Library - Regular Meeting

I was unable to attend, so he became the chairman.

With no previous warning at all.

Know it's like here.

That's the best thing.

I've ran run a few meetings that's for sure. I would think so. Between churches and HOAs. It's a thankless job.

Think we're pretty You ready?

What game right now? What game?

Good evening. I'd like to call to order the January 28 meeting of the Parks and Recreation Advisory Board. My name is Patrick Rafter. I'm chairman of the board. I would like to take this opportunity to introduce the other members of the advisory board who are all volunteers.

To my immediate far left, if you will, Stephanie Siste has joined us. Next to me is Marty Armstrong. Next to me on the right is Kelly Kelly, and further down to the right is Candace Gardner. Appreciate everybody being here tonight and for your volunteering for these positions. I would like to advise that if there are items that are not on the agenda that any member from the public would like to speak upon, you may approach to the podium and speak to us about that item.

We also have agenda items that hopefully you have a copy of so you can follow along for the items that are on the agenda or realize an item is not on the agenda and you may approach at the proper time to speak about that one. We do ask for you to limit your comments to three minutes and we may ask questions of you as a result of the comments that you're making. With that, I would like to move on to item 2.1, which is approval of the minutes. The minutes of the October 22 meeting have been published. If there are no corrections from the board for those, I would like to entertain a motion to adopt those minutes as they have been published.

So moved. And a second, please. Second. Seconded as well. The minutes of October 22 are therefore adopted and will be submitted to the city.

Item number three on the agenda is citizens to be heard on items that are not on the agenda. As I just mentioned, if you have anything you'd like to talk about that is not on the agenda, please come up to the podium, introduce yourself, and confine your remarks to three minutes if you will. Evidently there's nobody here that would like to speak on an item not on the agenda, so we will move on to the next item of business. New business items. Item 4.1 is to be a discussion of the January project update report which was issued to all of us and was last updated on January 2.

Workers to give me the reports put it together, so that's why you don't have a correct report. But I will do my best to kind of use this to go through and give you the correct information.

Art, you could have said this was a test of the board to see how carefully we're reading this report, and we all failed evidently. I did have a question on the item about the, Moccasin Lake bridge repair. It's something that I've had an interest in with the Friends of Moccasin Lake, and I noted that it was to go to the council in January. Did that in fact happen in January? It went to before council for approval of the construction costs.

Is that what that was?

They no. I think it was there was. Yes. You're correct. There was a bridge that needed to be repaired. Mhmm. They water sheet flowed across the park originally. It was twenty, I'm talking about thirty years ago.

Right.

And basically it was like a swamp, and that's why we put the boardwalks what we did, so you could get across and see the park. All

right, Very good. Any other questions from the board on items?

Is Cooper's Point still available? Thanks. Cooper's Point, are they still going to be doing a boardwalk?

At Cooper's Point? No.

Over across from the Causeway?

Well, that's a project, yes, that we have put in to do in the future. But right now, it's not in the budget, no.

Put a hold on it, okay. The

grant for Edgewater Drive Park, what's happening at Edgewater?

Edgewater Drive, the grant is to basically to extend the parking lot. Right now if you've ever been there, there's like five, six spaces at the most. They're always full. People are parking everywhere they can to get in there. It's a sign capital of the world. But basically what we're doing is extending the parking lot to add, I think about six to eight spaces there. They'll be run the same way, parallel to where the others are, to install a dock, an observation dock that will go straight off from where their parking lot is, and hopefully to widen the sidewalks in that area.

Okay.

That is what that project is for.

Any other questions on the project list from anyone? Very good, we'll then move on to item 4.2, and I think this is an item that both Kelly Kelly and I submitted a request for it to be on the agenda, and I thought this would be a great opportunity for the director to tell us the current status of the land that was purchased near Lake Chautauqua that has expanded that park, because it was a great idea and initiative on the part of the Parks and Recreation Department. Yeah.

We have there is an open space recreation impact fee that has been in existence since 1983, and we've collected money from basically developers, whether commercial or residential. And that ordinance got changed about two years ago. So we have funds that must be spent according to the old ordinance. The funds we have were about $4,000,000 and it had to be spent on land only. And so what we are doing now is, as we always had done, we looked for land that was generally adjacent to another park, because it doesn't make sense to have another when we got 109 parks out there to add another one that we have to go maintain in a different area.

So we try to add them. This is a little different in that it's a beautiful piece of property on the Western Side of Lake Chautauqua. The city owns, as you know, Lake Chautauqua Park original park, which is on the eastern side of the lake next to the Boy Scout property. That is a 20 acre park, which also is connected to the Equestrian Trail Park, which is another, I think 15 acres. So there's 35 to 40 acres on the eastern side where the city has a park.

Beautiful natural park with sidewalks through there. It's a mile long to be able to get in and go and do the whole loop. So it's great for exercising, people love it. And then there's also, believe it or not, Sewell Road Park that's on the south side, and the city also owns a property that's the south side of that lake, owns all of that. And then to the north, doesn't touch the lake, but

it is

the dog park, the Enterprise Road Dog Park. So we kind of encircle that by doing this, we encircle that lake. The property is beautiful. It would be ideal for a canoe launch, kayak launch so that the public can get in there. There's actually clear water. I mean like no weeds, no plants. I mean you can actually get to see the water. So is really, it was a, and basically the people, we were able to buy it at the appraised value.

Very good. Very good use of the funds. With that purchase, of the $4,000,000 how much it funds?

It was actually, it was about 1,200,000.0, I think it was, yes.

Art, is that adjacent to the dog park?

It's not adjacent. It's close, very close. It's probably three lots away from the dog park. Those are big lots out there. There's access?

We don't have access on the backside of the dog park. We only have one entrance in on Enterprise just to control it, to control, because otherwise we have to go out there every night and lock it up because it's a park that is chained in. But that's something we can consider if the board finds that there's a desire for that because it flows into a residential neighborhood on that South Side. So we like to protect the residents as much as we can. But it's certainly something, it's an easy walk to the dog park from this park.

Any other questions or comments from the Board on that? If not, we'll move on to Item 4.3. This again, I think, is an item that both Kelly and I asked to have a brief discussion on, and that is an update on the Long Center natatorium. I actually had to call Nathan and ask what was that so he could explain to me. He said it was a very posh word for what's out there, and he said, I'm going use it.

I said, thank you very much for that. The reason I put this one down is there was a discussion at one of the council work sessions relative to the amount of monies that were being requested to do both the design work as well as start the construction of the upgrade of the Long Center, and I thought it would be good for the board members as well as the public to kind of hear where that is at this present time, and perhaps some input that we did receive from the council members as to how to go about funding this, which is really a significant clear water landmark, if you will.

Yes, it is. And and fortunately, the the city council did approve the contract to make the necessary repairs. It's a $14,000,000 project, And I'll get you the exact numbers on this, so we'll put them in the minutes because my mind sometimes, I round things But it's $14,000,000 The one thing that they did do is that they took out one, it was an alternate, it's called the sundeck. If you've ever been to the long center, you know there's that flat, it's kind of rectangle and it's just flat and there's a raised concrete area with some some umbrellas over them. We were going to actually enclose a sundeck there that allowed people to be on the inside rather than having to be on the outside.

But they decided together to take that out of the project, saved about $900,000 So they wanted to be fiscal conservative in that regard. Also, we are looking for donors. So if anybody has $900,000 in the bank or something, I mean, we could help, we could add that in. It's a little teeny short window, but we are trying. I've approached some of the other foundations and some other donors and we may be able to put that back in.

If we don't, it is still a beautiful pool. That's why we did that as an alternate. The other alternate was also the solar panels, but we were able to get a 50% match on the solar panels, so they're going to continue to go with that. So that's kind of where we are with that project.

If I understand it correctly as well that in those discussions, it has been quite a long period of time before we've actually done renovations or repairs there, think I heard. Is that correct? In other words, this is long overdue to be done, and although $14,000,000 might sound rather pricey, it's to restore it and return it to where it was once before years ago when we acquired it.

Correct. The issues there too, there are a lot of humidity problems. We had tried about fifteen years ago to solve that, but it basically doesn't work out. So this actually is the only public funded pool that I found, Olympic sized pool in the state of Florida, and they'll be air conditioned. That's been one of the problems that so much humidity, you can go up there literally and there's just a pool of water that's there constantly.

And what happens is it rusts all the infrastructure, all the steel, all the metal, all of that through the years. And that has never been, we have painted some of it, we've cleaned it at least once since I know of, since the city has taken over. We've also repaired the pool and the pool room at least twice that I know and maybe the deck. We are looking at the pool. There is a leak in the pool right now.

It's not uncommon to have public pools to get leaks. Unfortunately, this is a big pool. And so we want to discover and find out the extent of the leak, if there's any damage underneath the pool as well. So we're going to do that before we actually begin the construction of the shell. Because you can build a nice beautiful air conditioned shell, but if the pool is not in good shape, then it doesn't work very good.

Well, certainly is an iconic landmark for not only the residents of Clearwater to enjoy, but in fact for swimmers to come there for meets and complications and so forth. So, in my opinion at least, that is money well spent bringing that up to speed. So, I appreciate that heads up on that. Is there any questions from the board relative to that item? No. We'll move on to item 4.4, discuss any action needed as a result of Director Cater's visit to Valencia Park. I received a notice about the invitation for mister Cater to make that visit. He did make that visit, and I thought it would be interesting to the board as well as the public to hear any outcome from that visit as to what may or may not have been done.

Mike Lockwood and myself did did go out and meet with a resident. And we talked about programming issues and we're working with them. They're going to get us additional information on some programming that they'd like to see done, as well as we discussed the issues of vehicles that basically parked vehicles are entering that park. And if you know of Valencia, it's a long park, linear type park. And so the trucks were entering at a certain location, and we've since changed that to make it safer.

They were entering in the middle, rutting things up, which is not good for the park. So we've corrected that situation. The other issues had to do with, did install two new sidewalks to their pools. There are two pools out in Valencia Park. The city has completed those sidewalks, which are a nice addition. But they would love a sidewalk to every cul de sac. The way that park is, it runs linear, and you're familiar with it. There's cul de sacs at each end. There's like oh, I don't know, I think eight cul de sacs. They would like to see a sidewalk at each cul de sac.

And the other thing is we looked at some drainage issues where it had eroded and they wanted some more trees there. We have yet to do that. That's something we can look at with our true planting program that the Public Works Department is doing. So that's it was a very positive, very good meeting.

I think one of the good things about that is that when residents or group of residents have a concern for one of the parks that they are using for recreation and they do bring it to the attention of the director, it is great that the director not only makes the time to go visit, but can actually take action So to respond to therefore, the residents feel like they are listened to and actions are taken when appropriate. Do appreciate that and always look forward to the, initiatives that are exercised with Parks and Recreation addressing questions like that. Well done.

Well, I appreciate that. I can't solve all the issues like duck hunting in the City Of Clearwater, which is one that basically it's a state issue. But I know some of our residents on Stephenson's Creek, the residents out at Cooper's Bayou, I'm sure you probably heard from some of the residents and their concerns. There's actually during duck season, this duck hunting is allowed. Actually, it's also allowed in some of the lakes, some of our parks, county parks. They have an issue too with duck hunters during this season. They actually literally go into the lakes and hunt just like that.

Very good. Any questions or comments from the board on that item? We'll move on to item 4.5, which is the election of officers for 2025, and my first question is, with one of our seats not filled at the present time and one of our members absent, do we have sufficient people to propose candidates and vote upon them? We're good? Okay. I've been chairman myself, and I have no problem with continuing as chairman, but I would also like to entertain anybody's nomination for another person for that role as well, and I will leave that up to yourselves.

You should continue. Yes. Continue.

Continue. You're doing a great job.

Majority. I

think it would require a formal nomination and a second of that nomination and then the voting. And I can't nominate myself. You can't? No.

What kind of job is that?

I can vote for myself, I think.

I nominate Patrick to be president. And I second. Is it president?

Chairman. Chairman, I'm sorry. Was thinking Did I come to Washington? Yeah, I've been merged with Very good. Okay. With the nomination having been made and seconded, we will now move to the voting. All in favor, say aye. Aye. All opposed? Looks like it's unanimous.

The next office that we need to fill, I believe, is the vice president. It was previously filled by Jason Hood, who elected not to have himself reappointed, so I would like to submit Kelly Kelly for consideration as the vice president and see if she would like to make any comments or if any of you would like to make comments about that proposed nomination. I second the

nomination. Yeah. Cool.

Very good. Perfect.

Checked me

by surprise. Wanted to surprise you.

Thank

you. The nomination hasn't been made and seconded. We can now move to the voting. All in favor of Kelly Kelly to be the vice president of the Parks and Recreation Advisory Board for 2025, please vote. Aye. Those opposed? Unanimous. Congratulations.

Thank you.

That concludes the four point five election of officers, and we'd like to congratulate both of those that were nominated and selected. Looking forward to another exciting year. Moving on to item five, old business items. Item 5.1, I had put that one on, and the only reason I did that is I just wanted to get an update on it because that item was actually suggested, if I'm not mistaken, by one of the board members. I don't know if it was Angie Lonesome or the lady that left the board before her, but in any case, it was a very good suggestion, and I just wanted to get an update from yourself as to

Fortunately, where it that is complete, And it is well used. People, the parents that go and pick up their children after school, they love it and they use it and it took us a while to get it in, but it is done. I will share with you that that park also is due for replacement of the playground equipment out there. So we will be replacing the equipment. That item will come before the council, I think at their next meeting. And it will be a new piece of equipment with the rubberized surface surfacing rather than the mulch. So that'll be very nice improvement for that park as well.

What I thought was very interesting about that item is it was actually proposed by a board member who was well aware of the issue with respect to the lack of sidewalk, and it was proposed and in fact has now been completed, and as you say, it is being well used by the children getting to the school and so forth. Another example, if you will, of a situation where a resident, or in this case a board member, points out an issue that can be taken care of and it is in fact completed. Done again on that. Any questions Yes. On that

For, to replace the playground, you say that's due, how long does a playground, how long has that playground been in use to where now it's due?

That playground has been there for I think fifteen years. I'd have to go back and get you the exact date. What we have, we have 27 playgrounds in the city, And we inventory all those playgrounds, the date they were purchased, and then the condition. We actually go out and inspect the playgrounds every month, once a month for safety, for nuts, bolts, screws, slats, everything on every one of our playgrounds once a month. We have certified playground inspectors that do that.

And so we don't want anything to happen to our children, and we want our playground safe. But there is a time when you have to replace it. And I think I won't get you the exact date, but I think that was about fifteen years old or 16. And the other one we're replacing is Sewell Road Park. I don't know if that's it or not, but Sewell Road has been there for twenty two years.

All right. I was concerned with Woodgate.

Which one?

Woodgate. How

It's

long

that one's been coming up. I will tell you that. It's probably next on there. We actually have a capital project that's in an out year to actually do major renovations to that park, because it's been a long time since we've done that.

Who was that? What did you say?

I said Woodgate Park, we have major renovations to the park. I think it's in three years from now. Okay. But we're looking at the you've got that the shelter in there, you get the parking lot's terrible, we need new parking there. The play field area has not really been improved there, so we're looking at that. But prior to that, we may put in a different playground or a different location at that park. I will get back with you though and let you know

when

it's due. All right.

Thank you.

The playground inspection by certified inspectors is a very interesting note because we certainly, as you have said, we want to keep the children safe that use that playground, and we certainly do not want to put mothers in the position of having to report to Parks and Recreation a safety issue, which I've never heard of one. So it sounds like a great job is being done by the certified inspectors keeping an eye on those playground equipment, and replacing them as necessary, primarily for the safety reasons.

Yes, well thank you, yes.

Any other questions or comments on that item? No. Moving on to item 5.2, an update on the newly acquired palm land adjacent to the Moccasin Lake Nature Park. I put that item on there because again, that was a case where the Parks and Recreation Department spent some money acquiring some land right next to Moccasin Lake, and they've done some work on it that is to the benefit of the visitors to the park.

Yes, it is. We've not been able to do. We have cleaned it all up. We've taken out all of the debris that was there and cleaned the park up. It's safe. We haven't opened it yet to Main Park. We were making a prairie basically out there. And we want to recognize the people that sold us the land. They wanted to keep it for the citizens of Clearwater. So I thought that was very good.

But right now, we have not opened it yet for the public. But we hope to do that soon. We need a little bit of money to do it. And we will basically open it up by putting paths through there, and so people can enjoy that area as well as the rest of the park.

And that land was purchased again from that fund that was there for that type of thing?

Yes, That's right.

Very good. If there's no questions or comments on that particular item, we'll move on to item number six, which is the Director's Report from our esteemed Director, Mr. Arf Kader.

Well, I've shared a lot of the things with you already through the report. Just an update on hurricane repairs. Obviously, we had several of our facilities that were damaged. The Clearwater Beach Recreation Center is still closed. It will be at probably nine months before we'll be able to repair that.

And it's actually the libraries out there too, the beach library. The reason is we have to have design done by architect and engineer. We have to go out to bid and then we have to construct it. So that's why it's going to take at least nine months to do that. The other areas though that we have that are still not been done is Pier 60.

Pier 60, if you go there, you will see that it's been blocked off since the storm. We are trying to, and hopefully by spring break, which will be March 1, we hope to be able to open the pier up to the bait house. We'll then be able to remove the fencing that's underneath there that's so ugly, but we'll be able to remove that fencing. It's only there to protect people. If you get underneath there and you have a railing fall or wood fall or concrete, it's just a liability.

So the plan is to have hopefully access to the pier and open again by March. We are working on the bait house, which is the little bait house that you go in. They have a lot of trinkets and all, and it's a wonderful place. Tourists love it. And we love it too because it makes money. So while it's closed, we're not making any revenue. So we're working on that. We have to connect all the electrical back, all the water, all the sewer that goes to that little building. So we're looking at probably that's going to take another three months to get done. But at that time, then we'll open that back up.

And then the last part is probably the most serious part, which is the area where the fisher people like to go. And basically it's to the pier and the T at the end. So we have an engineer that's looking at the cost to do that. Looking at two options. One, to keep the pier the way it is with a T at the end.

Or just to end it at the end without the T. So we're going to get basically cost estimates on those two options. And then you can even weigh in on it once we get the estimates on it as well. If you want to, we'll bring that to you. The only other thing I told you about our move to 1255 Cleveland Street.

Told you about McKay Park on February 12 at eight a. M. We do have some specific rules from eight to 12:00. We've set some rules there because pickleball people are very passionate about their sport, and how they play it and do it and put the paddles in and everything else. So we have some rules that we think that will work.

Basically what we have is we've set aside, during those times only, a beginner court, two or four intermediate courts, and one kind of pro court or really good court. Excellent. So that way, if you get out and play the sport, you want to be able to play it and enjoy it rather than going and not being able to. So we're going to be ready for that and hopefully it'll work out as a public park, so people can use it anytime. We set the hours from I think it's seven a.

M. To nine p. M. So anyways, let me see if there's anything else. Oh, I did want to share with you that we received an FDOT Beautification Grant.

Actually, the letter came in last week for $460,000 for landscaping the Missouri Avenue medians. Missouri Avenue medians are from going from Court Street South all the way to Bel Air Road. If you've ever gone down that area. The beautification that's been in there has been in there for probably, I'd say close to twenty years now. And when it was installed, you will see literally if somebody goes over the curb, their cars will be stuck because it's about a foot over the curb, it goes down if you see it.

But that's a win for us and it's an FDOT beautification grant, which will be coming to the council hopefully within the next month or two for their approval. Let's see if I have anything else. We obviously are starting to work on our budgets for twenty five-twenty six. So if you have anything that you or your neighbors are looking for or something you would like to see in the budget that has not been there before or somebody that you keep hearing, I keep hearing pickleball all the time, but there are certainly other things that we need to do, which is take care mainly of the infrastructure that we have. Rather than building new, we're looking at taking care of the things that we have and making sure that they are in good shape.

Just like the aquatic center, everything we bring to you most is not new stuff. So anyways, you can share that with us. So that's my report.

Thank you.

Any questions from Board members on the Director's report?

I guess not on that.

I did have one question myself. Is it on the repairs that are you did have one,

I'm sorry. Yeah. I mean, wasn't anything on specifically what he just said, so I'll wait.

Yeah. Okay. My question is that on these repairs that are done on Clearwater Beach, the rec center and the pier and so forth, is the reimbursement to the city by FEMA for this damage done to it by the hurricanes? Is this pretty much unexpected city expense that's come to the forefront?

I have to be real careful answering that question because I don't know for sure. Certainly, we apply for reimbursement, but there is certainly no guarantee. There are a lot of requirements that you have to meet, and you have to do things a certain way. For example, you don't have to bid. One of the reasons we're doing the rec center the way we are, is we're hard bidding that, because that's what they like to see, that you're hard bidded and you go out and it's competitive, and then they go ahead and do the repairs.

Rather than, for example, doing it with a C MAR, which is a construction manager at risk. Those are people that we have that you can literally go to and they will actually put together the plans and build it. They don't necessarily fund those. Sometimes they do. So we're just having to be very careful. So for me to say yes, we certainly are applying for it for the peer, for every area. For instance, the restrooms I mentioned to you, we're applying for it to replace those restrooms. We think they have a really good chance. The dock that got torn down, we think has a good chance. The problem you have also is that there's a rule by FEMA, it's called the 50% rule.

So what that means is that you cannot repair your property or your building anything if it's greater than 50% of the appraised, or not the appraised, the depreciated value of your property. So for example, where you're building. If you had a building there for forty years, it's pretty much depreciated to hardly nothing that's left. So that means you take 50% of nothing or very low, you can only do so much repair. I know that's one of the struggles.

I know that we're dealing with our and I didn't mention that, but both the shuffleboard club and the lawn mowing buildings, both of those were flooded. And both of those have had extensive damage to them. And that's one of the things that we're dealing with in that regard. I know that Ellen is here, and unfortunately, they've not been able to use their building because of the flooding and those types of things. And we're trying to hopefully come to a resolution of that within the next, I'm hopeful next two weeks.

We'll talk after the meeting, but we hope to have the final report from our engineers regarding if it can be repaired, if it can be repaired under the 50% rule, or if the buildings are too old that they have to be removed or demolished or built new. So we'll have that report and certainly bring that back to you. And I've been in close contact again with Ellen with the Long Bowl and with Mark with the Shuffleboard Club in regard to that, because that will affect their programs drastically.

Any further questions from the Board on that particular item? Art, can I ask you a question? It seems like the

way people are thinking is changing from just rebuild to rebuild so that it's not going to be damaged again, or don't rebuild at all and relocate. Is that thought process something that you guys are going through?

Well, that's exactly, yeah, that's one of the struggles too. We're still in a floodplain. So what are we going to do? Even if we build, if we tore everything down, which again, that was a proposal that we put in a capital project to build. Remember the intergenerational building? We're going to build one building, allow lawn bowls, shuffleboard, volleyball, pickleball. We're going to have a lot of things that were out there, have like even a little concession, a restroom there to make some money restaurant, yeah, to make some money there, but that would cost a lot of it's new money,

so it

would cost an awful lot to do that, and it's not in the budget right now. So even yeah, that's a struggle for us because we would have to those buildings get removed, you'd have to put it up two stories, which means then we have elevators, we have all kinds of issues. Even if I put a little restroom out there, it has to be elevated. Not unless I put everything on wheels that it can be out there and we take it and we can move it off. So anyways, let me sorry about that. I got a new phone and I

don't know

how to work it, so excuse Usually I shut them off. But no, you're absolutely right. That's because it's the FEMA rules and they restrict you and if you go back in and build it in the same area, put the money back into it, you're susceptible to a flood. That's why they have that rule. They don't want you to rebuild right there with the same structures. They want you to rebuild with the new codes. Yeah.

Stephanie, I think you have something you wanted

to Yes. After the storms, when the city provided that brush site for the public to bring at Woodgate, Does the city owns all of that land, like the little ball field and that extra space going right up to Enterprise Road? Yes. City owns all that empty space?

The city owns all that space. Okay. You know, we've looked at that for years, worked with the homeowners association as well. At one time they were okay, I don't know that they would be now, but okay, whether it's putting lights there and changing them into soccer, you know, regular soccer fields or some fields, you know.

Which HOA was that? You said the HOA?

Yes, the Woodgate. It's Woodgate Homeowners Association. They're the ones, the homes, I don't know where you live, but they're the homes that live right by that park. And obviously, parks are wonderful and beautiful, but some people don't like them right by their house. And especially if you're going to be putting soccer balls and lights at night and yelling kids, some people don't like that. So anyways, we have to kind of coexist. And so that's why we work with the homeowners association. Whenever we do any project, we try to get them involved first. We want their buy in because they're the people that will be most impacted by whatever park project we do.

Anything further or?

No. Very good. Thank you.

If there's nothing further on that particular item, we'll move on to item number seven, which is the Board members to be heard on a topic that they would like to discuss, and I would like to start with Stephanie on the far left.

Oh, I already asked what I had, so thank you.

Marty? No, I just want to thank Art for all the hard work that he and his crews have been doing for these hurricanes, because I know it was a long and arduous process. If you would, I know you've been thanking them because they put in a lot of hours, but it's amazing what you guys did, far as cleaning up the messes and taking care of the 109 parks

or whatever it was.

So thank you for your hard work. Appreciate it.

Well, we appreciate that. And that is all because of the people that work in Parks and Recreation. I mean, we have some just wonderful people that support me. I mean, it's just a joy to still come to work with a staff that we have like that. And they just pitched in on anything that needs to be done. We're kind of the can do department. Everybody calls us. We're finally having to say, no, we can't do that. Can you do this or can you do that? Because we want to stay true to the citizens and the patrons of Clearwater and what we do best, which is parks and recreation and serve them.

I have a servant's heart. That's what I do, and most of the people that we hire, they have servant's hearts as well. And so we understand that, and that's what we want to do. So thank you for that comment. Sure. Well received.

Candace, would you like to?

Well, I've known Art a long time because I was on the park and recreation before and he has been an outstanding person. And when I came on, I said, Oh my god, he's still working. My god, congratulations. You're doing such a great job as always. You really are. You're wonderful.

Thank you. Yeah, I am. I'm still working. Yeah. I have the notorious title. I think I am the longest term person employer right now with the city. And I've lost count of how many years. We're

lucky to

have you. Yeah. Well, you so much. Yeah.

Want to echo that, that you're so prompt in responding to emails, and I really appreciate that. I appreciate everything you do.

Yeah. Well, thank you. That's good.

I will guess third that the performance that Parks and Recreation, as much due to your leadership and the quality of the people that you have has just been outstanding and the responsiveness to the citizens visiting parks, visiting residents that have issues, and addressing those issues had been second to none, and has always been well done. So congratulations to yourself and the department. I would also like to take the time at this present time to note that Mr. Jason Hood has left the advisory board and he served his time with us and I appreciate his volunteering and his work on our behalf and he chose not to be reappointed which is certainly a decision that he can make. I would also like to note that the young lady that took all of our minutes and organized our meeting, Ellen, has retired, you indicated, so we'd like to wish her the best in retirement.

And I'd like to end with not only myself and the members that have been on the board, but our new members, Stephanie and Candace, to encourage people, residents to reach out to yourself with issues that are affecting parks so that you might bring them to our attention. I encourage everyone to visit those parks and recreation facilities in your immediate neighborhood to give us an idea as to what could be done there or what issues might be coming up from residents because I've always found art to be a great listener to things. They cannot be aware of everything, and need to bring to their attention things that residents bring to our attention, and the best way to do that is to go out and visit a park yourself.

Yes, yes, I agree with that. Definitely.

Okay. So with that, if there's nothing further, this meeting is adjourned.