City Council Regular Meeting - Regular Meeting

[Applause] All right. Good afternoon everyone and thank you for being here and welcome to this uh regular meeting with the city council of Fort Walton Beach, Florida. If you do have an electronic device, if you would please check it out real quick and make sure that it is on silent. We will uh call this meeting to order and we will rise for uh the invocation. our pastor, Pastor Estabbon Santana, wasn't able to make it. However, in hisstead, we do have Elder Harold Sanders here. And then at the end of the the uh invocation, if you could please stay standing for the pledge of allegiance. [Applause] Do you have any volunteers that wish to

I'll lead us. All right. Okay. Heavenly Father, thank you for this day. Thank you for this time together. Lord, thank you for our many blessings we all receive. Lord, we ask that you uh lead us and guide us in your ways and your teachings. And Lord, we ask that you bless the remainder of this meeting and all who are here today. We ask all these things in your name. Amen. I pledge algiance to the flag of the United States of America and to the republic for which it stands. One nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.

All right, council. We need approval of tonight's agenda. Second. Motion by Councilman Jeter, seconded by Councilwoman Barry to approve tonight's agenda. Any additional comments?

Seeing none, please go. Council [Applause] [Music] did pass. I'm sorry. Okay. Yeah, there we go. All right. That brings us to item five, proclamations. Do we have anyone here tonight representing the American Liver Foundation? Please come on up. Just want to read a a brief uh thing about what you all do. Liver disease affects an estimated 100 million Americans. Yet many are unaware of the risks, which include diabetes, heart disease, and obesity. There are more than 100 types of liver conditions with fatty liver disease now the most common, especially among children. where rates have more than doubled in the past 20 years. Raising awareness is critical to addressing this often overlooked health crisis. The American Liver Foundation is leading efforts nationwide to highlight prevention, treatment, and the importance of liver health. Therefore, I'm proud to proclaim October 2025 as National Liver Awareness Month in the city of Fort Walton Beach and encourage all residents to join in supporting awareness and education efforts. And ma'am, you are

Oh, my name is Casey Flores. I just wanted to say thank you on behalf of American Liver Foundation for helping us uh raise awareness in our area. And thank you, ma'am, for what you do. And here's our proclamation if you'd like to to take with you. Thank you very much. Thank you very much.

All right, one more quick proclamation here cuz October can be many things for many people. Uh, today we recognize the proud heritage and lasting I'm sorry. Is there anyone here tonight from the Italian American Heritage Association? There you are. All right, you guys. Come on up there. We want to recognize the proud heritage and lasting contributions of Italian-Americans in Florida and here in Fort Walden Beach. Italian-American Heritage Month, first established nationally in 1989, celebrates the economic, educational, and cultural impact of more than 1.3 million Italian-Americans in our state. From scholarships and community service to preserving cultural traditions, Italian-American organizations such as the Sons of Italy and our own Joseph B. Franelia Lodge have enriched our communities for decades. Therefore, I'm honored to proclaim October 2025 as Italian American Heritage and Culture Month in the city of Fort Walton Beach and encourage everyone to celebrate and honor this rich history. And who are y'all?

My name is Janet Ral and I'm the vice president of the club. My name is John Baratiano and I'm the uh immediate past president and I'm Elizabeth Hale of publicity and member. Fantastic. Is there anything y'all wanted to share with the room? We thank you very much for honoring our organization. Fantastic. I I have a very Italian last name myself. Make sure that you get an application. An application. I don't know if we run some type of a DNA situation. what we're going to get. But

I do have a very thanks all for being here. We really appreciate it and thanks for all you do for our community. Thank you. Here we go. All of us here together.

All right. Thank you.

Appreciate All right. And we do also have two uh student aids awards for uh excellent students here in our community. So, first we will call up Mr. Rock Robert Dugan from Fort Walden Beach High School. And if you have any family or friends here with you tonight, please also come up to the front. I'm going to tell everybody a brief bit about you before you can tell everybody about yourself. Brock Robert Dugan ranked first in his class of 361 with an extraordinary and this doesn't even sound believable bro 4.80 80 GPA. Goodness gracious. Distinguished himself as a true scholar and leader. Earned multiple perfect scores on state end of course exams. Achieved top scores on advanced placement tests and has been recognized as an AP scholar, a Sunshine State Scholar nominee, and a College Board National Recognition Program Awardee. Beyond the classroom, Brock is a dedicated athlete competing on the Fort Balton Beach High School varsity tennis team and excelling in regional pickle ball tournaments. He's also presented or I'm sorry, represented his peers as boy state delegate, beta club officer, and an active member of the National Honor Society and Ftheta Kappa. Equally committed to his community, Brock has volunteered countless hours leading beach cleanups, mentoring youth students through tennis camps, supporting local churches and charities, and assisting elderly neighbors and with yard work and home projects. Whether in academics, athletics, leadership, or service, Brock demonstrates integrity, discipline, and a commitment to excellence, making him a highly worthy recipient of the student ACE award. Congratulations, man. So, tell us tell us where you plan to go to school and further your education.

Uh, Auburn University. Nice. War Eagle, man. That's awesome. What are you going to be studying? Uh, engineering. Very good. Well, congratulations, man. We got this uh award for you here. And if you want to come up with I assume that's your mom. You can get a picture. Fantastic, y'all. Thank you. Congratulations.

All right. And we have one more award here for excellent student in our community, Miss Bailey Hamilton. [Music] Bailey Hamilton, ranked first in her class with a 4.72 GPA, is a shining example of scholarship, leadership, and service. A dedicated international balorette and advanced placement student, Bailey has earned top academic honors while balancing a strong work ethic outside of school. Teachers praise her as an incredible student who builds meaningful relationships, excels as a communicator, and continuously seeks growth. Baileyy's leadership extends beyond the classroom as a president of the Spanish Honor Society, a member of the National Honor Society and a mentor in the link crew freshman program. She also participates in Key Club, literacy club, and school leadership initiatives. In addition, Bailey has demonstrated independence and responsibility through her work experience, serving as an assistant manager at Bamboo Sushi and Abachi Express. Very good. And holding positions at Carter's Babies and Kids Store and Hunter Coffee. Equally committed to a community, Bailey's contributed through school cleanups, mentoring younger students, supporting local fundraisers, and participating in service projects such as the kidney walk and children in crisis initiatives. With her academic excellence, leadership, and passion for helping others, the city of Fort Walden Beach honored to recognize Bailey Hamilton with a student ACE award for her outstanding achievements and commitment to excellence. Congrat And please tell us what you uh plan to study in the future and where you plan to go.

I plan to go to FSU. Um and I hope to go through um their their law school at FSU. Um I'm more leaning towards environmental law. Um and then I also want to study international relations so I could do like um abroad programs. Nice. So very impressive. Congratulations to you. And if you want to come up and grab this and You can come up and get in the picture as well. You can take it.

We don't have to turn it off. Thank you all very much and congratulations. [Applause] It's always great to see so many uh great young people in our community and uh especially crazy high GPA ranked first in the class. My goodness. How do we get both first place in one night? Whoever was responsible for that good job. Oh, that moves us to our consent agenda.

I just saw a bunch of cheerleader girls out there. Are they coming up? So, they'll be coming up during public comment. Did they get They'll be talking some smack to the mayor of Shalomar. That's just a That's just a preview of yet what's yet to come. So, y'all stay here on the edge of your seat. Uh item seven, the consent agenda. Any action on that, council? Mr. Mayor, Mr. Mayor, I'd like to just pull out this real quick item um five and six. No, I'm sorry, three and four just for a couple of questions there. Okay. Um immediately follow.

So, that's your your motion. That would be my motion. Got a second to the motion. Second. Motion by Councilman Walker, seconded by Councilman Jeter to approve the consent agenda minus items 7.3 and 7.4, which we will discuss directly after the approval or disapproval of this consent agenda. Any additional comments? Council, please vote. Passes unanimously. Councilman Walker, your questions regarding item 7.3 to uh Mr. Davis.

Would it be to Mr. Davis? Just curious. I know that um in the leadup to the charter amendments that you know some of these benefits uh were you know potentially under threat of having to be reduced or premiums increased. Well, back can you describe or list any actions that had to change due to the charter amendments? were were premium were deductibles increased or anything that got this in under the line uh to meet those charter amendment requirements. So right now nothing just before I started the conversation I had to speed before I started the conversations were 10 and a half and 11% potential increase. Um, fast forward, I start that first week, Derek made some phone calls and they all of a sudden brought their numbers down to 3, 3 and 1/2, don't remember. But that put us well within the the limit. So, there's been no changes. That being said, at the end of this, we're going back out for competitive bid with other correct with we've already started the process of putting together what we want.

Sure. Uh the phrases that I've heard is whatever this company is PRM or whatever they win it every year because it's kind of geared towards them. So it's going to be substantially more competitive on the next round. See where we can get. Thank you. That answers your question. Yes, sir. Council get [Applause] a motion to approve those two items. You will and I do them separately unless you were want to talk about the second one. I'm sorry. That was just um those were both. Okay. Both. Yes. And you you can approve them both at once. I make a motion that we approve items 73 and four.

Motion by Councilman Walker, second by Councilman Jeter to approve items from the consent agenda that were removed 7.3 and 7.4. Any additional comments? Council, please vote. [Music] does pass unanimously, which moves us to item eight, mayor and council comments. We start tonight with the lovely Miss Gloria de. Uh yes, I would like to say thank you to everyone uh from the senior center at Fort Bal Beach Recreation Center. Uh September was National Senior Center um month and we had ice cream social one Friday and this last Friday was the lump uh cooking class. It it was wonderful and I want to thank everyone that uh came and uh shared the ice cream and the staff that helped uh set it up and and uh it was really really good and I hope we'll have more events like that at the recreation center for us. Thank you.

Very well done. Thank you Councilman Jeter. Councilman Mel Council

Councilman just want to commend Mr. ators and team on the initiative for cleanest city in the coast. Um the initiative is very wellreceived and it's a culture shift. Anytime you shift the culture, there's going to be some growing things and appreciate the the strong but humble approach that we're having uh to educate, encourage, and enforce. I just want to encourage our teams to keep leaning in and encourage residents to keep corresponding with either your representatives or with staff to to improve this process, but we're not looking back. Hopefully, we're going to continue in on being the city of East Coast. Other than that, thank you, Councilman Walker.

Yes. I'd like to also thank Mr. Davis for his uh continued efforts with me and my uh and Chief Beige and his team, Lieutenant Commander Williams, uh for their assistance and pulling together and combining the efforts by the police department, code enforcement and my and the property owners bill of rights that I submitted. I got an email yes recently. they all run together. Uh but it showed the combined efforts of their work and that bill of rights coming together and I look forward to the continued comment about that. Um so I just wanted to thank the team for that. Thank you sir. Councilman Brown.

All right. I'll just very briefly mention as well that I want to thank the Boys and Girls Club of Fort Walton Beach for uh the event that they put on this past Saturday and guessing um everything other than the parking situation which of course was had nothing to do with them and everything to do with people loving uh to visit our area. Um but what a fantastic event it was. It was always get the words out of order but I believe it was bourbon beer and burgers or bourbon burgers and beer however it was. I was a judge, which I did not realize that that meant you had to sample 14 different hamburgers. So, one bite of 14 hamburgers was at well more than one hamburger. It definitely felt that way. But, uh, all the restaurants that participated in as well, it's a huge fundraiser for the Boys and Girls Club and they do fantastic work. So, thanks again.

14 bourbons. I didn't have any bourbon or beer. I knew better. It was a hot Saturday afternoon and that would have involved me taking a very long nap. So approaching that's true. I should have used you on that one. Um let's go to I have nine public comments and let's first uh welcome in before before we do anyone else because I know they've got a lot of people here and they probably have to leave. Let's bring in the four beach Bucks and Mr. James Leewoods. He's got a big announcement for us. A big game. Big game coming. We'll give you a minute as everyone finals in.

What's up, dudes? How are y'all? Thanks for coming out here today. You guys must be a 14 and under team, right?

Greetings, Mr. Mayor. Ladies and gentlemen of the council, uh, Mr. Mayor, we're here because it's that time of year again. The annual battle of the bridge, the seventh annual battle of the bridge now, is going to take place this Saturday between us and Shalomar. This is the game that decides which city controls that bridge. which city's mayor is going to bring the trophy back to his city hall and city pride and uh Shelomar's hosting this year. So, I'd like to remind you of the time zone change when we cross that bridge, turning back and bring a launch. Oh, wait a minute. They're so far behind that they're actually going to play the game on our side of the bridge this year. The game has been moved to Chalkaw High School. So this Saturday, 10:30 a.m. at Sharksaw High School, these kids are going to play the Battle of the Bridge for our city's pride.

Now, over the past 2 years, our teams have been 6 and2 on bridge day. But those two losses were the two games that decided control of the bridge. We haven't had the bridge in 3 years, Mr. Mayor. And we have a chance to change that this Saturday. I'm joined at the podium by Coach A and some of the the Pee-Wee player. This is a seven and eight year olds. These are the warriors were sent into battle this Saturday, Mr. Mayor. Little history about the bridge. The bridge was built in 1931. It was it was part of the Port Dixie project. It was a failed project of the 30s. It was called the Port Dixie Bridge until 1947 when Shalomar became incorporated and that's when it became known as the Shalomar Bridge. Now, Mr. Mayor, our city was incorporated in 1941, 6 years earlier. That should be our name on the bridge. That's what these kids want is our name on that bridge. Three of the first six battles amazingly took place while both teams were undefeated. Sadly, that will not be the case this year, but it's not the fault of these guys. These kids are five and 0 heading into the battle of the bridge.

Let's go. Shamar did a 4-1. And since Shelomar appears to be at a disadvantage this year, I'm going to try and even things out right now by giving Shelomar our game plan. Hey Shelomar, our game plan is to run you over. Fantastic. To the rest of the council, this is a home game for Shalomar and we do not control the game. Shalomar is going to be charging about five bucks to to get in. Bucks. Bucks. Bucks. Bucks. $5.

I got to volunteer if someone wants a buck. But, uh, shall be, we charge about five bucks to get it. We still want you there, though. We hope you'll come. This is a city event. We hope you'll come and sit on our sideline and cheer for our kids as they play for our city's bridge and that trophy that'll go into your office. Now, uh, Jeff Peters, you told me that if I personally invited you, you would come. I'm personally inviting you right now in front of the world. Jeff Peters, come to our game this Saturday. To the city manager, the city attorney, to every city employee, everyone in the gallery, and everyone behind that camera. You guys make up the city. These kids are playing for you. We hope you guys will come this Saturday and sit on our sideline and cheer for our kids as they go to reclaim that bridge for our city this Saturday, 10:30, Chalkaw High School. We hope you'll be there, Mr. Mayor. Again, everyone try it out, Mr. Mayor.

Let's go. Can't wait. [Applause] Miss Riley, Mr. Bear, thank y'all very much. I very much look forward to the game and I know y'all are going to come out on top. I can't wait to be there and I invite everybody else to come watch it as well. Y'all kick some butt. [Applause] [Music]

I don't know that we've ever seen a better hype man. Fantastic. Mr. That was strong. All right. I don't know who wants to follow that, but we're still into uh public comments. Anybody with a comment on anything that's not on tonight's agenda, please step forward to the microphone and just tell us your name and address, and we'll give you 5 minutes to speak. [Music]

Hello everyone. Hope you're having a great day. My name is Gail Sansbury. I'm with the Fort Walton Beach Housing Authority. I just want to put this on your radar. Um we had a wonderful uh groundbreaking uh a couple weeks ago and now it's time to move forward for phase 2, three and four. So with that being said, um Florida Housing Finance Corp, they're cons uh always want the city and the county to buy into the uh deals as far as moving forward with um affordable and workforce housing. With that being said, in the ties, the council have um for the sale deal, the council have approved um $20,000. And that could be in like permit fees, tap fees, or so forth. Those type of things that would get us across the finish line to put those applications in. And then the next one, which is due in October, around October the 29th, that is due in um the next one is a 9% tax credit deal. That's the big one. Um, they only normally let one or two go a year. Last year they only had one. So that's throughout the entire state of Florida. And anybody can write for these um these grants um through Florida Housing uh financial uh core. So and that one is due in November. So the pledge is 20,000 for the sale and for the 9% it's $340,000. And what it is when we do these applications, you have to do a commitment letter that you are willing to participate if the housing authority or the developer receive the grant. uh because these FRAs just came out, it'll be way over into 2627 if we are granted those those grants

that you will have to commit to that. So, I wanted to put that on your radar just for when you're doing budget purpose to bring more affordable housing, workforce housing into this community. Unfortunately, affordable housing does not allow you to do it without the commitment of your municipalities. Uh the county has commit um worked with us in the past and so have the city. So I just want to bring this back to your attention when you're thinking about that because I will be making the ask as soon as the RFAS get completed. Any questions? Thank you, Miss Sansbury. Any questions? Council Smith, you said that 46 27 budget year requested. Okay.

Cuz you know the way Florida housing work is um you make the RFAS, you put your application in and then they rank them in score. So if I'm selected, if we're selected, it takes a while for them to do a commitment letter um because of the funding that they're going to put in. So, by the time you go through all the changes and signing all the documents and paperwork, you're talking 26, 27. I don't know if you remember or recall, but we actually started before we did baseline raise. We actually came to you back in 23, which we are now just not getting that deal done. I just wanted to make sure there was nothing like in this immediate budget that were

Oh, no. I just wanted clarification. Thank you, Miss Kim. Not not not you need it. Anyone else questions for Miss Sans? Thank you for being here. Thank you for letting us know about that. Anyone else from the public wish to speak? Yes, ma'am. Hi.

Okay. Uh good evening, council members. Uh my name is Rachel Clark and I'm here on behalf of the residents of Ashley Lane. I am asking for your help because our road has deteriorated to the point that is no longer safe. and more urgently, ambulances and other emergency services cannot reliably access our homes. This is not just an inconvenience, it's a matter of public safety. If an ambulance cannot reach a home on Ashley Lane in time, lives are at risk. For years, residents have been working with the city, sending letters, making calls, and attending meetings, but no meaningful action has taken time has been taken. In that time, the road has only gotten worse. To give you a sense of scale, Ashley Lane is approximately 650 linear feet long, yet it is riddled with dozens of deep potholes across that short stretch. This directly impacts 32 parcels, dozens of families, and an apartment complex. The road is simply not dependable for emergency medical access. Um, we have pursued every possible alternative. We researched plats and covenants, contacted nearly every property owner. We've applied for the Okaloosa County MSBU program. The county confirmed what we already knew, uh, that Ashley Wayne is inside the city limits. They cannot help. And without an HOA, there is no way to organize or enforce collective repairs among the dozens of owners. That leaves residents with no mechanism, no enforcement, and no path forward on our own. No single owner and no small group of owners can possibly manage or fund this project alone after decades of neglect. While Ashley Lane is technically a private road, it is a community lifeline. It serves dozens of homes in an apartment complex. When ambulances and emergency services cannot reliably

reach us, this is not just a a private inconvenience. It's a city-wide public safety concern. And we're not asking the city to shoulder this alone. Many owners are willing to contribute to both short-term patches and a long-term fix. But without city leadership and authority, nothing can happen. Tonight, we're asking for three things. We want an immediate safety intervention so ambulances and emergency services can access Ashley Lane without delay or risk. Uh we'd like a city-led engineering and cost assessment to scope and price full repaving and a commitment to partner with the residents on a fair enforcable long-term solution whether through a city managed assessment or cost sharing program or some other mechanism. Council members, the residents of Ashley Lane have been patient. We have worked with the city for years. The road is unsafe. It's riddled with potholes in just 650 ft of roadway impacting so many parcels and lives are now at risk. We need the city of Fort Long Beach to step in not someday but now. Thank you.

Thank you. Anyone have any questions? Counc. Uh thank you for the email you sent us all. We all got it. Um I didn't know have you heard back from any of the staff about um I I've been in contact with Mr. Davis. any updates kind of the direction we're going here because I've received some calls from the community um regarding special assessments obviously with the recent charter amendment passage and you know I was like oh well maybe this is going to be one that comes into play here and then right and then uh and then further conversations it led to an issue related to private property um you know issue so what kind of direction or what

my understanding of the best path forward and it's the only way I know how to do it if there's others I'm open to suggestions But it would be a special assessment that those 32 parcel owners pay for. So it doesn't need to go out for citywide uh referendum or whatever, but it'd be a probably a burden for Mr. Burns and I track down these 32 people and they're going to have to I mean just thinking out loud and done. I've actually already

I think it's going to be a very expensive project. We're going to have engineering fees. The setbacks are wrong. There's nothing there remotely standard. So, it's going to have to be a bonded or a loan. I don't know what the best path is. We can take that up, but then it would go on those 32 owners trim notice for God knows how long. 20 years. Yeah. Something along those lines. But that's the only way I know how to do it.

Great. Thank you. And then the conversation I had also kind of just dove directly into the private property. you know, can the city should the city would the city go onto private property and make parking lot improvements or andor would the members the 32 full members um have to, you know, would there be a surveying of the property, deeding of the property, turning the roads over to the city? Yes. And with that comes continued maintenance was a concern, right? So that continued maintenance would remain with the homeowners through the special assessment or just the initial construction

just like any other city road at that juncture. Now brought up the standard and so on and so forth. Gotcha. Okay. Thank you. Thank you. Anyone else Mr. B? Uh there's other uh streets um involved other than Ashley Lane that are in disrepair as you say uh as much disrepair if not more. So I'm concerned about this the others and there wasn't from what I understand I've been here a long long time. I remember when that was built all that the Shangril woods woods. Yes. Yes. Along the pond and Yeah. And and at one time I believe it was an HOA.

Yes. So decades and decades ago the developer is no longer in existence. Um it's my understanding and this is from years of research. the there was an HOA I guess it went defunct or there was no pool no anything to um you know support those HOA needs and so years and years ago people said why are we paying for this I don't think they realized the loan that a road was private and that we we would now be dealing with decades of of neglect on that property I think they just kind of assumed you know people do with these roads so we're we're ready to take action we're you know we're we're ready to do it we are all kind of collectively together it's just there's no whip. There's no whip or enforcement with anybody.

At one time, there was an LLC or a business that owned several of those. Uh um I personally re researched the subdivision plat and have provided it to uh the county as well as well as the original covenants. And from what the subdivision plat describes is the the owners own up to the road with a small easement that drives down. So it is in our deeds and as well as part of that platin there is that the the road runs up. Now there was a couple of LLC's that did some amendments a few years ago so that they could uh they purchased the land from the uh county from the city and put some town houses there um who were also on board for this. They're they're on my yay support list. So I think a couple years ago that they they did an amendment and purchased that land. But as far as I know there is no record. All of our deeds say you are responsible. So it is a private road in every sense of the word.

Thank you, mayor. Anyone else? Thank you for being here. Thank you. And I know our city manager will continue to work with you on Absolutely. Thank you, everyone. Just probably need approval from the board to go forth in Congress. This is going to be a a project. So, he he would want uh what he's asking for is u he would want y'all to go ahead and get permission to start the petition process. He has to give a petition to each one of the property owners out there and a majority of them under the charter amendment have to say yes they're okay with the special assessment. So I think Mr. Davis is asking that y'all go ahead and give him permission to start that process.

Mayor moved to give city manager and city attorney permission to start this longdue process so we can discover cost and impacts and then evaluate that when it's brought back to us. Second motion made by Councilman Schmidt, seconded by Councilman Jeter to give the city manager and city attorney authority to move forward with this petition process and uh hopefully arrive at some sort of road there. Additional comments, council. Yes, sir. Councilman Jer like Council Schmid said, at this point, this is no cul, just staff and resourcing time to do some investigative work.

No, we got to get the people. You're have to say yes, we're going to pay for it. Correct. you're in contact with those people and you're willing to assist and help and guide. So before anything would happen, right, we've got all that in place, then I'd probably go out just for a rough order of magnitude so they kind of understand the impact. Then we'll figure out how we're going to bond or pay for it and go for come back before council. Just want to make sure we're not tasking you with something you don't you can't accomplish. You're good to work with her in

Councilwoman De. I think you you uh basically answered what I was going to uh as far as assessments. I have bad bad taste in my mouth with assessments. So, I'm going to be following this very very closely. You know that it's not going to affect the rest of the the residents of Fort Walton Beach. It'll just be Ashley. The cost will be so high that it has to come back before the board council. Yeah. Council Walker. Yeah. Um you you had mentioned the people to pay first. Are you you're talking about the 32 homeowners um however many there are. Yes. They'd have to agree to it. They'd have to agree to what? That's what I was trying to figure out.

This process of going out to bond and it's going on their tax notice that say whatever it is. I'm just going to use random numbers. 100 bucks a month for the next 20 years goes on those 32 homeowners. It's almost like a CDD. I forgot what that stands for. Same concept. But it goes on their trim. I mean, they they pay with their apple tongue their trim notice, nobody else's,

right? And along the lines of the questions previous. So staff's time obviously going in. But you're going to you and your team will get together like cost of the surveying um the private property deed. You know, I heard her talk about the road going up to the road. It is private, but that road will have to be surveyed out. There'll be a cost for the surveying and deeding the property. Before we even get that far, it's going to be a rough order of magnitude that I'm sure Daniel can just compare some previous projects. So, you might spitball it. You might spitball it for them and say, "Guys, we're talking between three and $6 million." And this is what it might look like under a bond.

And then if it comes back and it's more and they say, "Well, fine." They come back and say less. Cool. But there's going to be several stage gates. Gotcha. Okay. Great. very long. Councilman Schmid.

Yeah, my my question was or comment was actually just reiterated right there by Mr. Davis. Just wanted to it's it's just those partials that would be paying the assessment and just wanted to reiterate that. I know the bitter taste in in your mouth and whatnot, but these property owners would have to want to pay that assessment to fund this rough order of magnitude that we don't know what that rough order of magnitude is yet. But then that's where the rub will really start is figuring out what the city's cost and how much these partial owners are going to be willing to to pay. Council, my question is to Mr. Davis. Um, sorry. Um, I want to know is there is there any way possible that there could be any type of subsidized fundings or grants or something to help them that? Yeah. Yeah.

Could be. Yeah. We'll look into all that. That's a big issue. you know, uh, infrastructure, housing, and, you know, lightening areas and making sure the potholes and I know there's neighborhoods take off subsidized funings can be found though, right? 100%. Okay. Thank you. It's going to be a very cost prohibitive project, so anything we can find, I think. Yes. Thank you, Councilwoman Dear. I I It's not only Ashley Lane. There's several streets there, but not only Ashley.

That's true. And I'm only representing Ashley Lane because it's a private road. I can't, you know, speak on behalf of all the people that I, you know, I of our 32 parcels. It's actually more families cuz there's an apartment involved. But I I'm not speaking on behalf of that other section of the the sub of the area. Yeah. Yeah. Because because there are several other streets that have the major potholes such as on Ashley. So is that we're including aside from somebody coming forth and asking for I don't know who these people are. I don't know how to get the the motion was for Ashley Ashley Lane only only Ashley we're talking about now.

Yes ma'am. That's all I'm asking for is actually the 650 linear feet is 650. Anyone else with a comment on the motion? Council please vote. And the motion does pass unanimously. Anyone else from the public uh with a comment on something that's not on tonight's agenda? Yes, ma'am.

My name is Annie Ponder. I live at 115 North Circle. You guys don't know me, but I'm also a member of the CDBG board. But I'm uh with the recent developments that's going on in the community and the demolition of the mall, is there any plans for building a shopping center or something? Because going to Destin and and Cres View is heart-wrenching at times. I needed a simple dress for hate and uh I couldn't find it in Washington and the traffic was so horrendous on 98 and 85 that I end up going through Amazon and you know how Amazon is in a hidden miss. So that's my question to any in the plans. Will there be any

Well, I mean, I would just say that, you know, over the past several years, the city has been very encouraging of private development uh within the city limits. I don't know of currently any plans of any kind of shopping center development, but obviously that would be up to whatever developer that that would choose to do that. I mean, there's one standing behind you. You might want to build a beautiful shopping complex. So, you know, there's another developer to my right. I mean, I agree with you. I'm sure my wife would agree with you as well.

But it's unfortunately up to the private market in that since we're definitely not going to build a city uh cityrun shopping center, but I I would be with you in hoping that that does come to town. Thank you. Yes, ma'am. Thank you. Thanks for your service on that board as well, Miss.

Anyone else with a comment on anything that's not on the agenda tonight? Seeing none, we'll move on to uh item 10, which is ordinances on first reading and ordinance 2190. Mr. Burns. Thank you, Mayor. Ordinance 2190, ordinance of the city council of the city of Port Long Beach, Florida, many code ordinances section 11.04.03 03 title hearings provide for severability and provide an effective date. Uh Chief Page is here to present on that for Chief.

Good evening, Mayor, council. This ordinance is to allow for parking tickets to go through the same process as a uniform traffic citation. Currently, all traffic citations except for parking citations go through the clerk reports county level and then to county court. Parking citations come here to our special magistrate. That does cause some confusion for people when they get parking tickets and we think this will build efficiencies into our process. To give you a little bit of history, prior to 2018, parking ticket appeals were handled at the police department and that was noted as being very objective. So at that point they went to the code board, then they went to the special magistrate and the majority of places send theirs to the county clerk and through the county court system. So, we'd like just to follow the existing structure that is set up for all other traffic tickets with our parking tickets. There is a $10 fee per violation when it goes through the clerk of courts and they take 10% of any fines collected. On a normal parking ticket is $40, we get back $27 from every paid parking ticket. And for a handicap ticket, which is $250, we'd get back $27. So, we still look at this program as being revenue positive and not costing the city. The other thing with it going to the clerk of courts and the county court system, they have more leverage to collect on outstanding fines. If you have more than three unpaid parking tickets, they can actually put a hold on your license plate and the validation sticker for the renewal of your license plate.

Thank you, Chief. Anyone with questions? Councilman, what is our volume of parking tickets? They're not that high. Our our volume is we probably write 20 on a good month. We don't write a lot of parking tickets. Parking tickets though or parking violations. We have gotten some additional complaints about them. So, we may start writing a few additional, but we're trying to push out a lot of education about not blocking sidewalks. That's probably the biggest complaint we currently get is vehicles blocking the sidewalk. Thank you. Anyone else questions? Councilman Walker.

Sure. Sure. Thank you, Chief B. Um, I know in Tom's past different topics or whatnot when things get turned over to the county from the city operations, I often hear, um, are we losing control? Are we turning over control? We want to keep control of this process. Will we be losing control by turning over this very important legal process to the county? I mean, we always lose the argument is we always lose a little bit control if we give it if we outsource an item. I think we gain efficiencies and effectiveness by doing this. And we're following the route of all other traffic citations except for parking tickets. If you get a speeding ticket or fire registration, that all goes to the county clerk. And currently, there are people that go to the clerk's office to try to pay our parking tickets

because that is the method of paying all other traffic citations. If if your department writes a speeding ticket or other traffic violation, it automatically goes to the county court. Yes. By state statute for traffic citations office. Okay. Thank you. That's all I have. Thank you, Mr. May. Thank you. Anyone else questions for the chief? Anyone from the public wish to speak on this item? Seeing none, council, do you wish to take any action on this item? May approval for 190. Motion made by Councilman Jeter and seconded by Councilwoman Deary to approve ordinance 2190. Any additional comments? Councilman Jeter.

Thank you, Chief, for always the department. Anyone else? Council, please vote. Motion does pass unanimously, which moves us to item 10.2, ordinance 2193. Mr. Burns. Thank you, Mayor. Ordinance 2193, an ordinance of the city council of the city of Form Beach, Florida, amending the city of Formal Beach, Florida municipal firefighters pension trust fund, amending section 5 2.06.03 subsection A definitions, repealing all ordinances in conflict here with and provide for an effective date. This his first reading and Mr. Davis is presenting on behalf of staff on this one.

Oh, sorry. Chief Shipman's here. Chief or Chief Shipman, excuse me. Welcome, Chief. Thank you. Good afternoon, Mayor and Council. Uh I presented before you uh staff recommends the adoption of ordinance 2193. It further defines the definition of what salary is that's currently in the uh ordinance regarding the pension. It was a a little confusion. Uh some uh legislation changed and it failed to meet the update. So we updated that that definition essentially no cost to the city at all. Thank you sir. Questions from council for chief shipman.

Seeing none. Thank you chief. Anyone from the public wish to speak on this item. Council, do you wish to make a motion? So staff recommendation to adopt ordinance number 2193. Second. Motion made by Councilman Jeter and seconded by Councilman Schmidt to approve ordinance 2193. Any additional comments? Council, please vote. [Applause] [Applause] And it does pass unanimously. Thank you. Thanks, Chief. That moves us to uh item 11, 11.1 and ordinance 2191, an ordinance on second meeting. Mr. Burns.

Thank you, mayor. Ordinance 2191, an ordinance to the city council of the city of Coral Beach, Florida to provide for authority provide for findings of fact provide for the amendment of code of ordinances chapter 4 finance and taxation section 4.01.02 purchasing approving the revised administrative policy number FIN-09 purchasing and provide for effective date and I believe Miss Neighbors is presenting.

Good evening. Um nothing has changed since the second reading. As G mentioned, nothing has changed since the first reading. Just as a refresher, um I just wanted to reiterate the limits that are changing. Um, the directors will have approval up to $19,999. The finance director and controller will have up or not controller, I'm sorry, the finance director will have up to $49,999. The city manager will have up to $99,999,000. And council, anything $100,000 and above, you will have to approve. You also will have to approve anything that has not been approved in the budget. So, even if it's a $10,000 thing, um, and we did not budget for it, staff will have to come back. Um the only other thing that did change not from the first reading but just in in in general was 3.2.4 in the purchasing policy. It was just grant language that we had to have in there um due to us applying for grants.

Thank you ma'am. Questions from Miss Neighbors on this item. Does anyone from the public wish to speak on this item? Council, do you have any action you'd like to take? So ask recommendation to adopt number 2191. Second. Motion made by Councilman Jeter and seconded by Councilman Schmidt to adopt ordinance 2191. Any additional comments? Yes, sir. Council, please vote. [Applause] That does pass 61. Brings us to item 12.1 and a local planning agency appointment. Miss Barnes.

Thank you, Mayor. We have a vacancy on the LPA. Miss Melissa Ozeneck is serving an unexpired term and that term expired or will expire on September 30th. When we contacted her to see if she wanted to continue, she's had a change of employment. She said it was a good time for her to step off, but she might come back later. So staff advertised a vacant position on social media. Then we received one notice of interest from Mr. Thomas Canon. Mr. Can has served uh previously on the LPA and code enforcement board where he has some experience with the city and um if uh council would agree establish that resident city council appointment of Mr. Penn as a regular member of the LPA for a 4-year term to expire September 30th 2029. I'll be happy to answer your questions.

Thank you ma'am. Questions for Mr. Barnes on this appointment? [Applause] See none. Council, you wish to make a recommendation. So move to ask recommendation to appoint Mr. Thomas Cannon to serve on the OPA. Second. Motion made by Councilman Jeter and seconded by Councilwoman Debury to appoint Mr. Thomas Cannon to serve on the local planning agency. And any additional comments? Assuming Mr. Thomas is not here, but I'd like to tell him thank you for raising his hand and having prior experience. That means a lot.

Anyone else? Council, please vote. [Applause] You all overwhelmingly approve of his candidates. That brings us to item 12.2, the police officers retirement fund board appointment, Miss Barnes.

Okay. Thank you. Um, March the 28th of 2017, uh, council appointed Mr. Michael Wright to serve on the Port Walter Beach Police Officer Retirement Fund Board to fill one of the positions of two as a resident of the city. Uh in 21, council reappointing Mr. Wright to a second term. He has expressed to continue a third term. There are no term limits on those boards. Um so staff respectively recommend city council reappoint of Mr. Wright as a resident member of the city's police officers retirement fund board with a term expiring on September 30th, 2029. We'll be happy to answer any questions. Thank you, ma'am. Questions for Miss Barnes on this appointment? Seeing none, council, do you wish to make a motion?

Mayor move staff's recommendation. Second motion by Councilman Schmidt, seconded by Councilman Jeter to approve the appointment of Mr. Michael Wright to the police officers retirement fund board as a city resident member. Any additional comments?

Yes, sir. Thank you, Mr. Council. Please vote. [Applause] He is also approved unanimously. Brings us to item 13 and item 13.1 the classic debate of Little versus Cal. Mr. Deas winning too. So um last meeting the direction was sit down with the Shalomar board so we could discuss having board members and changing the name. and the Shallomar group is back to speak to those two items. So, I mean, at that point, I'll just turn over to Wendy. M.

Okay. Dear council members, staff is advocating for the city of Walton Beach to form a partnership with Shalomar Little League rather than pursuing other options such as staying independent as a recreation league or transitioning to Cal Ripken. I believe this merge represents the most beneficial and forward-thinking solution for our community and most importantly for our children. Why merge with Shalomar Little League? Unified strength and growth. Merging with Shalomar would create a combined player base of approximately 700 children with 500 from Shalomar and 200 from the city of Walton Beach. This larger pool brings greater opportunities for competition, development, and community engagement. Remaining a recreationonly program or shifting to Cal Ripken would isolate us and limit that growth potentially. Proven structure and or infrastructure and management. Little League has been around since 1973. Shalomar Little League already has the operational structure in place for registration, scheduling, officials, general league administration. Their ability to manage league logistics would lift a significant burden off the city while still keeping us actively involved in youth baseball and softball development. Financial agreement for this season. I propose that Shalomar Little League remains the official league. The city of Walt Beach receive a particular number per registered child, $10 or $20 per registered kid. Shalomar handles all other operational expenses and logistics. This approach allows us to participate without needing to reinvent or heavily invest in a separate system, especially during the transition period. Future identity and inclusion. Next season, I recommend rebranding to Shalomar Fort Walton Beach Little

League. This dual name honors both communities and symbolizes true partnership. The name should not be a barrier in progress. It should reflect unity, not division. The bottom line, we must make decisions that are best for the kids, not to appease adults or preserve outdated systems. A merger with Shaomar Little League is clearly the most beneficial path forward in terms of growth, competitive opportunity, operational efficiency, community collaboration. Let's put egos aside and do what's right. Anyone looking at this with the best interests of the children in mind can see that a merger is the logical, ethical, and strategic choice.

Very well done, Mr. Before we go to questions, either you guys want Okay, fair enough. I'll answer any question you got. Councilman Jeter, so you're saying this year we're not going to change the name, correct? This year I proposed that we allow Shalomar to keep doing their thing, use our fields and pay us headcount. And next year we would go Aprilish. We can be on the board. Someone can be nominated to be part of the Shalomore Little League or Shalomar Fort Walton Beach Little League. They can change the name etc. This year just to When is that board established?

That board's already been established for this upcoming spring season. Um, next usually it's established sometime in the month of July. As soon as the season ends, we have a a general members meeting, which is any any adult that has a child in the league. So, if it's a grandparent, it's a a brother, a sister, an aunt, an uncle, whoever has custody of that child is now a member of our league as long as their child is playing in our league. We have a members meeting. They get to come, they get to place their vote of who's on the board. Um, they get to vote of if we change the constitution, if we change the name completely, all that's handled at the members meeting. How many people are on the board? 15.

There's 15 people on the board this year. The city of Form Beach has nobody on that board. Next year, how would we get there? The employees of City of Fort Walton Beach has nobody on this board. There's eight people on my board that live in the city of Fort Walton Beach for representation on on the board. But like Sean who ran the baseball season for us last year, what would your involvement be in this baseball league next year? You ran our league last year. I've heard a lot of great things about it. It was just a recre.

Yeah. So I would be overseeing the football and beach complex as itself of all the games held at Fort Wall Beach Complex. If I give up a board position on my board and I take it away from a volunteer out of the general members fund, I would allow it to be basically what he said, the field and and coordinator over here in the Fort Walton Beach area. And how much does it cost to play Lily? How much does it cost? This past year it was $75 a child. That will have to go up in price. No matter if we merge or not, my price is going up. To go up to what? $125 a kid. $125. And the cost to play the city of Fort Wall Beach last year of a city resident was $30. $30.

And we have discussed reaching out to sponsor. I've already started building a scholarship fund for those kids that can't afford the $125 to play. They will have to file with little league to see if they can get the T-Mobile grant. If that does not come through, it'll send me an email. I then can reach out to that family and go, "What can you pay? Can I help you get on here? Can I help you? Can I get your kid on this baseball field playing baseball?" That's the ultimate goal. It's not to prize our way out of it. It's And I will say, sorry, the we did about eight to 10 games, as many as I could do cost efficient wise. Little League does 12 games, so there are more games. It's better uniforms, so there is a little more with the fee as far as little league goes.

I definitely like the tier of it. You and I have had this discussion before and I've heard a lot of feedback from residents as well and some of their questions were that just cost if if someone wants to play baseball for two or three months, it's nice to go to direct league who just does two or three months of sports and pay $35. Like you said, if someone lives in the city now and wants to play Shalomar and and or go to a little league and have a chance to play, as you said last meeting on ESPN one day, they have that option. They can drive to that park and play that sport. If someone wants to play baseball year round, they can sign up for 850 or travel ball. So, there's already kind of options out there. With this attempted to be done so many times in the past, why this year? Why now? Why not? Why not next year when we have a chance to maybe get some city representation on the board?

I can't promise I'll be the president of this league next year. I can't promise I'll even be on this board next year. I hope that I do a good enough job to the members of the Little League community that they will reelect me back here. But I couldn't promise you the next president's going to be willing to come in here and attempt to do this.

All right. But if the next president is, I'm just saying what is what's the rush for this year? Cuz I feel like last meeting it was a public comment and it was kind of like really quick. Let's do this for October 1st and now it's kind of at this meeting. Like what is the rush this year? Why not wait till next year when we have board representation and we can really work together? cuz I've got a lot of questions still on the concession stands, how that's going to work. You got two different kinds of concession stands being operated. You got two different kinds of we've got to work out and I know you're very good at this, but we've got to work out our schedule with are we running off any travel ball tournaments? Are we running off any kids and pricing them out of the We just need to make sure we're doing this correctly. And I think all of us have sit up here on this board and just said, "Let's make sure we get this right." And I I just don't want to rush into something. when we had a good baseball league last year, we could definitely work together over the next year and and collaborate a little more and make sure we're on the same page.

And that's what I proposed is for next year to change it to Shallomore Fort Wal Beach. This year, I was just hoping that we could help each other. they could use our fields and we're we would allow them to use our fields for a certain fee which so much money per head instead of us being the 200 kids that we have it would be our kids plus their kids so it no representation and no name change it's kind of like whoa wait where does this come from I've heard nothing but compliments on the smooth efficiency of last year's short baseball season so I got some more questions but I'll stop now I appreciate that Councilman So you said the name change happened next year. You're not sure if you're going to be the president next year or on the board. So who's to say we lend our fields that taxpayers paid $10 million for and then next year nothing.

If it doesn't happen next year, what we got this year was their Shalomar Little League fees for each child. We got a headcount of 700 kids. We get $10 per kid. That's what we got. And we would not run off any um travel ball. We still get the TDC or TDD and um because that would be done on weekends. Uh Shamar little league would be played during the weekday. Thank you, sir. Any other questions? Miss Riley, how much loss of revenue if did not partner with you? How how much of a loss revenue have none?

Okay. So nothing in it for 100% for your city, ma'am. I my my league will be successful. We had 570 kids last year with our junior season. I look to have 600 plus again this year. Whether this partnership happens this year, next year, we're ready to roll. So, in other words, you're saying that it wouldn't benefit you one way or another. If we're It would benefit me tremendously to have seven more fields because then I could grow up to a thousand kids. That's what I'm going. But I'm going to have to cap my numbers off eventually cuz right now I'm trapped. I have six fields I get to play baseball on. Okay. I just wanted to see, you know, to kind of like make it make sense for me. Yes.

What would be the benefit for for Wanted? Cuz obviously, you know, if Fort Wall, obviously, I I would think that both cities would want some type of benefit from it would be advantageous. I guess, you know, we come into agreement or I'm getting 200 extra kids out of it. So, that's I'm getting 200 extra kids out of it. That's a huge benefit for me. That's my win. Okay. Well, I asked I don't need money from the city. I just need your facility and the children. Okay. Well, that's what I asked earlier. What would be the benefit? You know, with the city of Austin, you said it would be no benefit. So, just the children. But now, but now you're saying it would be a benefit, right? Yes, ma'am. Yeah. To get to 200 kids. Okay. Thank you, sir. Council member Smith.

Yeah, there was a couple years ago I think one thing we have to reiterate whether it's eight board members they currently have that are city residents and a lot of kids that are city residents that also are members at the Shalomar Little League. I appreciate the transparency of a transition plan to have a DBA for next year so that we can have a Fort Walton Beach Shalomar brand. But I know right now there's a discussion about Shalomar versus Cal Ripken, but a lot of our city residents not only play over there, but a lot of our adults have coached over there that are city residents. And

so there's a lot of city representation over there and I I look forward to hearing more about how this discussion goes. But uh I just want to reiterate that there is a lot of city of Fort Walton Beach representation that's currently on their board. I think he said eight out of 15 as well as I don't know the date of how many city players are members over there of that five or 600, but probably a lot. Probably a lot. I know you've got at least I know you've got at least three up here that have coached at at both facilities sitting on this board. So, I'm very familiar. Um, anyone else with questions from council? Uh, Councilman Jeter,

not to get into the weeds because we're not on the board, but games practices, where would they be? Both facilities, your facility, this facility would kind of be spread out. Mhm. Both facilities, depending the number of children, of course, we have signed up, you know, finally have 500 kids signed up. They don't need the city's fields at that point, which so we're hoping to have a lot more than that, but but let's just say hypothetically you only have 500 kids. So then at that point, you don't need our facilities. Everything happens in Shalomar. So all these people

the the biggest so the biggest thing for us and you brought it up earlier is our concession stand. Once the season starts that is our only revenue of an income source to our fields. We had already talked to both of them about this. We've kind of headbutted a couple things but once the season starts when games are in Shalomar that's how we're making our money is off the concession stand. So the more games I can have in Chalomar the more money that comes into the league the cheaper I can drive the price of registration for the polling gear down. So, how many times have you guys had parents in the city of Fort Walton Beach, and I know there's people up here on this board that have said this, I like kids at one place. Always. Always. And I strive to do that.

Yeah, but now you're going to have people in Fort Walton Beach that are used to paying $35. They're now paying $125 and being told, "We don't offer baseball here. You have to go to Shalomar." So, I don't want to get into the weeds. I really do like it. Love it. I was behind it three or four years ago. I'm behind it a year from now should it come to fruition. I just think there's a lot of details that we need to that we need to work through that we haven't thought about working through yet because I think it's a big it's not season right now. So, it's not on on the forefront of everybody's mind. But you're going to have people come to sign up and like the tears we talked about earlier, the $35 for three months of baseball that say, "What? I got to go where? I did I've been doing this. I've been doing that." And I know no one likes change and we're changing a lot a lot of other stuff in our community now, too. So, I definitely support it. I think I just need to support it in a much more structured, detailed version.

Any other questions? Seeing none, does anyone from the public wish to speak on this item?

Coach Lane. [Applause] Um, when I found this house, I've been named name. My name is uh Leonardo Moss. I've been coaching for about 20ome years. I basically helped uh the person that was before uh Wendy start up the softball because my 29-year-old was playing baseball because there was no softball. So the next year I was a substitute and handed out flyers and we uh we created four teams of softball and we got that going. But um so I've been coaching here and I have coached at at Shalomar also with little league with my uh ex-roin-law and my daughters and I was always rooting with I wanted something more structured like Shalomar and I also am on the fence like uh Jeter is and it's I I And I wasn't until it came up. I was rooting for for the little league to to happen over here. So, we cuz I want to grow the game. I want I want baseball to grow. And um a lot of people here know that I've been helping kids. I had kids this year come to me with no equipment. I went out with out of my own pocket thrift store, bought a bunch of bats, bunch of gloves, and started giving them out cuz there are people in the community that want to play and can't afford it. And now that price is going up. So I I I'm with you there. So, I don't I'm on the fence now, but I want it I want it to happen, but I want people to keep playing and not Yeah, I want the numbers to grow, but are they going to grow if people can't afford it? And doing paperwork to get grants and stuff is out of some people's reach or

time and and they don't want to deal with it. They just want it. So, I I don't know. I just wanted my opinion in here. And so, thank you. Thank you, coach. Another question. One second. Oh, go ahead. Go ahead.

The fees with little league, one thing everybody here has to understand is we have to pay little league international insurance. That fee is anywhere depending on how many kids are in league from 40 to $55 per child just to register with Little League International. So that's 3/4 of the half or a third of my registration fee I'm paying straight to them. I don't include uniforms, umpires, or anything else. So, it's not the Chelmar little league's making all that money. We also have to pay to be part of Little League International. Thank you. Anyone else from the public wish to speak on this island? Yes, sir. [Applause] [Music]

My name is Jared Farland. I'm the VP of the league. I just want everybody to understand too, you know, if we want to talk financials. Shalomar is taking on the insurance for the kids. We're providing all the maintenance and not maintenance, but like we provide bags, we provide catchers gear, we provide all of that. The city doesn't have to provide any of that stuff anymore. So, you know, when we could come up with a figure, if you said $10 a kid, say we had $800 in our league or $800 kids in our league, we would now provide, you know, the city $8,000 that you probably don't get out of the rec league that's in it. Now, the help fund, you know, you did make these beautiful fields that are out here and you want them to be used and the community wants them to be used and they want to see them getting used. So, you know, growing this and having a you know, both leagues and and it is going to be in separate places, you know, down the road. You can talk about having a baseball field and a softball complex and and and go that way down the road, but you know, taking some of the burden away from the money y'all have invested in the field, you could actually get it back from us. And like he said about the boards changing every year, Mr. Browning, you know, we would like to set up more of a contract where, you know, we could set this up for 3 years or something like that. That way that, you know, that the league is invested in it and at least keeping it. I mean, even if the board changes, as long as we've signed something, you know, it's it's put us in, of course, it would still have to go through legal channels and make sure that it's all proper, but you know, we could settle in for a length amount of time if we could.

Yeah. Go ahead. So, what is this year agreement? Is this a one year, 2 year, three year? This is just a one-year agreement. This is what we decide.

This is that y'all if See, that's you know, the other thing is we still want some feedback from y'all like exactly what we need. you know what you think you would want for this all to work, but we would like to make this a multi-year thing. We don't want to make it just a year thing. The problem with the name change and everything this year, since our board's already been voted on, we can't go back and rechange anything until we have our next general members and then we can do our DBA and things like that. That's where we're the doing it this year. You know, we won't be able to change anything. And so you guys providing all the bats and I know we're getting the leads here, but you guys provide all the equipment. So now all of our stuff is just we don't need it,

right? We have discussed that and I'm still details on that. Yeah, I would assume we would mix in and have the What about appreciating this and that because I know one other parts.

I think we need to get together with some of the people that have coached at both places and see do you enjoy coming here and having the equipment provided and never having the rate of field and having guaranteed umpires that have had background checks or do you want volunteer umpires that sometimes you don't have and a coach maybe comes in and umpires or different stuff like that. So, here would be my question. I'll get to it. Would you guys be willing to I I think the solution to this would be we have a lot of educated parents and sports lovers in the community. A lot of them. There's a lot more than just in this room. Even though I think there is a lot in this room. To get this right. In my opinion, I think we need to form a small committee, not a big CR, but there needs to be seven to nine people on a whole separate board that really works out all these details over the next year and says, "Here's how we can make this work." Does that make sense? I don't think, and I'll be the first one to tell you, I always like to think that I'm the dumbest one in the room, not the smartest. And I definitely want to feel that way in this situation, regard my regardless of my past experiences with both leagues. There is a lot of people out here that this decision could affect their kids' future next year and we're not taking that into consideration. I think we need to form a committee that spends more time on ironing out these details and brings us back more options other than just this or that. Would you So there's my question. Would you guys be willing to

Oh, we definitely would love to sit down and talk sit down over the next year with a committee. I'm sure there's plenty of coaches out there. Would you volunteer for a committee? We're not going to form a committee tonight, but I think there's some people out there that would rather have some input on this conversation.

Councilman Walker with a question. Sorry, I have to have a question. I'll finish it with I'll get a question here in a minute, but um you know, I grew up playing little league baseball and my kids uh played baseball up in Chalibar behind the school. So, I don't know which group that was, but but still, I know the I appreciate the value of baseball in particular, sports in general. Um, and you know, I'm sitting up here listening to the two teams, if you will. You guys have a growing independent. It's not been supported by taxpayers. It's been supported by your membership and your membership size exceeds ours by two and a half time. Y'all are doing something very, very well. and I um rely on experts and I consider you to be an expert and and staff's recommendation was to join and um make it happen this year and next year come along with that. So um trying to think the question um I'm sorry Mr. Mayor I can't come up with a question. I just I I I I it sounds like the the the experts in the room, one of which is very successful in the business model. It's not cost taxpayers anything, have come in and agreed to do something that will benefit us all. And I'll be supporting um the staff's recommendation. Thank you.

I would have just suggested, would you say that sums it up? Would you say that sums it up? That's good. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. That's great. I need to write that one down.

Hang on one second. Anyone else with a question? Councilman rough estimate, Miss Riggs, how much collaboration and correspondence have you had both externally with Shalomar Little League as well as briefing with executive leadership on this subject? Just rough estimate as far as time and effort. I would say honestly I started about 10 years ago trying to make this happen and I got shut down and then uh probably five years later I tried again whenever there was a different uh president and and I couldn't get um I guess our side on board and then I would say I total to answer your question I would say I've probably spent maybe 100 hours

and and fairly recently since it's been resurfaced I would say we've probably 25 and and with in Mr. Vegas's our correspondence as well.

My fault, too. It's my fault with, you know, just taking a capital error approach with it because it's just something I I've done it for so long. I don't think through some of these questions. So, as far as driving to Shalomar, I mean, when I played the league, it was a big deal to drive over to Palm Springs and smack them around and then drive over to Green Acres, show them who's boss. So, I didn't think that that would be an issue here. And this So, some of that's still my my learning curve. Uh the concessions was always wherever you played, it was theirs. So, I don't think I don't that's probably my fault that I didn't ask some of these questions. Um, so they they've done more than I've asked so far. So, if it's just something that I've overlooked, that's that's on me just because, you know, it's like tie in my shoes. I don't think to that level, but it's because it's all everything you asked is nothing outstanding to me. And I asked that question just because we all don't get a chance to see in the weeds of how much collaboration committee by staff or call it whatever we want to call it but committee or time and effort but there's been time and effort collaboration with staff leadership. Yeah.

As well as the park and recck staff as well as externally with with shallow little leave. Correct. So, I spent an hour with this group and then an hour with Wendy separately. Just again, maybe I should have put more time into it, but it to me it was it was uh there was nothing in there that was a red flag for me. Thank you. Anyone else with a question? I kind of got a question, but I got to figure out how to get to get to the question. I I just, you know, want you all to know that, you know, um I think it's a big thing. I'm I'm asking questions because I feel like there's

I like to be fully educated on certain things and, you know, and I know about sports. I love, you know, all sports, baseball, too. So I think it's a great thing. My my goal thing was when I was asking I just wanted to see well kind of like well what's in it for us as the city of beach you know and I don't know if that was you know I didn't mean that to to be a selfish question but I just wanted to know what I love the city of B so I want to know what's in it for us

you know and so I just felt like I didn't have that it wasn't coming my way you know and those are things that I I like to look at the what is the benefit you know what is what is it advantageous just, you know, and if if so, tell me where it's advantageous at. But, you know, kind of sort of like that, but I just feel like I need to be a little bit more educated. But, um, I think it's a, you know, anytime that you can come up with a, you know, any type of interlocking agreement or mutual agreement between neighboring neighboring cities. That's a wonderful thing because you want to partner, you know. So, I just, you know, kind of feel like I I needed a little bit more information. You can respond to that.

Yeah. Well, we want, you know, the benefit for for Shalomar Little League is is, you know, we're a community organization. I would say probably 80% of our kids come from this city. They don't really come from Shalomar. We all drive in probably 80% of us drive into Shallomar to play baseball. And we are handcuffed at the size that we can be. And and you know, when they came to us and you know, they said, you know, we have 200 kids over here. You've got three teams in one division, four teams in another division. and for Shalomar communitywise and and what you know little league stands for. It's all community based organization. Everything is divided is chosen based on you know the players and their parents in our league. And we just want you know we want the whole area to come together and play baseball together. And we don't want to miss out on the children in Fort Walton that could grow and make something really big in our area and grow a really big league because, you know, 200 kids from you, 500 kids from us, that's 700 kids. But that's not us really pushing hard and growing because we haven't reached out into the community knowing we only have so much room for kids. We could get so many more children on the baseball field with all of these facilities to be able to use in tandem. Thank you. So future listen, you're looking at 20% going, right?

I'd like to add too real quick. So essentially when I approached Ed about this, I had growth in mind to make four wall and bigger. That's my whole mindset. But partly was because I had maybe 15 girls that wanted to play softball. We just simply couldn't make teams with 15 girls. So they either joined for the boys baseball league or you know some of them backed out and they have softballs and then I had numerous parents approached me that aged out of the 12U and said could we do a 13U and I would love for that to happen but I don't know if I can get numbers to make you know four 14U teams and that is an option for Little as well. So, I see the downside of the the pricing, but also there's a lot of kids that still want to play either softball or older levels, which we could supply with little league if it if it is in shallow or at Walmart. So, thank you, Mr.

And I'll say we do have time to think about this because I I want to do that next season. This season I propose that we allow them to use our fields for a headcount and then let's kind of get our feet wet and see where it goes and then next season after we've had that committee to then say yes this is working out and here's what we want to do. Thank you ma'am. Mr. Davis

just another thought instead of the the shallom Fort Walton Beach what about Fort Walton meet Shalom. Let's just let's just let's just always remember when you address an envelope to a a husband and wife that share the last name, you always put the woman's name first, the man's name second because you don't separate the man from his original last name. So, Shalomar Little League. Um, Mr. Barry. Yeah. Uh, I have concerns about how about children or the players that don't have the money.

Yes, ma'am. That's why I covered on that sponsorship fund we're working on building. Um, I'll be partnering with our community and the people in the community and anybody that wants to sponsor a kid to play, they'll have that opportunity. I've already started building our sponsorship forms and that is one of the biggest sponsorships on it is is put a kid on the field on the almost like a an angel an angel baseball foundation almost in our in our actual league so I can offset some of the cost of some of the kids playing

cuz when we started this the Fort W since 197 we had nothing we had the cheerleading outfits I was sewing by hand I'm not kidding We had nothing. I was baking. I was cooking, you know, to to raise money. So, I want to make sure that those those kids have a spot on there. They will have a spot. We we as a lead last year, we funded about 32 kids to play our league. And we plan on funding that many or whoever else comes to us and asks us for help. I mean, of course, they'd have to come and ask for help. I mean, that is the big thing. A lot of people don't technically ask for it. So,

and and I know there's a way that you can read people. Yes. If you understand what I'm saying that need this because this is where we were way back when when we had nothing. So, think on that cuz I'll be watching it. Councilman Brownie.

Uh, so if y'all if we went forward this year and you utilized our fields, would it be for games or practices? We would kidney if if we had if we came with the same amount of kids that we had this year between both teams, both leagues, we have to utilize both facilities and we would we would use both facilities. We would have to use both facilities for games and practices. Um we we had our 500 kids last year and we were spread to the max. We had already expanded out with the county to go to uh the fairgrounds and use their softball field for practice facilities and things like that. So we were trying to get in a facility where we could have multiple fields in one spot, multiple fields in another spot. And we would like to you know use both facilities for both things. Um if we could, you know, utilize say three baseball fields at one time and then have two practices going on in another one and then do the same thing for our fields on our side. That would all just depend on it's hard to tell you. Yes, I'm going to give you, you know, two games every single day or three games every single day because at the same time, I don't know what our numbers are technically going to be. I hope they're bigger. I hope they're the same or bigger, but you know, things parents change. Everything changes. So, I can't guarantee our numbers.

And I do have it scheduled to where if we have about 800 850 kids, we've got plenty of room for practice and games. Now, of course, I can't predict more than that, but if we did, hurrah, we'll make it happen. Do y'all maintain your own fields?

So, the county maintains our fields. We rent our fields from the county. So, we pay a monthly feeder to our fields. Um, and then when we come on game days, since our fields are clay at the moment, we come and we rake our fields. We have our own drag tractor. We drag our fields. We line them and we set our own bases out. Um, right now the county is giving us two new fields that we turf to just like y'alls. And then the goal is to the next year do two more fields and then the next year have all our fields turned. So then there won't be any outside of mowing grass um there won't be any maintenance. I was just trying to with the Mr. Walker and I was trying to figure out where what was all funded with the non taxpayer situation. So I was just figuring out yeah Councilman Smith I like Mr. or excuse me I like MR's question for Wall. So the question as far as just a banquet standpoint, Sean, would it be a benefit to our Miss Wendy whoever to our team where you have a partnership with a group of volunteers that would be helping coordinate team meetings, coordinate finding sponsors, coordinate, you know, all the little things that whether it's Bobby Carmichael or the coaches meetings, all those things. From a bandwidth standpoint, we got park equipment and potholes and things that our park and rec staff needs to continue to to lean in on. What I'm hearing from a bandwidth standpoint, we'll have a job category there, overseeing it, being a part of it. But here's the question. Does this help the bandwidth and adding us more capacity by another organization, volunteer organization to help man it, run the program so that our team can do other things?

100%. Thank you. Councilman Jer question. So you guys are getting two new fields at your park now. Mhm. And they're getting turfed. Yeah. So is this just a you need us for a year for our fields or do you guys really want to be a partnership? And I only say that because like the name like if you guys are so adamant on no we're going to stay this league you just do you just need our fields for a year or do you guys really want to try to work you got to look past the name the name isn't up to me it's up to the general members at the next general member meeting if they decide to change the name that's up to the people of the league and the and and the members the board no not the board members the general members of the league the parents of the kids that come to the meeting the board doesn't get to set that that's not anything I can change

Mr. Mr. Just real quick, if I can interject on that point that you just made as well cuz I think you guys have both mentioned this. What percentage of kids that play in Chamomar little league are from the city of Fort Wald Beach or have a four zip code? The exact percent. Okay, so it should be for now. So this is like our bridge bridge to bridge battle together. We can't hear from that. What I was just trying to get at is if those are the people that are voting on a name change, you would think it would be pretty likely that they would vote to include the city's name that they live. For sure.

I I had also offered you ask what's in it for the city. I had also mentioned I'll put the city seal logo if we want to go with the 360 logo on the shirt sleeves of all the uniforms. So, you will have some kind of identification on the uniform. Um All right. Any anyone else? One last question. I'll go ahead. No. Make a motion. Any contract would have to come back to the board. Right. So, I mean, if the conceptual conversation is in one year or 3 years, whatever if the direction tonight with a motion here pretty soon hopefully so we get to the next item for staff to go work with Little League to bring us back to contract. We still have to evaluate the contract question.

Well, the f the contract absolutely back there a few times. would be a lease if this has some form of lease in there or if it exceeds the spending authority of the city manager. Uh technically you would give direction and it wouldn't have to come back to you but I don't think that's what you're asking to do. So but just clear on that. Got to entertain a motion at this point. I make a motion to move forward this year with the Wreck League or Cal Ripken. However, our current staff decides while also forming a committee that staff bring us back to iron out all these details and make this happen next year.

Second. Have a motion from Councilman Jeter, second by Councilman Browning to move forward with a WCK League/Cow Ripken League in the city of Fort Walton Beach while forming a committee to explore a more formal partnership with the Shamar Little League organization next year. Any additional Mr. Clarification? I'm not sure we could become a Cali in the window that you're giving us. How what's the time frame to do that window? We would, he said either or. We would stay as recreation. Okay.

Actually, Reckley wasn't on here for the action direction discussion. So, I'd leave that up to staff to decide. And again, look, I'm with you guys. We're all the same community. Shallomar, Mars, or Sinko, Fort Walton Beach. I We're all the same community. I want the best product for the kids, too. I think there's a way to get there. I really do just think we need to form and all that staff bring us back, too. However many people on this committee, I think that committee could even be involved with some county people that are turfing their fields over there that are going to be awesome and make sure we don't interfere with tournaments. I think that committee could also include some Baker and Crescue people. And I really do mean this and Councilman Schmidt says all the time, let's zoom out 30,000 ft altitude. What is the best thing for the whole community, all of Okaloosa County? Can we make wave a magic wand and get that next year? No. But I think we can iron out a lot of details and get this as a much better product. That's not a, "Oh my gosh, we got to know something by October 1st. We got one week. Let's just hurry up and get this done this year. Let's really take our time next year." And and and I hope we get this right cuz it really is all about the kids. Not a specific name. It doesn't matter to me what name is on the jersey. People don't know. We've talked about this before. They don't they tell us they're going to vote for us and they live in the county. They tell us they go so we're all the same community regardless of the name. I do see that. I do see it working. I just I see a committee making it a lot better for everyone that has a chance to vote, have a say on it.

Anyone else wish to comment on this motion? Mr. Councilman Schmid.

Yeah, I I disrespectfully disagree. I We have a staff that can be that committee. There's hours of collaboration that's going on. We're the board to trust staff of what the direction they're going. This has been tried for many years hearing from Miss Riggs. This has been tried as recently as two or three years ago. Uh, and we're at a time now where it's here right in front of us and we can close the deal. Now, I understand and respect. There's a lot of logistics that that that you want to better understand, but that's what our staff is here to do and bring us back that information through a contract. Next year, if the membership says, "Hey, they're not changing it." This board has the authority to do what it needs to do. So, uh, I'm going to respectfully disagree with the motion. I will be supported.

Thank you, Councilman Walker. Along those lines, um, and something Mr. Jeter says often, and I was surprised to hear, Mr. Reed, you've been on this for 10 years. It's been something that, you know, an expert in the field of recreation and baseball and Sean, you guys, you know, coming together and saying this would be best for us. I mean, it's been going on for 10 years. It's the time is now. It's here. Let's do it. I won't be supporting this motion because letting I'm ready to close this deal. Thank you. Thank you, sir. Anyone else from council wish to speak on the motion?

Mile. Um here I go again. Um honestly, you know, I think, you know, it's a great all of it is is great. You know, it really is. I love sports and I think that's an amazing thing to do. You know, like I said earlier, I just the main thing is I want us to be able to obviously both for Walt to benefit from it, but I want for Walter to be able to benefit also and and you know, I don't want it to be a nonchalant type thing that, you know, we're just, you know, you just want our 200 kids and and my wife. I know you got the concessions thing. It would seem like something need to be worked out before we all get a little bit of that revenue, too. But it may not happen like that either. But, you know, um, as far as putting the community together, um, you know, I don't know. I'm kind of in between on that part of it, but I believe in the staff and I and I do believe that our staff, you know, recommendation, that's what we hire, you know, get hired for is, you know, subject matter expert. So, I support the staff 100%. So, whatever the recommendation goal is, you know, the staff is behind it and the staff need to be the one to do the research. I have done the research and I'm in agreement with that. So, that's my take on Thank you.

Thank you, man. Councilman Merrill.

Yeah. I I said it last time, I don't have a dog in this fight. I can't play soccer. So, it's a little uh but I the the big thing for me, I wanted to hear hopefully hear from the parents. There's not a big there wasn't a big public comment outside of there. So, from you guys kind of in agreement. Look at you guys as the experts. 80% of the league is already coming over from Fort Walton. So, I don't think they're I'm trying to wrap my head around that and go, well, they're already going there now. Some of the games can be over here. I want what's best for the kids and the families. Is that is this direction? Again, I still ask a question. Is this direction the way it's Am I breaking the rules? Is this direction? Is this the feedback? Is this wanted

more than that's what's your opinion? We've heard some from a few of just our little league parents that are for it. Sorry, that are very very for it. Um they do enjoy having, you know, more community- based, more kids in the league. Um they all most their first response majority times, I don't know why we've never been this way. You know, I thought we talked about this once again like she said for 10 years. Multiple say, I thought we tried this 3 years ago. I thought we tried this four years ago. And you know, we would love to make it one big league. Um, my kid I played in both leagues last year. I played in Jar's little league and I was able to let my kid play in y'all's right league also. Um, and I was able to make both fields and make it work for me. You know, it worked for my family. Doesn't work for every families, but I just I think it would be great to just have one big league where we didn't have to pick red league over here and, you know, little league over here. Got. I appreciate it. And to be clear, this motion is to delay this for one year.

Well, correct. Uh, anyone else for the first time wish to speak? Councilman Jer, this motion is just to delay it for one year for for a lot of facts that we heard tonight. We don't have a seat on the board right now. It's already been established this year. The name is going to stay Shalomar. It's not going to hurt anybody. It's not going to hurt our league. You should have the same amount of kids. You guys should have the same amount of kids. and it just gives us a year to iron out all of these details because I'm with you. I know people that played at both fields last year

and I do so I do support this in the long term. I just think this is a rush and a quick jump and it would be a lot easier to work it out over the next year. So I do support it. I do I I want y'all to know that I support it next year, but this year the name is not changing and you we don't have a seat at the board and I don't feel like there's a point in rushing this when we can do what we did last year and iron out all the details in the long term. I do. I want to go on record of saying that, too. I do support a bigger and better league. Yes.

All right, we're out of vote now. So, council, again, just to reiterate before you vote, a motion is to delay this a year, continue with a rec, and uh form a committee to explore this idea further in hopes of doing it the following year. Mr. Mayor, just to clarify, I thank you for that. This is This motion is to not accept staff's recommendation. Correct.

Got it. Council, please vote. The motion does pass. 43. All right. I guess we'll form a committee. Sounds good. See y'all at the ball fields. Thank you, sir. Thanks for your time.

Thank you. [Music] That moves us to item 13.2, Mr. Davis. So, this is the follow up to the discussion on fees for field space. So, the current model is $150 per field per day. At night, there's an additional fee for the lights. Um, there was discussion on a block approach, more a free approach. So, the block approach that I've seen is any ranges anywhere from 350 to 500 per season. Um, obviously way more affordable than the $150 per day per field. Staff's concern is if we go to either one of those other models, it'll have a tremendous impact on what little do revenue we do bring in. It's the ballpark plus or minus 300,000 in uh expenses to include, you know, staff, labors, and whatnot. And then we bring in currently a third of that, about 100, but a little more than 100. So that's obviously going to have a budget impact, not ideal with some of the the charter stuff, but again, you know, we we can just course correct over the the next year or so based on the math. So again, I've always been accustomed to the the free approach with the exception of tournaments or special, you know, fundraiser type things. I'm good either way. That's just what we were asked to present on. So that's kind of where we're at.

Questions on this for city manager Jason D. Mr. Walker? Yeah. uh with that last item and you know seeing this come I don't know what the agreement was going to be with them about use of the field but it's fair to say now those 500 kids their 12 games and all the practices will not be using our field is that correct I don't know that I understood you're talking about the Shalomar people coming here yeah Shalomar they won't be coming here now had they been coming here would they be paying these this is that would be a little league thing this is for the travel teams that want to

where yeah so where would the revenue. If if they if that Shalomar little league they get bumped out or their fields are not available, they want to come over here and use the fields, they would pay a rate like this. Is that correct? No, that's all done through the little league.

Okay. Where this would come in to play is so we've already built the schedule out to include the Liza Jackson. They're not going to pay potentially. I mean, unless you say it, but we were going to do anou with them saying, "Hey, just as long as you clean up after yourselves and we don't have to do staff time to go clean the fields, then fine." Uh, but Wendy, is Wendy still here? Yeah. So, in case they had questions, but she has built out a schedule where you have practices and uh, you know, cage day, so on and so forth for some of these travel teams built around the Little Leagues. Does that answer your question? Maybe. I I just never understood with the little league where the revenue was going to be coming from.

We have made about $14,000 with if we would have had Little League, we would have made about $14,000. If we had 700 kids at $20 ahead and that's for the season, correct? $14,000 and they wouldn't be paying any field use fees. It's built in. Yes. And the concessions, I know that was a part of the discussion. Was it going to be or was that still to be determined that concessions over there was theirs? Concessions here were ours.

Actually, um I've talked to Stelios who had does our he's got our contract for the concessions and he did not get back with me today, but we were discussing if we had had Little League, would he mind if um we had volunteers from the Little League to take over and he did not do concessions during that time? Gotcha. And would the revenues from the concession go to the little league or to the city or would it would have been a split? It would go to the little league fund. So it's their money to I guess spend and save and Gotcha. So our net benefit would have been $14,000 plus. If we had 700 kids at $20 ahead,

Y and a reduction of staff and a reduction of staff because um volunteers were involved for Little League. Is that would there be a reduction of city staff requirements field? No. No. Would there be a reduction of staff? Not of staff, but I guess I mean I don't know how the I guess the contract with the concession was the only other thing. So, and they would have paid for um the officials. So, that would have saved us how much effort? Gotcha. Oh, so right now the city pays for the officials. Gotcha. Okay. Thank you.

Anyone else with questions on the fee schedule here and how we're going to do that? No questions. All right. Anyone from the public wish to speak on this item? Mr. Mats,

this is actually why um is this just for travel teams? So really kind of what we're looking at here is coming up either with the same fee schedule that we currently have to use the fields to rent or changing that um completely. So even if I wanted to go take five friends and go hit, I'd have to pay the $30 and $50 or that number. Why isn't that a thing for the pickle ball, basketball, soccer fields and stuff when people just want to play?

Sure. I mean I totally understand. I mean, we're I mean, I'm just saying where our tax monies are going because I mean, if it's just five, six of us that want to go practice some hitting some balls and then we got to So, maybe just want to make sure I understand the question.

If it's a sanctioned like it's my team, then yes, you should have a permit for the field, right? If it's just some kids out there goofing around, cool, right? We want the kids to use the field. as a coach. Not only not only the kids, but the adults that are playing, you know, if during the season, yes, we get the fields, we get practice time. Once the season's over, we want to keep in shape and keep hitting and stuff and we'd have to rent the fields. And I'm I'm I'm here because everybody's been all my teammates and every every place we go, it's the same thing. They've complained about having to rent. They don't want to do it because they're, you know, kind of I get it. I mean, I don't know that I would charge for that, but then five turns into eight turns into 15 real quick. You know, if it's a couple guys out there goofing around for 30 minutes, like I used to do home 30 all the time myself, but park ranger would come over and say, "Hey, you got a ride, man. You don't have a permit."

Yeah. So, as long as we can reserve just reserve a field for an hour and if it fits in the schedule, I don't I I have no problem with that. But when it starts turning into So, we don't have a means to police this either. I don't have park rangers here. So, like I said, five turns into eight turns into whatever real quick. Does that make sense? Yes, it does. And we're just trying to maintain the fields and I want to know who's on the field. So, all these teams that would get this permit potentially, they've been background checked. They've done the concussion protocol. They have insurance, you know, certificate insurance. That's the that's what really what this process is about. Okay. Thank you. Thank you, sir.

Anyone else from the public wish to speak on this item? [Applause] Seeing none, council, do you wish to make a motion on this item? Mayor so moved uh for staff to continue uh to develop a model that focuses on the youth sports at that uh facility. uh and having that uh having that lower rate for our local youth sports and continuing to develop a model for renting out the fields for folks that are wanting to do reoccurring programming and getting that permit like our city manager mentioned as well as to having that having that fee structure for our sports tourism and our folks who are wanting to rent those fields at a higher price.

I'm going to need you to dumb that down for me, man. I didn't Well, I'm not trusting y'all to square that up. I mean, you know, I I don't want to get too much in the weeds of who's paying what for a hot dog and who's, you know, who's hiring the refs and all that. We need we need understanding is there's no recommendation. So, staff's coming with us with no recommendation, just conversation. I want to primarily focus on local youth sports having a lower rate and then as soon as that programming is over with, however the staff decides to program it, having that space outside of the local youth sports for our call it let's say sports tourism where there's big money in that business and them paying to re to to rent those fields is to to try to to try to square it up. Uh again, without any staff recommendation, just discussion I'm I'm throwing that out there as a

again recommendation if I'm following your local sports teams will go to that block method. I don't want to touch the tournament teams that that is that that's the revenue that's keeping that offset. There you go. So if that's what you're saying, that's what I'm saying. So that's what I'm saying. Are you do you understand where that's going to go and you want to talk to how the budget impact would be? pick a team for example, what they pay for that hourly field use now versus a block approach and where that would impact you. Well, if I could kind of go over I do kind of have a recommendation if you have time. That's what we're here for.

Um Fort W Beach is one of the most beautiful cities along the Gulf Coast and maintaining that reputation requires thoughtful investment, responsible planning and practical policy enforcement, especially when it comes to our recreational spaces. Currently, we manage nine multi-purpose fields and eight softball baseball fields which serve as the backbone of sports and recreation activities for thousands of youth and adult participants. These fields are not just used for softball and baseball. They're also shared across sports like soccer, lacrosse, rugby, and football. That kind of shared use requires constant upkeep, coordination, and care. We budget approximately 300,000 annually for maintenance and labor for these fields. Yet in fiscal year 2425, we brought in only 134,000 in field rental revenue, less than half of what it takes to sustain these public assets. We currently charge $30 an hour without lights and 50 with a rate that is more than fair considering the year- round upkeep, staffing, and utility costs involved. Even the idea of a bulk rate, while generous, raises the question, what defines bulk? These groups create constant wear and tear with no rest for the fields. In many cases, a bulk rate should cost more, not less, because of the additional strain on facilities. We have over 20 entities that may be considered high impact renters or the bulk users. the Sunday soccer group, Chieas has about three or four age groups, Rip City surf soccer, Buccaneers, the Rad FC, Rugby, um Eric's volleyball group, the Peelers Baseball, Roses Soccer, Modified Fast Pitch, Chakahhatchee Beach Volleyball, Oakloose Men's Baseball, I9 Sports, Next Level Elite Lacrosse, Rush Soccer, Emerald Coast Social Sports, Recess After Dark, the um Future Stars football,

and then Alex's soccer camp. And there's a lot more. Each of these groups contributes to the vibrancy of our city, but also contributes to the ongoing wear of our fields. Even with responsible scheduling, field rest is a critical part of maintaining turf health and safety. And a note on the 501c3 organizations if they were to have free use. Many of our sports partners are registered nonprofits and their missions are admirable. However, being a 501c3 should not automatically equate to free field use. These organizations often charge their participants fees, hold triyouts, and generate revenue through sponsorships and tournaments. Asking the city to provide space at no cost creates a double burden. The city subsidizes both the organization and the maintenance while losing income needed to keep the field safe and open. What happens when schools can't accommodate their own growing sports programs such as Liza and also um Chalk Hall? Um they use our volleyball courts. Will the city be expected to provide free fields for school pickle ball, soccer, football? Um we're already seeing signs of this overlapping needs. If we offer free space to one, we set a precedent we may not be able to sustain and the word will get out quickly. We must be mindful and strategic about what is voted on. A small change in policy today could have long-term consequences that overwhelm our limited resources, frustrate residents, and undermine our ability to maintain these facilities for everyone. In summary, field rental fees are essential to keep our recreational spaces clean, safe, and beautiful. Bulk users create greater impact on fields and should not automatically receive discounts. Free use for all 501c3s is unsustainable and sets a dangerous

precedent. We need to explore partnership with schools, the county, and neighboring towns instead of placing the entire burden onto Long Beach. With 21,000 residents and growing demand, we cannot afford to devalue our public spaces. We are for the people, but we are also charged with protecting the resources that serve them. Let's continue to manage our fields with integrity, fairness, and sustainability in mind. That's a great recommendation. I I'm being serious. That's very clear. And that model, whether it's Liza Jackson or the Banana Pillars or all the other entities you just mentioned,

that's a prime piece of real estate that the taxpayers paid millions of dollars for. And what I'm hearing you say in the research I've done is each one of those entities are willing to pay. Yes. Prime demand.

Correct. So to dumb it down or excuse me to square it up. Um that that's the recommendation where I was going with with the the the cheaper rate for local youth sports is if we were going to have a model whether it's little league or you know there's different associations that that provide you know services like flag football or if we were to because ultimately what I heard Sean and you mention a little while ago this would help relieve y'all's bandwidth and instead of doing coaches meetings and finding sponsors and fixing equipment and things like that. These other associations could do that bandwidth and we don't have our FTE and time and effort focusing on finding hot dogs for the concession stand and who's going to get the equipment and all all those things. So that in the agenda packet goes a long way. But with that not being in there, thank you for that recommendation. Just to be clear, if I can somehow I know my motions are pretty long. That was a very long staff recommendation, but I'd like to say amend my motion to support staff's recommendation.

I have a motion by Councilman Schmidt. Is it second? Second. All right. Motion made by Councilman Schmidt and seconded by Councilman Jeter to move forward with Miss Rig's recommendation. Any additional comments, Mr. Jeter? Council member Schmidt said it best. That was very well said, very well spoken. and just hearing your passion and your voice knowing what you've done for this city and parks and reccks over the years. Thank you. I know that you care and I know that everybody in this room will have an opinion on to what's right and how we should do it, but continuing to to try to learn and get better. I 100% agree with you. Free is dangerous. So, thank you. Thank you. Very well said.

Anyone else wish to comment on this? Councilman Merrill,

I do agree as well, but I do remember in my short time up here so far, some of the things that we went after to help some of these. Um, I know you kind of spoke against bulking, even charging the people that use it more often more. I would still not want to lose as we pursue this in the discussion, wouldn't want to lose the desire to, and I agree. I agree you you said it well. Maybe not free. um and if there was something a program definitely a more rigorous um application program or something like that in a more rare instance but I would still want to make sure that first and foremost we're putting it out there as a an amenity as a service and some of those places that are looking for a little bit of help that we can still find a way in this fee schedule to help them. So I just do I'll agree but I want to keep that in mind for sure.

Thank you sir. Anyone else wish to comment on this motion? Mr. Mayor. Yes, sir.

Yeah. And I understand Mr. Loveitz is here and we had the gentleman speak about a men's league coming and using the fields, but you know, I I don't know the model of the Wildcats, but I know they're charging $5 at the gate. I heard from Mr. Levitz this Saturday, and I don't think the Bucks do. So, you know, whether it's we've we've worked hard on trying to find different organizations spaces for as cheap as possible, but we got to rely on those organizations to come up with the money to to pay rent and to do those things. And and different associations have different models. Uh so, I'm I'm very optimistic about this. And um you know, I know right now we're talking about Preston Hood Sports Complex, but as Park and Rex continues to whiteboard and collaborate, I I I support what the gentleman said on capturing revenue on how we're going to maintain pickle ball courts and other things that we have a lot of beautiful pickle ball courts and maintaining those is going to be very expensive. So, however we can whiteboard and do that, I know that's a separate topic, but as y'all are continuing to whiteboard and collaborate while the lights on, just wanted to want to share that too. Thank you, sir. Anyone else comments on the motion? Seeing none, please vote. [Applause] And the motion passes unanimously, which brings us on to item 13.3, photo speed enforcement for the school year report. Chief Page.

Good evening, Mayor. I'll keep this area brief. As you know, in May of 2023, a law was passed and signed by the government for enforcement in school zones. In September of 24, we passed an ordinance. In November of 24, we entered into a contract with Red Speed. And in January of 25, we had discussion in front of the council about hours of enforcement. Since then, we've issued several public service aid messages. Red speed have put a video out. We've also put out our own video about photo enforcement and I'm required just to read out some quick stats on the performance of our program and as you know by the law we also have to open this up for public comment when I finish. So comparison from prior to entering into photo enforcement there was a speed study done in October of 24 by red speed. When you compare that number through the end of the summer school program because this is for the school year of last year which was regular school and summer school. We started our warnings in April. We went live in May and then we had a month in summer school. So with two months of live enforcement, we saw a 95% reduction in speed around our schools. 88% of people that received a violation only received one violation. They were not issued a second violation. I know many times you may hear of the oddity where somebody does get two or three, but it shows that driving behavior has changed with only 88% of people receiving one citation. And 51% of the people had a zip code outside the city of Fort Walton Beach because that is sometimes a question that is asked is who is doing the speeding through the school zones? We have 10 school zones which have photo enforcement. And to break down the numbers a little bit more, during the warning period, which we were required to do 30 days, but we went a little bit further. We went from April 1st through

May 7th, there were 5,487 violations detected and we issued 5,321 warnings. Then for the period of May 8th through the end of the school year, we issu there were 3,292 violations and we issued 1,580 violations. There were two hearings from that period that actually gone through the special magistrate and we were victorious in both of those hearings. So, the violations have been held up by the special magistrate. We've had 1,070 citations paid for the regular school year and 171 citations paid during the summer school. During summer school from June 5th to July 1st, there were 327 violations detected and we issued 301 violations. For funding, the program collected $130,300. As you know, the fine is a $100 fine. It is split up between the state of Florida receives $40 for every violation. The state keeps 20 of that for general revenue. 12 goes to the school board for improvements. Three goes to the state's criminal justice training and standards commission for training and $5 is maintained by our local school crossing guard program. From our share, we get the $60 share. $21 goes back to Redspeed. We keep $39. That amounts to $26,000. $60 going back to the state of Florida for general revenue. $15,636 [Music] went back to the school board. $3,99 went to the criminal justice standards and training commission for the state. Red Speed or actually our school crossing guard program got $6,515. Red Speed got $27,363 into the city of Fort Wal for public safety improvements. Came back $50,817.

We plan to make the first project, the enhancement of the St. Mary school zone right here. There's been a request to enhance both Robinwood and Coral. So, we're looking to possibly do both. It should come out to about $9 to $10,000. That project will be done in the new fiscal year and we hope to get it done prior to the start of the new calendar year. And with that, mayor, I'll open up for any questions from the council.

Thank you for the full report, Chief. Anyone with questions for Chief Be Council Schmid? So, just to confirm, the the revenue that's coming in off of changing driving behaviors is going right back into signage and branding the school zones so that drivers can hopefully be safer as they go through the school zone. Is that correct? Rough roughly $50,000 is going right back into the beacons. You said correct. So, the first project would be about $9,000 project and then we can look for other projects of similar nature. Awesome. and they're going to stay pretty restricted with that type of scope of going back into the

that's a program or a choice made by city council the city manager the only requirement is that it's some type of safety program that is done so a general public safety would qualify any public safety projects only thing I'd like to add to that is is this in the form of a question is using some of that funding I know we didn't make the cut this past year but better branding over there off love joy the the academy that's inside the city of Fort Walton Beach and that school zone. I know there's probably different logistics that Danny or other public safety can speak on on why they didn't get a school zone camera, but if we can at least put money back into branding and having some beacons and things like that so we could look to do something over there. The reason it didn't get a camera is it does not have official school zone and it did not meet at the time some of the matrix for a school zone because there is not commuter traffic that goes to that school. When I mean commuter traffic, I mean walking pedestrian traffic. Most of the people that go to the academy either dropped off by bus or dropped off by parent. And it's something that we could look at in the future with public works to do a study out there that if we can justify a school zone out there, then we could justify a photo enforcement camera. And I don't know the standards like you do, but I mean whether it's someone walking to school or just someone driving through that school zone, just them having the behavior of knowing that this is a school zone and hopefully that driver slows down. Whether there's someone walking to school or they're they're driving to school or people are commuting down Martin Luther King and Lovejoy and going different directions. I'm just concerned it's very vulnerable right now in that zone. I don't know what the standard is that we got to do to make it a school zone. I know it was a school 70 80 years ago with the school district. I don't know what fell off on why it's not a school, you know, zone. I know y'all know way more than I do on why it did fall off, but I have confidence that we can figure out how to tie that back together and make it a school zone because it used to be a school and it's still a school. So, again, I don't know the state standards, but I think we can figure out how to make it a school zone.

That's all I got. Thank you, sir. Anyone else? Mr. Junior, a lot of data. Thank you. You may have covered it in there, but uh even the crossing guard program, I see $6,515 in there. Is there any plan for that?

So, we're looking into plans for that. We're trying to look for best practices across the state of Florida to determine one of the things we'd like to do to see if there's some type of retention benefit we can pay to our school crossing guards, but we're still trying to figure out how that the mechanism actually behind that. Other programs are using it for equipment enhancement. So, we're looking, our school crossing guards are fairly good with their equipment, but we may look for some equipment purchases in the short term while we learn while we research the retention type benefits. Got it. I know that I'll speak for Elliot Point. This isn't a question. Don't make a comment. That's okay.

Joan Elliot Point crossing guard for 10 years. He is awesome. He is so awesome. It truly is. That's why I would like to see where that money goes. He's the first person you see before you get to the school. who's a retired sheriff that's been there 10 years. On Labor Day, kindergarters dress up for what they want to be. My kindergartenner dress up dressed up as Mr. Welch, the crossing guard. I a great comment. They're He's awesome. And I know there's plenty of awesome crossing guards in the community. So, I just see that money there and want to make sure it goes to something that they all maybe have a say in what it should be done with. Well, and like said, we're looking for best practices and those funds are restricted to only the school crossing guard program. Got it. Perfect. Thank you, sir. Anyone else with questions? Go ahead, M. Riley. Go ahead, M.

I I have just one question. So, on the crossing cards, do they have um is it just adults or are there the children that No, the school talking about our actual adults that assist with the school crossing guard. schools do have a school safety patrol that may also help at the school itself, but it's adults that are actually crossing the the main street. I was ask my son used to be one of these. Yes. Mr. Barry.

Yes. Uh I have a question about uh Charter Academy uh on Col's New Heights area and Liza Jackson. Those are both charter schools, correct? Correct. Is that why they're not considered a school zone?

No, there are Liza Jackson does have a photo enforcement program there because there's a school zone at Liza Jackson. The requirement is that you have to have an established school zone first and then you get a photo program second. For some reason, I don't know what the reason is. I mean, maybe me and Daniel Payne can research or try to figure it out. When the academy changed from a public school to a charter school, that school zone went away. So there was no longer an existing school zone on Love Joy and that's the only thing that prevents it from having photo enforcement. Say that because at one time a ch it was the school zone. Yes, it was.

And say that one more time. At some point when it went from a Oaklooa County public school to being a charter school that school zone was removed and we'd have to research I don't know how long that charter school has been there but we'd have to research back in time to figure out why the school zone was removed. Yeah. I I I would I would like that researched, please, because I know at one time uh it was a school zone and I'd like that brought back. So, could we could we resource that?

Oh, Daniel said it was vacant for a period of time. So, that may have been when it was vacant, the school zone was when the charter school came back, the charter school may never applied for a school zone there. Oh, so then we would need to reapply. Is that what you're saying? the school would need to reply. Yeah, conceptually that's what I'm hearing, but I'm also hearing we don't know what happened. So, I don't know if it's the school's responsibility to apply for it or if it's the I don't know who's responsible for it, but I know we got kids walking down Love Joy Road to get to the school. Is it a charter school? Is it a private school? Is it a public school? I don't I mean, yeah, it's a charter school, but we got to figure out how to get that school.

Yeah, I I would like to to Who do I see or who do I talk to? I I'll I'll research the issue and get with Chief Beige and Daniel and and we'll probably the next meeting have an answer for you. Yeah, I I would like that to be reszoned as a school zone, please.

All right. Anyone else with questions for Chief Page on this? Seeing none, would anyone from the public like to speak on this item? Seeing none, council, do you have a motion? Mayor so moved the acceptance of this annual report for the school zone photo enforcement for the 2024 2025 school year. Second motion made by Councilman Schmidt, seconded by Councilman Junior to accept this year's um photo speed enforcement annual report for the 2024/2025 school year. Any additional comments?

Yes, sir. I know it may not be politically popular because I know we've gotten a lot of licks on this one, but I fully support this program and fully support the data that we're seeing as far as behavior and speeding speeding changing just like any other program, whether it's the cleanest city in the Emerald Coast or anything else. I know and confident staff is doing tweaks to develop it, make it better. You know, for an example, how government vehicles are held accountable and those kind of things to to make sure to apply that accountability fair and equitable. but fully supportive of this program and thank you Chief Beige for introducing this and thank you for looking out for the safety and wellbeing of our community.

Thank you sir. Anyone else with a comment on the annual report? Seeing none, council please vote. [Applause] And the motion does pass unanimously, which moves us to item 13.4, a request to legislative delegation for a local bill. Chief Paige, I guess. Yes. Me and Jeff Burns will probably tag team this one. So, would you like me to start here? I would love you to start.

Well, thank you. So about a year ago, we were contacted by Florida Highway Patrol about a traffic crash at Denton and Racetrack. Denton and Racetrack is one of those places that is right on the edge of the city. And from researching the issue, we used to have an old mutual aid agreement with the Florida Highway Patrol, the sheriff's office. At some point, it never got renewed. And depending on which map you look at, some maps have it within the city, some maps have it with outside the city. and it's caused confusion over time. By researching the issue, we've seen that when we voluntarily annex an area and a good example of this is on Marester Cutoff, you have the Academy Sporting Good Store on the east side of the road. That was the original boundary for the city of Port Wall Beach. At some point through the 60s and 70s and possibly even into the 80s, we've annexed well west of Mary Esester cut off all the way to Herbert Field, the Air Force Base. Even though we have traffic jurisdiction, these are court cases that say if a city has both sides of the state road, they have traffic jurisdiction over the state road to write a traffic crash, speeding enforcement. But some questions arise since it's not technically in the city because you cannot voluntarily annex in a state road. Could we have ordinance enforcement in there? So, our dangerous intersection that has been instrumental in getting pan handlers off the street, if a serious criminal matter was to arise on the street, could that cause a jurisdictional issue? And to make this very clear so every single map, every single person that responds out there knows that that is within the boundary of the city of Fort Wal Beach. We are proposing a local bill which has been done in other places to adjust the boundaries of the city limit since there are no voters that are being taken in. It doesn't have to go out to referendum

and we simply want to clean up some of the areas such as Marester Cutoff. So the recommendation would be to go from I believe it's 405 Marester cutoff which used to be the shrimp basket which is now the Mexican restaurant which is the most southern point of Fort Walton all the way up to be Parkway. We have the median up there that we currently maintain but it has a walking track down the middle of it because it is just outside the city even though the old wings and rings was inside the city. The same thing is true on racetrack like I spoke about on Lewis Turner. The roadway right in front of the golf course technically is not within the city because we cannot annex in a state road. But we have both sides with the golf course in the courthouse. Further down by Liza Jackson, that roadway is not in the city. Even though if you pulled outside the Liza Jackson parking lot, you would probably call us to handle an issue that happened there. The same thing holds true as you come over the sinko bridge by the arbies and across the street where highway is right there. Both of those places were voluntarily annexed in at some point in time but the state roadway technically cannot be voluntarily annexed in. So that is the main issue that we were looking at is to clean up the roadways. And since we may only have one bite at the apple, I've also talked with Mr. Burns about possibly the waterways. is currently the jurisdiction of the waterways. If you were here previously, Hayward Dyes would talk about the half mile, the half mile, the half mile. The half mile is an arbitrary point in the bay. We'd like to go out to an actual channel marker that is 65 miles off the coast. So, it's just slightly further off the coast, but it is a definitive line. So, if there's ever any issues out there, we would know exactly where the city of Fort Wall Beach stopped. And the same thing in the sound. Currently, in the sound, it is to the middle of the sound, which is kind of arbitrary. We'd like it to be to the inter coastal waterway between two defined channel markers. So we believe both these recommendations truly clean

up the boundaries for the city of Fort Wal Beach and will allow for more effective and efficient work by city staff when it comes to different issues. Mr. B, you have anything to add?

I do and I'll approach it just from a different kind of angle. Uh so uh one problem that arises is if someone gets in a wreck or a crimes committed on any one of these little enclaves as we'll call them. You'll have the sheriff's office, the PD, and the highway patrol will all call. You'll also have some crossover on which police or fire department to maybe possibly respond. The bigger issue though is with law enforcement. Uh if if this bill were to pass, it would clean up a cost perspective for all taxpayers and uh and kind of add to that sheriff Aiden does support this idea actually because we have floated the idea through Chief Beige to him before. He would love to enter into aou or interal agreement to clean this up and allow Fort Wall and cover these areas, but uh you know there's bureaucracy with our insurance companies and stuff there. So we don't necessarily like that idea of you doing it. we we'd rather have three folks respond to this. Uh, also there is a criminal aspect to it because technically if a non-tra crime occurred, which actually one did occur up on I think close to South Avenue few years ago, there was actually a shootout of some kind or shooting. Um, a a well-vered criminal defense attorney could come in and say, "Okay, well, if if it was supposed to be the Fort Beach Police Department, why aren't they the ones actually responding to that and arrested my client? they they did not have jurisdiction to actually enter that uh that that area. Uh it might be a technicality they could get out get off on. So there's a lot of public policy and taxpayer reasons in addition to the other items that Chief Pageige proposed. Uh our request though would be we come back at the next meeting with our proposed legislation because we need to get that in front of uh the legislative delegation uh on or before October 30th when they have their big meeting in Dustin. Uh probably a little bit well before that. I know Chief Beige has had some informal discussions at various meetings with Judge Manny. Judge Manny is fully in support. He said he he would slot some bill slots for local bills to

to achieve this. And uh I think if Judge Manny is supporting the other legislative delegation would as well. And so uh we if y'all do give us the go ahead tonight at the next meeting, you'll get the proposed legislation so you see what it looks like before it gets forwarded over to Judge May. Thank you, sir. Um just real quick before we get into it with questions. So you guys would obviously bring it back to the council for their decision on the full recommendation once it's there and then at that point would you also have you know for instance you brought up uh Sheriff Aiden perhaps that would be included in a presentation. Well so so Sheriff Aiden is given some I think

we can I talked to him again about it today. He asked for the same thing to see the draft before he could truly commit to it. But conceptually, he had no issues with it. But it's something once we had something pen to paper because it's harder to give a definitive yes when it's a concept before you actually have a draft written and that we present it to whoever would want to see it and try to get it endorsed by as many parties as possible. It would probably be DOA if Eric Caiten showed up at the October 30th meeting. I support this local bill for walks around the meeting. Totally understandable. Questions for Chief Beige or Mr. Burns? Yes.

Yeah. To better understand the workflow. So, what I'm here to say is we got to get a a concept into some form of a contractual product for the sheriff's office.

No. So, there's two routes that we could take. One route we could take would be a mutual aid agreement, a contractual form that would only be good like the old one was that expired and would always have to be constantly renewed. And there is some issues that the that Mr. Burns brought up with it. The other one is to make it permanently done by adjusting the city boundaries and then you would never have to take action on it again. It would be said and done and over with. I guess where I'm going with that is is but this is titled as a request to legislative delegation for a local bill and I'm trying to better understand the workflow of we just mentioned Sheriff Aiden is would like to see a

document that call it a contract call it proposed legislation yeah where the sheriff needs to see it he would need to see it technically doesn't need to see it but the city attorney said

it would put us in a very bad spot if we went to the local delegation meeting and I got up at the podium and presented in favor and then right behind me the sheriff of Rosa County got up there and spoke against it. The same dynamic played out with the local bill. The last local bill we were part of was the Ocean City right fire assessment. So the the state law everywhere else except for in Okaloosa County is four years of payment of advalorum taxes to the special district. They got a local bill passed. Same process we're doing right now. Their fire board said, "Hey, yes, presented at the local delegation. Local delegation votes for it. It goes to Tallahassee. It goes in front of committees. Eventually gets a floor vote in the House and Senate. Gets signed by the governor."

That's the workflow of a local 10 years. That's a That's the workflow of a local bill. What I'm trying to better understand is I thought I heard Sheriff Abe would like to see some kind of agreement so he could endorse it for us. So that he can endorse it for us. I'd like to Okay. be able to see set agreement to be able to endorse too because where I'm going with this is the workflow of we got a couple big requests coming up to our state delegation and not only do I want to support cleaning this up and and doing the things that we need to do for all the reasons both of y'all mentioned I also try to figure out the way that we're presenting this is it at the local delegation meeting October and Destin is it you know those kind of things because

you know uh to better execute what we're requesting for and asking for from the the state appropriations coming up next legislative session. We got around the mound, we got SB 180, and we got this. I'm trying to better understand what presentation or how we're doing it so that we don't muddy the waters on all right for Walton Beach. You're asking for a lot of things, three things. What are the priorities? All of them are priorities, right? But I'm going to continue to advocate for around the mound and how detrimental SP 180 is to the city of Falton Beach. And of course, we can create a very good subjective argument on why this is critical and those kind of things too. I'm just concerned on how it's presented or what format of the workflow is presented so that our four members of our state delegation is not leaving confused on all right, what are the ask and how many assets for Walt have. So, so a local bill like this, first off, Judge Manny has unlimited slots for these, unlike the other bills that they have to find co-sponsors for. Uh, so he has unlimited slots. These type of bills are really for more like this house cleaning type of stuff. This will be a Z cost. So, once presented, it won't cost the the state anything that once they pass it. Uh, and so I don't think it would interfere with any appropriations ask, which is definitely going to be the central message that y'all are trying to send. I think uh from what I've heard, Judge Manny supports this pretty heavily and I not had the personal discussions with him, but I think if Judge Manny says it's a local bill I'm supporting, our entire delegation will just support it uh because they know it's something cleaning up like a little uh enclave that's very personal to Fort Walton and it's not an appropriations thing. This is my gut on kind of how it's

similar to SP 180. It won't be any type of financial ask. It's more of a policy and

was actually annexing and technically so technically the roadways just so y'all realize that exist like if you go north on Cinco Bay you for the first about several hundred yards the actual road itself is not for Walton it's it was you can't annex in an state road so even though they voluntarily annexed in the properties years and years ago on either side those roads this is where like the confusion starts to get created like uh there's like Fort Walton has some traffic jurisdiction but they aren't actually in the city limits those roads And so really what this bill will do is just put those roads and those little enclaves in the city of Fort Walton. So then there's no confusion amongst all the agencies on who to respond.

That's it. And we were recently in a meeting with one of the four members of the state delegation and this seed was planted

on on you know this uh local bill request to try to clean up the stuff that you just presented. So I'm fully supportive of cleaning it up. I just want to make sure our presentation of what we're requesting in that state delegation meeting in front of the public and in front of the community uh to gain the momentum that we need on those other ask and those other requests. So um yeah, fully supportive of cleaning it up. Met with three of the four local state delegation on this and one of them recently on this local bill to advocate for it to clean it up. Just want to make sure as we get closer to that October I think it is in Dest October 30th

30th in Dest as as whoever from our team is presenting to the delegation what our requests are whether it's around the mound or whether it's SP 180 and also this it's a it's a clean presentation and the or was it the other path of okay we're not going in front of the community and trying to make all this make sense but we're going to go the other tactful route of meeting with the two representatives and the two senators and our board here tonight to effectively accomplish the mission. So, my only concerns are if we wait and and and present it into the community in that October public meeting along with the other ones, it it probably sometimes does what happens with me up here when I talk too much. It just muddies the water, you know, and that was a great presentation that we got a lot of questions on and Sheriff Aiden does, you know, those kind of things. I I just want to be razor sharp with our SP80 and our around the mound. That's it.

Councilman Walker. Yeah. Thank you, Chief Bash. So, um, you know, hearing the annexing, I know what that does. It takes the city limits across the street and that affords other annexation over there, too. But just out of curiosity, why wouldn't why wouldn't we be in favor of the county being the one remove ourselves? And for clarity purposes, you know, because it's about confusion. I'm not sure if it's you or me. And if we're going to annex it, let's annex it to the county. let them be the one responsible for it because you know the county taxpayers um we all pay for that but none of the county taxpayers pay us for your services. So I would like to see those roads where there's any confusion or enclaves be the the right and responsibility of the county because the county doesn't write traffic crash reports. So if you're involved in a crash in the unincorporated areas, you have to wait for FHP to come and FHP response time can be sometimes measured in hours and not in minutes as our crash response time would be. And then you clog up the roads that are in front of Arby's. So now you can't get to Arby's because there's a traffic crash in the road. It has direct impact into the well-being of the city of Fort Walm Beach. And I would think that anybody that pulls out of a property that is within the city limits, especially when we have both sides of the roadway, if you were to pull out of Academy Sporting Goods and something was to happen to your car, you would expect the police department that is of academy sporting goods to respond out there. You would not want to outsource it to a third party agency.

So, and I was in my head looking at your description of where that is on Mary. So going south was what 405 or somewhere where you said the you know it's it stops there. So south of that is your is I'm sorry. So the entire Mary cutoff will be by two police departments only. Yes. It'll be Mary South and then Fort Walton Beach. Correct. Mary Eester had a police department. Yes. It be two separate jurisdictions. It be the jurisdiction of Mary Esther and the jurisdiction of Fort Walton Beach. That's interesting you said that. So Mari Eester doesn't have a I mean they outsource to the sheriff's department. Does the sheriff's department go to um service those calls on the south end of Mary?

They have to if they're contractual city they have in destin and Mary they have to write traffic cross reports. If you're in an unincorporated area traffic cross reports are written by the highway patrol. Gotcha. Okay. Thank you. Anyone else questions for Chief Page on this? I have one more question. Oh Chief Page in the U the particular area of the of the academy. So what I'm hearing you say and correct me if I'm you know if I'm wrong is that the city of Fort Walton Beach actually on both sides that is the city of Fort Walton Beach correct correct and the uninccorporated area that's going to be the state there is an unincorporated area right there so everything everything there is for what

so the roadway we're not talking about ownership of the roadway maintenance of the roadway engineering of the roadway we're talking just about jurisdiction over the roadway. Just the same way like Publix's parking lot. If you had a crash in the public's parking lot, it's private property. Publix maintains the parking lot, but we would come out there and handle the traffic crash. The same thing on the roadway in between the Academy of Sporting Good and I believe across the street, it was the Friday's restroom. So, when you're sitting there at the light for Fridays, if you had a traffic crash right there now, we would go out and handle that because of traffic jurisdiction. We have both sides of the thing. So, it defaults to us. Where me and Mr. Burns are talking about is that it could get very complicated if it's something other than traffic. If it's an ordinance violation or if it's a sim serious criminal violation, if you found kilos of cocaine out there, there's a shooting out there in the roadway. There could be arguments made on both directions. And it's not something that you want to roll the dice on when you go to court to say, well, four wall should have handled it because they have both sides of the road. or on the flip side, Fort Wall should not have handled it because the roadway was never annexed into the state of Florida. To clear up any of that confusion ahead of time, we simply just want to adjust the boundaries of the city to include that roadway that every single person probably believes is in the city of Fort Wal Beach already. And and the state roads, just to pick up on this, the state roads always are like we we're not responsible for repairing those. The city does not assume that responsibility that even though those would become uh within the city jurisdiction at that point in time and would be part of the city at that point in time, for example, the road right north the cino bridge that would now be in for Walton actual road itself. It's not like it becomes a city road that the city's responsible for repaving. It's still a state road like the rest of Oakland Parkway that gets paved by the state.

Okay. something that's passionate in your email with that with the body of water what you're saying in that particular area if you need to extend out a little bit just so we have definitive markers so the email that you saw just so we have definitive markers because currently goes a half a mile out half a mile in the water is a little bit difficult to judge if you know and I forget if it is the number three or the number five marker out there it would just go out to that marker so you have a definitive line in the water to know whether you're within the city limits or you're not in the city limits Got it. Thank you. Anyone else questions for Chief Bish? See none. Anyone from the public wish to speak on this?

Council, do you wish to take any action? Mayor, so moved of taking the action of submitting this request to a legislative delegation to clean up all of the things that were just presented, but doing it in a way outside of the the U delegation meeting in October. I think you

I don't know if that can actually be done that way. Every local bill I've seen has always come in front of the delegation meetings. The delegation actually votes at it at the local meeting. So the last one with the fire assessment fee. It was actually voted right there. I spoke against the fire assessment and it was voted right then by the local delegation. So I mean we could look at it procedurally between me and the city attorney, but all the local bills I've ever seen are always voted at the local delegation meeting. And again, the intention of this is is we had a lot of good questions from Miss Riley a little while ago. A lot of good questions, I think, from maybe Sheriff Hayden. I if we got a lot of questions, I can only imagine what the community is going to think when we go and present this. And it's like, what is for Walton asking for? But either way, I mean, I'm going to support it. I would just like for it to go in a different tactful way than than uh than than the route of doing it in front of the uh community. If there is a way that we can do it, submit the request formally with the delegation so that they can still have the opportunity to vote on it through proxy or excuse me through email or through uh whatever it is, great. Not not to not to disclo not to keep from anything being disclosed. It's just going to be like we had tonight a lot of good questions from our board and the elected officials that represent all these people. It's probably going to be confusing for the listener as well that's in the audience that night.

I guess that's one clarification question uh on your motion. So if uh if if it's not required that we have actually have to speak at the public meeting but we have to submit it cuz I think Judge Manny said we need to get submitted to him plenty before that meeting if it's required that it has to be submitted to him before the meeting because he's going to discuss it is that okay your motion but if we can do it without actually anyone from the city speaking and advocating for it is that what you're saying right because of of the intention of us being razor sharp focused on the request with around amount. Okay. You know, in those bigger priorities that I that I also support and understand why we need to clean this up. I'm just trying to tactfully go through this.

So, just I need clarification on what the motion is. The motion is to see if we can submit this before plenty of time so that the state delegation can review this and if they can if they can accept this request and vote on it without us presenting it. If they can't, then let's present it and do it. There's my motion. Second. I understand that. A lot of seconds. Motion made by Councilman Schmidt, which he thoroughly explained. Second by Councilwoman Riley. Anyone else wish to speak further on this item? I just have a question for Mr. Burns. Go ahead. Yeah.

So, you already stated that it's going to be Judge Manny is going to present it, right? He's going to want us, he probably in perfect world would want us there to advocate for it. But if if if he can present it without us doing that, uh we will follow the motion that y'all are making right now. And if we can't submit it without presenting it, then we need to present it. Motion. Yeah. Council Jer, he just clarified it. So the motion does also include moving this forward in either direction it is required to be moved forward. Yeah. Yes. Great question. But primarily if we can do it without presenting because of the other legislative requests that hopefully we are presenting that night including around the mountain. Copy.

Anyone else wish to speak on this side? Council please. I know it. I know it.

And it does pass unanimously. Great motion. That moves us to city manager reports. Mr. Davis. very quickly. Uh the pause contract is done. Mr. Burns has approved it, so I'll have it ready for next council meeting. The fans of the golf course should be done. Uh we had a small battle over there over the weekend, and I've never seen it in my life, but you have to put all the fan blades on for that to start to work. So, it's been the cure. Uh the next cleanup will be at uh the Rotary Club is going to work with us, and we're going to do the part across the street. probably have to move the graffiti day because there's too many conflicting events downtown. But graffiti day will be moved and then we'll do a garers how we say that garner beach. And that's all I have. Gotcha. Before we move on, I just want to um I know you just briefly referenced it there, but I just want to recognize you, Mr. Davis, and and Mr. Hill, who Oh, there he is. I was like, I know you're in here somewhere. who spent six hours out there at the golf course installing ceiling fans. And while it wasn't successful, and while I did receive a text from uh a nonprofit owner who was holding a golf tournament out there asking why there's only one working ceiling fan, I want to recognize just the fact that that is the kind of stuff that always impresses me as a small business owner. You don't get a job title as a small business owner. Councilman Jeter knows, uh, Councilman Walker knows, many others, Councilman Merrill knows, people that have owned small businesses or or been that person. You don't get to just say like, "Oh, well, that's not my job, so I'm not going to do it." And sometimes you go above and beyond and spend 6 hours out there trying to put ceiling fans in. So, just massive uh respect to both of you for spending your very long uh after hours work out there trying to to remedy

that problem and and save the city money, time, and and everything else. So, nice work, fellas. Thank you. I'm glad they finally worked out. It's even better. Um final council or I'm sorry, city attorney reports. Uh if y'all have any questions, I can answer them, but uh nothing further. All right. Final council comments, Mr. Barry. Um, good. All right. Thank you, ma'am. Um, Councilman Jac. Yes, sir. Councilman Merrell, I'm good. Councilwoman Ry,

I just want to expound one incredible. Thank you so much. And I've always since I've met you. I told you I think you're a jack of all trade. You always said that. And so I did. I read the email too. So, I'm very proud of the works that Mr. Hill did. Thank you so much. You're doing a wonderful job.

Thank you, ma'am. Councilman Schmid, let's keep echoing praises. And I got something else to say too. But yeah, there's no job too small or too big in this short three or four months. And it's been neat seeing how you operate, seeing how you lead by example. Uh that servant leadership where you don't ask anybody else to do anything that you ain't going to do yourself. We hear that a lot around different coffee pots and leadership, but thank you for leading by an example. Also want to encourage everyone to come out to the Brooks School Historical Marker this Sunday afternoon at 2:30 or 3, I believe it is. But either way, get there 2:30 early just in case if it is 3. Um, very historic day for the Brook School historical marker. Uh, they've made a lot of strides with that uh, church and with that community as well as with the city and and we should be very proud of that. That's all I have, Mr. Mayor.

Thank you, sir. Um, Councilman Walter. Yes, enjoyed working with you, Jace, Mr. Davis. It's been a pleasure. Um, I keep you busy, I know, and I know the others do as well. Uh just wanted to double check and I may have missed it on the charter review final report coming up on September 30. Do we already have a copy of that in our email? Okay, great. Thanks. I'll look for that. And then lastly, um I've got a couple verified. I'm not sure if Miss Cop sent that out or not. Um I think she sent it to the commission and asked them for their last comments. Let me follow up on that. Sorry. And it's basically ready to go. Um, yes. I'd love to have plenty, you know, as early as it's available.

Just kind of waiting on your final since you're going to be the one that Yeah, I'm not going to make any changes to what she has done. So, if you want to go and circulate that out. Great. Thank you. Um, and a couple of last questions. Chief Mage, it'll probably be you and Lieutenant Williams. Um, I've got some questions regarding uh the code enforcement uh process.

Yeah, sure. So, uh, it deals specifically with the 338 lake which came up recently at the, um, magistrate hearing. And so, I've I've watched it a little bit and I want and Jason, you followed up with me regarding the certified letter. So, I kept digging in a little bit and I wanted to So, was the not certified notice it was sent to the uh, Charleston, Indiana. Do you remember if that was the address it was sent to? That's my understanding.

Okay. That was that was what I got. And then I was talking with a constituent and we looked and there was a oddly a Charleston Indiana and a Charleston Ohio tax the tax appraiser had Indiana tax collector had Ohio. So that was odd. I said, "Well, that could be coincidence." So that caused me to look a little bit more. Um, it came back non-delivered. Is that correct? That's my understanding.

Okay. And and then do you know was there any discussion or just any knowledge on why the why why there was a $500 a day uh fine on that particular law? Most lawns I've seen go through the magist trade have not been $500 a day. Was that by code or ordinance or just it could have been a repeat violation. We should have bumped it up to $500 and I believe that asked for my time. I can research a little bit more, but typically a $500 time would be in a a second uh or repeat violation.

So, the little bit that I saw it was um the magistrate hearing was in the first part of September. We're at the So, it might have been the middle of September thereabouts. And they made it retroactive to July the 7th, I believe. Is that your recollection? Or was it later? Sometime in July? recall.

Okay. It's just I was wanted to track it there. Um I have notified Jason that I will be representing that owner as his representative. No one's been able to make contact with him. So going to be looking for my next steps to the yard's been cleaned up. Um and so that has been notified over them. So what would be my next steps? Should I be planning on coming to the next magistrate hearing or is it something internally that can be addressed on take now that it's remedied fines and penalties? I mean that may be a more of a Mr. Burns question is what I don't

for the owner. I I I do have this point. Uh so that could be a situation uh since you're voluntarily going to elect to go represent someone in front of somebody for city business like that. Sure.

Uh then you are uh not acting like a regular citizen. You're acting as a city council member going in to advocate on their behalf. That would uh that would be in violation of the ethics code. Well, so and that's I mean as I'm going about it, I've been, you know, questioning, you know, how does one represent a constituent in their best interest other than being a representative? So, I'm a city council member, but I'm also I'm also known as a representative of the constituency. So, how can I represent their best interest by not speaking on their behalf? Yeah, all agree.

Okay. Yeah. Okay. [Laughter] I guess that's the real answer, Mr. Walker. You can't you can't represent anyone unless you're a licensed attorney in that capacity that you're actually going to do that unless you're actually like an owner of the property. But I'm a representative city council member. That's especially not allowed. They the ethics commission would frown upon that.

That's right. Um Okay. Well, then um additionally uh I I forgot to get with you on the the two different addresses that were used. I reached out to the tax collector's office and spoke with their staff and and brought up the two different addresses. Is it your understanding that you've only mailed it to it's only been mailed to one address, not two? Um I not fully sure. I mean that was going to come up tonight, so I will research it some more.

Okay. very good because when I reached out to them uh they went and looked through their records. They had actually on the at staff request they reached out to the property appraiser. The property appraiser had the Ohio address somewhere in July. And then somewhere in July 28, actually July 28, the city of Fort Walton Beach reached out to the property appraisers's office and requested that they change the address to the back to an Indiana address. Do you know anything about that on how why that would have happened?

Outside of the pictures you sent me, know that was the only time I've seen. Yeah, it just seemed odd that the property appraiser was contacted by someone in the city and said, "Change the address that had formerly been Ohio. Now it's Indiana and you mailed to Indiana and it came back unreceived." So, I definitely question the, you know, has the owner been notified of these uh issues. So, that's my concern. Um, okay. Very good. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you, sir. Um, Councilman Brown, nothing. Mr. May, other than you saying Eagle earlier, that made my night.

Anything for the kids, man? Councilwoman Dear. No, I'm good. Um, oh, I'm sorry. Guess my bad. I gave you second shot. I know. I know. All right. Uh we'll adjourn here for 10 15 minutes and then start our meeting that starts at 6:00 44. Four eyes.