

If we meet new folks right away, it's education, explaining them how we can get them housing, how we can get them off the streets.

So I think with the training and the focus being we don't want folks sleeping on our streets, this is awesome.

So I'm super proud of the unit.

I think two years in a row I have officers of the year in there.

They're performing at a high level, small unit, very proud.

I don't know if anybody's here from the hot team, but they do a great job.

Uh we have a hot detail, so we have officers that can go work with the hot team.

So I'm very proud of them.

I hope I answered your question.

I think that's well, I think um probably more co comprehensive, like what you know, what they actually do.

So when they try to get them housing, we've got we've got beds that the city pays for at the Salvation Army, and then what happens there, and then how you know, if if they do get arrested, what happens when they go to community court so that um there's a better picture of all of the steps along the way that have been effective.

I think the one piece I'll just add is that having the two city caseworkers working with our officers every day, that's a huge piece of this puzzle because we have two folks that are interconnected to all of the services that direct them right to housing.

So while the cops are doing the outreach and the enforcement, we have two case managers in the car.

So anything that has to do with housing, getting them off the street, they're right there in the car.

It's an everyday thing.

They they when they come in every day, they go right to the Salvation Army.

They start their day, they see who's there, they see who came in and lodging, and they start right back over every single day, and it's just r rinse and repeat.

So that's what how they do every day.

And then once we do find housing for them, they're provided wraparound services in order to stabilize and hopefully keep them in housing.

Yes, ma'am.

All right.

Thank you.

That's all I have.

Thank you.

I've got some questions for you too, Captain Armstrong.

Some of them are related to what has already been asked.

With the pit count, I understand that the federal government still has not certified the numbers from January 2025, nor from January 2026.

Have you had any access to an unofficial number?

And I'm not necessarily asking for it if you're not allowed to say, but I would think having at least an unofficial number would help the hot team see what kind of progress they've made over the last two years.

So I don't, in preparation of today, that was the last question I asked.

Every meeting we had in preparation of today, the chief was asking me what's the PIT number?

And I just don't know.

I've asked, I don't know the I don't know.

I'm sorry.

Yeah, I'm I'm on the board of the uh the partnership to end homelessness, and I don't have the number either.

But yeah, this is a problem that the federal government has not provided a certified.

Maybe explain.

For people who don't know what PIT is?

Oh, that's the point in time count nationally.

Um at the end of January, the number of homeless people are counted by volunteers and official people.

So that and the numbers are rolled up, sent to Washington, and we haven't gotten them back from a year and a half ago yet.

So I mean.

But we count them.

Um but then the other question is again, uh, Commissioner Ahern Koch asked about the individual contacts, number of individual contacts.

Are they speci different individuals, 2800 individual individuals, or are they touch points?

So we've we've talked to 2800 people, they may be repeats, or these are unique.

It includes the talking.

So every time they contact them, they do a report, and that's how we can track it.

But it's individual, new people well, different people comprise the 2800.

So John is not counted twice in that 2800.

That's right, yes, sir.

Great.

Thank you.

That's that's good to know.

Um and then um different topic with the forecasting.

Um might you also be using forecasting numbers to assign patrols to uh places with quality of life issues potentially forecasts, such as main street noisy cars, smoke belching from the cars intentionally.

So the answer is yes, we have actually directed patrols.

Uh there's kind of like a different variation of how we do it.

But right now we have off-duty details.

So we have officers coming in off-duty on their days off and they're handling the noise downtown.

That's actually separate from directed patrol and separate from the USF study.

Great.

Thank you.

And also I was at a conference last week, and somebody from another city was talking about midnight basketball.

And the city sponsors midnight basketball keeps young people occupied in something positive, and they have had a crime reduction.

And I immediately thought about the CRU and saying, hey, you know, what about midnight basketball in the parking lot of the CRU?

And I was wondering if you were doing anything like that or thought of anything like that.

So, yes.

So when I first came on, midnight basketball was my vision.

And it was because my dad was Chicago police officer in community policing and they had midnight basketball.

So, you know, if you can't, why reinvent the wheel when you can steal it, right?

So we did a version of that, uh, starting it at Robert L.

Taylor, we did start a version of that.

Um we ask a lot of our people, right?

And we only have a certain amount of resources.

And I I didn't feel it was fair to our officers to have them do that when we saw what we were doing was really, really working.

And it really is working.

If we do see a spike and we see that there's an issue in that time window, then we will start midnight basketball.

But you know, we talk about officer wellness and we talk about being fair to our people, and we also want to be fair to the community as it relates to overtime and cost.

So we're always balancing that.

But that originally was my first vision.

It was midnight basketball.

And if we have to go to that at some point, we're prepared to do that.

It's a great idea.

I love it.

Thank you.

And switching over to Captain Rainey.

Um you talked about compliments from your team to the officers.

What about compliments from the public?

Are you tracking when the public offers compliments?

Yes, ma'am.

Uh those numbers are actually reflected within that 75.

Uh so oftentimes we'll get letters uh, whether that's through uh Sarasota Stars coming from our City HR, um sometimes letters to the chief's office, but ultimately they end up in our office, and that becomes one of those compliments.

So I I I guess to answer your question a little bit more comprehensively, uh compliments can come while complaints come in, and we actually review them and we see wow they the officer did a fantastic job, and then we'll self-generate that, but then they can also come in from that source externally.

Thank you.

And uh would you describe the ABLE program active bystandership for law enforcement?

Uh yes, ma'am.

So uh that program has been in effect for uh approximately three years with the Sarasota Police Department.

It's actually a rigorous application process through Georgetown law.

Uh what we were ideally positioned as a police organization uh where we had invested in relationships uh with the community.

So we're specifically endorsed by the Sarasota chapter of the NAACP and Light of the World Church.

City management endorsed us, and the chief of police also endorsed uh his willingness uh to participate in this program.

This program is all about stopping uh potential misconduct before it occurs, empowering officers to at the lowest level uh to make a decision.

So uh you can understand police organizations are inherently hierarchical.

So if you have an officer that has two weeks on that may be witnessing something that's inappropriate, oftentimes they feel not empowered to act.

But this program, it turns that ideology on its head.

So this the officers receive that training at the onset of their career and they receive follow-on training very similar to uh to homeless outreach team training, and honestly, most of our topics.

It's uh initial training followed with continuous training.

Um at the time that we registered, I don't know the stat now, but the time that we registered in the state of Florida, we were one of six agencies that were accepted into Georgetown Law's ABLE program.

Great, great, yeah.

So I suspect that this prevents what we have seen in several of the cities in the country where uh an officer has done something actually criminal himself, and nobody, the other officers are afraid to say something.

Yes, ma'am.

That is the goal.

Uh but the interesting thing about this uh as far as tracking it uh year to year is uh the absence of data is indicative of success.

So I just like to add too when I talk to all the recruits post-all their training, I go over ABLE and I remind them that we're one of a handful of agencies in the state of Florida that are part of the ABLE program.

And number two, I go over a scenario in which maybe they see me doing something wrong, and I remind them they have full authority to bring that to my attention and step in.

Because the culture used to be where officers to Captain Rainey's point would look the other way if they were junior.

That's how the culture was, and we see that turned out in Minnesota.

So we're trying to stop a tragedy before it happens, and to Kenny's point, the absence of the numbers are a true indicator that it's working.

And we have also seen, and correct me if I'm wrong, Kenny, on body camera where officers have stepped in for other officers when they realize, hey, maybe they're having a bad day today, and they actually have stepped in.

So this program is working.

Great.

That's wonderful to hear.

Um and finally, I have something for deputy chief.

Um interested in the drone, which is like really exciting.

But the question is, how is that funded?

That was funded um through through the police department.

We worked out on where we were able to split the cost half last year, half this year, and they gave us a two year, it's basically a two-year trial period.

And we're gonna give it a go, see how it turns out and whether or not we renew it on the back end is how well it performs and what we think we get out of it.

I think I think what you're asking is I understand what you're asking.

It was funded by the Sarasota Police Foundation.

Okay.

It did, the money did come to the police department funded by the Sarasota Police Foundation from a philanthropist.

Again, this philanthropist was impacted by the homicide that occurred at the Lyra.

That was a good friend of his, and he feels very connected to us because we were able to solve that case so quickly.

So he funded the first year beta program for us.

We're going to be tracking all the data.

There will be dashboards incorporated that where everyone in the community can go on our dashboard within our website and they can track and see where the drone is flying when it comes back.

They'll see a case number, and at some point they'll see what the call for service was.

We think it's important to do a beta program first because we want to be responsible with our budget.

We want to make sure it's going to be utilized correctly.

So as discussed, we'll be tracking all the numbers to see if it's dropping crime, if it's mitigating, if it's allowing officers to take other calls for service because it can go into the area and tell us there's nothing happening.

It can find missing people, missing adults.

So we'll be tracking that all throughout the year, and then at some point we'll come before the commission and do a presentation and see if the commission wants to move forward with drone as first responder.

But it it is a philanthropist that paid for the beta program.

Essentially a grant.

Okay.

Yeah, so I was even wondering.

I mean, after that goes, there's potential for it to be eligible for some other grants.

Yes, ma'am.

We we are constantly looking for grants, and they all know it.

Uh we think it's very important to locate these grants to help us reduce the cost as it relates to budget.

And then when it seems like God's always on our side, if the grant doesn't come forward, we have a philanthropist that's willing to assist.

We're very blessed here in the City of Sarasota.

Thank you.

Um next up is the Vice Mayor.

Thank you.

Um I have two questions, both related to page 10 of your PowerPoint.

Back to you, Captain Arnstrong.

The homeless outreach team.

Uh if we look at the enforcement section of the table there and physical arrests, 561.

It might be obvious to some but not so obvious to others.

The physical arrest is not done because the person is homeless.

That's correct.

Yes, ma'am.

What are the reasons, some examples of why there might be a physical arrest of a homeless person?

I would say in probably almost all those cases, they'd be a felony.

And a felony.

If you have a felony that's not a misdemeanor, we can't push that to community care courts.

So it's going to be selling drugs, possession of a firearm, uh, if it's a domestic case, there are certain cases that we absolutely have to make arrests on.

Uh like I talked about earlier, a lot of our physical arrests of homeless folks, the criminal histories are not so great.

They're predisposed to criminal activity and they refuse services time and time again.

I know that they're frustrated because they want to help people more than they want the help themselves.

So, like I said, it's the last option, but we we certainly do the enforcement.

We have to.

We owe it to the city, and if you're you're committing crime in the city, even if you're homeless, you know, there is a place for you and it might be jail, but that's not what we're trying to accomplish.

Felonies.

Yes, ma'am.

Okay, thank you.

And the second question is regarding uniform traffic citations.

169.

Could you give us some examples of why a person who is homeless would be cited for a uniform traffic violation?

So it's just as a number for what else the hot team did.

It doesn't mean that the drivers were homeless.

These are just the stats of what the hot team did.

They do a whole bunch of other stuff.

So these are actually just telling you that they're doing other things.

So they're not necessarily homeless drivers.

Thank you for sure.

And and I was gonna ask, and how did they know?

Right.

Thank you.

Yes, ma'am.

Okay.

Commissioner Aaron Kodch.

Yes, I have two questions as well.

Um one question, and I know Chief that you and Mr.

Robinson are working on getting some detailed information for me on this.

But while I have you here, I thought I would ask the question expressly asked of me by a constituent.

The double-digit drop in crime, the question was as an average overall, it looks very, very good.

But is it pushing crime from other areas of the city to Newtown?

That was the concern of the resident.

The simple answer is no.

Okay.

That really is a simple answer.

Uh fortunately or unfortunately, I don't have a crystal ball, and neither does anybody here, right?

But what we do is we follow the data, and that's where we go.

So if we see that there's uh a spike in crime in a certain area, then we are going to be more visible, more proactive in those areas.

Uh people aren't transient in that regard as far as, well, I was committing crime here and I'll just go, I'll move my house over here and commit crime here.

That's not the trend that we see by any means.

Uh if you were talking more like people experiencing homelessness as far as we may go to an area and then that area, people leave there and go down the block.

That would be something where I would say is more transient.

But when it comes to crime, the simple answer is no, we're not pushing crime from one block to another down to another.

I think that was the question.

The concern was that it was being pushed from the rest of the city up into Newtown, and that is not the case.

No, ma'am.

And we can see that the numbers indicate that that is not the case.

Okay.

My um second question has to do with the PCC and IPAP, which is the police complaint committee and the independent police advisory panel, which were two city advisory boards that the City of Sarasota had.

Many cities don't have a an at HAT.

Many cities did not have one advisory board.

The City of Sarasota had two advisory boards.

Um and the state has now, I believe, preempted us from having those.

Can you just update me on the status of those two boards?

Yes, ma'am.

So a few years ago, we started looking into something called constitutional policing.

And essentially that was bringing in a unit and a team that would come into our department, they would look at our policies, and once they look at our policies, they would look at practice.

And then if there are any issues with that as related to our practice and our policies, maybe they're not intertwined, they're not speaking to each other, then those issues would be brought to us, and then that same person or unit would also handle any type of complaints outside of complaints that would come to internal affairs.

Now, fast forward two years.

Again, no crystal ball, but here we have the two boards essentially get dissolved or kind of rebranded, reshaped over here.

And so now we have been working with our city attorney and Heather Salzman to create this constitutional uh policing unit to assist us with certain types of strategies.

We're always looking, listen, I'm always looking to steal the best and the greatest from every agency across the country, and any good chief or sheriff should be doing that.

So those are things that I would bring to Ms.

Dr.

Salzman, and I would say, ma'am, can you look into this for us?

How does this fit into our agency or here we're looking at some challenges in this area here as it relates to policy and practice?

Can you, Dr.

Salzman, look into this?

Let's collaborate together and create a program to improve.

And at the same time, Dr.

Salzman is free to bring up challenges or issues of concern to me.

We would have those discussions.

Those discussions would then be brought to the city manager, and then we would work it out as a team.

So that is kind of like the rebranding and recreating, and all that is currently in practice.

I know Dr.

Salzman has already written a document on it for us to start following.

Right.

So it at the end of the day, it's policing outwardly and inwardly.

Yes, ma'am.

We like to call it inside out policing is a term that uh we came up with not too long ago.

Nobody steal it out there.

That's ours.

Uh but but we really think it's important to get ahead of things before they can go sideways on us.

That's why we are constantly monitoring agencies from around the country on every news media channel there is, because we are Goldilocks.

The size of our agency is perfect because we can pivot on a dime.

We can pivot within 24 hours.

I was just at a conference in Los Angeles, and I'm with agencies that are 9,000, 10,000 strong, 5,000 strong, 1,000 strong.

They can't pivot.

We can really pivot, and I feel like we are so linked into our community, unlike a lot of those agencies.

We're just like the oatmeal for Goldilocks.

Like this one's too hot, this one's too cold.

SPD is just right.

I can't top that.

Good point to end on.

Okay, Commissioner Batchy.

Uh thank you, Mayor.

And what talking to your point about midnight basketball, that's that's kind of uh yeah.

Yeah, exactly.

I was just on a basketball court this morning.

Um, but it would be kind of tough to do in this community or whatever, um, knowing the culture.

But one of the things that you know I wanted uh talk about and kind of give this uh take away the impression that Newtown is like kind of this dangerous place of whatever.

But you know, we we brought back this brain flame, whether that which was defunct for uh like 20 years or so, and I know the individual that uh had the seat before me when I thought about talked about bringing it back, thought it was a stupid idea and wouldn't, and I said that it wasn't, and we're gonna do it, we're gonna do it right.

And part of their problem concern was, oh well, it won't, you know, it would be dangerous and so on and so forth.

But we did that along collaboration with you and uh deputy city manager to to and manager at the time to bring that back and you all man it, you know, with in-con services from the city, and you've done a great job of doing that.

So basic that just based on that, I want to talk about and touch on the the outreach that you all do, particularly with um certain citizens of our community, great citizens of our community.

And I just saw her at the spring festival the other day.

Great woman, uh Deb Kavanaugh.

And the reason why I say this is because a lot of these kids from these types of, you know, like uh underprivileged, you know, uh situations and so on, um have they grow up with a total and complete distrust of the police department and police officers.

And that's fostered and uh reinforced for the most part, you know, by the community, but lack of engagement and everything.

But could you speak to the the engagement that you all do with people like Dev Kavanaugh to those communities and what what you all do in you know to to reach these kids and so on, because I think the community needs to know this.

Yeah, so again, it's all about collaboration and partnership, and we can say it and say it, but what does that mean, right?

Those are great words, but what are you saying to us?

So we really take pride in leveraging our relationships with philanthropists.

And Deb Kavanaugh is the one that you brought up, so we'll talk about her.

So Deb Kavanaugh, when I first met her, she asked what she could do in the community, and I already had an idea, and I told her I needed $50,000 for iPads in our community, and within a week I had the $50,000 for iPads for all the kids in our community.

Then she said, What's next?

So I said, I want to partner with Booker Law Academy, because I thought that was important.

Again, as said earlier, building those relationships with us in situations where it's not life and death or a manic 9-1-1 call for help, building it within our agency.

So Booker Law Academy came in, we did another $50,000 in iPads for these kids.

And when I tell you that a 17 and 18-year-old adult boys were crying, I mean that when they found out that they were getting these iPads because no one told them these iPads were coming.

This was done at the end of an all-day event where we showed them everything that we do from CID to criminalistics to SWAT, and at the end of the day, we rolled in 50, 60 iPads and in these boxes and they had no idea, and then we passed them out, and I mean I think everybody was crying.

We we even gave one to the bus driver.

So and you should see it's on our social media, but it it is a game changer.

And when these kids came forward and said they do their homework on their phone, then go to school and transfer their homework onto a computer because they have no access to a computer, and this will now change their lives.

This is game changing for us.

And then it doesn't stop there, right?

Then we do this learning center that's predominantly going to be used within our schools, and we use it in Newtown.

Our officers do tutor their kids.

Now this learning center, this is a over a hundred thousand dollar state-of-the-art learning center that the county school board is jealous of because of all the technology on board.

But we also use that for hurricanes because we have the ability to flip everything up and we can actually house people in there if we need to.

Again, Deb Kavanaugh.

Then we have Brotherhood of Men, which I'm sure everybody here knows about.

She wants to know what else she can do.

We bought all touch screens, Promethean touch screens for Brotherhood of Men, because they're given assignments to do.

They have to write on paper.

Now they're going to be using computers to research their projects.

So we are constantly leveraging Deb Kavanaugh, Ken Feld with our Steam program throughout our community.

And the diversity, you know, in terms of like the Hispanic community that that you all do as well.

Right.

1500 North Orange, we're doing it there.

We're doing it throughout Newtown.

Um I think I think it's also important to again, Ken Feld has stepped up as well to help us in the community like no other.

So we are constantly leveraging philanthropists so that we can help those in need in our community.

We do the barbershop, the haircuts.

You know, we noticed that everybody does a free haircut right before the kids go back to school.

So we got out of that space.

Because we already saw that that space was covered.

So when do we do it?

When they come back from Christmas break, and we're making sure that they're getting their fresh haircuts going back to school, so much so that we even had somebody going to a job interview, a 22-year-old uh male going to a job interview, and we're like, hey, nice suit, what do you go?

I'm going to a job interview.

Want a haircut?

Okay, let's do it.

So those are relationships that we are com that we are really committing ourselves into our community, but it's throughout the culture of the agency because we all understand the mission.

So we understand that there's a need for help in our community, and we're doing our best to leverage philanthropists that are willing to come forward and help.

And the beauty of it is, and this is what I tell them every penny of every dollar that you donate is going to that cause.

Going to that cause.

There's not many other places that can say that.

Right.

We partner with the housing authority and the officers are there.

Now, mind you, the officers have worked 12 hours already.

They work midnight shift.

They worked at 6P to 6A, and they are there for these kids every year.

All the command staff shows up, all the super.

We have our professional civilian staff.

They all show up, our volunteers show up.

I mean, it is really game-changing for us.

So again, a lot of places will say they do community policing.

I feel like we do community policing differently.

And it really starts with our heart at this agency.

Thank you, Mayor.

Thank you.

Thank you all very much.

Thank you for what you're doing for the city of Sarasota.

And thank you for providing all this information this morning for all of us.

We really appreciate it.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you all.

Thank you for your help.

And I'm going to ask the uh for a motion to accept the report.

So move.

Second.

Okay.

Move by Commissioner Batti, seconded by Commissioner A.

Earn Kotch to accept the report from the SPD.

And passed unanimously.

Next item on our agenda is going to be citizens' input concerning city topics.

We're going to have five requests to speak, so that should take at most 15 minutes.

And I'm going to ask the city auditor and clerk to read the Pledge of Public Conduct.

Thank you, Mayor.

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

We will direct all comments to issues.

We will not engage in personal attacks.

Thank you.

So the five people who've requested to speak are Nancy Lorch Archer, Christine Robinson, John Bordeaux, Ron Shapiro, and Kelly Brown.

So if you'll come on up.

We'll start, excuse me, with Ms.

Louis, Lord Joe Richard.

Thank you.

Good morning, uh good morning, Mayor, uh Commissioners, and the rest of the leadership team.

Uh my name is Nancy Lurch Archer.

Um I am representing Sarasota Sands here this morning.

Um I first want to send a thank you to the city.

Um as you know, we um got hit pretty severely by the hurricanes.

So just appreciated the work with the city and the building uh inspections and all of that.

We're fully operational, so we're happy to say that, but just want to give a quick thanks.

Um the reason why I'm here this morning, though, is relative to the beach uh renourishment effort.

Um I don't know how many people have been down Leto Beach where the renourishment has taken place looks beautiful.

Um but what I will say is that renourishment stopped short of Sarasota Sands, which we are not sure why that transpired.

Um we were on the anything public facing the map, stating that it would be coming all the way down to the last groin before you hit South Leto Public Beach.

Um we learned of this really from some of our owners just talking with the workers.

We've had zero communication from the city or from the Army Corps of Engineers relative to any change.

So this is kind of short notice to us.

Uh I initiated some communication via an immediate voicemail uh to the mayor's office uh last week, um followed that up with an email, which is the communication you have in front of you, which has also now been sent by certified mail.

Um not a lot of time to put this in front of you, but it's critical.

It's very time sensitive.

Um most of the equipment I learned yesterday is being pulled, which I'm not surprised.

Um we have to the end of April to have this done before turtle season begins.

So my ask here is um, you know, we were even communicated with just about a week ago where the pipes were going to be placed on our property.

We needed to get all the cabanas off of the beach so that they could do the work, and then they just stopped the progress and moved the equipment, went back down to the Ritz to finish that up, and are now pulling all the equipment.

So I guess huge concern of lack of communication, what changed.

So my ask this morning is you know, what transpired?

Um, how is this going to be right me?

Um I think you have some photos in front of you, which shows Sarasota Sands property.

It also shows the renourished area.

As you will see a huge difference.

So nothing short of frustrating that this has been on the plan from the beginning.

It's been at public hearings about what was going to be re-nourished and to have zero communication from the city or from the Army Corps of Engineers and just have everything gone.

You know, it's a huge expense, right?

A lot of equipment, a lot of resources, and just have it sh step short of us and I'll be pulled.

I'm I'm a bit at a loss, looking for clarity and how this is going to be remedied before the end of the month.

So we haven't we have a week left, week and a half.

So thank you.

Uh Christine Robinson.

Good morning, Mayor, Vice Mayor, City Commissioners, Christine Robinson on behalf of the Argus Foundation.

I'm here today with serious concerns regarding the downtown master plan update.

And to respectfully request that you halt the entire process, including any ongoing procurement, and begin again from scratch next fall, once your new city manager has had three to four months to familiarize herself with the current plan and is positioned to guide this effort.

The problems plaguing this update bear a troubling resemblance to those that derailed the city manager search, the first one, and the outcomes have also been disappointing.

By the time procurement reached the selection committee interview stage, only one applicant remained in the process.

We understand that staff are now in contract negotiations with that sole applicant.

Having just one candidate to choose from is not an acceptable outcome.

It is a sign of a process that selects structure and leadership.

Members of the business community have raised concerns about this procurement for some time.

In your packet that you you have received, which was also sent to you by email last Friday.

You have a letter from COBA, the Coalition of Business Associations dated almost a year ago, which represents over 7,000 businesses throughout Sarasota County, expressing reservations about how this procurement was being assembled.

The Argus Foundation followed with a letter on May 1st of last year raising concerns about transparency and process.

In that letter, we noted the lack of substantive information and agenda packs for the downtown master plan update ad hoc committee, supported COBA's request that the committee review the existing downtown master plan before drafting procurement documents and flagged ongoing transparency concerns.

The baseline review of the plan was not conducted to this day.

They have not formally reviewed the existing plan yet.

It established consultant objectives without doing so.

Over the year, we have raised these concerns repeatedly with individual committee members and the various city administrations that have covered this now.

Transparency remains a persistent problem through much of this process.

We to be clear, the ad hoc committee is full of wonderful members of this community, and they are struggling as well.

I've talked to them individually.

There's too many of them on the committee.

Twenty-five years ago, Sarasota undertook a visionary planning process that informed a downtown, transformed a downtown that emptied out at 5 o'clock into a vibrant destination.

What has unfolded here is the opposite of that.

The process has been troubled from the start, and the business community as a primary stakeholder has been sidelined in this process.

This is a pivotal moment for downtown Sarasota and its long-term future.

Getting the process right matters far more than moving quickly.

We are asking you to do exactly as you did with the city manager search.

Reset entirely.

Not just the procurement, but every component of this effort.

Start over right from the beginning.

Strong leadership will be essential.

Thank you very much.

Jean Bordeaux.

Good morning.

My name is John Bordeaux.

I'm a full-time downtown resident.

DISCA is an influential and well-respected organization.

When DISCA takes a position on a specific topic, it carries a lot of weight.

Myself and the thousands of downtown residents are happy to be represented by DISCA.

On April 3rd, which is a little more almost three weeks ago, the new president of DISCA, Patrick McNamni, I hope I'm pronouncing his name correctly.

Issued a letter to the Commission.

Here's a copy of the letter.

I'll read parts of it to you.

And additionally, staff was copied on this letter that went to the city commissioners.

The board of the downtown Sarasota Condominium Association, DISCA, urges the City Commission and the City Attorney to adopt the second sound ordinance draft prepared by former city attorney, Bob Fournier, as an interim measure while work continues toward a final comprehensive ordinance.

In January 2026, the Commission unanimously voted to move forward with Mr.

Fournier's draft, a carefully developed document that incorporates key elements already approved or discussed by the Commission.

Accordingly, we urge the Commission to approve the Fournier draft now while the sound study proceeds independently.

There's only one problem with this, that no one from the city ever responded back to the board of DISCA.

Okay.

I hope this isn't the end of a public uh comment and input.

Okay.

So what I would like to show you next is the daytime sound limits for various cities in Florida.

And you can see that Sarasota is an outlier at 75 decibels, whereas most cities are at 65.

What the DISCA and myself and my friends and neighbors downtown urge the Commission to go back to a 65 decibel daytime sound limit.

Along with codifying Mr.

Fournier's draft at this point.

Okay, that will get us a long way to getting a uh a good uh sound ordinance once the sound expert is complete their analysis.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

Mr.

Shapira.

Good morning.

I'm Ron Shapiro, and I'm a Sarasota resident.

As you probably know, a quasi-judicial hearing on the 1260 North Palm Avenue project will be held on May 4th, when the Commissioners will decide on a settlement that was mediated between city staff and the developer following the Fluidra process.

This settlement has only modest changes from the proposal that the Commissioner so soundly rejected last May.

The size and scope of the Sammuth building on a tiny lot remains unchanged.

And it fails to address any of the major reasons for which the project was denied.

The three adjustments that were requested, including full retail frontage, facades, and habitable space, are still required.

The technical deviation granted by the previous city manager for off-premises refuse collection is still required.

Maybe something we should have our new city manager take a look at.

Most of the criteria not met the last time in Zoning Code Section 4-506 have been totally ignored and not addressed, including, but not limited to, number one, land development regulations, number two, the Sarasota City Plan, and number four, compatibility and other key elements.

If you look at the mediation process, it's not surprising that this new plan looks very much like the old rejected plan.

This new settlement was an agreement between city staff who approved the last version of the project and the developer.

So why should we expect anything majorly different?

And of course, the mediator only met with these two parties, so why would he not agree?

He never got to hear the arguments from the other side.

The mediator said, quote, the redesign project appears to address prior concerns raised by the City Commission, end quote.

Evidently, he is not aware of the conclusion is reached by the Commissioners at the end of the last of last May's hearing, explaining why each of you voted to reject the project.

Four out of five are voted to reject the project.

I respect the city staff.

They are bright, hardworking people, and they do the best job they can, often in difficult circumstances.

But that doesn't mean I always agree with them.

And neither should you, the commissioners, especially since this is such an important part of your obligation and responsibility to us, the city residents.

Approval by city staff alone does not provide substantial competent evidence in a court of law, nor should it, especially when there are so many good reasons to override their approval, as I have already described.

I worked for 33 years in a Fortune 500 company.

I sometimes had to disagree with the recommendations of my subordinates.

And sometimes my bosses, including A.

G.

Lafley and others, would not agree with what I wanted to do.

So this shouldn't be viewed as some kind of extreme occurrence in either the public or private sector.

When I first spoke before the Commission on this project in early 2023, I said we were in this fight for the duration, and we are still in it for the duration.

We'll do everything we can for as long as necessary to keep this project from ever happening, and with good reason.

See you on May 4th.

Thank you very much.

And Kelly Brown.

That's a hard act to follow.

I'm going to do my best.

Met with everyone we can think of to meet with, including even the police department, for ideas on how we could stop this from happening.

The media even got involved, and you know, you can like that or not.

Here's the thing.

Now, today, magically, the bad actors have disappeared.

No one's able to reach anyone.

Sun Coast Waterkeepers can't file their lawsuit and proceed because everyone's missing in action.

No one knows what's going on on that site.

I'm here today to ask you to give direction to city staff.

Be bold.

Today, tell your staff to start the process to claim imminent domain.

Take that property and use it for what it can be used for properly and build affordable housing.

And you ask yourself, where will we get the money?

I have a suggestion.

Sell the property on First Street.

Use that money, buy the property at U.S.

Recycling.

You can still build real affordable housing for our community and stop the horrible pollution that we are breathing every single day.

Every time they operate, that water going to the bay is being polluted.

Help us, please.

Be bold.

Let them sue you.

Who cares?

Move forward.

Take that property away right now while you can.

Thank you.

Thank you very much for your comments.

Appreciate it.

And we're going to move to approval of the minutes before we take a break.

So move.

Second.

I'd like to say for the record that I did submit some non-substantive changes.

I think.

Yes.

It was so long ago that I submitted it, I don't even remember if they were what they were.

All right, I'll take your word for it.

Okay, so a motion by Commissioner Batti to accept the minutes with non-substantive changes, and seconded by the Vice Mayor.

So we can vote.

And passed unanimously, and it is now 1037 Apple time.

Shall we take a break until 1050?

Okay, 10 minutes to 11.

So we're recessed till 10 minutes to 11.

I want to call this meeting back to order.

Thank you.

Okay.

Okay.

The next item on our agenda is consent agenda number one.

Ms.

Griggs would are there any items to be pulled.

Um yes, Mayor, thank you.

Um item number six point five um has asked to be pulled by Commissioner Aher and Kotch.

And item six point six has been asked to be pulled by a Vice Mayor Ulrich, and that is all of the items that I'm aware of.

Okay.

Uh number five by Commissioner Ahern Kotch, and number six by uh the vice mayor.

Yes.

Okay.

Um can I have a motion to approve the balance of consent agenda number one.

Approval of the balance of consent agenda one.

Second.

Moved by Commissioner A.

Heron Kotch and seconded by Commissioner Batti to approve the balance of consent agenda number one minus number five and number six.

Passed unanimously.

Uh pulled that.

Would would you like to speak to that?

Sure.

I just had a quick question, uh, from Mr.

Fogel, and it talks about how the um the amount uh came in higher than expected, and that um there was a change in services requested.

Could you just detail those for us?

Yes, Jerry Fogel, Parks and Recreation.

Uh good morning, Commissioners.

And introduce the project as well.

So this is Martin Luther King uh park improvement project.

Um it did come in a little bit above what we anticipated.

So Juan DePazos, who was our general manager of parks and recreation, worked with the contractor, potential contractor to really uh get some of those costs down.

So the only item that was removed was the bid swing.

And some of you may know that's in some of our parks, but that was going, you know, where the seating area uh by at MOK by the water uh that the uh Sarasota Bay Estuary has done.

They have completed their project.

Um that was going by that area.

It's not necessary.

Uh so we removed that one, but all the other projects were just replacements with less expensive items.

Pavilions, less expensive pavilions, papers, less expensive papers, uh ballot lighting, less expensive baller lighting, so forth and so on.

But that was only one item that was actually removed.

Okay.

That was my question.

Thank you.

Um I think you answered my question.

Um I didn't see anything in what I read about lighting, but you just said light it.

So on page 44 of 88, uh it has a list of items that were removed.

Um and it has bought lighting in that on that page also.

So we just changed out, like I said, those items.

Thank you.

Commissioner Batti.

Yes.

And I thank you, Mr.

Bobo.

And how about the bathroom remodeling?

If any.

So that was done a few years ago.

We actually, Cindy M.

Schao with planning department was able to get us some community development block grant funding to renovate the restrooms.

And they have been pretty pretty kept up.

So they they look pretty good.

Okay.

All right.

Excellent.

Thank you very much, sir.

Thank you.

Mr.

Fogle, I'm sure there are people out there who will be asking if you're swapping out for less expensive items than what we had planned.

Is it lower quality?

Will it last less long?

I mean, will you know deteriorate?

Um because the other alternative they may be saying, well, why didn't we go with the cheaper ones to start with?

So would you care to elaborate on that?

Yes, I can, Mayor.

So uh when we do these projects, uh we have a penal probable call.

So normally that's from our architects, they give us uh that information, and we make sure we have the budget, and then we bid those out.

Um when they come in, we take a look at what the lowest bid was uh and then uh go from there.

This one came in a little higher than we anticipated.

Uh so we actually are looking at certain items that uh pavilion-wise, the materials, things of that nature uh made of, it's still pretty similar uh in quality.

Uh so you're gonna still get the same kind of quality, the same reliability, uh the same safety levels, if you will, uh of the higher level uh materials, but it's just a little less expensive.

Uh so we we actually know what materials and what pavilions and ballot lighting and things of that nature uh are going to uh how they're going to behave in our parks uh due by the the environment, uh usage, things of that nature.

Uh so we actually know kind of what levels we can go to if needed.

So we already have those things in our back pockets just in case.

Uh but we always want to start with the highest quality because we know that's going to last longer, it's going to be less maintenance, it's going to be a little bit more safer.

Uh but if we need to go down to just a little less quality, uh a little less cost, then we have those in our back pocket.

Okay.

Thank you very much.

Uh any other questions?

No.

But thank you for your time and your answers.

Um approval of item consent item uh 6.5.

Second.

Move by Commissioner A.

Her and Kosh, seconded by Commissioner Batti to approve uh item 6.5.

And we we have your votes, please.

And it passed unanimously.

Thank you.

And Commissioner Vice Mayor uh Ulrich, would you care to talk about 6.6?

I would.

Um, Ms.

Ryan.

Good morning, Julie Ryan.

Um planning and economic development for the record.

So if the would you explain briefly what this agenda item is?

Sure.

Um so this particular agenda item is um a contract that um after speaking with the procurement manager we bundled together uh because we figured multiple vendors would bid on multiple contracts.

So there's three um separate uh sections uh for this agenda.

The first one is a citywide service, um, so it is for uh marketing communication, um certain other um items that would be on an as-needed basis.

There's no minimum, there's no guarantee.

Um there are three vendors that were the top three vendors that will receive the contract so that the city will have a library.

Um it would be funded through individual departments that have a funding need for it.

The second one is for the downtown improvement district, who is uh consistently had a marketing contract over the years.

They do it as an all-inclusive um monthly fee.

Um so Quest Marketing was uh selected as that representative.

Um it is funded with the downtown improvement district funding, and then the third uh marketing contract is for the new town CRA that is with at large, again, for an all-inclusive monthly fee uh to run basically their website, uh their newsletter, all of their marketing needs.

So three separate contracts uh that were uh packaged as one solicitation.

Okay.

And so my question is, I understand why they were bundled for a solicit for solicitation purposes, but I don't understand why they're bundled together for a motion.

I always learn that if something can stand alone, it should be moved alone.

And I would think that these three contracts should be moved and approved separately for accounting purposes, but not necessarily for procurement and solicitation purposes.

Renee Hayes, procurement official.

The reason the contracts in the item are bundled together is because it was the one solicitation.

So we bring the entire packet to you with the three components because it was one solicitation.

And so what if a problem occurs with one of the companies and we have to revisit and come back with another motion?

All three of them are gone then.

Um well you can at that point, I suppose you could pull out the one contract.

We actually did have an issue with one of the areas that had been resolved prior to us bringing it to commission.

So we actually waited to bring the other two contracts when we went through the protest.

And so what is your comment about how I you know was taught if it can stand alone, it should be moved alone.

What's your comment about that?

Um, in my practice, we would take it just the way we have with the three contracts, um since it was the one solicitation for efficiency purposes.

Excuse me.

Okay.

Thank you.

You're welcome.

Thank you.

Um if it would make the vice mayor feel better, I would imagine there could be three motions, three separate motions.

It would definitely make me feel better.

Well, would you like to make a motion?

Sure.

Um now I have to find the language.

Um I moved to approve the contract for general city services, advertising, event planning, marketing, and multimedia services with between the city of Sarasota and Quest Corporation.

I need some help.

For RFP 25-44 SH?

Yes, thank you.

Second.

Motion by the Vice Mayor, seconded by Commissioner Batti to approve the contract agreement for uh the general city services.

Um but that's all three of them are that number.

Oh, sorry.

Yeah, that's why this is gonna get modeled up.

Vice Mayor, can I ask you a quick question?

Um Are you concerned if there's an issue with one of the contracts that they're all on one motion that we couldn't do something specific to the one contract?

Because they're also, but it would complicate matters.

But it seems to be complicating matters now, trying to separate them.

So my so I'll give up on um separating them.

Right.

Okay.

Okay, so I need you to I withdraw my motion.

Okay.

So would you prefer to make the motion or let somebody else make the motion?

I would prefer that somebody else make the motion.

Move approval of uh consent item 6.6.

Second.

Okay.

Motion by Commissioner Ahern Koch, seconded by Commissioner Bettee to approve item number 6.6.

Okay, and it passed four to one.

Thank you very much.

Uh so now we're at consent number uh agenda number two.

Um Ms.

Griggs are the well.

You want to would you read the titles of all of them before we determine whether or not any were pulled?

Thank you.

Thank you, Mayor.

Resolution number 26R 3390, a resolution of the City Commission of the City of Sarasota, Florida, meaning the budget for the fiscal year beginning in October 1, 2025, by providing for supplemental appropriations in the amounts identified in the exhibit A, providing for servability if any of the parts you wrote are declared invalid, provide for reading by title only and providing and effective date.

Resolution number 26R 3391, a resolution of the City Commission of the City of Sarasota, Florida, adopting the Sarasota County Unified Local Mitigation Strategy as a formal guide for hazard mitigation activities of the City of Sarasota in accordance with 42 USC Section 51654 CFR, Section 201.6, part one of Chapter 252, Florida statutes and Florida Administrative Chapter Florida Administrative Code, Chapter 27P22, setting forth findings authorizing the city manager or his designee to apply for funding in support of hazard mitigation activities providing for the reading of this resolution by title only and providing an effective date.

Resolution, I'm sorry, ordinance number 26-5592, an ordinance of the city of Sarasota, Florida, amending Sarasota City Code Section 33-248, Chapter 33, Article 7 to change the speed limits on certain city streets as more fully specified herein, setting forth recommendations resulting from the traffic speed study conducted as part of the seas pending traffic calming plan, repealing ordinances and conflict providing for the observability of the parks here of if declared invalid or unenforceable, but providing for reading of this ordinance by title only and providing an effective date.

Ordinance number 26-5593, an ordinance of the City of Sarasota, Florida to rezone a certain parcel of real property totaling approximately 16.59 plus minus acres located to the east of St.

Armand's Key and to the west of Burke with a street address of 700 John Ringley Boulevard from the Medical Charitable Institutional MCI Zone District to the residential multiple family 5 RMF 5 zone district.

Approving site plan application number 25-spero one to construct a new building addition containing 151 independent senior living dwelling units and three levels of structured parking, a funding portion of rezone real property, all that's more particularly set forth herein, providing for a reading by title only and provided for an effective date.

An ordinance of the city of Sarasota, Florida established establishing term limits for the downtown improvement district board of directors as more fully specified hearing and amending restating ordinance number 08-4832, which originally established the downtown approvement district as amended by ordinances 12-5005, 15-5123, 24-5463, and 25-5572.

Repealing ordinances and conflict, providing for reading by title only, and providing for an effective date.

Thank you, Ms.

Griggs.

Are any of those items to be pulled?

Yes, Mayor.

Um Commissioner, I'm sorry, Vice Mayor Ulrich and Commissioner Ahern Koch asked to pull item 7.1.

And that is the only one I am aware of.

So may I have a motion to adopt the balance of consent agenda number two minus uh 7.1.

So move.

Second.

Move by Commissioner Batti, seconded by Commissioner Ahern Koch to approve the balance of uh consent agenda number two.

Hit your plans and also roll call.

Ahan Kotch.

Yes.

Albert?

Yes.

That's he?

Yes.

Ulrich.

Yes.

Trice.

Yes.

Uh motion passes unanimously.

Thank you very much.

Uh Vice Mayor, would you like to speak on uh item 7.1?

Yes, thank you.

Good morning, Miss Strickland.

Good morning.

Um so would you explain briefly what this agenda item is?

Yes, I will.

This my name is Kelly Strickland.

I'm director of financial administration for the records.

Um this item is moving 250,000 from the city's portion, the city bay TIFF tax incremental financing fund to the SPAC, the Sarasota Performing Arts Construction Fund.

Um a portion of that money is to repay the uh SPAF for the portion that they made on the phase one of the Renzo Piano Architectural, and the remainder of it is for the city to do uh uh owner, and I'll ask Jennifer to help me with that, but it's just to move some money from our city Bay TEF into the construction fund so that we have an opportunity to use this fund.

Thank you.

And so um there is a SPAC and a SPAF and uh so for the record SPAF SPAF is the foundation.

Foundation and we didn't say specs, so we don't know if to define that.

Okay.

My question is the $250,000 that's being transferred or is requested to be transferred.

That money has already been approved through whatever channels it needs to be approved.

It has been we receed it through our city TIFF.

Yes.

Does the City Commission have to approve the transfer or we have to you city commission has to approve if you approve this transfer, that puts it where that is an expenditure budget line in the construction fund?

That's the approval.

I see.

Okay.

That ex that answers my question.

Thank you.

Commissioner Herancotch?

Yes, please.

Thank you.

So yeah, the SPAF in the SPAC, the SPAF is with the foundation and the SPAC is the center.

The project itself.

The project itself.

So not the same thing.

Right.

Okay.

And the $250,000, a piece of it is to pay Renzo Piano, is that correct?

Yes.

Okay.

That's that's the remaining portion that the CEOs on the phase one architectural design.

Okay.

It was my understanding that the SPAF foundation was going to front the money to Renzo Piano in the beginning.

Yes, that is correct.

And then they had asked us to repay them for the money that we had fronted.

So we agreed to do that.

And then for the remainder of the work that Renzo Piano did on the concept design, as Ms.

Strickland said is phase one.

We have been the foundation has been transferring money to us.

We've been paying Renzo because the agreement is in our name, so the invoices come in our name.

So the city pays Renzo Piano and then the foundation reimburses us for the their portion of that fee.

And how much is their portion of that fee?

50%.

Okay.

I'm curious about all of this because it's my understanding that we're going to have to renegotiate a partnership agreement with them.

Is that correct?

We are speaking to them about renegotiating their partnership or their the agreement between the foundation and the city.

Yes.

So wouldn't it be wise to wait on any fund transfers until we have a new partnership agreement?

So the at the March 2nd City Commission meeting when the foundation did present the concept design to the city commissioners.

At that time, former city manager, Mr.

Bullock had asked the City Commission to receive the concept design.

So and also had asked that the city do some due diligence on that concept design before we move forward with schematic design.

And the city is currently working on that due diligence, which there will be a cost to that.

So that due diligence is something the city has chosen to do and is not part of the partnership agreement with the foundation.

And some of that due diligence is running financial checks on the operating of a 2200 seat theater, which is the concept design that was presented.

So that's one of the due diligence that we're doing.

So we have a consultant that we have to pay to do that.

Potentially looking at the concept design itself, looking at some technical experts to review it, review the square footage, all those items that again, Mr.

Bullock at the time had asked the city to do.

So the transfer of these funds will allow us to pay for those consultants to run those checks because that was what was talked about at May 2nd.

That allows then the schematic design to be approved or the to move forward with schematic design to be approved once we have that information to bring back to the city commission.

So we are going to pay $250,000, or will that contract come back to us and that consulting fee could maybe be $20,000 or $40,000.

Not $200,000.

We're not committing $250,000 for a consultant.

It's sort of up to or not to exceed for these one or more consultants amount.

It's explain it.

Yeah, this dollar amount is just an estimate.

We don't know what the cost of each of these are going to be.

But when Ms.

Strickland and I spoke about what is the proper amount to transfer, so we're not having to come back every single time and do a budget amendment in front of City Commission for each and every consulting agreement.

And depending on how many consultants and which consultants we do hire to do this due diligence check.

We are also working on writing a scope to hire a project manager to manage this project.

So we included some of the cost of that in there as well.

So it is not to exceed or up to.

Right.

So it will these contracts come back to the commission?

They would only come back to the commission if they exceeded the um you know the 500,000, which they won't.

But the 500,000 that's in the the authority for the for the city manager to sign or the city commission to sign.

They could also come back should the interim city manager or the future city manager decide this is something the commission should see.

They could.

Yes.

You're right.

So it could come back to the commission.

It could, it's just not you know required to per our city code.

Okay.

Um so I understand we're transferring funds from a bucket to a bucket.

We're not expending them in the bucket per se.

We're just allowing them to sit there until we decide what our best path forward is and our due diligence to do our due diligence as this project moves forward.

We may need these resources to make an informed decision.

Without these resources, we can't make an informed decision.

Is that an accurate representation?

I would maybe put it a little bit different in that um again when the city commission received the concept design on March 2nd.

Um one of the conversations at the time was again to have city staff do some due diligence.

That will cost us to do that due diligence, and these funds are being transferred, so when those costs come in, we can pay the cost of those consultants at that time.

Okay, and to be clear as well, these are TIFF funds, not any other kinds of funds.

They're just TIF funds.

I mean, not just.

I mean, I don't mean to diminish a quarter of a million dollars.

But I mean they are TIFF funds allocated for specifically the park, the performing arts center, or the connectivity there too.

They are part of the TIF, yes, correct.

Okay, all right.

I just want to be clear in my head what exactly we're talking about here.

And I'm I would like to confirm my understanding is several years ago, this commission agreed that um each year the money that was generated by city taxpayers for into the Bay Park tax increment financing, the TIFF, each year the money, the city's portion of the money would be deposited into the fund that we are just discussing, the city bay tax increment financing, not a central one that we started out with.

Correct.

There's two TIFF funds.

One is the Bay TIFF and one is the city's portion of the Bay TIF.

Uh the Bay TIFF has a balance of about six million dollars, and then every year the city and the county contribute into this fund to pay the debt service for phase two.

Then we have another TIFF fund, it's the city's portion.

It's the amount that we receive from the TIFF increment that is above what we need for the debt service on phase two, and it's put into the city's specific TIFF fund.

And that's what we're talking about today is moving 250 from there into the uh Sarasota construction fund for the foreign arts.

So previously the commission had agreed that the money would go into the first fund, and what we're doing today is transferring it to another fund where it can be used.

Potentially.

So prior, we we um did an ordinance, because to your point, Mayor, originally when the interlocal was set up, the ordinance took the TIFF funds that was collected from the city's portion, transferred it directly into the um TIFF trust fund.

In order to spend any money from that TIFF trust fund, you have to get approval from the Bay Park Improvement Board, the county, and the city.

So in order for the city to spend their own funds, they'd have to get approval from those three entities.

So in working with Mr.

Fournier at the time, we created an ordinance that allowed the city's portion of the TIFF to be transferred into a city fund, so then the city can choose to use that how they wish, and that is the fund that Ms.

Strickland is talking about today.

If it gets transferred into that trust fund, which as Ms.

Strickland said, the the money to pay the debt services does, then in order to spend that we would need approval from the Bay Park Improvement Board, the county and the city.

Okay.

But in this, we're transferring it from something we control to something else that we control.

Yes.

Okay.

Thank you.

Um I have a motion.

Move approval of consent number two, item 7.1 resolution number 26R-3390.

Okay.

Motion by the Vice Mayor, seconded by Commissioner Batti.

May we have your votes, please?

And also roll call.

Albert, yes.

Betsy?

Yes.

All right.

Yes.

Trice?

Yes.

Aiden Cotch.

Yes.

And motion passed unanimously.

Thank you very much.

We are now at unfinished business.

And I will ask the city auditor and clerk to read the title of proposed ordinance number 26-5579.

Thank you, Mayor.

Ordinance number 25-5579.

An ordinance of the City of Sarasota, Florida Theresa on that certain parcel, a real property totaling approximately 1.27 plus or minus acres, located on the south side of Alderman Street, ordered by Hudson Avenue to the west, Pine Tree Lane to the south, and Roll Place to the east, from the residential multiple family five, RMF by zone district to the downtown edge DTE zone district.

All as more particularly set forth here in providing for reading by title only and providing for NFA could be.

Thank you.

And I didn't didn't note earlier this is the second reading of that proposed ordinance, and I will invite General Manager Christie to make the presentation.

Good morning, Commissioners.

For the record, Alice and Christie, General Manager of Development Services.

I don't really have a presentation for you.

Just wanted to note that this is under unfinished business because it wasn't a unanimous vote for first reading.

And there have been no changes to the ordinance made since the first reading.

Okay.

Thank you.

Any questions?

Vice Mayor.

Thank you.

Ms.

Christie, the applicant is choosing, is wishing to rezone without a site plan.

Is it correct that when there is no site plan with a rezone request, the decision must be based on the most intense development allowable in that zone?

Yes, that's how we um look at the rezoned requests when there's no site plan.

Okay, thank you.

And the applicant is requesting downtown edge.

Is that correct?

Correct.

But also an implementing zone district within this future land use classification of urban edge is downtown neighborhood edge.

Correct.

Although that would create a nonconformity with the existing structure and use on site.

Would you explain that please?

The existing density of the use that's there now is nonconforming to the base density for downtown neighborhood edge.

So that would create a nonconforming use.

And what is the existing density?

Let me see.

Just give me one second.

I can pull that up unless the applicant knows it off the top of their head.

Good morning, Commission.

For the record, Patrick Sidensticker from Mike Armirrell on behalf of the applicant.

I have not filled out the speaker's card, but I will.

It is currently 23.6 give or take just shy of 24 units per acre.

In base densities 18 units per acre.

Correct.

I see.

So it's a few units more dense than allowable in downtown neighborhood edge.

Correct.

And I did just want to note previous to your first question that there is a proffer that's being made by the applicant to limit the use to just residential uses.

So we analyzed it based off of that proffer, not anything exceeding that use.

Right.

Does the proffer?

The proffer limiting to residential uses doesn't limit the height, or doesn't restrict if the existing structure were demolished for the owner to benefit from affordable housing, increased density if there were affordable housing.

That's correct.

It just limits so that they could not do a more intense use like commercial retail or something like that.

It's limiting only to residential uses.

And it doesn't limit the property owner in height.

Correct.

It could still go to five stories in height rather than the three.

Is it three now?

90 feet.

It's nine feet.

It doesn't go by stories.

Correct.

It's currently three stories.

The max for its current zoning would be 90 feet.

And to your point, though, Vice Mayor, the code does, the code itself does limit the height for this property because of the surrounding zoning districts.

So to the north end of the site, it would be limited to three stories next to RSM9.

And to the east and west, it would be limited to one story above the max for that zoning, which would limit it to four stories next to the RS R MF3 zoning to the east and west.

So there are there are built-in height limitations in the code already.

And so what did you just say?

So I there was a question about height.

Yes.

How many stories would it be limited to the case?

So in in DTE, the height maximum is five stories.

In RSM 5, which it currently is, or MF5, excuse me, it's it's limited to 90 feet.

So a bit apples and oranges.

But the code also then goes further and says anything within 100 feet of RSM 9, which is Laurel Park to the north is limited to three stories.

And then anything within an RMF district, uh 100 feet of RMF is limited to one story above what the maximum height is in those zoning districts, and that's to our east and west.

So that is four stories that we would be allowed to build because the maximum height in those zoning districts is three stories.

And the code limits to one height, one story above the surrounding height limit.

What did you just say?

So it's in effect their maximum would be three stories on one end and four stories the rest of the site.

Thank you.

Yes.

And four contiguous to the other to the RMF.

And there is a caveat to that.

It's it's within a hundred feet.

So there is about a 35-foot strip.

In the middle.

In the middle to the south that could be a five-story building because it's not within a hundred feet of any other zoning district.

So I just wanted to be clear that three, four, and five is your own.

Correct, yes, ma'am.

A very small strip of five if they were to decide to build a building like that.

Thank you.

Those are my questions for now, I think.

Commissioner Haran Kotch.

Yes.

Um thank you.

And uh I think one of the things I wanted to ask about was when it goes from RMF 5 to DTE, it moves also from the public process to the administrative process.

Is that correct?

Correct.

Okay.

And I think that's a a big difference in this project.

Um and then live local can also come into play as well.

Correct.

Okay.

Which is also administrative, but could happen no matter what.

Okay.

Is that it?

That's it?

Okay.

Thank you.

Uh did you have any more, Vice Mayor?

Okay.

Um we may we have a thank you very much.

And may we have a motion.

Move approval on second reading of proposed ordinance number 25-5579.

Second.

Uh motion by uh Commissioner uh Alpert, seconded by Commissioner Batti to move approval on second reading of ordinance 25-5579.

Uh is there any discussion?

Okay.

Let's vote.

And also roll call.

Betty.

Yes.

Ulrich?

No.

Yes.

Aaron Cotton?

No.

Albert.

Yes.

Pass three to two.

Thank you very much.

Okay.

Uh next up, we're going to have uh legislative public hearing, but before we start, I'm going to call upon City Auditor and Clerk to administer the oh.

Um anyone plans as we get any public hearing held today, please stand.

Take this oath.

Do you swear or affirm evidence or factual representations which you're about to give or present to this commission during any public hearing held this 20th day of April 2026 are truthful?

Yes.

Thank you.

Thank you very much.

The next item is a public hearing on proposed ordinance number 26-5585.

And I will open the public hearing on that and call upon city auditor and clerk to read the title of the proposed ordinance.

Thank you, Mayor.

Um please be patient with me.

This is a long one.

Ordinance number 26-5585.

And ordinance of the City of Sarasota, Florida, amending the Sarasota City Code, Chapter 29.6 entitled special event permits, amending definitions, application process, and requirements for special events.

Creating section 29-68, special events lasting more than 96 hours.

Creating section 29-6.

I'm sorry, 29.6-9 pertaining to litter as special events.

Creating section 29.6-10 pertaining to city co-sponsored events.

Creating section 29.6-11 pertaining to security deposits.

Creating section 29.6-12 pertaining to identification and a liability insurance.

Creating section 29.6-13 pertaining to nonprofit special event permit status.

Amending the Sarasota City Code, Chapter 20, Section 6, and Section 7 pertaining to sound permitting for special events.

Amending the Sarasota City Code, Chapter 22, Section 22, and Section 23 pertaining to special events.

The leading chapter 23, Section 23.5 pertaining to commercial vending during special events.

A meaning of Sarasota City Code, Chapter 30, Section 21, and Section 23 pertaining to right-of-way usage permits for special events.

Amending of Sarasota City Code, Chapter 33, Section 121, pertaining to valet parking and special events.

Provided for the repeal of ordinances in conflict, providing for decipherability of the parts or of it declared invalid or unenforceable.

Provided for reading by title only and providing an effective date.

Thank you.

I will then call upon special event manager Wormley and Special Event Supervisor Benchon to make up a presentation.

Thank you.

Okay.

Good morning.

Uh Jim Warmley, uh special events manager.

Uh prior to uh we starting with the uh presentation.

Uh just gonna kind of remind us why we're here.

Our goal for updating the special event ordinance is to help preserve and enhance the city's vibrant atmosphere, making sure it continues to thrive for everyone who lives, works, and visits here.

We are committed to taking a balanced approach that thoughtfully considers the feedback we have received from residents, local businesses, and event organizers alike.

By updating the ordinance, we aim to create an environment where special events can occur while also respecting the needs and concerns of the wider community.

This collaborative effort will help Sarasota remain a lively and welcoming place for all.

Thank you for your support and commitment.

Good morning.

Uh Lori Benson, the Office of Special Events.

So I will kind of go through the PowerPoint here.

So these are our special event proposed ordinance changes.

Get a little closer.

Yes, speak a little bit more in my there.

You go.

Thank you.

So just for some brief history, on November 17th, 2025, we had our city commission meeting for proposed ordinance changes for first reading.

At that time, uh it was requested to continue the first reading to bring back options for the following areas.

No special event at St.

Armand's for over 96 hours, redefine the location restrictions on special events that include right-of-way closures, sound permits, and temporary alcohol permits, city co-sponsorship limitations, and notice and sign-off requirements for right-of-way closures, and then updates to the sound ordinance.

Okay.

And on March 2nd, 2026, the City Commission meeting proposed ordinance changes again presented for first reading.

City Commission requested continuing the first reading to bring back the following, and these are the areas that we're going to go through today.

Redefine the location restrictions on special events that include right-of-way closures, sound permits, and temporary alcohol permits, the 96 hour restriction at St.

Armand Circle Park, add language to clarify recurring events must apply each year.

Notice requirements for right-of-way closures, consistent use of term event organizer, and then updates to the special sound permit.

So the first one, redefining our location restrictions, which is section 29.6-5, standards for approving with or without conditions or denying a special event permit under subsection D, additional standards, restrictions, and requirements for special event permits.

So events with right-of-way closure, sound permit, and alcohol are limited to one day, with the exception of J.D.

Hamill Park and Gulf Stream Avenue.

And then events within the defined boundaries downtown as are limited as follows.

Events with a right-of-way closure, sound permit, and alcohol are limited to two per month unless approved by the city commission.

And events with a right-of-way closure, sound permit, and alcohol will not be allowed on consecutive weekends for any right of ways directly adjacent to each other.

And restrictions in this subsection D do not apply to city co-sponsored events unless there are other exceptions as noted in the ordinance.

And then we have an example here of the map again within the event boundary, so within the green boundaries, if you have a street closure, a sound permit and alcohol, no more than two events per month and no consecutive weekends on adjacent locations.

And I just wanted to point out so for this current fiscal year, we had 12 total events with a street closure alcohol and sound, not including city co-sponsored.

Seven of those were within the green boundary.

So we would have seven in within these restrictions.

For recurring special event and state permits, so standards for approving with or without conditions or denying a special event permit section B.

We removed the language restricting special event permits in St.

Armand Circle Park to keep it consistent with the rest of the ordinance that any event over 96 hours would have to come in front of the commission.

Subsection E, a recurring special event is subject to the following requirements unless approved by the city manager.

Recurring special events must be applied for annually.

They're limited to once per week and no more than one recurring special event on each application.

And then for subsection F for any special event involving the sale or consumption of alcoholic beverages, the event organizer must show proof of the proper state permit, proper state issued permit, and is fully responsible for compliance with state laws related to such permit.

The next section, the notice requirements in section 30-21 right-of-way usage permits for special events.

We removed the two-thirds signature requirement in favor of a more robust notification process.

So special events with a street closure must provide a notice of proposed street closure to impacted property residents, which will include the event organizer's name, event date, time, description, and location.

Condo association representative or property manager is responsible for providing notice to all residents and/or posting that notice in an area accessible to all residents, including residents of a rental property.

The event organizer must mail or hand deliver the notice to the proprietor or manager of the business to the condo association representative or a rental property management company.

And the event organizer will provide a copy of that notice along with a delivery list to the Office of Special Events.

And then the special sound permit, so effective May 1st, 2026, the sound has been limited on the permit to as follows.

So sound is not to exceed 85 DBA and 90 DBC during the approved event date and time for all locations except those noted below.

Sound is not to exceed 100 DBA and 105 DBC during the approved event date and time.

For the Bay Park, Bayfront Park, Payne Park, Ken Thompson Park, and Robarts Arena Sarasota Fairgrounds, or designated location approved by the city manager.

We've noted that the sound will be measured from the source of the complaint, and the sound permit may be changed based on the recommendations from the sound study.

We would expect that to have an effect.

And then I do have a couple other just changes that I wanted to note.

They're not these are changes that were agreed upon kind of previously that haven't come up in the previous meetings, but are things that are changing.

So I'm just going to read through those briefly.

So other changes in the ordinance, special event applications must be submitted prior to 60 days in advance of the event rather than the 30 days that it is now.

If the event organizer has been convicted of a federal or state crime or found in violation of a city or county ordinance within the last two years, we can deny the permit.

No street closures will be allowed on Main Street Monday through Friday before 5 p.m.

with the exception of legal holidays or with city manager approval.

And I just want to note that city co-sponsored events are exempt from that.

The event end time will be 11 p.m.

with the exception of New Year's Eve.

And then other event restrictions other than the map with the green box.

So no more than two events per month at JD Hamill Park Gulf Stream Avenue, not on consecutive weekends.

No more than one event per month on Boulevard of the Arts from Levin Avenue to Coconut Avenue.

No more than four special event permits annually at Bayfront Park, not on consecutive weekends, and no permits will be issued for events at the Bobby Jones Golf Club and Nature Park, however, events may be held and organized by the management company.

And no permits will be issued for events at the Bobby Jones Golf Club and Nature Park, however, events may be held and organized by the management company.

We've added commercial vending permit requirements as a part of the special event permit.

The application process for events in city parks greater than 96 hours is added with city commission approval needed.

We've also added requirements for litter, so the event organizer must clean up the permitted area, and if they do not comply, the city may contract to clean the area and charge the event organizer.

And we have also added language to codify the city co-sponsored event requirements.

Which I think, Joe, is that where we need to talk about?

That's something we can talk about now.

So this is section 29.6-10.

It's page 13.

So in here.

Page 13 of the backup material.

Page 13 of the backup material, city co-sponsored events.

And here we wanted to codify uh exactly who can qualify and what the terms are.

Um and they're laid out here.

Uh you know, one of them, some of them are very very simple.

You know that the event must support the vision mission values of the city.

Um there is one aspect of this.

The event organizer must be a nonprofit.

Um the the issue that's come up is just looking at Fresh Fridays.

Um, the event sponsor on Fresh Friday is actually the uh downtown improvement district, so they don't actually qualify under this.

So what we could do to address that, um, you know, the commission's discretion is either require the DID to get a nonprofit sponsor, or um we can allow, we can just add one phrase in there to allow the DID to be the event organizer as an exception to that nonprofit requirement.

Or we can also just change it to um you can allow anyone to potentially qualify um for city co-sponsorship with city commission approval.

So um that's just one wrinkle in in uh in that section.

Okay.

And then the last piece is I just want to point out there were some uh typo errors, so I'm just gonna read those in so that we would fix these before coming back for second reading.

So on page eight, number nineteen, we would add the word of after convicted.

On page 13, subsection B, the third line uh permit holder will be changed to event organizer for consistency.

Page 15, subsection A, eight lines from the bottom, remove and the can you can you slow down?

Yes.

You go back to the side one.

Can then just start off.

Yes.

So the first one is page eight, uh, number 19.

So the event organizer has been convicted.

We're gonna put of of a federal crime or found in violation of a city or county ordinance within the last two years, so that's the first change.

Okay, and then on page 13, subsection B, which is at the very top of the page, because there's three B's, but the very top of the page.

So in the event this section is not complied with, the city manager has the authority to contract at the cleaning service, and the cost of the cleanup will be the responsibility of the permit holder.

We're gonna change that to event organizer.

And then on page 15, subsection A, about eight lines up from the bottom.

The phrase and the is repeated twice that says and the and the.

We're gonna remove one of those.

And then the last change is page 22.

Subsection 7.

At the very top of page 22, uh it says the St.

Armand's Business Improvement District.

That will language will be removed out of the park permit ordinance.

And I think that was all of my corrections and notes and changes.

That's it.

Okay.

Um so thank you.

We before questions, we do have uh three requests to speak cards.

Um John Bordeaux, Jim Lample, and John Simon.

Anyone need the MO?

Yes.

Okay.

So I see you're changing your order.

Who's going first?

Jim's gonna go first.

Okay, Mr.

Lamble.

Good morning, Jim Lample, City resident.

Thank you for letting us speak.

I'm surprised and shocked that there aren't a lot more people here in the audience.

I guess they pretty much trust the city commission body to do what's best for the residents and citizens of the city.

Did everyone carefully read through the over 100 pages of this document?

I guess you can't respond, but maybe you can shake their head.

I doubt it.

I had a hard time, and I used to do documents in the legal department.

It's really a pithy document.

So I guess you're trusting staff to make these recommendations and trust that these are the best uh best thing or the best recommendation for the city.

Uh we don't quite agree.

Uh we've been at this for a long time.

The staff has met with us several times, and they've been great at doing that, but I don't think that they have the same uh sensitivity to these because I don't think when we asked for a show of hands, I think that none of the city staff lives downtown.

Living downtown and hearing this and being in convenience with road closures and the drinking and all the associated issues uh makes a big difference.

I suggest that we need more concise and a simple chart of these regs, because we're going to get into this muck and mire that they won't be enforced because they're just too arcane and there's just too many pages.

I think we could use a simple chart so that code enforcement whoever can look down and see if something is in violation.

I suspect that we need lower than a hundred decibels in downtown parks.

Most of us live in condos, or many of us do, where the noise echoes off of the buildings because as we know it's a lot of hard surfaces.

So something that might sound like 90 decibels out east would would rattle about a hundred decibels uh downtown.

So they're too close to residents.

The parks, some of these parks are like five points and uh Hamill Park are right next to uh the towers.

So I would ask you to omit those from the higher limits.

I don't think that any of these events should be able to hit a hundred decibels.

And I strongly urge you to reconsider giving the city manager whoever it is the privilege or ability to override sound limits.

That's what we had with the last city manager.

It was a lot of overriding, and there was no enforcement.

So please take that out.

Make the promulgation of this ordinance solid so that we don't have to uh give it to the city manager to override.

Thank you.

Thank you.

Um which one of you is going next?

John Bordeaux.

Okay.

Mr.

Bordeaux.

Uh John Bordeaux again, uh downtown city resident.

Um I I agree with Jim.

I mean, it had a really hard time going through a hundred pages, half of which were redacted, and others were added, and hard to understand.

Executive summary would have really helped.

Okay.

I kind of boiled it down to several uh items that were important to me, and I know some of my friends and and uh and people I live with.

Uh and uh and some of them are overlapping with what Jim said, okay.

The first and most important is this uh two downtown events uh per month.

Okay.

Those are two downtown block parties, does not include Fresh Fridays.

When you add fresh Fridays in, that's three events per month.

That's downtown.

That's too many.

Two events per month is more than enough.

One fresh Friday and one uh additional special event.

Okay, I really think that's one of the major keys here is this two events downtown.

Uh to end by 11 and Fresh Friday by 10, as is is currently now.

That's that sounds good to me.

Um Fresh Friday to have a sound limit of 85 decibels.

You know, this is the DBA.

I won't talk about DBC.

That's just confusing.

I think this 85 decibel limit, whether it's downtown, whether it's in the parks, wherever it is, that should be the maximum, so that there's no confusion.

Well, this is a park, so it can be 100, and across the street is it has to be 85.

Make it 85 for the entire city, regardless of the location.

Okay.

This thing about administrative changes is really bothersome.

Okay.

The fact that we have criteria in effect, and someone, whether it's the city manager, the interim city manager, whoever it may be, can arbitrarily change this criteria.

Why have an ordinance?

Okay?

Why have an ordinance if it can be uh changed that easily administratively?

So I really disagree with that.

I just heard from Laurie here.

I live in a condo, and we used to get one whole vote on a street closure.

Okay.

Now we're not even getting a one-hole vote.

All we get is notified that the street closure is occurring.

There needs to be something done with, you know, the fact that we have condos that have 100 to 200 units, two to three hundred people, and now all we do is get notified that there's a street closure.

We have no other alternative.

Previously, we at least we got one vote.

Okay.

Also, there needs to be strict enforcement.

It gets back to the 85 decibels, 100 decibels, the time, et cetera, et cetera.

You know, the people who are in charge to enforce need to be uh uh aware of how and when to enforce and all what the all the criteria.

Now I have two minutes left, and I'm going to try to do as much of this as possible.

Uh Peter Blandon is an amazing talent in what he is able to dig up.

He is unable to be with us today, and uh he sent the Commission a an email uh a couple weeks ago, and I'll try to read some of it here.

He says that this and this is from Peter Blanton's email.

This uh version of the special events ordinance is unresponsive to request by the City Commission.

Special sound permit is inconsistent with the November 25 mandate.

On November 17th, interim city manager Bullock announced no new special event limits of 85 decibels.

A reasonable person would expect these changes to be implemented quickly, aligned with the city's sound ordinance and clearly enforceable.

None of that is true.

The new limits will not take effect until May 1st, over five months later.

Bunching of parties has not been addressed.

At the first reading, Mayor Trice asks for protections against repeated burdening the same buildings with block parties.

This version still allows up to two block parties per month in front of a single building, plus fresh Fridays, meaning as many as three events per month.

Enforcement is still absent.

At the second first reading, Mayor Trice requested enforcement language, but none was added.

Effective ordinances typically include escalating penalties, warnings, fines, events, shutdowns, bar uh, or bans.

Other others readily present easily enforced limits using handheld sound meters.

Okay.

Uh we talked about the events.

Special events held in parks should not be 100 decibels, should be 85.

Uh no input by public or effective officials.

The version is written such that virtually all block parties may be handled administratively, no matter the impact on the adjacent.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

Okay, Mr.

Simon.

Thank you.

Um Florida law is very clear that when special events are selling alcoholic beverages under a not-for-profit permit, all net profits from the sales of alcoholic beverages collected during the permit period by a not-for-profit must be retained by such organization.

Um other special events are operated under not-for-profit permits obtained by downtown SRQ Enrichment Inc., which is a not-for-profit.

It has a not-for-profit designation.

It's operated by Darcy Jacob and Ron Soto.

And I'm not sure it is an actual not-for-profit when you review the Form 990 that they have submitted to the Internal Revenue Service.

There isn't much evidence of charitable or civic uh action, but we'll leave that for another day.

Here is a special event application that was prepared for the Rocktoberfest in 2025.

The applicant is DSEA, which is downtown Sarasota Enrichment Association.

It is not a legal entity.

There is no such entity.

It is a loose affiliation of merchants operated by Ron Soto and Darcy Jacob.

The contact information is Ron Soto.

The promoter is listed as Ron Soto.

I might ask the question who's the event organizer in this situation.

And the entity, which is the named insured in those insurance policies, which I brought to the attention of the commission and the city staff on multiple occasions, is still not a legal entity as of St.

Patrick's Day.

And it's very likely that all those policies have been ineffective if there was ever a claim.

So what do we do?

You have a situation here where you have an intense conflict of interest.

The same things are happening in a multiple events.

There's probably seven or eight different events that all have the same activity.

The transactions in these events, I am told reliably, are mostly done in cash.

So there's no trail.

How do you figure out where the cash went?

How do you know that all this all the required sales taxes are being paid?

Some protections to make sure that they can trace where the money is going.

Because the money is supposed to stay in the not-for-profit sector.

We may have had hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars over the years that have gone from the not-for-profit sector to the private sector because nobody's paying attention.

Nobody's enforcing it.

Now, the the city could require an audit of all these events at the expense of the of the applicant, at the event organizer.

The city could require that all the contracts, all the underlying contracts be provided so that the city could look at the contracts and make sure that the cash is supposed to go to the right place.

But none of that happens.

And it should be happening.

Let me say, first of all, the ending of at 11 o'clock and the 85 decibel limit, 90 decibel DBA DBC limit, is an improvement, and that's that's important.

But those limits are not included in the ordinance.

They're included in a separate sound permit, and that could be changed at any time by administrative discretion.

So we've reached a good point, but it could be taken away very easily without commission approval.

And it shouldn't be like that.

Thank you for your time.

Thank you very much.

Thank you.

So well, ask Mr.

Wormley and Ms.

Benson to return for questions.

It's almost mean.

Should we break and then come back with our questions?

Because I know I have a lot of questions.

Okay.

I was hoping we would get through this one without the break, but you want to take the break for lunch.

I think that might be wise.

Yeah.

She said she had a question.

I I wish it weren't so.

But I think sorry.

Because I have a feeling this is going to be a long discussion.

Okay.

So it is 1158.

Shall we take a break until 115?

Is 1555?

Is 115 reasonable?

Okay.

So we will be back at 115.

Welcome back to the April 20th Regular City Commission meeting, and we are in the middle of item number 10 point one legislative public hearing on proposed ordinance number twenty-six-fifty-five eighty-five dealing with special events.

And we were about to begin questioning of our special events team.

And Commissioner Ahern Koch is first on the board.

Okay.

Thank you very much.

So first of all, thank you for all the work that you all have been putting into this.

We've been having multiple first readings of this, and we really do appreciate it.

It's also, I would agree, it it's very difficult to understand, you know, the way, not the way it's presented, but just the topic in general.

It's just difficult to understand when we parse it up into like the green box area as I call it, and then the others, um, and all of these different intersecting things about permits and noise, and so it's complicated, and I've read this to some of the comments from the people who came and spoke I don't know, ten times uh more than that, over and over and over again.

So I'm I appreciate your patience while I ask these questions because um it's you know, it's still it's still complicated, I think for me anyway.

Um areas less than others, and like I said, I I do want to say it's you know you've done a great job with it.

Um and all of my the people I've spoken with, because I've asked a lot of questions of a lot of folks, businesses, residents, a whole swath of people.

And kudos always comes to this department for you know the outreach and and for communication.

So let me just get that off.

First question is on page six.

I'm gonna go pages instead of topic-wise.

Uh, I think that might be easier and more organized.

Commissioner, could you differentiate between the ordinance and the PowerPoint?

Yeah, I'm starting right with the ordinance.

Okay.

Okay, so page six.

Um B.

When I first read this, I was very confused, but I just want to c clarify.

Um, you can submit a request for a special event, um, ninety days or sixty days in advance of the event, but if you do it less, if you do it between ninety days and sixty days, you pay a fee.

Is that correct?

Yes.

Okay.

Um, just because it said, you know, uh, it must be submitted no later than, and then it just said, and then then below it it says um, you know, if it's submitted sixty days in advance, which uh it above it it says no later than, but it's a it's a must and not a shell.

So I get that.

Um you're paying a like a fine for submitting it uh less than ninety days.

Is that considered part of the final fee that you would pay, or is it in on top of?

It's in addition to.

It's in addition to.

Okay.

Um page seven.

Um it says here special event permit applications, which intend to allow for commercial vending, must identify the name of each vendor in the proposed location during the special event.

And I've had input saying that that, and then on page the next page on page 917, it says the event organizer of a special event intends to have commercial vending but has not identified the name for rejecting it, right?

The name and location of each vendor participating in the special event at least five days in advance.

That sounds to me like a much more reasonable request.

So the way I'm picturing it is you submit an application for a special event.

Let's say you're a good person and you do it in your 90 days, you don't have to pay your fee.

But if I'm organizing an event and I'm saying, oh, I want to have this event, let me see if I, you know, let me submit my application for it.

I'm not going to know at that time.

I'm going to have this stand that sells mustard and this one that sells, I don't know, uh soap, and this one that is doing a music thing.

I'm not going to know all that.

I'll probably have in my head like 10 vendors or 20 vendors and their stands, but I'm not going to know what vendor and where they're going to be in such detail with my application before I actually have permit to do it.

So am I confused on that or I think so we they need to tell us that they're going to sell things, so it's on the application, and it's usually an estimate, so maybe 10 to 20, and then five days in advance, they'll have to give us the names and locations.

That makes sense to me.

Okay, this language says must identify the name of each vendor and the proposed location.

That says to me, Joe who sells soap must be identified as Joe's soap, and it's going to be right in front of, you know, I don't know, the shop, this place.

So five days in advance.

Right, that's on the other one.

But this one here and on page 1787.

Exactly what you're saying here.

Um I think a quick fix for that would be that maybe to tweak this language just to say that special uh event permit applications, which tend to allow for commercial vending, you know, must provide the approximate number of vendors and locations.

Exactly.

And just, you know, just so that people can start planning at the application stage, but then we have the more specific language later on in another section that says, you know, you need to give the exact name of each vendor for five days.

So you know, if there's consensus on that, we we can make that slight change just to just to make the the wording clear that you know you don't have to have every single thing at the time of application.

Does that make sense to all the commissioners?

Just so we can to me, however, I I would leave in that you must identify the name of each vendor and proposed location within five days.

Yes, that's over here.

But I would leave it in location.

I agree with that.

We'll deny you if you don't, instead, you know, so you'll have the expectation you will have to do that.

Yeah, and when they read it, they'll know I can be generic now, but within five days I have to submit this.

Does that make sense to everybody?

Yeah, so it's yeah, cross-reference.

It basically say, look, we want the estimated number.

Uh however, please be aware that five days in advance, pursuant to subsection XYZ.

Thank you.

You you need to give us the details.

So even when we receive the um, or we talk to the organizer initially, we tell them you can just block off this is vendor area.

We know that they don't know all their vendors and stuff, and then we live in that we can get that in this later.

I just think it would be better if it were in the language here.

Okay, good, thank you.

Um the next one is on page nine B at the top.

Okay, um it says additional standards, restrictions, and requirements for special event permits for events in St.

Armin Circle Park and the public rights of way on St.

Armin's key.

So the question is, and I had this discussion earlier, a question earlier, and I'm still not crystal clear.

Is St.

Armin's Circle Park a park or a public right of way?

It's technically a right-of-way, but it is treated as a park.

Okay, because the language throughout this says if you're a park, then this, this.

And the exceptions are rights of way.

So there's on page uh uh uh uh where is it?

Um it's on the St.

Armand Circle part.

Um, so on page 12, and it talks about events for 96 hours.

It says event organizers of special events which will occur in a public park, other than city or other city-owned property, excluding a city-maintained right-of-way, must obtain approval from the city commission to receive a special events permit.

So in the case of St.

Armand's Circle, is it in this case considered a park or a right-of-way?

I think it would be considered a park.

I mean it is listed as a a city park.

And I know what you're talking about, which is just kind of a very unique history of how this right-of-way type area became a park.

But I think for purposes of this ordinance, it would be a it would be a park.

So I think we need to state that explicitly somewhere because I've heard from the folks on St.

Armand's that they read this as St.

Armand Circle Park is considered a right-of-way because I believe it's an FDOT right of way.

And so I just want to be consistent about what our understanding of whether it's a park or whether it's a right-of-way.

And when we mix the two and we call it one thing in one case and one thing in the other case, it's very confusing.

I would have considered it by this a park, but they're considering it, they're interpreting this as a right-of-way.

I think we should state what it is.

So I'm a we work with I don't know who they are at St.

Armand's, because I will say we we issue permits with individuals on St.

Armand's, and we've always issued it as a park.

If we treat it as a right-of-way, they're going to be required to do a lot more, and they're going to be required to pay a lot more.

So I don't think most of the people who apply for special event permits think it's a right-of-way or treat it as a right-away.

I think they're all used to treating it as a park, because that's how it's always been permitted as a park.

Now, Joe, if we need to put language in there, I I believe in talking to Lori and Jim, Mr.

Fournier has talked this before, and he has provided the direction that it's a park as it is dealt with with special events.

It is treated like a park, so all the special events park requirements are followed, not right-of-way.

If we need to either get a legal memo to that as opposed to putting in the ordinance, I think we can talk to Mr.

Polzak and his team to do that.

I just want clarity on it, yeah.

Whatever we can do to make it clear of St.

Armand's Circle, if it's a park or a right-of-way, because I think I think it is technically a right-of-way.

It's an F DOT right-of-way.

Yeah, I mean it it is a city park as well.

I mean, how how it got there is kind of a long convoluted story historical narrative.

But um, you know, if if that's a concern, we could even put something right here.

Right here in 29 uh.6-8.

When we say public park, comma including, but not limited St.

Armand Circle Park, if you want to make it crystal clear.

I think there should just be clarity, yeah.

One way or the other, what it what it is.

Yeah.

May I add here?

Yeah, yeah, I'm my time is up too, and I feel like I'll ask more good questions anyway.

Um well, I'll chime in on her time, not much more.

Well, she's out.

My time is out.

Uh consistency is the important thing, I think.

Okay.

So you can start your time.

Um thank you.

Um I have one, two, three, four questions about the PowerPoint, and then a whole bunch of them about the ordinance.

I'll start with the PowerPoint.

On page five.

Um again.

You did such a good job on this, but this is such a complex matter that it's still difficult to figure it out.

So would it be would you be able to tell me how many events are the maximum number of events that could be in one location during a one-month period of time?

Two.

I don't know.

No.

I don't think I understand the question.

Sorry, like what location is.

Well, let's just say uh Maine and Palm.

How many events can be at that location during a one-month period of time?

Right now there's no restrictions with these proposals, it would be two.

Not counting city events.

And even with co city co-sponsored events, it can't be two weekends in a row.

City co-sponsored events are exempt.

Don't count.

So it could be three, and it could be two weekends in a row, and then skip a weekend, and it could be the third weekend.

You know, people are concerned about this not just for the noise, but for the road closures, right?

Three weekends a month sort of disruptive to people who live in that area.

Okay, that was my question for number page number five.

Page six.

So this is the map that has the boundaries identified.

And when I looked at it, I thought as the city grows and with rebuilds going further east, the problems will also grow further east.

The complaints that we're having now in the middle of downtown as the people live further east.

The problems will go grow too.

Did you consider expanding your what's currently the green boundary all the way to 301 and north to Rosemary?

I think that that could potentially be too restrictive, but we didn't look at anything past this grid.

Um so I'll interject for a second, because when we were in front of the city commission back in March, we brought three options, and one of them was much more restrictive and did include other areas.

Um we had an option two, it was called, and within that option two, there were only certain right-aways that we allowed special events, and they were very specific.

If a special event was to be done outside of those specific options, it had to come to city commission for approval.

So that was a much more restrictive one.

And when we presented that in March, the majority of the commission had said that they were more comfortable with this one, and that's why we brought forward this one.

Okay.

And so if we look at the orange box on page six, it says outside of the boundaries.

Does that mean the green boundaries?

There are no restrictions on the number of events per month unless otherwise noted in the ordinance.

Otherwise noted in the ordinance is Boulevard of the Arts.

Yes.

So that's it.

JD Hamill, the Lovard of the Arts, Bayfront Park, and then the um Bobby Jones.

But nothing going further east.

Nothing going further east.

Okay.

Well, we could amend the ordinance if the time comes and we find it necessary.

All right.

Um page seven.

Um this is related to um subsection F.

We've, as you heard today, received.

I'm on PowerPoint.

Page my page seven, the PowerPoint is yes, recurrence.

No.

Yes.

Go to item F.

She's no I think there's nothing on there.

She's using an old link.

It's words.

Okay.

We've got on that.

There you go.

Um it's regarding the liquor temporary liquor license.

We've received, as you heard today, a lot of complaints about suspected violations of temporary liquor permits.

Is the city responsible for temporary liquor permits?

That is a state issued permit.

That's a state permit, and so if somebody has complaints or suspected violations of that, they would go to the state, not the city.

Correct.

Okay.

Could we do anything about it?

Well, you know, I did look into this issue a little bit, and um, you know, the permit comes from the the State of Florida Department of Business and Professional Regulation, actually the division of uh I believe it's alcohol, beverage, and tobacco.

And they actually have their own law enforcement bureau.

Uh and so if who investigates and and uh moves forward with criminal violations, and and that's something that um I did get the uh contact information for for that law enforcement bureau uh which investigates allegations of criminal conduct related to the temporary alcohol permit.

And um, you know, that local district office is in Fort Myers, but you know, they can be reached other ways.

Um and that's where people can go to make a criminal complaint, and that is the law enforcement agency charged with investigating.

So if somebody wanted that information, could they contact you?

Sure.

Okay.

That'd be great.

Um just to clarify, the city can't do anything about that.

Is that right?

It's not a city permit, so we don't have the authority.

Authority to my last question um on this is regarding page nine of the uh PowerPoint, the second item uh and so this is for special sound permits.

And the second item says sound is not to exceed 100 decibels, DBA.

Who would be able to play sound up to 100 decibels in what situations?

If it's a special event in these locations.

Okay.

And would it surprise you that if you did a Google search on 100 decibel sound, uh, what's the effect?

It would read something like this.

Listening to sound at 100 decibels for over 15 minutes can cause hearing damage.

Would that surprise you?

No.

Probably not, right?

And so, I mean, we all see band members wearing earphones over their ears because they're in close proximity to loud sound, and they do that to protect their hearing.

We all know that, right?

That's pretty obvious.

But here's the thing.

The city is responsible for the health, welfare, and safety of the band members who protect themselves because they know event organizers, and they don't usually stand real close to the music, but the city's also responsible for people who sit close to the music and don't know that a hundred decibel music for more than 15 minutes can cause hearing damage, hearing loss.

So my question is, are we requiring event organizers who have a special sound permit to post signs saying listening to sound at this volume for over 15 minutes can cause hearing damage?

Are we requiring them to notify the people who don't know?

We do not have any requirements.

We don't have that.

Okay.

Thank you.

Those are my questions about the PowerPoint.

Okay, I'll come back later.

And it's time for Commissioner Albert.

Well, I don't have any questions because I asked my questions of them when they presented to me one-on-one, but I do have a suggestions about the um the language for the um St.

Armand's Circle Park.

Um couldn't you just say that um for purposes of this ordinance, the St.

Armand Circle Park will be treated as a park.

Something like that that resolves that problem.

Or the St.

Armand Circle right-of-way.

Will be treated as a park.

Because it is a right-of-way.

Okay.

The St.

Orbans Circle Park, which is technically a right-of-way will be treated as a park for this ordinance.

I think that yes, because there are right-of-ways that they close, so we don't want those to be confused.

Right.

So anything else, Commissioner Albridge?

That's it.

Uh was there anything from you, Commissioner Betty?

Uh yes, thank you, Mayor.

And thank you all for your presentation and when that when we sat and talked about it, uh, it made a lot of sense to me.

I mean, I'm I was just trying to gain some clarity as to what it is you were asking or um so I was looking at page six of the PowerPoint, and there's an area defined in green, which has most of the limitations.

All actually, the restrictions, I'll say.

And other areas um don't have those same restrictions, but east of the green line, there are no restrictions, or actually anywhere beyond the green line, no restrictions on the number of events per month unless otherwise noted in this ordinance.

My concern is as the city as more people are moving east, Lyra, whatever the problems will follow and also go east.

In the future, you mean the future.

Okay.

Okay.

All right.

Yeah.

Um what you all laid out, they made a lot of sense to me.

But one of the things I wanted to ask is uh um so how are emergency events handled and would they be exempt from the time and fees and uh the fines and uh let's say the Sarasota Paradise, you know, um, you know, wins the championship or something like that, and they need to get some they want to hold an event and short notice, something to be done quickly.

Is that something that would come before the commission or or or how does that work?

In in the past, what we've done previously, if it is something like that.

I mean, we've had you know hurricane relief come in very quickly, right?

When they we've had different events, um they will usually get a waiver from the city manager.

So as long as we're directed by the city manager's office to waive, like maybe waive the late fee, then we would waive that.

Okay, okay.

Yeah, because I was wondering, because you know, these things could happen, like in Sarasota Paradise or something like that, you know, some sort of celebratory like event could could happen.

Um how does that work in the event you know that it needs to be done, you know, expeditiously or whatever.

Um but outside of that, I I don't really have any any you know questions, but I I hear you know the concerns with um you know two events more like in the same in the same area or whatever in front of the same like uh residential business or whatever, you know.

So um but outside of that, you know, I don't have a problem with what it is you all have done.

Okay.

Um couple of things.

One, when we talked, I was concerned about the word uh directly adjacent because it really needs to be refined, defined better in our discussion.

You said perpendicular, but that's not clear from directly adjacent.

So I'm wondering A, if we could get a better definition of what you mean by directly adjacent, because again with our discussion, I said, well, you know, and I'm gonna use the mark as an example.

You could have an event in the front of the mark, one weekend, and then in the back of the mark, the following weekend, because those two streets are not directly adjacent, but that is not fair to the residents of the mark.

So during the lunch break, I went and I checked Google Maps, and I measured a quarter of a mile.

And a quarter of a mile, according to Google Maps, is say from five points along Main Street to Orange.

So I'm wondering that whether or not you could add you know, cannot be directly adjacent or within a quarter of a mile of an event that was the previous weekend.

Where is that language?

Uh page on the ordinance top of page ten, I believe.

Uh yeah.

Two double I.

The Office of Special.

Uh the office of the case.

So I'm wondering.

Yeah, that's not clear, but I mean, but also I'm wondering also add a restriction, it cannot be within a quarter of a mile of the previous weekend.

I would have to look and see what that would potentially impact.

Without I I don't have a good answer without research.

Well, yeah, but but again, just for an idea of estimate, it's from five points to orange is a quarter of a mile.

So if it's the you know then it would basically that would be one.

You couldn't have anything else then because that's gonna take up much.

I think.

Okay.

Well, again, you know, you could say two blocks would would that solve the mile issue, yeah.

Huh?

If you wanted to.

Well, I mean, uh rather than we don't we don't have consistent block size.

So I mean, if you want to say an eighth of a mile instead of a quarter of a mile radius, but you know, enough so that we are not repeatedly uh disadvantaging people in a particular building or particular area.

And then the follow-up on that, and uh the vice mayor's question triggered this.

Um I can understand that we've got fewer restrictions on city co-sponsored events, but if the city co-sponsored event is in a particular location, rather than treat that as it never really happened, restrict a non-co-sponsored event from being adjacent to that the following weekend.

I mean, you know, they the city co-sponsored event actually happened, so don't but make believe it didn't happen, you know, restrict uh a non-city co-sponsored event from being adjacent or within the radius if we do include the radius.

Agreed, yeah.

It makes sense.

Um and and the other concern I had going back to city co-sponsored events, uh this was brought up by one of the citizens regarding the DID, I believe.

No, it was you, isn't it?

Um I'm wondering legally what is the DID's relationship to the city.

Is it a um uh is it dependent special districts?

Yeah.

So in so couldn't we say make the exception for dependent special districts such as the DID in that place in the ordinance where we're saying um I have that wording if if that's the option you want to uh go with as far as um the requirement that the event sponsor be a nonprofit or the did.

We could just say the did alone, or we could say or any dependent special district.

See, I would go with any dependent special district, the any of the city's dependent special districts so that if it's another, you know, next month maybe, you know, St.

Armand's will re-establish their business improvement district, you know.

Just without just saying the DID is the only one.

Where is that in the ordinance, please?

It's on page 13 uh section 29.6-10.

What are the other dependent special districts in the city?

At the moment, do we have any?

I think that's what the CRA is not a special district, is it?

Golden Gate.

Oh, yeah, Golden Gate.

Yep.

Yep.

So so I mean, look, if if the point of having an exception for the DID is because you're already doing it with Fresh Fridays, then you know you might want to have a narrow exception, just say, okay, you must be a nonprofit or the DID.

But you know, if if you really intend to expand it greater, then you do have to consider you know what that means and the consequences.

I mean, another thing I think the city managers pointed out is uh another option is just to say uh if you're not a nonprofit, you must obtain city commission approval, which is basically what happened with uh Fresh Fridays in the DID.

So then that can get tied into uh the the resolution on city co-sponsored events.

So that's an alternative wording.

And so I have that worked out too if if you want to see what that that looks like.

But it's it's real actually really simple.

It just would say that um to be considered for co-sponsorship.

Uh you either must be a nonprofit or specifically approved to do so by the city commission.

The city commission or the city manager.

City commissioners.

The city commissioner the reason uh I'm gonna go back to Commissioner Battisse's thing with the uh paradise winning the championship.

I mean, that I would hope maybe would be city co-sponsored.

They're not nonprofit, are they?

No.

No.

So, you know, and then if they win the championship, we don't want to wait 60 days to put in an application for a special event.

So and the city and the commission will probably not be meeting in that time.

So I would think we would want to give the city manager the right to make those kinds of decisions.

No?

No.

Yeah.

No.

I mean, for city co-sponsored events, those are really that long-standing list, you know, set by resolution.

I mean, I think that in the past, exceptions have been made to waive fees for things that come up last minute, even if they're not on the list.

It's not common.

It's it's I would say it's few and far between for something like the hurricane relief that we did down in the Rosemary district right after the storms.

They we have waived fees on the direction of the city manager in the past, but it's not super common.

But this is this is more for those long-standing, you know, the parades and the New Year's Eve and the you know different events.

Yes, because as you're reminding me, we've limited the number of city co-sponsored.

I was just looking at where we were sort of waiv the rules for emergency kinds of things, and I would consider you know paradise winning the championship and emergency kind of thing.

We don't want to wait 60 days.

No, right.

We don't want to wait for the commission to meet.

Uh, how would that be possible to have for them to have a celebration?

And they could put the application in, and if it was late, the city manager's office could waive that requirement of the under 30 days if they wanted to not pay anything or to get services from the city, that would have to go to the city manager's office currently.

So if I could suggest just to clarify, we do have a resolution that talks about all the fees.

So instead of putting the clarity of the city manager waiving, if we're just talking about the fees, I would propose we put that on the resolution.

If there is um a celebratory event or something that you know the city manager approves to waive the fees, we include that on the resolution as opposed to the ordinance.

Okay, I was looking also beyond fee waiver, if they put in their application seven days before the event.

That would be really difficult, seven days.

But I mean, we have gotten you know events that are under 30 days and they have been we've been given approval from the city manager's office to go ahead and try to process the application through.

That's not with a waiver of fees or with any in-kind services, but just to actually accept and process.

We've done that in the past.

So my time is up and it is up to Commissioner Agaran Coach at this point.

Okay.

Um let's see where was I?

I was on page nine.

Um six.

Um when a special event for a special when a special event application for a special event in St.

Armand's Circle is filed with the special events office notification shall be given to St.

Armand's residents association and the St.

Armand Circle Association via email.

That the application has been filed.

So those are those two groups are being notified about this.

What about the others, like the property owners that are not part of the circle association or the merchants that are not part of the circle association?

How do they get notification?

We just notify the two groups that it and that's just that somebody has put in an application, it doesn't necessarily mean that it will go through or be approved.

Um those are the only two groups that we notify.

Then they can't appeal if they don't know about it.

That's my thing.

Because there's there's a there is something in here about if you have that's an event over 72 hours or 96 or something like that.

You you're if you get five people appealing it, then it's allowed to be considered.

But if they don't know it's being filed, how can they have a say so at all in any of this?

Well, here it's not so much for a say-so, it's just to let them know.

Right.

And then kind of a process.

But if they're not a member of the Circle Association, then they won't know.

Correct.

So can we add um or property owner slash merchant?

I mean we have those addresses, we know those folks.

But that would be very we don't we do that for downtown too?

No.

So I would ad I would suggest they would sign up for the newsletter as anybody else.

We do these two organizations are specifically called out in this part of the ordinance because at one point they asked to be for whatever reason, and so they're in there now.

For anybody else who wants to know about special events, residents anywhere within the city, we are asking them to use the new newsletter notification process that the city um the special events team has created.

In addition to that, there is still the notice requirement that we've put in here.

So if you are an impacted property, you would get the notice requirement as is in the ordinance.

If we're trying to expand that, I think that's pretty onerous for um every single special event to notify every single resident.

Okay, so they will get notification once the application is approved.

There's a lot of different things.

If they're impacted, if they're signed up for the newsletter.

If the newsletter we list every all of the special events.

And you are you listing them when the application is put in or just when they're a month.

It's by month.

So it's a monthly newsletter.

Right.

But is it when they apply or is it when it's approved?

It's for the like we would send it out a couple weeks before the following, before the next month.

So it's not as we get them.

It's like here's all the events for October, here's all the events for November.

It's a monthly newsletter.

Right, but is it a monthly newsletter about it's the ones that are approved and applied for or just approved?

It we send it out about what I think a week or two before.

So they at that point we know there it's what's been.

It's what's been applied.

Right, Lori.

What's been applied for?

It would most of them be approved as well.

So but it also includes applied for.

Yes.

Gotcha.

Okay.

All right.

So we'll let them know that that newsletter is important.

Okay.

Um and then if they're impacted, then they'll get the notice.

Okay.

Um.

Then on page 10.

I just want to confirm that you have the green box and you have to do three, all three um items to be considered a special event.

If you do two of the three, you don't need to apply for a special events permit, correct?

No, that just means that the number wouldn't be restricted.

So you have to have, in order to close the street, you have to have a special event permit.

Okay.

So you can close the street and have sound.

Yes.

And then there's not a limit.

It's not part of it's not taken as well.

Perfect.

How to ask that question.

Um, um eight.

Eight.

Um special events activities excluding tear down shall take place after 11 p.m.

with the exception, blah, blah, blah.

Uh I it still concerns me about how long the teardown will take, how long it's allowed to go, what is the instrument?

I'm sure there's something that it's not going to go till 2 a.m.

and and things like that.

It could.

We we have events that have teardown to two or three in the morning.

It just depends on what they need to do, but it's important to note that the sound permit only extends to the end of their event.

So they have to follow the regular sound ordinance after the conclusion of their event.

So they can't be any louder than what's currently allowed in the sound ordinance.

All right.

That concerns me a little bit.

Um, page 10.

E.

Uh recurring special event is subject to the following requirements unless approved by the city manager.

What would be the the cases for that?

I don't have anything specific because we have not had anyone have a recurring special event yet.

So they don't have any specifics.

Okay.

And I would just like to say, I think that this document can be a living document.

You know, once you say we haven't had any cases like this, if we see there's an issue, we can address the issue.

If we see we need to expand the boundaries, we can expand the boundaries.

I mean, I think you know, this is all part of us trying this and seeing where the pain points are.

Uh we can only anticipate so much.

Okay.

Okay, Vice Mayor.

Thank you.

Okay, I'm gonna um address the ordinance now.

On page seven.

Going to page eight.

I'm gonna uh mention several subsections.

Subsection six eleven, twelve, and thirteen.

My question is the same for all of those.

Who determines?

For example, in the page seven, item six, subsection six.

It says the event organizer is legally incompetent to contract or to sue or be sued.

Who didn't makes that determination?

Well, I think normally when a uh application is put in, they they look at the uh event organizer and uh you know see if they're a Florida registered corporation.

Uh I mean that that's kind of the first start.

Um and if there's a question about the organization, then I I I think they'd probably contact the city attorney's office and um we'd we'd go from there.

Okay.

Um what about number 11?

Who determines?

There are alternate locations available where the event may be reasonably located without creating blah, blah, blah, blah.

Who makes that determination?

We do give some of those recommendations now.

Like there's there's some locations that are just not good for events, like if it's your only access to your property, we don't want to close that street and put put an event there.

So we would say, hey, you know, that wouldn't work, but what about X, Y, and Z?

And if they said, absolutely not, I can only have it there, then we would have to say no because it's there's other places that it wouldn't be so impactful.

Gotcha.

Uh-huh.

And same for number 12.

The proposed use or activity is inconsistent with the classification or uses of the permit area or surrounding areas.

You make that determination as well.

I mean, we could, yeah.

I mean, we've had some like suggestions for longer-term events in the parks that would maybe be a little bit too impactful to the park, something that would be there for you know, three to four weeks in different locations, and it just wasn't really wouldn't really work there.

So the event organizers are usually pretty amenable to suggestions you make.

Yes.

Okay, so I'm gonna skip over my last who determines question.

Um page eight number ten.

It says the user activity attended by the atten intended by the event organizer would conflict with a previously planned event scheduled for the same time and place.

That doesn't say that the event has been applied for.

Shouldn't I I think there's some other wording there that might add clarity?

A previously applied for event.

If it's not applied for, it doesn't count.

If he comes in and says, hey, wait, I want to have an event there, why is hers getting favor over mine?

And the only answer is because I mentioned it to you ahead of time.

Scheduled.

There's language in the ordinance.

You can plan it all day long, but in order to hold your event on a city park or city property, it's not it's not um until you apply for it and until we actually approve the permit, it's not considered a event, even though you may be planning it at home.

I mean, until it actually gets an application submitted to the city, it it wouldn't be a planned event.

I agree.

And so shouldn't the language in subsection 10 be explicit about that?

That the application has already been submitted.

But it's schedule it's scheduled.

It's actually scheduled.

Yeah, it wouldn't be scheduled.

Okay, if it doesn't matter, it doesn't matter.

But to me, I'm I mean I'll let Joe and Joe reply.

I guess I we I would look at it as what is the risk factor.

Um if the risk is great, we can make the change.

Well, I'm I'm actually wondering a little something different, which is you know it's it's a little more broadly worded than what you're suggesting, but um the the way it is now, but I mean it could be that there's some other event, it's not quote unquote a special event, but there there is something else planned in an area.

So I mean the broad wording gives staff a little more uh discretion.

I didn't think about that, and I agree with you.

Okay.

Um I j I have a hopefully quick one.

Um it's about enforcement.

Um and I understand that we, you know an event organizer who has broken the rules in the past, we're not going to allow to do an event for two years.

Um, but do you have anything stronger?

Um any kind of stronger enforcement for whether it's they totally violate the sound permit or um other things like that, uh their event gets totally out of hand with crazy people running around.

I mean, is there any kind of enforcement?

I mean, we have a special events monitor who goes to all the events.

Um just with the sound, we are very proactive, we work with the organizer, do some sample uh you know, readings, we work with SPD, you know, if there's a warning, we go to the organizer first to let them know hey, you're kind of hitting above where we're asking.

Again, we're even now we're asking below what's allowable in the sound permit.

So we've done this for over a year and a half now.

We're keeping things under 90 decibels already.

So getting to the 85 is probably going to be pretty easy.

Uh so we work well, and if we have any issues, which I don't think we've ever had any issues with the organizer saying no, um SPD is more than willing to come and back us up, and they will be glad to shut down the sound and turn it off at that point in time.

Okay.

And and if the event gets out of hand, SBD will shut it down.

And I'm assuming that if the event organizer is one that you were going to ban for the next two years, you tell the event organizer right away and that that's the case and why.

Sure.

Yes.

Sure.

I mean, even now we have some minor violations if they've gone over their time or kept the street closed, you know, we gave a portion of their um you know deposit and whatnot.

So uh yeah, we definitely uh follow up on that.

Okay.

Thank you.

And Commissioner A.

And gotch is more.

Okay.

I'm just gonna jump straight to one that's really important to me, which is on page 33, Vice Mayor brought it up about the uh sound, the decibels at 100 decibels.

Um not only can that cause permanent or hearing damage, but it can be permanent hearing damage.

Um so for me, this is a really important point that we do not allow it to go to 100 decibels.

And I understand that those are parts and that they're big.

However, some humans can get up close to that, and it it we are tasked with their health safety and welfare, and for me this is not um what we should be allowing.

So that's a big important point when there for me.

Um I will go back to my page by page, uh page 11.

Um page 11 F.

Um.

Uh Vice Mayor mentioned that one as well.

So is there no language we should be putting in this to make that the concern of the citizens um uh also evident in here that it's the bur their burden to comply with the nonprofit rules?

I mean, do we want to at least um underscore that it's important to the city that they comply with the state law or what says it there?

All right.

Yeah, I mean, there was there was a sentence added in in this section uh, you know, where it says the event organizers responsible for compliance with all applicable laws relating to the state of Florida issue permit for the sale or consumption of alcohol.

Right, right.

But it doesn't actually say, you know.

How about adding and the temporary alcohol permit?

Well, we don't issue that.

It doesn't matter, but if they're responsible for it, it doesn't matter who I think we wanted to be vague with the title of it in case they changed, you know, temporary alcohol permit is my vote be they call it now, but they may call it something different later.

There may be other um laws related to the issuance of sale and alcohol.

So this was the one that would cover any laws put in place by the state of Florida for the issuance of alcohol.

And there is a slightly different permit that hold on one second.

I have one minute left.

I have 54 seconds left, but I got some more questions.

We'll talk about this later.

Um this one here, uh so this was brought to my attention.

Um it says here that um if conditions precedent to timely special event uh permit application have been met, the Office of Special Event shall approve with or without conditions uh or deny the application for special event permit by the 30th day prior to the proposed special event.

If we could say within 60 days of a completed application submission that if somebody submits it 10 months ahead of time, they could potentially not hear if their application is approved until 30 days before the actual event, which allows no planning time.

Could we add language in here that gives a time limit for staff to actually approve that application?

So I can say that so if they've met all of the requirements, we will approve it as soon as those requirements have been met.

So whether that's 30 days, 60 days, five months, we will approve it as soon as they're have met all of the requirements.

So if it's not approved yet, then it means we are waiting on things from them.

Okay.

So but this this doesn't say that.

Is there some language we could add to here to give them some sort of reassurance that they're not gonna we're not gonna wait to tell them until 30 days before the event?

That's what this says.

You know, you'll hear from us at the very latest, 30 days before the event.

It doesn't even say you could hear from us sooner, but I it in Mr.

Millanik, please correct me if I'm wrong.

But the first sentence, if the conditions precedent to a timely special event permit application have been met.

So if they've given us a completed application, the Office of Special Event shall approve.

So that language right there does say that as soon as we get a complete application, we'll approve it.

So that's the that's the condition precedent to a timely special event permit application has been met.

But a complete application may not be approved.

Right.

So I'm saying that you were asking for can we add some language to give the event organizer comfort that as soon as they have a completed application, it'll be approved?

That's that first sentence.

It will be approved as soon as we have the um everything met in the application process.

There's other conditions to the application, so it's just not them submitting an application with a site map.

Uh once we get that, then we also give them additional documents that need to be completed.

If they're closing a street, uh we need to have an MOT plan.

They need to give us a barricade contract uh to show that they're paying for the mayor case if you put it downtown per the MOT agreement.

They need to give us a portable um potty contract to show that they're gonna have the appropriate amount of pot that.

So we're waiting on that from the organizer in probably 99.9% of the cases is why, you know, but we're also in constant communication with them.

It's not like we wait until we get all the stuff and tell them we will tell them like, hey, we still need this, we still need this.

I mean, the reminders are there.

And I'll also say this that uh some of the people that actually um are probably talk about the events not getting complete um are also not the ones that we're dealing with.

There's somebody that works for them that deals with it, so they probably know more, so they might want to talk to the people that are representing there.

Yeah, I I I hear what you're saying, and I know you guys do a great job, and that's not my concern.

It's that this language doesn't say in here that if they meet all the requirements, the application will be approved within, you know, at the latest 60 days after the completed.

So if their application is incomplete, that doesn't count, right?

It you're not gonna count those days.

As soon as you receive a completed application, it'll give them assurance to know that it will be approved or denied within 60 days.

I think that's the language that we're looking for that is a solid like you'll hear from us one way or the other, not 30 days before the event.

So my one concern with doing that on the dais today is that like Jim said, 99.9% of the applications that aren't approved 60 days out, 90 days up, is because we're waiting for something from an event organizer.

So if we make that change today to say it has to be approved that the city has to approve it within 60 days or deny.

The most of the organizers are probably going to get denied.

And we would just flat out have to deny them because we don't get a completed application from an event organizer 60 days before the event.

So we if that language was added to this, uh a majority of our events would have to be denied.

Yes.

Because we're still waiting from insurance from them from their um MOT contract.

But isn't that a not non-completed application if they don't have all those I items?

Yes, but that's what I'm saying is we would we would have to deny most of our special events because we do not get completed applications 60 days before the remote.

But what if you did get a completed application?

Then the team would absolutely approve it.

Right.

And so where does that say that in here?

I I think what she's saying is if the application isn't completed 60 days in advance of the event, since there's a 60 day, you have to give them 60 days, that would create a problem because they'd have to be denied.

So in other words, that makes it too restrictive.

So I again one of the questions I would maybe ask is if we're changing the ordinance, I feel like we are the changes we're making in these ordinances is because there's issues or problems we want to clarify or codify.

I don't feel like we have an issue with not approving special events in a timely manner.

We don't have event organizers who reach out to us and let us know that they are gravely concerned that they haven't gotten approved.

So I'd be hesitant to start changing language that we haven't vetted with our event organizers with our if if we haven't had those conversations, because I don't see an issue right now with the current language.

At least event organizers haven't shared with us that there's an issue with the current language.

I've had that input.

And I and I agree it might be one, and I think there's some information we can provide to you on that one.

Okay.

Um and then if it's still an issue at second reading or we've heard from more people, we can address it at second reading.

Perfect.

Okay.

Commissioner Batti?

Yeah, thank you, Mayor.

Yeah, I don't I don't want us to like wordsmit this to death, you know, and you know, just overkill it, man, you know, like we do so many other things.

You know, it's just too uh in the weeds.

But um one of the things uh wanted to talk about, and uh again asked Vice Mayor this when you were talking about the 100 decibels in terms of the sound and it being uh it being a problem, you know, may uh impair your hearing or something.

Are you just talking about put in some sort of notice there or whatever?

Well, that's by the event organizer to alert the public that you know standing too close to the speakers or at 100 decibels could damage it cause your damage or whatever.

So that's one uh option.

It doesn't solve the problem of people being exposed to 100 decibel sound and having uh threshold loss, which is a hearing loss that eventually becomes a permanent sensory neural hearing loss that is you can't correct.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

But at least if you notify but if you like publicly, you know, put it visibly for them to see that hey, standing too close to the speakers or whatever at 100 decibels could is that what you that isn't the solution I would prefer.

Okay, okay.

Well can I do that?

But it is one.

Okay.

Okay.

Because you know, we're talking about you know those decibels or whatever.

Um we're talking about like being close to the speakers, right?

Or whatever, not somebody saying, oh yeah, they're you know, playing at 100 decibels and it's you know it's gonna you know cause hearing problems for me and I'm like in the building or something like that.

We're not talking about that.

Okay, all right, all right, cool.

That that's pretty much my my question.

Thank you, Mayor.

Okay.

Uh Commissioner Albert.

Okay.

I I was just going back to the 100 decibel thing too, because I think our downtown events um historically have been allowed to be 100 decibels, and now we're reducing that to 85, which I don't know if that's loud enough.

They assured me that it is.

But I think for a huge park and for a larger area, you have to have it louder.

And I don't think it's I I don't think, you know, we have to be concerned with the health safety and welfare of our residents, but we aren't the babysitters.

And I don't think it's something that you know, we say, you know, we're gonna make sure you're never exposed to this.

It's up to them.

You know, I think most people are aware if you stand right next to the speakers, it's pretty loud.

And it's going to probably affect your hearing.

If you're standing at the back of the crowd, it's not 100 decibels.

So I think you have to have if you're gonna have music, you have to have it loud enough for the crowd to be able to hear the music.

So may I respond, Mayor?

Um, this is what we have for.

Yeah, quickly.

Sure.

Uh uh, I'll be quick.

Um people who are sitting close to the speakers probably don't know that they can get a permanent hearing loss after 15 minutes.

The people who are out there dancing, having fun, the sound isn't 100 decibels to them.

It is probably 85.

But they're paying no attention to it.

It's the people who are sitting close to the speakers who should at least be given notice that stay here and you're probably going to get a hearing loss.

Thank you.

I'm wondering if you can put on the special event permit some sort of warning that, you know, specific warning if you have an alcohol, state alcohol permit that you are expected to comply.

I mean, you know, actually put in writing a warning on the special event permit.

And I mean, if we want to go overboard, say, and any citizen who wants to complain, we will give them the state's enforcement number.

Yeah, we could certainly put a disclaimer like that on the permit.

So I mean there is language that they agree to when they sign, and I know, Joe, that it we looked at that, but not for that.

But it does say that they have to, you know, follow the law, all state stat every thing that there could be something out of there, maybe.

Yeah, I mean, I believe someone has to sign the affidavit with the state on each of these licenses that that says that they will follow under penalty of perjury, follow the rules and regulations.

So that exists.

Um I think what you're talking about is maybe just um something in the permit to remind them again.

Yeah, on hours.

Um you're supposed to follow the state law regarding your alcohol permit.

Sure, that's that's something that could be included.

And and you know, I mean, I I guess we don't get evidence if they're not following it.

But if we did, would that be enough for us to disqualify the event organizer in the future?

Yes, there's uh a provision in in this ordinance that uh that's the you know the two-year uh provision it would be for violation of state law.

Okay.

Um Commissioner Alkert.

Yeah, because I didn't get my three minutes.

So sorry, I'm sorry.

No, I mean, just in in talking about the alcohol, it's sort of the same issue in that excessive drinking of alcohol is also detrimental to your health and maybe somebody else's health if you hit them while you're driving while intoxicated.

But you know, we don't have warnings up about that at our special events.

So that's all I wanted to add.

Um Commissioner Battive.

Uh yeah, I was just gonna add, you know, to the commissioner's point, you know, regarding the 100 decibels of you know, us lowering it to 85 or whatever.

You know, anybody that's that's going to these events or whatever.

They've been the concerts, they've been, you know, they're adults.

They know what, you know, um, what they their threshold is for for themselves in terms of what it is they can tolerate and not tolerate.

If you're too close to the speakers and it's too loud that you move further away from it or whatever.

You know, I mean I I I don't want us to get to the to the point where we're over policing and feeling as though we have to, you know, like turn over every stone and create you know issues that are that are not necessarily there because again, these are these are grown grown folks or whatever that know and they've been around and been to a number of events, and that's why they come to these events.

They know, you know, again what their their pain tolerance and their threshold is in terms of what it is they can tolerate in terms of sound or whatever.

So I just wanted to add that.

Thank you, Mayor.

Okay.

I would at this point like to summarize the things that I believe we as a group pointed out as concerns and get a consensus or try to get a consensus of where we're aiming and to make sure that it's clear to you, and then if we get some sort of consensus, that would also be what we would put in amendments to uh a motion.

And then if we get some sort of consensus, that would also be what we would put in amendments to uh a motion.

And the first one I have on my list is defining St.

Armand's Park as a park for the purpose of this ordinance.

Is there agreement on that?

The second one I have is on page seven, clarifying that the specific location of the vendor is not required at the time of the application and that it will be due later.

It's 296-3D.

Okay.

Um the third one I have is clarification of well, I guess uh Lori, you had a couple of options on this.

This was regarding the DID and nonprofit uh entities being city co-sponsored.

Uh you gave us three options.

Yes.

Okay.

So uh one say no did, you can't do it.

You have to be you have to get a nonprofit.

Uh wait, wait, before you go, how do we feel about that one?

I think the other option is.

Okay, we don't like that one.

Okay.

The other option would be um you could say specifically the did is allowed to.

Or you could say um must be a nonprofit unless approved specifically by the city commission.

So you could leave the city commission discretionary thing in there.

So it sounds like we're saying nonprofit or the did.