Charter Review Board - Regular Meeting

Alright. I'd like to call the order of 02/05/2025 charter review meeting from

the board. Alright. Let's call the roll. Thank you, chair. Chair Valvo? Present. Vice chair Skoriazu? Present. Member Album? Here. Board member Minsis? Here. Board member Riziv? Here. Deputy city attorney Mahaffy?

Here.

City attorney Piper?

Here. Thank you.

We'd like to remind everyone to please silence your mobile devices. To help with sound quality, please make sure to speak clearly so that the microphones can pick up your voice. This meeting is being conducted live with a quorum physically present. The material for today's meeting is available online at coconutcreek.net. Anyone wishing to appeal any decision made will need a record of the proceedings and for such purpose may need to ensure that verbatim recording of the proceedings is made including the testimony and evidence upon which the appeal is to be based. The audio of this meeting may be requested from the city clerk or may be heard online at coconutcreek.net.

Excellent. Thank you. The first item on our agenda today is the approval of the minutes from our January 22 meeting. Are there any corrections or revisions to minutes from the 01/22/2025 board meeting? No. Anybody? No. No.

Move acceptance.

Alright. If none, Okay. There's a motion. A second to approve. Second. Alrighty. Meeting minutes from January 22 are approved and adopted.

Alright. At this point, we have invited commissioner Wasserman to speak with you all today. He is here, and we'll go ahead and let him talk. Thank you so much for joining us,

commissioner Wasserman.

Of course. Of course.

So I just talked to

how this goes. Yep. That's it. Yes.

It's very informal.

Cool. No. So thank you all for doing this.

I think it's it's important to

get involved and do what you can. And speaking of that, talking about boards. Something that I looked at when I was reading the charter is there really isn't any term limits on boards. I would like to see, you know, some sort of because what happens, what I'm finding you know, listen, I've been doing this for two years now. I consider myself still new to the game, you know, and and being a commissioner and learning the ins and outs and boards and appointees and this and that.

I think it's easy for a commissioner to get very comfortable with their appointee, and I think things can that can that can sometimes spiral into a good relationship that can lead to things, you can read between the lines in my opinion. I don't think you should be able to serve on a board more than two terms in a row. So that for me would be two years because our boards are one year terms. So that's my opinion on that one. It's board term limits.

Just like there's limits now for the commission, there should be limits for the boards. It also gives the opportunity for more residents to get involved and to become a part of the, you know, the the makeup of our city government. Another thing is serving on an advisory board, which would be Parks and Rec and PNZ, and the Charter Review Board at the same time. So this only happens every so often. But something that I was looking at was I wasn't going to appoint somebody to this board that is already serving as on the PNZ or the Parks and Rec board.

So I always think I don't think if you're serving on one, you should be able to serve on the other. I was worried that might have happened this year with some of our with some of my peers. It didn't, so nothing worry about at the end of the day. But it just allows more people to get involved rather than siphoning, you know, that influence in a in a way. That makes sense? So what happens is there

are there like any issues like a dialogue or

I just talk the whole time?

You can talk if I don't know you hear me.

Okay. They able to interject on some of the recommendations that we're making?

One of the comments I have with your first to board two year limit.

Yeah.

This our board is every four, five years?

Right now, it's every five years. Five years.

So I my opinion on on that comment is that it needs to be a significant enough time that you're able to have this dialogue because if you put it to a year, the next person that is replacing you wouldn't understand what where it's coming from. Right? So I think the term there, yes, cap it, but to a degree whether it does overlap with the review because by the time we implement our review, like, the previous board and their suggestion even hasn't been implemented yet or right?

Sure. Yeah.

So you're saying if if

you only served on this board and you were to be reappointed again, you would serve five months fourth months, five months, not again for four and a half years.

So so so

these boards saying is the last board that was formed, the Charter would be raised, their suggestion hasn't even been implemented yet. That's what we had talked about, I think, on the last week. And

Actually, from 2020, changes were all implemented. The change that we had talked about previously that hasn't been implemented yet relates to the elected mayor. Is that one you're referring to? And that was actually a change instigated by the city commission, kind of after well, in final, it was instigated by the city commission. So it was unrelated to the 2020 board actions.

So, that's the only reason why it hasn't been implemented yet and I mean, it has and that it's passed. It's part of the code. It's part of the charter but it doesn't take effect really until 2029, but that just had to do with the fact that we have to redistrict in order to create the mayor in four districts versus the five districts we have now. So really, it's more of a logistical issue.

Okay. Sorry.

That's okay.

As I understand, this this particular board only has a hundred twenty days service time.

Correct. What? And that's spelled out in the charter, the hundred twenty days. But that's

a good question. But this board is different than the two advisory boards. Right? It doesn't fall under the same umbrella, my from my understanding.

It's a different article in the chart.

Right. So, my reference is to board term limits for Parks and Rec and P and Z.

Okay, so Parks and Rec isn't even mentioned in the

chart. Can see that.

They're advisory boards.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I understand. To your point, I actually serve on the P Z board So right I broke your rule, sorry.

It's not a rule, just a suggestion. So P

and Z Board is in here, and I know Parks and Rec is the other one, so that kind of begs the question is, Civil Service Board isn't here, but Parks and Rec isn't. Like, should Parks and Rec even be in here?

Past history is they're a little bit different. Parks and Rec is a board that is implemented based on the commission's policy decision. Planning and Zoning Board sits as the local planning agency, which is a state mandated board. And now different cities can have that land planning agents or local planning agency be the city commission or a different body, but the city has said that that is going to be the planning planning and and zoning zoning board. So that is, in reality, part of why that's a little bit of a different board.

But we do have sections five zero one and five zero five, which just address boards generally. In the past, we have had a number of additional boards, and they, a lot of times, fluctuate with the needs of the city, and the commission has the ability to create them. And so Commissioner Wasserman's change could be implemented in either sections five zero one or five zero five, and I want to do a little bit more evaluation of that and if that was something that you all directed us to do and come back with language in one of those two sections is where I would put it.

How would you want your term limits implemented? So people have served on board. It's my first year serving on the board, but I know other people have been on it for a while. Yeah. So would you immediately

take For example, the person that I have on the board has been on there for like, forever. Right. But, you know, I speak, know, he's, whatever, I don't wanna to that. But how would I want to implement? What do you mean?

For example, let's say we say, alright, we'll do term limits two years. Are we starting once that rule is implemented?

Or Oh, okay.

So how would we sunset it?

Yeah. But when does it so now somebody's been on there forever, the clock restarts for everyone or

I would think it would restart. Would think in March, when would the next not this March, but obviously the following March, it would it would take effect. So if let's say, Bill was on Parks and Rec for the past four terms, in theory, he would be able to do two more, if that makes sense. Yeah. So anything ex post facto wouldn't wouldn't count. Okay.

I I have a couple questions. Alex,

I think

actually, the first one's for you. I have a little bit of a development background. I think parks are playing and zoning. At least my perception, I haven't served on it. But my perception is that there's a little bit of a knowledge maybe that's important to have for that board. Yeah. Right? You're talking about some complex things sometimes and

I said knowledge or interest.

Interest to pick up on. Alright. I guess some decision can get presented to.

It's the reals.

So how yeah. How important would

it be if based on

your experience there and your just in your opinion, if all five planning and zoning board members were, you know, rookies first year, you know, how would that hinder their ability to be effective? Like, I'm trying to gauge, like, how important it is to have some institutional professional knowledge.

It shouldn't. I mean, yes, a little, like it could. I mean, if everybody had no idea, I mean, it would probably make the planning and zoning board meetings a lot lengthier and a lot more, I'm not gonna say irrelevant questions, but to get to the meat of it, I mean, it would really depend on what's on the agenda. So, for example, this year's session of the planning and zoning board has been primarily occupied with Main Street development. But if it's new ordinances or

some of the

more recent things that have come up on the agenda, then probably some history, some tenure, or experience are probably more appropriate. Okay. Two questions.

How many how many people serve on the planning and zoning?

Five plus one. Five plus one. So

I could see a limitation to term limits and perhaps a staggered system so you wouldn't necessarily replace the entire board at one time. Because I do see a value in having people that know history, and they're more familiar with with with the city. See if I suddenly found myself sitting on the board, there's a learning curve. And I've been on planning and zoning board up north, and I know there was a period there for for six months. I sat there listening because I really had no idea what was going on. But as you sit there longer, as you serve longer, so I can see it and I understand what you're saying. I agree with you. You don't want someone who's been on there for twenty years. He was right. After a while, you get stale, whether we like it or not.

Yeah. And I love the idea just in general in any level of office of kinda scooting over and making room for some other people to get involved and Yeah. And and be a part of what's going on. And I think my other question for you commissioner Wasserman, can you there might might not even be a fair question to ask. I don't know. I'm just saying, don't know. But do you think the commissioners when they're appointing people for that, they take into consideration kind of the composition of an existing board, you know, like the length of or the presence of knowledge of what's going on. I'm just using planning and zoning as an example.

It's hard to gauge.

Would you try to

if you view the board as being kind of green, would you look to try to nominate somebody who's got a knowledge of that or just kind of pick the person

you think has good judgment? To me personally, I I don't, you know I always think judging somebody, you know, giving somebody requirements to run for something, like, that has a knowledge or something I'm not I'm not okay with. I ran as a commissioner, you know, and I didn't I taught civics. I taught US history. I wasn't, you know So, we have people who can run for president who don't need any experience. So I always think getting, you know, need you know, getting dirty in it gets you the experience. Sure. So I understand that. You know, there's a reason why I think we have staggered commission elections. Right?

Three and two. But there is a very big chance that in 2029, when we have the next election after this one, there could be four brand new commissioners and a brand new mayor. It's very possible. So then you think about, wow, what happens if we have four new commissioners who've never done this? There's nobody to lead the dais. There's nobody to bring that, you know, that consistency, and you try to think. That that'll be the only time I think in our history this will happen or potentially could happen because I believe after that, they'll be staggered again. But I understand the green the all five being squared is.

Yeah. Don't know

if it's an issue or not.

To me, it's not. I'm gonna ask Alex. But I understand somebody I can understand how somebody can feel about it. To me,

it's just I don't think it I don't think it breaks anything. You used the word hinder, so I think it might slow some things. The uptake would be slow and take a little while, but I don't think it's gonna break any process.

Staff might take a few extra deep breaths before each meeting. That's my speculation. And after. Not suggesting. And after each meeting, maybe something stronger than the deep breaths. But okay. Just curious.

Frankly, on something like planning and zoning, I think you do need people who have who say you've got some planning experience. I think you need either some engineering, some some kind of engineering, architectural background, and it helps. Someone also taught you was history. It does qualify you, frankly, because very few people understand how government works. We appreciate it.

Thanks. So my background is not in any physical engineering, but I've done some work in economic development consulting. So that wasn't at all in my application, but that's why I was interested because in that work I was, okay, well what does my city do

for that?

Right, that's

perfect. I think that's great.

And I get stuff that And when we review applications, you know, like, I review the applications for planning and zoning last March, you know, you look for those things. You know, people have experience, you know, the person I Who was from Connecticut? He was up in New England. You know, he served. He did a bunch of different things. He lives in, you know, he lives over in Wimmer, I believe. Saul? Saul. Okay.

Lot of background.

A lot of background. That My prerogative to choose that, it might be somebody else's commissioner's prerogative to say, Hey, you know what? I played pickleball with this guy, I'm gonna choose him, and that's gonna be it. You know? I can't say how commissioners do their thing, you know? Just stay in

my lane and do my own. Curious if it weighed heavily, like, in your And it seems like you're more inclined to lean towards somebody who has a good head on their shoulders, has good intentions, wants to get involved.

Everybody deserves a

I agree. And the funnel kinda helps. There's guardrails in the form of staff who help guide things. Definitely. We don't have to worry. The board can't unilaterally put 27 story building in a residential district

or commercial district or

something. Okay.

If I may chair, there was a change a couple years ago suggested by commissioner Vidal that had passed, I think before commissioner Wasserman's PNC board didn't have any final decision making authority. They used to have final decision making authority on-site plans. Rezoning still had to go to the city commission. At this point, all site plans have to go to the city commission and I think that was to help put up some guardrails. Again, in some places like the county and some other cities, they do have the ability to make final decisions with regards to certain types of development but I think there was just the desire here to make sure that no matter what skill level you had in the planning and zoning board, certainly the commission appreciates their recommendation and that is still required, but that they would have the ability just to have a second look.

Is

this something that we that this that this board has the authority to say that we recommend term limits for the charter? Where can that go into the charter? Just so I know the the the boundaries. And, also, let's say, we discuss the meeting we should make the parks and rec commission or board not sure. I guess it would be commission, a permanent board. Is that something that this board has the authority to recommend? Again, within our

You do. You would be writing it into the charter. That's why we make that recommendation.

Alright. And if we move in that direction, if I could just say maybe I'd like to first to chew on the idea of maybe instead of maybe referring to it as term limits, maybe we refer to it as not being nominated in consecutive years or something like that. I don't know. I think somehow we're gonna have the same It's more than usual. Yeah. Or not, like, if you're an incumbent in your second year or your consecutive year serving, you can't be nominated for a third year or something like that.

Mean, it's been let's say if they do do two years and then there's a year I think, again, it resets from two years and one off, and then the person comes back. I just put two terms two years in a row. In my mind, that's how I thought.

Yeah. A single board limit or So if somebody jumps from PNZ to Parks and Rec?

Specific board. So if you're on PNC for two years in a row, you would you would you've extended you've done your time for the two years. You can't be back on there, but Parks and Rec? That's a brand new game.

Right. And I don't think we should hinder anyone from being involved with the city either.

No. You can't volunteer.

Right? Yeah.

Well, I I just I just, it took me a minute, but you're on the PMZ too,

so. Yes.

So, my second comment of, know, cannot serve you on charter review at the same time, you know, that's something personal, I didn't know that was the case. But I do feel opportunity's important for residents and I think you all understand my perspective on that. Great. I'll open my next thing.

Yeah. Yeah. Absolutely.

So for a requirement to run for a commission seat, I do think you should be a registered voter in the state of Florida. That's one of my I don't think that's a part of that's a requirement to run for a city commission. I do think you should be a registered voter in the state or I mean, it doesn't have to be the county. I mean, I guess it would be the county. How does that go? The state or the county, Terrell? You register in Broward or

So, ultimately they would register in Broward because we have the residency requirement. Okay. They have to have been a resident for a year.

So I I think you should be a registered voter if you're gonna run for city commission. I don't ever think you should have like have to have like board experience kinda going into what I was saying earlier, like, you know, but I do think you should be a registered voter. That should be a requirement in my opinion. In terms of eligibility, you know, we our eligibility is very, you know, it's very lax. It's twelve months in your in your in your district, and you have to show your two proofs of identification, one being your driver's license.

But I also think adding in that registered voter piece, it kinda shows, you know, that I mean, you would think it's, like, super simple, like, voter. But you'd be surprised if there are people who run who aren't registered voters. So that's my opinion. That's my suggestion on that one.

Has anybody served who's not a registered voter for whatever?

That I personally don't know. But I do believe that currently there might be somebody running who isn't a registered voter.

Not as a takeaway from like a redemption story, but let's say somebody had a rougher past, got disenfranchised, an aspiring politician and community, you know, servant, they would not be able to run for commissioner in this case.

Did they were like a murderer who then got released from prison?

I didn't say a murderer. I said they were disenfranchised, however that might have happened.

Fair point. It's a fair point.

So they Haven't we, with Oprah, passed a constitutional amendment that played around with it, but that enfranchises people?

Potentially. But obviously, those things can take time.

So to board member Mensa's point, yes, we passed a constitutional amendment that provided that people who have a criminal past can register to vote. However, they have to have made good, right, all and paid all their restitution in order to qualify to be able to

do that.

Okay. So they have a way to eventually be an aspiring civil servant?

No, I think that's actually I didn't realize it's interesting, because we think of that as sort of a given that you're running for office to be a commissioner that you must be a registered voters so you can vote for yourself. But it's interesting. I look back and I said, you sort of have to present residency, which could be your electric bill.

Right. Your

FPL bill. And, frankly, that I think is a And good

I never thought about it before. The So the the are the city commission elections partisan or their party affiliations at all? Do they have to be avoided? I I never see them,

but is that Nonpartisan. Yeah. We don't when you run for a commission seat, you do not you don't share. You're not supposed to share.

Sure. And then with that being a registered voter, you know, if I'm a registered

pick

a party democrat, does that mean anything in terms of so that I'm running for city commission, registered democrat, does that then make it more partisan if there's I guess everybody to this point I'm talking to myself. I'm sorry for as much as anybody else. Everybody till this point has probably been a registered voter or likely majority of them registered voters, so it's never really been an issue before. Yeah. No. It wouldn't add in a partisan aspect

to those. Because what you have is the city clerk passes on the qualifications or the qual or or passes on, I guess, the proof. And if the person says, here's my driver's license, my Florida residency, and here's my border registration card. Or, frankly, if I have your date of birth, I can go online and Put me up. Yours. But it doesn't matter. They don't know that. The clerk doesn't have to pass on and say, oh, yes. I pass it. Jane Smith is, in fact, a registered voter. And by the way, she's a Democrat, but she's a Republican. That doesn't have to be known.

Yeah. Anybody.

So it's it's on the so on the ballot. Right? It doesn't it doesn't say doesn't does it say what is it just says no part? Just says MP what does it it doesn't say anything next to the name, right?

It doesn't say anything next to the name, and I believe under the statute it does provide that for these kinds of local offices, they are nonpartisan. That being said, oftentimes, as the chair has mentioned, our candidates for city commission will be affiliated with a particular party and that's okay and that's allowed. And I have seen kind of a movement afoot in recent elections, not only here but elsewhere, where different political parties will actually back and in some cases help kind of campaign for or put out electioneering communications, you know, supporting a particular candidate. And that's kind of a newer thing in the last handful of years or so.

Yeah, and that's kind of where my mind is going. It's everything. It's my personal opinion, everything in politics has gotten so tribalized and and you're not allowed to be in the middle anymore, but I'd love as long as it's possible to anything that I can be a part of to contribute to the city being just local. We all want nice parks, good sports programs, good schools, clean water. We all want small small trash mountain facilities. We all kinda want the same things at a city level, and I've just seen so many things and some things more recently where there's just

Getting ugly.

Yeah. It's getting ugly and I I don't know that it's kind of maybe adjacent to this conversation but just talking about city commission candidates and the potential for stuff getting I see a lot of endorsements and big parties and it's coming.

Oh, yeah. Those parties already give commission candidates money. I mean, it's it's evident whether it's in this city or other cities. You're seeing it. I don't know. Just going back on task to the eligibility of a registered voter, that I don't see the hand in hand. Anybody can look. When we would knock on doors, my wife and I, and they'd ask us who we are, what party are we? I'd say, I can't, you know, what does it matter? Yeah. But if you want,

you have Google, look it up,

you know, do your thing.

Yeah, and the Coconut Creek party. Campaign for our city.

We're for the city, you know? Those those policies, you know, don't affect city city government. People can certainly go down the path of trying to make it that way, but on the surface, it shouldn't. You know, we don't you know, but whatever. Awesome. Okay.

Thank you.

Anything else you got for us, commissioner? Yeah.

I think you do. I got one more sign on, and I've been thinking about how to phrase it. So there is nothing in here that talks about what would happen if a city commissioner moved out of their district, staying in the city? What would happen to that seat?

There's something that

They're moving out of the city. Right? They're moving out of the city, but not necessarily moving out

of the district.

But there's something they have to be in their district.

When they when they run.

When they run. Yeah.

Right. Like the eligibility. Right. So, is no piece in here that that says, like, if District B if commissioner of district b moves to, let's say, total opposite side of the city, what happens to that seat? What happens to that commissioner?

Is there a timeline that says, alright, now the commissioner, you know so this is what I was this is where my head was going. Right? So if a commissioner is living within their district limits and they move within the city to a different district limits, you know, because now it's a special election. There is no appointments anymore. They would keep the seat for up to three hundred sixty five days from the date and then there'll be special election. So I I would cool to play with it. Like, I mean, obviously, I it just came from my brain. I think multiple brains are important to have a conversation. But, you know, that was my I could go over it again, but that's kinda where my head was at.

Would that commissioner be eligible to take part in that special election?

No. Because they wouldn't be in that district that's now open. So because they because they wouldn't be living in that area.

So in a way, it's like moving out of your congressional district to a different district. You no longer represent that district because you don't live there.

Correct. But in our but what's different is in our city, it's a citywide vote. So everybody in the city still votes for the for the commissioners. It's not just only people district a vote for district a commissioner.

You know? But that's that's kinda why I feel a little odd about this one. Sure. I don't know about you, but I just had a daughter. I'm not a politician, but should I want to move but stay in Coconut Creek, like, that would be a strange, oh, but I can't, I have to give up my commission seat. Like, that would be a very strange or give it up in a year. Why put that requirement or constraint on someone who's still serving the people who voted for them?

So what I wanna ask now is this is to them because what happens if somebody does move from district a to district C? Right? What would that happen to that district a seat with commissioner? What is the what is the what happens to that seat and that person's responsibilities?

You're asking me? Yeah. So if that were to happen now, then yes, we would have to depending on the time frame, and forgive me, I don't remember the exact specifics off hand because I know we changed it recently. But if it's not within so many days of an upcoming election, then we would have to have a special election to fill that vacancy.

So that person would so that person would have to resign immediately?

Essentially

So it's already in here?

I believe that the way the charter reads, they would forfeit the office.

From from moving from their district or moving from the city?

From moving from their district.

Oh, wow. Where is that?

Where is that? It's like

I believe that may be under 305 b Three zero one a. 301 a and then 305 a b.

Oh, so it's even stricter right now.

Well, the qualification for any office.

I think it's three zero five b five, and that was a fairly recent change Well

within the district.

To remain primarily domiciled within the district.

Okay. Yeah. It's But it's

saying that's eligibility Well, forfeiture of all. That's eligibility. Where is it?

305 b.

What page is that? No.

That's on page number.

Mhmm. Yeah. Sorry.

Okay. Three zero five b five.

But what's interesting about that is, you know, one, the redistricting board meets every so many years, and they're scheduled to meet next year. So there's always the possibility that they move the district. The redistricting board, and usually the city hires a consultant that helps with that.

So it's actually

It's stricter. Yeah.

It's stricter now.

Yeah.

Yeah. I didn't I didn't know there was anything in there for it. I I could've sworn I

didn't see it.

But it is possible that the district could move and especially in light of the fact that at during the next redistricting cycle, we are going to be looking at moving from five districts down to to four with the mayor elected at large. So, that could create kind of a situation like Commissioner Wasserman was talking about and that is why we have the entire lineup in 2029 because we didn't want to create a situation where you have a commissioner who no longer has a district, and then what do we do with that? And they have a vested right to their term. So that was the conundrum we were dealing with, and that's why we have a complete lineup to help reset that once we put into effect the elected mayor.

Okay. So everybody runs with knowing that they have to stay in their district

They for their should. They should. I mean, that being said, there's always the possibility maybe there's an election coming up, for example, in March. Maybe you have a commissioner that's in the process of moving. Maybe they're not gonna close in their house until the March.

Right.

Maybe right now, you know, they're in one district and they're moving to one of the other districts that's up where the seat is up and they throw their name in the hat to run for that other seat.

How could they do that if they're not

That's true. You're right. It's true. They're not in the district for

twelve months. The residents

Not eligible. That's true. That's true.

Have any idea what it would cost to put on a special election? I wouldn't fault you if you don't. That's a just

I I defer to our city clerk.

Yeah. I would say based on the recent estimates we got a couple years ago, would say it'd be about $150,000 maybe even higher.

It's a lot cheaper. Yep.

Okay. And then if it's what's the time frame where we can run with an if it's within one hundred and eighty days. One hundred and eighty days of the expiration of the term or

If there is another if there is an election within a hundred and eighty days of the forfeiture or the then or the vacancy the creation of the vacancy, then it'll go on that election.

So the seat would be open for one hundred and eighty days? Yes. Or up to however when that would happen?

Yes. Okay. If it's more than one hundred and eighty days, they have to hold a special election. And

I think it may Six months?

Is it six months?

Yeah, roughly. I think that that part may be a little less clear to you all just because I don't think that that specific language, that level of detail is actually provided in the code ordinances, not the Charter.

Right. That's in Section 8.104 that we sent out after your first meeting.

And part of the reason for that is because in order to comply with some of the requirements of state law, it was determined that it was better to have it in the code of ordinances versus the charter so that way it could be updated as necessary without having to take it to the voters for a vote if there was another change to state law.

Now that we're talking about this, so you might want if let's say so we have term limits we have term limits for commissioners, three terms. Is that for their district seat that they hold, or is that for them personal individually as a person?

So I think that it doesn't matter the way that you rewrote it. Right. I mean, it starts over again in 2029, and part of the reason is because the thought was if somebody were to be a commissioner for two terms and then run for mayor for one term, they don't start over their term limits. It would all be within that kind of twelve years.

Okay. So if I so if the bill he ran for District A and starting 2029, and he did three terms in District A, can he then go and run move to District B and run-in District B?

Yeah. No person may appear invalid for election after serving three consecutive elected terms. It doesn't say for which seat. Okay. So it's all so it's Any elected term.

And they have to be out of

office for at least one election cycle, meaning a minimum of two years before they can run again.

Okay.

So they don't have to wait a whole four years, but they have to be out for at least, you know, because once we

Right. Stagger I'm them see

if they see that, oh, I'm gonna move to this district who's up for election in two years, then that would be okay.

Right. Or even if they're in the same district, they're termed out, they sit out on the sidelines basically and two then they could come back in two years later, but it would be four years because it's in the same district. Sorry. I understand. Follow that through. Sorry. That's a new portion of the charter, so it took me a second.

And that that wraps up my my recommendations and suggestions. You know, I think the city is running very smoothly. I think things are going well. I think rocking the boat, you know, sometimes it was a good thing and sometimes it a bad thing, and I think we just rocked the boat with adding an elected mayor recently, you know, with the residents voting for that. I think any more changes big after that, I wouldn't I wouldn't support because we're now, like, in we're now rebuilding, you know, the makeup of a commission in a sense.

Not right now, but in 2029, we would. So, you know, the residents voted for that, and I wouldn't expect any big changes, but that's in your hands.

Excellent. Thank you. Board, does anybody based on anything we've talked to up to NAV, if there's anything we wanna ping the commissioner on and see and get feedback or anything, feel feel free to I mean, I don't mean to use your time.

No. It's totally fine.

It's totally fine.

We can look at it.

My my child my my 13 old has hand, foot, and mouth right now, so I'm okay not being at the house. Sorry. Were. It's a snowball. I know. It's wild. It's wild. It's wild.

She's doing okay, though.

She'd rather stay here,

I think.

She'll go to school. She'll go back

to school on Monday or day care on Monday.

Just a question on what you mentioned with the the boards. Yeah. Not necessarily for you, but for city staff. It doesn't say the term of the boards. I know they're one year, but I didn't see it in the charter.

It's not in the charter. It is in the code. I think in our two.

Thoughts. Very

ultimately stated.

He's got some water or something. We should take care of these guys.

It's in section two dash one ninety one of code of ordinances. So

you've nominated several people to boards. And do you think it should just be one year terms? Guess the question to you.

Yeah.

I mean, I'm

not against two year terms. It's my first time sitting on any boards, these cycles. And two meetings have been canceled. So it's a once a month board where there's one special meeting. So I guess there's been 11 meetings in the calendar.

And you just said it took you six months to get up to speed another time. Mhmm. So I'm just, like, I'm I'm trying to put out there should should there be maybe a longer term, but then balance that with term limits? If it's something that's monthly and you're getting less, call it exposure, unless you're gonna be going out and meeting with city staff on your own, which you totally can.

And then factor in the preconstruction approval process for a project could be thirty months, thirty six. I mean, it could be several years. But I mean, for a fairly clean project, it could be, right, two terms of a three terms of a one year board.

Yeah. And I don't think this happened there's one that commission struck down. But there's lag time between, say, P and Z, the advisory board, I'll say in general, and the commission decision. So even for a P and Z board to see something through, there's a little bit of lag time, and should then something get kicked to a P and Z board meeting or a Parks and Rec meeting, it then gets kicked on the next agenda for the commission and so forth. So I guess I'm trying to put out there that there's a potential for a one year term to somewhat be a little sparse.

Yeah. I happen to have been just swayed to agree that boards should be two years in what you were saying, because by the time you're really experienced and you've got your feet wet, all of sudden you could be replaced with somebody else, and they might have to start all over. But that's also a big commitment from the person, right? Right now they commit to a one year. But I guess if people apply, they know that they would be committing to a two year. I happen to find that that actually would build experience and build consistency across the board.

And then I guess they don't all have to be alike. Like, parks and rec could be one year and planning and zoning could be two year. I just I guess planning and zoning is the one that I hold in the highest Yeah. Regard in terms of complexity and

I mean, the packets are much larger than packet will tell you. There's a lot more detail. Packets are like this big.

Yeah. And can revisit something over and over and over again.

But at the end of the day, when I think about PNC, right, the decision still comes to the commission. Right. So, like, PNZ just sounds to me, after doing this now for, you know, almost two years, it's kinda like PNZ's it definitely advises, but it's just an extra, like, hurdle that the developer has to get over. More of a semantic than anything.

It helps chisel it down because you always the developer always wants to go before commission with two things, the recommendation of staff and the recommendation of PMZ. And so sometimes they'll just keep revisiting it at those levels because they don't want to go. If you go to my experience has been generally, if you go to city commission and you don't have the staff approval and you don't have planning and zoning approval or at least one of them you should just go have dinner with somebody you care about and save your evening. Right? Yeah. So so it kinda helps kinda hammer it into shape like if there wasn't that planning and zoning process you you would have before you and city commission requests for roller coasters on Lions Road, amusement parks, all sorts of stuff. Right? But I

was assuming to go to the DRC here, you know, and then city staff and everything. I mean, PNC's I'm not saying get rid of that.

Would never

do that. But at the same time, it's, you know, it's interesting that the last you know, that it would move to not having any real role at the end of the day in terms of if it's going to be built or not, other than just a recommendation.

So, you know, from experience, right, in the service of the community, I take my role as, does this follow the, obviously, codes and spirit of the city? And then in my time during the meeting, can I ask relevant questions that the public might take interest in or the developer or city might benefit from? Because at the end of the day, like you said, there's very little actual authority in the PNC board. So that's just been my intention with it. So

Yeah. I mean, I think to carry I mean, maybe this is, like, radical. Right? What I'm about to say. Right? But maybe well, actually, it would because I was just thinking, like, maybe the PNC, like, when the commission votes and there's five votes, maybe the commission's vote I mean, the PNZ's recommendation is a vote.

Or Carrie, so we can change. Well,

so I'll I'll bring up one that passed, but then it was struck down on commission, the Taco Bell.

Yeah. Right?

So the Taco Bell followed all the rules of planning and zoning, but commissioners spoke out against really not being something the city wanted.

Well, felt the pressure The commission felt the pressure from the residents around Pittsburgh. Right.

So so in in that sense, I I don't I didn't wanna be biased from a a PNC standpoint saying, hey, the people don't want this. I'm not out there hearing from my constituents. I'm an appointed adviser. But that was a case where I even questioned, you know, is this something we should be approving? Because it follows the rules. It has recommendations from city staff, but obviously the commission took care of

it in the spirit

of what the city wanted. Right.

Did that require a variance or variances for anything? Hours of operation or drive through? No. I don't think so. Well, I was gonna figure

it out. No.

Oh, yeah. I didn't think it did. But then again, so PNC was doing its job. Mhmm. Right? What's the code? What's the zoning? What is required? They reviewed it. They weren't making a value judgment. Does the community need a Taco Bell?

Exactly.

That's what the commissioners

So why did that go before alright. If you wanted to open up a shoe store in a in a strip mall, you don't have to go before city commission to get approved. Right? Like, if it followed everything, it wasn't asking for anything.

It was a new development that needed a site plan.

And they were built?

It needed a site plan.

Yes. So the site plan had to be essentially a variance. Right? Because it's going from the green grass. Variance. What? It's Not technically a variance, but something had to be changed and approved to be changed.

Something had to be approved. Yes. Okay.

It's a building it's does the zoning allow it and then it's up to the commission to say well they would want one there

Yeah. Yeah. The process will Yeah. It works. And the suit's been dropped. So, that's good. Interesting. So I guess as we talk about the commission, the the the board seats, the potential for term limits, maybe we kinda throw in there the potential for terms. I mean, my mind is currently kinda like a board that takes a while to get up to speed and be productive on. It really makes sense to be a two year term.

With the understanding that if you get overwhelmed, you have a change of life, if you have give birth to triplets or whatever, you know, you can can resend, and I guess the commissioner could replace a committee nominee. Was that what the alternate's for? Or in the case of planning and zoning, guess, there's an alternate or is there an alternate on all of them?

The Redistricting Board and this Board do not have alternates, but the Planning and Zoning Board and the Parks and Rec both have alternates. And they the code sets out procedures for when there's vacancies and how those are all. Okay.

In regards to parks and rec, so it's not in here. It's in the code of ordinances, you said. Does it become more weighty with the change in impact fees with basically more budget going to parks? No. With parks being more important,

In my opinion, no.

Okay.

There are funds that go towards parks improvements now for in a different process through a different process. So it doesn't really change that. And they don't they so the Parks and Rec Board oversees and works helps development of, like, the Parks Master Plans and that type of stuff. But they don't get involved in the day to day implementation and spending of those funds. Okay.

Excellent. Do we have a time specific for Commissioner Brody?

We did tell him around 05:45. I think he's circling around there.

Okay. While you guys sit down, it'll only be forty five. Yeah. Who's gonna get the full hour?

You can take as long as you like.

We want, and maybe No. I have

to play. I have play. There's there's many taking a day. I

appreciate what you guys are doing. I know this isn't sometimes these things are thankless jobs, so

I appreciate it. Yeah.

I'm just glad we don't have to write it.

I think Craig needs to I don't if Craig's not bringing in, like, chicken parm platters for you guys. What's going on?

I gotta get some food or something.

Your ass

got through for It should've been

like a whole smorgasbord today. What's going on, man?

You you do have a restaurant connection.

I have. I'm one of those guys.

Are you expecting a lot of orders for us because She's

Thank

you, sir.

Good evening everybody.

You guys excited about this stuff?

Absolutely. Alright.

So first of all, we gotta make sure that it's in the charter that District D is named as the best district.

Best We were just discussing. So

I guess I'm gonna start with the kind of my little opening is I've not contacted anybody because I believe in the process. So I've even spoke to Alex who's my pick. I've never spoke to him since I say congratulations. So he's gonna be here for the first time. All of you are gonna be here for the first time. My a few tiny little things that I have. And then I'm gonna give you some background on why I feel that this kind of needs to be added to the Charter or fixed or amended or how we wanna phrase it. And it comes from the practical experiences that I felt seen through the thirty years I've been in the city and of course three years I've

been sitting as a commissioner.

One to dwell right into it because I don't wanna waste everybody's time. I know everybody's got family to go home to. The first one, this comes kind of lately, and it's always been kind of a burdensome thing. I think when people approach the city commissioner understanding that wearing two hats becomes complicated and we're seeing it now and I'm passing any judgment of what has gone on, but to be honest with you, there tends to be stuff that gets bled into a city issue that's not a city issue. And what I'm talking about is being on a HOA or CAA board and being a commissioner.

Now, and I'm not gonna make a comment on what's going on because I don't care. It's not my business. But it does become my business when the bits gets brought into the people's house. And I I strongly feel that, you know, we need to focus on what we do for 60,000 people. And I think something that we need to address in the charter is to make sure that if you're a commissioner, you're a commissioner and not on a board member of an HOA or COA.

I have a problem with it kind of having an overlap of what we can expect somebody to be doing their job here and and not bringing the stuff that's not our business into the home, our home. So I really like to see that we put something into the charter saying that you can't sit on a chart a HOA or COA board. I don't care what level of membership, whether it be a secretary or or whatever, an admin, just that it needs to be a clear cut between those two things, that we don't bring stuff into the house of 60,000 people. So I'd just like to see something clarifying that if you're gonna be a commissioner, once you are sworn in, that you no longer on COA or HOA boards. I just think it's a conflict.

And we're seeing it kind of play out and and I just don't wanna see that the people have to deal with something that's not really a city issue but more of a community issue. So that'd be the first thing.

I agree with you. We actually discussed it. We didn't form any opinions on it, but

It's been brought up.

It's been brought up once. And I would I would I'm a I've been on my community board for, I might be wrong, but it's I think seventeen years and I think I've been the president for twelve or thirteen years. I feel like it could even extend into any like appointed subcommittees in HOAs or COAs, like on the landscaping committee or whatever. Just my impetus behind it, these are my words not yours, but I'm just kind of giving for the sake of dialogue is it's not for me, and as you said, the people's house resonates with me, it's not enough to be, don't wanna say guilty, sounds horrible. But not it's not enough to be clear of conflict of interest.

I think to every extent possible, you wanna be above reproach from it. And it's not even to me as a sitting commissioner, something comes before we got a lot of things right now with grants like these tree projects and stuff. There's gonna be money issues coming before city commission. And for city commissioner to say, I've recused myself from that vote, they're in a they're in a on a board of peers right and it's you kind of know what's good for the person next to you and you guys have a camaraderie and a good working relationship with each other and it's just impossible to be above reproach if that situation arises and just to take the oxygen out of someone's fire to bring it into our city commission chambers and make accusations as unfounded as they may be, it just relieves all that pressure.

Right. I think the biggest thing is that we don't see a questionable ethical decision being made, and that's where we're kinda going with that, the same kind of view of there needs to be a clear cut line between the two things. Yeah. And and I'm even more willing to say I'm swearing in, because if you lose the election, don't wanna have to step down from the board that you're very good at if you lose an election. So it basically comes down to once you've won the election of being sworn in. That's the defining moment of separation. That way, if they do lose, they can still continue to be, you know, affected in their communities. And I certainly wouldn't wanna take that away from anybody. But it definitely there's gotta be kind of a break between those things. And you're right. There is friendship pieces that are elements of this that you go, yeah. Got your back. You know, it could happen. I'm not saying Well,

the question I have though is how deep does it go? I mean, I understand what you're saying. But how about spouses? If your spouse, let's say, is the president of the HOA or association Well, you know what?

I'm gonna be honest with I'm gonna that's more deeper than I wanna go. Yeah. Because I think the direct impact is you being on it as a commissioner. I think if you guys decide that it's even a spouse or a sibling or a relative close enough, we'll say first generation, I'll leave that to you guys to define. But certainly, as commissioner you need to have that separation. But I'll let you guys to sign that. I mean, that's I'm kind of throwing the thing out there if you guys wanted to find it down further. I would definitely leave that up to you guys to decide that what's best for our community.

How how does like a conflict of interest work? Let's say, there's a bid city city's looking to build a new building in the city and commissioner Brody is not a general contractor, but his brother owns a firm that might wanna bid on it. Sorry. I'm just you're here. Just use it as an example. Is it is there like a not allowed to do that? Not allowed to bid on it? Or is it if the commission's voting on it, commissioner Brody would recuse himself from that, or is none of that I'm trying to think and see if there's, like, how do

So there are prescriptions under both state law under chapter one twelve as well as under counties code board ordinances having to do with ethics and the Broward County OIG Office of the Inspector General that provide for certain prohibitions as it relates to voting conflicts. One of the things that it says is to the extent that, you know, if there's a direct benefit or gain or loss, meaning, you know, that they're going to get money from it or lose money from it, wherein they have an ownership interest of more than 5%, generally speaking, that's a conflict. Now, if it's not direct, maybe it's a family member. The state law actually defines who is classified as a family member. Generally speaking, it's husband, wife, son, daughter, you know, direct family.

Brother, I think, may be a little bit more indirect. And to some extent, they would have to declare the relationship, that they wouldn't necessarily have a voting conflict. But it really depends on the facts of each situation. And so you'd have to look at that. And then, again, there's also some exceptions in situations in which, let's say that it's a bid, a straight bid, that's put out there's an invitation to bid and it's made available to every contractor out there.

And if, as part of the bid selection process, you know, maybe in this hypothetical, his brother is chosen, maybe, you know, he even lives with his brother or whatever, so his brother is chosen let me use somebody else. Maybe his wife. His wife is chosen. And it was provided, again, everyone had the opportunity to submit and it was based on price only. Then in that context, there are even some statutes and language opinions saying that that's not necessarily a conflict, provided it's open and equally available to everybody in the same way.

But it really just depends on the specifics of each situation, and so that's something that, you know, we always encourage the commissioners and even board members to advise us of such situations in advance so that way we can do the analysis and determine if there's a conflict and advise them because you not only have to recuse yourself, have to fill out voting conflict form eight b, and then that becomes part of the record for the minutes of the meeting, etcetera.

Alright. I guess I was asking because I was trying to see if there's any comparative thought for the how far the conflict would carry, you know, like a spouse or something like that. But probably not a it's either a bad example or there's just no I

don't think it's a bad example, but there are different limitations as it relates to our ability to limit somebody's eligibility to run for office. And so that would kick in in addition to whatever voting conflicts you're looking at. And that's where I would be concerned if we go too far afield from the direct candidate, for example. There might be I mean, I haven't specifically researched that aspect, but there might be some issues or concerns or, you know, the case law may not be on our side in that we're kind of going too far from the direct candidate and it may be deemed to be arbitrary and have a chilling effect on people that, you know, want to run for office. Being said, there are also some prohibitions on lobbying under both state law and under the county's code in that, you know, not just contracting with, but, you know, if your spouse is a lobbyist that regularly appears before you know the city commission and that's a conflict those kinds And of

this is why we like Carol because she gives you everything.

Sorry too much.

And I do want say because I might have sounded a little affirmative in talking about that subject. I don't believe there's any conflicts going on with an existing city commissioner. I really don't. My thoughts towards it is to really just protect the city and protect the office and protect that individual really from unwarranted allegations or anything.

That's

Right. And and I'm gonna say though, I I don't think there's anything that exists but I think what we've seen is it could and then we just don't wanna go down that road because it's I'm gonna be honest with you, it's not comfortable. Yeah. Because as much as we all talk, we don't talk. So we don't know where all the lines are at with everybody. And it's just it's easier just to kinda keep that off the table as a commissioner. And I think that's where I stand on. I would be totally I sat on HOA boards, I sat on different kind of community boards, and obviously I put leagues together and did stuff and sat on these boards, and it's hard to separate those things out, but you just don't want If somebody steps in the perivial dog poop, don't want to drag them in house.

Yeah. So

Isn't that just at best like a distraction at worst is a huge conflict?

Well, didn't know well, yeah. I'll give you an example. Most of us know what's been going on. It it was a huge distraction. Yeah. Forty five minutes comments that really would had nothing to do with the city. And and it was two or three meetings. So that that takes up the city time and It kept the people's time.

I mean

And it

was unnecessary.

Two or three meetings and counting.

Yes. Yes. Mean, it's not a

way It might make a farce of an election too. So

So it's just easier if we separate it out and say, okay, this is just a con I'll be done with it. Then then we don't have to have it because we can stop it before it happens and keep the the people's house sacred. I'm gonna take any more questions. Yes. I'm not gonna get into detail, but that was kind of my feeling on this that we should should do that. I feel totally comfortable

with it.

And I would even feel comfortable with if you extended it out to a wife or you know a spouse. Are they comfortable with that? Other than that, it would be up to the law. Our great attorney sitting there. She's if you didn't notice you're gonna get three sixty degree view of everything you ask, so I love it. She keeps us

out of trouble. Thank you.

Any other questions? That Otherwise, it's gonna be fun.

Basically, no holding an HOA position. Right.

And at any level, it doesn't matter secretary or whatever. Just kept me on that board. Just clean and dry, make it nice and easy.

The board knew that I had to leave early today, So Okay. Nothing to with Utah.

He said it's gonna show

you early. I knew

it. Well,

thank you. Have a good evening.

I'll see you next week. Yes, sir. Alright.

I do apologize.

No problem. I'm still feeling it. What's two things

I have on it? I'll make it short. Oh, this?

Thank you board member. Thanks. Yeah. Thank you.

I'll see you later. Be safe, Brian.

Yeah. Take care.

Good to see you. Good to see you. So like I said, I only got two more things. We'll make it nice and easy. I'm gonna go blow it out a word on my computer, and I wrote them down just because this one's a little easier to get through. The date on the election. I know there's been a lot of conference or conversations going back and forth. We just passed a massive thing on the mayor. As you're sitting here, you're understanding how complicated it is just to deal with that piece of it. Changing the date doesn't benefit anybody.

And I've shared this with some of the staff. I have the honor to be able to represent Coconut Creek up in the state level going up there and doing meetings. And they're in the middle of talking about moving the date at a state level. So if they do that, don't really need to talk about it. We just need to get the charter in line with it.

If that happens, it's kind of a note we don't really have to even discuss it because at some point they're talking about doing it. And I don't know if you guys know where this I'm kind of a geek when it comes to learning this kind of stuff. This all started because of farmland, and that during the November time frame, there was a lot of harvesting going on in the state of Florida. And so they moved in March so that people could start vote, the farmers could vote, which was a majority of what Florida was for the longest time. In fact, still is in the north part of the state.

So now that we're getting more modern cities being built, they're talking about November dates. So they're at a state level, they're talking about it. I think it would be for us right now just convoluted that we're already kind of dealing with the newly elected mayor position having to deal with that moving the date also cause more conflict and making that process a little bit more uncomfortable for everybody. So I just recommend that we just keep with the March date until maybe state does it or the next charter review process. And I'm okay with taking steps to do this because I think it's digesting all these changes sometimes in a city it's gonna be hard to do anyways.

When we put this charter out to vote, there's gonna be a lot of questions and a lot of education for the community and I think just muddling it up with that would make it even more difficult. So that's my opinion on the March. I know that everybody has opinions on the March thing, but really it's just we've already just did some huge in our charter. Let's kind of stay focused on that. It's already a mess.

I'm still explaining the process to everybody what happened and what it means. So it's that difficult just on this to put the margin gonna make it a little bit more complicated for everybody else. So my that's 2¢ on that. I know you guys have probably heard from everybody and their mother about this March stuff. So my opinion is we're already doing enough right now and it does become more complicated when you're on page 15 of a ballot in the general election and ballot fatigue is a real thing.

I I kind of just went through it because I'm like where's our stuff? You know, and we were page eight. But the next one is a little bit more I guess, meaty. It's the meat and the taco. And and that's changing the position of the chief of police. So right now, the chief of police falls under the city manager. The commission has two employees, city manager, city attorney, and then everybody falls under them. I I don't know if you guys have known what has happened in the last two years in our city with the city manager and the chief of police, but it became very very hostile kind of stuff that happened. We did a survey. Survey came back that

the chief

of police had some issues, some serious issues. We had to do an investigation. The city manager was playing goalie on it and trying to protect the chief of police. The chief of police stepped on his own thing. I won't say what things, it makes company, but he stepped on his own. It was his fault. He said the words. It was in the survey multiple times. It actually made a press. You can look it up. And instead of going what's right and wrong, it became unprotected and deflecting. And I think that was a wrong move to make. When somebody did something wrong, they did something wrong. I mean, it's black and white. It was right and wrong.

It's it's not wasn't gray. And so for a city manager to get in the middle of that and try to to defer the process of what was going on was the wrong move. Alright. We've got to do what's right with the city. On top of that, the law changed last year that a chief of police now has an opportunity to go to the commission and fight for his job if the city manager wants to terminate his employer.

So I don't know why we need a middleman in that case. If the chief of police already has to go to the commission to get approval to get fired or stay, he should be a officer in the charter and report on the hiring and firing piece of his appointment to the commission. If that if we already have to do it anyways, the city manager wouldn't have any choice in that because she could recommend firing and we could overrule it. So if that's the case, why have it go through the city manager for that particular thing, hire and fire? As far as the daily objectives and the weekly objectives and control and and routine of the police department still should fall underneath the city manager for control of what is going on in budgets and things like that.

The day to day is really the city manager's job to do. But when it comes to hiring and firing, should that officer should call on the commission anyways because state law already says that. So all I'm trying to do is get us in line with

them. So is the current situation then does the okay. City manager says, hey, police chief, I want you gone. Does the the first time you said it, I thought I understood that the police chief has the ability to kind of appeal the decision to see the commission.

Yep. So the city manager than

this than the city manager just making a recommendation and then the city commission deciding if they

No matter what happens right now, the city manager says they want the chief of police out, per the law, they have a right to defend themselves to the commission. And we can overrule. A commission can overrule or agree with the city manager. Okay. So now The

state law. So then right now, if the city manager's fine with the status of the police chief, can the city commission say, hey, I want that person out of your terminal?

That that would could be a possibility too.

Like currently or No. The future?

In the future. Right now, we wanted to put out, we would have to go through the city manager to make that happen, and he would get to defend himself to us in public. And we've seen it play out. We saw it play out in Park where it happened right after the law passed, and he got up in front and tried to defend his position. It happened in Margate. So, it's happening anyways. These things are already happening and they're asking for the public going to the commission. All we're trying to do All I'm trying to do is get it that piece of it out of the way so that if the city manager recommends it, it's gonna come to us anyways. So instead of it being a control item from the city manager for hire and fire, it's still a recommendation. All it does now make him an officer makes it quicker for us to make that happen.

Is the hiring process the same as the firing currently?

So that I don't know. I know for sure that candidates are brought in, but I'm not sure who has the last say so. Even now if the city manager like we just changed police chiefs. She still brought it before us to get us to vote on approval. So we still have to approve his hire. Same thing with the fire chief. The fire chief, they brought it to us and they said, hey, we wanna bring Brian Blizzard in as our new fire chief. And I'll be honest with you, he's a great guy, so that was an easy decision. Nobody blinked on that. In fact, nobody blinked on Hock Opher either because Our fire chief is named Blizzard?

Yeah.

That's a good one.

Yeah. Brian Blizzard, b b. He's well respected in our in the fire community. But so, yeah. It's still they still brought it before us to get approvals. This is the guy I want.

Is it just a single approval? Like only one candidate or is there like multiple candidates? In

this case, we were promoting from within with the police chief. We all know we've known him for thirty years. So we all went, yeah, that's

a no brainer. Just out of

that current situation and normally what would Yeah.

Normally, they'll bring five people. Gotcha. They'll interview. I think the last time when Butch came in, commissioners did interview with them, gave the opinion of the city manager of what they wanted, if they approved or not. And then they still brought it up to the commission for a vote. So it's still that process of bringing it to the commission. What we're eliminating really is the middleman, and I'm gonna be honest with you. We got ourselves in a position with the last chief without due diligence. And I'm trying to say it as politely as I can. There were some things that were missed that shouldn't have been missed. And then we paid the price for it.

My opinion. So we we talked a little bit about in prior meetings the structure of commission city manager and basically that board CEO, call it continuum. Mhmm. Because these issues can come up where there are other employees, like the police chief, that the commission doesn't necessarily approve of. And our understanding, or at least my understanding, was that in that case, if the city manager is either protecting or misaligned from the commission, then the commission can just get rid of the city manager.

That would seem to be the button to press. Right? So in this case, what I mean, if you if you could provide a little bit

of

color because given the structure, why wasn't that what happened or did it eventually happen just over time?

Okay. So I'll you through the history a little bit of time. Well, you guys should know the history. It's hard for not to know the history and to understand why I'm bringing it up. So what had happened was there was a lot of things going on within the city that that the police chief was doing. And I'm gonna be honest, there was a racial comment that was made several times. There was abuse of power. There was, in my opinion, dereliction of his responsibilities, meaning he wasn't here all the time. There was dereliction of protocols. He was always in a suit, not a uniform, which I'm gonna be honest with you bothers me to no end.

If you saw a general walking around in a suit, would you take command from a general if you were in the military? No. So there's it was there was a lot of things that kind of shadowed his last few years. The survey is what triggered the data that we needed to figure out what was going on. So we, as a commission, had a survey done.

Survey went out, they came back, there were 71 pages of comments on the police chief, two pages worth of other people in our city. So it was pretty heavy handed there was an issue. When we were through there, we started finding out about the racial comments said several times in meetings. We found out of abuse, little bit of abuse of power. There was allegations that his wife had a few accidents that were whitewashed and we did a did a FDLE investigation.

There was not enough proof to prove anything. But I'm gonna be honest, if we're gonna be all put it on the table, please protect police. I'm just gonna be honest because there it would happen. There just wasn't enough proof to put it all together. But the report came back that it was not enough. So there was all these things that came out during the survey which gave us the data to say there's a problem. When during the investigation, the city manager at the time tried to hire oh, actually didn't try hired a company to come tell us how good the survey was. Now I'm gonna tell you the rest of the city was 87%, which is extremely high. Right? It was meant that 12 out of 15 departments really enjoyed what they did.

They thought they worked in a great place. But I'll be honest with you, 10,000 for me to say an 87 was good. We all know 87 is a B plus. We're not stupid. So the city manager was trying to prove that everything's okay by having somebody come in and say, well, 12 of the 15 departments are okay. But we're not done. We knew that. We knew where the that we could read the survey. So that that was where the problem was. She was trying to build the case that there was nothing wrong when there was obviously 71 pages of comments that was wrong. It makes me nervous when they write

this much.

But there was there was issues, and she was protecting somebody who was blatantly had an issue. We brought it up on on the board when it came to us saying the survey need to be she was gonna she was gonna handle the survey and then we called response and the investigation. And I'm gonna tell you, I had huge heartburn. She was already trying to hide it.

This is

when we switched over to the city attorney and said, no. The city attorney needs handle it because there's legal issues involved. So we turned it over to Terrell so that we made sure that it it was gonna be as honest as a cop possibly can be. And I'm gonna tell you, Terrell has amazing integrity and is beyond reproach about how she handles things. I only say it because I mean it. So we turned it over to her. When it came back, it is what it is. And at that point, the city manager realized that she was not fighting and winning battle. But we were sitting there trying to tell her, you're on the wrong side of this. Before the survey was even released, and this is where I have a little heartburn too, before it was even released, the day it was supposed to be finished, she was reading these comments prior to this because she admitted it.

She had already seen the comments coming back from the survey. And the very first thing she said, I said, Man, we got an issue. And she said, I backed my police chief a thousand percent. She'd already biased herself on the result of the survey before it was even completed. So I had issues with that kind of protection knowing that those comments were she'd already seen. So this is why I I feel that it can't be under the city manager for something that huge. That's a safety in our city. That's the biggest piece of our budget. But I'm gonna be honest with

Well, I guess if it was that much of an issue, right, why didn't you say, alright, the city manager's gonna die on this hill, then we're just gonna get rid of the city manager. She's gone. Well, I know she's gone, but I guess you did push the button or like you waited So until things kind of naturally progressed?

As we got closer to the report being released publicly, that's when the city manager decided that she wanted to retire. But I'm gonna tell you, we were already going down that path not to renew her contract, and I think she found out.

Okay. I I I can't prove

it, but the timing is very suspicious.

I guess that part of this is is, okay, so that was the balance of power used here, right? And you don't want it to get to that point. Right

is right and wrong is wrong. We had enough data backed up to say there was an issue, There's no way that anybody's deserved.

But was there any hesitation, right? Because it it seemed like it was like, I don't know how many how many feet of rope or how much you really gave here. Well,

as you know, the city moves so fast. Government moves so fast.

Once a month.

Alright. So it just took time.

Do you recall the vote from the commission on

We didn't get the vote because the city manager retired two days before we were gonna do the vote.

And how about the chief?

The chief stepped down after the report was released because he

can't find that.

And we're ready for comments. They hit Spun Sentinel. Mean, obviously, you can go tap into they wrote articles about it.

Oh, sure.

It was out

there. Spun off from there, yeah. I spoke probably over the course of six months probably. I probably spoke to 25 different maybe 30 police officers just not not fact finding just they come into my business and hey, how's it going? How are

you guys doing? Yeah.

Are there any surveys today? You know, stuff like that. And they all had very similar feedback. So in some way and I'm not undermining your point, in some way the system kinda worked well but Well, first thing it kind of like was very it was long and destructive process and maybe expensive process to get there.

So it didn't work because she was defending him all the way to the end. We basically, we're having to force out to get Butch out. But eventually you flexed. Yeah, but we shouldn't have to.

But you shouldn't have to. It's just a more

cumbersome process, expensive. I'm a military guy, right and right. Wrong and wrong. Okay? And she had the ability, and I hate to talk about she's not in the room, but I'm gonna be honest with you, she had the ability right then to make it right. Because it was she had the data. The whole reason for the survey was to collect data. And instead of going, yeah, there's a problem, she fought everything. Right. Some of it too, you know, when you do an outside, because this was big, it's a complete cheat, now you're dealing with new state laws, we had to make sure the t's were crossed and the i's were dotted.

The third party we had to do the investigation took an extremely long amount of time. We were all complaining about it too, but here's the thing, you want it correct. You can have some choice. If you can have it fast, you can have it right. We wanted it right. So some of it we were okay with going because we want the interviews took forever. I mean, she interviewed out of 152 employees at the time, I think she interviewed 86. That's a lot of the department to get that data on an investigation piece side of it. Now, most of it was kept, and the first go around was anonymous. It was just basically verifying the data that was in the survey.

The second piece of it had to be on the record. So now they had to go back to those 86 people and say, okay, are you willing to go on

the record?

And they did. Not all of them, but enough for us to go. So there's there's something we can do with this. So it just took time. On top of that, we ended up getting into the holidays, which obviously, know, slows the gears down and already a slow process. So in January, I believe January or February year is when the report came out. And then when we got it, the format it was in was just terrific. It was hard to read, didn't print out well, it was not something we wanted to give to the public because of transparency. It didn't look good. There's also some questionable punctuations, things like that. We were like, oh. So we had to make sure that the punctuation was there, the format was easy enough to read, so we had to send it back to her to get the right format. So it just took time to get it out. But it was messy. And the whole time, we're getting flop the whole time.

And to be honest with you, I couldn't see why anybody would wanna fight this. I mean, raise your comments, raise

your comments. Sure.

So it just took time to get there. It shouldn't have been it did. But it was also a lot of background of information and investigation. You know, these guys work shifts, so when they're setting up these appointments to do the interviews, it just took time to get them to come in and be able to

do it. I have a question. Maybe it's not in the right way of asking, but I'm gonna ask anyway. How does it help you if the chief is what you're suggesting, instead of going to the city manager is going to the commissioners. Right? Okay. And second part to that question, you have a time to manage a police chief? Two, how does this stop from happening? What happened to the city manager that the commissioner wouldn't do?

Okay. So the first part is when it when falling under us is not gonna change their day to day. The chief will still report to the city manager for the day to day activities of what their job is. Really, the only thing we will have to be involved with was hiring and firing.

Which you already have, so I'm confused.

Well, we didn't. You gotta understand that law only changed last year. So it's what we're working under is an old law that the city manager had control of. So it it what it does is streamlines that process now. It's saying instead of going through the city manager, if we have a problem, we can set up the the investigation. We can take control of that. And here's the thing, you got five people instead of one person. So it may not be a real issue, but you got five people now that are speaking for the city rather than the one person. And to be honest with you, she was part of the problem of slowing it down because she didn't want it to happen. So she slowed it down so she can get a report in and say that we did great.

You understand? She was trying to get her report in before the other report came out. So that was the problem. She was kinda getting in the middle of it rather than letting the investigation happen. My opinion, obviously. I don't know the back story, but it is weird that she pushed that report ahead of the one with the chief. So we wouldn't control what he does day to day. So say we came up, God forbid, with a racial comment or DUI or something that was not what our standard of chief police should be, the commission can now step in and go, hey, we need to have this investigation done. You only need three to two votes. Right?

You just need consensus. Three votes. This way it's not depending on one person making the decision on our biggest department with the biggest budget. It's not controlled by one person,

but controlled by the commission.

Now I'm not taking away any authority as far as if the charter says as how he does his job. Because I think all the reporting and how his evaluation still should go through the city manager because they do work together. And she, I'll be honest with you, should be the first person, and I'm saying she because that's who it is, it's a woman. She should be able to evaluate and say hey, we have an issue Kanesh. What do we do? And then we can say, Oh, let's do an investigation, or What is it? Is it something you can discipline? So there's a little bit different control there, rather than one person making that decision on something that impacts all of us, all of our safety. So that's where the differences come in between what it was. Because before that law came into place last July, the city manager had full control.

Hire and hire. Now, she can go to us and get a recommendation, we can overrule it, but what commission's gonna do?

Are they

gonna trust your city manager? In this case, we couldn't. And this is where we need to stop it because we're not in a day and age anymore that that kind of stuff works. We are in the public eye. Police chief is in the public eye, he should report to the people that I can look at this as a 30,000 foot level and go, yeah, there's an issue. So, I think, your day to day, you don't see it.

So then the law is already dead.

Right.

Why bring it up? You're good.

Right? Because we're now we're getting compliance with the law. Okay. So it just takes a step out of it.

And is there a little bit more to it than that though? Right? Like, the I'm still I'm a little confused with the is the law that the police chief would have appeal the right to appeal the city manager's decision?

Yes. It's a law's name because what was happening is they were just firing these police chiefs. But And they were lawsuits were starting to happen. So cities were getting sued because they're going to some unlawful termination, blah blah blah. So what it did is it said, okay, look, you gotta have an appeal process because this guy runs the police department, your safety of your whole city. So they said the state came out and said there needs to be an appeal process.

Now all we're doing could offer a stay of execution, let's say.

Right. Can can we reverse that Maybe the maybe the city manager doesn't like the police chief. You understand? They don't one person making those decisions.

Sure. Right.

And something that impacts 60,000 people and our safety. So that's where the law was turned because they said, well, one person could just not like a firearm. And when you look at Market right now, they're on the, what, their fourth police chief in five years?

But does the law the new state law speak to the opposite happening? So that's it can kinda go up the chain to the commission. Does the new state law speak to the commission being able to say, hey, city manager. Don't really care what you think about the police chief. Want to know But it's clear now by Monday.

I'm gonna let the city attorney have to look into that because I'm I'm sure if we even now, if say, hey. There's a problem. We can go to the city manager and she would have to investigate

it. Right.

But you'll be consensus. You have to have three of five people say that we've seen there's an issue.

Right.

But I don't know if the law does it the other way because normally what happens is the city manager has a problem with the police chief. Well, the police chief did something and the city manager is going after him. So that's usually what where the kind of the issue is.

We just have an example of a recent example of that not happening. And then do you think there's any concern not concern, but any thought to be given to like the old football, I think of Bill Parcells. If you want me to cook the meal I gotta shop for the groceries. Do you see would that be an issue with from the city manager's perspective? Like I gotta manage this person?

Well, no. Because Steve when you write it up in the charter, we got some great attorneys. They can write it up there that the day to day still falls under the city manager. So there's still a perceived chain of command. What we're really talking about is when it gets to the point of a higher fire situation who's in charge of that process.

But it could be their their third if you have a series of five candidates, it could be the city manager's third pick, but it's the city commissioner's number one candidate. So the

Well, it's still that way. I'm gonna say right now when when they were looking at this process, the city manager spoke to us individually, asking us what our goal was for a deputy chief, that kind stuff. So it was still that process was in place instead of it being on the dais, we just did it one at a time. Alright. I think I got it. I got it. I wish And just so you understand, it was so bad that what was what was going on? That we had to actually tell the city manager that you needed a deputy chief. We should've never had to do that. That's not our business, but things are so broken.

We're in the middle of investigation. If would've we got rid of the chief, there was nobody there to run. You just cut the head off the snake. Knowing that the investigation was coming down with this stuff, we had to fight to get the deputy chief in there. That's not really our job to do that, but we had to step in and make those recommendations.

I can tell you just as a resident you made good choices. I actually saw morale amongst rank and file police officers in the city low during that process. Like stated to me, loved, not really happy with my job, but I really look forward to going to work.

Yeah. And that the culture has changed. And the culture changed. Yeah. And then listen, I don't think I'd be able to sit here honestly and have this conversation with him. I didn't think it worked. But the process worked. We got the right guy in there. He's an amazing police officer. Decorated out to Kahootsu. I mean, this guy is it. He's respected by his peers. This is the first time that we had a police chief come from within. Which shocked me of a 50 year old city that that's the first time that our police chief came through the ranks. But he's respected because he came through the ranks. He wasn't some outsider trying to change culture. This guy knows the culture. He said this is what we need to do to make this better and it's worth it. When you go out there and talk to those guys, you go through a fire department, you go through these things, what we did worked. Okay?

Because it's changed the the feeling of it. People you go in that police department, people smiling and having a good time again. They're like regular people instead of going, yeah, I don't wanna be here. You And don't want those cops on the road like that. They're already stressed out enough with what they have to do. Their lives are threatened every day. You'd rather have them being able to come to a home where they're appreciated. Friends gave them that. So the process worked. All I'm trying to do is streamline so the next guys that have to deal with it have a better process than we had.

Because I'm gonna tell you, I didn't sleep for a year. I was stressed out, it mind boggling how difficult it was. And I worked in the civilian world where you fire them, you get the next guy in. I had to eat a lot of sit down and rest cereal to kinda deal with this because it was it was mind boggling how slow it moved. Then, you know, Terrell can tell you how frustrated I was. Why are we getting these reports? Why is this happening? So you start connecting dots. You start seeing why it slowed down. And I think it was more frustrating realizing that we were it was some of it was coming from within.

Wow. If we stream streamline this, really what we're doing, we're taking city managers, immediate decisions or undecisions, taking it out of our hand. We're giving it to five people up there that can speak for the five different districts of the city. Or in this case, coming up, four districts in a mayor. And I think that's really where it needs to be. We represent all the community. And I think that's where we kind of have to look at it for safety. I'm a big component to first responders. My family's all first responders. So they're a little bit of a soft spot

in my heart.

I wanna make sure that we can't we take care that they take care for us. We take care of them. That's what we're supposed to be doing as a commission. It's taking care of our city staff so they take care of the 60,000 people that live in our city limits.

Just for clarity, you are referring to both positions prior police, not just police. I know we use police as examples.

So right now, I think there's enough going on and Blizzard hasn't been here very long as a chief. He's only we appointed him November. So I think he needs some growing time for that department to kind of get his arms around it before we start splitting it out. I think that's maybe a discussion for the next charter review in five years. Whatever. Five years? We might change it. Yeah. By then, we'll be established and everything will be going. Right now, it's it's we need a little bit of control and budget.

We need a little bit of control in that from the city manager to help that process grow. I think right now, our police departments, it's where it should be, and now is the time to make this decision in this Charter review. So instead of two Charter officers, it'll be three. That's the goal. And then in the next Charter review, if still needed, we could certainly talk about and I hope I'm here talk about the chief of fire chief. But I wouldn't want to go very far with that. I mean the more people you put on the commission the more muddled it gets. But you would definitely want your first responders with a little bit more interaction with the commission. That has been one of my gripes since I got here. Sometimes we find out days after something happened.

And that's not right either because I'm telling you, when I go to Publix, like, don't know how many times I've had to return ice cream out of my cart because I'm sitting there talking about events that happened. And sometimes you're side blinded by events and you're going, I didn't even know this happened. And it was the communication wasn't there. Now that Fred's there, now that Sheila's there, I mean, our communication is wonderful. We know everything going on when it happens.

Within within twenty minutes of something happening, we get a text. So we got at least know what happened. So the changes worked. My thing is I think it needs there's the edge to get it to stay there. Is that if the police chief doesn't you know, if it's an officer, he's gonna be looking at it differently Then say somebody that's under the city manager who's being told not to tell us things because that did happen. I can tell you what happened. So this is streamlining the process and and and more or less getting in line with what the state are tells us we have.

Awesome. That's a lot that you want.

Yeah. Is. Thank you, by

the way, for your just for your candidness. That's like a breath of fresh air, least from my perspective, like, just being able to understand and not have to read between lines.

Well, one thing you'll know about me is I don't BS too much. I'm pretty much. Well, thank you. I'm just a regular guy. Won a popularity contest. Wow.

Are there any other questions for commissioner Brody?

Listen, you guys can call me anytime if you have any questions. I I did not wanna talk to you beforehand because of this because I know it's gonna be kind of heavy. But certainly, if you got any questions for anything, I don't sleep at night. I'm here all the time. I answer a thousand questions a day. You ask me a thousand questions, I'll give you thousand and one answers. So by all means, reach out. Alright. Thank you, David. Alright. Thank you, guys. I'll Thanks for your time. I look forward to seeing what

this comes out to. Thanks. See you.

Gotta get my runts so I can wave

to you some more. Yeah. Right?

Thank you for being here.

Did see oh, we did

get it. I ran by the house. Yeah.

My sinus is a killer. So I'm sorry. It's a little more intense than normal.

That's okay. Thank you so much.

Absolutely. Like I said, if you guys ever need anything, just reach out, and I'll help you the best I can. I'm here for you guys. If you like, do one unit.

Okay.

I don't wanna as much as I don't wanna delay you, I don't wanna interrupt you even more. So I'm just gonna run to the restroom really quick.

You definitely can do that.

Hello, everybody. And just anyone else?

Okay. Alright.

So now we're gonna hear from mayor Welch.

Been really casual, just kind of back and forth the other but the two commissioners are here prior just kind of sharing some thoughts that they had and

Well, I I do have some thoughts, but since I did come in at the at the end of one of my colleagues. I do wanna address one of the items that I heard first. So I I was gonna go in order of the charter, but I think I will

Yeah.

Was gonna ask you. Yeah.

Yeah. I would I would not recommend any other officers that are either appointed or reporting to the commission as a whole other than the ones that are there today And for a good reason. The city attorney represents she has her own leg of the business where she represents the commission and the city as a whole. And our city manager who very clearly has the full and administrative oversight over the entire departments and all of its employees. So it keeps it very clean.

And we, as a commission, individually or as a board, do not get in the daily administrative affairs of either of any of those reporting to the commission commission in in other other cities cities, and and it has not had a good conclusion. It has a lot of people in the mix, and it could convolute the process. And as I would reach out to your logical thinking, our first responders, we want them to have a clear feeling of who they're reporting to.

Not

five people individually or as a board, but the one person. And then that one person is reporting to the the commission. I'll leave it to your best senses, but I I, in all good consciousness, could not recommend that. I think it would really convolute the process that we have today, made a good process, a positive process. Especially now that we do have every every one of our departments, including our police and our fire department, now have all succession plans.

They all have deputies in place so that if something happens to the person that is at the helm, the director or chief or otherwise, the next person up can clearly step in and take over. They all, to my knowledge, because all the departments, city managers have been tasked to ensure that all the departments have succession plans in place. And once it was actually budget process last year that I brought up, I would we need to have that include our police department and that was. To put in our budget to have a deputy police chief position. And that happened.

And and it's clearly worked, as you have probably heard and I overheard but not for any of them to report directly to

us. Okay. I'll thank you for sharing that. Yeah. Thank you.

First of all, I just wanna thank you because I know this is a difficult task. I mean, it's not that many pages, the charter, but there's a lot of depth into each one of those words in each one of those sections. So thank you. Thank you. I don't know why you said yes, but I sure am glad you did because I know each and every one of you are gonna do a very thorough and positive job for on behalf of all of our residents.

So I just wanna get that out there. I I served on other boards, but I never served on this one. Okay. So at top of my mind is and I know we just went through a referendum that was a little challenging, I have to say, because I still run into residents that are not clear on that referendum that they voted on at the November election in which we have in 2029, we'll have an elected mayor and a redistricting of our city in four districts and four commissioners. Because I'm running now for reelection and I've had any number of presidents ask me, are you running as an elected mayor?

And I said, no. What you voted on does not take effect until 2029. So none of us that are running for reelection will be running for an elected mayor unless we run-in 2029. I'm not gonna be doing that. So not to add more confusion to the fire, but it it didn't get any traction when we put the referendum on the ballot in November.

And the one thing that I feel very strongly that should go before the voters additionally is to change our municipal elections from March off cycle to November when we have either the state or the large state or federal elections. First of all, we wouldn't be paying a $100,000 for that special off cycle election, and it's not just about the tax dollars, but it it is about the tax dollars because each dollar counts. It's my dollar. It's your dollar too. But it's that we have a higher percentage of our resident our registered voters that's upwards of 38,000 now vote in those November elections, whether they be for the larger state or for the national elections included.

Whereas, in our off cycle March elections, I think the most that we've had that I've seen was 12.8%, and that was when I ran in 2021. But prior to that, it's it's it's less than 10%. So that just means that 3,000 or more people voting on those off cycle, more expensive expensive elections are deciding who's running your city rather than the majority of voters that are going to the polls to vote anyway. I hear it often from the residents. I have through the years.

And I I hope that it time to actually put it on the ballot and let the voters decide on about the referendum. So I won't believe

her. I'm gonna

try to get you