City Council - Regular Meeting

Mayor DePue? Present.

Councilwoman Gillis? Here. Councilman Thomas?

Here.

Councilwoman Dalbo? Here. Councilman Rainberg?

Here.

City manager Mahoney? Present. City attorney Sabatini? Here. Interim city clerk Tupin, present.

Please stand for the pledge of allegiance. I pledge allegiance. To the flag of The United

States Of America and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God,

Please remain standing for a moment of silence.

That's how you do it.

Okay.

Mister mayor, it's great to hear kids saying that. Certainly. Put faith back in.

Item two, approval or changes or modifications to the agenda. I believe that mister Davenport is here from the Florida Inland Navigational District and will be given a presentation. I have decided as the mayor to present item four b, presentation by James Moore, certified public accountants consultants, financial report to the last on our presentation proclamations, plaques, and or certificates. Is there anything else, Mr. Manager?

No, sir.

Item three, approval of the meetings. Item 3A, regular meeting, 03/23/2026. Comments, questions, deletions? Is there a motion to approve?

Make a motion to approve the minutes, regular meeting, 03/23/2026. Second.

Roll call.

Councilwoman Gillis?

Yes.

Councilman Thomas?

Yes.

Councilwoman Rainbird? Oh, Councilwoman Dalvo? Yes. Councilwoman Rainbird?

Yes.

Mayor DePue?

Yes. Sorry.

It's 2026. I get it.

Alright. Item four, presentation, proclamations, plat certificates, donations. Item four a, Edgewater Public School, bring the noise, stomp team performance.

Sure. You can see.

Hello, everyone. I'm Samoy Reed, the music teacher at Edgewater Public School.

Let me take this

from here, mister.

Hello, everyone. I'm Corey Meder, and I came out here to tell you guys that you just seen the Edgewater Public School song team bring the noise. And I just wanted to tell you, we're going to Universal soon on May 22, and we have no money. And we love donations. Like like like, just look at them. They're so cute. Like, look at them. You can't say no to those faces, guys. Like Well, if you gave us some donations to Edgewater Public Stomp Team, that would be awesome. So thank you everyone, and have a great night. Thank you.

Thank you, guys.

Miss Zamoya, how do we get those to you if someone wants to make a donation? We

will tonight literally pass a bucket. But also, I will email miss Charlotte.

Oh, sounds good.

We have a QR code and or a donations link. We are about $2,000 short. So what happened was we only just got approved. I've been applying all year, but they just approved us last month, and the money is due next Tuesday. It will be posted on the Edgewater Public School Facebook page. You can leave donations to, miss Charlotte. I also will leave her the donations link and any or you could drop it off at Edgewater Public School. We would really appreciate any and everything that you can do if you know any business owners who could help us out, but we would really appreciate it. We thank you guys for your time. We didn't wanna interrupt your meeting, but we are a little bit desperate. So thank you very, very much.

Awesome. Thank you so much.

My team Awesome. You're gonna take with you what you have. And if you don't have anything, you're gonna take something that is not taken. And we are gonna quietly follow miss Flanagan outside. Thank you guys for your time. This is third, fourth, and fifth graders, by the way, at Edgewater Public School. Thank you all for your time.

Thank you. Oh,

thank you so much. Thank you.

Of course.

Oh, thank you.

Of course. Course.

I love that. Awesome.

If you guys wanna go

there too, don't go be shy. Alright. Thank you, guys. How awesome.

They needed $5 last week, so that means they've raised a good chunk of it.

Okay. Item four c, Earth Day Proclamation. Thank you guys so much for coming. That's amazing. We hope you meet your goal, and we'll help any way possible.

Whereas, the first Earth Day was enacted in 1970 and engaged over 20,000,000 Americans to advocate for a cleaner environment, and as Earth Day focused on bringing heightened awareness to several crucial environmental issues, thus resulting in passing of the Clean Air, Clean Water Act, Endangered Species, and Marine Mammal Protection Acts in the founding of Environmental Protection Agency, and whereas recognizing the importance of preserving our natural resources by being good stewards of our community, city, county, state, nation, and earth, and whereas do your part by reducing waste, collecting garbage, planting trees, encouraging pollinators, and whereas, teach your children how to be responsible, devote time and attention to the issues, sustainability, environmental health, and whereas, Earth Day is the annual reminder of the constant need for environmental activism, stewardship, commitments, and sustainability efforts. Now, therefore, I decently appeal, by the virtue vested authority of me as mayor of the wonderful city of Edgewater, to hereby proclaim 04/26/2026 as Earth Day, and I encourage all residents to partake in programs and activities that will deepen their environmental awareness. A witness therefore I heredo set my hand, cause this great seal of the city of Edgewater to be affixed the April in the year 2026.

All right. Anybody here to receive this proclamation? Okay. Alright. Item d, presentation, Volusia County Coastal Director Jessica Fentress, I believe along with mister Buddy Davenport. It doesn't matter. You could go afterwards as well, whatever you prefer. Okay. We'll wait for you then, Mr. Davenport.

The city manager, we we just have a really good we have a really good communication between us, and that's important because they're engaged. Therefore, it makes me wanna get engaged to

One more thing, mister Davenport, before you leave. Buddy, as we said, you know, he's a known figure in the community. Like he said, he gives money to almost any charity that asks. He's a great guy. Not only did he go above and beyond to get us our funding that we needed to get our boat ramp project going off the ground. I wanna thank our city manager and our chief of police and our grant manager, Sandy Camp, that was involved as as well. Communication was amazing, but he went above and beyond and said, well, not only let's do that, let's design this. So he's done a lot for the city of Edgewater, a lot of charities in the community, and I'd like to nominate him for a buddy Davenport day in the city of Edgewater.

That'd be great. Is

there is there a certain date you would like to that to be on? When's your birthday, mister Davenport? The twenty first. Yeah. This month? Yeah. Alright. Well, let's do April 21.

I can have it ready for the main meeting.

Awesome. It'll be on the main meeting. Thank you, mister Davenport. We appreciate you. Alright.

Thank you.

Happy birthday. All right. Miss Jessica Finch.

Thank you, honorable mayor, commission, for the opportunity to present today. I hope I don't bore you to tears following the wonderful kid presentation and then all the money that just

showed up.

So I

don't have all that for you. I want to talk very quickly today about our beach recovery and looking forward into the future and why it matters to people who may not have property on the beach. I am a mainlander. I live in New Smyrna on the mainland behind Tractor Supply. It's very important to me, and I'm sure it's very important to your community as well.

So following hurricanes Ian and Nicole, you may remember we had a lot of structural damage on the beach. We received about $82,000,000 of zero grant match money from the Florida Department of Environmental Protection to place sand back on our beaches and help us recover not only our structures, but also our tourism, our economy, and our personal sense of peace as being residents in the county who love our beach. Using that money, we have done the North Beach project. We're currently undergoing the South Beach project. We are looking at an additional dredging for the inlet shoaling.

We are also looking for offshore sand sources. A requirement of the grant not only to put sand back on our beaches and dredge our inlet waterways was to do a feasibility study so that we have a long term plan moving forward should we have another storm event like what we did. And then why is this important? We did an economic impact of our beaches for the whole of Lucia County. So right now, if you go to the beach in New Smyrna, it looks a little different.

If you are here for the past twenty years, we did a very similar project back in 2006. Following the 2004 hurricanes, we are offloading approximately 550,000 cubic yards of beautiful white beach sand from Rattlesnake Island, which is a dredge material management area managed by the Florida Inland Navigation District. Commissioner Davenport was very integral in getting this work done for us, and it allowed us to recover. What you see on the pictures is what the discharge pipe looks like. This is approximately 17th Avenue.

We have now moved South of Matthews, and we're in the Oyster Quay area. We are going south of Van Cleek single family homes and into the condos of unincorporated New Smyrna. This is what it looks like on the beach right now. It's going to be beautiful. Let me get that big ugly black pipe out of there coming in May with turtle season.

You have a wide beach where the dunes have been restored and you have excellent turtle nesting habitat, but also people recreation habitat, which is huge for not only our residents but for our economy. This is the North Beach SAM project, very particular to Edge Water because that's when the Army Corps was here dredging the Intracoastal Waterway. They dredged the spoil material out of the Intracoastal Waterway and pumped that onto the beach and Ponce Inlet. We did a truck haul project to run that north. Placed about 750,000 cubic yards back on the beach and we planted it.

That project has now closed and it was an overwhelming success. Looking forward, we have about 1,750,000 cubic yards of additional material that's sitting in our inlet. Anybody who likes to boat on our waterways, you know there's a hole on our North Jetty. There's a lot of sand that's coming in our inlet and in our navigation channels from the hole in the North Jetty. The North Jetty is an Army Corps of Engineer asset.

We are working with them so that they can fix their asset. Cost for them is probably in the 12,000,000 to $20,000,000 range for them to make those repairs. In the short term, I want to take that beautiful sand that is clogging our inlet and channel ways and put it back onto the beach where it came from. So we're going through the permitting process right now. The area highlighted in red are the shoals that we're very familiar of.

If it has emergent vegetation on it, if it is not beach compatible sand, or if it is declared nesting shorebird habitat, you're not going to be allowed to touch it. But what we believe we'll get about 1,500,000 cubic yards, and that's going to go north of the inlet. But what that does is it's advanced maintenance for navigation channels north of the causeway. We're also looking for offshore sand sources, both within the three mile marker and outside of that. That will be a long term project.

It usually takes about ten years to go through the permitting process. All of this work is DEP grant funding. Now I may get a little technical. I'm going to run through this really quickly. If this is interesting to anybody, the science of the beach, there is a thirty minute presentation as well as a three hour long format if you really want to nerd out and can't sleep on a Tuesday. Go to volucia.com

Are you doing slash that tonight?

No, sir. I'm almost there. I got like four more slides. I'm running through this one.

I'm joking.

But it is there if you want to dig into it. So there's 10 ways to basically protect a shoreline. We reviewed each of the 10 alternatives from no action to structural relocation, flood proofing and elevation, seawalls, we all know and love them, revetments, beach nourishment, groins, near shore sand placement, breakwaters, and artificial reefs. We took those and we did a weighted matrix to determine which ones have the best ROI and benefit for our shorelines. The top winners were beach nourishment, structural relocation, nearshore sand placement, breakwaters, and artificial reefs.

So those would be our solutions for solving our erosion problem along our beaches. Now, you'll notice nearshore placement and beach nourishment all require sand sources. We get a lot of sand in our intercoastal waterways. So the continual dredging of an intercoastal waterway, which is very specific to edge water, can help benefit our shoreline recovery on the beaches. So why do we care, right? I've got a full in-depth study. Again, same website if you want to dig into it and kind of nerd out on it. You may have heard the saying a rising tide lifts all ships. Well, why do people come to Volusia County? They come for the beaches.

They don't come for the conventions. They don't come for the two weeks the speedway is running hot. And they don't come just for bike week. Overwhelming majority of your tourists come here to go to the beach. 95% to 98% of all Volusia County tourists, whether you're going to a Stetson Hatters game in DeLand or you're coming to your mother's house for Thanksgiving, they go to the beach.

Volusia County residents, our people, go to our beaches 19 times more than they go to our park system. Overall in the county of Volusia, have 61,000,000 day trips. My husband serves. He probably has about 600 trips a year going to our beaches. But just a little bit of perspective, that's 61,000,000.

That's twice as many day trips just to our little beaches than all of the Florida State Park systems combined. This is the big slide. Bottom right hand corner, why do we care? Economic jobs pie chart. Your beach tourism is your largest employment engine County, whether that is the restaurant, the ice cream stand, the Publix, the gas stations, the bait shops, they're all coming because of our beaches.

Another important number here is your sales tax. Beach tourism generates 31% of the county sales tax. That equates out to $28,000 of sales tax per homesteaded property in the county, which is a direct impact for your residents and your property owners. My contact information is here. Why am I here talking to you about this today?

Well, thank you for inviting me. But as get further into the summer, I'm going to be presenting the Volusia County's beach management plan to our county council for their consideration and adoption. In order to become grant eligible for these large projects when we're not in a hurricane response, you have to have a plan. So what I don't want is I don't want to go to my counsel and then they say, well, you haven't done your homework. I want you to talk to people. I want you to give the opportunity for input. If you go on volucia.org/coastalstudy, there is a survey there. If you want to dig in, my contact information's everywhere. Please engage with me. I'm more than happy to have conversations with anybody about the beaches. I'm very passionate, and I just hope to have thriving beaches. And I'm available for any questions that you may have.

Well, thank you. We appreciate it. Mr. Rowe was a good friend of mine near Van Cleek, so I think that he was involved in this one, the first stages of it. So I think it's looking great. I see it myself. I can see the changes. No questions on my end. Counsel, is there any other questions or comments? Thank you. Thank you for coming. We really appreciate it, Ms. Finch. Fentress. Sorry, Ms.

Fentress. Sorry. Okay, item 4D. We're going to do presentation by James Moore, certified public accountants and consultants on the annual comprehensive financial report for the fiscal year ended 09/30/2025.

All right. Once again, you gave me hard acts to follow. So thank you, everyone. As always, before I get started, if any of you want to meet with me one on one, just let me know, and I can arrange a time to do that as well. I've met with the city manager last week. So this is your audit for the year ended 09/30/2025. So the one of the important things is to get a baseline. Your your city staff, Bridget, your finance director, goes above and beyond what's required by statutes and what your financial statements entail. So in addition to just regular financial statements, you prepare what's called an annual comprehensive financial report. And then that is submitted into Government Finance Officers Association.

And as in prior years, you'll receive your certificate in financial reporting excellence. So that's going above and beyond, and we don't see any problems with that this year. So you'll notice in the big book, 100 and something pages there, there's the financial statements. But then also, there's reports from us as the auditors from James Moore and Company. So the first one, most important one can you go two slides? Oh, clicker? All right, perfect. Here it goes. Where where did you do it? So the independent auditor's report on the financial statements, that's considered an unmodified report.

That's the best report we can provide as independent certified public accountants. It states that your financial statements present fairly and all material specs, your financial position and results of operations. You also are subject to government auditing standards. And under government auditing standards, you're required to

There we go.

Government audit standards requires us to look at internal control of financial reporting as well as compliance. We did have one comment there, a significant deficiency, related back to the recording of the public works loan that was entered into this year. So we don't anticipate that in the future because we don't anticipate having loans of that size. So we don't see that as an issue going forward. This year as well, you receive federal funds. Those federal funds were subject to federal single audit. If you expend greater than $1,000,000 in federal funds, it kicks in an additional audit of that compliance over those programs. So this year, we tested the CDBG grant. Those monies were used on your storm water. Close to $946,000 was used there, And we had no comments related to the testing of that grant.

Also, the auditor general requires us to issue additional reports as well. And there's two of them that are required there from the auditor general. One goes through a number of items, but the most important thing is financial condition assessment it looks at. It makes us look at financial emergency criteria. If you're not in a financial emergency, there would be instances where you were not paying your creditors or payroll, those type of things.

We also look at the city of Edgewater compared to itself over five years as well as the comparable sized cities by property value and population. And when we do that assessment, PECCI takes about 30 different ratio analysis and then looks at that and compares it to the city and those benchmarks. And then with that, we develop the financial condition assessment. We use a tool provided by the auditor general, and you come out what's called inconclusive. So you're not favorable. You're not unfavorable. You're kind of right in the middle of your peer group. There was a new requirement last year to also disclose any PACE organizations. So PACE organizations are used for solar. It's a it's a way people can purchase solar, and those assessments go on their property tax bill.

And they now require that any of those administrative entities that are operating inside of your boundary has to be disclosed in this report as well. And there's six for you guys. They also have us look at investment statutes and say, is the city of Edgewater's investment policies in compliance with statute as well as the policies themselves. And we found no issues with that. And you guys were talking about the CRA in the meeting before.

There is an annual audit required for your CRA as long as you're greater than 100,000 in revenues or $100,000 expenses, which we anticipate you guys to be for a while in that situation. But we had no comments in that audit as well. So some big changes in there this year. Governmental activities is a combination of all your governmental type funds. So that's your general fund, your capital project fund, your CRA fund, ARPA fund, impact fee funds, all those different funds there other than your business types, right?

So overall, there was an increase about $2,200,000 Property taxes makes up a portion of that, about $1,700,000 And investment income increased about a million dollars. Investment income overall between all your funds funds was about 2,500,000.0 total, but it's kind of nice because some of us can remember going back a couple years ago when maybe you were getting a half million dollars. That's just you invest conservatively. You're not in the market from, say, an equity standpoint. So it's typically like US backed treasuries, those type of things.

And, so it's nice when those interest rates pick up a little bit because then you're gonna get a little bit more investment income. Your business activities are your water and sewer funds, storm water funds, solid waste. So those are your enterprise. They're predominantly considered a business type because they're funded by charges for services, you know, through the through the billing system. The charges for services went up about 9.9%. That's based on your utility rate studies. So those were kind of planned increases. And then, of course, as your population increases and your customer base increases, that increases it as well. You did have some capital grant activity down a little bit from the previous year.

You know, I'm happy to

say we didn't have the four letter word FEMA so much a part of our audit this year. We always are happy for that not being part of it, so a little bit less there. Expenses overall decreased about $4,900,000 mainly due to repairs and maintenance and depreciation expenses. And then the master plan for stormwater was as well as a onetime expense for this year. So if we look at those numbers kind of going forward, this is your equity at the end of the year for those funds, for those for your governmental type funds.

That's your assets less your liabilities, kind of what you have left over. Remember, this is as of September 30, so there could be budget amendments that happened since then. So some of the big changes in your general fund, you'll see there, you know, restricted amounts, about 771,000. You know, that's primarily building permit fees. So any revenues you collect for building permits can only be spent on building permit activity. So those can be rolled forward. There's a state formula that when you get to a point. You gotta figure out if you need to reduce fees or or eliminate them totally for a period of time. The assigned fund balance, that's primarily your budget for the next year. So you always have carryover amounts.

So that estimated amount rolling forward to the next year, about $5,400,000 And the remaining, assigned portion is for city hall, about 400 and, 89,000. So unassigned is what's left over. So that's the remaining balance that's at your discretion. And we'll talk about that on a on a further slide. So your other governmental funds, the restricted amounts is primarily your impact fees.

You have about $5,900,000 in your various impact fees right now, that could be used, but only for those specific purposes to expand capacity. So there's certain statutes you have to file you know, look to to make sure you can expend those monies. You also have your CRA. It's got about a million dollars left in your CRA at this point. Your committed balances, those are items that you, as a council have approved, is for capital projects, about 1,300,000.0. See a big drop this year from 4.6 down to 1,300,000.0. That's because you did some improvements to the Sun Trail. You did some pickleball courts and some road resurfacing, which that's pretty much every year road resurfacing. But those are some of the things that came out of capital projects for the year. The assigned amount is the ARPA fund going forward.

So in your proprietary funds, your enterprise funds, what's left over, just your unrestricted portion of those, you'll see there on that slide. Relatively consistent water and sewer, slight increase each year, and that's anticipation of the growth that that you're seeing in your city. About 5.7 of that, but is already set aside for capital projects. So just going forward, you don't have you have done great the last couple of years getting grants in to cover a lot of your utility projects, but you'll still use up about 5.7 of that just for the water and sewer projects. Solid waste, you see about $3,000,000 As you know, for solid waste, very expensive, those garbage trucks, you know.

So every couple of years, you've got to be replacing those, but about $3,000,000 sitting there. Then stormwater, you'll never have enough money for stormwater. None of my cities will ever have enough money for stormwater. But there's about 1,600,000 set aside already for projects for storm water. Internal service, you see there actually has a deficit this year. That's due to the $20,000,000 loan for public works. As you know, the debt for that is gonna be paid by your water, sewer, solid waste, and stormwater funds. So the debt is sitting over there. So eventually, that'll flip the other way next year once that project moves along. So a little bit of where where you're sitting in compliance with your fund balance policies.

So you have your city charter as a 15% requirement, for for the next year's budget for all operating funds. Plus, internally, you have an operating cash flow of about 17% or two months as well, so about 32% between those two numbers. So when you look at where your general fund is, you're right about 45, just about the same you were last year. So you're just slightly above that. Water and sewer, you're sitting about 44%. Solid waste, 58. And then storm water, you're down below 13% just because you had a lot of expenditures for this year. Some note disclosures this year. We've already talked about for debt a good bit. But $3,800,000 total in government debt on the books and $28,000,000 for the business type activities.

The new thing for this year was, of course, the issuance of the public works for the public works complex loan. I wanted to point out this year I typically don't include this in the presentation just to show you your commitments by fund. You do have a lot of, you know, commitments out there, construction type commitments. And you'll see there for water and sewer, about $10,000,000 storm water, about $16,000,000 you know, public works, you know, dollars 19,900,000.0 going forward. I'll close-up on pensions because I do get asked a lot about pensions.

You know, for the city of Edgewater, you have basically three defined benefit pensions, and then you have a defined contribution pension. If we have the police and fire plans for the police and fire, you'll see those liabilities there. The police is sitting at about $1,900,000,000 of liability going forward. And then your fire actually has a net pension asset at the end of the year. The general employees defined benefit plan, no new employees entered into that plan.

All new employees are part of the defined contribution, but you still owe out into the future for any retirees to continue paying the monthly benefit payment to them. But what's interesting about that chart, you see like it dips really low in 2022. Well, that's when the market declined. Everything's as of September 30. So when the market goes down, it affects it dramatically, that overall net pension liability amount. And then as the market goes up, it fluctuates the other way. But we all know that if I could predict the market, I wouldn't be a CPA. I'd be making a lot more money. And so would we all. But that's the thing you always got to remember is that investment market can change dramatically within one year, two year time frame.

Florida statute does help us out. You do have actuaries that are hired to calculate those amounts, and then the division of, Florida Retirement reviews those actuarial calculations. And And then Florida statute is is good in this regard because it enables you as long as you pay that required contribution calculated by the actuary, that means you're gonna be financially sound in your pension plan. Thing goes forward for the Florida FRS retirement system as well. They have to do it as well. So I'll leave it at that. But if you have any questions, I'll be more than happy to take them. And as I offered before, if any of you want to meet one on one, just let me know.

Okay.

Thank you, sir. Any questions? Okay. Thank you, sir.

All right. Have a good night.

Out of five, city manager report.

Good evening, mayor and council. I have a few things to go over. First, I'd to speak about the city hall property deed restriction. As you know, the charter review committee will be forwarding language to restrict the sale of the property where City Hall is located. Like always, I'll support whichever decision you make on that matter.

But I think there needs to be a broader discussion regardless of that outcome. So we have an updated vision plan that was completed in 2025, and we have the need to allocate c r CRA funds strategically. So I'd like to create a staff led committee to implement the vision and provide implementation guidance. This kitty committee would involve community engagement and feedback. So first, I'm seeking consensus to create that staff led committee so we can guide CRA spending.

So we don't wanna allocate funding to streetscape at a particular location within the CRA or acquire property without having really a lot more questions answered and some overall guidance from the committee than brought to you, and then you can give us a direction to go from there. So I'm looking for consensus to create that staff led committee. It will be there'll be extensive community involvement with all stakeholders, business owners, and and citizens.

One thing to keep the vision plan going because we spent all these hundreds of thousands of dollars on these visions, and we haven't taken one initiative until recently over the past twenty years towards that plan. So I give consensus for that. And then potentially, maybe we could also have a community led one at separate date.

Well, I assure you that the public engagement will be robust. So I'm hoping to get as many people here as possible to talk about it. You know, during our our vision sessions, you know, our first one was 2008, and then it was a 2014 update, and then 2025 update. We had 1,200 participants that helped set that vision. And I just wanna make sure that we carry that forward and make sure we we actually adapt to what the people want.

So I look forward and I thank you for the consensus to create that committee. Second, I'm seeking consensus to table the city hall deed restriction discussion discussion until the charter amendment is brought before you. Or your other option is I we can take an alternate action before that date. So the Charter Review Committee's last meeting is the April. So we can table it until you see that Charter Amendment come before you, I believe in June.

Or I can bring back a different action, whether it's an ordinance or resolution, at the next city council meeting. My suggestion would be to wait until you hear the charter amendment, but that's entirely up to you.

They go hand in hand together. What is the commission's consensus? Absolutely.

I'm comfortable with it being on the charter because I think the people should be able to vote on it.

Oh, I apologize. Is it

I'm I should be on. No. I'm comfortable giving consensus with it waiting for the charter review.

Okay. I think that it should be in the hands of the people, but you also have the options that you have to take. And I think when then talking with you, you've laid out some pretty good options, and I guarantee you that, you know, I'm gonna make sure it's gonna be fulfilled, that it's gonna go back to the people. But I think we would be foolish not to look at every option.

Are you still talking? Or are you finished with your thought? I'm throw something in, but I didn't know if you're gonna say something else after the fact.

No. No. I'm fine.

No. I mean, I'm I'd comfortable with an ordinance, but I think ordinance but ordinances can be overturned, and I would like to see it stay with the people. So I mean, I'm comfortable waiting for the charter review just to make sure that that goes forward. But that's just my 2¢.

Okay. So I have consensus to wait

until the charter review.

Okay. Thank you.

You're welcome. Just want to

give you couple of updates on some staff programs. We're working to bolster the existing citizen business recognition program. This program enables one member of council to select a business for recognition each quarter. Economic development is working to ensure this program is on track and working to create more engagement with our business owners. And that's Mr.

John Scott who's spearheading that kind of revamp of that program. So I'm excited to make progress there. Additionally, staff is working on an emergency volunteer utilization program to augment natural disaster preparedness. And our police department will have a presentation tentatively for the May City Council meeting. So there's been many discussions during natural disasters.

And we have a lot of citizens that are great people and they want to help. So we're looking at a program that really could structure that so it's more formal and safe for all involved. So you'll have that presentation most likely in May. Additionally, we'll have a presentation on Wildhawks at our May City Council meeting as we spoke about a meeting or two ago. An update for the city clerk, application window closes this evening.

The acting city clerk and the HR director will communicate the next steps regarding the interview process. Unfortunately, as you've seen in the news, we do have some weather service advisories for potential of four to seven inches of rain over the next three days. Tomorrow morning, we'll begin pumping Duck Lake. Our stormwater crews are checking the stormwater system for obstructions, and we'll continuously monitor during the rain event. And if citizens have requests or concerns, I ask that you contact our public works division.

It could be on our website website or our after hours number is (386) 424-2490. You don't have to write that down. That's on our website as well. So if you have any concerns or requests, please reach out. And lastly, honored to announce a team member of the month. It's Kevin Ogier. Ager. Ager. Ager. Ager.

I always pronounce his name wrong. Kevin's a great guy. He's with our Parks and Recs division, And he's our team member of the month for February 2026. I'm honored to submit this nomination for Kevin Auger as February 2026 team member of the month in recognition of his outstanding performance, leadership, and unwavering commitment to the city across multiple projects. Kevin has played a pivotal role in several citywide initiatives, most notably serving as the lead on the city hall remodel.

The project has required careful coordination, cost control, creative problem solving, and a hands on leadership approach. Kevin has consistently delivered on all fronts through his expertise, resourcefulness, and willingness to take ownership of complex tasks. He has helped the city realize savings totaling tens of thousands of dollars. His attention to detail and ability to identify cost effective solutions without compromising quality have made a measurable financial impact. In addition to managing the technical aspects of the remodel, Kevin has demonstrated exceptional dedication to keeping the project ahead of schedule.

He has voluntarily worked weekends and stayed late when necessary to ensure deadlines are met and momentum is maintained. This level of commitment commitment is not prompted or required. It reflects his personal standard of excellence and pride in his work. His right reliability allows leadership to move forward with confidence, knowing that critical projects are in capable hands. Beyond his work ethic and technical skill, Kevin's attitude sets him apart.

He approaches every assignment with professionalism and positivity. Even under pressure, he remains solution oriented and supportive of his team. He leads by example, quietly reinforcing a culture of accountability, teamwork, and high performance. Colleagues respect him not only for what he accomplishes, but for how he conducts himself while he does it. Kevin consistently embodies the values we strive for to promote within our organization, dedication, integrity, fiscal responsibility, and service to the community.

His contributions extend well beyond a single project. They strengthen the operational effectiveness and reputation of the city as a whole. So congratulations, Kevin. If you could come forward. Oh, we can have all the counsel come up for a photo. It's photo night. Congratulations. I'm sorry I murdered your last name.

That's all right.

You're a great guy.

Been Murder Conley.

It's Oger. Oger. Spelled A

U G E R, though. And that concludes our report, mister mayor.

Item six, citizen's comments. This is time for the public to come forward with any comments they may have. Since this comments related to any agenda, the matter may be made. The time the matter is before the council. Please state your name, address. Please limit your comments to three minutes or less.

Good evening, mister mayor, council, staff, and citizens. I'm Michael Hayes, the exalted ruler from Edgewater New Smyrna Beach Lodge of 1557820 West Park Avenue. I'm here tonight to give an award to a non elk member as citizen of the year recognition. I'll follow your lead. The Edgewater New Smyrna Beach benevolent and protective order of elks fifteen fifty seven's wish to recognize and express appreciation for the public service of Debbie Daboll.

Whereas Debbie Daboll has demonstrated exceptional dedication, leadership, and compassion in serving her community through both her past and present contributions, and whereas Debbie Daboll has honorably served her country in the United States Air Force exemplifying courage, discipline, and commitment to protecting the freedoms we all cherish. And whereas Debbie Dowell currently serves as an elected public servant on the city of Edgewater City Council, where she works tirelessly to improve the quality of life for all residents through thoughtful governance and community focused decision making process. And whereas Debbie Daboll has shown heartfelt compassion for animals providing caring attention and dedication support to the Edgewater Animal Shelter, helping to ensure the well-being of our community's most vulnerable four legged residents. And whereas Debbie Dobol has generously donated countless hours of her time volunteering at the Gisela Food Pantry, assisting in fight against hunger to helping to provide essential food assistance to families and individuals in need throughout the Edgewater New Smyrna Beach area. And whereas Debbie Dobold has selflessly volunteered her time and talents at the Edgewater New Smyrna Beach Benevolent Protective Order of Elk's Lodge fifteen fifty seven, supporting the largest charitable missions and fraternal activities that strengthen our local community.

Now, therefore, be it resolved that Edgewater New Smyrna Beach Benevolent And Protective Order Of Elks, Lodge 1557, proudly recognizes and honors Debbie Dobold as citizen of the year for her outstanding service, unwavering commitment, and profound positive impact on the lives of so many in our community, presented the April 2026 on behalf of the Edgewater New Smyrna Beach, Edgewater Elks Benevolent Protective Lodge fifteen fifty seven. And witness whereof, we have hereunto set our hands and cause the seal of the lodge to be affixed. Stebi. Thank you. Thank you so much for all your help.

And Mr. City Manager, when you develop that emergency response plan, please get with me. The Elsh Lodge wants to support emergency disasters, so include me.

Definitely will do. Thank you.

Congratulations.

Hi. Cynthia Black, Umbrella Tree. A friend of mine and a friend to many a friend of my family, excuse me, and a friend to many in Volusia County passed away on March 23. He was a two time mayor of Holly Hill. And until his passing, he was the vice mayor of Holly Hill and commissioner of District 4.

Many, including some in this audience, even knew him. He worked as a mechanic for Smokey Unick and was part of a team of Casey Unick for NASCAR. He worked for FP and L for forty years, serving including in our community. His name was Roy Johnson. And I would ask that we take a minute to honor him in his memory. His service will be on Friday at I'm sorry, Loam Cemetery in Daytona Beach. Thank you.

Sure. We'll take a minute of silence. Mr. Johnson.

Kim Long, 3312 Mango Tree. It could have been an ordinance. Stop ripping out every damn tree. Could have been an ordinance. Use native plants on all new builds. That could have been an ordinance. Require stem walls. Stem walls on new construction, that could have been an ordinance. The deed to the city hall property, that could have been an ordinance too. Stopping the fill in bill, could have been an ordinance.

It could have been written as an ordinance, but this council chose not to for years, not just you, the council before you, and the council before that. The charter review committee did the work, which is better because an ordinance only takes three votes on the council to change it. We all saw how easy the former council directed the former city attorney to remove the deed protections on the very piece of property, this piece that we're sitting in right now, telling a judge that the city needed the ability to sell the only waterfront property that we have. Well, thanks to the charter committee, the members. Now all that remains to be done to accomplish all this and more is for this council to vote yes on all the charter amendments when they come to you.

So they'll be on the November ballot. If you vote yes, let us vote on them. Let the citizens vote. Let the people decide if they want all the city parks protected and this very property, city hall property, never to be sold, traded, or given. It's forever, and it's the right thing to do. See these two books? These are our vision books, which were spoken of earlier. We did one of these vision books in 2008 set on a shelf. 2025, we spent $300,000, which included the CRA study for another vision book. If you look at the fronts of them, they're the exact same pictures.

They're beautiful. They're gorgeous. We'd all like to have a town like this. If you'd have planted these trees in two thousand eight, they'd be this big now. Nothing was done, and we paid for yet another visioning book. It seems or I get the impression that our new city manager wants a developer to come in and partner with the city to make this happen. Billions of dollars we're talking about. What would we do to entice such a partnership? Waterfront City Hall property maybe? Seems to me that would entice a big development.

Well, I say no way. Ten years I fought for the deed for this property right here that we're sitting in. It was given to us, and it needs to be given back to us. Now this vision plan, it sure is a nice plan. Big shade trees, park benches, coffee shops with tables, and umbrellas, all the things that we all want and we all love to have down here. But we can do this without giving a developer this very property. We can start now. Protect the deed and the charter amendment.

Thank you. Thank you, miss Long, for your comments. Thank you. I appreciate it. Please note public participation during citizens' comments.

Hi. My name is Tanya Test. I'm new to the area, I'd like to introduce myself. I love this community and everything that it has to offer. Good things are done here. I naturally gravitate towards the organization and gathering of people to fund local benefits. It is a passion of mine. If you need anything along those arenas, please do not hesitate to call me. I, I am also a licensed Florida CAM, community association manager, and I have applied for the city clerk position. And thank you for your time, consideration, and all that you do.

Thank you for your comments. They're appreciated.

Hi, guys. I'm Mark Mello. I'm from 639 Coral Trace Boulevard, and I'm from a 222 home gated community. I lived here sixteen years. I have this great idea, and it's a three minute read.

A reservoir's main objective is to control the amount of water to prevent flooding. We can do this by modifying a reservoir that's already in place. These blueprints I've drawn up are pertaining to the Coral Trace Reservoir on the large pond in the community of Coral Coral Trace. The city could not find diagrams, plans, or prints on a reservoir, So I went out on location and took out measurements and draft them drafted out my findings. Our other two ponds along with the streets of Coral Trace flow into this approximately 10 acre pond, which then flows under East Coral Trace Boulevard to Mission Road.

In the wall of this reservoir, otherwise called the cement block, there are two six inch diameter holes that control constant flow of water from all the ponds. In continuous rain, the water table rises past these two outlets and then over the block wall and flows three blocks to Mission Road. My idea is to control this water by cutting and lifting the wall using an actuator. This will give us control before a massive storm hits by opening the reservoir to let millions of gallons out before the storm. The pond would become approximately 35% empty before it even starts to fill up.

That would greatly help Mission Road along with Coral Trace. I am not a mechanical engineer on reservoirs, just an idea the city should consider. These diagrams show modifications where it can be cut and actuator installed, hydraulic or manual, which is a driving force to lift the wall to let an even flow of water down the waterways before a big storm hits. This will dissipate before the big storm arrives. At this point, approximately 5,000,000 gallons from the streets would flow onto the contained pond out of the contained pond before breaking the levee.

October 2022, the pond was full. A hurricane was on its way along with flood warnings. The pond overflowed five to six four to five feet above the levee, flooding 30 feet up our back door into the street of our garage. The street was a river. This is something that is needed. Building more subdivisions adds more storm water. So asking Park to cover the cost, it would benefit them. So since they have 22,000 homes being built right above us and 18,000 more homes on its way, we have pushed the limit. And I'd like to give you the copy of me. I've been working on this for a year and a half. Right, Debbie?

Thank you, sir. Yes, please. If you could just leave it with the city clerk, that would be great. And she'll make a copy and get this to all of us.

Alright. I'll get it through.

Thank you, mister Meadows. We appreciate you.

Any questions?

No. Thank you.

Good evening. Jennifer Fox, Francis Drive Edgewater. I'm here tonight on behalf of the Jane Sheldon Chapter, Daughters of the American Revolution. I believe all of you are familiar with our organization. We are not we, but DAR nationally is one of, if not the largest, women's organization in the country.

We also have chapters across the world. We are a service organization dedicated to historic preservation, good citizenship, patriotism. And we also serve veterans. Our chapter, the Jane Sheldon chapter, serves a community of New Smyrna Beach, Edgewater, and Oak Hill. We recently celebrated our one hundred years of existence.

Last February, we had a celebration. We invited all three mayors. Mayor DeBeau was there as well as Edgewater and Oak Hill. Over the past several hundred years, we have donated several historical plaques, and you can find them located mainly in New Smyrna Beach. This year, for our hundredth anniversary, we decided we would like to partner with the city of Edgewater and do something for Edgewater.

Immediately came to my mind, we do historic preservation, Was the old flow well. It's something that I really cherish, and I like would like to do something with it. My chapter happens to agree. We'd like to partner with the city of Edgewater. We've had a preliminary meeting with the town manager as well as parks and rec, and we've come up with some ideas.

We would like to renovate the well, create a water feature, and install a memorial plaque very similar to the ones that we have throughout New Smyrna Beach. We have two members of our chapter, both of which are very active in history preservation. One is actually an archaeologist who will be working on this project as well. And hopefully, we can have it registered with Volusia County, if not the state of Florida as a historical marker. We had our preliminary meetings. And hopefully, we will have a final presentation to bring to council next month.

Thank you. Thank you, Ms. Fox, and all that DAR does. I think that sounds wonderful. We'd be happy to have that here. I can't speak for the commission, but I think it's a great project. Thank you.

Bob Chew, 208 Virginia Street, Edgewater. As you know, the Fallujah Forever is being challenged by people pro development. And the town of Punts Inlet just had a resolution in support of not changing Volusia forever. And I'm hoping that Edgewater would be willing to sign a similar resolution. And I'll Good. Yeah. Forward it to everybody up here to see if they can come up with something similar. But that would really help those who are trying to keep it from getting changed.

Well, thank you for coming to the meeting, but I believe we've already done that around two or three months ago to

do that,

I think. I believe so.

Yes. We're the first city to do that.

Okay. I was told by somebody that you hadn't signed. So if you have thank you.

Am I incorrect?

Yeah. It was on the, either February or March of the first meeting in March.

Yeah. Yeah. Thank you.

Yes. We've already provided a letter of support for Volusia forever. Okay. Good. Thank you.

Thank you, mister Chew. Please. We could stop with the public comments. This has been your third and final warning. Thank you.

Alright.

Go ahead and just escort this gentleman out as well, if you could. If you keep it down, thank you. No public participation at this time. Final warning. Just go ahead and escort him out, please.

Robert DeVoe, 232 North Bridgewood Avenue. First off, I just want to say this is nothing against Edgewater Police Department. It's that they have helped us out more times than one. But I'd like to know from the city lawyers, stuff like that, what is the transparency of this pending lawsuit against the police department stuff? One is, like I said, what we hear on TV. I would like to hear from the lawyer here. The money, if it has to be paid out, does that go against the police budget for training personnel equipment? And who pays for that? Is that us, the taxpayers, have to pay for that?

If he wishes, he could answer that during his report towards the end of the meeting. This is just for you

to talk to the thing you hear on the need. But I said, I think transparency for myself and for the citizens and what you Sure.

I got that. Say If the city

who's paying for this.

If the city attorney wishes to answer that during his report, he can. If not, you can always reach out to your commissioner or myself. We'll we'll get you some answers. Thank you.

You'd like

to Is is there a settled ongoing lawsuit at this time?

Yeah. I I missed it. Well, let's Let me

answer other comments at this time?

No? I just like to say, you know, where's the money?

Sure. Mister manager, if you'd like to address that.

So we got we got survey notice of intent to sue, and then we provided that to our insurance provider. And it's pending litigation, so I can't really say any more than that. But we have insurance for these type of incidents.

Okay. That I guess that was my question. Is it insurance that doesn't come out of their budget

No, sir.

For training, for equipment No, anything? Sir. Okay. That's what I wondered. Thank you.

Thank you, sir, for your comments.

Chuck Martin, 205 Cherry Wood Lane, Edgewater, Florida. First of all, wanna say congratulations, Debbie.

Thank you.

I never thought I'd say this, but I agree with Kim Long. I do. I agree with her. She's actually a pretty smart woman once you get to know her. And she's very well spoken. And I agree with her on keeping the city deed here at City Hall. I think all of you do, too, as well. We're two months out from hurricane season. I'd ask for an update on 18th Street Canal. You didn't do that last time.

Appreciate it if you would ask mister Mahoney just give us a quick update on that. It won't take but a minute. We really need get that cleaned out. As a candidate for city council district one, I've mentioned before that I wanna bring my forty three years of experience in working in construction, public works, solid waste, hazmat operations, fighting fires, power plant, water builds, storm water infrastructure. We do need to address our drinking water.

We get a lot of complaints on that. Everybody knows about it. We know why the prices are the way they are. But to fill up a bathtub and it's green, that's all I hear. Mister Rainberg, you made a comment before that you didn't hear nothing about flooding. That's all I hear about is flooding in our water. Not one person that I've talked to, and I canvass every day, and I talk to people every day in the shores and Edgewater said anything about a city clerk. I agree with you. We do need a full time one, but we're two months out. Thank you, Mr.

Mahoney, for getting in, Jeff Laracy for getting the Duck Lake pump fired up and get going. When the next hurricane comes or storm, we do need to put one at the Clubhouse Lake on Lime Tree Drive. I've assessed it. We can put a pump in there, do the same thing as Duck Lake, but wanting to still, still place the drop in at the culverts. Get that water, start pumping it down. A lot of houses flooded. The two neighbors across the street from her house flooded. I toted a lot of sandbags over there, and it didn't help. The water went right in their house. We need to save those homes like we did at Duck Lake.

That's about all I have for tonight, but I just would like a quick update on 18th Street. And if there's anything that I can do to expedite that, I don't know if we could issue a state of emergency with what's coming and get it cleaned out, but that's always an option. Mr. Mayor?

Thank you, sir. For your comments, Mr. Mahoney, if you'd like to address that, you can after this item or now.

Yeah, of course. So we just received our permit to dredge the 18th Street Canal. That was as recent as last week. So we are working with the construction company to begin that process. We also moved some appropriations money to armor the canal from US 1 to Riverside Drive. So when I first stepped in this role as interim, the permit that we thought was submitted was not. I uncovered that, and then I probably called every acronym in the state. We could try to fast forward the permit, glad to say that it was issued last week. We're ready to proceed. It's just the logistics with construction company now.

Great. Thank you, sir, for the update.

Hi. My name is Ken Cartosano. I live at 3312 Mango Tree Drive, and I do agree that Kim Long is pretty smart. I really didn't hear anything from the city manager that really was satisfactory about the deed. I've spoken to you personally one to one.

And I understand kind of where you're going with it. And I I disagree. I think it's something that the city should do piecemeal. I really feel like you guys wanna toss this over to somebody else and let them do a big project. I can understand how all of you that are sitting on the council could be pressured by the people that work here twenty days a week.

Once you have the property in your possession now, it really would be foolish to turn it over back to the citizens. But it was taken from the citizens illegally and unfairly and unethically. And it really should be returned. And that's I don't know what you all are planning to do with the vision thing. I I I really feel like if you were if the city was more amenable to new businesses, this area would thrive.

It was really interesting seeing the presentation by the woman from New Smyrna. This is never gonna be New Smyrna. You don't have a beach. We got the river. We got the Indian River. We got the lagoon. That's what we gotta work on. Davenport Davenport, when he said that new beach ramp that new boat ramp is gonna be a boon to the area, It is. It's gonna be. That's true.

There's gonna be a lot of businesses coming here because of space industry. This is all stuff that you guys all know. You guys know more about this and they do too than I do. But that deed, that should go back to the citizens. You all know it. They know it. And it it's all you have to do is just do it. As a lawyer and as a city manager, you too can do it whenever you want to. Okay? You're just dragging your feet. Thank you.

Thank you, sir, for your comments.

Well, mister mayor, since you're having a a dialogue tonight, so have a monologue, you don't know my views about the the property at city hall. It is my job as a city manager to ensure that proper analysis is done about any project. Okay? And then we have to I have to ensure that taxpayer money is in not impacted adversely, legal review of any topic. And it's my role as a city manager is to recommend, after extensive analysis and research, a direction to counsel.

I don't have a vote, though. Okay? I don't have a vote. And then the council votes on a project, And then whatever they vote on a project, I then implement. So whatever the council decides to do with a certain topic, it is my job to implement it. So I don't have a vote, but I do believe that, you know, as the city grows responsibly, we have to make educated decisions knowing all cause causes and effects. It's it's that simple. It's not taking a stance. If it's not an emergency, sometimes there's not a rush to get it onto the next agenda. And our our city council members should be fully informed of of what effects it may have.

So there's sometimes there's a simple something that may seem simple decision then compounds to multiple other issues. So one decision could then change the vision, then could change the CRA, so it could compound to to different decisions that are needed and different effects to the community. So that is that is my stance on it. I I have no opinion either way. I just want our our mayor and city council to be fully equipped with the facts before they are armed to make any decision.

Thank you, sir.

Noble Livingston, 2705 Queen Palm Drive. First, big props to our waste management and the way they pick up all the yard waste. Those guys are awesome. I've seen people put piles of leaves out there. They scoop all that up. They don't have to do that, but it's pretty awesome that they do. And the clam truck operator, I want to take him to Chuck E. Cheese and have him do the claw game. I mean, that guy is awesome. Does a great job.

Our fire hydrants along the walkway that go through the middle of Florida shores, they look pretty rough. And I took a picture of one, which is that there. That's all right. I had an idea that you go downtown New Smyrna, they've got theirs pretty shaped up and they have different paintings on them. If we could get them shaped up, maybe the kids could jump in on that and offer up their artist renderings and possibilities and get them involved in actually painting them to resemble the dog walk and something like that.

Just planting the seeds, see if it grows. That's what they've got in New Smyrna downtown. Lot nicer to look at when you walk down the walkway there. And, you know, they're good positive messages. You know? I don't know if the, the looks of the fire hydrants affect the way they function, if they're going to create any problems in an emergency or not. But it'd be nice to look at along the walkway. So just a thought.

Thank you, sir. That's a great suggestion.

Hello, counsel. Good evening. My name is Brian White. I'm a New Smyrna Beach resident. And I am a candidate for county council in District 3, including Edgewater. Thanks for opportunity to address you. I want to take a minute just to talk about something that's really important to this city, and that's how we're managing water and storm water as growth continues. Very recently, I filed an appeal with the Fifth District Court of Appeal related to a permit issued through the Water Management District for the Deering Park North development, which is right here in the city of Edgewater. And at the center of that case is a very simple question. And that is, where does the water actually go?

Because right now, the public has been given different answers at different times about where storm water from that development is ultimately going to end up. First, they told us it was Turnbull Bay. A lot of people, myself included, raised an alarm about that. Didn't make sense. Then they filed a corrected notice that it's going to be Turnbull Hammock.

I filed a petition contesting their original ERP. And it was thrown out on procedural grounds twice. Now I filed an appeal with the District Court of Appeal. And that's a problem because when decisions that affect flooding and water quality get dismissed on procedural grounds by citizens representing themselves, Before the public ever gets a hearing, it creates a system where there is no real scrutiny. And when there's no real scrutiny, people lose trust in the government.

Agencies like the Water Management District play an important role. But that role has to include transparency and accountability to the public. Right now, too many residents feel like they're being shut out of the process entirely, and that needs to change. I live along Turnbull Creek. I've seen the flooding.

I've seen what happens when systems get pushed beyond their capacity. And I don't think it's unreasonable for residents to ask clear basic questions about how additional storm water is being handled, especially in low lying interconnected systems like we have here. And I want to bring this up here tonight because the city of Edgewater does have the authority to hold developers accountable and to hold them to their word, especially in the PUD related to Dearing Park North. And that's why I also want to say that I appreciate the city of Edgewater for continuing to stand up for home rule, for Volusia forever, and for taking storm water and infrastructure seriously. You've really taken a leadership role in the community, and I use it a lot when I'm complaining about things.

So I do appreciate you guys. Local communities understand these systems best, and they deserve a real voice in how growth is managed. At the end of the day, it just comes down to accountability. And I'll be honest with you. It's an uphill fight. There's a good chance these concerns continue to get pushed aside unless more people stay engaged and keep asking the important questions. But that doesn't mean we're going to stop. It means we keep pushing for a system that's transparent and accountable and actually works for the people that live here. Because this is an abstract idea. It's flooding. It's water quality. And it's the future of our community. And more broadly, residents deserve a real voice in major water decisions that affect their communities. Thank you.

Thank you, sir, for your comments. They're appreciated.

Bob Chu, 208 Virginia Street. The 18th Street Canal, as some of you know, has been diverted. It runs into my property. And over the last few years, it's brought in hundreds and hundreds of yards of fill, damaging my property. And so now that you have the permit, I want to make sure that before any work is done on the 18th Street Canal, the first thing they do is restore the historical channel so that every time we do work on 18th Street Canal, it doesn't further damage my property. Is that something that we can count on?

Thank you, Mr. Chu. For your questions, the city manager does have your contact information. Thank you. Item seven, council reports. Councilwoman Gillis.

A few different things. So I attended the state of our schools. And Edgewater Public STOMP team performed there as well. And I'm going to talk about them at the end. I wanted to touch on the deed. My thing is I would like to see it return. I know that's been talked about. The only reason I'm not pushing for the ordinance right now is because I would like to see it go to charter because charter is harder to overturn. So if we want to see something go into the hands of the people, I would rather see it go through as the charter amendment as opposed to the ordinance. I wanted to address the gentleman who talked about the fire hydrants.

I think from what I was told when I was asking questions about some of the fire hydrants in the past, some of them had different colors, which talked about the water pressure that's coming out of them. So I don't think that there are some limitations with painting them, but I would be all for, like, some artistic expression there. I attended a Southeast Volusia, like a local Kiwanis Club fundraiser. They raised money for kids. I met with Congressman Mills and his staff to help discuss getting funding for Edgewater.

I attended the faith assembly. A lot of churches around this area got together to join forces to talk about affordable housing and flooding. I was invited to by several Edgewater residents. And part of their presentation, they were applauding Edgewater and New Smyrna for use of our CRA funds to renovate older duplexes and working for affordable housing. I met with friends of the Edgewater Library Board three times this month because I was on the selection committee with some lovely local ladies.

And this year, they are going to be hand well, every year. But they are going to be handing out $25,000 to Edgewater seniors that all live right here in the city. There was a lot of amazing kids that applied for that. And it's going to be great to see that money get doled out. I attended the ribbon cutting for Edgewater Public Elementary's new library that was just renovated. It's an amazing school. It was one of the first STEM certified elementary schools in the state. Thank you to Jen Metter, Doctor. Lavalle, Kyle Breyer, and all the amazing staff there for everything they did. I attended our Easter egg extravaganza.

Parks and Rec was amazing. We already honored Kevin tonight, but I wanted to thank, you know, Jason, Chris, Kevin, Jeff, Doug, all the guys. DJ Clay was amazing. The sponsors that they had were great. Steam Station, Indian River Lagoon Athletics, and Captain's Bar and Grill, lots of great people. I met Edgewater I met with some Edgewater Landing residents about some issues. I attended our River to CTPO meeting in their executive committee I serve on. I attended the Southeast Volusia Manufacturing Technology Coalition job fair. There was a lot of Edgewater businesses there, like Manufacturing, Calick Group, Angie's Day Spa. And they were there actively trying to hire locals.

I want to thank Bliss Jamieson for putting all that together. I attended our the FDOT District five Safety Steering Strategic Plan Committee. I'm one of the two members that serve on that board representing Volusia County. My big ask for the end of this is going to be that the obviously, the Stopp performs at the beginning of the meeting. They're raising money to get those kids to perform at Universal Studios. Several local charities have helped push them towards their goal. They have not met yet. I want to thank Edgewater Police volunteers. I believe Rotary Club's reached out, and I got a message right not too long ago. The women of the Moose Lodge are going to do a donation as well.

But if you are looking to donate to a worthy cause, you can reach out to Ms. ReedEdgewater Public Elementary if you are looking to do it ahead of time. If you shoot me an email, I will send you the QR code that she's going to send me tonight. They have won so many awards locally. They applied into a drumline competition. They are not a drumline, and they still won first place. So they went out of pocket on a completely different thing and did that. They are just a they are a great little organization. The kids love it. And Ms.

Reed does so much for the kids, so I want to try to help give back if we can for that. For the most part, that's all I have. I was going to address some. I'm going to go with it. So my last thing I'm going to say right now, we're obviously, there's a lot of canvassing and campaigning going on.

If people approach you and want to talk to you about things, just keep in mind, if people are out there and it's only personal attacks, then that's what it is. If you've got something you want to stand on, you should be out there telling people what you want to do and what you're going to do. And I mean, I can speak that I've gotten several phone calls in about my not about just myself, but about several other people that are sitting up here today where things that have been targeted. And it's not cool. So I don't want to get emotional. I don't want to keep going. But I was told, you know, not to address it, to be the bigger person. But there are certain things. But when you're out there hurling false accusations about things, if there's anything that number, well, I'm going to say this. So there's nothing on me to be had.

But if you were going to if there's somebody out there that's got think they got something on me that's going to get me removed from August, bring it on. Because at this point, it's political theater. If you're going to be people are going to be out there saying things that aren't true, just trying to stir up nonsense, and I don't know. So sorry for that tonight. I've got there's a lot of other things on the agenda.

And I will stop. And I hope let everybody else talk. Thank you. Thank you. Councilman Thomas.

Yeah. I'd like to bring out something that was mentioned before about the, the vision plan. You know, when we all ran, we had we had certain goals in mind, but, things happened and interrupt those goals. It's just like the mayor, his main goal, if I remember right, was to lower the water bill and to maintain quality water, drinking water, which I am all for. But in the meantime, he's got to deal with two hurricanes and I like, Councilman Rainbird's, and a hundred, well, a hundred minute rain event that, flooded us out.

So let me ask you, did your goals get altered?

They were all met.

But but still,

Yes. I mean

Absolutely. The goals are still there, but it gets interrupted. It's like things happen it does. During this twenty years unexpectedly, unexpected expense. Let's say your goal is to buy a boat where you can enjoy this Indian River. And you're saving your money, you're saving your money, and your transmission goes. What are you

gonna

do? You're replace your transmission, you know? I mean, we all have goals and we all, you know, want the best thing for this city. But things happen that when our our goals get uninterrupted. When when I first got in, I had a lot of goals.

And one of mine is still is to stop the influence of going in the Indian River. And it looked like we're gonna complete this. And I'm I'm really proud of that. But still, your goals get interrupted by different things. And I want you all toyou have to remember that. I mean, we the vision is still there, and and we wanna do that. It's just we we there's so many other things that come up. And and you're like, we gotta have money for that. We gotta have money for that. We gotta have money for that.

It it it it's just unreal. So Mhmm. Anyway, I that's that's my I just want to remind the citizens of what we have to go through to keep a transmission in this

in this

car and keep it running.

Making fun of me because my transmission blew yesterday. And I'm just sitting here like, how'd you know about that?

That's it. Councilwoman Dahlbo.

Thank you. I just want to start. I hear so many positive compliments from our residents lately. They see the hard work that Public Works and utilities are doing around the city. Their concerns are being addressed, and they feel heard. So I just want to say thank you again. You guys are all doing a great job. Thanks to Jason and his team for not disturbing the offspray's nest during lighting upgrades at Hawke's Park. I saw the pictures, and I heard it was pretty intense when you're trying to get those pictures taken, so thanks for worrying about them. And what a great turnout for the Easter egg hunt.

I was told the staff put out 15,000 eggs. Thanks thanks to our Parks and Recs team, staff, volunteers, vendors that helped to make such a big success. And if you haven't been to Menard May Park yet to see the new pier, you got to check it out. It's beautiful. It's beautiful. And I've seen a lot of people out there fishing and lot a of families getting together. So just another great thing that Edgewater has to offer. That's all I have right now. Thank you.

Councilman Rain Bird.

Good evening, Edgewater. Not too long ago, I went to the fiftieth anniversary of the Volusia League of Cities dinner. It was at the Ocean Center. It was pretty cool to be part of. Then they announced that we're the next host. And this kind of goes into the vision. Do we really have a place that could have an event that big? Hawks Park is not enclosed. We have other places that we could use. Hacienda Del Rio has a beautiful, beautiful recreation center there.

Disco ball, beautiful place, kitchen, no parking. So I've been having wondering, like, what are we going to do when it comes time? The vision I was on the planning and zoning board, and we were brought in to that vision meeting with those nice pastel pictures and all that. And I kind of got frowned upon because I have no filter. And I held my hand up and said, we're talking about this town has a small town feel.

Small town feel left this town ten years ago, folks. You have a fiftyfifty chance of waiting three minutes to make a left turn in this town now. I mean, so we've got to think of what we're going to do. What can we put here? This building, Jason and his crew saved this city a lot of money. They renovated this whole place. There's stuff they renovated that you can't see. But this place is old. It's dilapidated. What can we do with it?

So as far as a new city hall and all that, that water one day will be three feet in this building. It's gonna happen. We're gonna have a king tide. We just wanna think about what to do with this place, and that's where I think what is our vision is coming from. This place, it's not the greatest location. Yes, it's beachside, but this place needs to move. We're going to outgrow this very soon. Do we have the money to build a new one? Not yet.

We outgrew it twenty five years ago.

Yeah, right. Renting we have a 10 lease on another place just to fit Ryan and his people, and that's going to grow. And then I haven't heard about flooding lately. I'm sitting in this seat because I wanted to do something about the flooding, not stopping it, but fighting it. And that's what we're doing. We're fighting it. We're making leaps and bounds. We finally got the permit to clean that 18th Street. Diesel and I were out there walking on that thing, taking pictures. We were told we were waiting eight months for their permit.

We finally have the permit. Things are going to happen here, folks. But we want to keep the transmission in the car, too. What I am hearing a lot about, though we gave into public opinion a while ago, which we do work for you. But I'm hearing a lot about the kids on the e bikes, in the parks, in the Publix parking lots.

I mean, one woman I was coming out of Publix about a week and a half ago, and one woman was walking with her little kid. And some kid comes riding up from the side where true value is, comes flying up there, almost hit this woman with a kid. So parents out there, please tell your kids, slow down. These bikes are heavy. It's not just a regular bike.

That battery somebody gets hit with one of these bikes is going to be a problem. I don't know what the insurance implications are of a kid getting hit by a car. But we didn't pass an ordinance about a year ago. And I don't believe there should be an ordinance about it. But parents, tell your kids to just ride it like it's a regular bike. I know it's pretty cool, and it's almost a motorcycle. I would probably be ripping on one if I was 15. But there's safety involved. And as far as the fire hydrants, they are looking dilapidated. I've seen a couple.

But I got two granddaughters. And if they were to paint a Hello Kitty or a bluey fire hydrant, all I care is that water comes out of it when somebody needs it. I think that is a great idea to maybe have a or whatever. Just let the kids have at it. That's a pretty great idea from a citizen right there. That way we just have to sandblast them. We don't have to paint them. We just provide the paint, saving money right there. And that's all I got.

Well, I enjoyed attending the Strike It Rich event at the Kiwanis Club. They meet every Wednesday. They raise thousands of dollars, I believe, $100,000 for kids. I enjoyed attending the Edgewater Public Media Center grand opening with several other individuals, the city manager and our economic development coordinator. And I also enjoyed speaking at the faith meeting group in Port Orange, Florida.

There was at least over 400 or 500 people there about affordable housing, our partnership with our CRA to help affordable housing, Habitat for Humanity, and other steps the city has taken. And I also enjoyed supporting the Upward Trend Academy. They received a new playground totally on donations. Item eight, consent consent agenda. All matters listed under the consent agenda are considered to be routine by the city council, but acted upon by one motion. There will be no separate discussion of these items unless the discussion is desired by a member of the council, in which case the mayor will have that item removed and discussed separately. Is there a motion to approve the consent agenda?

I make a motion to approve the consent agenda.

Second, Rain Bird.

The roll call.

Councilwoman Gillis? Yes. Councilman Thomas?

Yes.

Councilwoman Dalbo? Yes. Councilman Rain Bird?

Yes.

Mayor DePue?

Yes. Item nine, public hearings, ordinances, and resolutions. Item nine a, second reading, ordinance number twenty twenty six dash zero dash o three, increasing the annual salary for the mayor and city council members. Staff report.

Mayor and council, this is the second reading, and staff recommends approval.

Thank you. Open a public hearing, citizen's comments.

Kim Long, thirty three twelve Mango Tree. First, I want to say it's pretty good turnout tonight. I wonder if it's because you guys are voting on raises for the council tonight. I'm sure that you would appreciate if this many people would come to the meetings when you discuss other city business, that's just as important. But tonight, you're having your vote on future councils getting an increase in their pay, and I think that they deserve it. I know that this council returns phone calls. I've spoken to each and every one of you. Some of you have come out to my house when there's a problem. When there's a fire, you're there. If there's a child that needs shoes, this council is there.

You promote local businesses. You give out scholarships. You do research. You travel. You listen, and you learn. This is the best damn council in the forty years I've lived in this town, and I think you guys deserve a raise. So I did a little math. I figure at a minimum, you guys work twenty five hours a week. And I know that because I used to work for a nonprofit. They came to me and they said, just give us two hours a week, Kim.

That's all it takes. Boy, that was a laugh. I spent twenty years with that nonprofit, and I guarantee you, I did at least twenty five hours every week preparing, and you guys work a lot harder than I ever did. You're the most proactive counsel that we've had in forty years. More often than not, you voted no on out of control growth, and I thank you for that. You got the moratorium. No other city did that. SB one eighty killed it, but Edgewater Council listens to its citizens. So with the math I did, I figured if you worked twenty five hours a week and you made $20 an hour, and I think you're all worth more than that, that would be 26,000. You're not asking for anywhere near that.

Somebody online said you should get paid $8 an hour. Let's say they think you're worth $15 an hour. At $15 an hour, you'd make 19,005. You're not even asking for that. So I think you deserve the raise. I'm glad that you're gonna get it for the next council. I hope you vote yes. Thank you. Thank you, miss Long, for your comments. I appreciate it.

Doug Frederick, resident of Edgewater, thank you for making my night with those kids. Whether I agree or disagree with this city council, I have nothing but total respect for the way that you discuss, the that you present, and the way you give citizens the right to make public discussion before any vote. Any negative commentary that I have is is unrelated to failure for citizens to present. I respect you guys whether I agree or disagree 100%. The woman that represents our area, councilman Charlotte Gillis, is beyond comprehension, ethical, honest, upfront, and represents this community with pride.

I have nothing but respect for you, miss. And I have nothing but respect for the way whether I agree with or disagree with you people, you represent this community with pride. I only wish we had full disclosure and full commentary on every issue that involved the city of Edgewater. God bless you, God guide you, and God protect this city. Thank you. Have a good night.

Thank you, mister Fredrick. We appreciate you.

Less than three minutes.

Plus, she has four kids.

I'm sorry?

I said, Plus, she has four kids.

Who? Her. I never had any kids.

No. Her. She's got four kids.

All you people elected all you people are really sincere.

Thank you.

And I I you should stand proud. And I I hope you vote for a pay increase for yourselves, not the next council. Stand proud. Thank you.

Thank you.

Jeff Brower, DeLand Springs, Florida. I wasn't gonna speak to this, but I wondered if I could bar some of your residents to come to a county council meeting. Am in huge support. I know what you guys earn. I know what I earn on the county council.

It's it's a little more than you, but it still doesn't cover my gas bill for a a county the size of of Rhode Island. I know the midnight calls that you get about a crowing rooster, somebody making too much noise in a neighborhood, or worse yet, floodwaters coming over their doorstep. People tell us all the time, you get paid too much to do two meetings a week. That's what I hear in the county council. You guys are doing meetings all the time.

But it's not the meetings that just take your time. It's everything that you do to serve the public that you represent. This council is made up of a majority of absolute public servants that have run, campaigned, run, and now serve as people who truly love your city and truly love the people that live here. You're trying to correct past problems. You deserve a huge pay increase. May not apply to you. Some of you, maybe when you win reelection, it will. I don't know how it's written. But I just wanted to to support it. Most politicians won't vote for a pay increase.

You're not politicians. You are a public servant. And you deserve to get paid more than forty hours, $40 a week for the time that you put in. It's an insult. I hope this passes.

Thank you, mister Brower. We appreciate you.

Good evening, counsel. My name is Janet Shira, 148 William Street, Edgewater. Like miss Long, I am kind of analytical, so I did some thinking on this because I've seen a lot of stuff flying around on social media. I also have worked the majority of my career in local government, so I'm well aware of what a council does. I looked at your last year just as an example.

In 2025, the city council, either meeting as the city council or the CRA, had 39 meetings, just your regular special meetings. You also hosted 13 events. That doesn't even count all the outside meetings you attend. People need to realize there are chamber functions. There are roundtables, Volusia County quarterly meetings, the Volusia League of Cities, V Card, the Florida League of Cities, Team Volusia.

I could go on and on. And these meetings take place every week, and I'm sure several of you attend all those. So again, I did a little brief analysis on all the hours to attend all those meetings and then I added in some additional hours for answering daily phone calls, emails, meetings with your city manager, responding on social media, all those things that I know take a lot of time. And came up with and miss Long and I are pretty close. I came up with just over $22 an hour.

And I think that's fair to make sure that people are compensated. I mean you can call it public service. But one thing I think of is the person who might want to run who needs a second job to make ends meet. Well, if this could be that second job and they could run and make a difference in their community, then they wouldn't have to worry about making that second job. And you would open it up to more people perhaps to be able to run for public office. So I am in favor of this. And

I support the ordinance. Well, you, Ms. Shaira. You're appreciated.

Hey. Good evening. Greg Gimbert, 255 Lico Avenue, Daytona Beach. I'm not here to tell you guys what you already know. I'm actually here to talk to any residents that may be listening live. I've gotten to know several of these council people over the years. As someone elected to earlier, half of this council came washing in on flooding. You don't usually get that kind of turnover in a city. You don't usually get type of regular person aspiring for a political office, number one, because the developers own them and they don't have the money to beat them. Most of these people are up here on a fluke, and they've served admirably.

But if you ever want people like this again, you can't count on a fluke to keep washing people in. I know how much they give. I know how much I've given up, personally, with the stuff that I do. I bet I gave up $40 in the last year of work I gave away so I could participate. These people have sacrificed way more.

It'll improve performance, whether you believe it or not. These folks are up here, like, grand a year. When you get tired, when you get beat down, you've got somebody talking crap about you, your phone out and everything else. And sometimes you just want to go, ah, I get like that at work. But you know what? I work for a guy so great. I get up and I make one more call. I do one more job. I bid one more thing for him when I can't do it for me. And I guarantee you, if you folks compensate your city officials correctly, they will feel that obligation. And when they're tired and worn out on this other one, they're still going to be there for you. And last but not least is the economic realities. I mean, knows the kind of inflation we're under. When this when their pay rate was set what was gas? $2 a gallon then?

From the dry cleaning, if you want your people to go out and look good, you can't expect this to be a vow of poverty. But that's what all these people are doing. And every other city that I've been in, I see rich people serving. That's not a bad thing. That's just people who have accumulated enough personal freedom where they can give among themselves, but they'll never ever have the perspective that you folks do. I work hard, but I haven't worked that hard. And some people never even get the chance to. But if you want a representative reflective of the residents, you've got to pay them something worth showing up. That's it. Thanks.

Thank you, sir, for your comments. I appreciate them.

Jim Lefkrim on 82 Jones Fish Camp Road. I agreed with everything everybody said here. You guys deserve a raise. I came from New Jersey. And one of the first things I did here was check the salaries of the council and the mayor.

And I

I was shocked. I was like, you like working for free. The race that they're talking about, it's it's more than doubling present, but you are working harder. And and by that, I mean, like, how many times in the last year have you had two council meetings in a month? You know?

You have to go through all of these plans, all of the development, all of these the paperwork that the people don't see, reviewing everything. It's a lot of work. So when it gets down to it, you're talking at a total budget of the city. You're talking less than a point 5% increase in the city budget. It's it's minuscule. You guys earn it. This is the most responsive council I've ever seen. K? And and I'm going back to my days in New Jersey. But you you guys are doing a terrific job, and you you have a target on your back from many people, and it's not fair.

And that in itself earns its pay. There's only one request I would make there, and that's that mister Thomas buys himself an email address. Thank you.

Hey. Thank you,

Can I can I ask him a question? Sure. Thank you, sir.

My name is Jim.

I rode down your road the other day with a city worker, Jones Fish Camp Road.

Yep.

Can people actually drive a car in those new garages?

Well, if they like them full of stuff yeah. Yeah. You can. You can. But the driveways are narrow. It's

I could not believe how small they were.

Yeah. Yeah. Well, on the townhouses, they're very small.

Yeah.

Yeah. I I I have a house, so it's a two car garage that you can fit one car in.

Well, I'm I'm sorry for you.

Yeah. Yeah. But that, you know and and once, you know, planning and zoning board. These guys are doing all of this work for nothing. This is this is free. That's true public service. But anyway, I wanna thank you all. And Debbie, thank you for your service. Didn't know you were in the Air Force. And congratulations on the award.

Thank you, sir. Your comments are appreciated.

Just, my name is Ken Cartesano. I wanted to take this extra opportunity to say that I agree with everybody else. I thought you guys got a raise years ago. The raise that you're proposing is really not enough. But I wanted to take the opportunity because last time we had a meeting, I was a little rambunctious in the gallery here.

I didn't even know I could get thrown out until today. So, you know, and I was a little impatient with you, Charlotte. And I don't really know much about you other than, you know, what I overhear and your zillions of conversations with Kim. But I do know that you're involved and you're a hands on person and you're you you know what's going on in this city. You're dedicated.

I mean, I know that about you and I I also know that about the guy sitting next to you. And the mayor, your honor, I totally disagree with you on so many subjects. But I totally respect you because you like the rest of you, you listen to what the people say. And I really appreciate it. You're doing a good job.

Thank you, sir, for your comments. I appreciate them. Council discussion.

Wow. Thank you. And I'd like to say that we have three planning and zoning members that are at these meetings, and they're listening, they're paying attention, and they're contributing. And I've been there. They don't get paid. They're doing their own. So the three of you, thank you.

Okay. Is there a motion to approve?

I make a motion to increase the annual salary for the mayor and the city council members.

Second, Rain Bird.

Roll call.

Councilwoman Gillis? Yes. Councilman Thomas? Yes. Councilwoman Dalbo? Yes. Councilman Rain Bird?

Yes. Mayor DePue?

Yes. Item nine b, first reading, order December 2026 dash zero dash o four, potable reuse charter amendment limitation on reclaimed blackwater use staff report.

Mister Laracy is gonna present on this, ordinance. Mister mayor.

I gave the impression it was only half, but it's a full page. Sorry. Good morning. Good evening, mayor and council. I would like to briefly summarize the memo the memo I sent to the city manager about possible restrictions on potable reuse and underground injection and what those could mean for the city of Edgewater.

Our public works and utilities department serve about 11,000 utility customers. Our wastewater treatment plant must treat wastewater to a high standard, removing nutritions, solids, and harmful bacteria. About 92% of the reclaimed water we produce, is used for irrigation throughout the city. The rest, unfortunately, is being discharged into the Indian River. Looking ahead, the city needs to re re remain flexible in how we manage our reclaimed water.

There are several options, including storage systems, potable reuse, infiltration basins, underground injection, and wetland parks. The planned wetland park in the Daring Park development will eliminate the need for routine discharging into Indian River. However, we must still plan responsibly for the next fifteen, twenty, thirty, forty years out. The public works and utilities department must ensure the city can adapt to future regulations and remain eligible for grant funding. This agenda item could unintentionally impact the future.

Because of the possible legal and financial risk involved, the the Public Works and Utilities Department recommends consulting with legal counsel on this matter. However, if any action is taken, the Public Works and Utilities Department recommends an ordinance rather than a charter amendment. An ordinance gives the city council control in the future. Wastewater regulations, environmental rules, and grant funding requirements can change over time. An ordinance would allow the city council the ability to update the ordinance to keep up with those future changes.

Thank you, sir.

Have any questions?

Mr. Manager, Mr. Attorney, would you like to add anything before we go to counsel's, citizens' comments? Okay. I've

talked to a few of you. I think you guys are all pretty familiar with this item. And you have different options on how you want to go about it. And they're all legally sound.

Thank you, sir. Up on the public hearing, citizens' comments.

Thank you. Jeff Brower, De Leon Springs, Florida. Not a resident of Edgewater, but I'm a resident of Volusia County. And what you just heard there was one thing that I heard said that is true. You are going to affect the future, not just of Edgewater, but of Volusia County.

I need to make it clear before I go on that I'm not here speaking for the Volusia County Council. I am, though, speaking as a public servant, just like you are, and as a resident of Volusia County. And I'm asking you to pass tonight a ban, a charter amendment to ban potable reuse, injecting cleaned up sewage water into our aquifer or into their drinking water. It's an absurd idea that we're actually having to talk about. We have one water in Volusia County.

It's all of our water. We have one water in the Indian River Lagoon. There is one reason that we are talking about this tonight, and that's because water has become politicized. The Florida legislature has given a tremendous gift to developers so that they can continue to build houses and whatever else they build right past our clean drinking water supply. This is the best growth control measure that you could ever pass.

Stop the development past our clean drinking water supply. And let's use the water that we have and protect the water that we have and not pollute it. It's now being discussed in Volusia County's largest city, Deltona. Discussed and funded to inject cleaned up sewage water into our aquifer. You just heard that you could either do a an ordinance which can be changed by any future politician, or you could be public servants and do a permanent ban through a charter amendment to keep this out of the hand of politicians.

The argument that you will hear, well, science could change. Well, I'm here to tell you, science changed last year. For decades, the Florida legislature has been saying, take this same order we're talking about and just pump it into the Antiover Lagoon right up the street here or or let the people drink it for decades. And in one year, they said, oops. That didn't work. The science didn't change. The reality of a bad decision changed. Now we have an Indian River Lagoon that we have fish kills in it. It's hard to grow clams sometimes. Even up here in Edgewater, where you're closer to an inlet than Ormond Beach and Holly Hill and Daytona Beach.

Daytona Beach, the largest city on the East Side, unanimously passed a ban because they want to stop polluting the Indian River Lagoon, and they don't wanna serve it to their citizens. Don't do an ordinance that a future group of politicians can change. Give this put this in the hands of your residents, of your citizens, and let them vote. Do you wanna drink cleaned up sewage water that the state of Florida said was good enough for the lagoon that has that is now killing it? Or what could possibly go wrong?

Well, that didn't work, so let's just put it in the aquifer. Let's just drink it. Let your citizens decide. Do they ever wanna do this? I bet they're gonna say, I don't want even a little bit of sewage water in my drinking water. It's like baking a beautiful apple pie for Thanksgiving and just putting a little bit of cat stuff in it. Nobody will ever know it's there. Who could it hurt? It will hurt all of us. It's one water.

It's all of our waters. You're not just voting for these residents tonight. You are one of the smaller cities on the East Side, but you are voting for Pearson, Florida. You're voting for Ponds Inlet. You're voting for every other small town that doesn't have their own water. They've gotta buy it from somebody else. And every single one of them have come out and said, don't do this. We oppose it. We don't want it. You're voting for every small city in in in Volusia County, and you're voting for all of us like me that runs an organic farm from a from a well.

Everybody on a well, once we start putting this into the aquifer, we don't just kill the lagoon. You kill your family, your grandchildren, your great grandchildren. This should be a permanent ban, not a temporary ordinance. Stand up, please. I know you people. Stand up and be public servants and take this easy vote. Ban putting toilet water into the water that we drink. Thank you.

Thank you, Mr. Brower, your comments. They're appreciated. Please no public participation at this time.

Hello, everyone. Y'all heard plenty about this from me. That's how I know how much y'all work. But tonight is not about an ordinance, and it's not about Bannon and going direct to customer because there's no plans to do that in Edgewater. Tonight is about earning that money you talked about. Tonight is about looking forward and protecting these people from our neighbors. The city of Deltona already has the money and they have the plan and they are gonna shoot sewage water into the aquifer. And anybody who's done any research on it whatsoever, whether they looked at the US Geological Service or Tampa Bay where they're doing it, every model says, oh, we put it down there. But by the time it works its way up, it's out to sea. It's fine.

Yeah. Well, by the time it works its way out from Deltona, it's gonna be at New Smyrna. It ain't gonna be out to sea. The this aquifer injection, oh, it'll just percolate up out in the ocean, is a flawed concept that doesn't even work at the coast. That's why Brevard County is so polluted because they've been doing it for going on twenty years. Luckily, the upper flows south and out south and out generally. What's gonna happen when Deltona starts pooping the aquifer? It's coming to you. It's coming to New Smyrna. And as hard as you work to clean up the lagoon, we certainly don't want it percolating up there.

So with all that and more respectfully, you're doing this not as an ordinance but as a charter amendment because you have the dignity to know that humans are fallible. You know that the commissioners that came before you did not treat the residents good. You've seen commissioners in other parts of Volusia not treat the the citizens good. Tonight, you had the strength to to demand the money that you've earned, and I want you to have the strength to do the job of the money. And that means to know when it's time to be selfless and to step back and give your residents a vote of one that they can build a future on, build a business on, plan to keep a family here on because nobody's staying for sewage water.

As soon as that starts percolating up everywhere, houses start to sell. Everybody that come leave does. Everybody that can't leave stuck. No more kids. No more business. It becomes affordable housing. Edgewater is better than that. Volusia County is better than that. So I'm asking you to vote today unanimously, not some penny any ordinance and not some half measure where we just ban it direct to customer. Vote for the whole thing. Just like the revolution vote amendment three that we already signed up for. We really just need one more vote. Right? So with all that, I implore you to please do the right thing for today. And for those kids that were here earlier, they're the ones that are going to have to drink it. Thank you.

Thank you, sir, for your comments. I appreciate it. Council comments. Who would like to go first? I don't know

if I go first.

We'll see

what we'll say. I mean, my biggest thing is I want to see it be with the potable reuse ban as well as the aquifer injection because what's the point of the one if you're still going to inject it in the aquifer and it's going to screw up the drinking water down the line anyway? I know it could put some extra steps into things down the line. But if we are going out of our way to get the reclaim out of the lagoon, why are we even talking about the possibility of putting it in the aquifer too? We're trying to clean up our drinking water.

We have enough issues with we got water issues with our water being green some places. I don't want black water going in anywhere to boot to make it even worse. I just I have a lot of feelings. But I want to see it move forward with both. And I am I'm aware that it could cause us issues in the future. But there's there's what's right. And I know the state wants to come in and try to tell us what to do on some things. And I'm not worried about this happening today. I'm not worried about this happening in five years. But I am worried that if we don't do something now, that there's possibility of something happened twenty years down the line.

And the truth is, how many things are happening today that we're finding out that somebody else approved twenty years ago and it's causing us problems, so with as far as projects and whatnot. And then there's other laws that I've seen passed where it's, oh, well, if you didn't have something on the books now or if you didn't have something on the books in 2011, you can't pass this ordinance now. So I would like to see something move forward tonight on that. And I believe that the people should have a say on it, and I would like to see it as a charter amendment. Mean, goes back to when we were talking about the deed earlier. Ordinances can be overturned. And I think that we should put our protections in our charter. This would be a protection on drinking water. And there's the other things talking about, about weeds that are coming up for charter review, about native plants and everything else. Ms.

Long spoke about, and I think was going to point at her, but I think she left. But a lot of those ordinances that are coming up are going to be to help us manage growth and help us manage our water. And I mean, I want to see no more building on wetlands. There's so many I want to stop the fill and build. There's so many other things that we can do to move forward that I would like to see in the charter, because like as it keeps getting said, ordinances can be easily overturned. And we shouldn't have our protections be able to be so easily overturned. So that's my thoughts.

Well, I always support letting the residents vote. I think that we are elected to represent the residents. But it's always best when you are directly going to the voters and the people that we represent. So I'm always for having the voters vote. As far as the whole toilet and the tap idea goes itself, I don't think that this is for, as Counseling Gill said, within the next five years, even possibly ten years.

But I certainly don't want my generation drinking dirty water. Now, there's been some concerns and talk about potentially hurting our grant funding and potentially hurting what we can go after. And it seems like the state says that we must have our water stopped pumping in the river by 2032 or any kind of bodies of water. Is that correct from what I hear?

Or to clean it

up there.

Oh, no public participation?

That is correct, yes.

So when is our next charter if this does affect anything, which I don't think it will, I think that it's definitely needed. I certainly don't want my residents drinking dirty water and not having strong water quality. So when is our next charter review?

Five years.

Five years.

Yes. So We can't put it on this charter review?

No, no, we can't. We're just saying if there's something effective, we could put it would potentially be before the next charter review. So that's just my thoughts and my concern, but I always support the residents being able to

I always support that, yes. I'd like to see it put on this plan. We don't have time to do that?

No. No. It certainly I'm is just saying that if there is any kind of concerns or anything, it could always be reversed at the next charter review amendment if we did miss out on funding opportunities by that 2032 date. That's just what a lot of residents have have spoken to me that they had concerns of. So, no, absolutely. This is for this charter review.

Okay. So I got two takeaways from what we just heard today. First of all, Edgewater is not planning on doing this. We just got approval of Deering Park. Deering Park has 40 wells, 20 more available. We got plenty of fresh water, folks. I don't want to drink no, as it's called, poopy water either. But it looks like we're not going to have to. And as far as our refuse, Deering Park's going be taking Mr. Solsz, 8,000,000 gallons a day away from the river, sending it that way, right?

The question you had asked earlier was what the city's current cup is for. That's what we're allowed to withdraw out of. What I was referencing is the total amount of water is almost about 30,000,000 gallons a day between what's out at Deering Park and what the city currently has that's in its own cup. The water that's going out to Deering Park is in the Wetland Park. And that's our treated sewage water. And that's going into those built cells.

And that won't be going into the river anymore.

And it won't be going into the river. And the city typically, in the summertime, that's where we discharge anywhere between half a million to over a million. It can't be greater than that during the summertime.

So that's 8,000,000 gallons a day that we're not going to have to be injecting into the ground, correct?

Correct.

So I don't know why we're worried about this for now. The other thing I heard was things that were done twenty years ago that we can't correct. They weren't ordinances, so they could have been corrected already. I asked a while ago if we can correct something. No, it can't be corrected. Daytona Beach did pass it. And I watched the meeting, and one of them said, well, it's going to be preempted anyway, so we might as well vote for it. I have three main questions. Again, I am not for poopy water. But I mean, we're talking about a unicorn right now.

We will not be doing it. We're reverse thinking, folks. We should be thinking, how are we going to stop Deltona from doing it? This is one freaking body of water. There's no way there's PFAS that we should be worrying about too, folks. We should be worrying about our water right now. There's PFAS in Delian Springs. You can't tell me that Delian Springs water isn't underneath us right now. We're worried about something that we're not gonna worry about. And again, I don't want it done. We're not gonna be doing it. But if we pass an amend charter review, they just said we can't change it for five years. If the people, everybody in the city can say, oh, wow, we made a mistake. We need to change it. You've got to wait five years now, folks.

You're right. An ordinance can be changed at the next meeting. And then we could we'll have another meeting in two weeks. In six weeks, we can if we decide that we made a mistake, St. John's Water Commission is gonna do what they wanna do. They're the managing body of the water in this state. And I know you guys are gonna be like, oh, Rain Bird wants poopy water. I'm just trying to do this the best way for you. Because if we make a mistake doing this, and we can't get a cups in the three of you, Mr. Solstice, Mr.

City Attorney, Mr. City Manager, I have three main questions here. Will it cause a possible raise in water rates? Will it stop the city from attaining water related funding for projects? Can it affect our cups increase if we need it?

So mister Rambert, we're unsure. That's the that was a recommendation from staff. We are unsure of what the possible side effect it is for funding in the future.

Can we get fined? I mean, yeah, it's great. Let's ban poopy water. But we will not be doing it, folks. And to make something as permanent I mean, everybody up here was afraid of pissing off Tom Wright. I'd rather piss off Tom Wright than piss off St. John's Water Commission. I'm just saying. And everybody's in a hurry to do everything. I think we should get some kind of cost effective study on we have to have alternatives, correct?

Yes, sir.

We're already talking about we don't have money for anything, folks. And we're trying to get grants, grants, grants. We could be getting ourselves into some trouble here. And I got no filter. I'm just speaking out loud. I do not want poopy water here. But it doesn't look like we will, unless it comes from Deltona.

Well, we can do the charter. I mean, the charter review is every five years. But there's an election every two. So theoretically, if there was actually an issue, you could fix it in two years, not five.

You guys willing to wait two years? Okay.

I just I mean, I'm coming from a standpoint, like I said, for everything in the future. I mean, like he said before, I got four kids. In twenty, thirty years, I don't want them drinking that. The one outspoken over there, she's got seven kids. In twenty, thirty years, I don't want to see her seven kids doing that. I mean, anybody out there with kids because this isn't about me. This is about I'm worried about the future. I'm worried about what's going to happen twenty, thirty, forty years from now. And that's where my concern is. And if there's something that we don't try to work on bettering our water supply now, I mean, the future like, where are we going to be thirty years from now? That's I mean and I think that we should I mean, let the residents vote.

What else are we doing to better our water supply then? Right now, we're doing nothing except we're going to ban something that we're not going to do. We need to get on it. And I'm telling you, Deltona, they're just going to do what they want. We need to find a way that we can get an injunction or something to stop them. Because, again, the woman with seven kids, you're not going be getting crap order from us.

You don't know that if you don't

walk away.

But is there public participation in the house closed?

Let me just jump in with one legal point I think somebody made. So in the charter, it says that every five years, there's a charter review committee. They come up with some ideas. They go to you and you choose. That doesn't preclude you at any time from just coming up with a proposed charter amendment because the next section of the charter says the charter can be amended with general law. That's a fancy way of saying there's a Florida statute that already exists that gives you power. So it's not your charter, but it's your power. So you can just come up with a charter amendment that you'd like to see proposed that people can vote on at any time anyway. So I just wanted to make that one technical point. The five year thing is superfluous. It's extra. It's different. You still have the ability to just amend the charter or propose a charter amendment.

And I mean And if Bob I'm not mistaken

to a special election, though. Correct?

If I'm not mistaken For

a special referendum voter referendum?

Correct. Yeah. The dates are the the the council can choose the dates. Correct.

If I'm not mistaken, the Saint Johns River water management, those people are appointed by the governor. Am I not correct? Exactly. Remember that when you go to the polls, if he appoints them, just like the FWC, he appoints them. They're not elected by the people. They're not listening to the people. So when you go to the polls, you remember that.

I have a question just following up on, Anthony, what you said about that. So the charter review is every five years. But having said that, if if, current counsel at that time would like to make a revision on the charter, there would have to be a special election because it would have to be voted on by the people?

The charter amendments that are given to the city still have to be set on the general election according to Florida, this Florida statute on the subject. So it still has to be

Every two years.

Put on the correct.

Yes, ma'am. Okay.

All right. Well, I have my concerns are from, thirty to forty years from now, Edgewater's need to find a new source of potable water. We have a charter amendment banning the city from the utility for doing the black water. No direct injections of the aquifer. That's all if it was to be put in the charter.

Could this put the city in a situation where we need to find another source of water? How do we find it? What would be the cost to the residents? Imagine if we had engineer a new treatment plant specifically to address the alternative water source that we're going to do because in our ordinance, we're not allowing the poopy water, which I am not for in any way. But here are the things I'm curious about. What would the utility increases look like for the residents at that time when we're banning what we want to ban and we have to find alternative sources, which there's got to be something out there. I don't know what it is. I'm not an engineer. But what's that going to cost the residents? And that's a big thing.

We worry about utilities every year keeping everything low. And something like that happens, then it's going be a new address for a council at that time. I know these are what if scenarios, but it's a what if that we still need to have a conversation about. And I would like to have a full analysis cost of what it would look like if that were to happen if we were to ban this, which, again, I'm not for injecting the aquifer. I'm not for black water. But I want to know what it's going to cost the residents, what it's going cost the city. What are we looking at? I don't want to jump on the bandwagon just because it's a hot topic right now. And as Eric said, we're not planning on doing it. This is not something that we are planning on doing ever.

I mean, thirty, fifty years, I don't know. But this is not on our radar at all. And I don't want to rush into doing something that may take longer to get out of. And Jeff had a lot of good points during his presentation about possible consequences. Well, we don't know. But I think we need to do our due diligence and learn a little bit more about what it could cost the city. I'm not for aquifer injections. I'm not for drinking the black water. But I don't want to jump into a situation without knowing more facts about it. So that's where I'm at with that.

I don't know. I've got a couple of things. So I think when we're talking about there are a few things. Okay. So I don't think that if we put it out to residents, if they said, we may not get an x dollar grant because of this, that they are going to say, oh, we wish we got that extra $20 versus drink possibly drinking sewage water.

So I think there's that there. But then also, when you run like, I'm going to say the quiet part out loud. Once you hit a certain point where you're saying we are running out of water, at what point does that help stop development? Because there's not I mean, once we hit the amount where we don't have clean water to allow it to up our cup limit, shouldn't we let them have them stop building? I mean, there's a certain point where it's got to slow the development because if there's if we've only got a certain cup limit, we could say that St.

John's is going do what St. John's is going to do. But once we get to that point, nobody knows what St. John's is going to do in thirty years from now if we start hitting our limit of clean water. So why do we have to go to Blackwater as an option? Why are we not looking at other We shouldn't have

to go to Blackwater as an option. I agree 100%. Ordinance versus charter charter is very permanent, not forever. But ordinance, if we were to even investigate after there's a lot of questions that I have for staff that we're following up on. I don't have the answers to everything yet.

An ordinance is not as permanent, but there would be no future counsel who would sit up here and say, oh, have to change this ordinance because we want our residents to drink coopy water. I just want more information. I think it's important for the residents to decide. In the long run, is a big decision for them. But I guess I want the residents and counsel to have as much information as we can going forward. And that's all I'm asking for is more information. I don't want to jump in the fire with two feet without knowing more information about it. And the residents should have a voice in way to size the city. But they don't have enough information. They're reading everything on Facebook.

I'm sorry I don't believe Facebook. I believe my staff. I believe the staff of the city will give us counsel the good information that we can use our best judgment on, not listening to a lot of there's a lot of voices out there, a lot of voices who have agendas or things. I just want to make sure I want to know I'm making the best decision for the city and for the residents. I want them to be able to make the best decisions for themselves, the residents, with the information that is given them. I want to I just don't want to jump in real fast. That's all. I'm not for putting on a charter if that's what needs to be, but I just want more information before we put that out there.

GREGORY We've stood up to the state several times. And the state tells us to just sit down and shut up. So I got no faith in any of them anymore. I agree. If St. John's wants to come and start injecting it right there, they're going to. I think, again, we've to worry about stopping other places from doing it. And we're being told that we can. So

the state will come yeah, in like like SB one hundred eighty. They did the I mean, we could have the charter. We could all vote for it. And the state will come in like they did with the moratorium. And it was defeating, the fact that they can come in and do that and remove the power that the residents have that we have over our community and how we to enjoy the community have healthy, clean air and water. And that's just a scary fact.

And I do agree. I do agree with what Councilman Dobo says. I don't think there's anybody stupid enough to sit up here and say, injecting water.

It ain't going to make that happen. I

Well, I'm for letting the residents vote always. I think that they could do their own research as well.

Well, then why are we here?

Outside of

Let's let the residents vote on everything in this city.

I think we probably should. And we're elected. We're five of us. But there's also 25,000 individuals out there that should make sure that their voices are always heard. And the easiest way to do that is a charter amendment. So I I necessarily think that it could be reversed if it if it is an issue. And cup level sizes, at that point in time, what I've been told, if it is a strong issue, like we've already discussed tonight, the state would step in. So I don't I I'm always for I said this again. I'm always for letting the residents vote.

The state would step in against the state?

I'm sorry. What was that?

The state would step in against the state?

The state would step into our water supply if we couldn't increase it by a certain amount of time. Yes.

So if the

state We don't have a survey.

Our cups, the state will increase our cups.

That's not necessarily the how it works.

Not necessarily. We don't know. That's the thing. We don't know what our

consequences the process of what the cup increase goes if we don't increase it by a certain amount of time. Yes. The state will step in, and there is consequences from that, absolutely, miss Rainberg. You are correct. But the state will step in if we get to that point in time. And by then, we could always reverse the charter because I don't see that happening to the city of Edgewater with drinking water that we have in Deering Park in the next five to ten years. But I'm not I'm I'm not for drinking poopy water, as we've already discussed it tonight and gave it that name. I'm not for us losing out on grant money, but I'm just solely for the fact of the residents voting. That's my opinion.

I've heard from quite a few residents, and I'm I mean, I'm getting calls from Oak Hill because a lot of Oak Hill gets their water from us. So I mean, they're, and they, they wouldn't even vote on our charter thing. But I mean, I am hearing from a lot of Edgewater residents and then concern from Oak Hill residents. I mean, and I would like to see it be put, you know, and I want to see more water protections and environmental protections put into the charter. And there's other things that we could be doing. We can be working on those, too. If you've got something you want us something else you want to bring up to put on there, let's bring it forward. I'm all for it. I mean, I just think that we should let the people vote.

All I'm saying is they shouldn't be calling you. They should be calling Deltona. Oak Hill should be calling Deltona.

Well, we can do a good I mean, if we pass something here, that's a good faith effort moving forward and pushing the other cities forward and show them how to do the right thing. And that's let their people vote.

And what I'd like to interject real quick on behalf of the people I represent Deltona, are you listening? We're talking about you guys a lot.

Should be a regional effort with St. Water management along with individuals in Volusia County. It shouldn't just be us. And if there are negative effects, there's been other municipalities where this hasn't necessarily been discussed as being a crucial fact in other municipalities that still also have to increase their cup size as well. So are there any other discussions?

I say take a stand on it.

I I say we let the people vote.

I say pass the ordinance against the injection, and put it on the charter amendment to vote.

Is there any other discussion?

Well, if that's the way you guys wanna go, I'm all with you guys. I'm gonna stand behind you. I just wanted to voice the concerns that I have. Don't want the poopy water. I just hope, guys, that this don't bite us in the butt.

Well, I said it during the moratorium. Councilwoman Debbie Dabo just said it. You don't know what you don't know, but we had to take a stance.

Okay. So if we do get a lawsuit or anything, we discuss this. Okay.

Well, I would like to.

Make a motion? I wanted Make a motion. Sorry. Is there a representative from Deering Park here that can how much how much water are y'all selling to Titusville every day? Can anybody answer that? Can can you come up and tell us how much water y'all are selling to because, you know, their their water is salt intrusive. So we buy the the city whole city of Titusville buys their drinking water from us. How much do we sell to Titusville every day?

Sean Steffen, 3450 Old Nelson Ranch Road. I'm the project director for Deering Park, the development side. I can't answer that question on behalf of the landowner. I don't know the answer to that.

Oh, you don't? You don't know the answer.

No, don't.

Okay. Well, it's a lot. I know that.

Okay.

Let's wait for councilman Rainberg if it does go to a vote. Are there any further discussion?

I want to make a motion, and so I want to include in my motion. So I wanna make a motion to approve the first reading of ordinance twenty twenty six-zero-four, banning potable reuse charter amendment limitation on reclaimed backwater use. But also, want to include I want it to be the amendment that also lists aquifer injection. I want that clarified. There was two amendments that were proposed. One was talking about aquifer injection. One was not. And I want to clarify. I want to. That's the one that I am seeking to make a motion to pass for the charter amendment this evening.

Is there a second?

Second, Rainberg.

Roll call.

Councilwoman Gillis? Yes. Councilman Thomas? Yes. Councilwoman Dalbo?

I wanna vote yes. Although I I voiced my concerns about the cost and things like that to move things along, I'm gonna be a yes because at the end of the day, it's the resident's choice.

Councilman Rainbird?

Yes. Mayor DePue?

Yes. Item nine b, first reading, order number 2026ODashO4. Possible reads oh, sorry. Item nine c, first reading, order number 2026Dash0DashO5. Possible.

You guys went forward with the charter amendment.

This was the other proposal.

I mean, we can Yeah.

If you wanted. So you would just skip over if you wish.

We can do both and call it a day.

That's legally true. There's nothing prohibiting you guys from going ordinance and charter. I'm not pushing you either way. I'm just letting you know there's you can do all, you can do none, you can do one or the other. It's your

What's the consensus of the city charter? For office city council, we've already done a charter.

Mean, do we have to do an well, do we have to open for public comment or do anything else first? I mean, I'll make a motion to approve the next one.

Yes, of course, you have to have the citizens' comments on something we're moving on. Okay. So are we moving forward with the ordinance as well,

or Yeah.

Don't city have charter

And if you're moving forward with a motion I thought I heard a motion. You would clarify the language. You want to include both prohibitions, correct? Okay. I just wanted to make that on the record.

You just wanted to separate motions?

No. What I was saying was, well, I didn't know if he had to do another presentation because we already did a presentation on the item is what I was getting at before.

No. You can just go right in.

So there's consensus to also do a ban on audible reuse as far as that ordinance goes. Is that what I'm hearing?

I give consensus for that. I mean, we already did the charter amendment.

Why? Well Why do we need to do this if we're gonna go with a charter amendment?

So so the ordinance would be immediate after the second reading next month. The Charter amendment, of course, would take effect, upon passage, which, of course, is the November election. So that's that's the only legal difference.

Legal difference.

I get it. But that's not letting the people vote. We vote, and then they vote. We should just okay. I get it. Let's do it now.

There's a consensus to open this up with Councilman Thomas? What? To have an ordinance as well.

Yeah. That's fine. I feel there's no need to have the ordinance if we're going to vote for it. We're not planning on doing this anytime in the near future. But that's fine. If the council wants to do it

Yeah, we don't need discussion. We've been here long enough discussing it. Ordinance.

Whatever you want.

Okay. Item nine, I take that as consensus. Item 9C, first reading order summary twenty twenty six-zero-five, prohibition on direct potable reuse of reclaimed Blackwater staff report. Citizens comments.

Kimber, Daytona, you did the most important thing. You sent the message for today and tomorrow. Thank you all so much. If you wanna underline it, the only reason to pass an ordinance is a placeholder and a protection until we get to the vote. It does not it is not more important than the charter amendment. The charter amendment was the gold standard, and you did it. God bless you all. But if you wanna underline it, you pass the ordinance, and you go home knowing you did it to the t. And mister Rainberg, you have sent the message to Deltona. They need to hear that nobody's on board with this, and and thank you for your strength tonight, all of you. Thank you.

Thank you, sir, for your comments.

Cynthia Black, Umbrella Tree. I want to remind you that or maybe you're not aware there are times that we actually run out of reclaimed water.

So you may want to

keep that in mind. I know we've had that problem for many years. In fact, when they first installed the reclaimed water system, system, there was a shortage. It would just basically spit out of the system. So we were paying and not even getting reclaimed because they couldn't produce it fast enough. Another thing as far as where ville gets their water, I know that they have the Deering Park owns a lot of land all the way down into Brevard County, and they have aquifers down into Brevard County. So they're getting their water from an aquifer down there West of 95. That's

all. Thank you.

Thank you for your comments.

Quick comment. I know it's getting late. Y'all can pass it?

Can you state your name and address